Kanon - Mai Kawasumi Route & Character Discussion

[kyuketsukimiyu]

The vagueness of the answer increases when you look at one dialog in the epilogue clearly stating "“If at the end of the dream, there is something that would make me feel brave enough to return to reality, it would be a new beginning for that innocent young girl […]”. That kind of implies that what Yuuichi is seeing at that moment in time is actually a dream.

This line is actually what made me think the ending did happen in reality. I felt like the text was saying Yuuichi would have given up but didn’t because Mai’s power created the miracle.

I believe that Mai sacrificed herself not because of her lack of willingness to continue living and not because of her own guilt at realizing she was hurting other people, but because she probably thought that that was literally the only way to destroy the demons once and for all.

The two things that make me thing that her stabbing herself is more of an emotional-thing than a slay-demons thing are that by that point, when Mai and Yuuichi meet again, Mai is looking past Yuuichi to attack not a demon, but the bunny girl who was behind Yuuichi. This coupled with the line

If she is to start a new life , all ties to the old one must be severed

Leads me to think that stabbing herself was more about rejecting the current Mai and the 10 years of pain she had from fighting demons.

What do you think is the theme of the latter half of the route? Specifically, everything after Sayuri gets into her little accident.

I think the way they split the ending into a few info dumps made it a lot harder to pick out what the ultimate theme was - but I felt like it was focusing mostly on acceptance. The feeling I got was that once Yuuichi really accepted Mai they reveal just how little Mai accepts herself.

[HeliosAlpha]

“If at the end of the dream, there is something that would make me feel brave enough to return to reality, it would be a new beginning for that innocent young girl […]

After going over it some, I’m with Miyu.

“If at the end of the dream, there is something that would make me feel brave enough to return to reality, it would be a new beginning for that innocent young girl […]”

The big gap is which dream he’s talking about, and that word comes up a lot. The graduation scene can be a dream, but the flash-forward is also a dream. On top of that, when Yuuichi gets killed in the demon fight, he refers to his time with Mai as a dream. So I read it as he turns away from the dream of the demon hunter in order to make a new beginning for that innocent young girl.

[Kanon]

I’m really hoping to get my post done before the podcast, but just incase I don’t, there is something I want to highlight.

What is the benefit of making Mai yet another childhood friend?

I feel this is a really weak plot point that serves no purpose, I mean I get it, it’s Kanon, Ayu and Nayuki literally SWIM in their memories of Yuichi, and Makoto is there too, but it’s not a mandatory thing to be a Kanon girl, Shiori has none of it, there is really not much point in Mai having that relationship, it doesn’t bring anything to the route.

It’s a simple thought that came to mind, I’d love to know what people thing on the matter.

[Pepe]

Leads me to think that stabbing herself was more about rejecting the current Mai and the 10 years of pain she had from fighting demons.

Well, if that were the case, then why does she have to go so far as to stab herself?

[kyuketsukimiyu]

Current Mai had to die so that the Mai who was free from pain could be born. Current Mai could not be the innocent hopeful girl who she was meant to be, so she that Mai kills herself and her power re-creates her as a Mai who can be hopeful girl she would have become if she had not been fighting demons for 10 years.

[EisenKoubu]

Now then, one last question I would like you guys to answer is : What do you think is the theme of the latter half of the route?

Going back to the beginning of the route, Yuuichi took pity on Mai because she didn’t act feminine enough; she never talks to people, hides her emotions and has no real friends besides Sayuri. Yuuichi finds it his responsibility to teach her how to properly express herself, and experience life as it should be experienced.

He tried to teach her how to be feminine, but that didn’t work since her duty to protect the school from her own demons ended up being far more important. So, Yuuichi figured that the best way to teach her how to live to the fullest was to assist her in defeating her demons. It was then that he realized that the only thing truly holding Mai back was herself, as it was her power that conjured the demons in the first place.

In context of the ending of the route, Mai’s ability to experience life to the fullest is locked away in part because her life is tied by fate to Yuuichi’s. Once she knew he was the only one who could accept her powers, she was duty-bound to protect their bond and their friendship. When Yuuichi left, it reduced her to a recluse, locking away her heart and constantly fighting away her inner demons, literally. The field of wheat that turned into the school building was their playground, and she promised to protect it until it came back. But after ten (Seriously, ten? Why not seven like every other route? >.> ) years, perhaps even she forgot why she was fighting the demons in the first place.

Ultimately, the theme of Mai’s route is not really about hope, sacrifice, or acceptance. It isn’t about friendship, family or the development of the self. It’s yet another imitation of the same melody, a melody of finding joy and peace in life despite its trials and the mistakes we all make as humans. Mai was not wrong in attaching herself to Yuuichi, nor was Yuuichi wrong in leaving her behind, as both had to happen. How they each took it to heart, however, ended up steering their life courses in different, undesirable directions that had to be corrected with their reunion by fate. Yuuichi was the only one who could help Mai overcome the pains of her past, as he was ordained by fate to do so. That is, in my opinion, the overall theme of this route, as well as the overall theme of Kanon.

[Pepe]

I find it a bit absurd that she would have to go so far as to be recreated by her power just to become a hopeful girl. I would think that that sort of emotional growth would require a more emotional solution, like naturally getting over it through a gradual change in mindset.

and even if that is the truth, it kinda cheapens character development, IMO.

In context of the ending of the route, Mai’s ability to experience life to the fullest is locked away in part because her life is tied by fate to Yuuichi’s.

I think I would disagree with that, as I honestly felt the theme of the first half of the route was Yuuichi realizing that he was wrong in trying to find a way to make Mai live her life to the fullest because, well, she already had a great thing going with Sayuri. If it weren’t for the demons, which caused physical problems for both her and the people around her, she’d have had a pretty nice school life and personality that would not be asking for more.

Actually, now that I think about it, the whole “imaginary daily life” scene with Mai goes against what I believe so much; I don’t want Mai to live with this kind of crybaby personality, because she can already handle life with her current personality, and fairly well at that. Why try to change what already works and gets her happiness, after all?

So, in my opinion, the only thing worth accepting is the fact that there isn’t wrong with her except for the demons that she conjures up from her powers.

[therationalpi]

[[Trigger warning for self-harm]]

I really can’t see Mai’s route as anything other than an allegory regarding self-harm and self-destructive behavior.

Throughout the arc we see Mai fight, quite literally, with her inner demons. In the process, she injures herself, damages the school, and hurts the people she cares about. The demons are representative of Mai’s inner turmoil, different aspects of that pain that drive her towards self-destructive behavior. It’s telling that Mai fights using a sword, a bladed weapon not unlike the knives and razor blades that a cutter might use to hurt themselves. This portion of the allegory is fairly self-explanatory, but I think that relating this to the narrative is where things become interesting.

First off, I get the sense that Yuuichi ends up being the impetus for Mai to start “killing off” these inner demons. The fact that there is this person that gets close enough to see this hidden part of her life, something that she hides even from Sayuri, forces Mai to really deal with these problems. Unfortunately, rather than understanding these demons and reconciling with them, she assaults them with her sword, rejecting them and thereby rejecting an important part of herself. Ultimately, this approach hurts her deeply, even if Yuuichi doesn’t realize that until it’s too late. From his point of view, Mai is overcoming these demons, but in truth she only achieves this at great cost to herself.

What does the damage to the school signify, and how does Mai’s reluctance to blame the demons figure in? The natural symbolism here is that the collateral damage signifies the outward harm that Mai commits while fighting with her own emotions. However, rather than blaming those inner demons that she cannot control, Mai chooses to take responsibility for the damage. On the one hand, this can be seen as admirable, Mai does not want to take the easy path. On the other hand, the first step to recovery in mental illness is often to admit that one doesn’t have control and needs help, and this is a step that Mai is not willing to take. Rather than revealing those inner demons that control her, Mai would sacrifice her own reputation.

The attacks on Sayuri represent how Mai’s emotional problems affect the ones closest to her. Naturally, the very fact that Sayuri cares for Mai makes her more vulnerable to these attacks. And when Sayuri suffers from Mai’s inner demons, Mai’s response is to lash out violently, making a scene, and further destroying her reputation.

Finally, Mai’s suicide at the end of the arc makes much more sense in this context. Rather than coming at a moment of reconciliation, as the bare narrative seems to suggest, within the allegorical context this act comes at the depth of Mai’s self-harm. She has utterly assaulted her own psyche, completely rejected those part of herself that are most painful, and all that is left is to take her own life.

Ultimately, Mai’s story is a very sad one. It’s a story of self-rejection, self-harm, and the all-to-common tendency to value personal responsibility over one’s own mental and physical health.

[Mogaoscar]

What does the damage to the school signify, and how does Mai’s reluctance to blame the demons figure in? The natural symbolism here is that the collateral damage signifies the outward harm that Mai commits while fighting with her own emotions.

I’m finding it hard to finish this routes before the podcast, and I still have to do the Sayuri mini route…

Anyway, here are some general thoughts, and just before the Podcast I think I’ll post something more detailed, deep and I’ll have a look and analyze your thoughts as well.

So far, I’ve found this route to be the most easy to read. It was full of hilarious moments and even if there was no comedy at some points, just hearing Sayuri’s voice or Mai’s sprites made it enjoyable. The think I liked the most about this situations is how you had to guess most of the time how Mai was feeling just by looking at her sprite or by noticing the most subtle actions she made. It left Mai’s feelings up to interpret by the reader a lot of the times.

I coincide like most of you in that the day part of the route was much better than the fights against the demons:

it would have helped a great deal if the danger behind the demons Mai fights were greater.

Yeah, we aren’t told much about these demons. Up until the end, the only think we know is that they are there, they kind of try to attack Mai for no apparent reason, but neither Mai nor Yuuichi ever get seriously hurt. Then, all of a sudden, Sayuri gets severely wounded in two occasions. It looks way to plot-convenient. It felt a bit off, but still, it helped advance the storyline.

One theme in this route is friendship, however, not friendship in a way I hate to see: the typical shone situation in which for some reason some strange “power of friendship” saves the day. No, I mean true friendship, the one about helping others or caring about others when they are having a bad time. Obviously, Sayuri and Mai are a vivid representation of this kind of friendship, but you could say the same about Yuuichi in this route. He ended up caring not only for Mai, the route’s heroine, but also for Sayuri. He really felt guilty when something bad happened to either of them and tried to help them regardless of what could happen to him. I’d say this is the most human Yuuichi I’ve seen so far.

As for the ending, it was certainly emotional, and profound. The whole “you’ve got to accept yourself” concept was really well put here as I’ll expand on in another post. However, the moment Mai commits suicide is quite unexpected, and in a bad way. The more I think about it the harder I find it to find a logical explanation as for why would Mai do something like that.

My first thought was that she didn’t feel like she was worthy to live a happy life with Yuuichi because of how she had focused on the demons that she realizes she was the source of and caused everybody a lot of problems

This is the closest I get to some logical explanation. Maybe she really wanted to hurt herself as a punishment for what she had caused, like Yuuichi says just after the second time Sayuri gets sent to hospital.

About the last part, I’d say this has a very similar feeling to CLANNAD (Heavy After Story spoilers) It feels like when Tomoya finds himself embracing the lifeless body of Nagisa. Is all that happened afterwards an imagination of an alternative world or reality itself.

I guess we will never know, but both interpretations are a good ending, though the one in which Mai remains dead looks like the true ending to me.

I’ll go read the Sayuri mini route now and try to post something more before the bookclub. Cheers and I hope to see you (or rather hear or read from you) during the podcast!

Edit
I finished the mini route and I’ve got to say that even though it’s short, it condenses Sayuri’s backstory very well. Something I liked about this route is that Sayuri doesn’t get her backstory from the fact that she tried to commit suicide. She had her own personality even before we knew about her story. That’s something you don’t see usually, since most of the characters I’ve seen in Anime and Visual novels tend to be only remembered for their backstory rather than from their personality.

Anyway, now that I wrote the obligatory paragraph about Sayuri I’ll get into the demons symbology.

The demons are a manifestation of Mai’s power, this is what we know for sure. However, what does Mai killing the demons represent? As some of you have already said and is partially implied in the VN, Mai is rejecting her own powers because people were afraid of them. This leads to a self-reject situation and what I feel this represents is that Mai, in the process of rejecting her own powers, she is rejecting what she herself is, her very own essence.

This is why Mai’s limb grow darker and starts loosing her balance and strenght as she keeps on killing those demons, because what she really is doing is killing herself. Summed up, it would mean that rejecting a part of us is like rejecting what we are, so we would be negating our own existence. For me this is the most important theme in the route.

What does the damage to the school signify, and how does Mai’s reluctance to blame the demons figure in? The natural symbolism here is that the collateral damage signifies the outward harm that Mai commits while fighting with her own emotions.

That is exactly what I think. The damage cause to the school is the colateral damage she is actually causing to both Sayuri and Yuuichi.

[Kanon]

January 11th

I touched on her introduction over in the common route thread, and what a wonderful introduction it is.

January 12th

Shoujo no Ori still going strong, it’s not a song that should go with daytime scenes by all means, but since we know nothing about Mai and she’s all alone, it manages to continue the air of mystery.

Course I said she’s all alone just now, but Sayuri comes along to change that fact and Shoujo no Ori is banished back to the night, the otherworldly nature of Mai takes a backseat and Yuichi launches bullygirl.exe for her almost immediately. While she says almost nothing herself, her very presence completely changes the atmosphere and allows Yuichi to see Mai as more human.

Interestingly enough, Mai pats Makoto’s head to comfort her this day, stating she thought it would calm her down (Makoto Spoiler)Amano did the same thing to the deteriorated Makoto to good effect, considering Makoto’s true nature, this deepens the mystery of Mai even moreso. Although the routes are, ultimately, different writers so it might not mean a thing.

January 13th

We begin the day with Yuichi talking about Mai’s shit infront of the ladies eating because he a crass barbarian. I feel like Yuichi’s teasing of Mai is a lot more juvenile than the other girls, with them he aims to make himself seem better than them, but with Mai he just fucks around. We also get some nice hints at Sayuri’s miniroute.

Here we see the route really start to kick in, Yuichi being all like ‘why should Mai be here alone all night that sucks’. It’s also the last time we see Shoujo no Ori for quite some time, as the mysterious atmosphere of Mai begins to melt away as Yuichi gets more and more comfortable around her.

January 15th

Here’s where the demons/evil spirits(I’ll be calling them demons) really make a scene, you have a scene that is completely unfathomable for any other part of the VN, where Yuichi is running for his life and Mai’s dinner from actual monsters, the Mai route is W E I R D, and this day cements that fact as real.

dates are dropped from now on

For a solid week it just becomes Yuichi hanging out with Mai and Sayuri, as I said a bit earlier, Shoujo no Ori vanishes for this period, this period where the strange and bizarre Mai becomes a normal girl, the effect is fantastic. The strong chemistry of Kanon doesn’t seem to make it’s appearance, Yuichi doesn’t fuck with Mai in the same ways he fucks with the other girls because he knows he won’t get a reaction and he’s downright POLITE to Sayuri, so even in the ordinary everyday life, Mai’s route is completely different to the rest, this is not a bad thing to say the least, but it’s certainly curious.

The ball is some great stuff, Shoujo no Ori finally shows up again to help give it a fairytail atmosphere while Mai guzzles sausages. While the scene is a nice departure it’s not in itself a huge deal, the consequences of it are the good stuff and you see something very important about Mai and Sayuri’s personalities, namely that they themselves are nothing, the other is everything. Mai intimidating the student council president was some cool shit.

It’s pretty neat how the demons are strong, they don’t go down easy, Yuichi adamantly talks about how fucked up he’ll get if they hit him even once, vomits when he is hit, rather than some trash for Mai to cut down to look cool, they’re a real deal.

OH NO H-SCENE. Naturally the only fitting music for this is The Only Thing I Know For Real, due to it’s associate with another sword wielder like Mai. It’s as amusing as ever, but not quite as cumsniffingly funny as Makoto.

Following that however we get a very good scene, Mai flipping shit, and Yuichi running into her sword to grab her face and get that thing he’s been offhandedly mentioning he doesn’t get thoughout the entire route, eye contact, he forces Mai to look at him and listen to him while she acts completely not Mai
(sidenote: anime version of this scene gets my dick rock hard, in which it happens at the dead of night after leaving the hospital, having her wait a day and doing it in school just seems completely off to me). Regardless it’s good shit and a nice beginning to the big finale.

The big finale which is super cool for reasons that basically boil down to Mai jumping off the roof to kill a demon holy shit just typing that sentence is cool. I feel the impossibility to visualize the demons make the fight scenes of Kanon someone dubious, but there is nothing vague about Mai jumping off the roof.

But then the route takes it’s strange turn, with ZE PLOT TWIST, Mai being the demons, it’s kind of huge really, it’s not really important to the entire rest of the route, the route would have been perfectly coherent without it and don’t get me wrong it’s not a bad thing, but it’s kind of odd how something so huge can have so little impact on the entire story as a whole. As stated in my earlier post, I don’t think it was entirely necessary to have her have known Yuichi, their relationship stands perfectly fine without that, but everything else is good stuff. Writing, music, atmosphere, cheesy fucking writing, emotional impact, it’s really good. Especially the flashback with Mai’s mother.

Mai Epilogue

2 straight minutes of Mai chopping people and I love it.

Sayuri Miniroute

Why this is optional I have no idea, Sayuri is very important part of the route, there is no reason to pass over her because the route ‘belongs’ to Mai. Her backstory is straight fucked up, but the main draw of the miniroute is seeing laid bare how utterly pits Sayuri’s self esteem is, this is important, because Mai’s is the same, the two girls and their complete devotion to each other stems from their shared lack of single solitary shit given about themselves.

Mai’s Route

This is pretty good, it’s very constant in it’s quality, it doesn’t take any dips and really peaks into an emotional climax at the end. The route stands out in how utterly bizarre it is, in an otherwise fairly normal setting with a slight magical feeling lingering in the air, Mai’s route comes along with demons and swordplay and the mysterious atmosphere of Mai herself in general. It’s constant, it’s unusual, and it’s worth a read. I route like this wouldn’t work in say, Clannad or Little Busters, it embodies the melancholic feel of Kanon with it’s heavy use of blues and terrible Maeda shitposting.

Mai, Sayuri, and Yuichi

Yuichi doesn’t treat Mai like any other girl, his teasing is more subtle, and Sayuri joins in on it too, of course, this works well, these characters, like most of Kanon depend on each other to shine, both in universe and in the writing, if that isn’t an example of good stuff I don’t know what is. Mai is about as good as you can do with the silent character type, her personality, her likes, dislikes, thoughts, even though she says nothing, these things are displayed clearly, a lot of media try and use this character type but rarely do they succeed in making it as great as Mai is.

Overall

I feel like I’ve said a lot of my thoughts already, the route is extremely solid with a fantastic climax, but I feel it’s perhaps a little too solid, remaining good if stagnant for quite a while. It’s definitely a good read but I’m just getting this nagging feeling I could be better but that makes it sound like I DIDN’T enjoy the entire thing which is wrong ahhhhh.

[Naoki_Saten]

What is the benefit of making Mai yet another childhood friend?

Simply put, it defines Yuuichi’s strongest connection to Mai at the end of the route and makes him… important.
The source of all of Mai’s problems is actually her power. It made her the subject of persecution. It made her weak. It drove her to despair at the end of the route.
But Yuuichi is the only person who openly accepted and even praised her power. He’s the only person theoretically capable of saving Mai from her self-hatred. He is the reason why the demons appeared in the first place.
The current Yuuichi can’t do that, because demons=power was only revealed at the end. The current Yuuichi can’t be the guy who accepts Mai despite her powers because he doesn’t know about them. Therefore, he can’t save her from her biggest problem.

Without all that (you’ll probably disagree with me here), Mai’s route would be just about Yuuichi being the super good guy who was nice enough to hang out with an unsocial girl and her perfect best friend.

[Kanon]

Without all that (you’ll probably disagree with me here), Mai’s route would be just about Yuuichi being the super good guy who was nice enough to hang out with an unsocial girl and her perfect best friend.

I mean that is what it is, and what’s wrong with that? Aside from Sayuri being perfect because she ain’t.

Yuichi can accept her powers after finding out without having already thought they were cool in the past. That won’t change him accepting them.

[Naoki_Saten]

We have the story equivalent of spaghetti code here. If you change one part, you’re forced to alter lots of other parts it’s connected to.

If Mai hadn’t met Yuuichi, she wouldn’t have created the demons. No demons means no noble task to keep her going. But then, Mai as we know her wouldn’t even exist. She would be the frail, crying girl we get a glimpse of near the end of the route.

That would suck, so other excuses are needed to keep the story as close to the original as possible. Let’s say there’s a reason for demons to appear regardless (no love involved? Oh, come on!) - but it would lessen Yuuichi’s importance and disconnect him from the demons issue completely. If your current crush tells you to stop fighting demons, it can’t even compare to your crush of over 10 years who’s also the reason for them existing doing so.

The way I see it, no matter how you change it, it would always lead to cutting out several layers from both the story and Mai’s character.

[Pepe]

If the demons appeared regardless, then it could have been caused by some other, deep-seated emotional problem; one that Yuuichi, as someone she just met (theoretically), would try to help her get over.

And I personally think that would have been a better way of constructing this route than what was done :kurumu:

[Kanon]

Hmm, we seem to agree it can work without it, just disagree that it would seriously effect the story.

Most of Mai is entirely grounded in the current time, she doesn’t even remember him. Little would really have to change.

[Sonic112003]

I just have finished Mai’s route and I think I understand now why Mai had wanted to sacrifice herself. It was her powers that she needed to fight her own personal demons that she could come to terms of protecting the school. It was really Yuuichi she had to meet during their encounter at the wheat field that she needed to not be afraid of her powers but for to accept them. Mai’s struggles when fighting in the school only had served to severe her good points and her reputation in that no one would ever believe that she was causing damage to herself and others. This route did feel otherworldly as Yuuichi had described when he first met her and when I thought of Mai back then, she was really distant and anti-social because no one could understand what she was doing in the night at that time, but it was Yuuichi that had thought she was almost like a different person from another world that had an otherworldly realm.

I did enjoy the dynamics between Mai and Sayuri with their deep friendship they had with each other and Yuuichi having so much fun with them both as well as eating together at the corridor that led to the rooftop. I also enjoy the scene where they had the school ball dance when her sprite was shown for the beautiful dress she was wearing as well as Sayuri. The H-scene after the incident with Sayuri at the school did feel strange at first, even though it did not have anything to do with the story, almost (correct if me I’m wrong if I offended anyone) was important for him to be useful to her and was probably the only solution he could think of in easing her pain and suffering.

The dream that Yuuichi had when Mai had stabbed herself made me think of how Yuuichi could have a different life altogether with them and how they would treasure those moments. The fact that it would have been deemed impossible for him to accept that dream and to be alone without Mai in his life would be devastating. The ending was rather touching and it was funny to see them interact with each other using chops on their heads when they were joking with her.

I think that what makes the connection between them so special that they were willing to be together despite whatever problems they may face, but with Mai, she has changed so much from her offset personality to one that could enjoy one’s company and also to share those moments with each other towards the future. I would rate her route a 3 out of 5.

[bionic]

… I don’t mind this route (Ahaha)

I really did enjoy this route. Even though the bulk of the route was crammed into the end, I felt that a comfy amount of time was spent on it. I don’t have much to say about this other than I enjoyed it, so here are some things:

Mai’s mom says “Ahaha” like Sayuri. Is this the source of her attachment?

Theory I found somewhere (for the life of me I can’t remember where): The demons represent the members of the construction crew who built the school

Makoto still gets sick and stuff in this route.

And now it’s time to talk about Shoujo no Ori (The Girl’s Prison).
Damn is this song underplayed. I don’t think it works well as an “everyday hanging around” song, but the sense of mystery that comes with it is perfect for those hunting nights, and it’s just classy enough to fit the ball scene. You can really get the feel of someone staring out of a locked window from it (which is perfect). As for the title of the song, I think that the prison refers to one of three things:

1. The prison is the school. In a more physical sense, she is bound to the school by the demons she has to fight every night.

2. The prison is herself. By extension of the first theory, she created the demons, so in turn she has trapped herself. While I don’t really understand the stabbing scene towards the end, it can tie in here because she kills herself to release herself from her own prison.

3. The prison is Yuuichi. By extension of the second theory(lol), the demons came from Yuuichi leaving the town. She is trapped by the demons, etc

All three have one thing in common, the demons. Unfortunately I don’t have anything to go off of past that so I’ll stop here.

I rate 4/5. I enjoyed this route a lot, but the main part was slammed into the end.

[RickyNg1994]

I wonder, is Mai still alive at the end of her route after she stabbed herself with her sword? I mean, I strongly believe she survived her suicide attempt. We see her powers talking to Yuuichi where he tells her that he truly loves Mai and wants to be with her (with her alive and well, of course). Hearing this, and the fact that Mai accepted her powers, Mai’s powers healed her wound, saving her life. Of course, she and Sayuri had to stay at the hospital for a while. After they got out of the hospital, both Mai and Sayuri then proceed to graduate, with Yuuichi by their side. I believe that’s what actually happened, considering Key Magic and the fact that Mai’s powers healed her when she accepted her powers. What do you all think? Is this what you all believe happen? It’s most likely that Mai is alive at the end of her route, including Sayuri.

[Takafumi]

I wonder, is Mai still alive at the end of her route after she stabbed herself with her sword?

Like several parts of Kanon, the ending of Mai’s route is up for interpretation. In this case, you either take the ending literally and believe they moved on happily, or you follow the implication that the “ending” is Yuuichi’s idea of what the future could’ve been like.
The fact that it is left so blatantly open is one of my favorite aspects of the route.

If you go over to the Nayuki thread, one of the last posts in it is an excerpt of a blog post I wrote explaining similar things. All of the ideas in it are applicable to the Mai route, though I unfortunately haven’t taken the time to write a Mai version of the post. It’s actually my favorite post on the forum (of my own at least) so I should really go and cover the rest of Kanon in a similar style.

[machelmore]

I reread Mai’s route of Kanon yesterday and I have to say, it’s not as good as I remember it being. It used to be my favourite route, but I’m not so sure now. That’s not to say that my opinion of Kanon has gotten worse overall, I actually thought the common route was a lot better than I remember, though that’s probably because of its similarities to the One common route due to my One bias. In any case, it’s not Kanon in general, but Mai’s route specifically that’s not living up to my memories of it.

My biggest issue with the route is the long flashback scene with Mai and her mother. That entire subplot was pointless and shoehorned in, in my opinion. There was no foreshadowing for it, and it didn’t really have any impact on later events either. We see within that scene Mai’s desire to go to the zoo and her love for animals, which means that both originated from before the time-frame we’re shown, and therefore can’t really be used as foreshadowing.

You see, earlier we got the scene where Yuuichi figured out everything that was happening:

Ten years. I feel like they really missed a chance for an emotional scene here by ending it so quickly. Not to mention the music that plays immediately after is “Afterglow”, which to me invokes an image of hope, not despair, and is completely out of place and ruins the mood as well as any chance there was of the scene being emotional.

It seems to me like the subplot about Mai and her mother was an honestly cheap attempt to cram some emotion into the route after they missed their chance earlier. It distracts from the emotional gratification that we could have gotten when we find out that Mai and Yuuichi can get those ten years back.

In summary, I think that if they focused more on the ten years lost and taken back rather than throwing in the unnecessary mother scene, the route would be much more succinct and emotional.