I don’t know about anyone else, but I just about died at Kazuki’s last line of the episode. I called it, there’s something up with Haruka. Still not sure whether he’s an actual bad kid, but there’s definitely something off about him. Right now I’m thinking that he’s probably not genuinely bad, but that Kazuki resents him for being a clingy wheelchair child or whatever. And going by the theme of the show that resentment is probably going to fester into some sort of Eldritch abomination that will kill us all.
I think Kazuki tricking Har
uka into thinking he’s texting Sara is probably a metaphor for their relationship in general. More than likely, Kazuki has for most of his life been suppressing his own wants and needs in favour of Haruka’s in a way that hurts both of them in the end (his collecting the dishes for Haruka is another hint towards this). Haruka ends up being dependent on Kazuki and Kazuki ends up hating Haruka for taking over his life even though he’s all but engineered this situation single-handedly. Or that’s my guess for now, at least. Oh god though the fan meet this is going to be so bad I don’t want to look yet I must. Kazuki’s carefully-constructed web of lies is all but finished. Unless he actually pulls off the kidnapping, which would be horrifying in itself. Either way, it looks like we’ll be seeing Sara in the flesh pretty soon which I am excited about.
All Kazuki/Haruka business aside, though, this was mainly an episode about Toi and his own horribly dysfunctional family (man all these sibling relationships are unhealthy as fuck. I guess Enta and his sister aren’t the worst). And soba. Having seen his darkest secrets, I stand by my claim that Toi is the most normal of the three protagonists. Okay yeah, he killed a guy, but he didn’t have much of a choice. It’s definitely way less fucked-up than all of Kazuki and Enta’s bullshit, so I don’t know what Enta’s getting on his high horse about. Enta is kind of the worst, to be honest. I can’t wait to find out more awful shit about him. Also Toi’s kappa song is so cute, he’s absolutely precious. Toi in this episode in general was cuter than he had any right to be, considering everything that was going on with him.
Going by this episode, I guess it’s obvious that the leader of the kappa transformation is the person who harbours the most desire to defeat a given zombie, which is 
kind of interesting. Revealing a secret about yourself is the price you pay for giving in to your desires. So I suppose the moral is “be honest about all your weird shit”. Thanks, Ikuhara. No longer shall I hide my anime figs when my parents visit.
Oh boy oh boy, I wonder if the fan meet is next episode? I’m so hype to find out more about whatever the hell is going on between Haruka and Kazuki, this is gonna be good.
The 2 evil cops are the main characters in a prequel manga spinoff written by Ikuhara.
https://mangadex.org/title/35848/reo-and-mabu-together-they-re-sarazanmai
Also, Ikuhara admitted he snuck in the shirikodama/buttocks aspect of the plot AFTER the initial butt-less pitch was approved and scriptwriting started. He said this was necessary because it wouldn’t have been officially approved otherwise.
“(W)hen you make an original anime, you may come up with some really out-there ideas, but the pitch may not get through…(because it) has no track record (to justify its existence)…(unlike a Weekly Shounen Jump anime adaptation pitch whose source manga has tangible popularity statistics to justify said pitch.)
That’s why you put in the really wacky stuff after it’s already been approved… You have to resort to something like a sneak attack.
I think my job is all about to what extent I can keep getting away with cheap, illegal moves like playing my hand after seeing everyone else’s cards… If Sarazanmai’s pitch had included any details about extracting shirikodama from zombie butts, (I don’t think it would’ve) gotten approved.”
https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/interest/2019-04-25/sarazanmai-anime-pitch-did-not-mention-butts/.146112