10 Second Anime - Owarimonogatari S2 - Episode 3

Araragi catches up with Yotsugi and then goes on a date with Senjougahara.

Episode 3 - "Hitagi Rendezvous - Part 1"

Hmm.

This was a quintessential Monogatari Series talking episode. The plot in three scenes - 1) Senjougahara asks Araragi to go on a date; 2) Araragi talks with Yotsugi in his room before Tsukihi barges in to take her doll back; and 3) Senjougahara drives Araragi to the planetarium in her rental car.

In between those simple events, there was the usual rapid fire dialog where the last few dramatic events are recapped and explained, questions and answers about the immediate aftermath, jokes about Araragi loving too many women, and hints and foreshadowing of upcoming dramatic events. SHAFT did their usual visual treatment as well, so you got your fill of head tilts, camera shutter sounding eye blinks, and visual gags starring the cute girls.

What was confirmed - Araragi is human again and can use mirrors again. Kiss-shot is indeed back to full power and no longer lives in Araragi's shadow slowly feeding off him.

Two dramatic deadlines have been established too. One may be just a red herring or to add a bit of tension Araragi's and Senjougahara's date if something develops, which is getting back in time for her to spend the evening with her father. The other is definitely making sure Araragi makes it to his graduation ceremony. The school is Ougi's territory, so something is bound to happen from a narrative perspective.

Otherwise, it was just fun to see Araragi and Senjougahara riff off each other again. It has been a long time.

Heh.

Oh hoh. Koyomin has to give the ladies a little fan service for sticking with the story so far.

Some philosophical foreshadowing - Araragi wonders if he can love himself like he loves Senjougahara, because if he can't, he's as good as dead as a human. I suppose humanity is the theme for the new recovered ex-vampire.

Araragi made it to his college entrance exam, apparently, so now Senjougahara wants a date. A date full of 6 months worth of dating! Hey, this is a young adults story! I'm sure we'll only have hanky instead of the full panky.

Yotsugi just camps out in Araragi's room reading a weekly manga magazine.

No more "yay! yay! peace! peace!" Where did she pick that up from, anyway?

Ha! Now Yotsugi wants to learn how to speak politely because Shinobu is full-powered Kiss-Shot Acerola-orion Heart-under-Blade again. She may have said some things in the past when she was a weak little girl, so now she's afraid. She should be. Heh. She should be.

Yotsugi thinks Hanekawa really left to look for Meme to practice her martial arts skills.

Aw. Yotsugi promises to stay with Araragi if Kagenui doesn't return. Or is she threatening him? Even to his married couple house with, uh, whomever...

Hilarious! From Yotsugi's perspective, Shinobu and Mayoi have as much a chance of marrying Araragi as Hanekawa or Senjougahara.

Nice flop. Tsukihi doesn't know that Yotsugi is alive and treats her like a doll. She better be worried her big brother isn't doing "weird things" to her.

I don't remember this. Tsukihi says she's been dating a boy named Rousokuyawa since forever. Ougi in disguise manipulating memories again? SHAFT animated the epilogue stories last year and Ougi was playing a boy who knew Suruga.

Tsukihi and Nadeko have become good friends and she's almost ready to go back to school. It's been about three months since New Year's Day when Kaiki rescued her.

Huh. Tsukihi says Nadeko just told her a big secret. More foreshadowing, since we saw her running around in Hell during Mayoi's story.

Ha! A nice, shiny red, modern Mini Cooper instead of the old one SHAFT has always thrown in the visual gags.

"Welcome to a lovely day!" Hello to you too, Senjougahara!

Being roommates with Hanekawa meant there was a lot of "girls talk" about Koyomi. Senjougahara is totally revving his engine up with those braids!

Man, I've missed this flirty banter between Araragi and Senjougahara.

Oh ho! She got a driver's license! The picture conveniently blots out the registration year...

Aw. She figured she needed to get a license because Araragi couldn't. He wouldn't be able to show up in government issued ID's as a vampire. She's kind of disappointed that this is all moot now. She wasted that emotional gesture, I guess is the feeling.

Nice desert landscape looking like where Araragi picked up Shinobu when she ran away. Kind of another nod that we're really saying goodbye to this story because we looked at how far we've come.

Here's some more foreshadowing. Hanekawa "found" Meme, but she did it in reverse. Senjougahara says she doesn't quite understand what she meant. She said, "This is a pen," in English. That's got to be a reference to a Magritte painting and how Hanekawa pierced his hiding place with some kind of mental trick. Oh, and she'll definitely be back for graduation.

There's the obvious foreshadowing. Senjougahara says a space map would be in the shape of a hand fan, an ougi. She's actually right. Describing Space-Time in a way that would matter to navigators depends on reference-frames. The nexus of the hand fan would be Earth as the origin point and its two outward planes would be for expansion and contraction relative to Earth. Because of how the Universe expands faster the further away it is from a reference point, objects would be spread out like a fan the further out you place them on a space map.

That conversation should be ample enough to put one in the mind for a planetarium tour and perhaps a dramatic development with a local "hand fan."