I love you, Reina.
Impression
“What’s wrong, Katou-chan? Are you in pain? Are you giving birth?” – Asuka of the Week
A lot of progress was made this episode. I wouldn’t say that this whole commitment and motivation issue is completely solved, given that the end of the final scene lingered on Aoi-chan for a few moments, but they’ve gone a long way in terms of dealing with it. It’s actually kind of scary – the dissatisfied members are trying their absolute best for the sake of proving him wrong. I can’t help but think that he’s manipulated things so that they would end up this way, especially as I’m sure he’s aware that a lot of people aren’t happy with the way he’s been going about this. After all, he was very quick to cash in on the promise he’d extracted from the club members to work hard and aim for the Nationals – which, as I’ve already mentioned before, was the choice they were all but pressured to make. The opinions on Taki-sensei are as divisive amongst the fanbase as they are with the characters themselves – you get snapshots of random members letting us know what they think of him, and of course the main girls have their say as well. No prizes for guessing how the crying girl from the flute section feels.
I agree with Reina. I won’t forget that she was one of the few who had complete dedication right from the start. I love her, and everything she says is correct. Ahh, Reina~! Well, perhaps I don’t idolize Taki-sensei as much as she does, but I have to admit that he doesn’t only say good things, but is a good teacher as well. I predicted that he wouldn’t step in to help at all during the one week they had, and that the band would have to sort out both their internal conflicts and their skill level by themselves somehow. But he did help – all the hate was focused towards him, and he provided an efficient albeit spartan form of practice alongside helping out individual sections. I would like to think that the reason he was surprisingly nice to bass was because bass actually already cared, minus Natsuki. He thus didn’t have to spend time whipping them into shape like he did with the flutes. I didn’t get what happened with Natsuki in the end, actually – is she okay with practising now? Or was she just genuinely sleepy or something?
Finally, I was just as satisfied as Kumiko with her first lengthy conversation with Reina! It was adorable to see her all scared and flustered. I have to admit, when Kumiko was thinking, ‘she’s going to kill me!’ I was unashamedly thinking ‘she’s going to confess!’ over and over in my head. It didn’t happen. Yet. Still, I’m happy that she’s managed to push their relationship a little further down the line, even if they’re still strictly acquaintances and not really friends – although it honestly felt like I was watching an easily embarrassed person talking to their crush in person. Sadly, we never got to see Reina’s reaction. I ship these two so hard.
