Bloom Into You – 03 – Too Kind, or Just Normal?

This week Yuu stays by Touko’s side at every turn, giving her an indirect kiss-through-bottle-sharing like it’s not biggie and then surprising Touko about her family owning the bookstore she likes. Yuu’s fam is certainly impressed with Touko (and why wouldn’t they be) while Yuu’s older sister Rei seems to cut right to it, perhaps without realizing what she’s doing, by referring to Touko Yuu’s “girlfriend.”

During vacay Yuu hangs out with friends, one of whom the others know is pursuing a senpai. She doesn’t break it to them until after they watch the mushy romance movie that she already confessed but was kinda-sorta rejected, with the guy saying he wants to focus on basketball.

Yuu is both envious and bemused by her friend, but also her other friends’ insistence things will “turn around” if she keeps at it. Speaking of persistence, before Vacay is over Touko makes it a point to stop by Yuu’s to give her a gift…but also, likely, simply to see Yuu at work at the store.

Yuu “guesses” she’s “pretty” happy about being given the gift of a mini-planetarium, but seeing the stars projected on her ceiling call to mind how the distance from her understanding of why Touko likes her sometimes feels as vast as the distance from those stars.

She just might gain a little bit of understanding the day of the stump speeches. Touko looks like a picture of calm…until Yuu notices her hands are shaking. She takes Touko outside, where Touko admits she can’t hide from the likes of Yuu. So she doesn’t: she bares her feelings right there, and also goes into her past, when she was “nothing” (i.e. shy and introverted).

Yuu isn’t shocked by Touko’s sharing. Even if others see Touko as perfect, Yuu knows perfect people don’t exist…but nor does she look down on Touko for not being perfect and trying to hide it. Touko may say she’s “hardly special” for showing her “weak side”, but Yuu thinks having such a side is perfectly normal.

But out there, Yuu realizes she saw a “special” side of Touko, one she wouldn’t show to anyone else. Simply being that person makes Yuu herself special, and not just to Touko, but in general. Her speech doesn’t betray what she’s learned about Touko, but nor does it lie about who Touko the Student Council member is. She really does put the work in, and really is kind, and really would make a good president.

But it also means Touko’s hands will shake sometimes, and she’ll need someone to help her steady them. Yuu lists the boxes Touko checks, but includes her personal take on her, including using the speech to announce that she’s joining the council.

Touko win the election handily, and celebrates with Yuu via a PDA that their classmates don’t read too much into. As for Yuu, she’ll stay close to Touko and see where this goes. Will things “turn around” if she merely “keeps at it”? She’s resolved to find out.

Bloom Into You – 02 – Really Unfair

It’s not just Yuu; Nanami Touko IS pushy. It looks like she has been for a while. I don’t think she works at it, its just the way she is. Others may hold back or defer or concede, but she knows what she wants, she knows who she wants to help her get it, and as of the other day, she also knows who she loves, and it’s Yuu. If you can’t present a strong enough argument not to go along with her, you’ll get caught in her current by default.

Nanami choosing Yuu as her campaign manager has caused a rift in her longtime friendship with Saeki Sayaka. Nanami knew it would, but she did it anyway, and she presents a solid argument why: to reach out to and galvanize the first-year vote when no one else will. Nanami and Sayaka are always in sync on the volleyball court, but this is a lesson to Sayaka that at some point quite suddenly they weren’t, and that time has come.

Sayaka doesn’t fight it, and shows absolutely no outward aggression towards Yuu, save agreeing with Yuu’s assertion that Sayaka may well do a better job as Nanami’s manager. Sayaka isn’t blaming Yuu for this; she knows Yuu is as swept up as she is.

When Yuu finally brings up Nanami’s sunset confession, it’s at a railroad crossing. When the barriers come down and the train passes, Nanami steal’s Yuu’s first kiss, to make no mistake what kind of love she was talking about. Considering neither of them know much “what to do” following that kiss, it’s apparent Nanami may just as along for the ride as everyone in her orbit.

When Nanami asserts that she didn’t choose Yuu simply because she loves her, but still asks again to stand by her in the election as a friend, Yuu doesn’t have a problem with it. What she does have a problem with is that she feels she can’t properly respond to Nanami’s feelings, not matter how much she may want to.

During an interview and photo shoot with the school paper, Yuu suddenly takes Nanami’s hand in her’s, behind their backs where no one else csan see. She sees Nanami’s reaction, and is further frustrated: how can Nanami feel that “special feeling”, while Yuu feels nothing? What drew her to Nanami was the feeling they were similar in being unable to fall for anyone. That’s no longer the case. She feels left behind.

A meeting at a cafe to go over a speech provides Yuu with another opportunity to express how she can’t fall in love with Nanami, but the barista interrupts them with their coffee, and then Nanami steps in and speaks first: She knows what Yuu is going to say, and is willing to accept it. All she asks is that Yuu let her love her, not expecting anything in return.

Yuu thinks that’s weird, and it kinda is, but for someone like Nanami, who was like Yuu for so long—never knowing what that special feeling was like—finally feeling it made her that much more fulfilled. Yuu says fine, she doesn’t mind…but she doesn’t know why she said it, as she’s not even sure whether she really doesn’t mind.

For all of this, Yuu calls Nanami “unfair”, but that’s not really, well fair; it’s just that Nanami is a little older, and a lot can happen in the years between them. Yuu shouldn’t be measuring her own feelings against the older, wiser, more daring Nanami’s—that’s not being fair to herself. Nanami is a little older, a little wiser, and most importantly, a different person. It’s not a question of fairness for Yuu…it’s a question of patience.

Bloom Into You – 01 (First Impressions) – Waiting for Wings

Be it shoujo manga or song lyrics, Kaito Yuu has been trained to know what true love is supposed to feel like. That it’s a feeling so conspicuous and powerful and different from anything you’ve felt before, you’ll know it when you feel it, so just be patient and wait for it.

Now a first-year at high school, Kaito Yuu does not get run over by a truck, but ends up getting tricked into a position with the student council. On the way to the far-flung, isolate council office, Yuu encounters a confession in progress, followed by a prompt rejection.

The one doing the rejecting is second-year Nanami Touko, who also happens to be her senpai, and it isn’t her first, or even ninth, rejection. She always says she’ll never go out with anyone, because her heart never flutters when she hears them confess, be they boys or girls.

Yuu is in a similar situation. When her good guy friend from junior high confessed and asked her out, she expected that to be the moment she finally felt the same “blinding radiance” (or “sparkles”) she knows to look out for from her years of consuming conventional media.

But it wasn’t. He asked her out, and she felt…nothing at all. That was a month ago, and she’s been delaying her reply all that time. Now that she’s met someone with confession experience in Touko, Yuu decides she’ll try to ask for advice. She almost chickens out, but Touko can tell something’s on her mind, and Yuu is able to tell her.

Touko replies very wisely that there’s nothing wrong with Yuu not feeling anything special with her friend, nor should she feel like there’s a way she should be that she’s not being. When the guy rings as scheduled, Touko holds Yuu’s hand, giving her the courage to gently turn him down.

It goes so easily and is over so soon, Yuu wonders what took her so long and why she was torturing herself all that time. But Touko hasn’t let go of her hand yet. Unlike Yuu’s, Touko’s hand is trembling and clammy, and she’s blushing. The moment neither of them have ever experienced? Touko is suddenly experiencing that moment, right then and there.

She draws Yuu closer in and gazes into her eyes…but Yuu doesn’t understand what’s going on. At least, she doesn’t feel the same way as Touko at the same time. To be confronted with someone saying they’re “falling in love with you” immediately after turning someone else down must be a bit disorienting for Yuu, not to mention the fact they’re both girls, which Yuu isn’t quite sure how to handle.

Time passes, and nothing more happens between Touko and Yuu. But that afternoon is always weighing on Yuu’s mind, even as the whole council assembles to celebrate the impending transfer of power. Touko is running for president, and essentially asks Yuu to be her campaign manager. That means they’re going to be spending a lot more time together, often alone.

Bloom Into You is solid, straightforward shoujo romance. Yuu’s sparkly internal monologue about her ideal of love (how she thinks she’ll sprout wings and fly off) is beautifully illustrated, and Kotobuki Minako’s strong, assertive voice is a great choice for Touko (I don’t know much of Takada Yuuki, but she does fine work as Yuu). I’m in!

Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans – 27

This striking image encapsulates the episode pretty nicely: Hash (or Hush) wants to be able to do what Mika can do, and what what his “older brother” couldn’t do back in the slums. He is at the head of the new recruits who have heard tales of Tekkadan and seek greatness—and purpose—in this new Mars, but haven’t escaped their past.

We also check in on Tekkadan’s Earth Branch in Edmonton, where Takaki lives with his sister Fuka and takes her to school. Things are still a little delicate, but Takaki will take all the stability, normalcy, and domesticity he can get. He’s an iron-blooded orphan success story; in a way, he achieved what Biscuit tried to but could not. Now that he has it, he has no qualms about paying it forward.

We jump from a meal on earth to one on Mars, where Hash makes his pitch to Yukinojo: he wants the A-V surgery. “Too old” is the cold reply, along with warmer words from Atra that Hash simply doesn’t want to hear. He’s poised to shove Atra aside, but Mika grabs his arm. And here Hash is: faced with the person he wishes to be more than anything, even at the cost of his life.

Hash seems an over-eager brat in a hurry to die—until we hear his story, and it’s a sad one. His “big bro” Builth went off to CGS looking for glory, but his A-V surgery failed, leaving him paralyzed from the waist down.

Hoping to make the lives of the younger kids like Hash easier, Builth’s actions had the opposite effect, and he took his own life before he could over-burden them too much. But doing so bestowed Hash with a new and potentially deadlier burden: to follow in his footsteps, but succeed where he failed.

Meanwhile, Tekkadan is going to subjugate the Dawn Horizon Corps pirates, Todo reappears (as a Very Irritating Person), and Fareed has sent the Arianrhod Fleet to Mars to join the pirate fight. Aboard is Iok (who seems put out), Julieta (who seems less crazy but no less devoted to Rustal), and…a new Masked Man.

Who the heck is this? Will he ever speak, or does he rely on the pulsing lights on his face to communicate? I’m not quite sure, but Julieta doesn’t trust him. Nor does Orga trust Fareed, but that doesn’t mean they can’t work together, at least for a time, towards a shared goal.

Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans – 26

Donna Draper, Creative Director

Tekkadan is finally legit, Kudelia is getting shit done from her Mad Men office, and Gjallarhorn has fallen out of favor. Perfect opportunities to introduce new players on all fronts. Tekkadan’s standing is more solid, but there are still tectonic rumblings throughout this episode, which starts out peaceful, even mundane, but becomes progrssively more Gundam-y as the unintended consequences of everyone’s success mount.

Looks like a family

Kudelia’s underestimating of a sniveling economic rival mirrors how seemingly innocuous threats could end up a pain in our heroes’ collective rears. Cookie and Cracker are getting a decent education, but they cling to Mika when he even thinks about going back out into danger, something he obviously has to do and will continue to do.

Julieta here (voiced by MAO) is sure be in a cockpit soon, facing off against Mika

Kudelia and Tekkadan alike gained feisty rivals by showing the world that not all underdog causes are hopeless. Now that McGillis has a seat at the Seven Stars Big Boy Table, he, like Orga in Tekkadan, isn’t going to stop moving forward; it’s the only way for either figure to survive. Only Orga just wants to settle down make an honest living some day. McGillis has big ambitions, which attract both ire and push-back from the families whose toes he’s stepping on.

Mika makes another grand entrance in the nick of time

The world(s) is familiar, as are most of the faces, but it was exciting to see many in new or refined roles. It was also good to see new recruits positioned below, experiencing at the end a measure of the hell of war the main cast went through in their first episode (though these newbies have much nicer bosses.

All of Kudelia’s, Tekkadan’s, and McGillis’ plans to “let it ride” on the gutsy gambles they’ve made are being challenged at every turn by those who want to keep them down in the muck. We’ll see how the new role of the challenged, rather than challenger, fits our scrappy team.

Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans – 25 (Fin*)

This episode marks the end of my Winter 2016, and it was a good one. In fact, it was a great one. The order of the final battles were all set, with no more surprises in store; all that was left was for everyone to have at it and see who comes out of the fray getting what they want.

Kudelia wants peace and equality for Mars; Orga wants to find, through the crucible of war, the place where Mika and Tekkadan belong. Henri and Iznario want to maintain their grip on power; McGillis wants to purge Gjallarhorn of the corruption and hypocrisy that brought about the crazed FrankenstEin monster.

The actual battle between Mika and Ein is brutal and smashy, as has come to be the typical mobile suit battle style (even Ein doesn’t have any beam weapons or missiles, which is for the best). As for the personalities, Ein remains, well, crazy, while Mika keeps a casual calm, muttering fuel levels and tactics and generally ignoring Ein’s ranting.

Slightly more civilized in execution is the duel between McGillis and Gaelio, with the former landing swift and deadly strikes on the latter once Gaelio states he won’t let even a lifelong friend in McGillis get away with exploiting Ein the way he did.

While these final two mobile suit duels are going on, Makanai finally arrives at parliament. Was there any doubt once he got there that he wasn’t going to have any difficulty getting his way?

When Orga receives the good news, he starts to be able to see the end he’ll make…but they’re not there quite yet, so he orders everyone to not die, warning them he’ll kill them again if they do.

As Henri and Iznario sweat, McGillis really gets into Ice Cold Mode, telling Gaelio such “soft-hearted emotions” as friendship, love, and trust Carta (who it’s confirmed has died) and Gaelio gave him won’t reach him, as he has “lived in anger.”

It’s an anger his two childhood friends were too busy trusting, loving, and even partially pitying him for not having been born to power as they were. McGillis took full advantage of their blind spots in using them to expose Gjallarhorn.

When he marries Almiria, he’ll become head of the Bauduin family, the Seven Stars, and the new, unblemished order. He admits to Gaelio that he was the only true friend he ever had, but sacrificing him was necessary for the good of the world.

Ein’s constant ranting about making Mika repent for his sins really starts to grate, and it doesn’t help that Ein isn’t going down while Mika is running out of gas and ammo.

Back in Parliament, Makanai cedes his speaking time to Kudelia, knowing she’s more likely to deliver a speech that will rouse more members to their cause. She states her purpose for coming and the constant disruptions by Gjallarhorn, and asks the body to choose a future filled with hope.

Mika, finally on his last nerve, hears Orga’s voice of support and finds his second (third?) wind, finally understanding how to use Barbatos, and proceeding to cut away at Ein’s mobile suit.

Ein calls him a monster, to which Mika dryly responds “Look who’s talking,” finally simply telling Ein to shut up by running his suit through the core. Mika’s never needed many words to get his point across, and achieves yet another badass victory by sticking to that M.O.

Makanai wins re-election, cease-fire flares are fired, and the battle ends with Tekkadan the victor. Half-metal negotiations are opened, while Mika asks Orga at sunset if they’ve arrived at that place he’s always talking about. Orga affirms that they have, at least one of them, and Mika simply says “It’s pretty.”

McGillis proceeds to send his father away to exile, then comforts his betrothed; he got everything he wanted out of this, but he still has much to do, and while he’s sitting pretty near the top of the food chain, he’s still not invulnerable.

To Merribit’s relief, after the battle the seeming death-and-revenge-obsessed kids…turn back into more-or-less regular kids/brats. They’re not doomed after all, but a lot tougher than she thought.

Laffter, Azee, and Shino are all fine. Orga meets with Naze and laments the men he lost, but Naze tells him that’s part of being a leader, and he can’t let it get to him. For his men to believe in him and his cause, he must believe in it too, no matter the cost.

Kudelia will be staying behind in Arbrau, but Atra still has the two of them console Mika, who’s lost the use of a hand and a partially ruined eye. And finally, after Orga congratulates Tekkadan for completing their first mission—escorting Kudelia to Earth—he turns around and asks Mika what they should do now, a nice mirror of the usual dynamic. Mika’s response: Let’s go home.

*If it seems like this “final” episode left a lot of things on the table—no return to Mars, McGillis’ plan just getting off the ground; more observing and maneuvering by the parent companies—well, that’s because a new season has been announced, airing Fall 2016. We haven’t seen the last of the Iron-Blooded Orphans, and I’m not complaining.

Gatchaman Crowds Insight – 12 (Fin)

Both this sequel series and its final episode share the title “insight”, meaning “the capacity to gain an accurate and deep intuitive understanding of a person or thing.” Throughout much of the story, the public at large didn’t have much insight into anything beyond what they collectively felt they wanted in the moment.

Their growing enthusiasm with becoming one, fueled by Gelsadra’s brief rule and new ways of doing things, created a new enemy that no one saw coming until it was too late, due to their lack of insight into themselves. That enemy was the pervading atmosphere.

Everyone was to blame, but an individual was still needed to represent collective guilt and collective culpability; a bad guy who the Gatchamen would beat so badly, the atmosphere would become too terrifying for anyone to want to be a part of it any more.

As Tsubasa explains to the public on the Milione Show, in the second phase of their plan, she says Hajime took that role. She used Berg-Katze’s power to become Gel-san, then told her G-men comrades to beat her mercilessly before a live nationwide audience.

Hajime was the ultimate hero of heroes in Gatchaman because he realizes her role in protecting the planet goes beyond simply saving whoever is right in front of her, but, when necessary, saving everyone from themselves, even if it means putting her life on the line. Rather than go with the flow or settle for quick votes and easy answers that feel good, Hajime thought, long and hard, about what she, Ichinose Hajime, could do.

Last week’s straightforward battle is thus place in a far different and more compelling context, with added dialogue that accentuates how conflicted the G-men really were about beating up “Gel-san”, because it was really Hajime. Yet again and again, she told them not to stop, until they literally cleaved her in two. As a result, she’s in a coma, and the sight of her on TV incites public rage against Gel-san.

But Tsubasa implores everyone to follow Hajime’s example and think carefully about what is to be done about Gelsadra: Should they expel him from Earth, allow him to stay, or leave it up to the Gatchamen? Unlike all other previous votes, the people have a whole month to decide, and can change their votes as much as they want until the final tally.

As the days and weeks go by, anti-Gel-san sentiment goes from a boil to a simmer, as after longer and more thorough thought, everyone starts to take responsibility for what happened to the atmosphere rather than blame it all on Gel-san, who was, after all, only a naive facilitator with the very best intentions.

When the vote comes, Tsubasa is relieved that not only do the people (by a narrow margin) agree to let Gel-san stay on Earth, but only a tiny sliver left it up to Gatchamen. Well over 90% of the population decided for themselves. To Suzuki Rizumu’s delight, the people evolved beyond the level of apes.

After the vote, public opinion is driven a little less by what happens to be the flavor of the week, but greater intuitive understanding of the situation and their own individual power to shape their own opinion. X tells Rui to think long and hard about what to do about the Crowds, who play with the remaining, calm, Kuu-sama. The Prime Minister reminds his salty colleagues in the Diet that everyone was responsible for the atmospheric fiasco, and everyone is responsible for preventing it from happening again.

As for the savior who woke everyone up from their destructive bliss, Hajime does, thankfully, eventually wake up from her long slumber, without any fuss and grateful she slept so well. She’s clearly happy her big plan worked out, since so much of it depended on her fellow Gatchamen as well as the general public to make it a success.

Now, with the world more or less back to normal, the G-men await the next arrival of an alien who might, unwittingly or not, take a certain human quality to its most dangerous extreme. If that ever happens, I’ll be here to watch and cover it. GATCHA!

Gatchaman Crowds Insight – 11

As ‘Lil Gel-san chills at Gatcha HQ with Sugayama, the reunited Gatchamen do battle with the Kuu-sama…to no avail. While easy to defeat, the damn things keep coming, which makes sense, as they’re the granular embodiment of the collective atmosphere. Hajime stops fighting and determines they’ll need to try different tactics to get rid of it. But first, she and several other Gatchamen go on the Milione Show to receive the public’s blessing via smartphone vote. (OD also gets to meet his knockoff, DD).

As soon as the public votes 84% to leave things to the Gatchamen, the Kuu-sama immediately cease their attacks and aggressive, and switch to fawning admiration for the Gatchamen. Such is the shifted mood of the people. But they’re still hanging around, to which Berg-Katze and Suzuki independently agree the only answer is to kill Gelsadra. So the Gatchamen deploy and start fighting him head-on.

As we saw in his battle against Joe, Gel is one tough customer, but against the concerted forces of the Gatchamen he is eventually worn down. Only they’re not interested merely in wearing him down. In fact, the G-men make it a point to pummel Gel-san as mercilessly as possible, all while the public watches on streaming media. The Kuu-sama celebrate Gel-san’s imminent defeat, but then…the atmosphere starts to change again.

People start to pity Gel-san’s treatment, and believe the G-men might be going a bit too far in taking him out. These peoples’ Kuu-samas pop like balloons one by one. Tsubasa tries to stop Sugane from a coup-de-grace, but after all the other assembled G-men salute, he fires off his attack anyway, which teleports through Tsubasa and slices Gel-san in half. Curiously absent in all of this is Hajime.

The reason for her absence becomes clear a short time later, once the atmosphere has calmed and peace returned to the nation: she wasn’t absent. Utsutsu borrows the life force of her fellow G-men to heal a Sleeping Beauty-esque Hajime, while Tsubasa goes on the air to apologize to the people for deceiving them: Gel-san isn’t dead. They managed to get around the fact that only killing him could calm the atmosphere by “killing” a fake Gel-san, who Hajime posed as for the purposes of the operation.

Hajime understood that the atmosphere everyone had a hand in creating was far tougher opponent than Gel-san or the Kuu-sama, and defeating it would require more than brawn. They needed to convince the people that they were delivering swift and terrible justice to their fallen alien prime minister, and only when he was in smoldering pieces did they start to find such justice distasteful and prefer to move on to other things. I for one just hope Hajime didn’t have to pay for this victory with her own life.

Joukamachi no Dandelion – 12 (Fin)

Election day is finally upon us, and the Sakurada siblings are all scraping together their final speeches before the votes are tallied. The leader of Akane’s fan club notices she’s changed in the last eleven episodes, but while she’s not as shy or prone to flash people, he remains as strong a fan as ever. Hana’s friends are thinking of voting for her boyfriend Shuu, though they worry they’ll see less of her if he wins.

Aoi, the expected victor in the election, informs her parents she’s backing out, and neither of them are disappointed. The whole reason they had so many kids—and have an election to begin with—is so they can all choose their own paths in life, which may not include ruling the country.

On election day, with the gathered masses in attendance, Aoi announces she’s withdrawing her candidacy and explains why (Absolute Obedience will give her more power than she wants or should have). Her siblings’ speeches are interrupted by a runaway airship headed straight for the castle and the crowd below, but thanks to quick thinking and teleporting by Shuu, Shiori’s ability to talk to the airship, and Akane’s ability to manipulate gravity, the siblings end up preventing a calamity of Hindenburg-like proportions.

In fact, it’s another all-sibling effort, with Haruka determining the proper landing spot for the airship, Kanade creating a barricade, and Teru pulling the ship to a stop, while Misaki, Hikari, and Aoi keep the crowd calm and safe. But it’s Shuu, who is able to give a speech as this is all going on, who ends up winning the election and becoming king, by taking the lead in averting disaster and promising both to Hana, and everyone else present that he will strive to protect everyone and help them to thrive and live happy, fulfilling lives.

With Shuu crowned, Aoi is off to college, Kanade studies for medical school, Misaki becomes class president, Hikari reveals her identity but remains an idol, Shiori and Teru continue their studies, and Akane pretty much continues on as she has, only now that she’s been through the rigors of an election she’s come out with a thicker skin and more confidence. And she still has time to stop and admire the dandelions.

Gatchaman Crowds Insight – 09

Considering episode 8 ended with a guy being eaten (or absorbed) by a Kuu-sama, and episode 10 started with the public reaction, I didn’t realize I had skipped an entire episode by accident until I was already through it. I also noted how quickly the plot progressed, leaving me to think the episode I missed was probably superfluous anyway. Boy, was I wrong!

This week, among many other things I missed out on, Hajime diagnoses Tsubasa’s problem: her resolve to run forward with everything she’s got can be both a strength and a liability. Like Tsubasa, I found out that it’s okay to stop and even go back to ensure you’re on the right path, not a path of convenience and expediency.

As a result of going back, I found episode 9 did more than simply fill in a few blanks; it further enriched the episode 10 I accidentally skipped to—itself a great episode.

For instance: I learned what led to Tsubasa no longer being by Gelsadra’s side, but returning home to Nagaoka. The public didn’t immediately react to the Kuu-sama’s “feedings” negatively; most people welcomed them being a “hammer of justice” as they punished those who committed crimes, be they petty or serious.

Tsubasa can’t be on board with this, because she’s not a weird alien who uses cold logic to solve everything. She doesn’t see the point of becoming one if those who are hesitant are forced under pain of devouring. Paiman also condemns the acts of the Kuu-sama and hastily announces the Gatchamen will move to detain Prime Minister Gel-san, who is definitely somehow connected.

Paiman’s plan backfires, because he chooses a course of action before fully understanding what he’s up against: the Kuu-sama aren’t minions doing Gel-san’s bidding; they’re a side-effect of his weird-alien methods to unite everyone at any cost. They are of the people, not Gel-san, and as long as the pervading public opinion is of acceptance and contentment with Gel-san’s “regime”, both the Kuu-sama and the majority of the public will condemn the Gatchamen for attempting to disrupt the flow.

Hardcore supporters thus throw stuff at Paiman when he comes to arrest Gel-san; parents take their kids out of his day-care; Sugane’s harem dumps him. The Gatchamen find themselves unpopular; an eyesore to either be spurned, ignored, or, if they persist in their intervention, dealt with.

The team regroups at HQ, where Hajime decodes Berg-Katze’s riddle: “everyone’s favorite thing that goes in easy but is difficult to get out” is a pervading atmosphere. Sugane says he’s had a lot of fun going with the flow, and wonders if it’s really that bad. And it isn’t, until you suddenly find yourself outside of it.

Hajime seems to take great pride out of being an outsider, whether you’re talking Gatchaman, alien vessel, or general space cadet. Even her hand gestures are subversive, sticking with the scissor fingers while everyone else puts their fingers together for the Ge-ru-ru Salute.

While trying to visit another fellow outsider in Rui, he doesn’t answer the door or his phone. His AI X-san, has to answer for him, worried about its master. At this point Hajime is accosted by numerous Kuu-sama, who are clearly telling not asking, that they become one. In her usual nonchalant-yet-badass tone, Hajime says “Yeah, I’d rather not,” successfully dodging the tongues.

Then there’s the sustained action setpiece of this episode: the fight between Joe, who blames himself for Gel-san getting elected, and Gel-san, who doesn’t understand what Joe’s problem is, only that any attack directed at him will be countered in kind, and then some.

Joe is perhaps a bit foolhardy, but who would have thought Gel-san would be so adept at combat, be it dodging bullets on the ground or matching fire with wind up in the stratosphere. It’s a beautiful battle, all the more interesting because of Joe’s inability to gt through to Gel-san not because Gel’s bad or evil, but merely fundamentally wired differently as a living being.

Back to Tsubasa. Feeling like the bottom’s fallen out of her world, she wanders an increasingly bleak city with ominously gathering clouds and scene after scene of independent-minded folk being bullied into going with the flow, and devoured if they don’t. The Kuu-sama even come after her. It’s all like some terrible nightmare, but then there’s a hand on her shoulder—it’s Hajime’s with an umbrella. And Hajime isn’t there to judge or say I told you so. She’s there to help and support her friend.

Speaking of friends, Sugane cannot heed Joe’s warning to stay out of the fight, protecting Joe from Gel’s giant shiruken-like weapons, but getting stabbed in the back himself. Like Paiman with his premature arrest attempt, Jou’s attack only made things worse. Meanwhile, after a pep talk from Hajime (she’s all over the place wryly supporting people this episode!) X-san reaches out to Rui’s nemesis Suzuki Rizumu to try to rattle his cage. Rui is nearly catatonic in his bliss, sucking his thumb like the ape Suzuki warned him everyone would become in Gel-san’s world.

But it does rouse Suzuki to action, and he gets out of prison thanks to a VAPE member who is a guard, in order to “change the atmosphere.” Having gotten her Gatchabook back from Hajime, Tsubasa heads home, for a similar change of atmosphere, seeking wisdom from her gramps. And then, in the scene episode 10 starts with, we see one more example of the insidious danger of the Kuu-sama and their fundamental wrongness of their existence in society when a little girl simply can’t abide an older kid shrugging off a recently-devoured friend. Out of the mouths of babes indeed!

Gatchaman Crowds Insight – 10

When Mana’s father is swallowed up by a Kuu-sama, a former (current?) member of VAPE catches it on his cameraphone, forwarding it to Suzuki, who sends it out into the digital continuum, where it catches fire. I like how the means with which Gelsadra and Tsubasa united and consolidated the majority of society are the same means that prove their undoing. As with everything else, enhanced technology effects change much faster than more primative methods, but the door swings both ways.

When the nation sees Mana’s father getting eaten, followed by a response by Gel-san that inadvertently sounds cold and uncaring, and a warning for those who don’t want to become one to get in line, Tsubasa is beside herself, unsure of what to do, leading her to sit with her grandpa and listen. I found Yuru-jii’s monologue to be a fine, stirring, cogent, unblinking look on Japanese history and society.

He’s seen this “atmosphere” before, and he was caught up in it, as was everyone around him, including his little brother: in WWII. “We lost ourselves, and fought against people we didn’t hate”, all out what was essentially a national inferiority complex. The atmosphere that led to war and the slaughter of millions just kinda snuck up on everyone, until it had become irreversible.

That atmopshere created an empire that would fight to the last man when faced with certain defeat. It took the first and only use of nuclear weapons against an enemy in human history to dissipate that atmosphere. Gatchaman’s sobering critique of the national psyche in the darkest years of Japan’s history stands in stark contrast to the glorification of the military in shows like KanColle and GATE, and I for one am glad shows like this are around to balance the discourse.

The difference here is, the mood, and atmosphere, or kuuki, has been given physical form by Gelsadra, with the best of intentions, but ignorant to the world, its people, and their inherent desire to break from the crowd. He neutralized their wills, but he did not break them. And so, when word comes down the Kuu-sama are killers and Gel brought them about and is doing nothing to stop them, those very Kuu-sama reflect the changing mood, one of hatred and desire to bring Gel-san down.

I like how it’s Hajime who first comes to Gel’s aid against the amassing hordes of Kuu-sama. They may have physical form, but they can be disspated, or “popped” with the power of the Gatchamen. Gel-san also reassesses what he wants, from something as massive and ultimately impossible as uniting all of mankind as one, to something far simpler and more personal: wanting to see his dear friend Tsubasa.

So he exhales, releasing all of the mood bubbles in his belly and reverting to the form he took when he first landed…which is good news.

Meanwhile, the Gatchamen muster and start taking out the Kuu-samas, lending a nice action angle to the episode. Rui breaks out of his funk thanks to X, into whom he inadvertently, but fortunately, programmed a sort of “Backup Will”, a fail-safe to rouse him from indolence should he get swept up in the fluffy bliss of belonging. X reminds him that he came up with her, and Crowds, and every other amazing accomplishment, when he was alone, not in the fetal position in the lap of a physical manifestation of the nation’s mood!

Just as Gel-san exhaled to release the atmosphere, so too does Tsubasa, taking her grandpa’s advice to do some heavy breathing before setting off and joining Hajime and the other Gatchamen. She races to the city by transforming into an awesome hoverbike-thingy. Thanks to the events of this week, the apes are quickly evolving and thinking for themselves, but the residual caustic atmosphere must be purged in order to move forward. Everyone has to take a deeep breath.

P.S. Yup, I accidentally totally skipped Episode 9. I’ll be watching that soon and writing a review later. Sorry about that!

Joukamachi no Dandelion – 11

With only a month to go before the election, the Sakurada siblings watch the latest polls, and the question of why Akane is so scared of crowds and attention comes up. Her older siblings recall that she wasn’t always so shy in public; quite the opposite, and thus we enter a flashback with that bold, courageous Lil’ Akane, obsessed with spreading justice throughout the land (perhaps influenced by comic books).

Her confidence in and ease with which she wields her powers leads to her ditching her guards in order to hang out at her best bud Karen’s house, only to encounter two burglars tossing the place. The two girls are paralyzed at first, but Akane gathers her courage and uses her powers to foil the bad guys in a Home Alone-style action scene.

Then the bad guys take the kid gloves off and threaten to hurt the girls, at which point Akane has no choice but to go a little overboard, scaring the burglars into submission, but destorying Karen’s house in the process. The gathering crowds around the site, with all the opinions and judgements flying as Akane stands holding a thankful Karen’s hand tight, gradually overwhelm her. It’s an ordeal that informs how she reacts to being in the spotlight to this day. But as Kanade said early in the episode, she had some stuff in the past that she managed to deal with; so can Akane.

Her story is carried into the second segment as she gets the opportunity to overcome her shyness once and for all (or, at least, partially). That’s because their dad the king is in bed with a strained back (much to their mom’s chagrin), and the Sakurada princes and princesses must work together to accomplish all the official duties he’s unable to.

Akane initially helps out saving various people at a town that was hit by a landslide with her powers under the bespectacled guise of Scarlet Bloom, but she gets so into her good deeds, she doesn’t realize she loses her “Jamming Glasses” (which we know don’t really do anything) and is recognizable to all as Princess Akane.

She then remembers Karen remarking on that day she saved her from the burglars. Sure, there was some collateral damage, but that didn’t mean anything to Karen or presumably her folks, because Karen was alive and okay thanks to Akane’s heroism. So she can hold her head high—as herself, not Scarlet Bloom—as the election approaches. Because far more people like her than don’t.

Joukamachi no Dandelion – 10

Hikari remains not-my-favorite Sakurada, but her half of the episode benefits not only from Sacchy, who has some hot takes on royalty (they don’t understand true hardship; they’re set for life no matter what), unaware her fellow idol is in fact a princess. Akane is also cleverly brought into the storyline, since she’s such a huge Sacchy fan and is (slightly) aged up by Hikari to serve as a substitute assistant. Then Sacchy learns the truth—accidentally, creating fresh tension.

Hikari’s manager wants her to reveal her true identity after the next joint concert with Sacchy, but Hikari decides not to do so. Now, in the past, this might seem like backtracking on the original plan to increase her exposure to the voters through idolling. But she feels to do so now would be unfair to “Raito”, and more importantly Sacchy and her fans. Still, she wants to tell Sacchy the truth before they take the stage, and she does.

Sacchy doesn’t care which identity Hikari chooses; she knows she’s a hard worker and someone she wants to keep performing with. Akane is inspired to see how much her little sis has grown, and a little envious she knows what she wants to do (outside of becoming king) and is going for it with everything she’s got.

The second half is arguably a far simpler story, focusing on the twin siblings Shuu and Kanade. Just as the first half was a callback to a previous Hikari-Sacchy segment, the second is a callback to Kanade’s feelings of grief, regret, and idebtedness for injuring her brother by recklessly using her powers as a youth. When she sees him on the street with his girlfriend, she re-resolves to become king so she can heal his legs.

Then, all of a sudden Shuu teleports before her, knows she’s troubled by something (they are twins after all) and tells her…he doesn’t want her to become kind just to heal his legs. He’s happy with his life, and Kanade doesn’t own him anything. Kanade’s personality is much like her power: transactional, so she can’t easily accept Shuu’s position. It just doesn’t make sense to her. Frustrated, she runs off, and nearly falls victim to an anime classic: the Bundle of Heavy Pipes Precariously hanging over the street above her.

It’s almost history repeating itself: Shuu getting hurt because of her, but both of them are fine, as he teleports the two of them to safety. Kanade, in Shuu’s arms, is still frustrated, but Shuu reiterates, thirty seconds or no, he’s her BIG BRO, and it’s his goddamn job to protect her, no matter what happens to her. It’s her job, as his little sister, to shut up and let herself be protected. Kanade lets Shuu carry her home, and tells him she’ll no longer try to become king just for his sake, but for hers…so she can build a despotic state she’ll rule, like, well, a king!