Letter
What they say
Kazuya Kagami never goes anywhere without the precious “Sakura Obi” his mother gave him. One day a beautiful, kimono-clad girl named Kiriha appeared before him. Kiriha naturally began to live with Kazuya in his room. Then there’s Chisato, Kazuya’s childhood friend with glasses and a ponytail, who meddles in his affairs. Soon there’s also an overprotective older sister who seems to want to take baths with him. Jumble in a huge-chested priestess, a good-looking sorceress named Kokuyoura, beautiful women, and hot girls, and Kazuya’s happy, embarrassing, confusing life begins…
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
I always like it when stories take a unique twist that I didn’t see coming, and while I have already read this far into the manga and therefore DID actually see this coming, I still enjoyed episode 8’s dark turn as though it was my first time seeing it. On the other hand, I do think that this episode was awkward because we weren’t given a bath scene. Weird, I know. However, there has been a bath scene in every episode but this one, so it felt odd not having one here.
The episode begins with Kazuya squaring off against Kukuri. No, they aren’t fighting. They’re sparring. Now that Kazuya has become a exorcist, it seems he’s decided that it’s time to learn how to properly fight. This follows the standard storyline for anime like this. I don’t mind, though. While the “training from hell” trope happens in pretty much every shounen anime, there’s a reason these people need to train. Kazuya is going up against dangerous creatures that can and will hurt people. It’s only natural that he, as an exorcist meant to purify amasogi, would train to become strong enough so he can actually do his job. What’s more, he appears to be doing fairly well.
After the beginning segment, we return to school, where Kazuya, Chisato, and Osamu are called to the student council president’s office. It is here that we learn some interesting information. First, the student council president is balled. This is thanks to the malison atonement. Basically, there are three ways to defeat an amasogi: when it fulfills its purpose, when the host destroys it, or when someone else destroys it. If someone else aside from the host destroys the amasogi, it gives them a backlash—malison atonement—where they suffer in some way. The backlash depends on the amasogi’s nature and power. Some might only make someone smell really bad, but if an amasogi and the desire fueling it are powerful, it could potentially prove fatal.
What I really liked about this episode was the dark turn it took from the typical fan service episodes we’ve had so far. Don’t get me wrong. I love fan service. However, this presents an interesting twist that I doubt anyone who isn’t familiar with the manga would expect. It begins with Kazuya and the others being asked to investigate a girl who has been harrassing a group of students. The caviet in all this is that she’s already dead. Of course, ghosts do not exist in this world, so the problem is obviously related to an amasogi. The group goes through the typical investigation mini-arc, we’re introduced to the little sister of Nago, the girl who died, and then we find out some shocking truths before the big boss battle.
In Summary
There were two things about this episode that I didn’t like. The first was the “hapless protagonist lets female love interest beat him” trope that was used when Kiriha began stomping on Kazuya’s back because he apparently wasn’t good enough at fighting. I understand this is used for comedy. The problem is that it’s used so often that it’s no longer funny. The second was the degradation of the animation quality. This episode’s two fights, the training and the fight at the end, were nowhere near as visually appealing as the last several. It could be that the studio wanted to save money for the more important fight scenes. It could also mean that they do not have much budget left. In either event, outside of this issue, the episode was definitely solid and presented a nice twist that I doubt many people will see coming.
Grade: B
Streamed by: Crunchyroll
