Delicious Party Precure Episode 11

Oooooohhh man this episode was a juicy one, and I’ve even more excited for the next one!

In effort to make up for her recent failures, Gentlu enacts a plan to trap the girls into being preoccupied with extra assignments while she goes out to capture the recipippis. And to her credit, it worked out pretty well since Yui and Ran failed the tests. But unfortunately for her, since Kokone passed, she and Mari were able to pursue her, and just the two of them were enough to make her attempt to get away a difficult one.

For that that reason, we finally got to see Gentlu go on the offensive and use her own powers. We saw her first use it on Mari in attempt to get him off her heels. Mari did end up getting hit by it, but while he appears to be fine at the moment, I do wonder whether that will be something that will come back to haunt him. We did see the invert flash, which usually indicate the character has been inflicted by something, apart from pain that is.

The second time Gentlu used her abilities was when she was fighting against Ran. The Heart Juicy Blender ended up overpowering her, and actually resulted purifing her completely from Bundoru Gang’s influence. However her true consciousness as Amane was short-lived when Narcistoru suddenly pops up from behind to recaptured her.

AND MAN. THAT SCENE! The way he just appears and got a chokehold on her and called her a puppet gave me the chills! It was so creepily done, I loved it! Now the girls know Gentlu is a victim who has been brainwashed by the Bundoru Gang, and so their new and most important objective now is to rescue her.

But by the looks of things, it seems once Amane’s consciousness makes a return, things can be foggy with uncertainty, but she seems to otherwise recognize the precure. Considering how early on this is happening, I wonder what will become of her especially since we actually don’t see her hanging out with the group in the Opening at all. One would think even if she weren’t to become a precure, she would still be that friend who can support them from the sidelines. So now my brain is buzzing with all sorts of possibilities: Will she fall into a coma? Will they fail to save her from Bundoru Gang’s grasp? Or will she simply have no recollection of them at all and the girls will leave her to returning to a normal and peaceful life?

But before that, they need to save her, but as I mentioned, it might not be that easy as the preview makes it seem. Both Narcistoru and Secretoru are on top of things, which was precisely why the girls were unable to safely escort her out today. This was also the first time we really saw Secretoru indicate she is doing her job, as she didn’t hesitate to announce it was time to report Gentlu’s condition to their boss. After-all, Gentlu’s performance has not been up to par lately, and with their control over her dwindling, they aren’t about to let that slide– at least not without making the most of her abilities before disposing her when they deem she is no longer usable.

On that note, it is very encouraging to see the antagonists be proactive this early on. And the fact that Narcistoru imeaditely went to retrieve Amane as soon as the influence they had over her worn off, just goes to show these guys aren’t here to play games. They are looking to be productive as much as possible! And this is fantastic to see because I absolutely love it when we have sensible villains who aren’t necessarily there to serve as comedic relief!

The development we saw this episode makes me even more excited to see how the story will unfold going forward. The pace of the show so far has been fantastic. I appreciate how they have been taking their time with laying down the foundation for the main characters. It also helps how they are not beating around the bush, so getting straight to the point is really helping move the story along– and faster than I had initially anticipate! And that is certainly one of the key reasons why we’re actually seeing both Amane and Takumi actively getting involved this early on.

Speaking of Takumi, his presence has been largely on and off for the first ten episodes, but it looks like he may start getting a bit more involved now. We were finally given a follow-up to the time he witnessed Mari using a strange power. For that reason he was (understandably) concerned for Yui’s safety as that struck him as suspicious how he has always been at the scene when a monster showed up and then disappear without a trace. So it was a delight to see Takumi actually be straight with Yui when he brought up his concerns about how he thought Mari might be involved with the monsters that has been popping up lately. And when Yui denied that he had anything to do with it, Takumi put his trust in her words. And it wasn’t just because he believed in her, but because he has also made an incredibly important observation: At most he has only seen the monsters howl, and they have never actively sought to wreck havoc and hurt the people around them. This played a crucial role of giving Yui some clarity and evidence that Gentlu’s intent and actions don’t add up.

And best of all, we actually heard from Gentlu herself that it is important to her to do her job with gentleness, that’s why she was so disturbed to see the power inflict such pain on the recipippis. This is fantastic to hear because this offers us a whole new perspective as well as a solid explanation of why these monsters have been otherwise docile in town.

However, while they have been doing a great job with establishing the foundation for the main character, some may feel like they are rushing Gentlu’s development. Personally I am not bothered by it because I take it as a breath of fresh air because typically the whole identity reveal are dragged out for a long time. Having this happen sooner than later helps shakes things up and offers more flexibility of how they want to go about her character. And besides, since she isn’t the malicious type like Narcistoru (who I’m pretty sure blatantly lied that ‘controlling how much power she uses reduce the pain of the recipeppis) and is gentle by nature, she wouldn’t be useful for the organization in the long run. The only way they could truly make use of her is change her nature into something that would serve them better. Either way, we should wait and see how things will play out in next week’s episode since she will be personally fighting the girls!