The wheels had begun spinning in the plan to resurrect the Sister Princess, but not all were happy about this.

Rinrin had slowly but surely amassed a small fortune from the money she borrowed from Wataru every so often. With that money, she set into motion a plan of her own — a plan she believed would allow her to usurp the power of the Sister Princess.

Of course, Rinrin could not breathe a word of this plot while she worked out the kinks. However, now that the resurrection of the Sister Princess had begun in earnest, Rinrin could not afford to be careful. She had to take some risks. So she confided in Wataru.

“Yo, Bro, I need your help with something,” Rinrin said.

“What is it?” Wataru asked.

“Don’t tell any of our sisters about this . . . but I’m building a robot,” Rinrin replied.

“Whoa, a robot?!” Wataru said. “I wanna see!”

“Shhh, keep it down!” Rinrin said, clamping a hand over Wataru’s mouth. “I’ll show you the robot if you keep quiet about it and you help me out with something.”

“Do you need more money?” Wataru asked.

“That would be nice, but not at the moment,” Rinrin said. “I just need help with a little . . . experiment.”

“An . . . experiment?” Wataru asked.

“Yes . . . an experiment,” Rinrin said.

“OK, sure, that sounds OK to me,” Wataru said.

“Excellent,” Rinrin said. “Just follow me.”

Rinrin led Wataru to her room and walked up to the bookcase. She slid a book off to the side, revealing a keypad built into the wall. She entered a pass code. The bookcase shuddered slightly and moved to the side; a spiraling staircase behind the bookcase led down to a darkened room.

“Let’s go,” Rinrin said.

She took a lantern that hanged from the wall and led the way down the steps. Why Rinrin chose to use such a technologically ancient form of lighting is beyond me. Perhaps she liked the effect of it — if I were her, I wouldn’t be able to help putting a bit of a scare into Wataru with some ambient lighting. Indeed, Wataru could not help but shiver a bit as he watched his and Rinrin’s shadows dance on the wall, which seemed slick and damp. A heavy layer of air seemed to press down on Wataru as he and descended the stairs, which appeared never ending. Wataru’s legs became more tired and wobbly by the step. His brain felt heavy and clouded, and his vision blurred. Wataru thought he heard whispers in the dark; his skin prickled as the voices got closer. Then, everything went black.

When Wataru awoke, he was strapped to a table. Rinrin looke down at him. She was wearing a gas mask and took it off when she noticed he woke up.

“Sorry about that, Bro,” Rinrin said. “I couldn’t think of a better way to get you down here. But you did say you would help me with my experiment, right?”

“What’s going on here?” Wataru asked. Or, rather, he meant to ask that. He was still recovering from the gas Rinrin had used to knock him out, so the question came out more like, “WHASH GONNNNNN ONHERRJJJJJJ” with no question mark at the end. Wataru struggled, but Rinrin made sure he had been strapped in tight. Soon Wataru gave up and leaned his head back against the table. He looked to the side and saw a robot.

“This is my pride and joy,” Rinrin said when she noticed Wataru looking at her robot. “I call her Mecha Rinrin. She’s going to help me become more powerful than I have ever dreamed of . . . but, first, I need to make sure she works. Hold on for a second, will you?”

Rinrin walked out of Wataru’s eyesight. He could hear Rinrin flip a switch, and then an immense electrical shock ran through Wataru. He felt as if he were being torn apart at the seams. Then, when Wataru thought the pain could not get any worse, he suddenly felt nothing. It was as if his spirit floated away from his body and went somewhere else. Actually, that’s exactly what happened — Wataru’s spirit floated out of his body and settled into the cold, metal chassis of Mecha Rinrin.

Rinrin shut the machine off and bounded toward Wataru’s body. She waited until everything settled and then poked at Wataru. She got no response. Then she giggled to herself and ran toward Mecha Rinrin. She flipped the robot’s on switch and grinned with delight as the robot started up and stared down at her.

“Ahahahahaha,” Rinrin cackled. “It’s a success! Mecha Rinrin has no power source, and yet she’s moving due to the power of a human spirit . . . I did it!”

“What is going on?” Mecha Rinrin asked.

“You, my friend, have just made a valuable contribution to my experiment,” Rinrin said. “You are in the body of my robot. And I control you!”

Rinrin took out a control box and pushed a button. Mecha Rinrin stood up and awaited orders. Rinrin inputted a series of commands and had Mecha Rinrin run around the room, do jumping jacks and back flips, and do a Russian folk dance. Wataru’s spirit was very confused after all this was complete. He felt as if someone had some sort of mechanized controller in her hands and was forcing him to do actions against his will. A funny feeling, that.

“Now that I know my transfer mechanism works, the only thing I need to do is figure out a surefire way to get the Sister Princess into here . . .”

“Not so fast, Rinrin!” a voice shouted.

“Curses!” Rinrin snarled. “How did you know I was down here?!”

“Your experimenting is pretty loud,” Sakuya said. “Also, you left the secret passageway open.”

“Well, now that you’ve found me, I’m afraid I cannot let you live, Dear Sister,” Rinrin said. “Mecha Rinrin, destroy her!” Rinrin pounded a complex order into the controller, and Mecha Rinrin slowly ambled toward Sakuya; however, Sakuya was ready for this. She ran full speed toward Mecha Rinrin and used her momentum to bound over the robot. Wataru was vaguely aware of all this, and he heard a commotion going on behind him after Sakuya leaped over the robot. There was pounding, screeching, and wailing; there was a sick squishy noise, and someone hit the ground. Someone groaned with pain as more evil, foul noises filled the air. The floor under Mecha Rinrin’s feet grew red with blood. After a few minutes, Sakuya ambled in front of Mecha Rinrin.

“She won’t be bothering us anymore,” Sakuya said. “And neither will this robot. Much as I would enjoy disposing of you, it’s probably best if we get you back into your body, and quickly, before the other Sisters find out what a mess I’ve made down here.”

Sakuya led Mecha Rinrin back to the table and strapped the robot in. While Rinrin had been a mechanical genius when she was alive and her guts were still inside her body, she tended to make her devices simple and easy to use. Sakuya walked to the switch, flipped it and marveled as the experiment went off without a hitch, this time in reverse. But the business of switching a spirit back from robot to flesh is an exhausting one, so as soon as his soul found itself back in his body, Wataru fainted. When he woke up, he was in his bed, with Sakuya sitting beside him.

“What happened?” Wataru asked.

“Oh, you just had a bad dream,” Sakuya said. “By the way, Rinrin transferred to some fancy school in America, so we’ll never see her again. Bye!”

Hello, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls! The Crown Jewel of noitaminA — aka Guilty Crown – has been taking the anime world by storm since it began airing in the Fall 2011 season. And because it is so wonderful and popular, we should of course make spin-offs cashing in on how super duper totally awesome the show is! So, without further ado, it’s time to play . . .

GUESS.

THE.

DUMB!

That’s right, folks, it’s an all-new game show built around Guilty Crown, where you, the viewer, vote on the dumbest moment in this week’s Guilty Crown! So, really, this show is more like “Vote the Dumb” rather than “Guess the Dumb,” but the latter is a much better title, don’t you think? Whichever moment is voted the dumbest will be named Grandmaster Dumb and go on to defend its championship against a new slew of idiotic moments next week! Boy, I wish I thought of this idea earlier!

Here are the nominees for this week’s Dumbest Moment . . .

1. This fucking guy invoking the high school student council charter to bounce Not Sheryl from leadership and install a new student council president. He does know the student council is not a legitimate form of government, right? Then again, if I want capable leadership after a near-apocalyptic event, I know I’ll turn to the person who helped plan the school dance.

2. Shu is an awful, creepy spy. Way to fail at eavesdropping on people’s personal conversations, dipshit.

3. POWER LEVELS. IT’S OVER 2000!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

4. Tsugumi definitely not getting molested while her friends grope her for her void. Nope. Definitely not.

5. Tsugumi’s super convenient Void. Truth be told, this isn’t that dumb for Guilty Crown, because it does it every week. But it’s worth a mention nonetheless. Also, I’m convinced this Void is straight doujinshi bait.

6. More super convenient Voids! Actually, I think this is kind of cool, but at the same time it is dumb, so in the spirit of fairness, I put it on this list.

7. Yahiro putting Shu into a position of leadership so that he can turn into a Social Darwinist. Who does he think he is, Charles zi Britannia? WAIT IT’S ILLEGAL TO MENTION CODE GEASS WITH GUILTY CROWN LOL

Also, because the distinct possibility exists that a moment is so dumb that I cannot comprehend its idiocy, I will allow for write-in votes! I’m pretty sure, though, that I covered the dumbest of the dumb in this episode.

Have at it!

This is one of the scenes that really sold me both on Hunter x Hunter and Hisoka as a villain. Before this, the viewer knows that Hisoka is obviously much, much stronger than everyone else participating in the Hunter Exam, but there is a glimpse of his real power here, and also a peek into the depths of how monstrous Hisoka is.

Once again, the remake and the older series take a different path to reach the same result. The visuals in this episode focus on making Hisoka into a dark, frightening figure. He looks unreal before, but inhuman here. Hisoka’s bloodlust is apparent in every aspect of him — his voice is more guttural, his eyes are blackened (I like that visual detail; the lust is so intense that it’s almost draining him of energy), and holy fuck, the look on Hisoka’s face when he attacks that would-be hunter. I would not want to meet Hisoka at night!

The feeling I get from Hisoka’s bloodlust in the remake is that it’s something that pains him physically to a point, but that it’s also something he embraces. He likes that craving for blood that runs through him every so often. That’s part of what separates Hisoka from many similar villains to me: His physicality is used so well to create a palpable sense of fear about him. The way he moves and the way he shivers in delight as the bloodlust runs through him is just wrong. What you see is not a human, but a demon masquerading as a human — someone whose whims and delights are beyond our understanding.

I didn’t totally remember how the original Hunter x Hunter approached this scene, so I went back to it after finishing this episode. (Skip to 9:00 in this video to catch it.) The main difference in how Hisoka carries himself in the original is that the bloodlust seems more uncontrollable. In the remake, there’s definitely the feeling that the bloodlust is out of Hisoka’s control to an extent, but he seems more in command of himself, if more animalistic. In the original, however, the bloodlust almost seems crippling. Hisoka is clearly in a significant amount of (probably delightful to him) pain; the bloodlust is so strong that his body threatens to burst with painful pleasure.

It’s almost like Hisoka is a drug addict in the original anime. He has intense, violent cravings, and if he does not sate them, then his body is wracked with intense pain. He claws at his arms. His eyes are out of focus. He clutches his stomach and tries desperately to control his breathing. It’s intense and utterly frightening. There’s another big difference in this scene, though: The original goes more out of its way to depict not only Gon’s fear at seeing this side of Hisoka, but also his utter disgust. Look at the way he reacts physically to Hisoka: He’s not only frightened of him, but also repulsed. Between the two series, Gon’s reaction to Hisoka is where the original series clearly takes it.

Yet again, the different paths each show takes with how Hisoka deals with his bloodlust are indicative of the approach of each series toward the material. The remake is still very much a kids series, and with that in mind, it makes Hisoka more visually and obviously monstrous and inhuman. He’s a bogeyman that children will likely find frightening (or maybe fascinating, I dunno lol). The original, keeping in line with its more dark fairy tale type approach to the material, depicts Hisoka in a more sinister, skin-crawling way. He’s still a monster, but one of a different breed — a monster who’s not always in control of himself, which may be more frightening than the monster who always keeps his cool.

And since I haven’t shown this off for some time, here’s HISOKA’S GLOWING PENIS AGAIN, YAAAAAAAAAAY

Marika’s reaction during this final scene really strikes at the core of why I like outer space so much. It’s not simply the austere beauty of space that’s so awe-inspiring, but also the sheer vastness of it. Ever since humanity has launched shit into space, we’ve made great strides in mapping out the universe and seeing what’s out there, but all that is still a tiny blip of what’s truly out there. The possibility exists that we could go on exploring the universe bit-by-bit on into infinity (you know, assuming our species survives into perpetuity) and we’d still not see everything it has to offer.

How could that not be attractive to a pirate yearning for adventure?

I can feel that. When I watched Star Wars as a lad, I always admired Han Solo the most. How could you not? It isn’t just that he’s the coolest and most charming, or that he has a furry sidekick; it’s that he has the Millennium Falcon and roams around space doing whatever the fuck he wants. Luke Skywalker has a laser sword and psychic powers, sure. Darth Vader has the all-black gear and James Earl Jones’ voice, yeah. But, man, a life of roaming around space getting into scrapes, getting chased and doing chasing, and, again, that fucking awesome ship? Now there’s the life. There’s a reason why my favorite scene in The Empire Strikes Back is the chase through the asteroid field: That’s the kind of shit a space adventurer should be doing every day!

I think (not having watched the preview for the next episode, so don’t say shit here, please) this episode is probably the last of the slow burn beginning. The main topic of the episode among the characters seemed to be whether Marika would actually become a captain, and now that Marika has been given a taste of outer space, surely she cannot resist its call. Plus, pirates and yakuza and shit will be coming after her regardless of whether she decides to become a captain or not, so she might as well join up with the pirates and get some professional protection. Then again, Ririka seems as if she would be more than capable of protecting her daughter what with that insane arsenal of hers . . .

I don’t have any real problem with the slow pace so far, but I would also like to see some piratey scuffles in the near future. Being chased by space yakuza and having a brief tangle with electronically-inclined space pirates should just be the appetizer. I also wonder how Marika’s classmates will figure into things in the future. Somehow I don’t get the feeling they will be ditched once Marika is all, “Yep brb pirating”, although I would be more than happy if the show ditched Chiaki Omigawa’s character. MY WAR AGAINST HER SHALL NEVER END.

Now that this abomination is out of the way, we can begin the next chapter of our sordid tale.

Wataru eventually recovered from his impromptu surgery and was back to his normal scrawny frame in no time. When he was up to going out and around, he found that it was close to Christmas time — possibly. Stores seem to put their Christmas dressings out earlier by the year, so relying upon decorations to figure out when the Christmas season is upon us is a poor decision at best. Alas, it was Christmas, and yet not at the same time: The citizens of Promised Island celebrated Christmas in January rather than the customary December. A strange choice of holiday, perhaps, but it did not bother them.

Wataru ventured downstairs one morning and found a surprising sight: All his sisters were waiting for him! Except that is not surprising at all, but Wataru was nonetheless surprised. I probably don’t need to insult him at this point; it’s expected that he approaches life with the awareness of a cod clubbed by a fisherman.

“What’s going on?” Wataru asked, looking around the room at the Christmas tree festooned with Christmas lights and Christmas ornaments.

“It’s Christmas time, Bro Bro!” Hinako said. “We need to get you a present!”

“And that means we need to get you out of the house and somewhere else,” Sakuya said, linking her right arm with Wataru’s left arm.

“Why do I need to leave?” Wataru asked.

“Because we’re actually making you something rather than buying a soulless piece of capitalist merchandise!” Rinrin said, twirling a wrench around her finger. “So, go on! Get out of here!”

And get out of there Wataru did. Sakuya took Wataru to the strip mall and showed him all the shops with the most expensive items for sale. Wataru window shopped with her for a while, oblivious to Sakuya continually elbowing him in the ribs whenever they passed by a shop with especially expensive wares for sale. No matter how many times Sakuya dug her elbow into Wataru, however, the blank stare on his face refused to change, and eventually she gave up.

The night dragged on. Sakuya and Wataru stopped at a large Christmas tree in the middle of the largest park on Promised Island. A giant star shined at the top like a beacon of empty hope. The light shined up to the heavens, where the Sister Princess waited for her charges to summon her to this world once again for global domination. Sakuya clasped her hands together and prayed silently; Wataru looked at her, felt awkward and then did the same thing, although he prayed for a good cheese sandwich rather than the return of a bloodthirsty goddess to our mortal world.

“Let’s go home,” Sakuya said. “I’m sure everyone is done by now.”

“You can go on ahead of me,” Wataru said. “I’m going to stay behind for a while.”

“. . . Why?” Sakuya asked. “Are you keeping something a secret from me?”

“Yes,” Wataru said. “. . . I mean, no. I mean, yes. Uh.”

“That’s fine,” Sakuya said. “Do whatever you want. Even if you’re keeping something a secret from me, I still know everything about you.”

“That doesn’t make any sense, but OK,” Wataru said.

When Wataru believes something you say makes no sense, then you know you’ve said something truly idiotic, but Sakuya paid no heed to his words and skipped off toward home. Wataru went off to shop for a gift to give the Sisters, but we shall pay no heed to that leg of this story, because it is dull and aimless, and I tire of Wataru’s wandering.

Wataru went home having bought his gift, and when he walked into the door, he found the Sisters once again waiting for him. He was as shocked as before; so shocked, in fact, that he nearly dropped the box he lugged around in his spindly chicken wing arms. Alas, Wataru caught the box before it hit the ground, and he gathered his bearings and managed to stay balanced. A pity.

“What’s going on here?” Wataru asked.

“Our present for you is ready,” Karen said, stepping forward.

“But it’s not Christmas yet!” Wataru said. “Or is it? I’m having a tough time keeping track of dates here. It’s really weird.”

“It is indeed Christmas, Beloved Brother,” Haruka said. “And we have your present right here!”

“What is it?” Wataru said. “Did Rinrin build me a giant robot?!”

“No,” Rinrin said. “What gave you that idea?”

“Well, you were twirling a wrench,” Wataru said. “That made me think you were going to build me something.”

“No, I just like to twirl my wrench,” Rinrin said. “But we were building you something of a sort!”

“Yeah!” Mamoru said. “We wrote you a song!”

“A song for me?” Wataru said, his eyes brimming with tears. “Really?”

“Yep!” the Sisters all shouted.

Oh, Sister Princess
You are our guiding spirit
When The One is sacrificed
You shall lead us to
The Promised Land
The One shall hang up above
The skies will be crimson red
A hole will rip through
Space and time
And you’ll be here once again
Oh, Sister Princess
You are our guiding light
You keep us safe
Through times of strife
And let us kill once more
Hear our call, Sister Princess
Lead us through once more
Let the world cry
Tears of blood
Once more

“Um, wow,” Wataru said. “That didn’t really sound like it was about me at all.”

“It’s all metaphorical,” Karen said. “We spent a lot of time on it.”

And Wataru of course bought that explanation because he did not want to seem stupid. What an unfortunate child. What he did not know was that his eventual sacrifice was finally being put into motion. This song — a plea to the Sister Princess — was the first step of the endgame.

Oh, Leorio, you should know by now not to fall for such an obvious trap, especially against someone as shady as Tonpa . . .

We finally catch a glimpse of all the other folks in the Main Character Brigade this episode. Sometimes I wonder how Leorio manages to function in this world. Every other episode he’s getting fooled by someone who’s obviously trying to play him, or he’s screwing up an activity or something. Even for a comic relief character Leorio is a failure. But that’s partly why I love him. He looks like he should be the adult of the group, but he’s not, and he tries so hard to be cool, but he’s cool only intermittently. At least he has the best fashion sense of the main characters. A nice blue suit will never go out of style.

Tonpa and that monkey guy have the right idea, though. It’s to one’s benefit to team up here . . . provided you can trust your partner. Leorio and Kurapika make a good team because they’ve already become friends during the course of the Hunter Exam. They know each other to a decent degree: Each can be sure that the other won’t suddenly betray him out of nowhere and yoink his ID badge. Also, Hisoka and our shapeshifting friend have clearly been in cahoots from the start, although they’re not really teaming up here so much as hanging out after a hard day’s work of beating the shit out of people, haha. Poor sniper lady really got a raw deal in the new Hunter x Hunter. Did she even have a single line here? She at least gets to talk a bit and actually shoot in the original anime. And I don’t know if the subs are weird (watched the HorribleSubs version, which is of course the Crunchyroll translation), or Mr. Shapeshifter is just a dick, but she’s referred to as a he! It would be kind of hilarious if Shapeshift-san didn’t even bother to see whose ass he kicked and just took the ID badge without looking.

Getting back to teaming up . . . I’m willing the bet the Tonpa and Mr. Monkey Connection would have eventually dissolved like so many pro wrestling tag teams. Obviously Tonpa would have done some betraying eventually. He’s too big an asshole not to do that. Even if it would be to his benefit to keep an alliance going until the end of this round because he’s such a doughy marshmallow, Tonpa would not be able to resist stabbing someone in the back, simply because he hasn’t done so in a while. Mr. Monkey I’m a bit less certain about, but anyone with a thieving monkey is either a jerk (because he taught the monkey to steal) or a thief with a heart of gold (think Aladdin), so I suppose he could go either way. Maybe he’d be a bit smarter about things, but he’d probably dump Tonpa at the first sign of trouble.

And now Gon is playing the waiting game with Hisoka, who seems to instinctively know that this part of Hunter x Hunter requires a good deal of tension, so he plants his ass on the ground for a while just because. One of Hisoka’s favorite past times must be sitting and around and doing nothing, because he sure did a lot of it during the previous round of the Hunter Exam, too. This episode does a decent job of establishing Gon’s utter fear when faced with the chance to steal Hisoka’s ID badge. The above screenshot has a bit of the blurry camera thing going on with Gon’s sweat dripping into his eyes, and man, I wonder how Hisoka didn’t hear Gon’s heavy breathing.

It’s kind of funny how many people converge into this point. You’ve got Hisoka in the grove, the shapeshifter, Gon hiding in the bushes, the dude with the spear and the dude who is stalking Gon right now. The guy stalking Gon must be really good at hiding if there are two people around who don’t notice his presence!

Best mom, or BEST mom?

I like how practical Ririka is regarding Marika’s inevitable leap to piracy. She knows there’s really nothing she can do to prevent Marika from being a captain (short of the crew performing a mutiny, I suppose), so instead of dissuading Marika from the pirate lifestyle, Ririka instead imparts the lessons of piracy. Image matters. Consider your situation before you pull the trigger. Handle giant fucking laser guns. That’s everything you need to be a successful pirate!

Again, I really like the relationship Ririka and Marika have, too. They have sort of a sisterly thing going on, what with how Marika addresses Ririka and how they relate to each other, but Ririka isn’t afraid of being a mother to Marika in her own way. She has all that pirate experience going on for her: Might as well put it to some use, right? I also like that Marika has such a decisive personality. Bit of a refreshing change from the usual in anime, yes? I imagine that decisiveness developed because Ririka wasn’t always around — she seems to be a bigwig in some such government department (important enough to carry around a trunk of guns without being arrested, anyway!), and you don’t become that important by slacking off. Marika probably had to learn at a rather young age to be decently capable on her own.

It’s the gumption (I just aged 50 years by using that word) Marika displays during the electronic warfare scene that shows she has what it takes to be a pirate captain. People in charge don’t always know what they’re doing; I’m pretty sure we all see that day in and day out. If you’re going to be a leader, though, you’ve got to make the best decision you can with what you have available, and then see that decision through as thoroughly as possible. Marika knows fuck all about electronic warfare, and it seems Chiaki knows little more than that, but in this setting, I doubt that will matter much — the will to kick some electronic ass is all that matters here.

I doubt they’re in any significant danger, anyway. My suspicion is that this is a test set up by Kane to gauge Marika’s worth as a captain. She’s already shown that she knows her way around a ship, but does she have what it takes to take charge and confidently lead a crew when the pressure is at its highest? So far she’s passing the test with flying colors. Chiaki is staying cool under pressure, too, so I’m sure there’s room for her on the ship, as well, unless of course she has some ulterior motives floating around. She wasn’t connected to the folks who went after Marika in the first episode, but doubtless there’s something going on with her. Nobody is that tsuntsun all the time for no reason!

I will say, though, that she won me over by bringing her parfait with her while she ran Marika to safety. That’s a hilarious touch to the scene, and the note she leaves in the parfait glass shows that she has some good ol’ fashioned pirate style to her, as well.

And, people, I’m not gonna lie: The OP for this show is so dumb, but I totally dig it in a “FUCK YEAH HAIR METAL LET’S SHRED AND WHIP OUR HAIR AROUND” kind of way. Cheesy anime hair metal is the greatest.

Wataru stared glumly at the food in front of him.

He had ingested five pizzas already, and Shirayuki had six more waiting in line. Wataru could feel his stomach bulging outward. He loosened his belt another notch as he ripped off a slice from the pizza sitting in front of him and wolfed it down.

There’s so much food here, Wataru thought to himself. Is Shirayuki trying to kill me?

It seems depressing that so much time could pass before Wataru would actually suspect one of these malicious murderers of trying to off him, but that is where we stand. However, perhaps it would be helpful for us to see how Wataru got to this point. Actually, I doubt it will be helpful at all, but let us partake in this journey nevertheless.

This mess began at school, as these events so often do. Wataru was scarfing down lunch in the classroom while Shirayuki smiled at him. Normally she would attempt to poison the lunch she fed to Wataru, but lately her ego had wrested control from her common sense, and thus she fed Wataru the best-tasting food she could cook and watched with pride as he scarfed down her delicious concoctions with the table manners of a chimpanzee starting a food fight with its feces. But while Wataru shoveled food down his throat with nary a crumb even brushing his taste buds, he was being watched jealously.

By whom, you may ask? By his best friend in the class: Yamada.

. . . By whom, you may ask? I cannot blame you for having forgotten the name of this ignorant whelp. I take great care in mentioning him as little as possible; unfortunately, this tale cannot proceed without that idiot rearing his deformed head.

So, yes, Wataru’s idiot friend, Yamada, watched him with jealous eyes. Yamada had nobody to make him lunches every day, because only a moron like Wataru could possibly see anything likable in Yamada. This Yamada was spoiled rotten, so he was never left wanting for money with which to buy food at school each day. Everyone knows, however, that food bought at a school is no match for food lovingly crafted by the hands of a younger sister, even if that younger sister has a taste for murder.

After class, Yamada waited in the hallway for Shirayuki and took her aside to speak for a moment.

“Wataru likes that food you feed him, right?” Yamada asked.

“Of course he does!” Shirayuki chirped. “I’m the best cook on the island!”

“That’s swell,” Yamada said. “It seems to me, though, that you’re not feeding him enough.”

“What do you mean?” Shirayuki said. “Elder Brother always seems full after he is finished with my meals.”

“Of course his stomach is full, but what about his heart?” Yamada asked.

“What?” Shirayuki said.

“You must feed Wataru so much food that not only his stomach is stuffed, but also his soul!” Yamada said. “It is only when his soul is full that a man will be satisfied!”

“You really think so?” Shirayuki asked.

“I know so!” Yamada replied.

“Then I’d better get to work right away!” Shirayuki turned around and ran off while Yamada chucked to himself. Wataru surely won’t be able to eat all that food by himself! he thought. When he’s so full that his stomach will explode, I’ll swoop in and grab all that extra food for myself! It’s the perfect plot!

And that is roughly how we got to where we are at right now. Not very illuminating, yes? You surely did not expect me to recount every insipid detail. My time is precious despite the fact that I spend so much of it funneling the details of a worthless journey into something halfway resembling a coherent narrative. Oh, and please ignore the fact that Wataru could not possibly have jotted down the details of the preceding conversation. We are all better off not considering such silly details.

From then on, Shirayuki spent much of her time in the kitchen. She cooked and cooked and cooked some more, and when she was finished cooking, she shoveled her food into Wataru’s increasingly fat face and went right back to cooking again. She cooked so much food that Wataru was scarcely able to sleep; he ate everything Shirayuki cooked out of a crippling fear that he would somehow disappoint her. Wataru was a skinny string bean boy, but not after Shirayuki was finished with him — he blew up slowly like a balloon until the Sisters suddenly decided to vacation out in the woods.

Truthfully, they were tired of Shirayuki gorging Wataru with food; they were afraid that he would die of a heart attack or something before he was ready to be sacrificed to the Sister Princess. Unfortunately for them, Shirayuki had the foresight to bring a portable kitchen, which she used to bring this vignette full circle and cook pizza after pizza for Wataru.

Wataru breathed heavily as he crammed yet another slice of pizza down his gullet. He could practically feel his arteries harden as he ingested each greasy slice. Wataru’s stomach rumbled angrily, as if it were warning him that the next piece of pizza would be the one to break the dam, and then all hell would break loose. His eyes could no longer focus on anything; they were blank and dead. Wataru tried to pick up another slice and shove it into his drooling maw, but he no longer had the strength to do so.

“No . . . more . . .” Wataru wheezed.

“What?” Shirayuki asked.

“I can’t . . . eat . . . any more . . .” Wataru huffed, launching into a coughing fit that nearly expelled every slice he had eaten that day.

“But that can’t be!” Shirayuki said. “Your soul isn’t full! You need to eat more! More!”

“Wait, what is this?” Karen asked, walking up to Shirayuki and grabbing her by the shoulders.

“Wataru’s friend told me that I needed to feed Wataru more so that his soul would be full and he’d be happy!” Shirayuki said. “So I’ve been trying to feed him as much as possible!”

“Wataru has friends?” Karen asked.

“Indeed he does!” Yamada shouted, leaping out from behind a bush and charging toward the pizza. “You fell for it hook, line and sinker, and now I’ll be taking the pizza!”

“Hold it!” Sakuya said, grabbing Yamada by the collar and jerking him backward. She threw Yamada toward the ground and planted a foot on his chest. “I don’t know who you are, or what your deal is . . .”

“I’m Yamada!” Yamada said. “I’m the quirky best friend character who gets in all sorts of amusing scrapes!”

“. . . and I don’t care, but I’m not going to stand by and let you screw everything up,” Sakuya said. She pulled Yamada to his feet and shoved him toward the trailer they had driven out to the woods. “I’m nipping this problem in the bud.” Sakuya opened the door and threw Yamada inside. I am not certain what happened afterward, but I do know that a lot of clean-up was necessary.

“Now we need to get Big Brother home,” Karen said.

“If we move him with all that food inside, there’s a chance he may have a bad reaction,” Chikage said.

“Then we’ll just need to gut it out of him,” Sakuya said, walking out of the trailer and putting on some rubber gloves. She was covered in blood from head to toe. Sakuya pulled out a scalpel and descended toward Wataru. I’m sure you all know what happens next, and that I will not need to go into the bloody details, which is fine by me because I personally consider it quite disgusting. The mere thought of Sakuya cutting into Wataru and removing lumpy pieces of wet, half-digested food makes me queasy . . .

Random reader in the far-flung future: If you’re reading this way after the fact because you have nothing better to do than trawl my archives, then know that I skipped from episode 12 to episode 14 because episode 13 is a recap episode!

Anyway, apologies for getting to this episode kind of late. Been pretty busy over at The Nihon Review lately, and Real World stuff has built up a bit for me as well. I should hopefully have some more time available from here on out, though! But enough of that: Let’s get to this episode, shall we?

This is the start of the next stage of the Hunter Exam, and with it the part of the story where Hunter x Hunter should take another leap. We don’t get one of my favorite episodes of the original series, episode 20 (which was an anime-original episode where all the folks taking the Hunter Exam work together to escape a deadly storm), but hey. This is mostly set-up: You’ve got the rules laid out, everyone getting their prey, and work being done to catch that prey.

What’s cool about this portion of the exam is the built-in tension. The examinees are staying on the island for a week, which means that nobody is ever safe within that timeframe. Even if you accomplish your objective, like Pokkle does, it means fuck all until the conclusion of the week. He can still be hunted and lose everything he gained if he’s not careful. It’s a basic scenario, but also a classic one because that tension is constant. There are so many ways that a person could get caught. Gon makes the mistake of focusing too much on his training to get Hisoka’s ID badge, and because of that, he is easily tracked by the man who is hunting him. However, if one were to assume that he or she is being tracked at all times, it would be easy to give in to paranoia and split one’s focus among too many details and miss that one crucial detail that could give away the hunter.

I love that the most pedolicious shot of Hisoka is used for when Gon and Killua talk about him.

I’m pretty sure everyone watching predicted that Gon would be going after Hisoka. Obvious shonen thing, right? Put the plucky protagonist against the most fearsome enemy right off the bat and let him know how it actually is in the real world. What I do like about Gon’s approach is that even though he is confident in his abilities, he is realistic about his victories. He’s not looking to crush Hisoka or embarrass him, or anything — Gon knows Hisoka can and will straight-up murder him at any time. Gon knows that taking Hisoka’s ID badge is the greatest victory he can hope for at the moment, and he’ll put all his effort and focus into making that happen. The original series had grabbed me completely before this point, so I really felt the tension as Gon stalked Hisoka. Hopefully the new series can keep that same tension.

I don’t have a problem with the concept of the title Bodacious Space Pirates – rather, my issue is with the choice of word. “Bodacious”? That is an awful piece of slang. It doesn’t sound good, it doesn’t look good and anyone who has used it in the last 20 years is a grade A douchebag. I get that the point is to make the show sound exciting and fun in a throwback sort of way, but I am going to suggest a different ’80s slang word to use:

Bitchin’ Space Pirates.

Now there’s a word that still holds up. It makes the show sound kickass and fun, the word itself sounds and looks good, and, most importantly, it has my seal of approval. Good bye, Bodacious Space Pirates; hello, Bitchin’ Space Pirates. Done and done.

Anyway, this is about as solid an opening episode as you can have for this sort of thing. You’ve got the basic premise, characters galore, some world building and a nice firefight to cap things off at the end. I especially like the appearance of the Space Yakuza at the end. Nothing would make me happier than to see all these illicit earthbound groups wage war in space. Bring on the Space Mafia, Space Crips and Space Bloods, Space Triads — get ‘em all up in space! We don’t really know yet how this piracy/privateering/whatever works in here, or how many competing factions there are, or whatever else, so that will be fun to see when Marika inevitably becomes the captain of the ship and goes after some of that sweet, sweet booty.

I’m interested to see what direction they go in with Chiaki, as well. Those crazy eyes she has going on in the above screenshot, as well as her general attitude toward Marika in the maid cafe, seem to indicate that she is a rival character (maybe leader of her own faction of pirates?), but there’s also the possibility that she teams up with Marika and becomes a First Mate or something. (Not that kind of First Mate, shippers!) She’s kind of grumpy, but she at least helps Marika escape from the Space Yakuza and the fake government official with her flashy gun skills, so there’s that. (Or maybe the Space Yakuza is her entourage. That’s kind of unclear for me.)

My second favorite part of the episode is Ririka throwin’ down mugs of wine and reminiscing about the good ol’ days with her pirate buddies. Really fun scene that shows a lot of character for everyone. I like how this episode goes about suggesting Ririka’s devil may care pirate attitude, like how Marika addresses her by name rather than a title like “mom” or “momma” or whatever. She does seem like the cool mom type who would be OK with that sort of thing. And if her outfit at the end of the episode has anything to say about it, Ririka did not retire from pirating to be some no name nobody — she has a position of some importance in this place. You don’t wear a hot businesslike outfit like that if you’re not an important person.

So, yep, fun opening episode, and I’m definitely looking forward to more. Fun pirate times for everybody!