This week was a bittersweet episode, starting off with the twins and Musa all succeeding passing the time qualifications, but things quickly became dampened by the rain with Yuki and particularly Shindo struggling to make improvements with their time. Yuki handled his failure better than Shindo, who found himself being hit from all sides, failing his time, struggling to recruit members for the fanclub to help raise sufficient funds and worst of all, his girlfriend breaking up with him.
My heart broke for the guy. We have never seen his girlfriend up until this point, and the moment we do, it’s when she dumps him. I think what makes me so sad about this was how it was quite apparent she wasn’t willing to support him. I mean there’s a number of things she could have done, cheer him on, support him in promoting the club, and so on, but obviously they weren’t the right fit for each other.
And you have to hand it to Shindo for not losing himself over the breakup. Instead he was able to find solace in running, and using that as fuel to keep working at improving himself and look for other creative avenues to promoting their club. With Nico’s help, he created a website, which by the end of the episode, seems to be a success. However it was a bit of a double-edge sword, as we see a reporter (seen interviewing Kazuma) suddenly showing up. Odds are, he is probably looking for Kakeru. I don’t know his history, but he’s probably going to bring up Kakeru’s past again. The preview makes it a bit difficult to judge whether or not that “Summer Prank” is in good humour or will take a more serious and potentially dark turn.
Besides the heartbreaks, this episode also focused on the anxiety building up not just on those who are still struggling to make improvements, but on Haiji as well. Months have passed, and they are slowly running out of time. However he was able to find renewed faith seeing everyone’s willingness to continue practicing when Shindo asked to continue running.
It was around this time when things started to look a bit brighter, as the sun finally comes out. Through the hardships we were able to witness some heartwarming support and the team coming together. Again, my favourite parts was seeing Kakeru find small ways to help the others, working with Shindo after Yuki pointed out he probably needs to fix his form, as well as making sure to provide him some tea seeing that he is working so hard of building the team’s website. I also like how he apologized for doubting him, and acknowledged he is the one who keeps them glued together. It was a very sweet moment. Yuki also deserves some recognition, for despite his own short-comings, he is somehow is able to keep the morale up, using his words as absolute, ensuring Shindo that he will meet the qualifying time.
Another important thing that was highlighted this episode was shedding some light on some of the member’s strengths and weaknesses, and what their roles in the club is supposed to be. Kakeru’s role has shaped into helping others correct and adjust their forms as necessary. He was able to do this with Shindo today thanks to Yuki successfully observing Shindo ran. This little detail may actually prove to be incredibly important for everyone else who has yet to qualify, as the way they run affects their speed and efficiency. And Yuki, as he has proven before, is someone who has a keen eye of taking notice of things others may miss. I am curious to see what kind of role the rest of the group is going to pick up, and most importantly how they will develop each of their own unique strengths.
With that, I eagerly await for next week’s episode! I can’t wait to see how much the team has improved. I would certainly love to see Kakeru stun Sasaki with his newfound team-work approach. He will be also be running with the other guy he had competed against the first time, but I’m curious to see whether or not that will be within his priority, or will he stun his opponent by prioritizing supporting his team first.
UPDATE: Kaze ga Tsuyoku Fuiteiru Episode 12 is scheduled to air on Jan 8, 2019!
