Koimonogatari

Circling back to a middle school girl's apotheosis if we can call it that in <i>Otorimonogatari</i> and the mortal threat it poses to the hero and his girl this Season Two finale is narrated for the first time in the series by a grown-up--but if the word conjures a sense of reliability of stability and certainty to you dear reader then the lesson to take home from this is to trust no one. <p/> Because the teller of the tale who has been summoned by the heroine to defuse the situation despite having been her nemesis since the very outset of the series is--in the absence of the equally shady adult Oshino who at least was an expert--none other than his college frenemy the fake ghostbuster who doesn't believe in ghosts the shameless swindler Deishu Kaiki. <p/> And it is indeed a con that he agrees to perpetrate uncharacteristically pro bono on a wrathful god--a mythic undertaking if true which it may be when a liar among liars holds that his story like any other is all a lie. But maybe not when a man who claims to be wise in the ways of the world sounds just as self-conscious as his adolescent counterparts or a Russian anti-hero.