Still in the halloween spirit? Here’s the beginning of a monster story
The monogatari series is well known for having an ensemble cast of waifus – every female character is best girl material, and a unique visual presentation that’ll make even the most mundane of actions appear sensual. Nisemonogatari viewers may never brush their teeth the same again. The Kizumonogatari film trilogy turns the production values up a notch – perhaps the best an ecchi has ever looked aesthetically – and delivers a backstory to the main series; we learn how Araragi turned into a vampire, and when he first met Hanekawa and Kiss-Shot.
Hanekawa is a popular waifu for reasons that are immediately apparent – huge rack, bespeckled beauty, sweet natured yet very coquettish. She is one of two main attractions of this film series; the sometimes voluptuous, sometimes loli, always snarky vampire Kiss-Shot being the other.
We meet Kiss-Shot lying in a pile of blood after her limbs have been severed by a trio of vampire hunters. Quite the introduction.
Naturally, Araragi volunteers his blood to save the life of a big titty vampire he randomly met in the subway. Wouldn’t we all do the same?
Kiss-shot’s appearance reflects the state of her powers. After being weakened she now resembles the form of a ten year old child. This is relevant to us because it creates a window for guilt free loli fanservice – she’s actually five hundred years old.
This cute head pat scene is the beginning of a pact between Araragi, now a vampire, and Kiss-Shot to retrieve her stolen body parts from a group of powerful hunters. Araragi agrees to do so under the pretense that he will become human at the end…though this is seemingly contradicted by him having to resort to inhuman means to fight the three obstacles that stand in his way. This dilemma is the crux of the drama in Kizumonogatari.
Part one of Kizumonogatari is the tamest of the trilogy, clearly meant to be an introduction that will set the stage for future events. The fanservice will spike dramatically in part two, and the finale has one of the best non-nude/skinship cockteases in ecchi anime.
This film series has a great story. One of the rare ecchi with a convincing narrative that isn’t undercut by the fanservice. The scene with a near death Kiss-shot struggling on the ground is very tense, perhaps even scary depending on your threshold for violence. This is not only communicated by the obvious severed limbs and gushing blood, but a sinister OST thumping in the background and character facial expressions that convey desperation. You can totally enjoy Monogatari and it’s derivatives for the PLOT, as well as the plot.
Shinobu has gone from a busty vampress to a ten year old child in a single film, and we will see her continue to spike in age range as Araragi restores her powers. This means fanservice for a wide variety of body types, all of which are attractive in their own special way.
You may notice that the webms and screens are without Monogatari’s signature black bars. Those were removed to make the scenes feel more immersive, but is an extra step that can make creating media for this show more time consuming than typical. There’s also the issue with constantly shifting backgrounds, variable lighting, not showing the entirety of a character model that may cause issues with media. But I’d say Kizumonogatari is worth any potential headaches. Looking forward to finishing this one out.
