Otakuism

Gift just keeps getting better and better. Quick recap of what’s been goin’ on.

When we had last left the young incestous couple of Haruhiko and Riko, they had been fighting. However, they quickly made up, something the shy and jealous Kirino didn’t like. Chisa, seeing her friend so sad, gives Kirino one of her fake gifts, that Kirino accidently uses on Haruhiko, her wish to change things back to the old days. Kirino’s fake gift accomplishes this by causing Haruhiko to keep seeing his dead mother when he see’s Riko, freaking him out to no end. So if you love your sister who looks like your mother, is that twice the incest? Kirino confesses to Haruhiko of what she’s done, and he goes on a mad scooter chase after witch Chisa.

After finding her, Haruhiko tries to get her to cancel the wish, but she can’t. She can only do that by canceling everyone’s wishes. She then starts talking how she always obeyed her mom to make her happy, and she got her fake gift power from her mom. That it’s her role to make everyone happy. Then she has a psycho moment where she say’s “Happiness can be easily recieved.” while looking like she’s about to cut open Haruhiko with an axe. Great wtf moment. Haruhiko wonders off and finds Chisa’s maid, who we learn has amnesia, but is still very happy and looking toward the future. Haruhiko realizes what he must do, and goes to Chisa’s home. He ask’s her to give him a fake gift so he can wipe out his memories of his mother to live with Riko. Have to admit that Haruhiko was looking pretty cool here.

Chisa can’t do it. She realizes that happiness isn’t something you can just give, and gives back her powers to her mother, getting rid of Haruhiko’s hallucinations. After this whole incident, it’s the school trip to Kyoto! Right before leaving Kirino ask’s Haruhiko for a love charm from Kyoto, from him to her. But Haruhiko can’t do this, as he loves Riko. On the trip Haruhiko manages to confess to Riko (again) and she accepts. Of course this causes problems when they get back. Kirino finds out their together, but tells them she’s happy for them. She’s lying, and falls apart crying. She then apparently has a psychotic breakdown, as she starts talking into a cup-phone and listening to it. Greatest psychotic episode since Kaede. Around this same time, we find out that Riko used her Gift when she was young to create the eternal rainbow in the sky, so she and Haruhiko could be together. When talking to Kirino later Haruhiko mentions this, and Kirino gets incredibly angry. Turns out she and Riko made a promise when they were kids that they wouldn’t use Gifts to win Haruhiko’s heart. Kirino starts yelling at Riko, and swears to get Haruhiko back no matter what.

Quite a lot, eh? Kirino’s breakdown was expected, but the whole cup-phone thing was beyond my expectations. It was just so out of nowhere and messed up, it looked like Kirino had really lost it. Partly it’s her own fault though. She’s never been proactive in trying to get Haruhiko, resorting to her fake wish thing. It’s as if she’s expected him to just fall into her lap. You have to love her logic for winning Haruhiko though. She say’s that she wanted to be his little sister, because you can lose childhood friends, but little sisters are forever. Maybe Kirino’s been messed up for a long time? I can’t wait to see what happens with her next. By the preview, it looks like she’s gonna use her Gift to start rewriting reality. And here I thought she was gonna summon a monster to kill everyone. Though I guess she could rewrite reality to have everyone dead.

Aside from Kirino, Haruhiko’s pretty weird also. Since it turns out that he was seeing Riko as his mom even before Kirino had made her wish, what does that say about him? Does he want to bang Riko because she looks like his mom? Because she might be the reincarnation of his mom? Does he just have a thing for every female member of his family? You could probably write an entire book on Haruhiko and his incest fetish. Though I guess since Riko’s not his blood sister everything is alright? Kind of confusing, but I’m still glad they got together (though Haruhiko x Rinka would of been better).

Chisa has some problems too. I’m not quite sure why she was giving the fake gifts to everyone. Was she trying to make her mom happy? Was she trying to prove she didn’t need her mom to make her happy? The whole point behind Gift seems to be what really is happiness and what is it for each person. Riko and Haruhiko finds happiness in eachother. Kirino can only find happiness in her obsession with Haruhiko. And Chisa can only find happiness by giving it to other people. Though all of this is kind of screwed up by the Gift power. What is it exactly? Wonder if they’ll explain it by the end, though it will probably be something sappy.

Right now Gift is beating out Kanon slightly on my harem meter. Even though Kanon is cute and gorgeous looking, I like a bit more conflict in my harems. The girls in Kanon are just too kind to eachother. I also have a weakspot for any harem that ends with an actual decision on the guy’s part, which it looks like Gift will. Haruhiko’s still not as manly as Kyon’iichi though ;).