YES I know I've been really slow in watching shows like this and I apologize to my sister who is always waiting on me so we can watch it together. ANYWAY I WOULD SAY SPOILERS but I'm probably the last one to finish this series (along with my sister) so I don't think any of this is spoilers to anyone. If anything people are telling me to hurry up so I can finish the series already... :V (Well my sister is anyway)
But I want to talk about this episode since it was kind of sad. Kind of.
The interesting part I thought about this episode is how something like this can be more touching than two episodes before when Nagisa died. For me when Nagisa died, yea it was a sad event but I wasn't crying or feeling that emphatic. Yet the end of episode 18 seemed to have that effect. Perhaps its the young innocent child, unknowing and unaware of the plight that she and her father have to go through, or maybe its just the parental bonding which seems to affect me so well (I attribute this to why I like AIR so much as well). But I just found it strange how I found Tomoya recalling about Nagisa to his daughter so much more emotionally powerful than for Nagisa to die herself. It might just be the parental bonding thing. Regardless Key has always been this way.
Another thing that Key has always been is to make the series... not so frustrating, even if its sad. Case in point, Tomoya. In any other type of show, I may have got frustrated at the protagonist whenever they go into a fit or a state of depression (ie emoing), mainly because I find the reasons usually pretty stupid. But I can't with Tomoya. From his anger raging to his father to his "life sucks" theory after Nagisa died, Tomoya never frustrated me even though I thought he would. His frustration for his father seems understandable since, according to Tomoya at time time, his father did ruin a lot of things. However, as episode 18 showed, his father WAS really trying to care for him. Both sides had their understandable story and no one was at fault in my eyes.
The other part that I thought I would be annoyed at was Tomoya's depression after Nagisa died. But even then I thought his actions were understandable. He had been complaining about it a while earlier how he wondered if he did the right thing. I think he thinks about these things because he wonders if he's actually suitable for Nagisa, who he regards as this wonderful angel (which in a way she is at some times). Seeing his past and his relationship with his father, along with the not-so-noble job he has, he does have reason to feel that he's not suitable. And when of all things Nagisa dies, its understandable that he felt that HE made the mistake of being in a relationship and "killing" the angel Nagisa. Some, I think, may believe he was just being selfish and wished he never experienced the pain of the death of a loved one. This may be true but for me, judging how they developed Tomoya and the way Key presents this series, it seems to me that Tomoya is more blaming himself for the pain of others than for the pain of himself.
Key is certainly an expert at making sad stories not frustrating. Its hard for me to watch most depressing or sad stories because I usually feel frustrated or think the reasonings behind their emoing is not legit. I still have to watch more with the series but while I won't give up the top favorite spot of AIR, I am certainly commending this series to be quite good (interestingly enough since it seems that many people I meet when talking about After Story didn't like it as much as the first season, or at least not as much as other shows). At the very least, better than Kanon which was pretty much all romance and something I couldn't really relate to. :x
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