I took a peek at the manga (not many chapters scanlated at the moment though) and it was telling a very different sort of story where Shinkuro was going around taking dispute mediator gigs and Murasaki was following and helping as a sort of sidekick. Seems to be a lot of other kure-nai source material that the anime didn’t touch on… Maybe we’ve got a chance at a second season?

@tzhuge: I felt the same way about the ‘horn’. Without it, the story could have had the same impact. You’re also right about Lin probably training herself only to be able to fight Benika since she was so obsessed with her. It’s kind of strange that a professional like her would only focus on a specific fighting style, but I guess if you can beat one of the best then you could been almost anyone else (except the Houzuki style in this case).

@Paj: Thanks for your support.

“Did I forgot to mention that this blog is by far one of your most thought out?”

If you’re talking about this last post being more thought out than the rest, then I guess it’s true. I did try to put more thought and detail into my final thoughts of the series and tried to analyze the ending as best as I could.

@Calawain: Another season worth of episodes may have given the series a more complete feeling or it may have made it a bit too long. I mean I enjoyed the slice-of-life parts of the show and would have liked to see more development of the side characters, but you have to wonder if people would get tired of it. I, for one, would have welcomed it though.

I never read the novels so I wasn’t aware that parts of it was anime-only. The animation quality did fall a bit at times, but I wasn’t really too concerned about it. And yes, the musical episode was pretty awesome solely by the fact that it was a musical episode. =P

@Zanshun: You have a good point. Murasaki’s presence and interactions with the other characters was a vital part of the series. I only mentioned a possibility of having another season where the story could continue logically. Of course, it probably would never happen since I doubt many people would continue to watch it without her. A retelling of the story could work where they would focus more on developing the other characters and having Murasaki still living with Shinkurou. Not sure how it would work with a drama series like this, but it’s worked for other series like Negima or Minami-ke, I think.

In my mind the only possibility of a sequel is 1. a time skip 2. Renjou dies/gets killed and Murasaki ends back up with Shinkurou. Neither sound plausible and both would really detract from the message and the scope and the conclusiveness of this first season.

Of course they could go totally offwall and do a retelling like with the Incredible hulk. Go like the manga and have episodic stories with Shinkuro’s mediating missions and have Murasaki there without mentioning the first season and not going into her history.

What I liked most about the show was the conversation flow and the humor of the first 3/4 of it, before they got into the anime original story at the end. Combine that with the really crisp animation of most of that first part of the series and I had given it a 9/10 going along. But it kind of slips down to an 8/10 as the anime original stuff was only “alright” and the animation quality slipped quite a few times.

Still, it was something quite unique and generally enjoyable to watch. I mean hell, I never would of thought I’d enjoy a musical episode of anything.

Did I forgot to mention that this blog is by far one of your most thought out?

The way I rationalize Yayoi being able to defeat Lin so quickly is that Lin trained herself specifically to fight Benika. I think there’s been plenty of hints indicating Lin is totally obsessed with fighting and defeating Benika. So it stands to reason that she would have trained specifically for it.

@Webbmaster62: Killing off Ryuuji might have been good for us, but it may have causes some problems for Shinkurou and the Kuhouins. If Ryuuji would have died, then they might not have let Shinkurou go and hunted him down to the ends of the world. Murasaki probably wouldn’t have gotten off so easily either.

@Phil: Stuff like that may very well still exist today, you just don’t hear about it much.

@Zanshun: I don’t think the ending was that conclusive to the point of no possibility of a sequel or follow up. I’m not sure how far the story can go, but they can still expand on other things like character backgrounds or even a new mission for Shinkurou. It doesn’t have to stop with Murasaki (even though she was the main point of the series).

Overall I feel that Kurenai was an awesome ride, and though it was a bit short it’s message came through just fine. =D