Subculture Anime Blog

Minaide!

Summary:

Kafuka visits the clinic in belief that she is suffering from a summer cold. When she enters the doctor’s office she believes that she sees Nozomu, but finds that the doctor is actually Nozomu’s older brother Mikoto. Upon writing his name on the board, she finds that his name spells out “death”. This makes her call him Zetsumei Sensei. After letting out stress from the belief that his name is the reason no one will visit his clinic, Mikoto asks what Kafuka has come for. However, she tells him that she seems to have already cured, which makes him through her out. Chiri meets Kafuka in the neighborhood sometime later, and asks if she has seen Nozomu. Kafuka takes Chiri to Mikoto, who confirms that Nozomu has left. Under various circumstances, all of Nozomu’s students end up in his hometown. They are all picked up by the Itoshiki family butler, who Kafuka likes to call Sebastian. After arriving at the Itoshikis’ large estate, the students are introduced to Nozomu’s younger sister Rin. Rin becomes angry after Kafuka calls her Zetsurin Sensei, but her guards take her away. The students then discover that if Nozomu sets his eyes on someone, he must get married to her, and they are invited to participate. Matoi and Chiri try to convince Nozomu to look at them, but Nozomu declares that he is a pro at not looking. Nozomu declares that he will not look at anyone for the next twelve hours as he runs into a storage room, but he finds Kiri there. He runs into the grounds below, where “look at” pros have been dispatched. Even the pros fail at looking a Nozomu out of concern of themselves, but Kafuka detects that there is another pro in the vicinity besides them. Nozomu suddenly runs into a horrifying sight in the form of many eyes, causing him to faint. The monitors that Sebastian and the students were using to keep track of him also go off. Chiri suggests that things can be seen with the heart, as an eye appears on her forehead. Everyone starts to head home after Nozomu succeeds, and they leave just as Nami arrives. On the train back, Nozomu believes that he sees the eyes on Kaere’s panties, which makes him pass out again.

Impression:

There were a ton of references in this episode as usual, but I was only able to catch a few of them. I think a lot of the references were to old movies that I’ve never seen before. Out of the ones I did catch there was Kill Bill, Zelda, and Jigoku Shoujo. The scene with the eyes reminded me of Hellsing and the eye of Chiri’s forehead reminded me of Tien from Dragonball. I could be way off on those two references though. Some of the scenes on Sebastian’s monitor reminded me of a Naruto OP or ED as well, but that one’s a stretch too. Unfortunately, after the long rant I had last week, I don’t have as much to say about this week’s episode. This is mostly because I don’t know what they were referring to. I predicted that the cultural references might throw me off early on, and my prediction was proven today. That’s ok, because I could still enjoy the humor of the episode in the way most people do. That’s what’s so great about this show. There’s so many ways to appreciate it! It was nice to see Nozomu’s siblings, Mikoto and Rin. Just like Nozomu, their names can be turned into negative meanings and they both have odd personalities. Unfortunately, they didn’t really get the same treatment as the students did as far as their introductions go. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a new iMac to set up…

EDIT: Ah geez I feel like an idiot. Maybe I’ve been paying too much attention to my new computer to give this episode any thought. The scene with Mikoto represents the stereotype of people judging things on the surface. Just because his name has a negative connotation, people avoid his services. This is like people judging each other based on their appearance, or maybe avoiding a restaurant after hearing negative things about it. Nozomu’s family actually happens to be one of those high class Japanese families, where arranged marriage is common (although Nozomu’s proposal was very odd). All of Nozomu’s students were thrown in as marriage candidates at random. As ridiculous as this was, it wasn’t too different from what usually happens when wives are chosen for marriage. Rin was very funny for appearing to be a Yamato Nadeshiko, but actually being quite violent in a yakuza type way. This was also very fitting for the rich family type stereotype. The rest of the episode just seemed to be a parody of horror films, and the shots inserted inbetween scenes probably strengthened that. Ok sweet, now I’ve written enough about this episode to satisfy myself. Now I can set up my computer in peace.