Yo!
What They Say:
“Chika Fujiwara Wants to Beat a Rhythm / Ai Hayasaka Wants to Talk / Maki Shijo Wants Some Help”
Shirogane couldn’t tell Ms. Herthaka that sometimes humans need to expose their weaknesses and endeavors to practice rapping which should be able to convey that. But his rapping skills are catastrophic. Fujiwara, who previously taught him singing and dancing, tags along for practice. But she’s a total amateur when it comes to rap that she’s on the level where she’s convinced it’s all simple-minded puns. So Fujiwara begins special training. With the advice from Shirogane who has overflowing knowledge on rap music, she rapidly improves… But something is still missing!
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
What on earth is this show? As if to create a battle of battles, Kaguya-sama answers Paripi Koumei/Ya Boy Kongming!’s big freestyle rap battle episode by immediately taking up its entire episode with freestyle rap battles the very next day. Yes, it sounds absurd, and it’s even more absurd than anything you could imagine from that description. The team behind this series goes so above and beyond with everything that what could be a silly little one-off gag to spend maybe five or ten minutes on and then never think about again becomes an unbelievably unforgettable juggernaut of bizarre creativity.
The premise for this, as they always are, is complete nonsense. Like many recent events, this ties back to the karaoke incident, which has stealthily turned into the defining moment of the season that’s already approaching its halfway mark. That story had a good blend of humor and sincerity, and this followup comes from the latter. Shirogane wanted to communicate to Hayasaka that she doesn’t always have to put on an act, a profound message, particularly for her character to hear, but his solution is… rapping, which apparently means that the reason he was rapping in their private karaoke booth way back then was because he was already attempting that strategy to share his feelings. Despite being so bad that he has to acknowledge it himself, he’s still convinced that this is the only medium he can use for his mission.
His justification for using rap actually belies the general wackiness of the episode. Like the other anime series that had this theme yesterday, he speaks to the power of the technique, intellect, and artistry required for great freestyle rapping, and through that he sees it as the perfect conduit for nuanced self-expression. He’s not wrong, but of course it immediately devolves into an assault on the senses that sends Chika flying. It wouldn’t be Shirogane if he wasn’t comically bad at anything music-related.
We already had references back to Chika’s tutorship arcs in her very brief appearance in that karaoke episode, sending her packing from just the thought of Shirogane trying to rap, but naturally she has to face it in all of its destructive glory, as he invariably finds himself begging her for help and she invariably finds herself helping him. You’d think she’d be used to how bad he is at these things by now, but it’s the fact that they’ve been through this so many times and he has shown enough progress to get the job done that she can’t believe he’s still back at step zero. While Chika has always been highly competent at whatever Shirogane needs to be taught (a hilarious concept in its own right given her usual character), this scenario subverts that formula. To call back to more Kaguya-sama lore, you might expect that Chika was the best rapper in town, but in fact she’s only a “good” rapper in a joking context, as she basically just adds “Yo” to the end of her sentences. In deliciously self-aware fashion, the series has Chika openly acknowledge that she always believed that was all there was to rap.
So in a change of events, Chika has to learn from Shirogane so Shirogane can learn from Chika. It sounds idiotic and it is (which they point out after the former achieves her goal), but it does make some amount of sense in that Shirogane understands what makes rap effective from a theoretical perspective while Chika is just a natural at anything artistic, especially musical. But even after raising Chika from novice to master, Shirogane is still just as much of a lost cause – nothing more training montage can’t fix.
Once the two are finally ready to present to Hayasaka, the situation gets even more complicated. While both believe in a “Herthaka” character, they disagree on the gender thereof, leading to classic misunderstandings that carry an added bit of irony as the direct cause of Hayasaka’s tendency for deception toward herself and others that Shirogane is directly trying to help her move away from. Meanwhile, the way Shirogane calls her out essentially feels like a date to all parties involved, which means that Kaguya cannot let it go unsupervised, another ironic setup given the fact that this all stemmed from Kaguya forcing Hayasaka to supervise Shirogane at that group date.
Once the players have all assembled, this episode transcends into something that even Kaguya-sama has never seen the likes of. It’s an absolute fever dream of an extended sequence of freestyle rap battle music videos that weave together with hilarious aesthetics that reference decades of rap culture and music videos of all genres. It’s like the torture dance from JoJo but spread across a much longer period of time with much more meaning and genuine impact.
Everything about this is wild, but the lyrics are still key, as should be the case. Some are pure comedy: Chika spouts English swears and vulgarities by letting her fujoshi flag fly with glorious abandon. But the highlight is Hayasaka’s contribution. I noted that at the end of that karaoke episode her relationship with Kaguya is very sweet but also unbalanced because at the end of the day she’s a servant who dedicates her life to her master, which was a general theme of that story as she started to rebel when she took Shirogane to a private room instead of just leaving. Now she uses this platform to finally let loose on Kaguya about the subservience of her position and how it interferes with her ability to be her own person and live the normal life of a teenager that she should be entitled to. This is all wrapped in a context of being somewhat comical and you could enjoy it without thinking about the words too much, but when you really listen, it’s a powerful moment in which Hayasaka uncharacteristically speaks her true feelings.
The fact that there’s a short segment not related to rap near the end of the episode feels wrong at this point, but everyone in this show is delightful, so it’s fine to check in with our newest addition Maki for a few minutes. The most notable development to come from this is the reveal of Nagisa’s boyfriend’s name – apparently I hadn’t simply forgotten that he had one; I was just on the same page as Shirogane and Ishigami all this time. Aside from that, though, there’s plenty of fun to be had with Shirogane being a hypocrite of godly proportions by condescendingly spouting platitudes about how foolish it is to wait for your crush to confess first, and Maki showing us more traits of her family by being just as prude as Kaguya. At least she knew what sex was. It has a cute little ending that reminds us that the tsundere is defined by her dere. Perhaps Kaguya doesn’t find it so cute, though.
As if to make up for the transgression of deviating from its rap theme, we get a very special ED that can only be compared to the Chika Dance from early in the series. Sure, it’s not on the same level, but the animation style is so striking that it’s still an incredible piece of art to watch. The song is of a very different style than in the episode proper, but it’s actually quite a catchy song in its own right.
In Summary:
Kaguya-sama is a crazy ride. It’s (almost) all about rap, of all things, this week, but as this series always manages, it takes that concept and takes it to a level entirely its own. Through its hilarious jokes, it finds sincere artistry in the poeticism of rapping, and uses it to speak to deep-seated emotions held back by the likes of Hayasaka to connect the characters in new ways. Perhaps most notably, it takes amazing visual leaps to call back to countless music video aesthetics across decades. This is a showcase of artists appreciating art in all of its forms and nuances. And it’s also really damn funny.
Grade: A
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
