This is the most important scene in Clannad

Yet people only scream "ass pull ending", even though you had it explained to you in advance.

Just because the put in one minute of exposition in the second half of the second series didn't mean it's not still a gigantic asspull

Except there was foreshadowing and references throughout the entire show.

wow Nagisa is fucking fat

Not really. In that scene in the VN the only person that comes to visit is Sunohara; Kotomi has no role at all in Nagisa's route or After Story.

The only people who think it's an "asspull" didn't pay attention for the preceding 44 episodes. It was being set up since episode 1, including the wish aspect when it first shows Nagisa practicing her play.

OP's got a point faggots

This. It's time to stop eating tacos

>tfw it's been 8 years since I last watched Clannad
Maybe it's due for a rewatch. I might actually like it this time, either that or it might feel outdated.

Play the vn instead.

I read it, before the After Story anime came out no less. I thought it was a bit better than the anime (the kind of story definitely doesn't transfer to anime that well), but I'll never read it again because it's so goddamn long.

Yeah, the VN is generally better, but I think the show actually handled some things better near the end of After Story.

Anyway, it got an official English release with a graphics upgrade and a proper translation, if you didn't know.

I never thought it was an ass-pull ending. I thought it was stupid and cheap.

May have been explained, but I still think episode 18 was still a better ending for the anime.

The whole wishes thing was just a mechanic in the VN to get you to play through all the storylines. It wasn't really necessary for the anime since it only followed one storyline and ending the series at the point where tomoya accepts nagisa's death, forgives his father, and the children are reunited with their parents was the perfect amount of closure for the story.

The last episode is so much better if you just pretend it's not real. It's just Tomoya thinking of what could have been.

It doesn't matter if theres an expanation, it shouldn't exist in the first place. Nagisa should have stayed dead and tomoya should have gotten over her death, just like he did. The show should have ended after the sunflowerfield scene.

Honestly I liked the ending because I got to see Tomoya and Nagisa raising Ushio together. This is one of those times where I don't give a fuck whether it's good or bad.

The mechanic in the VN was the light orbs, not wishes. You only get to make two wishes in the VN, one for Fuuko to wake up from her coma, and the second one for Nagisa to not die. Of course you see two more, Misae's wish about Shima and Akio's wish for Nagisa to get better when she was a child. The wishes are connected to the personification of the town and the metaphor of the town as a family and not necessarily dependent on the collecting light orbs mechanic.

Anyway, ending the story at episode 18 would require rewriting the story; e.g. why Nagisa and Ushio were sickly and died. The entire illusionary world would need to go, as well as Nagisa's play. The symbolism about the town and family would be lost. Etc. etc.

>it shouldn't exist in the first place.

According to what? That it needs to be realistic for some unknown reason?

>Anyway, ending the story at episode 18 would require rewriting the story; e.g. why Nagisa and Ushio were sickly and died. The entire illusionary world would need to go, as well as Nagisa's play. The symbolism about the town and family would be lost. Etc. etc.
None of those things were important in the big picture and I'd go as far as saying that the story would be better without them. The simple down-to-earth theme of family was strong enough without the supernatural bullshit clogging the story up. Maeda was just too ambitious with Clannad.

It sounds like your problem is just with the genre itself. Regardless, the story would have to be rewritten to give it the ending you want. The Clannad movie by Toei does that, and ends with Tomoya reuniting with Ushio and Nagisa staying dead, but it's not very good.

Anyway, you might like Tomoyo After. It's a spinoff VN that continues Tomoyo's route and has no supernatural things at all. It's as good as After Story, IMO.

>why Nagisa and Ushio were sickly and died
Nagisa: because sometimes in life people get sick and die. It's sad but it happens, and the way it happens in clannad just makes the story stronger as the Tomoya has to come to terms with her death before he's able to live again.

Ushio: Didn't contract clannaids until after episode 18 so it doesn't need to be explained.

>The entire illusionary world would need to go, as well as Nagisa's play.
Illusionary world could easily just be explained as Tomoya's subscious/dreams about his feelings for Nagisa and the sadness/emptiness he feels about her death.

Nagisa's play is easily just characters bonding, Tomoya's realization of his feelings for Nagisa.

>The symbolism about the town and family would be lost.
The town symbolism is the entire problem with the ending. A supernatural town that removes tragedy from the world is a cop out. Without the reset the symbolism of family in the story is even greater. Family members sometimes die, people sometimes have a hard time accepting that loss, clannad is about loves, loss, acceptance, and reuniting. After episode 18 just adds another loss, some magic, and then unrealistic reuniting. After the reset it basically removes the entire scene of Tomoya speaking to his grandmother about the difficulty his father when through trying to raise him alone and asking him to come home.

>Nagisa: because sometimes in life people get sick and die
Nagisa's illness and death were for the reasons that the show explained, when Akio talked to Tomoya about taking Nagisa to the tree grove and praying for her to get better when she was 5. Ushio got sick at the same age. She was able to live for a time because Akio had some of the trees preserved.
>Illusionary world could easily just be explained as Tomoya's subscious/dreams about his feelings for Nagisa and the sadness/emptiness he feels about her death.
Except that's not what it's about. Nagisa isn't even there. He's there with Ushio from the beginning of the first episode, though it isn't taking place in that temporal order. You can't just attach random meaning to something. You'd need to write it out or substantially change it like the movie did.
>The town symbolism is the entire problem with the ending. A supernatural town that removes tragedy from the world is a cop out.
A cop out of what? Why does it need to have a realistic ending? The existence of the supernatural was established from the Fuko's arc at the beginning of the show.
>Without the reset the symbolism of family in the story is even greater.
It isn't, because everything prior to the "reset" actually occurred.
>unrealistic reuniting
You're just complaining about the genre at this point.
>After the reset it basically removes the entire scene of Tomoya speaking to his grandmother about the difficulty his father when through trying to raise him alone and asking him to come home.
It doesn't remove it. It happened and Tomoya remembers it. If anything it just allowed to occur sooner and in a less traumatic way, as in the last episode Tomoya goes to visit his grandmother with Nagisa and Ushio, and the recap states his father is living with her.

>stupid and cheap to finally cut Clannadman some slack after having lost two of the closest and precious people in his life, and then dying in the snow after having finally lost the will to live due to the stress of watching his only daughter literally die on the spot
>then, even after all that, he comes to terms with his past regrets and says that despite all the pain and sorrow, he still loves Nagisa and no longer regrets ever meeting her.

Yes, totally cheap to give this dude a happy fairy tale-esque ending, should've just let the dude live in crippling depression for the rest of his life.

>none of those things were important in the big picture
>clannad literally revolves around the concept of family, with every little arc involving family in some fashion

And that's why you're the guy watching these shows, not writing them

I wasn't saying the family theme itself was a problem; the family theme stands strong even without the supernatural element, even arguably better.

Contrarians for the sake of being contrarians.
You don't like fantasy in your anime? Well, bad news for y'all, anime=fantasy you stupid fucks. Go watch a documentary or the news if you want to see real-life situations. Hell, even your favorite shitty SoL anime has the same (if not more) amount of fantasy that Clannad has.

Did you miss episode 18 or something? That was the conclusion of Tomoya's character arc which was the most important part of the story. It just needed to end there.

I think most of the opposition to the ending comes from people who are biased against the supernatural content in the show and somehow expected the show to have nothing supernatural in the ending, despite having tons of supernatural shit through it. I've seen this with other things, where people try as hard as they can to explain away supernatural aspects of stories when its clear they're intended to be literal.

How does it stand better when the inclusion of the town in the metaphor expands the message? Like Nagisa says, the town is like Big Dango Family. The "family" exists in a group larger than just the biological unit. Maybe the problem here is that Japan is a collectivist society and the sentiment isn't passing over across the cultural divide.

You can interpret it like that, yeah.

What actually happens is a parallel universe, one where Nagisa and Ushio never gets the clannaids.

Clannadman and Ushio are still dead as fuck in the other universe.

>Clannadman died after Ushio did? They never imply that.

Clannadman and Ushio gets transported to the parallel illusionary world after dying. The fact that Robo-Clannadman is there is indicative of the fact he died in the snow along with Ushio.

After having collected enough light orbs, Ushio sacrifices herself and releases all the light orbs in order to transport Robo-Clannadman back to another world in which Nagisa lives.

Damn I feel you, been unable to finish watching more than 3 episodes... gigantic loli heads with uber eyes and nonsense... nah not my thing.

The Toei movie is much better in every way except art/animation quality. It has actual jokes instead of pants-on-head shit. It has actual characters instead of moeblob shit. It has a better-structured and more meaningful story. It's even more visually inventive and interesting, but without the budget to make it look slick (I dunno about you but I got sick of looking at upward-falling light orbs after the first couple of scenes they appeared in).
>Contrarians for the sake of being contrarians.
No, you autist, people just have different opinions.

No it wasn't. Tomoya's view that he should never had met Nagisa was not resolved until after Ushio died and he called out to Nagisa on the hill in the last episode. In episode 18 he came to terms with her death emotionally and came to terms with his father, but there's no indication that it resolved his regret.

No it didn't, he deserved his happy ending.

>the conclusion of Tomoya's character arc was episode 18
>Tomoya thereafter regrets ever meeting Nagisa after witnessing the death of Ushio and then dying himself, having lost the will to live this shitty life

>What actually happens is a parallel universe, one where Nagisa and Ushio never gets the clannaids.
>Clannadman and Ushio are still dead as fuck in the other universe.

This is what happens in the VN, but the show ending changed enough that I don't think that's what they were going for.

>The Toei movie is much better in every way except art/animation quality.

It's hard to take this seriously.

>after witnessing the death of Ushio and then dying himself, having lost the will to live this shitty life
Yes, and if that didn't happen (it didn't need to happen in any capacity) that wouldn't have been a problem in the first place.

He still would have regretted meeting Nagisa even if Ushio didn't die. See

>It's hard to take this seriously.
That's nice.

>praising the movie
Being 'different' doesn't remove the fact that they are shit opinions.
>why did they follow the plot of the orbs that went presented since ep.1 instead of ending the story when I wanted it to end?
Write your own story if you didn't like it, but don't fool yourself and accept the fact that magic shit was happening since ep.1.

Ushio dying was to make Clannadman think a little harder on whether it was a good idea to get funky with Nagisa in the first place, something he occasionally mentions offhand every once in a while, but moreso during Nagisa's pregnancy, where Clannadman has an unshakeable feeling that something unfortunate will happen.

Ushio didn't need to die, yes. But when something that shitty happens to a guy who had already lost his wife and still he says afterwards, "even despite all this shit that's happened to me, I still love you", it's more emotionally engaging.

Ushio had the clannaids since birth so she would've died anyway.

I love urban fantasy and supernatural elements when they belong in the story.

Little Busters for instance was an example where Maeda's Keymagic actually worked well. If you take the magic away from LB all you have is an SOL about a bunch of teens bullshitting around with no conclusion. With the supernatural stuff though, it becomes a beautiful story about becoming stronger and saving your friends.

Clannad on the other hand feels like it's a drama that had magic thrown into it at the last second. The whole struggle that Tomoya and Nagisa go through to live together and make a living is something that is completely relateable that real people go through. Your wife dying of sickness and childbirth and having to cope with the depression and subsequently reconciling your relationship with your daughter is something completely down-to-earth and realistic. It's a complete story on its own, and that's why the magic element doesn't feel like it fits.

The simple fact that the Illusionary world exists and the only two characters in there are illusionary world Ushio and robo-Tomoya is enough to let you know that this takes place after the two of them died in the snow. Also, I highly doubt they went the "let's turn back time in this universe instead of hopping to a different universe" route when characters in the show mention the "many-worlds" interpretation and shit along with the light orbs.

It fixed every problem in Clannad.
>streamlines bloated story
>more satisfying thematic story
>focus on characters that actually matter and are interesting rather than just take up space
>better and more engaging visual direction than the TV series
>comedy is actually watchable

If you take the magic away from LB all you have is a bunch of dead kids from a bus accident.

Did you just skip the first season and exclusively watch After Story or some shit?

Literally the first couple episodes involves an autistic comatose vegetable ghost girl who gives people star-shaped autism

Clannad makes it very clear that there will be supernatural elements throughout the story by starting off with the most supernatural story of them all.

And let's not forget that one time Clannadman had a fucked up dream where he saw through the memories of a fucking cat who had a giant boner for a lady 5 years older than him?

>affect each other worlds to create new ones
So Tomoya just went to a different world? There is a universe out there where Nagisa and ushio died, then Tomoya disappeared and the parents need to live their life alone?

>that had magic thrown into it at the last second
That must be why the first arc in the show was about a girl in a coma projecting her spirit into the world in physical form.
>It's a complete story on its own, and that's why the magic element doesn't feel like it fits.
It's been explained over and over how the supernatural aspect expands the message of the story.

>that this takes place after the two of them died in the snow.
It explicitly states otherwise. That it could be in the past or the future or at the current time. Tomoya knows the story already in high school, so does Nagisa. Tomoya sees the illusionary world momentarily before Ushio dies.
>let's turn back time in this universe instead of hopping to a different universe
The difference is that in VN, After Story actually ends after Ushio dies. The route is over, you go back to the title screen, you got the bad ending. Once you have all of the light orbs you go back through it to the point that Nagisa would die, and she's able to be saved. It's quite clearly occurring in a different universe where her death doesn't happen at all, even from Tomoya's perspective. The show didn't just change it to a linear progression but also kept Tomoya's memory intact. So I don't think it's clear at all that it was a separate reality in the show.

The Toei movie isn't good, not because it removes the supernatural stuff, but because the short amount of movie screentime simply doesn't work well with something like Clannad.

The movie misses out on the fun times with Nagisa's parents, the awesome banter among the characters, Tomoya and Nagisa's extensive struggle to live together, and even the gorgeous flower field part. All the "important" plot points of After Story are crammed into a tiny portion of time that can't possibly feel satisfying in any way.

>where he saw through the memories of a fucking cat
Not just a cat, but a cat that was sent back from the afterlife in human form to deliver a wish to someone.

>Nagisa being as sticky as honey to Tomoya because fuck the VN
>Tomoya being a dick at Nagisa for almost the entire movie
>Suddenly they are lovers, & have a kid, & Nagisa dies
>END
>'fixed'
Seriously, don't try to defend the undefendable.

Except none of that shit matters with a standalone work. It's a complete experience. It's not a particularly good adaptation, but you end up with an experience that works better in a movie and is additionally better than the original story.
I got "compelling story between interesting characters", which was not what the VN gives you. Literally none of what you said matters for any reason.

Yeah, pretty much, but he doesn't know that yet.

It's not like I forgot about those supernatural things in the first season, it's just that the removal of them would not hurt the development of Tomoya and Nagisa at all.

>I got "compelling story between interesting characters", which was not what the VN gives you.
This is getting stupid.

In what way, friendly and open-minded discussion partner?

I really wish Dezaki worked on something actually worthwhile in his last years instead of the Clannad film. He's an awesome director, it's just that Clannad is impossible to get right in movie format even for the most talented staff.

No, Tomoya just dies after Ushio dies. When he's crying for someone to help and then falls down into the snow clutching Ushio tightly in his arms? Yeah that's Tomoya dying. He just fucking gives up on life. He literally just dies from a broken heart.

Anime left that part unclear, I guess because they wanted to give more pointless screentime to the autistic star child after the story is essentially over but they still have 5 minutes with nothing to do with.

Your statement that taking (most of) the same characters and then simplifying them and their story is compelling while the original, fully-fleshed out characters and story are not.

It's not clear that he dies in either the anime or the VN. I think that's the easiest interpretation, though.

>I guess because they wanted to give more pointless screentime to the autistic star child after the story is essentially over
The Fuuko ending scene is straight out of the VN.

You're saying that Tomoya being a dick 24/7 towards Nagisa and from one night to another he decides he should fuck her & have kids n' shit is a compelling story. You're just craving for attention m8, you don't even know what the hell you're talking about anymore.

>The Fuuko ending scene is straight out of the VN.

Leave it to Key to make the ending abruptly stop to a painful crawl with some top-shelf banter between the autistic star child and her hot older sister

The show actually improved it. In the VN, Nagisa doesn't die, and then it goes to credits and afterwards shows a CG and Tomoya, Nagisa, and Ushio going to visit Tomoya's grandmother. All of the shit showing Ushio growing up with bother of her parents, etc. is original to the show.

>shows a CG of*
>with both of*

What would you do if you were in the same situation? Very deep within you, you'd wish that things would be different, that you could go back in time, etc., & that's the time when the orbs come into play, making his wish true, whatever it was.

The ending would have been more believable if time travel was introduced earlier in the story. Time travel is super touchy for suspension of disbelief, much more that other supernatural elements and it shouldn't be put in the same category. Just because you have astral spirits and talking cats doesn't justify introducing it at the last second. If we were shown Tomoya using time travel in the school part of the VN/anime even just for a short while, it would have made much better foreshadowing.

Sanae calls Tomoya "a being that has surpassed the flow of time" in episode 1.

Not time travel but dimension travel, and is literally the first scene in the VN

>impossible to get right in movie format
Sure it is: you don't worry about fitting in all the extraneous elements that matter to a however-many-dozen-hour VN but not to the core story, and make something original and complete out of the core elements.
It's probably worth noting I mostly hated the characterisation style in the VN. But yes, less can be more and the quality of the craft is more important than how much of it there is. For example Nagisa's parents' backstory added some more detail, but it didn't fit well for me. It added volume to the narrative and characterisation, but it didn't feel cohesive. It worked well enough in the story. Tomoya was a pretty decent character overall though, and I found the movie's version of him even better.
>You're saying that Tomoya being a dick 24/7 towards Nagisa and from one night to another he decides he should fuck her & have kids n' shit is a compelling story.
No, you're saying I'm saying that. You're summarising how well you thought the movie told the story (which I disagree with) and claiming I think it. Fuck, you're stupid. When you state the impression you took away like that, it makes it sound bad, yes.

It should have stopped at ep. 18, then add an epilogue where Tomoya makes babies with Kyou

You don't get time travel, but you get Tomoya having memories of the illusionary world (and thus Ushio) during the school arc. The illusionary world is also stated as being in an unclear time relationship with the normal world.

Kyou has her own route and ova.

Even if the thing has an explanation it's still bullshit because it invalidates the whole process of growing Tomoya went through.

You must be that one and only guy who bought the Deluxe version of the movie and now you have the need to defend it because you don't want to feel like you wasted your money in a poor adaptation.
I mean,saying that the movie gives 'a compelling story', really. Fuck dude, you're being too delusional. Even the Key staff would laugh at you if they had the chance of reading what you're saying.

No it doesn't, because it all still actually occurred and he remembers all of it.

Clannad is garbage. It's the very definition of forced melodrama because the plot and everything within it basically works to create emotional and dramatic situations no matter how stupid or convenient they may look.

The scenes are so fucking artificial and forced that it hurts, looking back I can't believe I actually thought this was the pinnacle of tearjerking anime when I first watched in 2008.

Good arguments.
No, I've never spent money on Clannad.
I enjoyed the movie and didn't enjoy the VN or the TV anime, and I'm outlining what I feel the movie did better and why.

>character development'd Kyou
>can barely see them kissing
Not enough, also milf Kyou is hot af

He grows and he gets rewarded, life ain't so shitty sometimes.

>the news
>real life

I'm of a similar opinion. It makes ''sense'' in the context of the bullshit plot that Clannad has, but I think it's a shit decision in terms of narrative. The anime would be a million times better if episode 18 was actually the last one.

It's ok, you just have terrible taste, my friend.

>>can barely see them kissing
Play the VN. Each romance route has exactly one (1) kiss CG, including Fuuko.

Okay.

>Liveleak
>YNC (if it still exists)
>not real life

Actually, scratch that. Fuuko technically has three.

Man, I sure am glad the industry started toning down on the size of anime eyes and adjusting other features to match the disproportionate size better.

The Fuuki and Yukine kissing scenes are awkward as fuck, & the Nagisa one is just plain & boring. The other ones are ok.

This has less to do with the ''industry'' and more to do with Kyoani trying to match Key's artstyle, which has retarded big eyes. Having retarded big eyes isn't a sample of old anime.

I didn't find the Fuuko romance in the VN to be believable. Yukine's was fine, but yeah the kiss was at an awkward time.

Sometimes I don't know why we keep having these arguments when it comes to Clannad. It's clear to me that those who liked the ending (like me) will continue to like it and those who hate the ending will continue to hate it no matter what so why bother?

It's okay, we were all young once. Let's just be happy that Clannad and the like are rightfully fading into obscurity and no one brings them up as masterpieces any more.

We're bored & have nothing else to do.

Not every discussion or conversation is meant to change the point of view of the other part, most of the time people just argue for the sake of it, or because they want to talk about the series they like and to present their viewpoints to other people.
Your post seems like something I would see on reddit.

You go on Reddit? Maybe you should go back there.

Some subreddits are useful to get information, all you need to do is not post on them. Nice job deflecting

I've watched the anime once per year since it first aired & played the VN at least 3 times, and it still makes me feel sad and on the verge of tears when I reach 'that' part. I don't care if it's labeled as 'forced' or w/e but I dare you to see that part again without feeling even a bit moved.

The only part which I find genuinely emotional is the moment between Ushio and Tomoya at the sunflower field, their whole arc is pretty good compared to the rest of the show to be honest. Too bad the rest of AS is boring as fuck.

I'm not deflecting from anything because I wasn't conversing with you prior. I was simply making an observation to a passing poster that they may be on the wrong website and their kind is happier elsewhere.

I understand but after reading a lot of Clannad threads these past years it's mostly similar to this thread, with the same opinions being thrown around without ever reaching at least a mutual understanding.
And personally I liked both the movie and the TV series but like I said here I still like the series' ending better.