School Rumble 2nd Term ep.4

April 23, 2006 | 13 Comments

What an insane episode! This one is full of various references to other anime series from Card Captor Sakura to Glass Mask. Animation-wise, I also like this one better than last week's episode simply because it actually has more colour and animation style. This one may not have as much action as last week's episode but in general, this feels more entertaining somehow. In addition to this, this week's episode is a lot funnier. Anyway, I'm excited with the fact that we're now gearing up towards the culture festival arc. I personally think that the arc is one of the most interesting arc in the series, especially since there are some story development which I really like. I still can't believe how fast this we get into that arc though. I guess the writers have a lot of materials to cover this time around.

Class 2-C are asked by Mai and Yuuki to write up the kind of class play that they'll like to see. The only condition is that it can't be about themselves. Mai and Yuuki then get the thankless task of sorting through all of the ideas. The first one is a romantic story about Hanai and Yakumo. However, when Hanai gets closer to Yakumo, Yakumo reveals that she is actually Harima wearing a mask. Hanai, however, doesn't care so he and Harima end up as lovers. The now blushing Mai and Yuuki immediately reject the idea. The second one is a send up of Glass Mask where Mikoto is a talented dancer being backstabbed by her colleagues. When the real Mikoto arrives to see how the story selection progressing, however, Mai and Yuuki has no choice but to hide this idea. The third one involves a story where Eri is now poor and gets to be abused by Harima, an angry restaurant owner. The two think that the writer is Harima and Eri happens to overhear this and becomes angry because of it.

The fourth one is about Ootsuka Mai, a High school student with a secret: she's actually a magical girl Mai Mai Dream. Mai immediately tear off the paper, suggesting that she's the one who wrote this one. Because the girl can't figure out which story to use, they decide to ask Akira to write the script. Eri seems to encourage this idea and everyone else does the same thing by presenting a sketch about Akira writing the script and cheered on by everyone. In the meantime, Eri confronts Harima about the story that he supposedly wrote. Harima, however, doesn't know what Eri is talking about because the actual writer is really Akira. Later on that night, Tenma informs her sister that she has to stay at school to do some preparations for the festival. She, however, tells her sister that she'll find out some information about Harima for Yakumo. This translates to Tenma asking Eri to ask Harima about the kind of things that he likes.

Because of this, Eri tells Harima that she wants to ask him about the menu for the maid-cafe. However, she suddenly if he likes a girl who can cook. Harima answer is a typical one where he doesn't care as long as there is love involved. The second question is if Harima likes girls who can do sport or those who can't do it. Harima doesn't care either way but he claims that a girl who can't swim is kind of cute. Eri is immediately reminded of the time when Harima gave her some swimming lessons. She blushes because of it. The last question is even more unrelated to the menu because Eri asks Harima about the kind of hair that he likes to see on a girl. Upon hearing this, Harima sees Tenma's ponytail. Because of this he tells Eri out loud that he likes girl whose hair is clipped on both sides of the head. Eri becomes happy to hear this but she's celebrating way too early because as it turns out, both Tenma and Yakumo style their hair that way today.

All of a sudden, however, Nishi enters the classroom and tells everyone that they're going to Sento. Once they all got inside, the boys go to the boys' side of the Sento while the girls go to the girls' side. The boys, however, are shocked when they realise that there is a girl taking a bath on their side. Upon closer inspection, however, the 'girl' turns out to be Jirou. At the same time on the girl's side, the girls decide to ask Eri if she's actually dating Harima. Because of this, Eri starts to question her feelings for Harima. On the other side, Harima hallucinates about kissing Tenma when in reality, he's about to kiss Jirou. When he realises this, Harima swears out loud that he hates blondes whose hair are tied on both sides. Upon hearing this, Eri tells the girls that she wants to kill Harima. When they return to school, the guys are hungry so the girls decide to make them some Onigiri.

Harima becomes obsessed with finding Tenma's Onigiri and when he eats one that taste bad, he thinks it's her. In order to get rid of the bad taste, he decides to eat someone else's Onigiri but it tastes even worse. As it turns out, the first Onigiri that Harima ate actually belongs to Eri. She thanks Harima by giving him more Onigiri to eat. Tenma then comes and gives him some square-shaped Onigiri and Harima suddenly realises that this is the second Onigiri that he ate. Despite the awful taste, Harima decides to gulp all of them down anyway. He, however, is relieved to know that Tenma really is the worst cook ever. In another room, Mikoto is seen talking to Hanai, who's happy ever since he finds out that Yakumo and Harima is not involved with each other. Hanai asks Mikoto if she herself has had any relationship but she hasn't had any either. So the two decide to compete and see who can get a lover first.

Impression:

Yeah, this is definitely funnier than the first 3 episodes. I was mostly amused with the kind of imagination that went into the script that the students wrote. The one with the magical girl is the funniest one because it shows how silly and fanservice-y the magical transformation can be sometimes. The one with the Glass Mask rip-off was also equally memorable. Other than that, this episode seems to explore the idea of Eri and Harima, which ends, as usual, in misunderstanding. Eri actually thinks Harima ate her Onigiri because he likes to help her. The one that I like the most, however, is the one where Kobayashi Jin ensures that the Yakumo/Harima/Eri triangle continues even after Harima mentions the fact that he likes girl whose hair are tied on both sides. This would have completely exclude Yakumo if it wasn't for the fact that she shows up in that sort of hairstyle towards the middle of this episode.

© memento 2003