Bakemonogatari: 03 – Heads Talking

85% talk, 15% Loli beat down.

Well there’s no OP for the episode, surprisingly. I thought that I’ll miss the “Stapler Stable” one they previously had. This episode is just dialogue-heavy, but at the same time, it’s still visually entertaining.

Almost 16 to 18 minutes had passed with Araragi and Hitagi talking in the playground. But what I enjoyed the most is the flirting happening in there, thanks to Hitagi. I’m quite glad though that she isn’t changing at all after that crying on the previous episode, and hell, she’s back to absolute awesome teasing Ararararagi. Just gotta love the way she transforms everything she says to cold ice picks on Araragi. But what the hell Arararararagi?! Don’t be a wimp around Hitagi!

You probably also got tired of this still shot which is used to death by the episode. And also I would like to comment on the playground as a whole. I think it’s made creatively, though I can’t imagine having an actual playground like that in here, but I love how SHAFT made the place very interesting with the use of the three primary colors, with all plain background.

Another thing that surprisingly amused me was the inserts of hilarious faces. Hitagi’s face was just epic. I would never imagine her to make like that to be quite honest, but that thing alone just made me love her more.

There’s a loli schoolgirl snail. Care to ask what she’s doing alone?

Her name is Mayoi Hachikuji. Koyomi approaches her because she seems to be lost, but Mayoi just ignores him because he definitely appears as a stranger and says that she hates him already. So Ararararagi got full of her and smacks her head into the wall when she still kept on ignoring him. Nothing happened to her again, instead that she admits that she just hates him. They ended up fighting each other. Wow, what a nice way for two strangers to meet.

Wow. Loli violence much.

Mayoi gets knocked out by Ararararagi, who’s celebrating a victory laugh. Lol he just knocked a middle schooler girl unconscious. Congratulations. But anyway, it seems like Mayoi has a problem of her own, ad she’s reffering to a snail.

Bottomline

I will definitely check out the subs as soon as it comes out and I might possibly add more to this post because this episode is the most dialogue-heavy one so far. I just can’t follow some stuff completely. (And I got lost on some jokes ”orz).

Moving on, I don’t know what the hell people are saying about this episode but I think it’s another good one as well. But still… Damn, that’s one of the longest 16-18 minutes of my life there. And almost a minute there was mostly focused on a still shot. But at the same time, Senjougahara just made the supposed-to-be boring upper half of the episode quite amusing. So yeah, Hitagi is just love. Her personality is just pefect and at the same time with her VA, I never get tired listening to Chiwa Saito like this.

SHAFT still maintained their stylish animation, but I guess it was toned down a bit in this episode. I really like it when they are switching down the over-craziness of the direction. What struck me is that the whole episode just took place in only one location.

Probably the best part of the entire episode has got to be the introduction of Mayoi (VA: Emiri Katou) because that’s when… uhh… they started moving more? Yeah. Though I must say that I was floored to have Ararararagi suddenly bash the head of a random schoolgirl on the wall only when she’s not noticing him. That was hilarious as well when Mayoi fought back, only to get being owned more by Ararararaagi. Poor loli.. Tsk tsk. Haha.

So overall, this might be the weakest episode out of the first three. It’s kind of a “breather” from the very intense previous episode. It’s also light this time, and we get to be introduced to the new character of the series, which I think would be the focus of the next few episodes as Ararararagi and Hitagi helps her out.

P.S. – Err.. Can someone please explain to me what’s the meaning of all the “Kuro (Black)” stills being flashed in some parts of the episode? Is it about Araragi? Or for other matter?

More screenshots on the gallery next page.

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