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Summary
Harada-sensei ends up losing in the semi-finals, while Arata loses in the fourth round of the Western qualifier. While Hiroshi from the Shiranami Society loses his match for the rights to challenge the current Master, Yamamoto Yumi wins her match and will be challenging Wakamiya Shinobu for the Queen title once more. At a Christmas party, Chihaya gets to know some of her other classmates and works up the courage to call Arata for the first time.
Impression
Everything this episode seemed a little detached to me, as if they strung bits and pieces into one episode rather than having anything that flowed well. With Chihaya knocked out immediately after losing her match against Yumi, you’d expect things to be a bit disjointed, and you have to question where the show’s heading to for a finale. Unfortunately we’re still looking for the answer to that question, since the atmosphere here was more of an arc closure one compared to something that would build up to an exciting finale. With a timeskip being the worst possible thing they could do, what seems most logical at this point is a second season. While they could focus on the Master and Queen matches, the show has Chihaya as a protagonist – it would only make sense for things to focus on her.
Harada-sensei’s actually quite strong, since he was able to beat Sudo and might have advanced even more were he a bit younger and had better knees. No matter how disruptive his loud karuta might be, it’s still better than contesting and going after every card, which I saw Yumi do again a few times, both in the regionals then the challenger qualifier match. It’s just not…professional to whine about close calls. Chihaya just gives them away most of the time xD
I felt so sorry for Taichi (as I often do) for putting himself and his own feelings second again, as he always does, every single time. This time it was encouraging Chihaya to go out with this random dude that just confessed to him, so I was glad that he acted for once and blocked that guy’s number. Also, props to Kana-chan for figuring it out, then referencing a karuta poem xD It’s good that he has a bit of backbone – he might not act against Arata, but some random guy is just out of the question. Actually what everything looks like is that both Arata and Taichi aren’t going after Chihaya for the sake of the other person, while all along Chihaya’s oblivious to everyone around her and surprised when someone asks her out. Seriously? With those looks, and it’s your first confession? The guys she scared off after showing them her karuta don’t count.
We’ve soldiered on for over 20 episodes now, please don’t fall at the last hurdle! If anything, that recap episode was a clear death flag of some sorts, since if plot was their main focus, there wouldn’t have been too much of a need to stick in recaps or “bridge” episodes. I’ll wisely leave the Arata fangirling to the girls.
I don’t know how to feel about this. I was so giddy at the end and was yelling at Chihaya going, “GOD DAMN IT, SPIT IT OUT ALREADY!” and then scolding her, “WHY DIDN’T YOU JUST SAY THE ENTIRE POEM!?”
Arata looked so cool this episode, even though he didn’t have much screen time. I was laughing hysterically how he didn’t cut any slack for the poor kid- but at least the kid had a good attitude. XD
I continue to pity Taichi just because he’s such a good guy. DAMNIT, WHY DO BOTH GUYS HAVE TO BE SO FREAKING AWESOME?! I’ve never in my experience of shipping business been so conflicted about who I would ship! THEY MAKE IT SO DIFFICULT TO CHOOSE! But I chose Arata, therefore I feel bad for Taichi. SOBS
With the fangirling and giddiness aside; I’m terribly concerned about how they are going to finish this. The way things are going, they MUST, MUST, ABSOLUTELY HAVE TO, AGAIN- MUST, have a second season. It’s so anticlimax right now, there’s no major development happening at the moment, except for a tiny bit in romance.
I’m going to take a FIT! if they create a dreamscape in the finale and rush through the episode going, “training, trainning blah blah blah” and all that bs and go, “BOOM QUEEN MATCH- GO!”
At this point, for the love of god- they need to announce that it will either be CONTINUEING and not ending at 25 episodes like Phi Brain or at least CONFIRM there will be a second season ASAP- or give us a hint since they don’t necessarily announce it right after the show ends.
This show is a masterpiece, it doesn’t deserve to have a shitty ending, it deserves to unfold properly and have a solid conclusion.
— Anyhow if we do get to see the Queen match between Yumi and Shinobu,
I’m cheering for Shinobu because she’s awesome and it would be incredibly badass and exhilarating to see her DESTROY Yumi! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!/SHOT
Am I the only one who has absolutely no scare whatsoever that this is going to end badly? To be honest, they could do anything like get Chihaya to fight against Arata and beat him or something, and it would make a fine ending. Moreover, this show moves me everytime so in my head it’s impossible for them to screw this over.
Also… The romance in this show drives me nuts because I fangirl so much, although the way things are going it doesn’t look like any pairing will happen. Now I can only hope for the second season… Which, if it doesn’t happen, might just make me believe that the producers are retarded because this show is incredible.
Chihaya beating Arata would be pretty unrealistic at this point, but there’s always the hope that everything will work out, we’ll get an amazing ending and we all worried over nothing.
And no matter how much Chihaya x Arata support there is, somewhere deep down, we all know we’re Taichi fans. He needs some sort of reward for being such a selfless guy all this time.
I still love ARAAAAAATAAAAAAAA much much much more ^.^ The way Taichi was represented this episode probably gave him many more fans though, he was really nice in this one, and made me fangirl a little (not as much as another person though ^.^)