MONOGATARI Series: OFF & MONSTER Season

Episode 12

This episode is about two things: reviewing the clues of the mystery so far and setting up the reunion between Shinobu and Suicide Master.

On the former front, this is necessary because we have a mixture of fake clues and real ones. And by reviewing them, we can partially solve the mystery. As for the fake clues, no one is going to leave a dying message in a code so complex it takes a whiteboard to decode. After all, the point of such a message is to tell whoever finds their body who did the crime. If you need to take the code to a code breaker, you've messed up. Not to mention that creating a complex code is not something you do as you're being drained of blood. No, these kinds of messages were well thought out and planned, not by the victim but by the perpetrator.

This brings us to the real clues. The first is that the fake clues exist as all. The perpetrator is likely leaving them behind to 1) play a game with the investigators and 2) implicate the Suicide Master. The next clue is that the perpetrator is almost certainly connected to Naoetsu Private High School's girls' basketball team (as all the victims have been members of it). Of the five missing girls, four have been found as barely living husks. But the fifth remains at large, despite Gaen's best efforts. Reading between the lines, this all implies that the remaining missing student, Kiseki Souwa, is the perpetrator—a vampire feeding on her teammates.

But even if we have a good guess as to the “who” the “why” is still unclear. There were many issues with the basketball team in Kanbaru's absence. Understandably, those on the team would want to lash out as they were basically bullying both each other and themselves. But why attack these four girls specifically? That's the big question that remains.

The rest of the episode is focused on preparing for Suicide Master's awakening. Shinobu, in her current form, is far different from the “fairy tale princess” she was when she met Suicide Master originally. At the same time, she is not the legendary vampire Kiss-Shot Acerola-Orion Heart-Under-Blade that she was for centuries. While Shinobu herself is happy with how her life (undeath?) has turned out—finding the companionship that she always longed for in Araragi—things aren't quite that simple.

While those around Araragi accept her and their connection, it's still a bit embarrassing for a great vampire to fall so low. For all rights and purposes, Shinobu will be meeting both her oldest friend and vampiric father in Suicide Master. She obviously wants to get Suicide Master's approval. It's a matter of pride. This poorly thought-out scam involves Shinobu pretending she is the master, not the servant, and booting Kanbaru out of her house for the night. We'll just have to see how their reunion turns out next week, and what information Suicide Master will be able to reveal about the ongoing mystery.

Rating:

Random Thoughts:

• Why is Araragi picking on Sodachi, angering her by asking for her to pretend to be a servant?

• If it weren't for the fact that Hamukai is completely unrelated to the supernatural world, I might have pegged her as a suspect (since it seems like she'd be a person who'd leave coded messages at the scene of the crime).

• It's nice to know the meaning behind Shinobu and Suicide Master's laugh together or I might think something sinister was going on.

• The fact that Kanbaru was just like, “Oh, you need my house? No problem! Bye!” did get a laugh out of me.

MONOGATARI Series: OFF & MONSTER Season is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.