“I’m back.”
Impression
I found last week’s recap episode absolutely agonizing, partly because I wanted to move on but mostly because I was hyping up the new OP. And the hype is real! It’s Unlimited Cooking Works! It’s a great fit for the Autumn Election arc, which breaks away from the last two arcs by introducing structured, direct competition between the remaining first-years in Tootsuki now that the unlucky ones have been weeded out – it’s basically becomes a battle shounen now. As Erina-sama said, it’s designed to determine who the best is, and so it really will be ‘Food Wars’ from here on out. The downside is that this OP spoils far, far too much, so if you’re anime-only then you’d be better off not looking at it too closely. You can pretty much tell who the important players are in the Autumn Election by who appears when and how often they show up, but make of it what you will.
The car scene was hilarious. Erina-sama was probably cursing her luck at having to yet again tolerate Soma’s smug faces and rice cracker offerings, but the joke is very much on her in many ways – because her hero happens to be Soma’s father, and it’s implied that she has a fixation with him that goes beyond simple respect. In fact, respect is already pretty amazing coming from ojou-sama, who only has a single friend in Hishoko and an occasional banter partner in Alice. Jouichirou is probably the one who taught her how to cook, or something – a lifetime spent travelling around the world while cooking must have included a visit to the Nakiri family. Pity he didn’t bring along Soma though.
Even a former 2nd Seat of the Elite Ten didn’t actually end up graduating from Tootsuki – that’s another scary statistic we’ve now got, although it’s just as possible that Jouichirou just left of his own volition for some reason or another. Soma must now understand a lot more about why his father made him go to Tootsuki – he’s literally following in his footsteps, even to the point that he’s staying in the same room that Jouichirou once had. Lots must have been coincidences though, given that his name is ‘Yukihira’ instead of ‘Saiba’ and all that. I guess the gravity of what he’s aiming to do is now dawning on him too – he’s got a looooong way to go before his power level equals that of the 2nd Seat and he’s able to gain Jouichirou’s approval. And that of the Polar Star girls.
