Clannad ep.13

January 13, 2008 | 9 Comments

I was debating whether to blog this now or next week, along with episode 14. But then I remember that I'm going to be away on a conference for one week starting on Monday and won't have access to brodband internet. That means I'll have a lot of catching up to do when I come back the week after and the idea forced me to just blog this now. Anyway, there aren't that many things happening in this episode. The majority of Kotomi's backstory turns out to be similar to what I had in mind. I was actually kind of hoping that it'd be a bit more supernatural because at least it'd be different. I have heard that next week is supposed to be her last episode, which is fair enough. That means the other 3 girls (Nagisa, Kyou, and Tomoyo) will get around 4 episodes to complete their story. I think Fukou got way too much screen time earlier in the series and now the writers have no choice but to haste the story of the other characters.

Continuing from the previous episode, Tomoya asks Kotomi why she didn't tell him sooner that they've met while they were kids. Kotomi explains that she was happy when she met him again in the library but soon realises that Tomoya does not remember her as the girl that he met when he was a kid. Despite this, she's happy that he becomes her friend again and helped her to make other friends. Because of this, she wasn't sure if she should tell him about the past or to just leave him as it is now. A flashback then reveals that Kotomi used to live only with her parents. The two gave her the name Kotomi because it reminds the father of a musical instrument called Harp (Koto) while to her mother, Kotomi is just a nice 3 syllable hiragana. Kotomi didn't have many friends so when Tomoya wandered into the backyard of her house, the two became friends. Before Kotomi's birthday, her parents had to travel to present their thesis and it means they couldn't be around for her birthday. This upsets Kotomi and in her anger, she told them that she hates them.

No one came to her birthday, not even Tomoya. Instead, Kotomi received a visit from the old man, who told her that her parents died in a plane accident and they need to get access to her father's research that is supposedly stored inside his study room. Kotomi refused to let the man to come in and after that, she calls him 'the bad man'. Kotomi later went to the study room and burned the research paper left by her father. In the present, Kotomi explains to Tomoya that she feels that she's being punished for burning that important research paper. Now, she doesn't want to lose people that she loves anymore. The next day, Tomoya is informed by the teacher that Kotomi doesn't feel like going to class. Moreoever, Kotomi is now apparently interested in a program which sends student to study overseas. Later on, Tomoya decides to go back to Kotomi's house and decides to clean up the backyard. Nagisa joins him soon, revealing that she has a plan to cheer up Kotomi. The plan is to celebrate her birthday, which will happen 4 days from that day.

Tomoya's mission to clean up Kotomi's backyard progress slowly. To plan better, he goes to buy new tools. He meets with the others, who apparently were planning to give Kotomi the violin that she used to perform at school. Unfortunately, they got startled by a biker and in the process, dropped the violin. As a result it is now broken. They try to bring the violin to the repair shop but is informed that it'd be cheaper to buy a new one than to fix it. Despite this, Kyou reasoned that Kotomi would prefer this violin than a new one. They eventually find a shop which is willing to fix it. The problem is, it'd take months or even years to fix it. Also, even if the violin is fixed, there's no guarantee it'd sound like it used to be. Tomoya is also worried about the cost of fixing it but Kyou suggests that they do a fund-raising should that time arrive. That night, Tomoya insist on cleaning up the backyard again so Nagisa, Kyou, and Ryou decide to help him.

Impression:

Kotomi's parents probably loved their daughter but I can't help but saying that they are lousy parents. What kind of parents leave to go to work not long before their daughter's birthday? It's really cruel to leave your child on her own, unsupervised, and without anyone to accompany her. At the very least either one of the parents should have stayed home. I think this is partly the fault of modern-day companies as well. More and more company expects their employees to work like there's no tomorrow. As a result, the employees have to sacrifice the time they should have used to be with their family. As for Kotomi, it must be difficult to be in a position. She clearly believes that she is being punished for her selfishness. This explains why she is reluctant to make any friends because she's afraid that something bad will happen to them. What almost happened to Ryou clearly awakened some deep-seated trauma within Kotomi and caused her to retreat to her shell.

© memento 2003