The Quest for KINO is back once more, after 2 months it's finally time to continue onward with our quest, and this time, to Kanon. A repeating melody, a repeating routine. Stuck in a dream is Yuichi Aizawa.

For context, this anime is one of KEY's first works and the second to be adapted by Kyoto Animation, coming out a year after AIR's adaptation and a year before Clannad's. I'm watching after I've already watched Clannad so I'm trying to treat Kanon as its own thing the best I can.

The main rundown of the plot is that Yuichi Aizawa revisits his old town from where his cousin Nayuki Minase has lived after a good long 7 years. It is evident to us that Yuichi has mostly forgotten about this place and this will become a running theme as we go further into this. In the first few episodes, we essentially see Yuichi starting to get accustomed to living in the town, going to school, making new friends in the forms of Kaori, Kitagawa, Sayuri, Mai, and Shiori as well as performing errands for Akiko (Nayuki's mother) sometimes when he is available. In these episodes, we're introduced to the new faces of Ayu Tsukimiya and Makoto Sawatari, two vastly different characters in their own right but important to the plot of the story all the same. Essentially, with time, Yuichi has forgotten about most of the promises and unfortunate or lively events that had occurred years ago and in the respected arcs, it's up to Yuichi and the others to find these memories for him. Whether while dreaming or thinking for himself or being brought to a place or person who can jog his memory.

Like most KEY works, there is an underlying message in all of this. Here for Kanon, it's that "memories are important", should be treasured and never forgotten. It should never matter if the memory itself is happy or sad, blocking out the memories would deal a lot more damage in the long run to you and others around you, which was what Yuichi did for the longest time. Messages to the audience can be meaningful to that person if they are struggling themselves and need motivation. I thank KEY works and Jun Maeda for implementing that into their stories.

The arcs in question consisted of the introduction arc where it builds the world around us, gives us a first look at our characters, etc. Nothing inherently too special but definitely not a bad start whatsoever, gives us details into who Yuichi and the others are. Makoto's arc was next and you could tell when an arc was starting with that character because of how it tends to hone on and focus on one specific character for quite a few episodes. I'd like to think Makoto's starts when Yuichi first meets her since we see her often afterward. Either way, Makoto's arc had me loving her character before and after, the relationship that she and Yuichi had being almost like a cat and dog while Makoto pulled her frequent antics beforehand was pretty sweet to see and had me rocking with her character immediately. However, even after Makoto was starting to lose sight of her human traits and could only do little with them, I still really loved her then because of how the relationship between her and Yuichi developed knowing she had little time left to spend with him. There was a beautiful end to her arc, sad but beautiful in that right as well.

Next was Mai's arc which was something I definitely did not expect from this anime whatsoever, action and almost shounen-like scenes for 5 episodes straight with a good backstory and explanation to boot. This is my favourite arc because of Mai's enigmatic but lovable character, the arc's entire intensity, and because of the message of "killing the inner demons that lie within you" so to speak.

Shiori's arc wasn't necessarily that big of an arc but it did highlight more of Shiori's and Kaori's characters and what they were dealing with as a whole. This arc I had a problem with just because of how it was treated. It felt too fast, the pacing wasn't as great as all the other arcs and on top of that, the arc just ends abruptly with a note to Yuichi and nothing else after. Also, I don't think 3 episodes was even enough to get into what Shiori and Kaori were really going through. This arc wasn't bad by any stretch of the imagination because I really did like Shiori's character as a whole but it was definitely not to my taste, I wasn't heavily affected by what it had to offer.

The final arc was a mix between Nayuki and Ayu. This arc had me going through loops but is an ode to everything that had been shown before me and what I had learned in a solid ending to the series as a whole. I do love Ayu's charming character, the relationship she has with Yuichi and Nayuki's enthusiastic and encouraging qualities are charming too. Even in the down periods, sympathy was there for those characters where they definitely needed it which brought the mood back up and Kanon delivered on selling those characters to me thanks to how Kanon wrote these characters into existence. The redemption of Yuichi at the end of the series was satisfying and did put a smile on my face once I was finished.

The OST used was warm, calming, and comforting, almost like a contrast as to how the town was portrayed to us in Kanon, being cold in the winter. The use of musical terms in the titles of episodes was also a nice touch, linking back to Episode 14 and Sayuri mentioning how 'Pachelbel's Kanon' was a piece of music that had the same melody but changed production and instruments slightly as the song progressed. 'Kanon' for the title of the series makes sense since Yuichi's daily routine was essentially the same but changed drastically for each arc.

The OP for Kanon was much like what I described the overall OST being like, calming and comforting with the vocals carrying a lot of weight. In contrast to that though, the ED was bouncy being more akin to a 2000s dance track but also did carry some weight with the vocals.

The visual style for Kanon was what I expected for mid-2000s KyoAni anime to be like, they were only just mastering this new wave of animation at the time and especially so with AIR. I do like the art style of Kanon, it would have been similar to AIR and the other KEY works considering their art style at the time was definitely very similar to one another and I find no issues with this art style. People like to make complaints about the eyes as you would probably know from Clannad, but it doesn't bother me in the slightest if they have big eyes or not since the art style itself is fine as is.

So overall, how do I feel about Kanon? Well, first and foremost, did it resonate with me? I hate to report but, it did not, while I do understand Sayuri's and Shiori's struggles since... bit personal but I had to deal with a 'coping mechanism' like that myself when I was going through a rough time. Other than those little things, nothing immediately stood out to me as being personally meaningful in any sort of regard, hence it doesn't resonate with me much.

Was the message in the details strong? Yes, I believe that "your memories are important" is a testament to growing and improving on one's self and that was the message that they used of Kanon and what they had meant by it, very meaningful and could apply to anyone.

Did I enjoy it for the duration of the time? Yes, I wasn't at all disappointed by any of the arcs or episodes within those arcs whatsoever, there was always something to enjoy. With the tiny exception being how they handled Shiori's little mini-arc and how that ended, it did ultimately make sense however I just wish that it had been adapted a lot better from the original source material being the visual novel, as I had talked to a KEY aficionado about it and even they said the adaptation for that arc lacked a lot.

Do I like the characters? Most, yes. Each character had their unique charms, quirks, lovable qualities, and low points that had you sympathising with them. I'm still unsure where to place Kaori since she is an "eh" sort of character, I don't hate her but I can't say I like her all too much. Kitagawa was mostly used for comedic effect as well and didn't have all too much to his character at all so I'm "eh" on him too.

In conclusion, I can say that Kanon is definitely a solid SoL and a good one to get into when you're willing to start diving into KEY works, this should be your first option if you're wanting to get into KEY but don't know where to start. Aside from the issues with pacing and abrupt endings with little to no clarification, I did enjoy watching Kanon quite a bit and it has almost impressed me as much as Clannad S1 did. However, I still do prefer Clannad S1 over Kanon simply because when reflecting on the two, I had a much more enjoyable experience with Clannad S1 and love the characters there a whole lot more than here, Kanon's characters are good but I really do prefer Clannad's.

For these reasons, I didn't feel as though Kanon fit the bill for where I put Clannad S1 at an 8, so it only really made sense to bring it down to a 7 and I feel as though I'm happy with this score because it still means I enjoyed the anime but did notice the problems it had and that it couldn't necessarily compare to similar anime that I had watched and also enjoyed, so I felt a high 7 here made the most sense to me.