Monogatari Series: Off & Monster Season

Koyomi Araragi spent his last year of high school helping girls in his town resolve various supernatural afflictions. But now Araragi has departed for university, leaving his friends to fend for themselves against new problems and curses that plague them. Yotsugi Ononoki, once a human corpse and now a living doll, takes residence in Araragi's home, keeping watch over his sister Tsukihi, a girl harboring a mystical secret of her own. As part of her duties, Yotsugi fills Araragi's vacated role as occult expert, assisting others in town with their issues.

One of these girls, middle school student Nadeko Sengoku, slowly recovers from her own recent brushes with the paranormal. She avoids returning to school, instead spending time alone in her room and pursuing her dream of becoming a professional manga artist. In order to speed up Nadeko's quest for mastery of her craft, Yotsugi convinces her to create four copies of herself, each representing a distinct aspect of Nadeko's personality. However, the clones refuse to help Nadeko, instead escaping into the town and creating a chaotic mess. Now forced to grapple with her own fractured sense of identity, Nadeko sets out to capture them and resolve her inner conflict.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Oshino, Shinobu Main

Sakamoto, Maaya Japanese

Araragi, Koyomi Main

Kamiya, Hiroshi Japanese

Sengoku, Nadeko Main

Hanazawa, Kana Japanese

Ononoki, Yotsugi Main

Hayami, Saori Japanese

Deathtopia Virtuoso Suicide-Master Main

Fukami, Rica Japanese

Senjougahara, Hitagi ing

Saitou, Chiwa Japanese

Hachikuji, Mayoi ing

Katou, Emiri Japanese

Kanbaru, Suruga ing

Sawashiro, Miyuki Japanese

Oshino, Ougi ing

Mizuhashi, Kaori Japanese

Araragi, Karen ing

Kitamura, Eri Japanese

Shioya, Yoshiyuki Producer

Yodo, Akiko Producer

Ishikawa, Tatsuya Producer

Nishibe, Maho Producer

Reviews

Mar 23, 2025

Theprophet334

Recommended

Tldr: It's still going strong and the studio keeps on delivering

Inherently I am myself a rather new anime enthusiast and I only really started to seriously watch anime around 2 years ago. Throughout this time I encountered many things that surprised me of how underrated they are or other things left me disappointed in how overhyped some adaptations have gotten looking at you Re:Zero, Oshi No Ko etc. Monogatari was that one series where it always managed to bring solid stuff and this time this season is one of the strongest ones out there. The barrier of entry to this season is high there is ... a lot of material to go over but the journey the characters go through the symbolism the series make with real life aspects were always highlight of the show.

Monogatari belongs to one of those series where everyone can see that they are putting their heart and soul in it and it shows big time the storytelling is unique and despite being hard to understand they incorporate different shots or show something symbolic as the characters keep on talking and talking. It is an information overload but somehow Shaft was capable of making the yapping enjoyable too

I highly recommend this newest season without a doubt Monogatari is here to stay and I am very glad to see that because let's be real a lot of popular entries started to flop hard in later seasons or have a horrible ending where the author just wanted to end it.

Reviewer’s Rating: 10

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Jan 3, 2025

LazyLopes

Recommended

That is what makes Monogatari great.

There are a lot of studios making horrible adaptations around there, they aim for the money over everything, they do not care for the author, and how he would like the adaptation of his work to be, but SHAFT made an awesome work with NISIOISIN. they made it alongside with him, respecting the novels, and maintaining the quality that the previous seasons had.

All the philosophical dialogs and monologs are how it was meant to be. The jokes, reflections, investigations, all made in such a exceptional way.

As a novel reader, I can say that the anime is the best adaptation there ... is, and will be. Monogatari does a great work with something called "perspective", it makes us investigate with the characters, try to understand what they feel, and how the problems are going to be solved.

I totally loved these arcs, and you are going to love too, at this point you are obviously a fan of Monogatari, so don't worry, it is all perfect.

Reviewer’s Rating: 10

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Nov 28, 2024

Brittaman12

Mixed Feelings

Animation: Not much to say. Shaft is not a flashy studio like Ufotable or Mappa. But where they lack in eye candy they more than make up for in art direction. Every frame serves a purpose. Every frame has personality. And in this entry, those qualities are as present as ever.

Nadeko Draw

Story: Definitely one of the stronger stories so far. A very moving culmination of a decade’s worth of character development for a very complex, well-written character. As with past stories, Nisio Isin’s usage of his aberrations to give shape to the inner complexities of his characters is fascinating, and with this story, very well ... executed. This story seems like a great improvement on the author’s unique storytelling method, and Shaft presented it very well.

Music: Some pretty clever usage of Renai Circulation’s main melody. Definitely an old fashioned approach to scoring, but executed perfectly. A tasteful use is heard in the main opening, but also the utilization in character themes was done very well. Also very appropriate to the theme of the story. A story where the main character is confronting their storied past is perfect for this form of musical expression.
As for the ending. YOASOBI loves their 4-on-the-floor dance grooves, but I would be lying if I said this song wasn’t catchy as hell. And the visuals were also quite simple, but stunning in their own right. Quite a testament to their confidence and commitment to making quality music.

Overall, one of the best if not the best stories of the entire franchise so far. Quite simple in some ways, such as the music, but I don’t view that negatively at all. In my opinion, the later installments to the monogatari series, such as Hana, Tsuki, and all of Owari, were straying from the simplicity that really made me enjoy the earlier installments like Bake. So seeing Nadekomonogatari really makes me feel refreshed. The vision is still alive. 9.6/10

Shinobu Mustard

Story: To start with, let me just say the short story that prefaced this arc was very good. I think it set up Suicide-Master's character well and gave good insight into Shinobu's origin. However, the main arc leaves much to be desired. The pacing of this arc was pretty bad. It took me a lot of willpower to remain interested. Its cool that Araragi came back, and there was definitely some great humor thrown in here and there, but overall, the story was boring, didn't have much at stake, and mostly served to reunited Shinobu and Suicide Master. It seemed unnatural and awkward to me and I think that it was executed poorly.

Music: A good third of the arc actually lacked any sort of opening theme or overarching motif throughout the story, and when it did finally show up, it was just a recycled version of past Shinobu arc OPs that was executed uncreatively and didn't have much going for it in of visuals. Uninspired and uncreative. Very dissapointing.

Overall, boring. Not much to say. I really feel like they flubbed the momentum they built with the first arc. Suicide-Master ended up being quite boring and didn't add much to the story. The twist at the end was unexpected for sure, but it was weird and random.

Reviewer’s Rating: 8

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