What They Say:
Episode 8: “Party Chopper”
A play depicting the tale of the Queen is the party entertainment. Kiri and Iwai are led backstage to get into costume for the next act, but this will leave one of them hanging.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
So, we come to the Gossip party, which is quite the lavish spread. Iwai, of course, is the center of attention as everyone looks upon the Queen of Hair. We even get a play showing a “queen” of some sort interrogating a “witch” who has long and beautiful hair. Iwai quickly figures out the play is about her. We get commentary from the spectators as the “queen” goes off on the “witch” and appears to sentence her to death. For having better hair.
Things get more ominous and stranger still when a worker at the party informs Kiri and Iwai that they have been chosen to help with the entertainment, and are asked to put on costumes backstage. It quickly turns out that this was nothing more than a ruse by our less than favorite villain, Nakajima. And so, boring villain locks Iwai in a cage and then goes into some boring speech which I ignored and then attempts, yet again, to kill Kiri with his magical noose. This time, of course, Kozakura is nowhere to be found in order to intervene, just as Nakajima had planned.
The curtain is drawn back and this is the entertainment for the party. Remind me never to accept an invitation from Gossip. Kiri attempts to fight the noose and use his scissors against the Rule Book, but Nakajima is able to maintain the upper hand. It doesn’t look very good for Kiri. He does manage to strike one blow on Nakajima after calling him a coward (which is exactly what Nakajima is and what makes him so contemptible a villain). But the struggle seems to be in vain as Kiri loses consciousness on the way to losing his life. After the credits, we see a potentially lifeless Kiri hanging, though it’s not all smooth sailing for Nakajima. It seems the wound Kiri managed to inflict on him may be more serious than it first appeared.
It’s unfortunate that the writers have chosen such a contemptible and cowardly villain as Nakajima to be Kiri’s main opponent here. There is nothing less entertaining or less interesting than a self-righteous, hypocritical, self-proclaimed champion of justice. It’s even worse when he’s a coward who won’t even get his own hands dirty, relying on a magical book to do the dirty work for him. If this is meant to be entertaining on any level, it’s failing quite seriously for me. There are elements that save this episode from being a disaster. Kiri is still feisty and trying his best to fight. I’m more than pleased that he called out Nakajima on his cowardice. But they cannot entirely make up for an uninteresting villain being in the spotlight and getting his way almost too easily.
In Summary:
The party turns out to have been little more than a ruse to get Kiri into Nakajima’s clutches in a place where no one, especially not Kozakura, would be able to intervene and stop him. Kiri puts up a spirited defense, but things do not look all that good by the end. I have no doubt Kiri will survive this attack, but I’m not sure the mostly positive opinion I had of the series before this episode is going to be able to survive much longer if they continue in this vein. A course correction is sorely needed at this point.
Episode Grade: C+
Streamed by: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Apple iMac with 4GB RAM, Mac OS 10.6 Snow Leopard
