Steal food from this King of Beasts at your own risk. (RAWR ;3)
<
p style=”text-align: left;”>Summary:
The Roshigumi find a potential sponsor with the Aizu domain, but remain on volunteer basis. They head to the red-light district where Serizawa harasses the geisha, except one of them has the guts to stand up to him. The Roshigumi establish their code of conduct, but Ryunosuke still refuses to join up, despite being fed by them.
Impressions:
I came back from watching Mazinkaiser last week; back to one of my not-so-guilty pleasure shows of the season! This episode was well-paced, with the three key events that happened. Let’s go!
Sannan’s idea of inviting Ryunosuke turned out to be a bust, since Ryunosuke refuses to take up the sword, and probably going to get killed soon if he doesn’t smarten up. Hijikata noted that Sannan would usually only invite those that know how to use the sword into the group, and through that, the writers continue the build the relationships between the different members of the Roshigumi. I know a lot of people will call me out of this…but don’t get me wrong, this show is all about the bromance. I’m not a fujoshi by any stretch, but I know full well, because of the sheer imbalance of male-to-female character ratio in this show, people are going to say that this is all about imagining the guys together. This isn’t the case at all. If any of you have seen the Uraboku anime (“Betrayal Knows My Name”), that show is all about the implied relationships. This…this Hakuouki: Reimeiroku was written for the viewer to experience the era of the Roshigumi through the eyes of someone who is familiar with the group. I can’t imagine the guys in any yaoi relationships; it’s just…just…beautiful brotherhood and family. Warm and familiar, like, if you had a band of hot brothers.
No Oriemo or little sister jokes, please. -_-
The point is, the Roshigumi are short-handed, and is currently mired by infighting. Hijikata is all for putting Kondou in charge, and he doesn’t particularly care for the collateral, which in this case, is Ryunosuke. Anyways, even if they did recruit Ryunosuke, he’d be damn useless as a spy because of his loud personality. He also has the inability to think things through before jumping in.
We’re introduced to the red light-district (all together now! WOOOOOOO!) where Serizawa inflicts his asshole behaviour on other people, including the newly introduced geisha (?) Kosuzu. FYI geisha does NOT equal prostitute, they’re more like entertainers. Er, I tried to determine on my own through research if Kosuzu is a geisha/geiko/maiko, and the results are inconclusive since I know nothing on this topic.
I can’t blame her for being snarky towards he, really is an arrogant prick. But the thing is, in this time, women have almost no power, and server < samurai, so I was surprised for her spunk. She did need to be protected by Ryunosuke in the end, but she had her moment to shine. I’m looking forward to seeing more of her,. Her design is very similar to that of Chiizuru, but she seems to have a real personality.
The gang head back to the temple for food, and Heisuke ends up being goaded into a fight with Shinpachi over food. I just love the relationships that develop around Shinpachi, despite not having his own route in the Hakuouki games. Ryunosuke somehow thinks that he can join in on the fun by stealing other people’s food…and makes the mistake of reaching for Saitou-kun’s food. ZOMG LOLOLLLOLOLOLOL IDIOT AHAHAHAHAHA. Don’t. Mess. With. The. King. Of. Beasts. OMG BREATHE. Saitou-kun is probably the most deadly- so sexy when he’s threatening you with death-by-chopsticks. <3
Hijikata, in his uptight manner, introduces a code of conduct to the Roshigumi. Everyone doesn’t seem to take it well, but they know it’s for the best. I’ll spare you the details. The most significant rule is the last one on the list (HISTORICAL SPOILER), which is the right to commit honorable suicide. This comes into play later in the story, but this symbolism upholds what I believe they were trying to uphold. Honour above all else, which is a pretty good code, if you had to use the other extreme of Serizawa as contrast. Not that I’m for samurai gutting themselves, but yeah. Honour keeps you from being sword-wielding jerkwads.
I am well aware they’re cleaning up the history of the Roshigumi a lot, as when short-handed, you might take on a few bad apples for more manpower, but it’s OK to enjoy this show for what it represents. Like not thinking about the 2000+ people that died on the historical Yamato’s final journey when watching Space Battleship Yamato blasting off into space to save humankind. Yarr.
Okita’ anger shows through a lot in this episode. He even goes as far as going all yandere on Serizawa during a drunken toast, which is really weird for someone that is usually careful in his threats. Considering that Serizawa is indirectly his leader, this feels like a yell for help? I think, at point in the story, Okita might have an inkling of what is soon to cripple him as a samurai. ><”
Their quest for sponsorship continues…but slowly. They’re pretty much volunteering for now, since no one is sure what to make of the Roshigumi.
SUMMARY OF EPISODE IN ONE SENTENCE: Beastly hot killer Saitou-kun and shirtless Shinpachi.
Note: animation is nice overall, but damn, those faces are derpy sometimes.
Note: I might need help coming up with new insulting ways to describe Serizawa, if this show keeps going like this. I’M RUNNING OUT OF TAME-ISH BAD WORDS, MAN.
(I’m sorry the post is so long. But there’s just so much stuff to talk about in this show…)
Kosuzu is referred to as a maiko by the other characters, but the women to be found in Hakuouki’s red light district always have me confused. There’s Kosuzu, essentially a geisha (or geiko) in training, and some women dress roughly the way a geisha should, but many of them wear their obi tied at the front (Chizuru included), and only prostitutes did that. We even have Sen’s companion Kimigiku being called an orian when she was in disguise during the first season, the highest ranking prostitute of the time. So who are the men of the Shinsengumi going to see, geisha or prostitutes?
Although the word ‘prostitute’ brings up crude notions, orian and the like were called on for entertainment above all, so like their geisha counterparts they were also skilled in the art of music, dance and conversation, and sexual acts weren’t always the main goal during these visits (I think I’d prefer to call them courtesans or something). I’m just dying to know what’s what here! Maybe at this time geisha were only starting to become more prominent, so certain houses in Shimbara featured both types of women? This is just my guess in regards to the series of course, not real life. Hakuouki, please be more clear on these matters @.@
But on the main topic of this post, the episode was good- Okita’s behavior unsettled me a little, in a good way of sorts, and Ibuki continues to edge his way towards being annoying with his refusal to pick up a sword. But at least this means he has a personality- plus I love his voice actor haha XD. I didn’t care for Saito much in the first series, but I do love me some awesome bonding between warriors (in the totally non-yaoi sense like you were saying) so the first three episodes have me warming up to him. Shinpachi’s loveable as usual, Sannan is cool (oh Sannan, how sorry I felt for him playing through Chizuru’s game routes!) and Serizawa needs to die! He makes a great antagonist though, I’ll give him that.
Super excited for the next episode, I just hope the animation isn’t durpy like ep 2 was in a lot of places D=
It’s a lot better in the fourth episode, the flashback aspect really helped in covering up the mistakes. I spent a couple hours looking up geisha information and trying to pin down the exact time and era for things, but it didn’t work so well. I guess we’ll have to guess…? Harada was implied in the game that he hung out with the ladies in the red light district, and yes, as you mentioned, Kimigiku the orian was favoured by Hijikata. @_@ There’s an actual mention of the burning building incident on Wikipedia (it’a fairly reliable), but argh, I want to find out. orz
I know Hakuouki isn’t crazy accurate in history like “Kaze Hikaru”, but I love it anyway~ Guess you like Ryunosuke, he’s kinda just mehhhhhhh compared to Saitou-kun super-bias and weakness for tsundere guys exposed XD Sannan-san is a lot more likable in this this show than in Shinsengumi Kitan b/c he isn’t playing the devil’s advocate (yet).
Agree on the Serizawa point!
I AM SO HAPPY SOMEONE ELSE LIKES THIS SHOW, ZOMG. (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧