Hirogaru Sky! Precure Ep 17 – 19

I apologize for the long delay. I had a lot on my plate due to a family emergency that happened earlier last week, and it really burned me out so I just didn’t have the energy or drive to do the write-up for the three episodes. So without any further ado, let’s get started!

Episode 17

Episode 17 was Sports Day where Sora kinda dragged Mashiro into the Relay competition. She wanted Mashiro to be the one to hand her the baton, but one problem: Mashiro never liked Sports Day and she didn’t really have much confidence she’d do well. Nonetheless, she was a good sport about it and agreed, along with committing herself to intensive training with the help of Sora and Tsubasa. Unfortunately she ended up stumbling over herself and fell behind– which left her feeling awful in that moment. And I can relate, this actually once happened to me, not in relay, but doing hurdles. I ended up on the track where there was a  huge rock (why they even allowed to even HAVE a course there still baffles me) right before the hurdle, which I ended up tripping over and injuring myself in the process, but I digress. The point is, nothing is more frustrating than training hard for something, only to mess it up because you stumbled over yourself or something else. Of course you’re going to feel disappointed in yourself, that’s why even though they had won thanks to Sora making up the lost time, Mashiro was still upset that she couldn’t have done better. Sora ended up cheering her up by explaining to her that the real reason why she wanted Mashiro to be the one that passed it to her is because she was her precious friend, and wanted to do that with her. That said, I think we all saw that coming from the get go.

Episode 18

Episode 18 certainly caught me off-guard with the decision to make Ageha a Precure this soon. I had honestly expected it to be held off till at least Episode 20, but for a number of reasons I am very glad they got that covered sooner than later! It was a good episode, though as I was watching it, the subject of how kids copy their heroes. I never really thought about it before, but it dawned to me this episode when Ageha had to deal with an issue when Takeru, a child at the nursery school hit another kid for cutting in line to take him down like Precure do with the bad guys. Kids replicating the heroes actions they see on TV or read in books, and this was actually a good example of the consequences of that. However when you think about it, it’s awfully a tricky subject. Because you tell the kid “no hitting” but then they watch you tackle the enemy. Obviously the circumstances are different, but you can see where the line would blur and become confusing. I think it was good to broach into the subject. Interestingly, this episode’s fight noticeably tried to abstain any physical hits, where as the trio were almost immediately trapped, and Ageha’s attacks were mostly shields to serve defensive purpose, and she wrapped up the monster like a mummy to keep it down. It was not till her final attack when she actually struck, but not with her fist like Sora would have. Anyways just an interesting observation I wanted to make note of.

Aside from that, I have to laugh at the bit when Tsubasa was going on about how they need to keep their identities a secret. I mean, hate to break it to you, but Sora already blew her cover in first episode. Honestly more surprised that it wasn’t been brought up more often, even though they are clearly trying to feign ignorance and pretend it’s not the case. Nevertheless, Ageha is the next one in the party to sort of reveal herself when she rescued one of the nursery kids who was a huge fan of Tsubasa, and now is equally a fan of her after seeing her become a Precure right before his very eyes. (Well isn’t he a lucky fan?)

It was also was rather entertaining to see the way Ageha bruise Battamonda’s ego, and the way she snaps back at him with that fierce glares of hers (like seriously, don’t mess with her haha). The only thing I am a bit concerned about is the way they kind of shoehorned this “Exciting!”, which… I noticed they were kind of setting up from the beginning of the episode with the way Sora and Mashiro were almost very animated during her visit, in-fact you could say they were dancing. It seemed a bit much compared to the previous visits. And sure enough, after she became a precure, they all started doing this butterfly pose thing, and I noticed they had established a catch phrase/motto (whatever you’re supposed to call it) for her. At that… I sucked in a breath because I knew what was about to unfold.

Episode 19

…And sure enough, in Episode 19, my fears were realized. “Exciting!” is now going to be the annoying catchphrase. This is something that I’ve noticed Precure been doing more often as of the late. To my memory, I don’t really remember— maybe with the exception of Go! Princess Precure going on about “Princess”, “beauty…grace” and etc… (I can’t remember the lines) but at least that was implemented so organically that it never really stuck out like a sore thumb and become an annoyance to hear every time it’s brought up. But even though, I don’t think it was ever spammed in the way like it had been with the cursed song from Hugtto Precure or “Delicious Smile!” from Delicious Party Precure (and dear God, that drove me insane)! I honestly wish they would just drop it because it really doesn’t add anything to the character’s charm. So all I can do is hope that they will do this in moderation or use it when it’s appropriate as opposed to shoehorning into everything, all the time.

But while I did enjoy the episode (and I will get to that right after this bit), there was another existing issue that was once again glossed over. Ageha has no respect for one’s boundaries, and it’s frustrating to see her steamroll Tsubasa instead of asking him about how he would feel and so on forth. Cleaning is one thing, but retouching his bird house to make it “cuter” without asking is not okay. Tsubasa was clearly dismayed and asked of her to not do that again, and yet it went right over her head. The other part was imposing him during breakfast, treating him like a baby when he isn’t. And when he even told her later on what she reminded him of, (his parents smothering him like a baby as well), it frustrated me a bit that the keyword “smother” was completely glossed over and Ageha didn’t even stop to think and apologize for her actions. And god, the part when she says ‘sometimes she gets too carried away’ THAT was when she SHOULD have apologized to Tsubasa, and acknowledge her wrongdoing. This is a problem that I don’t really have a lot of faith of them actually resolving. I fear this is going to be something they sweep under the rug and the whole dynamic of Ageha steamrolling Tsubasa is going to be used for comedic gags. I’d much rather if they don’t do that… I feel like the best moment they’ve had so far was the mural scene where they were painting together. That was really the only time I felt like they were more on equal grounds, and I’d like to see more of that.

The next thing which I kind of have to laugh at the irony of, is the double-standards that panned out during the fight this week. Unlike Kabaton, Battamonda isn’t the type to play dirty, but rather intelligently. He used his head and realized that strategically, it would be wiser to split up the Precure and it’d be easier to take them down that way. Ageha called him a coward for it, but when it’s 1 VS 4, that’s not cowardice, that’s just using your brain properly. As result, it sort of rubbed me the wrong way to see them break the rule of the ‘fair fight’ he challenged Ageha to. Of course what was at stake was the mural (though let’s be honest here, it’s not like they couldn’t magically restore it after the fight is over like how it goes for everything else). I think it would have been a lot better to see Ageha be stubborn and have her determination to handle it herself  blow up in her face, and THEN team up with Tsubasa. But I can see why it didn’t pan out that way because of the way Ellee jumped in to scream, “BAD” – which was actually the cutest freaking thing ever.

Apart from those gripes, overall I did enjoy the episode a lot, to the point it was enough to persuade me to continue my coverage. I thought it was really funny, but also probably the most realist moment we’ve ever had in precure where they are handed a brand new power tool and their first reaction is, ‘What on earth is this thing?‘ and ‘Wait how do we even use it?!’ and then they ultimately wing it– which was probably the joke itself. And hands down, the Paint Palette is way cooler than the whole UFO disc thing that Mashiro and Sora got going with their duo special attack. The way Tsubasa transforms into such a majestic and badass bird for Ageha to ride– and then freaking poofs into a giant chonky version of his original bird form was FREAKING HILARIOUS. I understand why he’d be embarrassed about it though, and it makes sense why he was a bit disappointed that he couldn’t maintain his majestic form till the very end of the attack. Perhaps down the line they’ll keep it that way from start to finish, that would be a bit more fitting for a finale power-up.

That said, I do feel like given the nature of this show, double and triple posts will likely be more frequent as we go forward, and I’m probably going to stick to that so as long as it’s more comfortable to do the write ups in this manner.