Subculture Anime Blog

Gender role disaster.

Summary:

Kana arrives home to the delight of being served one of her favorite deserts by Haruka, but she still can’t help but steal some of Touma’s when she meets her in the living room. In response, Touma head-butts Kana into submission. While the Minami sisters have dinner that night, Kana brings up the previous conversation she had with Touma’s brother Akira at school. He was quite grateful for Kana and the other sisters for giving Touma the chance to be around girls, and to develop more feminine qualities. Kana decides that this was all Touma’s brothers’ decision though, guessing that Touma may actually prefer otherwise. This leads Kana and Chiaki to guess that Touma would come to the house to seek inspiration from Haruka. The two sisters further wonder which of them is above each other in skill, but when Touma arrives at the house, he finds Haruka subduing both of her younger sisters in punishment.

When Touma returns home one day, she finds Natsuki quite angry at her for arriving late. Because of this, she denies Haruka’s offer to stay for dinner when she visits the sisters later. After hearing Touma’s explanation, Haruka recalls the conversation she had with Natsuki earlier. Natsuki had suggested that Touma was acting more like a boy, but this didn’t bother him. If she were to do so, he would just treat her more like one. Because of this, Kana comes up with a plan to help Touma. This involves her giving Natsuki a certain feminine photo. Natsuki is angry when he finds Touma arriving home late once again that night, but to Touma’s surprise, her giving Natsuki the photo successfully calms him down. This picture turns out to be a risque one of Haruka.

At home, the Minami brothers wonder what they should buy Touma for her upcoming birthday. This leads them to recall the gifts they got her previously, but most are situations from when she was younger. Natsuki had given her a game console more recently, but it had broken to Touma’s disappointment. With this, Natsuki decides that he will purchase her gift. Later at school, Kana is met by Hiroko who wishes to learn news about the current banchous. To Hiroko’s disappointment, Kana cannot do much more than recall the situations of the previous three. Elsewhere, a girl named Hitomi watches Natsuki intently over lunch. Realizing that he has forgotten his wallet, she helps him in her own way. Natsuki freezes when he sees Haruka in the halls, but when Hitomi looks at the gaze in his eyes, she believes that they are meant for her. This leads her to run away in embarrassment, bumping into Haruka and Maki in the process. Haruka and Maki wonder if Natsuki had done something to Hitomi, so he tries to put on a look that suggests otherwise.

On a particularly rainy day, Hitomi approaches Maki asking for advice on how to be more adult-like. Hosaka eventually shows up to give his own suggestion, which deals with his unwavering plan to save Haruka from the rain with an umbrella. Hitomi takes this as meaning that having an umbrella will make one adult-like, so she offers an umbrella to Natsuki later. He tries to avoid her, seeing that the said umbrella is pink with bunnies on it, but he seems to have sight of hope when the sun appears outside. Haruka is also relieved elsewhere, but for her sisters rather than herself.

Preview: Fun in the sun…Manabi Straight style!

Impression:

Anybody taking sociology, psychology, or communication courses this semester? Hitomi is a pretty pro observer at taking hints from Natsuki’s nonverbal language! Okay….so she’s not. I’d say the said character’s introduction stood out the most in this episode though. She’s played by a seiyu that I hate oh so much, but otherwise, I like her character just as well as I do the rest of the cast. (Stalkers in love FTW.) It was also a plus to hear Saeko Chiba make a return as Hiroko, rather than the more commonly shown Hayami, though this didn’t last for very long.

The other half of this episode dealt a lot with Touma again, which was kind of surprising. The play on gender roles was as funny as ever, and I loved all the Street Fighter action. (Natsuki dodged that dragon punch like a champ!) The subtle humor made these parts of the episode as usual, while I laughed at things like “99 in 1″ and Chiaki’s general awesomeness while watching the bad informercials on TV. On a more random note, who else remembers how annoying it was when people blocked your way like Natsuki did to Touma in this episode??

Notes:

• Holding chopsticks in your mouth like Kana did in this episode is very dangerous. I don’t recommend it.
• Also, loli Touma. That is all.