Kanon - Ayu Tsukimiya Route & Character Discussion

Key Discussion
#16

This is probably the first time I have been able to catch up with the reading in the Kanon bookclub and I’m determined to post my thoughts about Ayu’s route as it has now become one of my favorite routes since Shiori’s route. Ayu is the most adorable, sweet and energetic girl and it is because of her personality that I find her very cute though sometimes she can be clumsy and silly. The times she spent with Yuuichi were always the most fascinating aspects of this route between his usual teasing at her and Ayu constantly getting upset when he makes fun of her.

Anyways, I am halfway of reading her route as of now and I hope I can get in to some discussion later on this week with everyone. So far, I am up to the 22nd already and I think the writing so far has been well-paced and it’s been keeping me interested yet again since I finished it last year.

#17

After the solid beginning of Nayuki, the phenomenal plot of Makoto, the confusing ride that was Mai, the short but sweet exposition dumping of Sayuri, and the memorable drama Shiori had to offer…it’s no surprise that Ayu is a little underwhelming in its execution. Nevertheless, it’s the route that thematically ties every route together. Happiness, acceptance, hope, memories, love…Ayu presents them all in a simple, small, neatly-wrapped package.

Ayu herself is energetic and cute on the surface, but there is a constant subtle sadness surrounding her figure. On several occasions she pushes herself to be constantly happy in front of others rather than bother them with her troubles. In a sense, she represents Yuuichi’s own attitude towards the town, with deliberate ignorance of whatever sorrows occurred in the past seven years. Throughout her route, however, she never strikes me as a complex character. Rather, she seems more like a simple character who occasionally shows complex feelings.

Up to now, every character in Kanon found complexity in their relations with other characters. (All these are mild spoilers for each route, by the way.)

For Nayuki, it was her familial relationship with Yuuichi and Akiko, the former of which constantly changed as the route progressed but never grew to a point where it forced them apart.

For Makoto, it was also her relationship with Yuuichi, starting out chaotic before growing into something closer to father and daughter before becoming lovers.

For Mai, it was her relationship with Sayuri, a deep and passionate friendship that goes far beyond what we are told in the story, but is easy enough to understand through Mai’s actions.

For Sayuri, it is her relationship with Kazuya and with Mai, the former being a huge reason she acts the way she does and the latter standing as a testament of her will to live.

For Shiori, it was her relationship with Kaori and Yuuichi, the former acting as her ultimate goal and role model in life and the latter as her reason to continue on with life.

We are shown Ayu’s past relationship with Yuuichi in tandem with their hijinks in common, and it serves to show the parallel between their past and present interactions. Perhaps the best thing that connects the two together is Ayu’s desire for comfort after the death of her mother left her an orphan, which is fine. It creates a need for Ayu to be friends with Yuuichi, even if he’s not quite the best person in the world to be friends with. It’s hard to feel the same need from Yuuichi’s perspective since he was forced into the relationship through circumstance, but he does develop a devotion to Ayu through their small talk and play time together.

Their relationship in the game’s present time is best described as one-sided verbal abuse. Yuuichi says or does something offensive to Ayu, she uguus and points out his mistake, he retorts with his own logic, rinse and repeat. It works as a comedy act, but not so much as character development. The more serious moments of their conversations work far better in moving the story along, although I personally feel that their teasing routine works to relieve the tension of the plot. Thereby, it’s one of the easier routes to read in Kanon, as the language is simple and concise, and the serious and silly are kept well-balanced.

The real kicker of Ayu’s route, however, are the last couple days of the route. As Yuuichi (and the reader, by extension) discovers the true nature of Ayu as an ikiryou, he finds that the memories he had of her were partially forged in an attempt to cover up the sad reality. My personal theory on all this is that his false memories, combined with the promise to always remember Ayu, resulted in Ayu’s manifestation as an ikiryou. Her memories as an ikiryou overlapped with his, and as she discovered the harsh truth, she began to realize that the memories she held were lies and her existence was unnatural. Finding it hard to believe that her time with Yuuichi should have happened, she attempts to wish herself away from Yuuichi’s memory and thereby cease to exist. However, Yuuichi tells her that the fun times she had with him were not in vain, and it was not a good thing for her to bear her problems by herself. Trusting Yuuichi’s judgement, she subconsciously wishes for another chance to be together with him instead, and as if by a miracle, she awakens in her once-comatose body.

It still bothers me that Ayu woke up completely fine after falling off a tree and severely injuring her back, which is why I praise the anime’s correction of putting her in a wheelchair at the end.

With perhaps one last attempt at sparking up some discussion, I would like to ask the podcasters one question: Why do you think Ayu prefers pinky swearing between her and Yuuichi? Do you feel it adds to the weight of their relationship, or do you think it feels pointless in the long run due to Yuuichi constantly breaking his promises? I look forward to hearing more in the podcast. :wink:

For my final thought, I would like to not only summarize how I feel about Ayu’s route in particular, but about Kanon as a whole. As the first Key novel I ever read, Kanon introduced me to a beloved set of characters and a setting unlike anything I had ever seen before, as well as set me up for what to expect from Key in the future. I’ve read more of Key’s novels since then, and while I think they are great in their own way, there’s something nostalgic and comfortable about going back to the town of seven years ago, with a sleepy girl to greet me at the train station. Every time I go shopping, I run into a cute girl with a winged backpack and a love for taiyaki. When I go to school at night, I can fight demons with a quiet girl and make friends with her and her ojousama friend during the day. Out in the quad, a lone girl waits for me to bring her ice cream and make small talk with her, perhaps even ask her out on a date. At home, I can outsmart the freeloading bratty teenager with a love for manga and nikuman, then wake up the next morning and eat toast with strawberry jam with my cousin. All while making quips about how ridiculous the whole situation is.

I love Kanon. It was ambitious for its time, but it’s a classic today. I love the characters and setting, the music is great, the visuals are dated but charming to look at, and the message it brings is timeless. Key has found solid footing since then, with many successful visual novels under their belt and even more coming out in the next few years. If there’s anything I hope neither Key nor its fans ever forget, it’s the memory of the town of seven years ago, and the people we promised to meet there.

#KanonRemakeWhen ._.

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#18

I think Ayu wanted to pinky swear with Yuuichi because it did serve as a connection and the hope of them seeing each other again. It feels like a basis of how their relationship had grown despite Yuuichi losing his memories as he started a new life in the town he left those seven years ago. It was Ayu’s way of saying that she wanted him to enjoy their time together so that Yuuichi would remember her for who she was and not to feel regret for those painful memories he would later have experienced. I’m not really good at expressing my thoughts on this because I do tend say things redundant but I am trying to comment on what I feel that can contribute to the discussion. :sweat_smile:

I do agree with @EisenKoubu that Kanon as a VN in itself is very nostalgic and memorable for the moments Yuuichi spent with Nayuki and Akiko as well as the other heroines he met in the other routes were characters that you could come to love and cherish as Yuuichi’s attitude in time had changed about the snowy town and the cold he had eventually was getting used to over time. Kanon has this unique setting of how beautiful and wonderful the town covered in snow had really made the pacing of the story interesting and meaningful. I also do love the music as it is nostalgic in the sense that it conjures up the way how the town changes and feels as the snow makes it a wonderful setting of how very personal Yuuichi had felt during his time in the town.

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#19

I agree somewhat, but I don’t believe that the ghost Ayu is related to the real Ayu in any way but being a part of Yuuichi’s memories.

Back in the Nayuki route post I made it was mentioned that Nayuki wished for the accident to get closure. This was backed in-part by a monologue at the end of the route by a mysterious person. Presented in Ayu’s “dream” style, the monologue mentions that they will make the final wish, and the only wish. Ayu is probably the one who made that wish, but keep in mind, this was a dream sequence. Soooo the Ayu in the coma made the wish, while the ghostly Ayu had been long gone. Ayu’s “spirit” is Yuuichi’s wish. It’s both the thing tying him to the town and the thing that made him want to leave in the first place. It’ll ask for him to uncover those memories he denies, but it’s fine with him just letting go so long as he learns to love that town. The wings are the dead giveaway of this, being those of an angel, a wish-granting being.
Some may believe that the apparition of Ayu exists to branch the gap between Yuuichi and Ayu, but I believe that Yuuichi was the one to create it. A version of Ayu that fits with his clouded memories enough to not force him into a memory-fueled shock. With how unreliable Yuuichi is as a narrator, and with how perfectly this version of Ayu fits into his unreliable vision, I can’t believe that she came from the real Ayu.
Meanwhile real Ayu is there with a wish ready for when Yuuichi gets a heroine. Best wingwoman. She even helped Yuuichi get with herself!

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#20

Finally, I have finished Ayu’s route and I loved every single moment re-reading again. I am understanding a bit more with her route that Ayu was wanting to treasure those memories with Yuuichi ever since the seven years that they spent together but she was really afraid to accept the happiness given to her knowing how lonely she felt throughout her life and that Yuuichi had to leave the town. I guess it wouldn’t be hard to imagine that Yuuichi had to bury those memories and shut them out so he could feel at ease with the pain he was suffering and how moving back to the town might make him not wanting to come back if he regain those memories ago.

It does goes along true that Yuuichi would want to create the illusion of having an actual ‘spirit’ so he would be able to uncover the truth about what had happened those seven years ago. He needed to understand the real reason why he had to go back to the snowy town and the time he used to remember when meeting Ayu for the first time and how much those irreplaceable times that he could call her first love meant for him. The last wish that Yuuichi had to grant for Ayu would have meant that he had to let go of the illusion he created from the memories he had buried deep within his heart and to let Ayu’s spirit in a sense to rest and having the real Ayu wake up from her long dream.

I really do love this route very much and yet it has still managed to give me the feels after this whole time replaying Kanon as a whole. I would rate this route a 5 out of 5 for me because it shows that despite the moments that Yuuichi and Ayu had with each other held together in the pacing of the story and how it kept me as a reader to experience the memories that flowed through the town Yuuichi had eventually come to love in the end. :smile:

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#21

Ayu’s route is a perfect example of how important changes of context are to attachment. Whether it’s in real-life or in a story, the more times and places that you see someone, the stronger to your connection to them becomes.

I’ve made a lot of friends over the years, and the ones that often stand out are the ones that I remain friends with even though I rarely see them. The sort of friends where I can go years without a word, then meet them at a conference or event, and after catching up for a few minutes, it’s just like old times.

Many of the routes in Kanon, but especially Ayu’s, remind me of this dynamic. It’s been seven years since Yuuichi last saw Ayu, and despite the fact that they had only met a briefly as children, the connection they feel after growing up is made so much stronger by it. I really feel like it’s all about the change of context. Ayu feels familiar, because Yuuichi knew her as a child, but now sees her in the context of a highschooler. All of the ways that she’s changed and stayed the same making her seem like a more complete and interesting person.

We also get to see Ayu in a lot of contexts in the story. We see her in the shopping district, she visits Yuuichi at home, she wanders around town with Yuuichi, and we even see her as a child. This helps to build that connection with her and convince us of Ayu and Yuuichi’s romance. More importantly, Ayu appears near the midsection of pretty much every other girl’s arc, placing her in yet another context for the reader. Basically, within her arc and beyond it, the readers get a ton of indications that Ayu is the most important character in the story.

Personally, I find it very successful. Ayu really does feel like the most iconic Kanon character, and probably the most iconic Key character in general, because she appears in so many contexts. She is ubiquitous, and familiarity breeds not contempt but compassion. We can’t help but feel for this story because we can’t help but feel a connection with this character that we see everywhere.

Most of the main characters in Kanon have some sort of connection with Yuuichi’s past. How much of that do you feel is necessary for the plots of those characters, and how much do you think is there to manufacture a sense of connection, either between the audience and the character or between Yuuichi and the character?

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#22

This week on “Quest for Consent!” (sponsored by CJ)
… we found none…

Anyways, I liked this route. Here’s some random thoughts:

  • I think that it’s cool that the game starts on her birthday
  • Yuuichi almost peeks into the gym on the day of the ball
  • Ayu mentions mentioned that wolves are extinct (but they’re not…?)
  • Around the 29th or something the date thing in the top left corner goes away but they still tell you what day it is at the start of the day

Back to the good stuff. The color red is a pretty big motif in this route. Her eyes, her hairband, red bean paste, her face after running into things, and the descriptions of the snow and sunset. At first I felt like the VN was forcing the whole “red colored snow” thing onto me way too often, until I found a line (I can’t remember exactly where) towards the end of the route that described the snow as white. Coupled with the scene where Ayu falls from the tree, where the snow is also described as red, I believe that all the “red scenes” represent events happening in (for my lack of a better term) “Ayu’s dream world”. I thought it was cool that they showed this with color (even though it was bloodstained…).

Another thing (mentioned by others above) I liked was Ayu staying in a child’s mindset. Even though her body aged while she was in a coma, her mind did not, which is really good writing.

Ayu’s theme, “Hidamari no Machi” (A City in Sunlight) reflects her character really well. It’s fun and bouncy, really makes you feel like the sun is shining. It’s a little ironic, however, that the town Kanon takes place in is know for it’s incessant snow. At the very end of Ayu’s route, though, it’s sunny. I can’t recall any other time it was sunny(pls help). I believe that the song reflects Ayu’s optimism that she would someday awaken from her coma and enjoy the clear weather after the snow.[quote=“EisenKoubu, post:17, topic:1965”]
Why do you think Ayu prefers pinky swearing between her and Yuuichi?
[/quote]
I think that it’s because he breaks all his promises that she wants him to do it. Maybe Yuuichi struck her as an untrustworthy person, and in her childish mind she believed that if he pinky swore, he would be bound by the sacred covenant of uguu to keep his promise. Ayu even went as far as to use one of her wishes to ensure that Yuuichi wouldn’t forget her. I guess it’s this distrust she has towards him.

I rated 5/5, because it was good yeh.

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#23

I think for those of the characters are very significant with their connections with Yuuichi because it serves as an establishment of how he felt close to each of their situation and for him to feel that his memories would change the way of how he felt about the snowy town despite losing his memories. With the audience and the character, I’m not sure how to answer this but I think as the audience that they wanted you to understand their circumstances of how they thought and feel as they have regrets that needed to be resolved and for us to understand why it was necessary for Yuuichi to come to their aid when they needed him the most. I was struggling to answer this but I gave it a shot anyway but this is only what I can think of the moment as I was playing her route.

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#24

Multi part post festival!

Dream Sequence 1

Hahahahaha I lied in the common thread, I told them the only detail was that there was a crying child and sunsets and shit. But the ‘red dream’ isn’t the world tinted red by the sun, it makes reference to the blood from the tree based accident. The PoV character being Ayu is not hinted at at all, but when you know it is the ‘endless dream’ refers to her coma and there is multiple references towards her being incapable of moving or seeing straight due to her injury, not out of any sense of ‘I can’t cheer that crying child up’. The scene is clear an literal about a bunch of things it says, but it’s cleverly hidden behind more abstract interpretations. It’s quite a good scene.

January 7th Memories

These scenes are the fucking heart of Ayu’s route, the dreams every night where Yuichi remembers Ayu, Fuyu no Hanabi(Winter Fireworks) makes a point to make the scenes exceptional. For the first one we’re mealy mimicing the day itself and getting the meeting out of the way, there is bumping into Yuichis waiting for Nayukis and uguus, but the mood is very different.

Dream Sequence 2

This one works much worse without prior knowledge, obviously it hits at the coma, but there is nothing to really interpenetrate otherwise so it must seem a bit strange to firties…

January 8th

“Just my luck running into a tree in the middle of an emotional reunion after seven years” YEAH AYU, YOU AND TREES HUH AYYYYY

Dream Sequence 3 + 4

“Man are these memodreams from 5 minutes ago or years ago, kind of both really, coma and all that”
“THIS SURE IS A FUCKING LONG DREAM”
I realised during the fourth one that Yakusoku(Promise) which plays during these sequences is a remix of Hidamari no Machi(Town of Sunshine), my god these dream sequences are just vague enough to be brushed off but absolutely spell everything out.

January 10th

Part 1 of the ‘Ayu doesn’t know things’ series as she asks Yuichi what a Benefactor is. Akiko also hinting at SHENANIGANS because she K N O W S. [strikeout]of course she doesn’t act on it, because she’s a former key protagonist herself and knows to let Yuichi handle this.

Yuichi is literally ramming ‘she’s like a fuckin’ kid’ down throats hard today, A L M O S T L I K E S H E A C T U A L L Y I S

January 10th Memories

The Yuichi/Ayu meeting is so truly off, it’s really quite strange how Ayu Ayu(ja nai mou) has JUST had her sad story happen to her, there is no build up, it’s not a repressed memory, it’s a world shaking event to her that has just happened. It’s really quite unusual.

Dream Sequence 5

oh hey yuichi told her to wait on a bench and then the dream sequence talks about waiting on a bench.
For hours.
Days.
Y E A R S.

January 11th

Part 2 of ‘Ayu doesn’t know things’, what’s a cell phone? We don’t have those in 1992 prominently. Also weird how the Crepe menu has doubled in size since she was last here, and the cake shop is a book shop!

January 11th Memories

Worth noting, these days of the past are always sunset, most of her present scenes are always sunset, maybe this isn’t the right part of the post to even bring this up, but MMMMMM LOOK AT THAT T H E M E I N G. Kanon, in general, hates doing important things during daylight anyway, but Ayu Ayu takes it to the next level, she’s very predominantly featured during sunsets and I feel this is even reflected in her design, the light browns of her hair and coat, with her red eyes, blend with the orange tinted world, whether that was intended I don’t know, but what I do know is I really dig her link to sunsets, if you wanna think of something S Y M B O L I C, sunsets are between night and day, Ayu is stuck in her perpetual dream, not awake, but not completely unconscious.

Kid Yuichi is a swaglord, as soon as she smiles he’s like ‘You’re almost pretty with a smile, it suits you better than crying’. 110% swag, 90% cheese, 200% a good line. The voice acting on display here is great too, Ayu is quiet and mumbling a lot, she’s shy about Yuichi and still fairly messed up from dead mom syndrome, and the voice acting is working well to help push that. Ayu also has a good line at the end, ‘I like being with you, it helps me remember happy things’. 10 year old Yuichi/Ayu is the CUTEST thing.

Dream Sequence 6-8 is just repeating what the others have already said really.

January 12th Memories

The final boss makes his debut! It’s been a week and all of that hesitation in Ayu’s voice is gone.

January 13th

January 13th is a bit of an outliner day, it’s the day where the sky is very cloudy and the snow is heavy, and Pure Snows is playing. Ayu takes advantage of this day, for a bit of serious despairy talk about how difficult it will be to find her thing, with no Town of Sunlight. but a Town of Pure Snows to suit the much less cheerful topic.
Also muh immersion when Ayu goes beneath the umbrella and her mugshot no longer shows up, because she’s not in front of Yuichi.

January 14th

Ayu route more like the foreshadowing route WOW AYU YOUR SCHOOL IS REEEEEALLY WEIRD.

January 15th Memories

“Will you come back next year?” “Yeah promise”
Well you fucked that one up.
“My first wish is, please don’t forget about me”
WELL YA FUCKED THAT ONE UP

January 17th

MAYBE SHE’S BEEN WAITING FOR YOU ALL THIS TIME YUIGI, GET THE HINT?
GET THE HINT?

“Hey Ayu what did your parents stop taking you to the movies about seven years ago?” “eh, probably the part where I fell out of a tree”
It’s absolutely incredible how utterly lathered in hints this entire route is from start to end.

January 19th

That’s not your number anymore Ayuuuuuu.

An interesting event happens, the transition typical of what I’ve been calling ‘memories’ happens, but the music is that of the dream sequences, it stresses the world of red from the first one, and ‘It’s a promise, ok?’ is spoken in Ayu’s voice, I believe this is to definitively link the dreams to the memories, for the absolute idiots who haven’t already put them together. Yuichi goes on a tangent about how the red world of his dream feels uncomfortable even though he don’t remember jack shit.

Aside from that, Ayu was dreaming too, at the same time, about a big tree.
Wehee the big tree and the red world are connected wooo, I know I keep going on and on and on about the foreshadows of this route, but I think this is one of the better ones, I’d really like to see a first timer react to this writing without fully picking up on these hints.

January 19th Memories

Oooooah the memory of her cookies is on the day that she attempts to cook for Yuichi I LOVE THE MEMORIES PARTS

January 20th

Kaori winks about Shiori’s route. Far too late.

January 21st

“Do you know what happened in this town…in winter, 7 years ago?”
Akiko-san could you PLEASE keep your bombs untouched, that said I really like how she doesn’t eleborate on the EVERYTHING she’s clearly already figured out, but instead gives a vauge ass hint to Yuichi with ‘A tree was cut down’.

January 21st

SUBTLETIES
Ayu said ealier that it’s ‘only (herself) and her mother’, and there isn’t any mother. So when Yuichi asks if her family will be worried about her being out so late, Ayu says it’s fine, with her mugshot losing it’s smile, in that instance her thoughts went to the only close family she had and all they had to do was make a tiny mugshot change to shows she’s still upset without brining attention to it at all. Mmmmmmmmmmm.
OOOOH “It’s been a short holiday, but so much has happened, hasn’t it? Sad things, painful things, and happy things too…if you wern’t here, if I hadn’t met you…there would have only been sad things. Right now, the only reason I can keep smiling is because of you.” Ok, see. There is nothing outstanding about that line, it’s cheesy and not all too uncommon a thing to say, but FUCK ME I LOVE IT OH MY GOOOOOOD I KNOW SHIORI IS THE BEST ROUTE BUT AYU JUST EVERY TIME MAN I CAN’T HELP IT.

January 24th

Man why is Akiko worst in her own daughters route and way better in routes involving random girls coming to live in her house?
I really dig the mock ‘you’re late’ from Ayu sitting on the bench scene, that’s the appeal of this route, it’s not the writing behemoth of Shiori, it’s a series of really pleasent scenes and quotes. There are people who might not find this as good, but I love it. Following that is the Kiss Scene, it’s absolutely excellent, Ayu’s telling of how she lost her mother, asking Yuichi if he knows those feels, and he does, BUT THE PERSON HE LOST WAS HER, the view shifts to focus the sunset to try and connect it to the red world of the dreams, then the most natual ass kissu happens.

January 25th

haha oh my god they use cleaning duty to make Yuichi late for Ayu for the sole purpose of forcing it to be sunset LOOK AT THIS THEMING GUYS HISAYA IS SO FUCKING GOOD IN KANON.

ORE…AYU!

January 26th

“The Taiyaki is going to get all salty if you start crying now” “Uguu…I don’t care…It’s alright…It’s a Nostalgic taste” 10 outta 10 10 outta 10 100 outta 100 best route best route.

WHOOPS H-SCENE. Todays musical accompaniment is the one that got this whole Revengence music thing going, Red Sun. I picked Red Sun because have you read this post? It’s the perfect complement to Ayu’s route with its love of Sunsets. The scene itself was possibly the best, maybe not as good as Makoto’s, for sheer comedic value, when Yuichi described going balls deep as ‘burying myself to the hilt’ I became officially done’o’clock.

January 27th

The whole plot twist scene is good, it’s completely vague about what’s going on, it tells absolutely nothing itself, but they player has been force fed hints by this point. The transition into

January 27th Memories

We haven’t had Memories in aaaages, so having them show up after that mad bullshit is great, this one isn’t normal either, Yuichi doesn’t just go to sleep and enter it with …, the scene immediately transitions into it, and he narrates the start. In this narration, he calls her smile appearing on her sad expression upon seeing him ‘like melting ice’ and Hisaya knew exactly what he was doing with Kanon and Maeda is a hack.

January 28th

Hisaya pretending the route is over again with Afterglow. “Do you like the Sunset Yuichi?” “It’s not that I like it or anything…but [changes topic]” SO MANY INTERPRETATIONS WOOOOO.

January 29th

You did it Kitagawa. You did a thing.

January 29th Memories

It opens up with “A dream…I’m dreaming” like the dream sequences from common, this route is just full of small nods like that.
And then she falls. It’s the morning, it’s not sunset, the mentions of red in the dream sequence was neeeever the red of a sunset. Yume no Ato makes a rare appearance to help set the mood as a dying Ayu slowly tries to talk while grasping the situation she’s in. The emotional punch is strong, I especially can’t deal with when Ayu is unable to make the pinky swear on account of dying too hard, She can’t keep a promise to play together again.

January 31st

The scarlet red finale speaks for itself, it a scene that’s had set up, atmosphere built, the music, the cgs, voice acting, it’s the emotional climax of Kanon, one I find to be very effective. Also god damn look at that shot of the town that then pans up to the sunset sky, it mirrors the shot of the tree in the OP, get all symbolic up in this bitch, Ayu is there in the past, like the tree, and gone in the future. Of course, this finale does hinge on making the player believe Ayu is dead(I’M SORRY BONECUSS), but it’s far from lacking in impact with the truth in mind either.

Ayu: Epilouge

Unlike all the other Epilouges, we’ve got Yume no Ato playing, it’s really one of Kanon’s best music, I don’t recall it getting much use at all in the VN, but that just makes it more special!
And then…“MAN, SURE WAS A BIG ASS TREE CUT DOWN 7 YEARS AGO, WAS ON THE NEWS THIS MORNING”, the most natural ass drop in the world, Akiko just sitting there knowing everything all morning waiting to drop the plot twist on the Yuichi.
And so the viewpoint shifts, we see the inner monolouge of Ayu, what it’s like to see the relentless teasing of Yuichi without his dickhead thoughts alongside it, I was going to say it’s not a revolutionay thing to have the viewpoint temporarally shift, but shit it’s 1999, probably was a bit of a curious choice, not one I at all feel is unwelcomed.
You ever notice how the end of this route has reeeeeally liked calling back to other things. At the end of the prolouge, meeting at the station, Yuichi ends it by walking away with ‘Lets go, Nayuki’, here, at the end of this meeting with Ayu at the station, Yuichi walks away with, ‘Lets go, Ayu’.

Part 2 at some point

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#25

I guess this is it for reading in this bookclub. It was long and fast at the same time, but certainly fun. : )

Ayu’s route was the one I was looking forward to the least. I never liked Ayu. She looked way too childish during the common route, but she kinda “grew up” during her route, so I could enjoy this read in the end.

This route also helped explain the miracles occurring during other routes. Ayu made her last wish to help whoever she had to help to make Yuuichi happy. This is what makes it a good closure route. I like how the anime depicts this. It’s never revealed what Ayu really wishes for, but it is heavily implied that she wished for Yuuichi to be happy.

This route was amusing, interesting and relaxed (except for the tension during the last days), however, it lacked something I value a lot and that I found in the other routes. What does this route tell me? What makes it special? What is stated that may influence you or changes your life in some way? These are all questions to which I, sadly, couldn’t answer.

Sure, but while this is true, I can’t seem to see this as a theme in the route. This message didn’t reach me.

There was some pretty neat writing too. Not as much as during Shiori’s route, but the whole white / red scenery descriptions really got me, specially when Ayu fell from the tree and the snow turns from white to red.

You can definitely say that memories are a theme in this route, but what about them? Is it good to remember them, should we not forget everything? If we remember things from the past then miracles may occur? I didn’t get the message behind the memories. Also, this theme also appeared during other routes nonetheless. Still, I think the fact that almost the whole route was driven by Yuuichi remembering things during his dreams helps make Ayu feel more natural during her encounters with Yuuichi. She doesn’t have many dismal backstory to explain so she feels like her own character, not just some recipient for a backstory.

I also wanted to comment on one of the final scene: the dream in which Ayu is stuck. We can hear her talk, but we can also hear her mind. As it has already been mentioned, there are other Visual Novels doing this change of perspective, but this is the first where I hear the thoughts voiced. It struck me how both the voice and thoughts had different voices associated, it gave it a stronger feeling of being a dream, like the dream protagonist and the observing dreamer. Maybe it felt more normal to you, but I truly enjoyed that to a new level. :slight_smile:

I also found the Shiori’s route wink very refreshing. (Shiori route spoilers) When Kaori says that she just wanted to get out of her own home.

I don’t think it means anything special. It’s just a friendship symbol. In my opinion, the repetitive use of this pinky swearing is done so that the reader remembers about it. Then, during the scene in which Ayu falls from the tree and Yuuichi tries to pinky swear with her, the emotions of the scene are amplified by this pinky swearing symbol.

Almost made me shed a tear. So nostalgic… But seriously, even though what I am going to say in the next paragraph, I really loved the time Yuuichi spent with Nayuki and Akiko. It felt so relaxed that I almost imagined myself sitting at the table with them watching the whole situation.

Now, I’ll use this post to also share my very personal and subjective thoughts of Kanon as a whole. This was my first time reading it, and while I enjoyed it, it’s become my least favorite Visual Novel from KEY. There were very good routes, like Shiori’s, or ones that while they weren’t so good, I still loved, like Nayuki’s and Mai’s (yeah guys, I enjoyed the first half of Mai’s). However, as a whole it hasn’t struck me so hard as CLANNAD or Little Busters! have. Maybe it is because Kanon lacks this final resolution route, much like CLANNAD has After Story and Little Busters! has Refrain. Kanon has several different routes, and while Ayu is depicted as the principal, once you finish it, you don’t get that feeling of “I finished more than a route. I finished a Visual Novel”. This allows for something cool though. With no final resolution the reader is left with more to its imagination of what really happened during this long January (which route really happened).

Anyway, It’s been really fun, I’m really looking forward to the next bookclub, which I think that will be Little Busters! if I’m not mistaken. Cheers!

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#26

I think Ayu’s route to me personally was the fact how the memories she shared with Yuuichi were precious moments and how she had treasured those moments in the past with each other made their connection between them both so strong that she valued her memories with him. The color red that carried so many variations between the snow, town, sunset, and as well as Ayu’s eyes already have represented the mitigating factor of why Yuuichi wanted to forget everything and suppressing those memories so that he would shut his heart out from that pain himself. Ayu’s dream was to have been for Yuuichi to actually forget her in order for him to move on with reality and to put her ‘spirit’ at rest so that she would eventually waken up from her long dream.

If I had been in Yuuichi’s situation, it would have not been easy for me to forget Ayu because of the deep friendship as well as the value of wanting to save her from the deep regrets that she experienced over the course of time that made her feel sad. I would have to do everything in my power of wanting to spend every day being around her and making her feel that she is needed. The time that is spent on helping others in the long run makes not the only person you help feel good but gives you a feeling of satisfaction and hope that you made someone feel that they are needed and are never alone in life.

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#27

I feel a frustration in my chest that makes me want to tear myself apart. All I wanted to do was spend the days peacefully. I wanted my memories to continue to remain a peaceful place forever. Because memories are somewhere where anyone can be at ease. But I’ve abandoned those illusions. The door to those sealed memories has been opened. All that lay on the other side was the truth. The reality is before my eyes. The person that I had loved… Tsukimiya Ayu… No longer exists in this world.

Memories buried under the snow. For seven years, Yuuichi has been running away from his painful memories. Everything related to the snow-covered town, he had sealed in the back of his mind to make sure his Trauma would never resurface. On the day he had forgotten everything, his time has been frozen. Just like the time of his beloved girl, lying in a coma. Only when Yuuichi remembered everything, only when he was faced with the tragedy he had made himself forget, only when he has finally accepted it, did his frozen time begin to move again - as did Ayu’s. Yes, that was the most important step. By accepting the tragedy, he could move on. And precisely because he did, somehting new could occur and open a path to happiness.

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#28

I wasn’t saying it was a theme of the route. I clearly isn’t. I was saying that it was a narrative tool used to make the route more effective.

#29

Part II

The Route

The route is great, the foreshadowing is intense, both vague yet obvious and laid thicker as the route progresses, which is how you do foreshadowing. The Sunset theming for the entire route is fantastic, it’s a small thing but it’s really nice and consistent. While I’d agree that it’s not quite to the writing quality of Shiori, I believe it to be the better route on other traits. The aesthetic/atmosphere is astounding, the scenes of the past slowly revealed though dreams is great, the emotional punch of the big scenes is in my opinion stronger. The connection to the big themes of Kanon is at it’s strongest in this route, but to an extent, those are the big themes of Kanon because of this route being main so that one makes sense, and lastly, I personally believe that Yuichi/Ayu is better chemestry. Of course I’ve mentioned all these things as ‘done better than Shiori’, but all those things are fantastic regardless, alongside the writing.

Ayu’s Character

Soooo Ayu sure gets some shit, our lovely Aspi I recall was giving her some shit. So imma throw this down here. Earlygame Ayu who screams about Taiyaki and uguus at high speed. I can understand a dislike of the character there, but I definitely feel that character disappears the more you spend time with her, she mellows out, and while still energetic and excitable, is still completely calm and chill most of the time. I feel like this may be a case of bad writing overall, like how the character changed to be more mellow and mature as the writing progressed and yet Hisaya never went back and adjusted early scenes to reflect that change in character.
Of course the change is a very good thing, even I as a hardcore Ayu Ayu supporter can definitely see problems in Ayu’s early appearances, it doesn’t even match up with her younger self, whom a lot of people would say is more mature than the early Ayu, overall, however, the change was very good and while it is awkwardly mismatched with the start, I really like the Ayu after she mellows out. The character has a mix of childish innocence(She’s literally a child, lest you forget in hateful remarks) but also striving to be mature, both past and present.

It also helps that she especially plays off well with…

Yuichi’s Character

My fucking hero. Imma drop the anaylistic nature for a bit here to just kind of gush about the massive influence of this phenomenal dickhead on me, personally. It’s been what, 9 years since I first watched Kanon, back when I was a young and foolish teen, back when I was a total pile of self esteem lacking pile of garbage…I wanted to be Yuichi man. In my pit of pathetic teenage angst Yuichi gave me a goal to aspire to be, to be that man who lives to have fun, to fuck around in every conversation, to enjoy everyday and everyone. My social values were crafted around how this character thought and pulled me about of that childish teenaged mind.
And that’s why it’s not the best Key VN, but Kanon is always going to be my favorite.

Anyway Yuichi’s character! Yuichi is excellent, he’s fun to be around and adjusts his level of teasing depending on the girl he’s bullying, he plays off every single one of them perfectly while never feeling like he’s ‘not acting like Yuichi’ like other Key Protags can fall into from time to time, he’s extremely full of character in an era where his role was expected to be nothing more than a pair of eyes and a dick. And while he is certainly a dick, Yuichi is 100% a character who is part of these routes and I love him.

Shout outs to Nayuki and Akiko for being better in this route than their own.

Overall

I love this route. Even aside from the huge sentimental value the route has to me, I think this is a fantastic route and one of Keys best, it has flaws, here and there, but everything is done right.

yes aside from amano

Nothing says she isn’t in a wheelchair in the VN, she never stands up from the bench.

Never. Kanon must remain dated, the charm of it is far greater than any silly HD graphics would give.

Fuck that’s a really good theory.
It completely explains the otherwise mystery of her owning the hairband.
I don’t want to subscribe to it, but it’s really good.

Sunsets are Sunlight too. Course I’m to believe that ‘Hidamari’ is more explicitly talking about bright daylight, but you could, in a roundabout way, link her theme to Sunsets like everything else in the route.

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#30

Actually, this is an ongoing theme during pretty much all Kanon routes. It is only when Yuuichi and the route heroine realize that crying in a corner or avoiding the problem won’t help that they both can go on and become happy or extract at least a positive message from the events that happen.

As an example:

(Makoto’s route spoilers) When Yuuichi accepts what happened, he stopped being sad about it and instead thought that Makoto had a good time while in a human form.

(Nayuki’s route spoilers) When they both accept the tragedy about Akiko, they think that they will be able to carry on living happily even if Akiko hadn’t been miraculously healed at the end.

#31

…my sentence is missing some words there xD

It’s not just any kind of theme, it’s the central one. Yuuichi left a lot of stuff unfinished and when he visited for the last time seven years ago, he ran away with the tail between his legs, then forgot about everything unpleasant. Kanon is all about facing those problems properly because they will occur over and over. By running away, Yuuichi would not only be leaving an unfortunate girl behind (= bad ending), he’d be giving up on any chance of solving the problem and finding happiness, which is, as the game shows, is not impossible. There is no progress, and no good memories to create if he doesn’t stand his ground and fight.

#32

Alright so now that I’ve finished this route (later than I expected) and have done the podcast, I guess I should talk about what I thought of this route in general. Unfortunately, I have mostly a negative view towards this route; and have had this negative view for as long as I can remember. I just never thought of this route as very good, based off my own expectations on what I should see in the story. I just want to note here that I am not here to rant about what I dislike about the route; I want to add discussion in and I want to be proven wrong, because I would love it if I could see the value of this route somehow.

Firstly, the first half of the route is, well, for lack of better words, boring. Pretty much the time she spends staying over at the Minase household. Frankly I thought these scenes had only one purpose: to showcase Ayu. To show her quirks (like being horrible at cooking) and to make us learn more about her personality… However I feel that they spent too much time showcasing those personality quirks which do not add to much in the long run of the story. Ayu’s personality does not affect much how Ayu acts or feels in the rest of the route. Perhaps the only connection I can make is during the times that Ayu talks to Yuuichi in the balcony, where she resigns to being not a useful person, which ties into her final wish being “please forget about me”. However, that is the only connection I can make, and those balcony scenes also prove to be the saving grace of these “daily life with ayu” scenes.

The second issue I have is with the emotional impact of the climactic scenes of Ayu’s route. There are, arguably, two very powerful scenes in the route: Ayu falling down the tree, and Ayu making her final wish. Naturally, the former was very sad, but I think that’s pretty much all it needs to be. The latter, however, really had missed opportunity because of how Yuuichi reacts. I’ve said it before somewhere, but it isn’t sad scenes that make me cry: it’s the cathartic resolutions to these sad scenes that really get to me. That latter scene with Ayu lacked the catharsis to make big enough emotional impact to me. I said this, and I guess other people agree, but there was wasted potential when Ayu said her wish; Yuuichi could have responded by saying “You can only make wishes that I can grant for you, but granting that wish is impossible for me to do” and that would have given so much more impact to the scene. It would have hammered in the fact that Yuuichi cannot and should not forget these memories with Ayu, which would have also given us readers a message to follow from Yuuichi. However, Yuuichi just keeps silent for the most part and goes to hug Ayu, which, to me, implied that he would forget her. Not only does that take away from the message, it also throws away any impact the scene might have made on me.

Third issue I have, and this is, I feel, is the most important issue to me: the route fails to make me, as a reader, come out of this story with a message. At the end of the day, I was not able to see what the writer wanted to tell his readers through his route. I mean, sure if all he wanted to do was show the story of this character, that’s all fine and dandy, but to me that brings down the value of the route by a very large margin. I think the reason why I fail to see the value of this route is because Yuuichi himself was not able to come out with any value at the end of the route. I really like how @Naoki_Saten put’s it: the central theme of Kanon is about not running away and hiding your memories, it’s about facing them head-on and accepting that they happened. I just feel so sad because I can’t say that Ayu’s route was able to make me feel that way, and I think it’s because of the way they have Yuuichi treat that lesson. Even after Ayu disappears, we are given absolutely no inkling of how Yuuichi feels about it. Yes, he remembers Ayu and accepts her death instead of keeping it buried under his memories but… how does that affect his character? How does remembering Ayu make Yuuichi grow as a character? How does it make him more well-prepared to handle the future to come? And most importantly, how did Yuuichi benefit from that? And I feel that the route failed to show that to its readers.

I guess it could be argued that by remembering Ayu, he gave her the chance to fulfill her wish and revive herself from her coma. I guess that’s a good benefit and it makes remembering Ayu worth it in the end for Yuuichi, but it just isn’t real. That sort of benefit simply cannot translate into the real world; it fails to be relatable and thus leaves me feeling a severe lack of value in this route. And, honestly, I just feel so bad about it. I hope that somebody can help me see this value in her route, and maybe you guys can help me understand how the story was able to impart these messages to you in a relatable way.

I think Ayu’s route had some nice aspects; the duality between past and present Yuuichi was something that I thought was very nice and interesting how it was executed, as well as was the whole thematic late-afternoon scenes with Ayu. But, at the end of the day, that’s all it is: it’s something nice, but it isn’t valuable. I can definitely see people who find value in the artistic aspect of that sort of narrative, but I’m not that kind of person.

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#33
#34

(Anime 2006 only)…Ayu is my favourite character from Kanon (although title of Best Girl belongs to Shiori), not too surprising as she and her story share share so much with a certain one from Clannad. Most of the best funny moments involve Ayu and it was clear that she was at the core of the story from an early point; plus the Angel Wings are such a neat touch to add a bit more quirkiness and mystery that result in a great “a-ha!” moment when we realise their significance.

There are some curiosities about the writing but on the whole I loved the way her story developed from comedy sidekick to making me much more empathetic about her travails, she has some “deeper” great quotes and monologues too. Such a waterworks moment when we hear “…Tsukimiya Ayu… No longer exists in this world.”.

And then we have the Key Magic but even in the anime I felt like this was earned because the setup was all there and it was done so beautifully with the symbolism of the headband. Is Ayu’s miracle recovery a bit cheesy? Who cares! We should all have room in our lives for believing that a miracle is possible.

I have to give this anime arc 5/5.

#35

Ayu’s route also really battled with Makoto for my favorite route. Ayu is my favorite heroine of the visual novel. She is a bit simpler than the others, and her story doesn’t do a whole lot to “complicate” her, but she is my favorite because I found myself smiling in nearly every scene she was in. I feel like I maybe had an advantage in enjoying her route as I already knew what an “ikiryou” was, so when the big twist happened that she was comatose, I had that nice feeling of “Ah, I see what is going on here” which really made me more invested in the story. I also think her and Yuuichi had the strongest and most well established romance, but it was probably sort of meant to be that way because she is the so called “main girl” of the visual novel.

While I sort of saw the twist coming, it still really threw me for a loop. It was really well done. I was encouraged to read this route last, and I think it was really the best choice. It feels like a proper conclusion to Kanon as a whole, and all in all made me enjoy Kanon immensely.

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