Out with the old, in with the new I suppose. This is one of those times where I wish they didn’t get rid of the old. I liked how Takemoto finally realizes the real reason for his journey when he’s together with Hagu. Thanks to his journey, you can see that Takemoto has really matured. I have mixed feelings about the ending. On one hand it was very good if we only consider Takemoto’s story. On the other hand, the Mayama, Rika, and Ayu situation doesn’t get a conclusion in this episode. Although I guess it wasn’t meant to have a conclusion when you take into consideration how Takemoto’s story ended. By not wrapping everything up you know things will continue to roll forward and this isn’t the end of the road yet. Life will have times of happiness, tribulations, sadness, and confusion, but the bottom line is the wheel will keep on turning.

This series caught me off guard. I was pleasantly surprised by how fresh and entertaining this series was right from the very beginning. The character designs were extermely well-suited for a series that contained drama on one end of the spectrum and humour on the other end. One of the best things about this series are the characters. They all have very distinct personalities and there is a whole lot of character development. You can see how they all change through the course of the series. Each and every one of us can find some sort of connection with at least one of the characters. I highly recommend both anime and non-anime fans to give “Honey and Clover” a try, you will not regret it.

I guess it’s a bit late to hope for a Mayama and Yamada episode. They could easily extend the series for another season if they spent that time on that part of the story. Unfortunately it doesn’t seem like that will happen so we’ll have to make due with what we have. I don’t dislike Takemoto’s story at all, it’s just that I would have liked to see them spend more time on Mayama and Yamada’s story. Hagu seems the most troubled because of Takemoto’s absence. I’m excited to see how this will all play out. With the next episode being the last one, I hope they will be able to provide a satisfying ending.

Ah! Only two episodes of “Honey and Clover” left! This episode is quite possibly the least humourous one thus far. Of course in no way am I implying it was a bad episode. On the contrary, I thought it was really meaningful. Takemoto is still continuing with his bike journey in search of his identity. Ayu meets Rika for the first time. It was only a matter of time before they were bound to meet one another. By watching Rika you can really feel that she is still not ready to move on. My only real complaint with this episode is Morita didn’t have a single line in this episode. He only appears twice, both for a very brief moment. With just two episodes left, I hope they will be able to come up with a satisfying ending for all of the main characters.

We’re back focusing on Takemoto this week. After a short-lived celebration Takemoto goes out on a “self-discovery” journey. I wasn’t expecting them to let Takemoto figure out his situation within the same episode. No episode of “Honey and Clover” would be complete without its signature humour. We get plenty of it in this episode. I thought the Mario and Luigi scene was pretty hilarious. How their reconciliation will affect some of the main characters, I’m not too sure. There are a few possibilities but they’re not strongly supported guesses at this point. I found Mayama’s analogy to be quite funny too. Especially cause Morita took it so seriously.

At this point it’s no surprise this was yet another good episode. Although there’s still a decent amount of humour in this episode, they focused more on the actual story this time around. It’s pretty rare to see Morita become so serious for two separate scenes, especially his scene with Hanamoto-sensei. Considering both scenes it’s clear that Morita genuinely cares for his friends’ well-being. This episode didn’t revolve completely around one character. A large part of it was focused on Ayu, however. Hagu already has plans for after graduation, but chances are she won’t end up going through with that plan. Takemoto was barely in this episode. It looks like the story will be focused more on him in the next episode.

This week is another Mayama and Yamada episode with a bit of Takemoto thrown in. Morita’s scenes in this episode was pretty limited, but the scenes in which he did appear in were good. You can always count on Morita for a good laugh. Part of me wants to see Mayama end up with Ayu, but another part of me also wants to see him with Rika. I’m not exactly sure what he thinks of Ayu. Hanamoto-sensei’s comment from a past episode may be correct even if Mayama denied it. From the way things were going it looked like Nomiya was going to try and make a move on Ayu. Although nothing happened in that department I still can’t rule out a possibility that he will try something later on.

Morita is back! Things just haven’t been the same without Morita. The humour level in this episode is one of the highest thus far. The dramatic scenes in this episode was pretty much kept to a minimum. Although this episode doesn’t have the usual balance of humour and drama, it was still highly entertaining. It was a good episode to reintroduce Morita into the series. Finally after 8 years Morita graduates…or so we thought. I thought his new semester outfit was hilarious.

Just leave it up to Honey & Clover to keep up with their high standards. Most of this episode revolves around Takemoto. I liked how they made Takemoto be completely lost as to what to do with his life. It adds a lot of realism to his character. Of course no episode of Honey & Clover is complete without its signature humour. We get a taste of “Twister version 2.0″ with Takemoto and Hanamoto-sensei as the challengers. It was a pretty short scene but funny nevertheless. Then of course there was the unexpected “Space Titanic” shown at an award show. We don’t get to see what shocked the whole cast, but chances are they saw Morita on TV.

There were some pretty big developments in this week. With Mayama back working for Rika things will get more interesting. Speaking of Rika, I thought they did a pretty sloppy job with her animation in a few parts. The disproportionate eyes come to mind. To lighten up the mood a bit we also get a short wedding scene. I thought it was quite funny how the old men reacted to the bride’s sinister eyes. From the looks of it, we’ll be getting some more story of Takemoto and his relationship with Hagu.

We got another Mayama episode this week. Just like last week this was another good episode. I thought the scene where Hanamoto-sensei was telling Mayama to let Ayu be was hilarious. When Mayama reminisces about Rika we get to see what happened after he helped her out of the shower. It was pretty unexpected. After all this time he still refuses to give up on Rika and willingly starts from scratch. Ayu’s feelings for Mayama are just as strong as ever in this episode, if not more. From what we’ve seen in these past few weeks, it doesn’t look like we’ll be seeing Morita for another while.