Hyakkano – 08 – A Time to Kiss

We know the stakes: Rentarou and Kusuri need to reverse the other girls’ affliction or they’ll remain kiss zombies forever. But because they have superhuman strength and speed, avoiding them on the way to the chem lab proves impossible. That said, they’re able to neutralize the vice principal by administering a face-melting drug that only removes her foundation, forcing her to reapply it.

When Rentarou realizes Nano has the girls using a pincer movement, he has Shizuka chase him, as he’s confident he can stay ahead of her due to her low base speed. But when she trips and falls, he has no choice but to run to her and take her to the nurse’s office to treat her. But while Shizuka’s slower and weaker than the others, she’s still a kiss zombie, and she makes her kissing time with Rentarou count before he leaves her hanging—literally.

Karane and Hakari won’t be so easy to neutralize, as the former launches the latter at him like a missle, leaving him vulnerable to both of their kisses. That said, a measure of their original personalities still remain, including their tendency to argue, so Rentarou uses this opportunity to push their mouths together. Since the potion makes you want to kiss the one you love, they end up making out with each other.

That leaves only Nano between them and the chem lab, but as a good chunk of her intelligence and analytical thinking remains, tricking her won’t be easy. Rentarou hides in a locker only to find Kusuri there. After she tearfully declares she’ll stop researching drugs after this fiasco, she produces a vial of reversing medicine.

Rather than give it to Nano as Rentarou thinks, she drinks it herself to grow to her normal size, which Nano won’t recognize. This backfires when Kusuri’s tendency to speak in the third person exposes her true identity, and Nano ties her up with the rope meant for her (and with bondage knots, no less!).

Rentarou decides he’ll use his love for the girls to break his own limiter and run away from Nano, but she eventually chases him to a classroom, smashes through the door, and greets him like Jack Nicholson in The Shining. We saw what happens when a kiss zombie catches you, and the result is no different here.

As Nano smootches away to her hearts content and Rentarou strays out of all reason, the end credits begin to roll. But this is not the end. By luring Nano away, Kusuri eventually shrunk back to chibi size, as she didn’t take a full dose of reverser. This enables her to make another dose in the lab, hurry to where Rentarou is, and administer it to Nano.

Nano, Shizuka, Hakari and Kurane come to in the nurse’s office, none the worse for wear. They also still have clear memories of what went on while they were kiss zombies, but since those memories include Hakari and Karane making out and not disliking it, they each very loudly proclaim that they actually don’t remember a thing.

All’s well that ends well, but Kusuri maintains that since she caused this whole mess, she’ll give up on her drug research forever. She loves Rentarou and the others and doesn’t want to make trouble for them. But Rentarou rejects her sacrifice.

He loves all of Kusuri, including and especially her passion for making drugs. So if she ever makes another mess with her research, he’ll be there to help her clean it up. A teary-eyed but joyful Kusuri leaps onto Rentarou to kiss him, while his manly declarations only reinforce why the other girls love him so.

This episode only reinforced my love of this series, as it once again balanced zany hijinks and steamy action with genuine emotional and dramatic stakes and compelling character development. Rentarou also continues to be the most honorable and rootable yet still relatable harem MC I’ve ever come across.

He remains as much a treasure as the girlfriends to watch, and is never not decisively proving why he deserves all of them and more … ninety-five more, to be precise!

Reign of the Seven Spellblades – 04 – Comrades In Arms

Thanks to her new senpai Vera, Katie is able to interact with the troll from the parade, and even work to gain its trust. But Vera can’t shield Katie from the barbs and snide comments from other students. Oliver and Nanao are preparing for an inevitable duel against Richard Andrews, but the bullying of Katie by their classmates becomes so bad that Oliver rises to their provocations and starts a fight. Nanao and Guy have his back.

Unfortunately we don’t get to see the bullies get their just desserts, but Oliver, Nanao, and Guy end up in detention cells. When Katie blames herself for not standing up to the bullies, Oliver rejects that; he started the fight, so this is his fault, not hers. She did nothing wrong.

Nevertheless, Chela notes that their little circle of friends is on an island now, with the rest of the first-years (mostly hoity-toity, anti-demi conservatives) hating their guts. This is confirmed when they’re led to the site of the duel with Andrews, and it’s a coliseum packed with hostile students.

Before their official duel begins, an “exhibition fight” commences, with Andrews demonstrating his prowess in the sword arts by slaughtering some kobolds (werewolf-like creatures). While our friends are disgusted by the spectacle, especially when handlers force a scared kobold to return to the arena, Nanao gives them a piece of her mind, calling the whole crowd scum. For this, she gets pelted by glass bottles.

When a Garuda, a high-level beast that Andrews didn’t at all expect to appear, appears, students are battered and bloodied in quick succession, to Andrews’ horror and panic. But it’s Nanao who finally stands up to the monster and crosses blades with it. She had no interest in fighting a rigged “duel” with Andrews, but this is a battle more her speed: one in which she must put her life on the line.

She does a decent job keeping up with the Garuda, the fact remains she alone is outmatched, so Oliver joins the battle…and quickly gets slashed across the midsection. When he retreats to heal himself, a cowering Andrews asks him how he and Nanao can fight the Garuda without fear. ‘

Oliver tells him he is scared, because he’s an ordinary person, but Nanao, a warrior, probably isn’t scared at all, so he needs to keep her from going too far and getting killed. As he gets up and returns to the arena, he tells Andrews that Nanao wanted to see how he fought too.

Back in action, Oliver tells Nanao he’ll give her an opening to make the kill, but things go a little pear-shaped. Oliver has to end up getting between Nanao and the Garuda, and very nearly meets his end, were it not for Richard Andrews, using his high-level wind magic to blast the Garuda away. It’s a triumphant moment, and I hope his new understanding of Oliver and Nanao will trickle down to the other privileged students.

This creates the opening Nanao needs, and she spares no voracity in beheading the Garuda. Once it finally falls defeated, Oliver is the first one to thank Richard, who admits that while he was scared of the Garuda, he was more scared of being seen as an embarrassment to his clan. Both Nanao and Oliver acknowledge the courage he showed by standing his ground, and when Oliver lends him a hand up, Andrews takes it.

From that point on, Richard is no longer Nanao and Oliver’s enemy, but they are all of them comrades-in-arms. Of course, Nanao was pretty badly slashed in her fight with the Garuda, so she needs to be patched up. But as Richard takes his leave, Chela also thanks her childhood friend, addressing him as Rick, and notes how long it’s been since she’s seen “how wonderful he can be”.

All’s well that ends well. I’m glad this wasn’t just as simple as the good guys beating the bad guys in a duel, but things going out of control and the good and bad guys working together to end the threat, resulting in a welcome face turn for Andrews.

As for the mysterious student who is loitering around the coliseum after everyone has left, I presume they’re the same person who sent Katie flying towards the troll, and perhaps the next significant threat to Oliver and his friends. The silver hair has me suspecting it’s Vera, which would certainly be a blow to Katie.

Reign of the Seven Spellblades – 03 – A New Way to Live

Ophelie and Cyrus could probably achieve terrible things together if they joined forces, but each finds the other’s methods (her promiscuity, his necromancy) repugnant, so they fight each other with huge summoned monsters. Ophelie actually gives birth to hers; judging from her ahegao she seems to get a kick out of doing so.

When Cyrus blocks the underclassmen with his wall of bones, Nanao arrives to give them cover to escape. She also makes it sounds like she’s been looking for a place to die, and has found one. Oliver is ready to follow her into battle when Ophelie and Cyrus’ duel is cut short by the student body president, Alvin Godfrey.

Backed up by school prefect Carlos Whitlow, Alvin orders the two villains-in-training back to the depths of the Labyrinth, and escorts our first-years to safety.

Once there, Oliver gets in Nanao’s face and asks her what all the suicidal talk is about. Chela pulls him away, but is just as curious to know what’s up with Nanao, so she asks her to please tell them all if she can. That’s when Nanao looks back to the last and worst battle she ever experienced.

Even with a seemingly hopeless deficit in numbers, Nanao is able to easily carve her way to the enemy general, and dispatches his son, who was purportedly one of the finest warriors in the land, before she even knew it was him.

When the general orders his armies to kill her without learning her name, their spears are suddenly stopped dead…by a western mage on a broom. He invites Nanao to Kimberly, and here she is. But ever since being plucked from that battle—and from her certain death—Nanao has felt like she’s strayed into a dream.

When Nanao fought Oliver in class, she experienced shiawase, a moment of clarity and shared admiration and respect when locked in mortal combat with an opponent. But the battle was cut short, and Oliver pushed her away. Attempting to join the battle with the upperclassmen was her way of ending that dream on her own terms, before it ended on its own, worse terms.

Oliver thinks Katie is speaking out of turn when she says that, basically, Nanao is saying she’s heartbroken after Oliver rejected her entreaty of love and happiness (i.e. shiawase). But Nanao admits that yes, whether she fell for Oliver the person or his sword, to a warrior like her, there’s little difference.

This is when Chela asks Nanao, as a friend, to consider living her life in a new and different way than she did before. One need not cover themselves in blood or glory to thrive at Kimberly. Chela wants to spend more time with Nanao, and all of the others feel the same way. Indeed, it was clear Oliver was only upset with Nanao because he thought she was being too reckless with her life.

When everyone else chimes in agreeing with Chela, Nanao bows her head in apology and vows not to put her life in danger again. She also admits she’s happy she has friends at this school, since she hasn’t been able to learn much of anything in the classes so far. They all agree to help and support one another. If any dangers cross their paths, they’ll face them together.

It’s the Oliver-and-Nanao making up scene I’d hoped for at the end of last week, but I won’t knock the show for interrupting it to demonstrate how dangerous the school can be when our first-years are fractured. The next morning, Nanao clings to Oliver, who is both embarrassed and flattered. I love the varied reactions from the others to what is basically a newly formed couple.

Back in Garland’s Sword Arts class, Richard Andrews isn’t done with Oliver, and wants to fight him one-on-one. Oliver agrees, but before they get started Nanao grabs his arm, sensing he intends to lose on purpose. When Richard hears this he gets even more angry. Thus Oliver needs to give it his all to satisfy Nanao, and not humiliate Richard into desperation.

Chela takes Oliver aside to tell him she and Richard were childhood friends, always compared to each other by their elders, hence Richard’s inferiority complex. She’s not entirely sure how Oliver should proceed, only that some kind of fight is inevitable.

This dilemma is interrupted by news that Katie has rushed to the defense of the troll who went on a rampage at the parade. It’s about to be executed by faculty member Darius Grenville, but she stands fast in his path. Unamused by her insolence, when he learns she’s a “civil rights activist” he mocks her parents.

When she refuses to step aside, he uses an extreme pain spell on her, cementing his status as a real sonofabitch. Her friends come to her rescue, and thankfully don’t have to fight Grenville, as he’s told to stand down by fourth-year Vera Milligan, backed up by Professor Garland.

They inform Grenville that not only is there an ongoing investigation that demands the troll stay alive for now, and that it wouldn’t do to anger the growing pro-demi civil rights political faction, but the use of pain spells by faculty were banned five years ago.

Vera formally introduces herself to Katie as a fellow pro-demi advocate, and tells her she’ll be happy to help her in her efforts going forward as they share the same cause. Even though she’s still feeling the effects of the pain spell, Katie leaves the confrontation with a big smile on her face, having found a strong, cool upperclassman ally.

While the good vibes are somewhat marred by an inevitable duel challenge from Richard to Oliver, I still enjoyed this episode immensely from start to finish. Oliver and Nanao made up and may be an item, and we learned that Kimberly isn’t just a school full of perverts and assholes outside of the friend circle. In Alvin, Carlos, and Vera, there are good seeds looking after them too.

It’s a testament to the character writing that Garland’s explanation of the titular Spellblades (there are apparently only six of them at the moment) is the least interesting part of the episode. I’m sure they’ll come into play soon and a seventh will emerge, but for now I care more about these lovable kids.

Reign of the Seven Spellblades – 02 – What Lies Beyond That Moment

The first years’ classes commence, starting with sword arts (the offline kind). I did notice that instead of wands, our wizard analogues are running around with little daggers. Thanks to Pete wanting to show off his knowledge, we learn they’re called athames.

Professor Garland decides the best way for kids to learn is by doing, so he asks for volunteers to have a little friendly duel. Nanao’s hand is the first to go up, followed by Richard Andrews, clearly one of the old money kids who is full of himself.

Oliver takes exception to Andrews dueling Nanao, and makes it known that he helped Nanao bring down the troll while Richard and others stood by and did nothing. Chela does Oliver a solid and volunteers to duel Andrews so Oliver can duel Nanao.

We know two things going into this duel: First, Nanao has fought so many battles she’s covered in scars (and kudos for Oliver’s gaze last week focusing on those scars and not the usual body parts). She killed before, and not just one or two people. Not even one or two dozen.

Second: Oliver is pretty decent with magic, and he’s also secretly a big deal, or his brother wouldn’t be having him tailed. Between his magic and her swordsmanship, the duel ends up being quite a spectacle. The episode does a really cool visual trick of having Oliver see Nanao in full battle regalia as she slashes at him.

When Oliver sees tears in Nanao’s eyes, he suddenly feels awful for even thinking about holding back against her. He decides to commit himself entirely to the battle, as she is. Then Garland stops them, because broke the anti-lethality spell he placed on their blades.

Chela retracts her challenge of Andrews, who is perfectly willing to not have his ass handed to him by an ojou-sama with drill ringlets. Oliver leaves class in a hurry, but Nanao catches up, elated over how exciting and fun their duel was. She just wishes they’d been able to finish.

Nanao wanted to see “what lies beyond that moment” when they were forced to stop, but to her shock, Oliver angrily refuses to ever fight her again. When she asks way, he says he doesn’t owe her a reason, but he doesn’t want to kill her, or be killed by her.

The next day, the gang is together for lunch after spellology (oy) class, whose instructor abhors athames as medieval. Notably, Oliver and Nanao are as physically distant from one another and not facing each other. But classes roll on, like magical biology with the shark-toothed Vanessa Aldiss

Aldiss makes it clear to all the bleeding-heart magical animal lovers in the class that in her class, living things are resources to be exploited to improve their magic. This sucks for Katie. The teacher provides them with live magical silkworms and tells them to create cocoons. If they fail, the cocoons turn black and deadly moths emerge that must be incinerated.

Once again, Chela, who is an ace at this, helps Oliver out by helping Nanao out with her magic, since she can tell there’s something going on that hasn’t been resolved yet. Poor Katie takes extra time to ensure her silkworms don’t suffer, but her final cocoon fails, and the moth bites her.

Oliver and Chela kill the moth for Katie, and their teacher docks points for helping her. Oliver takes Katie to the infirmary to get her wound tended to. While he appreciates that Katie came from a wonderful, caring upbringing that respected creatures great and small, he also gives her a gentle warning that she can’t be an “angel” in a place like Kimberly.

That said, he also makes it clear she’s not alone in her struggle. She has him to lean on, and he then opens the door and all the others spill out into the room. I really appreciate how this show has so quickly endeared me to these characters, all of whom are good kids.

The fact remains, however, that we’re not quite sure what Oliver’s whole deal is. All I know for sure is that when Miss Carste informs him that she’ll be leaving his side temporarily to meet with his brother, it felt like a sign Oliver would end up in trouble with no covert ninja agent to back him up.

That night at dinner, Katie is just mentioning that Nanao seems out of sorts about something when Pete says he needs to go grab a book he left in a classroom. Oliver and Chela decide to go with him and brook no argument: the school, which doubles as a castle, isn’t safe after dark.

Specifically, the giant labyrinth beneath it starts to encroach on the upper levels. I like how subtly and suddenly the once cozy, opulent school halls take on the dark and sinister look of a dungeon. But Chela and Oliver insist that they’ll be okay: faculty and upperclassmen patrol the school at night.

Unfortunately, the trio comes across two of the less savory members of the upperclassmen, starting with fourth-year Ophelie Salvadori. Her body secretes pheromones that can put others in her thrall. Oliver and Chela are magically gifted enough to resist it; Pete can’t.

When they try to make a speedy getaway from Ophelie’s clutches, their path is blocked by a fence of bones summoned by fifth-year Cyrus Rivermore, who is in cahoots with Ophelie. I expected Oliver and Nanao would make up by episode’s end, but we end on a cliffhanger, with Oliver, Chela, and Pete having more pressing issues afoot.

Reign of the Seven Spellblades – 01 (First Impressions) – Freedom and Results

Oliver Horn is a new first-year student at Hogwarts Kimberly Magic Academy, a school with the design of a breathtaking castle perched upon a hill. While walking through the cherry blossoms to the opening ceremony, he encounters his classmates, and they encounter one another. The one that makes the biggest impact on all of them is a petite samurai girl with a bright smile and a complete disregard for the dress code.

The assembled classmates are greeted by a parade of magical beasts, but one of them gets pissed off when a troll is part of the parade, believing it to be a wrong, even racist practice. She butts heads with her male classmate, and it’s here where I note that she has huge brown hair and he’s a redhead, just like Ron and Hermione! Probably a coincidence.

What likely isn’t a coincidence is when someone in the crowd casts a spell that makes the brown-haired girl’s legs run even though she doesn’t want them to. She’s on a collision course with the troll, and it doesn’t look like he cares whether she’s pro- or anti-troll. Who should come between her and her sudden and unncerimonial demise but the magical samurai girl.

Here, Oliver not only shows his ability to herd cats and get the classmates to execute his plan even though none of them know each others’ names (and neither do we—we don’t even know Oliver’s yet) but also his penchant for spell customization, creating a decent facsimile of a dragon’s roar.

That roar distracts the troll, giving samurai girl the perfect opening. As she leaps into the air, she’s covered with glowing mana and her hair turns white. Her magical katana slams against the crown of the Troll’s skull, knocking him out.

Immediately after looking cool and badass as hell, the girl turns around and acts like a big goof, as her hands are still shaking from the skull impact. But her classmate is safe, and so is she thanks to Oliver and the others’ magical teamwork.

When Kimberly’s headmistress Esmeralda apparates into the auditorium with a flourish of lightning, it’s made clear that incidents like the one we just saw are relatively common, as the academy has a student attrition rate of 20%. And by “attrition” I mean death by myriad means both magical and otherwise.

Esmeralda minces no words in making her point, which is surely to sharpen these first-years and get them used to the fact that while they have extraordinary freedom, with it comes responsibility for their own lives and futures. The curt sobriety of the headmistress’ speech is followed by the samurai girl not asking Esmeralda a question, but just recommending a way to reduce headaches.

Once the classmates are magically wafted to the banquet hall, the classmates finally introduce one another. This should feel like last-second infodump—and in many ways it is—but allowing each student to introduce themselves also allows gives us an efficient Cliff Notes of who they are and where they’re from, it also allows for plenty interaction between these six different personalities.

You have the cordial aristocrat oujou-sama Michela McFarlane, complete with drill curls, the mousier animal lover Katie Aalto, the outgoing farm boy/botanist Guy Greenwood,  the introverted tsundere Muggle-born Pete Reston, and Oliver, who has two older cousins at the academy. They all come off as likeable, though Guy is the closest to being grating.

Finally, there’s Hibiya Nanao, the samurai girl, who is far more far-flung than anyone else, and also didn’t have to take any test to enroll. Instead, she was discovered by a faculty member (who happens to be Michela’s dad) and received a special recommendation.

With all the intros out of the way, everyone heads off to their dorms. Oliver is roommates with Pete, and makes sure he’s tucked in before heading out on an pre-dawn stroll. He’s confronted in the garden by a “covert operative” named Teresa Carste, sent by his brother Gwyn to watch over him.

Oliver gets another taste of Hibiya Nanao’s whole fish-out-of-water deal when he finds her topless, purifying herself with water from a fountain. Oliver warns her about the nearby boys dorms, but Nanao doesn’t possess the same Western modesty as he does. What she does have are a lot of battle scars, suggesting she’s no stranger to leaping into death’s jaws.

The reason she was able to save Katie was that she also harbored a healthy, if almost unconscious trust in her peers to back her up and, incidentally, save her from getting killed by the troll. It’s a group I’m looking forward to watching as they grow closer as friends and make each other better mages.

Skip and Loafer – 03 – Camp Salted Caramel

Mitsumi considers every turn along her walk to the student council office to be momentous, as she envisions herself as a venerable lion of politics appearing on her favorite news program in the future. It all starts here…only someone is already at the door, having had the same idea.

That someone is Kurume Makoto, a reserved and introverted classmate who is considering joining the council but doesn’t want to be a bother, and jumps twenty feet when Mitsumi sidles up to her. As far as Kurume knows, Mitsumi is the rumored “secret boss” of the school, public vomiting aside.

Kurume is even more bewildered to see Mitsumi being followed by the “flashy gal” Yuzuki and “himbo” Sousuke, both of whom seem to be chummy with the secret boss. All Kurume has is labels and feels rather indimidated by these personalities, but she harbors a lingering curiosity nonetheless.

Both Mitsumia and Kurume look set up for heartbreak when the council president informs them they don’t recruit members. However, Mitsumi’s dejected visage brightens when she learns she can join the Tsubame Society, the council’s support group for events and such.

She’s then bathed in the warm light of Takamine, one of the council treasurers, when she talks about how the added council works causes time constraints, but she apportions out her day by the minute and essentially game-ifies her days, and says it’s all worthwhile time spent.

Mitsumi is excited to join the Tsubame group, but isn’t sure if Kurume feels the same way. Mitsumi runs her down and gives her another start in the hall, and before Kurume knows it, she’s in a “Starmax” cafe with Mitsumi and Sousuke, having ordered the same goofy boba drink as Mitsumi.

Both Sousuke and Kurume experience vicarious joy in watching Mitsumi’s Starmax and boba debuts. Kurume also comments on how well Mitsumi and Sousuke get along despite being so different. Sousuke’s thoughtful answer surprises her, as he says it’s more about the little things, like when food tastes better with a person.

Kurume then joins Mitsumi and Sousuke in a commemorative selfie. She has to admit she would have never ordered such a weird drink but for Mitsumi, and that it actually does taste better when she’s drinking it with her and Sousuke. I love how Sousuke wordlessly gestures for Mitsumi to get Kurume’s contact info. They make such a great team!

Mitsumi again demonstrates how lucky she is to have a stylish aunt in Nao-chan, who doesn’t let her leave wearing all of her extra clothes and accessories. The reason she’s getting dolled up is that Kurume was bold enough to invite her to go see a movie that’s adapted from a book they’re reading in class.

Of course, since Mitsumi is a shining sun surrounded by planets of every shape and size, their two-girl movie trip becomes an eight-person group, which includes Mika, who is glad Mitsumi and Kurume are so plain, only for Yuzuki to show up and dazzle everyone with her effortless glamour.

Mika at least gets to sit next to Sousuke at the restaurant prior to the movie, but the more she looks at Yuzuki, the more self-conscious and depressed she gets. Sousuke, continuing to show he possesses a great deal of emotional intelligence by complimenting how stylish Mika is. Even then, Mika regards Sousuke as a mystery.

Yuzuki, meanwhile, tries to be friendly with Kurume, but more than once her attempts fail miserably when a flustered Kurume is unable to engage with her. After the restaurant, Yuzuki is upfront with her, saying if she doesn’t like “people like her” she doesn’t have to force herself to talk to her.

Mitsumi watches, senses something is amiss between the two, and blames herself for getting such a big group together without considering the potential for clashing personalities. As class leader she feels obligated to fix things, but isn’t sure how, and simply finds herself sitting between them.

That’s when she gets a taste of salted and caramel popcorn at the same time, and realizes that two distinct flavors can be combined to make a new, even better flavor. She didn’t know until now because she’d never tried the two simultaneously. That reminds Kurume how how it was that same adventurousness and vulnerability that not only got her to drink that weird Starmax drink, but become friends with Mitsumi.

So she sends texts to Yuzuki admitting she typically doesn’t like “people like her”, but wants to change that, and wants to get to know Yuzuki better. When Yuzuki looks over at Kurume, the latter straightens her glasses and looks straight ahead, but also blushes a bit. Both are clearly happy to have mended fences and excited to be friends.

After the movie, everyone goes their separate ways, but with new bonds forged, and existing bonds strengthened. Mitsumi proves herself to be someone that puts everyone at ease and enables new connections to be made and new instances of fun and happiness to be shared.

As she watches a stylishly-dressed and exceedingly handsome Sousuke glide along the streets with Shibuya as a backdrop, Mitsumi also realizes she will surely come to love this strange, loud, busy new place.

Skip to Loafer, then, is the quintessential Tuesday feel-good anime. Its characters that feel like real, imperfect people who are learning that they complement one another in surprising ways. It’s lovely and charming and heartwarming, and I’m glad it’s in my life.

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – 22 –Nine Angry Hashira

This week we meet the seven remaining Hashira, a most colorful bunch in both appearance and personality. Unfortunately, when they’re all standing in one place they look a bit silly rather than intimidating, and they stand in one place this entire episode. Tanjirou is bound and lying on the ground the whole time, his voice of explanation drowned out by the competing egos of the entitled, arrogant Hashira.

This is an episode where nothing really happens. Everyone stands around, and for over half of the episode, they stand around talking about nothing in particular. This episode is meant to bring the Hashira up to speed about Tanjirou’s unique—and officially sanctioned—situation. We the audience are already up to speed. Thus, the Hashira look even more foolish for dominating the with their opinions despite being completely in the dark.

At the halfway point of this episode where nothing happens and nothing is said we didn’t already know, the venerable “Master of the Mansion” finally arrives. Where the hell were ya, buddy? He calmly explains to his “children” that Tanjirou’s traveling with Nezuko has been sanctioned by the Corps. Urokodaki, Giyuu, and Tanjirou have all vouched for Nezuko with their lives.

Considering the deference the Hashira show to the Master, the matter should be fucking CLOSED. And yet many of the Hashira won’t accept their Master’s decision. These are the same Hashira who only minutes before were barking and whining about Tanjirou and Giyuu “breaking the rules” all Demon Slayers were sworn to follow. Excuse me, but how is contradicting your boss and acting on your own following the rules?

Not all the Hashira are foolish. Giyuu is obviously on Tanjirou’s side. Shinobu is at least willing to hear him out. Kanronji Mitsuri, who seems to love everything and everyone, is fine with her master’s wishes. Tokitou Muichirou is indifferent, going whichever way the wind blows. But Hotheaded Wind Guy, Giant Weeping Monk, Everything Must Be Flamboyant Guy,  Snake Guy, and Hot Rod Guy form a caucus of dudes who have decided their Master’s word isn’t good enough.

Frankly, they are the ones who should be put in their place, for speaking and acting on matters they know nothing about. And yet, the Master gives them leave to make an argument convincing enough to overturn that of three people who have pledged to commit Seppuku if they’re wrong. Hotheaded Wind Guy (Shinazugawa Sanemi, yet another white-haired guy right on the heels of Rui & Co.) decides to make his argument by slicing his arm open and dripping it into Nezuko’s box to tempt her.

Leaving aside the fact Demon Slayer is playing fast-and-loose with these five Hashiras’ devotion to The Rules, as a practical narrative matter, you, I, and everyone else watching know full well that neither Tanjirou or Nezuko are dying anytime soon; they’re the goddamn co-protagonists, and this is not Gurren Lagann. So this is a big ol’ waste of time better spent formulating a plan for dealing with the real villain, Kibutsugi Muzan.

TenSura – 27 – Bonds Through Brandy

While we initially see the king in his standard position on the throne in full armor, Rimuru’s meeting with him is a far more casual affair, the two sitting across from a coffee table as equals. Dwargo is pleased to hear that Kaijin, the brothers, and Vesta have all found a place where they can exercise their talents to their fullest.

He also has nothing but good things to say about the apple brandy Shuna presents to him, which gives Rimuru to mention that they’re in trade talks with Eurazania. This impresses Dwargo, who is now at the stage of friendship with Rimuru that he has no need to check his drink for poison. Shion gets into it and demonstrates what a messy drunk she is, but Dwargo isn’t offended. Heck, he’s entertained.

The next day, Rimuru gives his big speech to the myriad peoples of Dwargon in his slime form. Shion is sufficiently sobered up to hold him up high so those in the back can hear his message of mutual respect and excitement over the new alliance between their nations. Dwargo later awards him zero points for coming off far too friendly and humble than a leader of a great nation should be, but the bottom line is, the speech is a success—the people of Dwargon have heard Rimuru and like him.

That night, Rimuru arranges a boys’ night out with the goblins and dwarves at the Elf Paradise hostess club. While I realize that deep down Rimuru is still a salaryman and takes these kinds of rituals seriously, the fact that Gobta and his fellow riders look way too young to be in such a club made the scene a bit awkward.

Granted, this isn’t a brothel, and if Rimuru, the goblins, and dwarves are literally objectifying them by regarding them as lovely jewels in a wood-lined treasure chest, at least the women don’t seem to be exploited; indeed, they’ll happily teast Gobta until his nose is drained of blood. The club manager is also happy to sell the apple brandy and research how much people will pay for it, so Rimuru gets another potential revenue stream out of the business.

I can also forgive the subtle skeeviness of the club scene because the boys are ultimately caught by Shuna and Shion, as one of the elves was too pure-hearted to lie about what they were up to that night. The two women are rightfully hurt that they wouldn’t so much as tell them where they were going, which only indicates they knew they wouldn’t be pleased about it, but that’s no excuse for their secrecy. Rimuru’s punishment is to endure a week of Shion’s cooking. Sounds fair!

From there we travel to what I believe to be the human kingdom of Falmuth, which, if King Dwargo is right, may someday be supplanted by Tempest as the continent’s main trading hub…whether Rimuru wants it that way or not. For now it’s a pretty bustling city, and Youm and his party of champions are walking along when his friend Isaac introduces Youm to his sister Myulan, the wizard we saw who is working for Clayman.

Myulan requests that she join Youm’s party. When he says he has enough magic users (and one of his more sexist comrades mutters that they have no need for a woman) Myulan decides to demonstrate her power to Youm in a duel between them. Myulan wins in an total cakewalk, with Youm ending up waist-deep in the ground and enveloped in a magical wind funnel.

Youm is convinced not only by Myulan offensive capability, but the insights she can offer into improving his clearly-lacking magical defense. They shake hands to make it official: Demon Lord Clayman now has a mole in the party of one of Rimuru Tempest’s best human friends. [Grabs popcorn and apple brandy]…This should be interesting!

Wandering Witch: The Journey of Elaina – 12 (Fin) – The Multitudes of Me

Elaina’s final trip takes her to the suspiciously foggy “Country That Makes Your Wishes Come True”. Elaina enters the country wishing to become rich, and is utterly mystified when she happens upon a landscape comprised of all of the places from her travels thus far.

Things get even stranger when she enters Mirarosé’s palace to find no less than fifteen alternate versions of herself. Some of them represent individual personality traits she possesses, while others are just random like the gel and ghoul versions.

Hondo Kaede has a blast voicing all these different one-note versions of Elaina, but I have to admit…it’s all a bit much. The intros were fun, but the gimmick wore quickly. This wasn’t one of those dreaded Recap finales, but it did borrow elements from the previous episodes, without adding much new or compelling, which gave it the sheen of a recap.

Deemed “Protagonist Me” by her intellectual version, Elaina sits down on the throne and orders the others to go out and investigate, but all of a sudden the “Violent Me” everyone else had been avoiding bursts into the palace.

Violent Me’s hair is still short from being cut by the ripper, as apparently she never emotionally recovered from the events at the town with the clock tower. All the other versions kind of hang around while the Protagonist and Violent Elainas fight to a draw (as expected).

Only when both are completely exhausted of magic and can no longer fight does Elaina try to calmly discuss things with her violent self. While we heard Elaina wish to become “rich” back in the beginning, it seems the country interpreted that as becoming rich with different “experiences”.

As such, all of the versions Elaina has now encountered represent different paths and possibilities available to her on her journeys. She also believes her other selves wished for the same thing, which brought them all together to pool their stories into a single book: Wandering Witch.

Elaina then wakes up in a meadow; the whole ordeal with her versions was just an elaborate dream. She hops back on her broom and continues her travels, cognizant of and excited for all of the possibilities and choices those travels will present.

In an epilogue that seems to preview a second cour of Elaina I’m not sure it earned, Elaina (in plain clothes) bumps into someone with similarly ashen hair but green eyes. They’re both holding red books, and when they bump into each other, those books get switched. This person’s name is apparently “Amnesia.” Um…alright then!

It’s a curious yet also fitting way to end a show that was never quite sure what it wanted to be: episodic or serialized; lighthearted and comedic or dark and dramatic. It started strongly and had a couple of powerful episodes, but that lack of decisiveness and focus in the stories it wished to tell ultimately dulled its impact.

Read Crow’s episode 12 review here!

Cardcaptor Sakura – 32 – Serious Kero, Comical Li

This episode starts rather than ends with a cardcapture, and the rest of it deals with the lingering effects of the card. Because it’s the Change card, and both Syaoran and Kero-chan were in contact with it when Sakura sealed it, the two end up swapping bodies. As soon as I heard Kero speaking in a normal Japanese accent while Syaoran broke out the full Osaka dialect, I knew we’d be in for a rare treat. Even Sakura can’t quite contain her delight at such a development!

Naturally, neither Kero nor Syaoran find this remotely amusing, as they’re not exactly fond of one another. However, since the effects of Change won’t wear off for 24 hours, they’re stuck in each other’s bodies. Interestingly, Kero!Syaoran heads to his home while Syaoran!Kero stays with Sakura, leading to him blushing over her for the second time. As luck would have it, Yukito stays for dinner, but when Kero leaves the safety of Sakura’s room, he’s almost accosted by a cat!

Meanwhile, Kero does his best to make dinner, but the taste of the soup and the sound of his accent immediately cause Meling to be suspicious. After all, he’s the love of her life, so she’d be the first to notice if he’s not himself—which of course he isn’t! That suspicion only intensifies the next day when he animatedly gives the class video game pointers…despite the fact Syaoran doesn’t play video games!

Like Meiling with Syaoran, there’s no fooling Tomoyo regarding what’s going on, especially when she holds up her camera and Syaoran!Kero strikes a classic Kero pose. Similarly, Kero’s clumsiness in Syaoran’s body is plain for all to see during a soccer match when he runs on all fours. Syaoran doesn’t fare any better in Kero’s body—he can’t fly, and he’s accidentally carried off by Terada-sensei, who bought a plush toy for his niece that’s a dead ringer for Kero.

Meiling also learns the truth, and joins Sakura and Kero as they track down Terada, who exchanged Syaoran for a different toy. Kero then has to play a claw crane game for the first time in order to pluck Syaoran out of the glass box. He gets fired up and eventually succeeds, and the two put their differences aside long enough to enter an embrace while Sakura re-activates Change in order to switch them back to their rightful bodies.

The episode pulls a clever fast one when Syaoran arrives back at school to find Sakura and Kero have now switched (Sakura’s Osaka ‘lect is great, though I wish Kero had gotten a good HOEEE in)! Then Syaoran realizes he’s swapped with Meiling, only to wake up in his bed; it was just a dream, and Meiling is glad Syaoran is Syaoran—as he was meant to be.

While normally standing out with its gorgeous visuals, the success of this ultra-entertaining outing primarily came down to the performances of Hisakawa Aya (Kero) and Kumai Motoko (Syaoran), doing impressions of each others’ usual performances. They pulled it off without a hitch! Now if we could just get a Sakura-Tomoyo swap (desu wa!)…or Touya-Yukito for that matter!

The Quintessential Quintuplets – 01 (First Impressions) – Five Times the Tutoring Trouble

Uesugi Fuutarou is a studious loner from a poor family trying to have his frugal lunch when an unfamiliar redhead in the uniform of another school tries to take a seat at the same spot with a 1000-yen megafeast. When he starts rudely studying in front of her, she spots the 100-scored exam he blatantly left out in the open, and she gets an idea: this guy could help her study! Instead, he storms off, telling her she’ll gain weight if she keeps over-ordering lunch. Wrong answer, pal!

Fuutarou later realizes the error of his ways, especially when his sister Raiha informs him that a lucrative tutoring job is available, and the redhead is the client. It turns out this girl, one Nakano Itsuki, is one of five quintuplets who have transferred to the school, all of them in need of tutoring. His other initial interactions include the flirty, teasing Ichika and the friendly Yotsuba. The quiet Miku and hostile Nino round out the quintet.

When Fuutarou arrives at the sisters’ opulent penthouse apartment, he’s met with resistance at nearly every turn, with the exception of the kind Yotsuba, who tries to help him wrangle her skeptical sisters in a harrowing room-by-room gauntlet. Even when they’re drawn together at the coffee table, it’s only because of the promise of cookies—no one ends up doing any actual studying during his first tutoring session.

Nino even manages to get Fuutarou out of the house by drugging his water, but Itsuki accompanies him on a taxi ride home. That’s when Fuutarou’s secret weapon imouto Raiha comes into play, using her cuteness to get Itsuki to join them for dinner. That’s when Itsuki learns that Fuutarou’s family is depending on the five-fold tutoring fee he stands to gain to pay off debts.

In light of the fact she’d be hurting more than him if she refused, Itsuki agrees to let him continue his tutoring sessions, with the caveat that she won’t accept “tutelage” from him, but will seek to improve her scores without his help. That’s good enough for Fuutarou, but he has yet to realize the gravity of the task before him: all five of the quintuplets are failing, which is why all five transferred to his less prestigious school.

The Quintessential Quintuplets (lets call it QQ) aired back in Winter 2019, but I neither watched nor reviewed, and it seems I missed out. I figured “5/5” would be the appropriate time to correct that error, but unfortunately I’m a couple days off. No matter: QQ is a ton of fun right off the bat. The premise couldn’t be simpler or more obvious and familiar, but the execution is solid.

Production values are high, the character designs and personalities are distinct, diverse, and well-balanced, and the all-star voice cast is pitch-perfect. Everyone comes off as likable despite their flaws, and the comedy works more often than not.

Sometimes you just need a good high school harem rom-com (this episode is intriguingly book-ended by marriage scenes), and there’s no harm in looking back to the recent past for a shining example, which is what we seem to have here.

Astra Lost in Space – 01 (First Impressions) – The Final Frontier: Getting Along

ALiS immediately sets the mood and grabs our attention by throwing us into the inky nothingness of space to float with poor Aries Spring (Minase Inori). She has no idea how she got there, but is understandably terrified, until she spots someone approaching her with an open hand.

Now that we know how bad things are going to get for Aries, the narrative rewinds back to the day Aries sets of for the five-day “Planet Camp.” Shortly after arriving at the spaceport, her bag is stolen, but the very fit and valorous Hoshijuma Kanata gets it back…only to be arrested by cop-bots.

No matter, Aries and Kanata eventually join their six fellow high school students (plus one little sister with an alter-ego in the form of a hand puppet) at the gate and before you know it, they’re on a 9-hour FTL journey to Planet McPa.

The meetup at the gate and the trip paint the characters in broad strokes, but the bottom line is they’re all very different personalities—pretty typical for a Lerche show. Within a couple minutes of setting foot on McPa, those clashing personalities are immediately tested by a weird floating orb, which I’ll just call a singularity. One by one, it sucks up the students who can’t outrun it.

After a very trippy visual sequence, everyone finds themselves floating in space, near a planet that doesn’t quite look like McPa. You couldn’t ask for a more nightmarish scenario, especially considering these are just kids with zero experience in space. Fortunately, there’s a spaceship in orbit, just within the range of their thruster suits.

They head to the ship, open the thankfully unlocked hatch, and climb aboard. There’s a grand sense of adventure afoot, and the music really helps to sell it. That’s when they realize there are only eight of them—poor Aries is still out there, drifting further and further away.

With insufficient fuel for a two-way trip in their suits, Kanata decides to use a tether to reach Aries, and we return to the end of the cold open, with Kanata reaching out to take Aries’ hand…only his rope is just too short. Disaster! Whatever to do? Kanata decides to go for broke and detach himself from the tether so he can grab an eternally grateful Aries.

But while they’re safe for the moment, there’s another problem: on the way back Kanata runs out of fuel, but his trajectory is five degrees off, meaning he and Aries will fly right past the ship. It’s time for the others, putting aside their initial differences to create a human chain outside of the airlock that snags Aries and Kanata and pulls them aboard.

That’s when they learn of several more problems—there are always more problems in space than in…not space, after all. They’re 5,012 light years, or more than three months, away from home, with only enough water for 20 days and only enough food for three.

With the aid of Zack Walker, he of the 200 IQ and spaceship license, he manages to calculate a route that will enable them to resupply at planets within twenty days of one another…but there’s only one possible route. Even so, the fact that there’s a remotely feasible plan bolsters everyone’s spirits.

With hope in their hearts (and probably very little food in their stomachs) Kanata is chosen as their captain, and they all take their places as the ship’s FTL activates, and they head off, through hardships, to the stars, on a very simple mission: Get Home Safe.

The last act seems to blow by extremely fast as solutions present themselves almost too easily, and while many members of the cast showed different sides, the jury is still out on others, but over all this was a strong start to a good old-fashioned space adventure. No convoluted factional conflicts or supernatural chosen ones…just nine kids probably in over their heads, but who have no choice but to grow up and do the best they can.

Koe no Katachi – (Film Review)

Koe no Katachi isn’t just the redemption story of a guy who bullied a deaf girl in elementary school, got caught, became ostracized, and came a hair’s length from offing himself. It’s more than just the tale of a deaf girl trying to do the best she can to fit into a world in which everyone else can hear. It isn’t just the story of a little sister being so worried about her big sister that she neglects her own life.

It’s all of those things, and far more. It’s really a story about all of us, because we all have flaws. We can’t always fix those flaws, either due to lack of understanding or guidance. All of us have at some point or another hurt others, or been selfish, just as others have hurt us or been selfish themselves. These are not unique qualities to have, they are the things that make us human.

Can people truly love themselves, or anyone else, completely unconditionally? Rarely. There are always conditions and compromises, and transactions. Words fly and are heard or not heard, but actions are felt, and ultimately they define us. Not one action or two, but all of the actions in one’s life, good or bad. And the sequence of those actions are crucial.

Ishida Shouya WAS a colossal dick in elementary school. He DID bully Nishimiya Shouko mercilessly until she had to transfer out. When confronted with his crimes, he DID lash out at his friends, who then turned on him one by one. But he’s trying to make things right; he’s trying to make amends. And he’s lucky; Shouko is as kind and forgiving in the present as she was in the past; almost to a fault.

And yet meeting Shouko again, seeing that she harbored no ill will, and even seemed interested in being friends with him aftrer all that happened, changes everything for Shouya. One by one, he makes friends again, through acts of kindness, forgiveness, and selflessness. Yet he learns that friendship isn’t a right attained by fulfilling qualifications or conditions, but about the simple gesture of reaching out and grasping someone else’s hand.

Of course, friendships can and almost always do get a lot more complicated. Back in elementary school, Shouya likely did what he did not just for personal amusement, but for approval and acceptance. When those things suddenly didn’t work, and in fact had the opposite effect, he was suddenly un-moored, and left with nothing but his own regret for all of the pain he caused.

But as long as there are other people in the world who will even consider sharing the same space or breathing the same air, recognizing pain and sharing it is the best way to go. We are social creatures. We may hurt each other sometimes, but we need each other to survive; to help each other live.

Whew…that’s probably enough pretentious babbling like I’m some kind of expert in psychology or sociology for one sitting! It’s just that Koe no Kotachi, as I said, is far more than the sum of its parts, and even those parts are phenomenal in their construction and presentation, be it its fully-realized and complex characters, KyoAni’s seemingly more obsessive-than-usual attention to human and environmental detail, marvelous dialogue, voice acting, music, etc.

Koe no Kotachi is BIG, and it’s often messy, much like life. There are moments of despair and disgust, but also moments of grace and astonishing beauty. Scenes filled with hate and loathing mixed with scenes of love, understanding, and camaraderie.

It’s immensely though-provoking and impeccably performed. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry (probably more than you’ll laugh) but mostly it will tear your heart to pieces and then meticulously reconstruct it, bigger and better than ever. Mostly it’s just really really good. I highly recommend it!