Akiba Maid War – 03 – Raging Boar

It didn’t take long to get on board with this episode, as the cold open shows us exactly what’s going down: Ranko in the corner of a boxing ring, looking battered but determined. Cut to a far gentler scene of Nagomi offering her roomie a cute hair tie to keep her hair out of her face while washing up.

While handing out cards on the street, Nagomi and Ranko encounter some unsavory figurine dealers (perfect for this Akiba), including one who talks to one of his treasured figurines in a cutesy voice. When this guy impugns maids, Ranko advances on him, but is stopped by an athletic woman with silver hair, who says she doesn’t acknowledge the stern Ranko as a maid.

They return to Oinky Doink to find Tenchou with the yakuza’s gun in her mouth. The café is behind on its payments, but in Ranko the guy sees a solution to that. I love how Ranko keeps pouring him water until it starts sloshing in his stomach.

Ranko is to report to the marvelously-named Akiba Fluffy n’ Sweet Club, which is actually an underground MMA club where maids beat the stuffing out of each other. It’s run by Madame Taira, who puts her cig out in Tenchou’s hand when she offers it.

Taira also happens to be an immense fan of “Gracey-poo”, AKA Inomata Grace, an obscure side character from an old anime who nevertheless inspired her to start her whole fighting enterprise. The figure of her watching from behind a tree as the protagonist trains reminds me of Nagomi: innocent and out of place in this temple of violence.

Ranko’s job isn’t to win, but to fall to Taira’s chosen champion. The only problem is, once she’s in the ring, Ranko finds it hard to hold back, and knocks the champ out with one punch. This is obviously a suboptimal result for both Taira and the Oinky Doink’s debtors.

As a naked Tenchou prostrates herself (we later learn she stripped of her own accord) she does manage to convince Taira into sparing her and Ranko’s life by proposing that Ranko win through to the finals, only to take a fall in the finals. We meet the serious silverhead, Zoya, who is Taira’s muscle. She and Ranko are at odds: Taira believes netiher of them are “true maids”, but Ranko says once one dons the uniform, anyone can be one.

Taira has Ranko dispose of the dead collector’s body (Taira killed him after Ranko won), and the genuine Gracey-poo figurine falls from his pocket (he sold Taira a fake). This episode is full of seemingly random yet ultimately extremely satisfying setups and payoffs.

Before Ranko and Zoya start tearing through one competitor after another on a collision course with one another in the final, Tenchou and Shiipon borrow betting cash from a bank that lets them put up their organs of choice as collateral, which is just…chef’s kiss. When the figuring dealer’s men come by, Taira shows them footage of Ranko disposing of the body, then promises them that her Zoya will kill her in the final bout.

The match between Ranko and Zoya arrives, with words from Ranko ringing in Zoya’s ears: “The only judge that determines whether you’re a maid or not is yourself.” Zoya, with her military training, is a far tougher opponent than the others, but Ranko is determined to last twelve rounds with her.

What follows is some truly splendid combat animation. Great care goes into depicting Zoya punching Nogami’s cherry hair tie off Ranko’s head, as well as the concussive force, bursts of air and sprays of sweat of each punch, block, and kick. Zoya talks shit not just about Ranko as a maid, but her fellow maids as well, which Ranko won’t let slide.

Borrowing a strawberry tie from her Gracey-poo Nogami to replace the cherry one, Ranko smiles and utterly rejects Zoya’s philosophy of “maidness”. As she fights Ranko Zoya looks back on the past that shaped that philosophy, from being denied cute dolls as a child in Russia, to moving to Akiba to be a café maid and giving up on it because she thought she wasn’t cute enough.

As the final round enters its climax, Ranko and Zoya come to a mutual understanding and respect, speaking telepathically with their fists and legs.

Ranko doesn’t need anyone to acknowledge her as a cute maid; she knows she’s a cute maid, especially with Nagomi-poo’s hair tie. Before Ranko lands the knockout blow to the side of her face, Zoya admits Ranko looks cute, and Ranko tells Zoya she looks cute too.

Ranko, of course, wasn’t supposed to win, which means it was only a matter of time before Taira killed her, Tenchou, and probably the other Oinky maids just for the hell of it.

But the figurine collectors come calling again, and this time they have evidence that their boss met with her: a note on the door to her office from Ranko mentioning the body she disposed of. Instead of showing us the ensuing bloody shootout and Taira’s demise, we watch only Gracey-poo watching from behind her tree, getting splattered with blood. Perfection.

But, as we know, that’s the fake Gracey-poo. The real one? Yumechi ended up with it. That’s a good thing, because it means they can sell it to recoup the cash Tenchou and Shiipon lost betting for Ranko to lose as planned. This leaves them just as deep in the hole with the yakuza guy, but as Nagomi says, at least they still have all their organs!

The cherry, strawberry, or whatever fruit you like on top of this deliciously epic sundae of an episode comes when Zoya reports for duty as the fifth Oinky-Doink maid. Freed from her previous work by Taira’s death and her dream resurrected by meeting Ranko, she’s ready to give the café game another shot, to which I can only say khorosho!

Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu 2 – 08

After a taste of Kyoto-style rakugo (which has a lot more props than Tokyo style…not sure I like it) courtesy of Mangetsu, who is trying to make a comeback after ten years out of the game, We see a frail and withered Yakumo showing his grandson one of Sukeroku’s albums.

Higuchi and Matsuda then come in to show Yakumo the veritable bonanza of recordings and memorabilia the professor has collected over the years. Higuchi leaves it up to Yakumo whether the recordings and such were ever to be released to the public, or destroyed. Yakky says he’ll think about it.

In a really, really lovely scene, we see the happy couple of Yotaro and Konatsu relaxing on a warm night, and Konatsu rests her head on Yotaro’s broad back and asks him to perform some rakugo, and is no doubt soothed by the vibration of Yotaro’s voice as he does so. It’s personal rakugo; not for a crowd, but for someone close.

Yotaro can’t get far in his story before the couple notices Yakumo walking onto the nearby bridge; he feigns a desire to get out and about and a bout of sickness, but Konatsu knows what he’s up to: he was trying to off himself, something she won’t allow until he “atones.”

Or at least, that’s how she chooses to label her love for the man who brought her in when she lost both her parents and raised her into the fine woman she is. Yakumo concedes that fate may not be ready to let him die.

Yakumo visits Kido Isao, an old friend and who owes him a “debt that can’t be paid”, knows how to keep quiet, and longs to hear Yakumo perform again. Then, one night, after seeing a play with Matsuda, Yakumo finds himself the victim of his loyal servant and family’s machinations.

To wit: he’s being forced into a performance before a small, select audience of old friends, colleagues, and patrons. When he threatens to leave, the lady of the Yanashima Inn “insists” by hilariously shoving him onto the stage.

But before Yakumo has to perform, he yields that stage to his “dunce” of a student, who performs “Shibahama” to his master’s shock. When asked how he learned it, Yotaro confesses to having watched the film, though doesn’t go so far as to hear the truth of what happened at that inn so many years ago.

As for his “Shibahama”, Sokuroku’s was, in my opinion, far superior. But to Yotaro’s credit, he uses his tendency to weep easily well here.

When it’s finally Yakumo’s turn, he introduces himself with an air of “whelp, I guess I can’t rest easy yet, so despite my dry tongue here goes”…only to be rudely interrupted by a police raid that has come to arrest Kido Isao. Have those coppers no decency?! 

One also wonders if, like when his suicide was thwarted by the sudden appearance of Yotaro and Konatsu, if there’s something to the fact that he was so harshly silenced just when he was about to do rakugo again.

Barakamon – 04

When I decided to paint beige-colored racing stripes on 1991 Honda Accord, the most difficult step in the process wasn’t the measuring, the marking of guide points with non-permanent marker, or making sure the masking was tight. No, the toughest part was making that very first mark with the paint upon the (sorta) pristine blank surface. There was no going back from that moment, so I figured I’d best not screw up.

Once that first mark was made, I felt a lot more confident, and sure enough the stripes were turned out true and crisp. Seishuu faces similar apprehension, only it’s quite a bit more pronounced, because the boat he’s painting belongs to an ill-tempered gangster (and Miwa’s pops), and for the entire process he is distracted by a gaggle of little kids darting around like gnats, upsetting the calm such a job normally requires.

Then there’s the fact that he shouldn’t be doing odd calligraphy jobs now that he’s been entered in the upcoming Naruka Institute Calligraphy Exhibition. Exhibiting the humility he’s gained since moving to the island, he doesn’t promise to claim to Grand Prize, as he’s still “in the darkness,” but he’s certain he’ll someday “find the light,” lines that are both cool and corny. I don’t buy, however, that someone his age has never operated a rotary phone!

If you can successfully paint a five-kanji name on the boat of a prickly gangster-geezer under the constant distraction urchins constantly up in your business, well…you’re not completely worthless as a human. Intimidated by the vast stretch of pure, empty white, Seishuu ceases up, until Naru plants a tiny black hand on that white. Then another, then the others join in.

It’s as if whatever spell was keeping Seishu from touching brush to boat was lifted. From there, Seishuu dives in going with a wild, splattery style to cover up the prints, and ending up with something both he and Yamamura can be satisfied with. But the true challenge lies ahead with his exhibition work, where he won’t have the benefit of Naru making the first mark for him.