xxxHolic:Kei 01
Ever since I found out about the second season, I’ve been very excited about it and finally, after 5 days since it’s Japan premiere, Shinsen Subs released the fansub of Episode 1.
I am an avid fan of the manga and I must say that so far they are loyal to the manga. Animation-wise, it’s pretty ok and is still xxxholic-ish. (xxxHolic’s design is pretty unique after all.) It’s nice to see (and hear) the characters once again after a year (or years?). Watanuki and Doumeki still amuse me. <3 Kohane, on the other hand, irritates me. I don’t know, even in the manga, I don’t like her story arc. I hope it will only run in a few episodes >.<
Anyway, the Spider Arc is one of my favorite arcs for it clearly showed the bond between Watanuki and Doumeki. <3
Opening
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Yes, it’s another opening song done by Suga Shikao and it’s called NOBODY KNOWS (reminds me of one Bleach ending song). I think the new song is great but I like 19sai more.
Summary:
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Rating: 
The story started with Watanuki dreaming about Himawari-chan. In the dream, he can only see her as if he has no half of his vision. When he woke up, he realized that Mokona was sleeping on his face, covering his right eye. This must be the reason why he only saw half of his vision in the dream and for this, he blamed Mokona. He then told Yuuko about the dream but Yuuko, as usual, replied that it could be a bad omen and that something bad might happen since Himawari is bad luck for him.
On his way to school, Watanuki passed by Doumeki’s place (the temple) and hoped that Doumeki isn’t there but he was there and when he saw Watanuki, he forced him to help him clean the temple. As usual, Watanuki complained and all but agreed in the end. This was the time when Watanuki got stuck in a spider web and so Doumeki helped him by pulling it apart.
During lunch time with Himawari-chan, Doumeki felt like he got something on his right eye. (Watanuki is a bit worried.) By the end of the day, Doumeki felt that the thing in his right eye got worse and he can no longer open his eye. Watanuki was with him and he suggested that he should go see Yuuko but Doumeki replied that it’s impossible since he can’t enter her shop.
So Watanuki went to Yuuko by himself and told her about Doumeki. Yuuko then told him, after she picked a spider’s thread in Watanuki, that Doumeki has fallen victim to a spider’s grudge. She explained that even if it was just a simple thing for both Watanuki and Doumeki, for the spider it was a disaster in which it’s precious house was destroyed. And since, Doumeki was the one who destroyed the web, and not Watanuki, the spider turned his hatred to Doumeki. After knowing this, Watanuki wished for something from Yuuko and so after a short while, Doumeki was free from the curse.
The following day, Doumeki found out about what Watanuki did and was shocked when he saw that Watanuki was wearing an eyepatch and when he removed it, he saw that Watanuki has lost his right eye. For this he became mad and commanded Watanuki to call Yuuko out so they can meet somewhere.
And so, they met up in the park. Doumeki asked Yuuko to restore Watanuki’s right eye back to normal but Yuuko refused him since it would just conflict with Watanuki’s wish which came first. Meanwhile, Watanuki met up with Himawari and she asked him to give her book to Doumeki. Watanuki agreed and when he arrived at Doumeki’s place, he saw weird visions in his right eye. It stopped when Doumeki appeared. Watanuki then gave him the book and noticed that Doumeki was carrying tons of old books about removing curses and the like.
When Watanuki went back to Yuuko’s shop, he found out (while serving Yuuko in Alice in Wonderland cosplay) that Doumeki is reading books to find out how to return his eye to normal. Watanuki felt bad about this, stating that he doesn’t want Doumeki to mind his problems. But Yuuko replied that Doumeki didn’t like what Watanuki has done too in the first place. Watanuki felt bad even more then left to get drinks for Yuuko. At the end, Yuuko stated that Doumeki has his own ways to grant his own wishes so he doesn’t need to enter her shop.
ENDING (CREDITS)
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I still need a few more episode before I can say if I like the ending song or not. But I think I uber love the colorful (other?) mokona. (I thought at first that the white mokona is mokona=modoki but I guess it’s still the black mokona… but heck, mokona is mokona!) lol =p
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