“Oshi no Ko” S2 Episode 5

I think this episode just cemented my feelings of not liking the Aqua x Akane ship. I already had a feeling of one of Akane’s big flaws and it definitely reared its head this episode. When Akane turned around and said “I’d help you kill them,” I immediately paused the episode and was like: NOPE. NOPE. NOPE. I DO NOT LIKE THAT. That legit terrified me and was like: ABSOLUTELY NOT. I honestly don’t like the sentiment of a “ride or die” or an absolute devotion relationship since it feels like they would just enable terrible decisions or actions. I am of the belief that if you truly love someone, you wouldn’t support them when they are doing bad things. I’m sure Akane knows why Aqua wants to kill a specific person, but sheesh, the whole thing just feels so icky for me. It feels like they’re just enabling the really bad parts of each other. I’m seeing so many people rooting for this relationship but I just cannot see it in a good light.  Aqua is still having difficulties grasping emotional acting due to his PTSD as he was a lot more emotive as a kid before the incident happened. The guy definitely needs therapy and a lot to work out before actually committing to a relationship. Especially with his current mindset where he is still willing to throw away his life to get revenge that may ultimately not even be what he truly needs. I already don’t like the idea of Aqua killing out of revenge and inevitably ruining his life, so the fact that Akane wants to help him with it immediately made me dislike the relationship.

Akane as a character feels so weird to me. In these sorts of cases, I usually love or hate a specific character. But with Akane… I’m just so neutral towards her. I feel like I dislike her actions more than disliking her personally, but I also don’t feel strongly for her character. It might have to do with still not fully knowing or understanding her like we do Kana and Aqua. Though I admit that she does tend to annoy me. Especially when she literally comes out the gate swinging at Kana for just walking into the dressing room. Kana hadn’t even done anything besides ask her why she’s already glaring at her and Akane basically just insults everything Kana has done. Like, Akane woke up that day and chose violence FOR NO REASON. Girl, freaking sit down. Even if she’s already sitting in that scene. And of course Kana isn’t about to take that provocation lying down because yes, Kana can be a jerk at times. Girl seemed like she was WAITING to whip that magazine out whenever the time arose. We find out that Akane actually looked up to Kana as someone her age who got into acting. Clearly something went wrong when Akane met Kana back when they were kids. But knowing how Kana was at that age, the meeting most likely did not end well. However, I feel like Akane had no right to get upset over what Kana did because she freaking poked the bear first. Did Kana go a little far? Yes. But again, Akane swung first without any provocation so I definitely expected Kana to hit back. I think Kana definitely worded my issues with Akane perfectly with how she holds herself up as “she’s right and you’re wrong” kind of feeling. And yes Kana, I agree. That also ticks me off. I started noticing her mildly presumptuous attitude during her interactions with Aqua and when she made a comment on how she seemingly “knows exactly how he is,” it did rub me the wrong way.

While Aqua is dealing with his issues, Ruby seems to have some of her own. While we haven’t seen that much of her this season due to focusing on the stage play, I feel like we did get a pretty big bomb from her in this episode. Despite it being played up for silly ha-ha’s at first because “ooooh Aqua is shacking up with his beautiful girlfriend~”, it definitely took a dark turn in terms of Ruby’s mindset. At first, I think the knee-jerk reaction to it is that she has weird feelings towards her brother. But it definitely plays into the trauma with Ai as she had to deal with the struggles of being a teen mom. And because Aqua knows this too, it does make a lot of sense why she would never forgive him if he knocked a girl up and put that girl in the same position as Ai. Not to mention that Ai was incredibly fortunate to have her manager’s family help her with her kids instead of toughing it out on her own like a lot of teen moms usually have to. But this was the first time we’ve ever seen Ruby’s star eye turn dark and it felt so haunting since we usually see it sparkling. I feel like we don’t know Ruby as well as Aqua or Kana so we don’t know the deep, dark depths of her as a character. We know how the trauma of losing Ai effected Aqua, but I feel like we don’t truly know the extent of how Ai’s death effected Ruby. So seeing her react this way showed us a complete different side to her that definitely will need to be addressed eventually.

I wasn’t sure how I was gonna feel about the pudding haired guy that reminded me of Kenma from Haikyuu. But after this episode, he will not be associated with Kenma anymore because unlike Kenma, this guy is a CREEP. Despite his cheerful demeanor, the way that he was portrayed in shots gave him a very intimidating presence especially to Ruby’s school friend. I even went back to episode 1 to verify something and SIR she is underage! This guy is a freaking adult trying to pick up 16 year old girls. ABSOLUTELY NOT. I’m so glad that Melt actually went to put a stop to it because it was obvious that Minami was extremely uncomfortable with his advances. Considering he essentially cornered her, I can’t really blame her. The guy was already a creep for trying to pick up underaged girls and he just kept sliding down my personal rankings when he basically told Melt that he had no talent and he’s ruining the play. I’ve developed a soft spot for Melt through out the second season so seeing him just getting kicked while he’s down makes my maternal instincts flare up. I feel like this kind of thing would have passed if Melt was still the same guy back in season 1. But we have seen the guy legit trying to get better and made it a point that he is taking this role seriously. So having pudding head essentially trample over his efforts on trying to better himself just made him out to be incredibly unlikable. Though I do find it odd how he claims to be a playboy but we’ve never actually seen him do anything like that on screen. Especially when he first meets Ruby and Minami, he doesn’t flirt with them at all. Anyways, at this point, I just hope that Melt is able to prove him wrong and redeem himself from his terrible acting in Sweet Today. Considering pudding head isn’t the only person he needs to prove himself to.

Though good on both Kana and Memcho for immediately blocking the creep on Ruby’s phone.

I actually didn’t notice it on the first watching, but when GOA comments how the play will ride on the actors’ performances and Yoriko glances woefully at the image of Melt’s character. If it wasn’t clear from their interactions thus far, she does not have the highest opinion of him. He definitely wants to prove himself as a better actor, though it might be too late to forge a good relationship with Yoriko. Since even if he does put on a good performance for the stage play, Yoriko might think “why couldn’t he have done that for Sweet Today?” Though at this point, Yoriko might be more worried about whether or not he’ll ruin the stage play for Abiko. I’m definitely rooting for the guy to show all these people that he has changed and is putting in so much more effort to help make a good performance. I do wish we got to see the process of him getting better, but I suppose we’ll have to see how he does during the actual play.

Also holy crap, I didn’t expect to get the play this soon into the season. Though I will say I am excited to see how it goes because there feels like there is SO MUCH banking on this stage play’s success. Not only is Melt trying to prove himself an actor after completely botching Sweet Today, but Kana is also out here trying to prove that she isn’t a has been. And what better way to show her true abilities going against the current “Genius Actress.” I’m rooting so hard for her because Kana feels like she’s been FIGHTING for recognition for so long but hasn’t had the chance to show her stuff recently. So I’m hoping this gives her the opportunity to get her back into the spotlight in the acting world. It feels like she and Akane have been at odds with their acting for quite some time and having them act together might show many people how she compares. The two have their own very personalized ways of acting and while none of them are necessarily wrong, causes them to clash because they don’t agree with the other. It’s also interesting to note that despite hating each others’ guts, there is a mutual deep rooted respect for the other as both of them are excited to be acting with the other again. Which is definitely a very interesting dynamic and we’ll have to see how it plays out on stage.

And then there’s Aqua… I honestly have no idea what is going to happen with him since he hasn’t been able to fully tap into emotional acting due to his PTSD. Judging from the OP, he’s most likely gonna nail his ending scene, but we’ll just have to wait and see just what he does to get to that point. Especially since he seems to be going down a dark mental path at the moment judging from his dark star. With all that going on, that just leaves whether or not Abiko will enjoy the stage play and will have the privilege of having a good adaptation of her work.

I’m really looking forward to seeing the entire performance as we only got a taste of it in the first episode, which already had me hyped for the stage play. I also didn’t expect to see so many old characters from the first season pop up again. Like the reality TV show cast. I honestly didn’t expect to see them again lol. This episode definitely felt a little more rushed than the other ones so far with how many things happened and chapters it adapted. Was still a good episode though, albeit a little weaker than the previous ones. I’m excited to see how everything plays out and if there will be any disasters happening on stage, hopefully not though. Probably some close calls if I had to guess, but we’ll just have to wait and see. I’m rooting for you Kana and Melt! Show everyone what you all are made of! waves glowsticks enthusiastically