Arata Kangatari - 07

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After taking a week off - table tennis coverage getting the timeslot - Arata Kangatari is back. Guess what? Still taking its time.

Truth be told, Arata Kangatari continues to be a worrying series the closer we get to the end.  It's hard to see where the series plans to end after adapting, what I assume to be a narrow portion of the manga and what's more its hard to imagine an ending without a multitude of clichés.  Also factoring in Arata and Kadowaki's showdown, it's hard to imagine how the story will incorporate the antagonist into the remaining five episodes.  Now back to the episode at hand.

Finally we get the full story about Kannagi's past.  This particular subplot has been in the works for quite some time now and it was bound to come out eventually, even if it is this late in the game.  Nothing spectacular or interesting per se though it's nice to get his background story out of the way.  Kannagi has long since been freed of the role of the villain, so this was more of a formality to get him to join Arata Hinohara's crew in the quest for saving the world.

With the episode being almost entirely about Kannagi's past, the little progression we got came at the end of the story.  Another Sho was shown to be making an inquiry, and a mysterious group monitoring all the show also appeared.  Again, this raises some concern about just how much Arata Kangatari plans to cram into its remaining five episodes and right now it seems overly ambitious.  Given how the series hasn't picked up the pace at any point - with merits and problems to that decision - we could be facing a much faster final arc to bring the anime to an end.

For now there's no reason for complaint.  The series has carried on well, with nothing exceptional to it and that's been its selling point.  My fear is that it'll be paying for its tame approach in the final episode more than anything.  A fear that'll hopefully be wiped out in the next four episodes and set up the series for a decent finish.

Arata Kangatari Episode 08 Preview

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