Finally watched the series in a marathon run and getting the whole strength of it. Finally read the monster-sized posts of this thread. Great read!
Overall I also agree with Perishthethought's and kokanaden's posts on most of the major points and that is also how I interpret the series.
First of all I blame both Mitsuki and Takayuki of prioritizing the stability of their friendship over the risk of exposing their love and ending up in a awkward dead-end should that love end up unrequited.
As far as Mitsuki goes I think she's the overall victim of this series, and definitely the
weakest person (which isn't the same as the weakest character, in fact, she's probably the strongest, closely followed by Haruka). As soon as Takayuki agreed to Haruka's affections you can clearly see that Mitsuki's already starting to break down. In fact, she's the only character to suffer before the accident.
On the betrayal point, I think it
was betrayal, but only as far as the definition goes. I see no moral faux-pas on Mitsuki's part. As it was pointed out, Haruka was out of the picture
completely, highlighted by the fact that the parents did not even want Takayuki to see her anymore. He was in the process of collapsing, and basically Mitsuki was his life support. He had the will to go to the fridge, but I question his will to fill that fridge up, since he didn't even bother to do anything else but the bare necessities, and cleaning himself wasn't even one of them. At that point Mitsuki was also striving for survival (out of love) since he was the only thing she had left. Of course, one could argue that it is because I am biased, which I am as a Mitsuki fan.
Haruka on the other hand is the character that has most evolved in this series (closely followed by Mitsuki) and it's clear as daylight. Just compare her from eps 1-2 with herself from ep 13-14.
Takayuki is one
seriously broken character. I truely believe that the accident took away his humanity. I personally state that the only love he had was for Mitsuki before the festival. I don't believe his move on Haruka right after the festival to be much more than sealing his friendship with Mitsuki (don't create an incident, go with the flow of the current relationship). After the accident he definitely lost any and all love and was just an empty shell drifting towards the one that needed it the most. After the accident he never expresses himself initially: all his emotional comments were triggered by the one he was speaking to. Not only that but all the emotions he expressed were what he thought they wanted to hear, and not his own.
Effectively speaking, after his attempt at waking up Haruka by taking her out to the expo, he was just a walking, reactionary, emotionless entity.
I don't believe the end where he declares his love to Mitsuki simply because he wants to heal her wounds "
even if we have to be together" (I got this from Keep's version). Now
that is definitely simply derived from obligation; if he had any love for her that sentence shouldn't have appeared. If you notice, on every occasion he held himself from saying what he wanted to, the text he omitted were the ones that would end the series right there (non-verbatim) "I'm only doing this because..." "Could she be...?" and "I'm only with her by obligation, you're my girlfriend (or something like that, when he was on the phone with her from the restaurant)" are notable examples.
I personally need to add that as far as I can remember, Takayuki's the
one most annoying male-lead character without a backbone. Even the most pathetic losers of the simplest harem anime had at least one redeeming quality. Takayuki simply did not have any; his kindness was definitely not one. On an irritation scale from 1 to 20 he scores a 25.
As much as Mitsuki/Haruka contained what Haruka/Mitsuki lacked, I believe that Shinji had all the elements Takayuki needed to be human. He was Mitsuki's protector, person of comfort, and moral support (though the two last parts failed because he was not Takayuki himself). He was clearly Taka's conscience and 'safe-guy' for Taka to
park Mitsuki with.
As far as Mitsuki lying to Haruka, I think it was a double-edged sword. To me Mitsuki was not only trying to give moral victory to Haruka, effectively cutting the last chain to let him loose, but she was again trying to hide/erase her own feelings, even if that task was impossible. Visually, she seemed to be talking to herself as much as lying to Haruka.
Speaking of ending, I agree on the ambiguous aspect of the conclusion. When Akane checks the cover of the book, isn't Haruka's last name different? Does it imply that she's married? Also, we never actually
see Takayuki and Mitsuki together, but simply implied by the fact that she's wearing the ring. The lack of the scene with the kids seems rather deliberate as opposed to a lack of time to fit it in.
Overall KgNE is a series I am glad to not have missed but at the same time it's definitely not a series that I want to watch completely again, even though I'd be more than willing to revisit the various scenes. It has been an excruciating long ride, as the pace doesn't totally suit me (way too slow in many occasions) but one that I far from regret taking.
Well, I think I said everything I wanted to.
Edit: got Takayuki's name wrong
