Here in the US, it’s one of my favorite days, a holiday about eating. Well, that’s not exactly what it’s for, but that’s besides the point.

It was a fitting day to watch episode 8 of Ninomiya-kun, an episode about cooking ramen. Never realized how complicated a process it could be. I can always count on this show for a steady source of crack this season.

*cough*Perhaps this is a gimmick post, but who cares? Happy Thanksgiving. ^_^

Because Nanaka is ignoring him, Sana starts to think she’s mad at him, and inquires her about it. She claims that she’s not mad, and admits that she saw him with Asami. Sana explains that it was an accident, similarly to what happened at the festival with Nanaka. However, hearing that Sana didn’t think anything of that only makes her more upset. Both Sana and Nanaka realize that the other has changed from the person they used to know. Sana reflects on his past with Nanaka, and remembers a secret mailbox they used to use to send messages to each other. Sana had the only two keys, and gave one to Nanaka. They helped solve each other’s problems through their letters. Sana decides to look for the key, leaving his room a mess of porn books in the process. Aoi of course walks in on this.After retunring to the box, Sana is shocked to find it’s full of letters, including one that says “help me” all over it. Needing to know what happened to Nanaka, Sana questions Syusuke. He explains that Nanaka’s parents died in a fire. She was left traumatized for a while. While Sana thinks about his learnings, he’s confronted by Yuzuki-sensei. She gives him more caramel, leading Sana to question why she always does so. She explains to him, and as he’s leaving, realizes that he was the boy she gave caramel to in the past. Later, Sana and Nanaka meet each other by the mailbox by chance, and Sana admits that he knows about the fire. He apologizes for not being able to do anything when she was suffering. Nanaka starts crying, saying that she suffered more because he wasn’t there for her, and running into his arms. Afterwards, during a call with his mother, Sana says that he’s become stronger.

This was definitely an important episode. Nanaka’s past was finally explained. Her vision of fire did turn out to be significant, as it was a fire that killed her parents. I suppose the reason she doesn’t play the violin anymore is because she associates it with the loss of her parents, having it with her when she escaped the fire. I can see how this would’ve been a traumatizing event for her, and I really felt bad for her at the end. Not having an important person to you to help around after losing two other important people must’ve made it even harder on her. It also excuses her behavior towards the beginning more, of going as far as slapping Sana just because he didn’t remember her. It’s clear that she really loves him, so I can see why that would be insulting to her. Syusuke was interesting this week too. I’m surprised by how hurt he was over what happened to Nanaka, mostly because he was unable to do anything for her. That’s the kind of thing I can really relate to, often feeling bad that I can’t do anything for people’s problems. Since Nanaka’s problem was so big, it was probably particularly hard for Syusuke. Anyway, I’m glad Sana and Nanaka have pretty much made up, and hopefully their relationship will work out. Though, I’d be disappointed if there was no more drama between them, and there’s still a few episodes left. Hopefully when Sana’s background is explained, things can become interesting again. Next weeks episode looks like it could be cute, with more Hinako and Syusuke stuff. I thought Hinako would switch harems, but I guess she can still try for him.

Tamaki wants to buy a new boxset of a sentai anime, Material Puzzle, but doesn’t have enough money. Toraji is also having money issues, and ends up meeting a guy on the streets whom he forgot he owes money to, and is forced to give it up. At practice the next day, Tamaki overhears Miyamiya on the phone, who’s still suffering from her hurt foot. She convinces her to let her help at her job. Tamaki has to work at a creepy toy store, for a creepy lady. Work proves to be stressful, as she keeps fantasizing bad situations, and seems to be missing her normal life.

That was an amusing episode, even if it seemed a bit fillerish. This storyline didn’t end though, much to my surprise, so maybe Tamaki’s adventures in the workplace will somehow have significance later on. If anything, this episode did finally introduce the last girl, though she had little screentime. I still have no clue as to what she’ll be like, though she did do the preview for next week, so at least we got to see her do something. For the most part, I think this was just here to give Tamaki more development and for cuteness. Tamaki’s fantasies were amusing, especially the one where money went flying out of the register and she got arrested. think it amused me further since she’s not the type of person I could ever see in jail, as she’s supposed to be a defender of justice. Also, the scene with Miyamiya and Dan on the bike was adorable. Perhaps her pink side is just as destructive as her black side, even though I doubt she was intentionally crashing into things.

A couple quick posts are required, so I don’t fall further behind.

Da Capo 2 07

Okay. Koko wins. Nanaka, despite her feelings for Yoshiyuki, decided to give up on him and let Koko have him. The episode was really done in a dramatic way, making it look like she was going to confess, but in the end, she didn’t even go that far. I hope someone else at least goes as far as to confess, even though they’ll still lose to Koko, because it’ll add in some more angst and drama. Also, unless they get any development soon, I’m going to be really stumped as to why they even bothered putting Yume and Otome in this show, especially Otome. They do absolutely nothing. Even Anzu and Akane get more screentime than them.

Myself;Yourself 07

From the preview, I was expecting (and hoping) this episode to be more about Syuri and Syusuke, but what we got was pretty good anyway. It’s god to see Syuri finally getting some development, because I honestly had little care for her before now. I feel bad for her, because her father is a bit of a jerk, although I also have to wonder if she’s wrong as well. Her stepmother didn’t seem as terrible as she thinks, and she’s obviously having trouble letting go of the memories of her old mother, seeing how she wanted to protect the park from her childhood. Although, none of that really excuses her father from hitting her. There was also some Nanaka/Sana/Asami drama, which will probably set things back in Sana and Nanaka’s relationship, unless it gets cleared up soon that he wasn’t really doing anything with Asami. Finally, the animal sacrificing lady is creepy. First the bird and now the cat. Eww… I hope she doesn’t show up again.

Bakugan Battle Brawlers 33

Had to mention this one, due to more freakiness more cute shouta, and more development for Alice. Finally, a little reason for why she never battles is given. Apparently, she gets a bad feeling about it, and she doesn’t really understand herself yet. Well, I guess if she doesn’t know what her deal is, that’s probably why viewers like me are confused too. It was really cute though to see Tsuyoshi take care of her, and bring her up to his clubhouse. I’m starting to wonder if Tusyoshi might like her. He’s probably way too young, but I can see them in a brother/sister-type relationship. It’d be really sweet. And also, seeing Joe and the Infinity Core/Wyvern thing was interesting. It’s taken the form of his Bakugan now, granting him his wish of being able to fight to help his friends. Of course, the first person to challenge him was Masquerade, so I don’t know how much help he’ll be able to provide. All the excitement in the real world made Dan’s fight less interesting, although there was a great twist at the end.

In the first few episodes, when all the characters were being slowly introduced, Fuuko interested me the most. Of coruse, I was pleased to see that her arc came first, where in Kanon and Air, I had to wait until the end for my faves (Nayuki and Misuzu.) I don’t necessarily know if Fuuko will remain my favorite, not knowing much about the other girl’s backgrounds, and being rather intrigued by some of them, but anyway, that’s besides the point. Clannad is already being successful at being depressing, seeing how this episode ended. It was rather optimistic at first, presenting the thought of Fuuko waking up someday and making firneds, like Tomoya and Nagisa. It even seemed like Ibuki-sensei’s wedding plans would be worked out soon. But of coruse, it couldn’t last. People are forgetting Fuuko and being unnable to see her. Now all her hard work in distributing the starfish and getting people to come to the wedding seems like it could all be in vain. So this presents the question of just what she is. It’s pretty likely that she was somehow projecting her spirit, but I guess as her condition is deteriorating, she’s becoming less and less able of this. I wonder if soon, even the people she was closest to will forget about her. I sure hope not, but I’m expecting the conclusion to this story to be as depressing as ever for a Key anime. Of course, this wasn’t all depressing. Nagisa and Fuuko arguing over whether the Dango Daikazoku or starfish were cuter was one of the funniest things I’ve seen in a while. Especially Nagisa’s plagiarism line. The Dango are cuter, for the record.

Anzelotte has everyone over for tea, along with a mysterious man, who introduces himself as Nightmare, a dream user. She shows them the jewel of temperance, which other people retrieved. It makes Elis enter a dream, however, and it becomes possible that she could sleep forever. Therefore, Hiiragi, Akari and Kureha have to go inside her dream, with the help of the dream user who was there by “coincidence.” Of course, the evil lolis hear about this, and send an agent inside Elis’ dream to stop them. While inside, they fiond a library where Elis has a huge amount of copies of “Daddy Long Legs.” They see her as a child, and the dream Elis is lonely due to losing her parents and wants a man like in the story to be her Oji-sama. The agent pretends to be this person until he’s exposed, leaving Elis devastated. Hiirai, using a special water from Anzelotte, turns into a child and goes to speak to her, promising that he won’t be alone and that he’ll protect her. They then return to help in the fight. Eventually, Elis realizes she wants to help protect them too and uses her powers. She wakes up again in the real world, but doesn’t remember what happened in her dream. Kirihito, who was also in her dream somehow, finishes off the agent.

So, I haven’t wrote about this in a while, but this episode was just too cute. I love the little chibis, especially Hiiragi. It was also funny to see him retain his normal attitude even in a child form. The relationship between Hiiragi and Elis is coming along rather nicely, and it looks like this will be continued in the next episode. I’m pretty sure 7 is already out, but since I was behind, I was watching the sub release for a while. If I get the time I’ll watch the next, but maybe I’ll just wait. The problem is, now I’m really curious as to where the story is going to progress form here. They only need two more jewels, but I’m guessing this will be at least 12 episodes long. I can’t find an official episode count, but if it’s going to be 24-26, I’d be very surprised. I don’t think there’s much else left to cover, unless a really big plot twist is in store. They’re going to have to recover the other jewels, and probably have a final face off against the bad guys, but there’s still plenty of episodes to get that done. I really appreciate the fast pacing of this show, but I hope it doesn’t turn into a lot of filler now because of that. I guess they also have to explain Kirihito’s deal. I’m not sure if he’s good or evil. He has helped Elis, but he seemed pretty evil at the end of this episode. I’m leaning more towards him being a villain at the moment. I also can’t help but be a little suspicious of Anzelotte. I just think she knows a lot more than she lets off. Well, I guess there are still plenty of things for them to do, because they have to explain everyone’s motives some more. I guess they could focus on some character development too, if they have some less actiony episodes in the future.

The rival team is defeated with relative ease, especially due to the fact that Tamaki fights twice, once as herself and once as her newly-invented alter ego, Braver. The rival’s captain sees through her obvious disguise, but is impressed by her skill, and challenges her to a fight against him.

I’m surprised to say that this turned out well for an all kendo episode. They still managed to keep the things I like about this show, and so it was a funny, entertaining episode. If they keep future fights entertaining enough, I should be able to follow this all the way through. I doubt future opposing teams will be as pitiful as this team though. That’ll detract from some of the comedy, though at least it will create more of a challenge. Even seeing them last week, I was wondering if perhaps this new team had some kind of trick up their sleeves, but they turned out to be just as pathetic as they seemed. This was particularly apparent when one girl, after getting a phone call, got up and left. I’m not sure what the deal of that other girl, who looked totally petrified all the time, was. I got excited though when I saw that her opponent would be Miyamiya. That was also clever of them to make her go into black mode, so she could start to beat the crud out of her opponent. Anyway, next week’s episode should be interesting. From the preview, it looks like they’re going to be doing a lot of silly stuff as well as the fight. I’m guessing Tamaki can win, but at least it looks like she’ll have a bit more of a challenge.

Hinako ends up living with Sana temporarily due to her mother not being home. Sana discovers that it’s her birthday, and decides to take her out. He asks her what he thinks a girl would want as a present, and while Hinako thinks he’s shopping for Nanaka (or Aoi) she ends up picking out things she’s interested in while shopping. Sana also gets Syusuke to come so Hinako can spend time with him. Later, everyone throws a surprise party for her. Before she leaves to go back home, she gives Sana a kiss.

I think it’s time for Hinako to switch harems. I don’t think she has a chance with either Syusuke or Sana (actually, she probably has a better chance with Syusuke) but Sana would probably treat her better. He really is nice, letting her live with him, voluntarily attempting to eat her cooking, and then throwing her a birthday. Hinako’s family situation must be pretty sad, since she says she never had a birthday like that before. For a kid, throwing big birthday parties is important. The kiss at the end wasn’t too surprising. Anyway, this was a really cute episode, but it seems kind of irrelevant. It would’ve made sense to switch the order of this episode and last weeks, but maybe they wanted to show a creepier episode on Halloween or something. I guess it’s also good for variety, so there wasn’t two Hinako episodes in a row. It looks like they’ll be getting back to the main story, and the development of girls that might actually win, so that she be fun. With Syusuke and Syuri’s backstory next week, hopefully we’ll get to find out what Syusuke actually feels about Syuri. I still think there was some kind of subtext involved in him looking at her when trying to decide what his ideal woman would be.

Finally got a chance to catch up on Kodomo no Jikan. The censorship is still there and still annoying as ever, so I’m officially renaming this show. Episode 3 was particularly annoying. It was to be expected, seeing as the episode was mostly about Mimi needing to get a bra, but it’s still way too distracting for it’s own good. There were a couple cute moments, but all-in-all it just annoyed me in the end. I’d probably like it more if I could see half of what was going on. Episode 4 was better and finally added some dramatic elements to the show(though there was still annoying censoring). It was about Daisuke feeling guilty after learning about Rin’s family situation (parents divorced, mother dead, and living only with her guardian, who was adopted by Rin’s mother before her death) and trying to show he cares for her. I’m actually half convinced at this point that they’re somehow going to pair up Daisuke and Rin, despite the fact that it’d be way controversial. Daisuke is becoming much more comfortable around her and obviously cares about her. They’ve even actually kissed now, even if it only happened because Rin took him by surprise. He didn’t seem to hate it though, even though he was quite embarrassed and annoyed. If they don’t end up as a couple, I could see him at least becoming another father figure to Rin. For now, she has Reiji, but there’s something about him that I find suspicious. It’s not exactly in a bad way, but I feel he’s hiding some kind of secret. I remember him looking at pictures of Rin’s mother in the OAV. It could be as simple as him having been attracted to her before her death. I’m almost wondering if he has an interest in Rin too. Maybe that’s just crazy speculation on my part, but there is some logic behind it. A major point of this episode was that Daisuke thought that by knowing about the home’s and family of the students, he’d be able to know more about them as well. Rin is obviously attracted to older men, and seems to find it perfectly normal for men to like younger girls, so maybe Reiji is that type of man. I don’t want to villainize him though, because he seems to care about Rin very much. Though, just being attracted to her doesn’t mean he would make advances on her or anything. Anyway, for whatever the reason, he just is suspicious, so I’ll have to wait and see why. It’ll probably be much simpler than I think.