Ah, poor Moriaki-sensei! It’s not easy being popular. I didn’t expect him to play such a large role in the show, but with this episode, he’s now gotten more screen time than even Toshiko, and that’s turned out to be a good thing.
Both segments of this week’s episode featured Moriaki and Hotori spending some quality after school time together, specifically special lessons/detention because of, well, Hotori being Hotori. Hotori once again provided tons of laughs with her irreverent, take-things-in-my-own-pace attitude that makes her so lovable. And when her indignant self righteousness comes up in regards to getting a perfect zero on a math test and being late to school a whopping 1/3 of the time, it makes for some wonderful moments shared between student and teacher.
Moriaki did a fine job holding up his end of the comedy, especially during the bits when the point of view shifted to his internal monologue. Despite his imposing figure and image as teacher, he is just as flawed a human as Hotori is, letting his strict mathematical mind get the better of him too easily. And he even shows a side of him that is childishly sadistic during the 2nd segment with the 3 chair roulette. The analysis that he went through of how to best handle Hotori in that situation was gold.
Ah, poor Hotori! A victim of her own idiocy.
The two really have a good dynamic going. I love that Hotori continues to hold out hope that her crush on Moriaki will turn into something despite his rather definitive “meh” reaction last week, even as she continues to torment him with her antics. The gall on the girl, to make a fool of him during extra math lessons by giving him a lateral thinking problem! Or the matter of fact way in which she states her foolish reasons for being late! Hotori has a lot to learn about winning a man’s heart.
Speaking of which, a challenger appears! It didn’t move the romance aspect of the plot forward, but it did add a new kink to it that one of the teachers is actually Moriaki’s former student, back to try to claim him as an adult. Talk about… creepy. Downright stalkerish, really. I loved how this bit was revealed to the viewer, starting with Toshiko’s comment at the beginning of the 1st segment that there could be rivals for Moriaki’s affection, moving on to her story at the end of that segment about how he rejected a student once before, the introduction of the female teacher at the beginning of the 2nd segment, and then Futaba’s rumor that that student had returned as a teacher some years later. The show didn’t beat you over the head with this, opting instead to have some trust in the viewer to put 2 and 2 together by himself. That needs to happen more often in anime.
I didn't even catch her name. But the way the show introduced her was excellent.
Now, I don’t think this plot point will be anything more than a running joke given the show’s lighthearted and whimsical nature, but the show has managed to keep me on my toes so far. After the lackluster first episode, this has been the 3rd straight hit. Next episode looks to be about Toshiko, who has merged into the backdrop since the first episode, so I’m looking forward to seeing more of her. This show is proving to be a lot of fun.
I thought this was a surprisingly good episode. Again, Hotori’s complete disregard for authority slays me. I could kind of sympathize with Moriaki over the jumbled chairs, because he obviously needs every advantage he can get to keep Hotori in check. Not that he can win in the end. Her carefree attitude is spectacular.
Yeah, I feel like the show’s been riding on Hotori’s quirky irreverent attitude for humor for 3 episodes, but it continues to be funny. She’s just a joy to watch.
I loved this episode and have been liking this series much more for focusing more on Hotori and Moraki. His obsessions crack me up, as do the little bits where we can see that Hotori is having some influence on him, such as when he concocts his plan to embarrass Hotori.
The teacher’s name is Nishi, and it is highly unlikely that she is the same person as the former student due to differing eye and hair color and the lack of birthmark under the right eye of the student. I think he just invites attention despite showing no interest.
I took the image of the student to be a mental one that the characters had given that they couldn’t know what she looked like. If Nishi-sensei really isn’t that student, I would consider that to be a major fake out by Shaft, since they built the episode to make it seem obvious that she was.