“Oshi no Ko” S2 Episodes 11 + 12

Episode 11

Apologies for the late post, but I was out all last week and had very little wifi so I had to unfortunately put this post on hold. BUT WE’RE BACK. And immediately we start off with me suffering from the second-hand embarrassment of Kana going way too hard on her outing date with Aqua. Kana I love you, BUT DIAL IT BACK, I CAN’T TAKE THIS MUCH CRINGE. But dang, I be lying if I said she wasn’t looking CUTE in the outfit she chose. I’ve said it before, but I literally have such a hard time sitting through Kana’s love endeavors lol. I still love her of course, but maybe I just have a very visceral reaction to awkward teen love nowadays. I do have to remind myself that Kana is young and has never experienced having a crush on someone is like, so OF COURSE she’s gonna be a silly little bean who has no idea what to do in these circumstances, but that doesn’t stop me from cringing at her antics lol. Also, GURL, where did you THINK was gonna happen at the end of the night lolololol.

Aqua on the other hand makes it very difficult to grasp what he actually feels without his commentary due to how deadpan he is naturally. Even through out their “date,” I couldn’t get a read on his intentions and how he felt about it. However, if I were to try and interpret things, Aqua seems to be more of an action oriented individual where his actions speak louder than his emotions and words. So the fact that he went out of his way to allow Kana to enjoy herself and show her a nice time I think speaks to him actually really enjoying his time with her. It does throw me off on how I can’t really tell if he’s actually having a good time or not, but the fact he was basically acting like a boyfriend to her when they’re not even dating says a lot I’d like to think. As opposed to how he acts like a boyfriend to Akane since it’s expected of him and he wants to keep her close because she could be of use to him. And while it can also be interpreted as Aqua just being a gentleman and going through the motions of being nice, he only puts in this amount of effort if he actually WANTS to do it or if there’s something for him to gain. And Kana isn’t related to his revenge plans so the fact he put this amount of effort into their outing has to mean he wanted to do it out of his own desire. Whether it be for romantic intentions or just treating a friend out is still up in the air, but I don’t think it can be denied that Kana is an important person in his life that he wants to cherish. But come on, the boy freaking booked a reservation for a restaurant without even knowing whether or not Kana would go. HOW DO YOU INTERPRET THAT????

Also I really like the symbolism of the shot of Kana and Aqua sitting across each other at the table. It kind of reminds me of a similar shot in Idolish7 where it was shown that one of the characters had a bunch of stuff on their side of a wall since they had a lot to work for while the other character had a blank slate on their side indicating that he was empty and lack of an actual drive. This also applies to Kana and Aqua respectively as Kana has built up a lot of things in her career and has so much to work towards while Aqua doesn’t know what to do after being set free from his revenge. Though there is still a looming shadow in the backdrop there… However, instead of it being split equally on both sides, Kana’s side is overwhelmingly larger than Aqua’s. Almost as if he wants to cross over onto her side as she has so much to offer but it still hesitant because of so many factors.

Hard cut to Aqua out on a date with Akane where Aqua is thinking of finally ending their relationship because he doesn’t want to “tie her down” anymore. I find myself struggling harder to understand how Aqua feels about Akane since I never liked their relationship to begin with, I tend to overlook some of the positives because the negatives shine all the more brighter to me. But even so, I don’t believe that Aqua purely sees Akane as a source of gain. At least, not anymore. As much as I don’t like their bond, I can’t deny the fact that Akane telling Aqua that she would help him no matter what resonated with him deeply. She is the first person he expressed his desires to and didn’t reject him. Even though I wish she did because she should not be enabling this mindset in the first place, but I digress >_>. It’s honestly really hard to gauge Aqua’s interest in Akane if it’s just a platonic bond or if he sees them as potentially more. Considering I can’t really remember if he actually has hung out with her just to hang out that isn’t related to his plans. Regardless of all that, he does seem to be thinking about her future and seems to believe that being with him would only drag her down.

What did catch my attention though was bringing Akane’s feelings for Aqua into question. Especially since I’ve always felt that these feelings stemmed from being saved by Aqua and feels like she owes him. Not gonna lie, I was rolling my eyes at their whole “breaking up” and talking about their relationship. However, things got interesting when it seemed to insinuate that even Akane isn’t fully sure that what she feelings for Aqua are overtly romantic. While I don’t doubt that Akane would grow feelings from the “rescue romance” trope that kicked off their relationship. A classic trope used in all sorts of media. I always felt like their relationship was so unbalanced and I’ve talked about how I don’t like how Akane feels like she “owes” Aqua for saving her and is content with him just using her for his plans. It makes me so uncomfortable and it prevents me from enjoying their relationship.

In this episode, it really feels like they addressed the two different ways Aqua opens up to Kana and Akane respectively. In terms of Akane, Aqua opens up to her about his revenge and a little bit about past, which puts her in close proximity to the plot of the overarching story. With Kana, he seems more willing to open up about the more “normal” issues that also plagues him in the present and feels like he’s just a normal teenager. There are no ulterior motives in their interactions and Aqua and just be himself around her. Because she is outside the drama, it allows Aqua to just be in the moment and away from said drama. But because Kana is stuck out of the loop, I do feel like this can become a double edged sword narratively speaking. Like on one hand, I don’t really want Kana to be involved Aqua’s drama. Because gurl has her own issues to deal with and doesn’t need to be dragged into Aqua’s shenanigans. But on the other hand, that means she could become less relevant to the story.

Okay sooooo I actually was spoiled a while ago about the twins’ dad not actually being dead because I am a filthy tv tropes reader. I’m trying to cut back on it so I don’t ruin everything for myself, but it’s hard lol. So I do know a lot of main points that happen, but don’t know HOW they happen. Which is the same way I am with Demon Slayer. And while we don’t have full confirmation that this guy is there missing dad, the insinuations can’t be ignored. Especially with how they brought up the fact with Akane that Aqua actually wanted to be freed from this burden and he missed a loophole in the story that was presented by Himekawa. Even when I know what happened, the sequence of visualizing and representing what went down to conceive Aqua and Ruby still confused me. I don’t even know how anime-onlys would be able to interpret that lol. All I will say about the matter is that it was BAD. But I’m pretty sure anyone could interpret it that way.

But oh my gosh, they really had Mamoru Miyano out here voicing another sus blond man. As soon as he spoke, I just immediately started laughing. Mostly because I recognized the voice right away and I honestly wasn’t expecting that voice from him. I thought it’d be more similar to Aqua and Himekawa’s voices but alas, we are left to wonder if this guy is truly the twins’ father or not. Especially since it could be a bait and then a switch later on. But just basing it off of purely the information given to us at face value, the guy literally addressed Ruby as he and Ai’s kid. Either way, this man looks far from trustworthy. Not to mention the other issue of Aqua believing he is free right now. It’s going to be so heartbreaking to see him go back to his revenge because he just seems so much happier without this burden. Especially since it’s not an if, it’s a WHEN he finds out. We just can’t have nice things in this series.

Episode 12

We’re finally getting some B-Komachi and Ruby focus with them finally receiving their first original song. Not only that, but they’ll be going to Takachiho to make music videos for their songs thanks to Memcho’s friend. But poor Kana… she do be just having the worst day. She probably felt like Akane was taking everything away from her. Aqua is one thing, but Ruby was like the last straw. Especially since Ruby was most likely Kana’s first actual friend. It was really cute to see a shot of them on the train ride with Kana leaning against Ruby. Also poor Memcho for just constantly being caught in between rooting for Akane and Kana while the two can’t stand the other. Friend to both parties can never catch a break lol.

It must be so surreal to come back to the place where you were in your original life. Both of them must feel some type of way coming back to the place where they both died. And because it’s been over a decade since they were there, a lot of the old faces might not be around. In Aqua’s case, his old coworkers ended up getting shuffled around to a different hospital. We still haven’t experienced Ruby or Aqua bumping into someone they previously had a relationship with. So I’m kind of bummed that we didn’t get to see his previous coworker since it would be really interesting to see how Aqua would interact with her. Unfortunately she wasn’t there anymore. Though I wasn’t expecting Aqua to go see his old place of residence. I’m actually surprised it hasn’t been touched all this time. I would have thought that someone would have moved in or something.

Despite all this, we were given a little more insight on Goro and who he was as a person. With the information of what happened to Goro’s mother, it does make a lot more sense as to why Aqua’s feelings towards Ai got complicated. His mother’s circumstances were eerily similar to Ai in regards to being a single mother and had to keep their children a secret. Unfortunately, unlike Ai, Goro’s mom didn’t seem to have a good support system and ended up having her child on her own and died during childbirth. Goro had never experienced what it was like to have a mother, so the fact that he became the child of his idol who actually did her best to spend time with him as much as she could, probably meant a lot more to him than we initially thought. It honestly makes me wonder how he views Miyako considering she was the one who did the heavy lifting of raising the twins and took them in when they had no where else to go. Definitely puts into consideration about how he felt about Ai and whether or not he actually viewed her as the mother he never had. Though because of this, he must have had a much deeper reaction to Ai dying than just the idol he looked up to. And while he never experienced his first mother’s death first hand since he was too young to remember, it still must have been extremely traumatizing to watch his mother figure die in a pool of blood similarly to how his original mother did.

I think it also says a testament to Goro’s character as the last we see of him, he’s working as an obstetrician. While him going into the medical field was initially brought upon him from shallow feelings, I feel like after his experience with Sarina changed his perspective. When he is initially described, Goro seemed fairly callous, aloof and only did things to please others. He seemed like an empty husk and didn’t seem to care about anyone or anything. But after bonding and having to witness Sarina’s death, it started seeming like he became a more caring individual. And while he originally wanted to be surgeon, I think it’s poetic that he ended up being an obstetrician in the end as it feels like he found inspiration from his mother dying from childbirth but also honoring Sarina’s death by helping to bring new life into the world.

Speaking of poetic, the series itself even talks about how poetic it is for two people to grew up not really having a mother figure in their lives become the children of a mother who loved them so unconditionally. Which begs the question on what Sarina’s relationship with her mom was like. The only thing we can garner is that her parents didn’t even put too much effort in trying to see her when she was nearing her final moments. Didn’t even seem like they visited that often to begin with. Which feels incredibly cruel. On another note, what did they mean by Ai giving birth to soulless children? Were they expected to die if not for putting Goro and Sarina’s souls into them? Also who is this girl who is constantly surrounded by crows??? Is she another fantastical element to this story? Considering what happens later in the episode, it might not be too farfetched. Though considering how much she seems to know about the situation of the twins, I think viewers would already be aware.

While I said in the previous episode that I didn’t have a clear understanding of how Aqua feels about Kana, I feel like this episode paints a clearer picture. When Aqua responded to Kana asking if she were cute with “You get a passing mark,” my immediate response was “Sir, she is VERY CUTE.” To an extent, it does seem that Aqua has a unique interest and fascination with her. And while I do think it can still be argued as to how he views her, the way that he was struck speechless and in awe by Kana, to me at least feels like it hints towards romantic feelings. This isn’t even a new reaction as he’s always found watching her and being surprised by her in some shape or form. But the fact that it didn’t even register with him that him being around an idol like that could cause negative reactions I think says a lot as well. For someone who is always calculating the positives and negatives of a situation to forget the possible repercussions of his actions makes me believe that his outing with Kana was of selfish intentions. Not selfish as in a negative connotation, but in the manner of “he wanted to spend time alone with her,” “he wanted her to enjoy their time together.” He wasn’t thinking about pros and cons with her, he was just thinking of spending time together. Which I think is actually really sweet, but unfortunately in the world of idols, he’s seen first hand what happens when it gets out that an idol had a significant other. And man, Aqua visualizing Kana in Ai’s situation was horrifying. It’s honestly surprising that he straight up forgot this could be a result. But it doesn’t bode well for the relationship since he might end up pulling away out of fear of endangering Kana. Which would make me really sad.

I don’t particularly support Ruby’s strong romantic feelings for Goro due to the age difference, but I can understand why she has such a strong attachment to him. Considering from the sounds of it, her own parents didn’t even visit that often. Which left Goro as the only person to really make time to bond with her and made her days at the hospital memorable and as pleasant as he could. I do also think it’s sweet that Ruby named her group B-Komachi partly to try and meet with Goro again. But as soon as she dropped that he was the reason to live, I felt an incredible sinking feeling. Considering we knew Goro was already dead and nothing good would come of her finding out about it. And of course, she finds out. And probably in the most horrifying way possible by finding his freaking skeleton. The body was definitely moved as he died at the bottom of the cliff but is now behind a shrine. It’s probably easy to conclude that the stalker must have hidden it to avoid getting caught. Which was probably why he is still considered missing as I feel like a dead body at the bottom of a cliff would have been found eventually. But man, seeing the light disappear from her star eye was incredibly sad and also worries me as to what will happen to her now. A part of me wants Aqua to tell her that he’s Goro to reassure her, but another part of me fears what would happen if he did…

Well this is bound to end well, I say sarcastically. Things have definitely been way too peaceful so drama was bound to come around the corner. I just didn’t think it would happen like this. Ruby has been out of the picture for a while and we haven’t really had as much focus on her as opposed to her brother and the other girls. So it felt like it was about time we got more into Ruby’s headspace and the inevitable drama that awaited her. Next episode is gonna be the season finale and I am both waiting in anticipation and dread because hoo boy… this was quite the drop for Ruby emotionally and mentally. She was always just a cheerful ball of energy for two seasons, so I’m not emotionally prepared to watch her go through this amount of loss. Especially since Goro might be the final straw for her after losing Ai.