School Rumble 2nd Term ep.8

May 21, 2006 | 12 Comments

This is a fun prologue to the upcoming baseball game. Before this episode, I wasn't aware that Asou actually has many girls lining up for his affection. But as it of now, it seems Mikoto, Sarah, and Satsuki are all interested in him. There are also some nice physical jokes here. My favourite is probably the one involving Satsuki and a meal set. The running joke of Tenma getting lots of foods from Yakumo but not getting any exercise is also a comedy gold. Last but not least, Lala giving Imadori the beating of his life never fails to incite any kind of laughter.

Brief summary

Tenma becomes excited about the basketball game at her school after reading a basketball manga. The next day, she becomes even more enthusiastic upon seeing Asou playing a very good game. Harima, who's jealous decides to score a slam dunk as well but later on realises that he doesn't know how to get down. When 1st year student Satsuki sees the on-going game outside her class, she gets an idea of forming all girl basketball team and ask Tae to become her sponsor. Since Asou is a good at basketball, he ends up getting the task of coaching the girls. Because of this, the two begin to recruit members. Eri ends up being one of the girls that Satsuki wants in her team but she refuses the offer and recommends Mikoto - much to Tenma's disappointment. As it turns out, however, Satsuki has a hidden goal in creating the team. It appears that she simply wants the opportunity to get close to Asou. One week later, Mikoto admits that she kind of like being in the team. It seems she is motivated after she sees Satsuki doing her best on the field.

Tenma, who knows that Satsuki likes Asou decides to gossip about it to her friends. Later on, Satsuki becomes jealous when she sees the closeness between Mikoto and Asou. Because of this, Satsuki challanges Mikoto to play one on one basketball game with her. Since Satsuki is on 'impress Asou-sempai' mode, she goes out of her way to win the game much to Mikoto's annoyance. At the end of the day, however, Mikoto asks Satsuki if she wants to join her and the others to have dinner together but Satsuki claims that she has somewhere else to go to. In the end, however, Satsuki ends up meeting everyone else inside the restaurant where Asou works part-time since she was already planning to go to the place to begin with. Inside the restaurant, Satsuki stuffs herself by ordering meal set after meal set. As a result, she has to be carried home by Mikoto after falling asleep inside the restaurant. Back at the restaurant, Asou tells LaLa that the total bill comes to 18,000 Yen but of course Lala doesn't have that much money.

In the second half of the episode, Yakumo decides to give her sister some meal to eat after her basketball training. Unfortunately for Tenma, by the time she arrives at School, Tae tells her that they only need five people for the team and as a result, Tenma is only going to be a substitute player. Tenma is depressed to hear this but when Yakumo asks her what happened to training, she pretends that she's actually still doing it. Meanwhile, Imadori wants to be a coach so he can get close to Mikoto. He even compares himself to Michael Jordan. Unfortunately for him, everytime he tries to show off his basketball throwing skill, Lala keeps blocking his attempt. He eventually manages to score a dunk but this simply piss Lala off so she decides to beat him up. At the same time, Satsuki is asked by Asou to help Mikoto with her shooting skill. But because of pressure she ends up failing to shoot any ball into the basket.

Meanwhile, Tenma's blues continues because she keeps getting food from Yakumo but she still doesn't get to play at all. At the same time, Masakazu from Class 2D comes to the training room to offer his help but everyone immediately turn him down. The focus then return to Tenma, who one day receives bento box enough to feed the entire team. Because she doesn't want to disappoint her sister, she decides to eat all of the foods. This causes her to become fat and makes Yakumo wonder if she has made too much food for her sister. Tenma, however, doesn't have the heart to tell the truth so she ends up becoming depressed and always sit alone on the swing. One night, however, Masakazu suddenly appears out of nowhere to tell her that there are other who also feels excluded by the basketball team as well: himself, Harima and Imadori. Because of this, they decide to work together to show everyone what they're capable of.

Impression:

I can't decide if I should pity or laugh at Tenma when she decided to eat all of the bento boxes that Yakumo has made for the team. On the one hand, I feel sorry to see her excluded like that. On the other hand, I can understand why Tae decided to put her aside. Tenma was the weakest link in the team. However, Tenma didn't have to eat all of the foods that Yakumo made since she could just give them to someone else. But I guess that just shows that even though she's not the sharpest tool in the drawer, she has a kind heart. I am kind of excited to see what happens next since she will partner up with Harima and the other rejected candidates. The other focus in this episode is Satsuki and her jealousy of Asou and Mikoto's closeness. I personally think it'll be lightyears before Asou realise that there are many girls who like him. Having said that, if I have to choose, I personally like him the best with Sarah.

© memento 2003