Just when we thought the darkness menacing the town had been identified, named, and tamed, clear and unclear mysteries of seasons past looming or surfacing, then resolving, not without tears, not without bittersweetness, of course, but satisfyingly, in a tripartite finale, all loose ends tied up into, or at least with, a bow…
 
The End Tale continues—if only for one last time, in a bonus stage for the ages, as our softie of a protagonist who wished for all parties involved, including himself, maturely enough, to end up happy, sees his reflected image freeze in a mirror and regretfully, regrettably, reaches for it to find himself through the looking glass.
 
In an alternate reality where bits of the world have been flipped around, the hero comes face to face with the hidden side(s) of familiar faces, along with author NISIOISIN, whose bravura attempt to reimagine character possibilities concludes, with signature flair, the MONOGATARI series proper—thank you for reading.
 
(Source: Kodansha USA)

Third season of the Monogatari Series, part 5/5. Contains the arc Koyomi Reverse from the Zoku Owarimonogatari light novel.
 
The morning after high school graduation, Koyomi is standing in front of the mirror above the sink to wash his face when he suddenly feels like his reflection is staring back at him. He instinctively reaches for the mirror, and upon touching it, his fingers sink in... When he comes to, Koyomi finds himself in a world where everything appears to be reversed.
 
(Source: Aniplex)
 
Zoku Owarimonogatari premiered in theaters across Japan in November 2018. It was later released as a 6-part OVA on Blu-ray/DVD from February to March 2019.

Yotsugi Ononoki, the shikigami girl assigned to watch over Koyomi Araragi. This dead tsukumogami girl faces a challenge, but what exactly is that do-or-die struggle with her life on the line? As the "story" grows, it keeps on running, ever burning bright!
 
These are the modern-day oddities! Oddities! Oddities!
 
Youth is going back and forth between pain and peace.
 
(Source: Kodansha, translated)

Volume 1: 
Before we witness the series’ climactic showdown in the third volume of the End Tale—each part of which forms its own cohesive whole—narrator Araragi wrestles with a crucial bit of history that had turned him into the loner we met at the very beginning, who opined that friendships only lowered his intensity as a human.
 
What initiates his pilgrim’s progress of a reckoning is his first encounter, at school, with the mysterious freshman Ogi Oshino, self-described niece of the equally enigmatic aberration expert Mèmè, and the book’s opening chapter is a harrowing standalone novella of a who-dunit involving a locked room of sorts.
 
Our increasingly well-adjusted hero kept on beingdecent at one thing even when he was just hanging on, but this forte, an unlikely aptitude for math, of all things, becomes the focus of a cheating scandal and a web of recollections that forces him to come to terms with, what do you know, his capacity to connect to people.
 
Volume 2: 
When an old flame who gave up on life and chose to go up in flames—because he wanted to leave you but couldn’t—comes crawling back after four hundred years, you might not appreciate it, especially if you’re in a new relationship. But nothing’s ever simple between people, and that’s even truer between monsters.
 
For the first time in months, our heroic loser Araragi is human, parted by previous events from the ex-legendary vampire bound to his shadow. Before he, the second-ever thrall of the former Kissshot, can resume his partnership with the donut-loving waif that she’s turned into, she must make a choice—about that first-ever. 
 
Before the End Tale can end, some loose ends must be tied, and in this volume, the fixer Gaen calls in her favor, requesting an introduction to her niece; the errand of the amulet that Araragi ran with Kanbaru comes into crisp focus; and the time-traveling and -spanning Dandy and Demon Tales see their devastating resolution.
 
Volume 3: 
No good deed goes unpunished, they say, and so does friendship and lowering your intensity as a human, they don’t say—alas, for all his literally painful hustle and inveterate need to save others, our brave fool of a hero ends up in hell, a conception of the inferno in its full Buddhist glory, and muses (lol) if there’s a return ticket.
 
Told in three chapters, the final part of End Tale concludes the story proper and resolves the series’ panoply of ongoing mysteries: the dues of a do-gooder for relying on a power not his own, the identity of a shady transfer student, the outcome of a class president’s questing abroad, and even the true name of a park.
 
Araragi, indeed, is the one who knows, but along the way he meets old faces, really every last one of them, who aid him on his journey for understanding, and perhaps for salvation, and you for one might not be surprised if he had another rendezvous with an erstwhile “cloistered princess” before it—guess what it is—sees an end.
 
(Source: Kodansha USA)

What if Monogatari's Ararararagi, Zaregoto's Ii and Jun "Humanity's Strongest" Aikawa, and Okitegami Kyouko no Bibouroku's titular forgetful detective all attended school together? In 2002, NisiOisiN won a Mephisto Prize prize for his debut novel Zaregoto, Book 1: The Kubikiri Cycle. Part of the 15th anniversary celebration will be 4-panel crossover gag manga Seishun Kijin-den! 240 Gakuen (240 is a pronunciation pun - 240 can be read as "Nishio," so "Youth Oddball Story! Nisio Academy"). 
 
(Source: Crunchyroll)

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