REVIEW - Clannad (Anime, 2006)

Once in a while, you come across something that's hard to talk about without bringing up some personal memories. For some people, they simply can't because what they find in the story they've seen is too familiar to them, and therefore could hurt them emotionally or make them feel uncomfortable.

That's how I felt about the anime version of Clannad by Key Visual Arts.

Clannad takes place in Modern day Japan. The main character, Tomoya Okazaki is a bored delinquent who has given up on everything he's ever dreamed of and has lost all care for his own family. One day on the way to school, he meets a girl who goes by the name Nagisa Furukawa, a girl who's repeating her final year of school due to illness. Tomoya also meets a host of other colourful characters, such as Fuko Ibuki, Kyou Fujibayashii, Kotomi Ichinose and Youhei Sunohara. The main focus of the show is bonding between characters, and the way they all deal with their pasts. They all have some sort of sad incident that happened in the past, and Tomoya feels it's his duties to help them overcome what happened before. While it may not be he best set up in the world, I think that the plot itself is pretty competent and it get's across what it needs to just fine.

The characters of Clannad are easily the shows highlight. The tragic backstories of some of these characters is truly a sight to behold. The way that Tomoya has to deal with some of these is really complex and drawn out at times, but it's worth it. For the sake of spoilers, I'm only going to talk about the show's main characters here, so don't be upset please if I left out any of your favourites. Trust me, it was very hard to not talk about how funny Fuko and Sunohara are!

Tomoya Okazaki

Tomoya has lived a very difficult life. His mother tragically died when he was small, and that made his father turn to drink and become depressed. As a result of this, Tomoya and his father often got in fights, and one day, his father dislocated his shoulder in a rage. Tomoya couldn't raise his arm past his shoulder anymore, and thus this led him to his delinquent life. His father becomes a recluse and Tomoya starts to hate everything around him, his father especially. He spends most of his time outside of school at his friend Sunohara's house. One day, he meets a girl splurting random foods out of her mouth, and decides to walk to school with her. And thus, the story of Clannad begins.

Nagisa Furukawa

Nagisa - since a very young age - has been extremely weak. Her body is frail and she's vulnerable to illness for God knows what reason, since her condition is never explained to us. All we know is that, when she was young, her parents used to be out all the time. One time, Nagisa fell very ill, but her parents still had to go to work due to very important jobs. Nagisa - with all her strength - got up, went outside and waited for them. Due to the harsh snowstorms, she barely lasted a minute before feinting in front of her door. Her parent came over after someone called in the accident, and Nagisa's parents both quit their jobs to become bakers to be closer with their daughter. Nagisa has the ambition of becoming a stage actress, but lacks the confidence to do so...until she meets a boy on the hill to school....

In the animation department, Clannad loves to use it's backgrounds to impress you and they certainly are impressive, right from the get go the backgrounds are just absolutely flawless, even in the opening. It's extremely well done and detailed. The characters are pretty good, although sometimes their eyes annoy me. Yes I know that's a nit pick but there's just something about them that tick me off and since I'm the most critical person in the world when it comes to this kind of thing well I have to say something about it. Overall, very nice to look at with nothing TOO Major to complain about.

The soundtrack to Clannad is quite different, in that it focuses a lot on one type of instrument - that being the piano - and mainly uses that for most of the soundtrack. The soundtrack is very good, and I'm a fan of the piano version of Dango Daikazoku. The ending theme is my favourite one in all of anime, as it's sad but happy at the same time and it really get's the image of the anime down just right. Seriously, go check it out:

 Overall, I could only reccommend a show like Clannad to those who really like drama. For those looking for a full on Comedy, Clannad is not for you. However, if you love drama, tension and emotional finale's, you can't get an better than Clannad. I'm not sure if it's available for legal streaming or not, so a fan sub would be okay for this one. Clannad is a journey of heart, friendship, feelings and love. Do NOT miss out on this.

Story: 8
Characters: 10
Animation: 8
Sound: 9
Personal Enjoyment: 8.5

OVERALL SCORE FOR CLANNAD (ANIME): 8.2/10