My hotel does have an internet connection, albeit a slow one, so I managed to watch Iroha. I have to run in fifteen minutes so let’s see how I do at speed writing. No guarantees on whether I’ll have time for Stein’s; Gate, but expect a big post tonight (about what? it’s a surprise!).
Things are starting to head back in the right direction with this episode. The biggest improvement, from my perspective, is that this episode didn’t focus on a single character but instead consisted of a bunch of intermingling subplots woven together. We had Minchi attempting to lead a group of students in cooking (who are not nearly as gung-ho as she is), Nako becoming a connoisseur of abstract art, and Ohana and Yuina leading a group of waitresses. There were also many smaller developments of interest: we discover that Beanman has a son, Enishi begins bragging about his love life, and the novelist’s fantasies continue unabated.
The drama seems like it is making a comeback as well. Minchi is in quite a pickle, and I’m guessing it will require some intervention by Ohana and Yuina to salvage the cultural festival. The love triangle with Tohru is also reigniting, with Tohru going to the culture festival to see Minchi Ohana. I wonder if Ko will show up? There seems to be some not-so-subtle hinting to that effect.
My favorite part of the episode had to be Ohana’s dream sequence. Cross-dressing in anime is often overused, but I felt that as part of the dream sequence it fit in quite nicely. This is the kind of ridiculous and nonsensical thing with just the right amount of connections to and confusions with reality that it felt like an actual dream. Ko is quite cute as a girl too.
I also like how they showed Nako making a friend in class- she actually does seem to have grown a bit from the previous episode. It’s not a big change, since the rest of the class still ditched the two of them, but this makes it a more believable amount of progress. I wonder if Nako’s new friend will be insulted by the painting title. Also Nako’s compliment for Ren’s eyebrows: what the hell? Is this the beginning of a new pairing?
Not what I was hoping for in terms of story direction, but it will do. If things continue to move at this pace (barring a rushed ending or intense plot development somewhere along the way) we’re almost certainly going to need season 3. I don’t know if one is in the works or not but I get the feeling that there’s MUCH more to be told here.
…and much more to be developed. Personally, I’d like to see more of Ohana’s relationship with her mother and (especially) her grandmother. The Ko/Ohana thing has been abandoned and needs resolution. Yuina and the future of the Kissuiso won’t take as long, but both require fitting conclusions. Due to time I get the feeling that one of these plot points will be left hanging and that would really be a shame.
Nako/Ren would be an awesome pairing 😀 To fully enjoy it, they’d have to develop Ren some more and with where we are in the season, I doubt they’ll have time for that.
Yeah, I’m hoping that we get more focus on the mother and grandmother for the ending (particularly the grandmother). Ren hasn’t gotten much screen time, and neither has Beanman- with the new revelation that he has a son, I’m guessing that he’s going to get his turn though. I’m still optimistic that they’ll be able to bring things to a conclusion (especially considering that the last few episodes were more or less fluff), but I have my doubts as well.