Takunomi. – 01 (First Impressions)

Takunomi is a good old-fashioned sitcom, centered on the lives of four young women who live together in Tokyo, and enjoy good food and good beer, particularly YEBISU premium beer.

That golden can is flashed on the screen so often you could make a drinking game out of it. But I didn’t really mind the blatant product placement, because A) I personally like Yebisu and B) the rest of the show is quick, simple, enjoyable enjoyable watch.

Takunomi isn’t trying to do that much, merely portray that Michiru had nothing to fear by moving to a Tokyo share-house with three strangers; they all turn out to be very friendly, kind, and generous. The first housemate she met, in fact, retrieved her purse from a thief at the station before they even knew each other, after all.

Everyone’s drawn to look at least five years younger than they are (Michiru is supposed to be 20), but it’s still good to have a show about adults who appreciate good beer, good food, and good company, and know how to properly kick back after the grind.

If I had to choose between Ramen Daisuki Koizumi-san and this—and I do—I’m choosing this. Kanpai!

Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo – 08

I’ve liked how deftly Y7 has kept things fresh by approaching each new witch intro from a different angle, which is also appropriate considering the unique problems that led to them getting their powers in the first place. Urara was and is Yamada’s primary love interest. Nene was an adversary, while Meiko and Maria needed his help.

With Takigawa Noa, we seem to be dealing with another adversary. Her powers are believed to be the opposite of Maria’s, meaning the Supe Club assumes Noa’s turned three formerly popular students into troublemakers through blackmail or manipulation. But nothing is ever as clear-cut as it seems on this show. In fact, Noa’s turns out to be the most emotionally complex witch cases yet.

She’s also, at first, the toughest nut to crack. Yamada thinks at first he can put on the charm and get a kiss to make things easier, but to his shock, Noa is grossed out by him, having only teased him about liking him.

With Yamada’s pride hurt, he tries again, but only gets a push broom to the face. When he reveals he’s in the Supe Club and knows she’s a witch, Noa pulls attitude 180, and is suddenly keen to kiss him. So keen, Yamada thinks something is fishy, and rebuffs her advances. Now she’s the one with the hurt pride.

Using her knew knowledge of Yamada, she hits him where he lives, having her three troubled friends/minions brutally ransack the clubroom. I’m not sure how they weren’t simply suspended or expelled right then and there, but the adults are all but nonexistent in this school, so whatever.

Pissed off more than ever, Yamada confronts President Yamazaki for the truth about Noa, and he gets it: she wants to make witches out of her three friends, and eradicate all the others. That means Urara, Nene, Meiko and Maria are all in danger.

Rather than panic, Yamada stages a trap for Noa’s crew, using a game, excited Urara as the bait. I appreciate her adventurous spirit throughout this mission, and the fact she trusts Yamada’s judgement more than anyone else. The female friend of Noa kisses Urara, and celebrates the fact she was able to switch bodies, so she can now pesumably do something to get Urara expelled and thus powers revoked.

Only Yamada kissed Urara before, so the girl only ends up switching with him, in Urara’s body. She and the other two are tied up and held captive in the club room while Yamada, still in the girl’s body, opens negotiations with Noa.

Two others (not sure who) accompany Yamada in the bodies of Noa’s friends, but Noa knows who they are immediately. She offers the notebook, then both notebooks in exchange for her people, but Yamada wants more: for the witch-hunting activities to stop, a condition Noa flatly refuses.

The talks break down, and Tsubaki and Itou beat Yamada for failing again, but Yamada insists this is about more than getting the notebooks back: three students’ reputations are at stake, and Noa must be stopped. That’s when Noa’s friends agree to stop their activities of their own volition. They’d rather be together with Noa than for her to be alone.

This awakens Yamada to a key point: Noa hasn’t been manipulating her friends. When he gives them back to her, he asks her if taking over the school with her power was really her goal, and castigates them for causing all those problems that caused them to lose the popularity they already had.

That’s when a frustrated Noa kisses Yamada, and he experiences her power firsthand: in a dream, he relives the most traumatic memory of her past, when her classmates locked her in a storage room for hours until she wet herself. Similarly, her three friends never did anything bad; they were framed.

Noa has wanted to save them for so long, and thought she could do so by getting them witch powers. But when Yamada stopped them, she remembered they were popular from the start, and only their association with her hurt them.

Then the three friends come to Noa’s aid, fighting Yamada and insisting they won’t leave her side. But Yamada shoots back that it’s their wishy-washiness that’s causing Noa’s suffering. Yamada doesn’t have all the answers, but he thinks they should at least do whatever they can to make Noa smile.

At that, another switch seems to go of in Noa’s head, and when we next see her, she’s in the club clinging to Yamada, whom she claims to have fallen for completely. Urara, whom you’d think would be jealous about such a development, is actually happy, because Noa’s power is more about simply seeing someone’s darkest hour, it’s about both kisser and kissee opening their hearts to one another, eliminating artifice and pretense.

They haven’t known each other long, but Yamada and Noa experienced that, and now he knows she’s not just an annoying schemer, and he’s not just a nosy, gross upperclassman. Urara also remarks that the two aren’t all that dissimilar: Yamada’s power also ultimately brings him closer to each of the witches, since to know their powers is to know the problems that gave rise to them. He knew exactly what to do for Noa, and she appreciates it.

It was great watching the battle of wills between Noa and Yamada, as well as the breathless evolution of their relationship. Yuuki Aoi is a great addition to the already stacked cast. Two witches to go!

Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo – 07

This week the Supernatural Club changes the future, not to save lives (as in Steins;Gate) but to save reputations. No one wants to be pegged as the one who set fire to the old school building, after all.

Yamada and Miyamura end up at the house of “shut-in” Sarushima Maria, a returnee who also happens to be a witch. Her power is precognition, and saw sees a future in which she was blamed for burning the building, which is why she doesn’t go to school.

Then Yamada appeared beside her in the vision, which why she expects his arrival. He tells her the first step to figuring this whole thing out is by kissing her, which she agrees to. What Yamada wasn’t expecting was a french kiss!

Yamada experiments on his new copied power by kissing Miyamura, then gets a vision of being slapped, which comes to pass when Nene stops by and her skirt caught on her sweater, revealing her panties. But because his vision is from Miyamura’s POV, Urara determines that Maria’s vision is being seen by another person, who could be the arsonist.

Maria admits she did kiss one other guy (and likely french kissed him, at that): one Tsubaki Kentarou, an old friend and fellow returnee. Yamada confronts this Tsubaki, who promptly tells him he’s in love with Urara and wants Yamada to arrange a meet-up for them.

Tsubaki then leads Yamada to the old school building, site of the fire, to do something he does whenever he gets depressed: make tempura. While insanely random, it does explain how the school gets set on fire; it’s an accident; one that they must now prevent.

The next day, when Tsubaki is expecting Urara, he gets Yamada and Miyamura instead, with Yamada insisting they kiss. But not only is Tsubaki not into guys, he’s extremely strong, and the other guys are unable to get him to kiss Yamada.

That gambit failed, and they return to the clubroom to find Maria there, who knew it would fail. She came to kiss (i.e. french) Itou, who witnessed the fire from the club room where a clock read 8:03 PM. (BTW, I love how tall Maria turns out to be—she reminds me of Kino Makoto—and the fact Itou seems to be instantly smitten with her, perhaps due to that french kiss)

That means if they can keep Tsubaki from cooking tempura past that time, the future will change and the fire in her vision will be prevented. But how to do that? The episode doesn’t make it so easy. Tsubaki certainly wouldn’t cook tempura if Urara accepted his confession, but she can’t do that, because as we know, she likes Yamada.

Yamada believes he’s cracked it: switch bodies with Urara and agree to a date with Tsubaki while delaying a situation where he could confess to her as long as possible, thus staving off the fire. This is another episode in which Yamada’s brute strength is useless and he depends on his friends to help him sort through the tangle of temporal probabilities.So I like his little dance as Urara when Tsubaki agrees to the plan.

Only problem is, Maria still sees the school fire in the future, only this time Itou (very hot and bothered by another Maria frenching) is with them at the fire now rather than by the clock. Worse still, Yamada-as-Urara stumbles into an extremely romantic place while parting ways with Tsubaki, and Tsubaki follows her and exploits that location to confess.

This puts Yamada in the unenviable position of having to answer a confession aimed at Urara, but Urara, in his body, prevents him from saying anything by kissing. Now back in her own body, Urara tells Tsubaki “this is the way it is”, pressing herself into Yamada to make her rejection clear.

By doing this, Urara has all but assured Tsubaki will make tempura tonight, and indeed he races to the school to do just that. Yamada follows him, but isn’t strong enough to get into the kitchen. That’s when Urara arrives, which draws Tsubaki out. Yamada pounces on him, and in the confusion, the time when the school catches fire passes. Mission Complete! Maria embraces Itou in joy and relief.

She also takes Yamada aside after the club celebrates to give him a big ‘ol hug, but also tells him one of her visions was of Urara standing alone before the fire; just like the cold open. She switched bodies with Yamada during Tsubaki’s confession so she could take his place in the vision, protecting him from being blamed for an arson.

While Yamada meekly thanks her at first, he continues to say “as if I’d thank you!”, and tells her never to do something so stupid again. Thus this whole exercise in changing the future Maria saw was also an exercise in romantic development, as Urara moved to sacrifice herself for Yamada’s sake, something Yamada appreciates but doesn’t want.

The way things turned out, they worked together to resolve the issue, and neither of them had to take the hea, and hopefully that’s how they’re operate as they discover more witches.

The cast is ballooning, and Tsubaki is a somewhat simplistic character whose role in the club is still not very clear, but I did like Maria. I expected the pink-haired popular-looking girl would be a pain, but she turned out to be a big-hearted statuesque, french-kissing delight. On to the next witch!