Hawaii gets kawaii.
What They Say:
“Kaguya Won’t Forgive / Kaguya Wants to Forgive / Miyuki Shirogane Wants to Go Somewhere”
Kaguya and Shirogane had an argument over the “home visit incident” and as they’re both unable to be honest about their feelings, a hostile mood pervades the student council room. Since Kashiwagi has a boyfriend, Kaguya goes to her for “romantic advice,” although she lies, saying she’s “asking for a friend.” Meanwhile, when Shirogane asks romcom fan Ishigami how he can make up with the “person of the opposite sex” he had a fight with, the class treasurer goes off on a heated rant… After getting an earful of various advice, Kaguya and Shirogane begin to realize how they really feel about each other.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
While the “Part 1” from the end of the last episode doesn’t see its “Part 2” here (perhaps in a later episode), we do get several continuations of the storyline that already lasted pretty much the entirety of the previous episode. Yes, Kaguya and Shirogane sleeping together is a rather major event to overcome, even if it was in fact far tamer than it sounds. It’s only used as a pretext for the conflict in the first segment, but its full continuation comes in the second.
Indeed, the first section only briefly acknowledges what had transpired as a means to establish a more antagonistic tension between our protagonists than usual, but that just allows the two to have a vicious battle over something even more trivial than their normal fare. A slice of cake has arrived, and each demands that the other eat it, to such extreme lengths that they spend over an hour trying to push it onto each other. These two are clearly made for each other, as they have way too much in common, not only their impossibly stubborn sense of pride but a need to act considerate to the point of being inconsiderate that extends from that. Horrified about eating the other slice of cake when abstaining could’ve prevented this deadlock, Ishigami calls in the reinforcements, but as Kaguya and Shirogane each follow the same path to try to get the other to concede, they end up showing some evidence of how much they pay attention to each other. As this progresses, their romantic development begins to blossom out of the least likely scenario, but this also means that the inclusion of the likes of Chika can ruin the mood as quickly as it can help when we need an injection of comedy.
But there are still plenty of unresolved feelings from both sides regarding the events at Kaguya’s house, so they each seek advice on how to reconcile. Kaguya turns the usual Kashiwagi situation on its head by actually asking her for romantic advice (and Kashiwagi knows exactly what “asking for a friend” means), but Shirogane doesn’t follow suit by asking her boyfriend, instead seeking out help from Ishigami, likely a poor choice no matter how you look at it. Ishigami’s persona is often a good source of slightly darker comedy, but when you get him talking about male-female relations, he becomes an obnoxious and rather reprehensible character, even if he reads enough romantic comedy manga to know how things will play out in the real world… as depicted in a romantic comedy manga. Although Kashiwagi’s advice is a little more reasonable, there’s really no reason Kaguya and Shirogane should come out of this with good ideas on how to move on, but fortunately, they really just needed to talk through their thoughts (while hiding the true identities as much a possible) and ultimately knew what conclusion to come to. While they may constantly be fighting in one way or another, holding a grudge about something that could be much more serious but really wasn’t will only serve to further interfere with the relationship they’re comfortable with. It’s another cute ending to what can really be thought of as an arc that spans more than a full episode.
Once that’s all behind them, they move right along to setting up for the next arc, perhaps one that will last the remainder of the season. Summer vacation is upon us, and that offers perhaps the best opportunity to make romantic progress. While Kaguya’s mind is empty for much of this, Shirogane knows that he needs to seize the chance, and with the help of Chika, he tries to bring back the topic of a group trip that was brought up early in the series. Chika is back to being a comedy delight throughout this segment, serving as Shirogane’s perfect foil while Kaguya is more or less out of commission (albeit in a different way than last time). This possibility can’t be ruled out again, though, and it’s Ishigami to the surprise rescue, despite Chika’s reaction leading him to believe he had ruined everything once more.
In Summary:
The events of the previous episode are of major importance throughout much of this episode, forcing both Kaguya and Shirogane to confront their feelings a little more closely, and resulting in several cute developments even if the best resolution for all involved is for everything to return to normal. With its remaining time, the episode sets up for what is likely to be the next major arc that could even cover the rest of this adaptation, and has a great deal of potential for varied comedy and romance alike. The series is less episodic now, but that’s to be expected, and the more each event matters, the more engaging they can become.
Grade: B+
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
LG Electronics OLED65C7P 65-Inch 4K Ultra HD Smart OLED TV, Amazon Fire TV Stick
