Sadly, in remakes that are set to follow the manga more closely, you sometimes lose precious and beloved filler scenes. Such as in this episode, we lost the scene of Momiji singing with Tohru in the hot spring.
It was a sad loss, but what we got instead was a beautifully animated and completely faithful adaptation of chapters 17 and 18.
The episode begins with the end of finals, it seems with Yuki’s help that Tohru feels like she passed the tests just fine. This adorably light hearted moment talking about grades and how stupid Hanajima is, is cut tragically short by Tohru being called out of the room by the Teacher. They speak briefly and then Tohru comes back in, still smiling and just says that she needs to work harder.
The truth behind this conversation leaks out at the dinner table as Shigure mentions that he received a call from Tohru’s Grandfather. Tohru is late on paying her part towards the school trip, her Grandfather is entirely willing to pay but she says that she won’t accept that.
She’d only late because finances in February were a little tight but she would pay with the earnings from her next paychecks. Why were finances tight, you may ask? Valentines chocolate.
Speaking of Valentines.
It’s now March 14th and for White Day, Momiji has come over to surprise Tohru with a trip to a hot spring as a thank you for the Valentines chocolates.
When I was but a young anime fan, watching this series for the first time. This is the episode where I learned what White Day was at all. It’s not something we celebrate here in the US obviously. So this is just a fun cultural bit to pick up from the show. In the future years, i’ve seen more anime with White Day episodes then I could probably name, but this was the first.
So Tohru, Yuki, Momiji and Kyo head out to the Sohma run hot spring.
When they arrive, they meet the hot springs hostess.
The hostess is, well, rather eccentric to say the least. She has a bad habit of apologizing constantly for even the most minor of things and even things that other people do and in the most outlandish way possible. She’ll scream her apologies to the world while absolutely freaking out.
Tohru and the hostess get a moment to talk in the hot springs and they speak of her child. Who is a member of the zodiac, the monkey, in particular. She says that her child has ‘psychological scars’ and when she first heard of Tohru, that she was a little worried what having an outsider know about the secret would do for her child’s mental state. However, she apologies calmly for thinking as such and thinks that Tohru is a wonderful person and that she hopes that Tohru will be kind to her child.
After the bath it’s time for ping pong, first up is Yuki against Kyo and it goes just about as well as you would expect. Kyo in all his competitive rage, keeps refusing to hit the ball against the table and losing his rounds. After seeing this is senseless, Tohru walks in to face off against Kyo and when he serves to her (properly this time) she swings and misses horridly.
Yuki excuses himself from the room and Tohru follows to find him and finds him laughing. Laughing at how horrible her swing was, the look on her face as she missed.
He says something that is rather important, rather casually. “I’ve never even laughed like this in front of my parents.”
We aren’t given any time to reflect on that line right now though, as Yuki presents Tohru with a ribbon for her hair as his white day gift. This scene is so sweet and Yuki’s price act is amazing, i love the way this entire thing plays out. Alas, all good things must end and they get ready to return home for the new school semester. This is where Momiji drops one more surprise on Tohru, he’s a lot older then he appears. He’ll be starting high school and attending school with them, along with Hatsuharu.
I really like this episode, it’s a rather relaxing episode that sets up a lot of plot points for later but isn’t too heavy on the foreshadowing or drama. A sweet, cute and harmless episode. Next week though, we’re back full swing into drama though as Akito’s voice echoes through the preview for the next episode. What happens? Well we’ll have to wait and see.
Also, super props to the animation team for how absolutely lovely the part where Momiji is telling the story about the worlds most foolish traveler to Yuki, Kyo and Shigure. The way they brought the story to life was nothing short of brilliant.