SEASONAL PRATTLE
Offering yet another great showing, Wonder Egg Priority pushes out a fourth episode that’s in fantastic shape; Crafting a strong personality through thematic subtext that boiled elegantly into actual text as it brushes across pointed ideas of sexual menace and identity. The introduction and use of Momoe is an effective vehicle for this, and Four makes sure to take advantage: There’s a nice weave between the events in Momoe’s dream world and Rikka’s early on that carries inherent relevance as a parallel, which then smoothly transitions into more blatant pieces of her internal conflict and relationship with Haruka as we head towards the ED. This is all once again beautifully dressed from the sound design to the choices of color and space, and all the way back to the use of off-balance frames – there’s plenty of favorable forces consistently promoting Wonder Egg’s world from a fluent narrative conceit to an instant, material reality. Very well done!
Horimiya (5)
“So committed to its snapshot portrayal of love that it almost injures its capacity to be legitimately investable”
Horimiya stayed relatively true to its recent quality with this latest showing, taking care of business where it has to narratively but still feeling disheveled and rushed in the way it’s told more often than it really should. Episode five’s scripting is so committed to its snapshot portrayal of love that it almost injures its capacity to be legitimately investable – with Hori and Miyamura’s conflicts and triumphs arriving just as quickly as they resolve with little afterthought, only finding slight room to actually reflect on their relationship as a byproduct of Kyousuke’s introduction rather than as a true focal point. And the tangent issues the secondary cast faces practically follow the same flow of delivery, noticeably coming off as too fast and short to land beats like Remi and Sakura’s second half dramatics effectively. The almost inescapable brisk speed that this show tends to operate in at times without a doubt has its toll, and while Horimiya can string together some competent sequences now and then despite that, it’s going to sink if it continues to regularly deny its more pertinent moments the necessary buildup and room to launch and cleanly conclude.
Jaku-Chara Tomozaki-kun (5)
“Riding its balanced blend of insecurities and routine social dynamics to the finish line of an enjoyable episode”
Good turnout from Jaku-Chara Tomozaki-kun, riding its balanced blend of insecurities and routine social dynamics to the finish line of an enjoyable episode. It’s good to see Five’s portion of the story challenging Tomozaki more fruitfully; Going shopping as a group allowed Tomozaki’s slowly crumbling loner philosophy and narrow-minded worldview to receive a deeper exfoliation, specially sloughing off his perspective when the episode finds lanes to match him with Izumi alone. More importantly, the addition and incorporation of Mizusawa directly in Tomozaki’s social sphere is a rather nice spark to this series’ telling. Not only does Mizusawa pepper the show with a different flavor, adding hints of drama through an increasingly jealous Tomozaki as he interacts with Aoi, but he’s also framed as his casual mismatch. When your lead lacks social clout, often struggles to steer conversations to his needs, and is kind of just awkwardly off in gatherings of three or more people – having a character like Mizusawa to engage him can be very useful in the long term and gratifying in the short.
