An interesting – and very different – pair of animated commentaries for the Oreimo stable this time. Our first is a bit of meta-realism – three fictional characters from the anime-within-an-anime “Stardust Witch Meruru” as “themselves” doing a commentary track. We get Comet – the good guy here, more Yuuno than Kyuube (and Meruru was around before Madoka Magica), the evil witch Eros, and Meruru herself. The running gag is that Comet actually finds Meruru incredibly stupid and annoying, but Eros eventually figures out that, like Kyousuke towards his sister, Comet actually loves her and would do anything to protect her. It was certainly interesting getting under the hood of Kirino’s favorite anime, though the commentary didn’t shed a whole lot of light on the episode. Does this mean a “Maeschera” commentary is coming?

Commentary for 08 featured Saori, but what was interesting was that she was in her otaku clothes but used her “Ojou-sama” voice. She was joined by Daisuke (Dad) in a commentary that was much less subversive but a lot more character-driven. It was interesting seeing Daisuke’s reactions to what was happening on screen – especially when Kyousuke rode to Kirino’s aid like a White Knight – and hearing his admission that her novel was absolute garbage. He even admitted than Saori and Kuroneko know much more about his kids than he does – true of course – and that he was proud of Kyou for sticking up for his sister – though he swore he’d never admit it and that he didn’t actually love him. That’s more growth than we saw from him on the series itself, but as far as I’m concerned he’s still a world-class A-hole…