This is a thread on Hanekawa Tsubasa, my favourite character in monogatari. Hanekawa's condition is primarily a deconstruction, of the morally upstanding, very pleasant and nice girl archetype. Our first image of hanekawa is that of the one depicted to us by araragi himself-

-i.e a saviour, by which we assume she was there for araragi in a rough time in his life. But as expected of Nisio Isin's writing, it's not that simple. Hanekawa as a person is empty, with no concrete identity, or a better description would be a 1 dimensional identity where-

-she is nice to everyone as if it were the only thing she knew, as if she was incapable of everything else, this is embodied perfectly in the part where she buried the sawari neko, a dead cat on the road, which is an apparition that latches onto a person via their sympathy-

-but she doesn't bury the dead cat out of sympathy, she does it on a mere instinctual basis,she is incapable of something that some might argue is another facet of being a "nice person", such is the condition that hanekawa finds herself in and Meme explains this to araragi aptly.

However, she is also not an empty monster as some people might think, she is genuinely a very kind person who is a victim of her own condition, very similar to araragi in this regard, both selflessly sacrifice themselves for others, while one does it for his sense of justice the-

-other does it as it's normal, hanekawa does not realize the importance of self-sacrifice, which begs the question, is there value in self-sacrifice if you don't value yourself to begin with? Hanekawa and Araragi have a fantastic dynamic/parallel in this regard.

Hanekawa is, again, a very kind person but her parents, who, like everyone, are flawed people and they, like everyone, hate when Hanekawa is so impossibly perfect that it shows them their ugly own side, which begs the question, how does one form bonds with a person who doesn't-

-even show a side of themselves worth bonding over? The situation got this bad because of hanekawa's domestic situation being pretty shitty. Hanekawa's self worth is so low to the point where she even thinks her getting abused is not a very big deal.

A situation where she should display outrage, distress and shock.....all she responds is with a moral correction. This scene is the most heartbreaking and horrifying scene in monogatari for me, purely because it depicts hanekawa's problem in such a way that it had me outraged at-

her lukewarm reaction to literal abuse and while you might think how disgusting her parents must be to have done such a thing,one must have perspective to see how they must have felt living with such perfection of a human being that a normal person feels like a monster around her

All this pent up stress cause her apparition to emerge which goes on a violent attacking spree to release stress. She has no family in her own home, doesn't rely on anyone, has unbearable amounts of stress, only displays a part of herself to others which she deems acceptable-

-an impossible situation at a glance it might seem, until she learns to accept every part of herself, including the sawari neko, and everything that encompasses the being called Hanekawa Tsubasa. But this name has changed so many times that she finds no identity in it-

She begins to question who hanekawa tsubasa even is, at the beginning of Tsubasa Tiger.She is so incapable of asking for her help that she sleeps in an abandoned building rather than ask anyone for help, and the outrage that hitagi displays tells starts her journey of acceptance.

Hitagi's breakdown is incomprehensible to hanekawa, as her "normal" is twisted as fuck. Hitagi again reminds hanekawa that attending school a day after your school burns down would be far more abnormal, but the again hanekawa is clueless as to what normal is.

In hitagi's home, hanekawa finds something that one might call a home, a place she is welcome, a family. This is further illustrated at her stay in the araragi residence. Finally the iconic mono theme comes into play, a person must help themselves, as said by araragi's mom.

Hanekawa and Gaen are obviously exact opposites,even their catch phrases contrast,Gaen reminds hanekawa that her knowledge of ignorance is ignorance nonetheless. After receiving such shoves by the characters around her, hanekawa finally decides to write a letter to black hanekawa

This is her form of acceptance and acknowledgement of her dark side, the very dark side that she has been suppressing, the side that makes her human. Hanekawa finally asks for help, from the very person she hates, has ignored and contained, herself.

The tiger is the literal embodiment of her rage, anger and every negative emotion she has pent up within herself for ages, for every time she showered araragi with kindness she was jealous of him for having a family, every time she spent pleasant time with hitagi-

-she hated her for having taken araragi. It's only normal as she was a human afterall, she was only ignoring her emotions. Her rage is so great that araragi and shinobu have to step in as not even black hanekawa could defeat the tiger. But all she needed to do was accept-

-the tiger too, as she did black hanekawa, she only had to reach out. Since it was a part of her, albeit the ugliest part of her.

Hanekawa, is saved by araragi, her hero, the knight in shining armour, the person she loves. She confesses everything to him, let's out her love for him, but obviously she's rejected (W, I win). She is rejected by her saviour, and what does she do after all this?

She cries, is able to express her pain, she is absolutely heart-broken and for the first time, acts like a human would in such circumstances. Her hair do have white stripes still, as a reminder of the scars she holds, for everyone to see the person that is hanekawa tsubasa.

Trivialising your issues never works in the long run, emotions are there to be expressed, there are side we don't want others to see but being negligent of those sides is not the correct approach either. Hanekawa's journey to reclaim her identity, find herself is beautiful-

-nothing short of inspirational and brings me joy to see her become an actual person and live life. Nisio Isin snapped with her character and her character is truly perfection with tsubasa tiger's conclusion cementing her as one of my favourite character in fiction.