Kanon (2006) Rewatch - 1: Intro

I decided to take some time this holiday season to rewatch the 2006 Kyoani anime adaptation of Kanon.  I wanted to write down my thoughts as I go through each arc of the story, to help me process and think about it a little more deeply.

It's not Kanon without pretty snow!

I first watched this anime in 2008 -- though I had previously watched the Toei adaptation (released in 2002).  I had not played through the original visual novel until afterwards in 2010.

It's been a while since I seriously thought about Kanon, but it definitely left an impact on me as a standout anime during a time when admittedly the standard for what passed as "good" was much lower (both for me personally, and probably for everyone as a whole).  This rewatch was motivated by a confluence of different things -- a conversation with a friend, along with a viewing of a video essay entitled "Memories & Grief in Kanon", as well as the subject matter of my latest pixel artwork, which was drawn by referencing a scene from Kanon:

 

Good meowmie.

The aforementioned video essay really piqued my curiosity as to how I would approach Kanon upon second watch, especially as I've gone through some very significant and impactful life experiences since then, resulting in less of a one-note understanding of grief, loss, and these types of things.

Amelie Doree says in their video's premise:

The major theme of Kanon as I see it, is grief.  The pain of losing friends and family, of things coming to an end.  The regret we carry with us from our past, and how we choose to cope with all of it.  What do we do when someone we love is going to pass away?  How do we hide our pain and our scars, and should we even hide them?  Should we just forget about everything that's hurt us and what happens when we do?

"Are you crying yet?"

Kanon as a game (and anime) is structured as a "nakige" or "crying game", attempting to present endearing characters and then formulate emotional or tragic situations around them.  From Wikipedia:

The developers at Tactics created a simple formula for a game: a comedic first half with a heart-warming romantic middle followed by a tragic separation and finally an emotional reunion formed what is known as a "crying game". The main purpose of such a game is to make the player feel for the characters and make them cry due to emotional scenarios which serves to leave a bigger impact on the player after the game is over.

Kanon has always been my favorite of the three Key VNs (Air, Kanon, and Clannad); I think some of its characters, stories, and situations really stuck with me.  I've long since moved on from praising it as my favorite anime, or holding strong attachments to its characters, but I'm curious to see how I'll see it this time around, with a new perspective after 10+ years.

Of course, I can't really write about the major themes and points of the show without going into spoilers, so proceed at your own risk for the rest of these posts.  I won't be doing a per-episode play-by-play, but instead will stop to parse my thoughts after each of the major arcs in the anime.  I'll start with the intro and Makoto's arc, which I've just finished (spanning episodes 1-10 out of 24).