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dokidokivisual · 4 years ago

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Gochiusa BLOOM episode 4 impressions

Previously: episode 3, episode 2, episode 1

And now, episode 4. Last time we saw Chiya and Cocoa being put in charge of organising a “restaurant” for their class’s entry into the cultural festival. And it ends with them showing up at Rize and Sharo’s school and borrowing some “supplies”. At the start of episode 4 we go back in time to see what happened between those two events, as well as the cultural festival itself.

The episode opens with one of Cocoa’s classmates discussing a proposed arrangement of tables in the classroom, from the feng shui point of view. This traditional Chinese practice is often used in East Asia to create harmonious environment. In Japanese it’s called fūsui (風水). One of the main instruments is a compass (羅盤 raban), which can be seen placed on the table here:

Like with a normal compass there are symbols for directions written around it. However it also includes Chinese zodiac and Celestial stem characters. Just so we don’t forget what show this is, the character for Rabbit zodiac sign is replaced by a pictogram. The flow of qi (or chi) energy is also discussed, which is one of the primary feng shui concepts.

In the very next shot we see a bunch of Cocoa’s classmates gathered around the table. In anime it often happens that the main characters greatly stand out among their classmates by having original design and colorful hair. In fact in season 1 episodes 4 and 8 when Cocoa’s class is shown, that pretty much appears to be the case.

However the new group of classmates we’re introduced to is different. Not only do they have colorful hair and unique design, but they also have names and different personalities. Moreover this story arc isn’t the last time they’re seen (at least in the manga). Some backstory for these characters is also revealed, such as Kano staying at carpenter’s house, and Class President having deep-seated issues because of failing to get into her preferred school.

Anyway, Cocoa and Chiya decide that the best way to decorate their “restaurant” is by borrowing the decorations from the other school. Apparently they had to defeat the clubs over there in various contests, including the blowgun club (with its president making only a background appearance this time). This is obviously a callback to season 2 episode 10 where Rize and Sharo also had to win various contests to reach their goal.

The “spoils of war” include a bunch of masks that were previously seen decorating the blowgun club. I’m honestly not aware of any connection between fukiya and masks, but anyway, in a callback to an earlier feng shui scene we see classmate Anzu being aghast at the negative qi the mask seemingly emanates.

We get a little "imagine spot” with the classmates imagining Rize and Sharo based on their descriptions, which are apparently quite scary. I thought it’s interesting how the question marks which in the manga were drawn on top of the characters silhouettes ended up being drawn directly on characters’ faces and being partially covered by hair. Spooky.

We also see how the classmates imagine Cocoa and Chiya. Cocoa is seen as a “little sister” (much to her annoyance), while Chiya is seen as bancho (番長) which is the title of a leader of a group of juvenile delinquents, a surprisingly common character archetype despite the fact that this subculture hasn’t existed for decades. This is in contrast to Chiya imagining herself as shacho (社長), company president. 社 also means “society”, while a delinquent is basically the opposite of that.

Also, what was up with this soup being prepared? I don’t think they even served it. Anyway, Cocoa and Chiya give invitations to the rest of the gang, and the official theme of the “restaurant” is revealed, which is Beer Hall! And more specifically, Oktoberfest. Now, as you probably know this is a huge beer festival held in Munich, Germany. Contrary to its name, it takes place mostly during late September, and ends on the first Sunday of October, so perhaps this is the time period when the episode happens. On the other hand, cultural festivals are usually held around November 3rd (Culture Day) in Japan. So that’s another datapoint. On the third hand (?) we haven’t reached the Halloween episode yet so it’s probably not November.

(yeah, this is the second gif of Cocoa and Chiya on fire, what about it)

Anyway, it’s the day of the Cultural Festival and we see all sorts of stalls set up by the other classes. Chino, who has never been there before(?) seems to be impressed by it all, while Rize seems to imply they don’t have events like this at her school. Chimame run off by themselves, which leaves Rize and Sharo on a date basically.

Soon Chimame come back, each carrying a beer mug (called Maß in German and “stein” in English) which contains what looks like beer, but is actually a very frothy apple juice. However note that in Japanese “juice” (ジュース) can mean any soft drink, so it might have been carbonated or something?

Soon, a very scary person in a Tippy costume shows up, but it’s actually Cocoa and this is her idea of a “Tippy hat” which she mentioned earlier. Cocoa (and the rest of her class) wears a costume which could be previously seen on the cover of Memorial Blend, the season 1 Gochiusa guidebook. This is actually a traditional dress called dirndl which is worn in southern Germany and other countries around the Alps.

The full menu can be briefly seen here and includes Apfelsaft (apple juice), Apfelwein (apple wine), Apfelsoda (apple soda, but pretty sure that’s not a real word) and Brezel (pretzel). No soup included. Also note Sharo being scared of the rabbit statue before this scene.

Anzu shows up again, this time doing a Tarot card reading. It seems she’s interested in all sorts of divinations. In response Chino does the same “much obliged for taking care of” greeting Chiya did to Karede Yura in the previous episode, while calling Cocoa dame-ane (ダメ姉 “no-good big sister”) in the process. It’s not very often that Chino calls Cocoa “big sister”, so Cocoa is very happy about that.

Kano is seen bringing 5 full beer steins to the table. The standardized volume of one beer stein is 1 liter, which corresponds to 1kg of liquid. Together with the glass itself, total weight is about 2.5kg, or 5 pounds. The largest number of beer steins a single person has carried simultaneously is 29 (by Oliver Strümpfel). For a female, the record is 19 by Anita Schwarz. I didn’t expect Rize to win the armwrestling contest against Kano (in the manga it was ambiguous who won, or whether the contest even took place) but I guess being a CQC expert would help with that.

Chimame, Rize and Sharo are convinced to try on the dirndls of Cocoa’s classmates, who then immediately bail, leaving Rize and others in the position of the waiters. However they happily take on the challenge, and even Aoyama and Rin join in. We also see the mysterious pretzel that was on the menu:

Without Cocoa, there was nobody to call in new guests, but it turned out that Chino had more appeal wearing that Tippy headgear, so Chino bravely takes on this role for herself.

This kind of dramatic shot is called “harmony processing” (ハーモニー処理) and comes from the time anime was cel-animated with the character cel being painted in to blend with the background cel. The most famous example of this technique is in the boxing anime Ashita no Joe.

Eventually Cocoa, Chiya, Rize and Sharo get to leave their post and explore the school, all wearing Cocoa’s school uniforms, and have a good time. They imagine how it would’ve been if they were all classmates (even Rize who is technically a year older, but if her birthday was not in February but in April she’d be in the same class as the others).

Just like the last episode’s title, the title of this episode あったかもしれない日常 is reused from the manga, namely the chapter 12 of volume 5. It basically means “the everyday life that could have been”, and refers specifically to the alternate timeline where Rize, Sharo, Chiya and Cocoa are classmates.

More importantly, Chino gets to see what it looks like, and it might be the final push she needs to decide which school she would join (although there are many scenes hinting towards it throughout the episode). Chino even manages to get a photographer to preserve the memory of this moment. She wasn’t brave enough to ask for it directly, so she puts on the Tippy headgear to do it. A funny difference from the manga though, is that in the anime Tippy (to his horror) gets covered up by it, instead of staying on top of it like before.

After the festival, there’s a mostly anime-original scene where Chino pretty much announces her decision to Maya and Megu. With Chino’s statement “I have decided” I can’t help but recall the lyrics of the ending theme

決めちゃいます ○ですから問題なーい (We’ll decide. Because we’re <blank> it’ll be ok.)

With the placeholder ○ standing for “Chimame-tai”, of course.

Which brings up a question: when does Chino tell Maya and Megu she has chosen Cocoa’s school in the manga? I can’t find it at all. Seems like they already know by vol.6 ch.7...

After the ED there’s another short scene of Chino sneaking in Cocoa’s room to imagine how her uniform will look on her. Interestingly, this is based on 4-koma from chapter 13, making this the first episode this season to adapt content from 3 different chapters. Makes me wonder how they’ll adapt the rest of chapter 13 because this reveal is at the end of it, and some scenes rely on Cocoa not knowing Chino’s decision. But I guess we’ll see in the next episode.

Anyway, thanks for reading, see you next week!

#gochiusa #is the order a rabbit?#gochuumon wa usagi desu ka?#review

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dokidokivisual · 4 years ago

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Gochiusa BLOOM episode 6 impressions

Previously: 5 - 4 - 3 - 2 - 1

Oh no, we are already halfway through the season! Time sure flies fast, doesn’t it? Anyway, let’s see what the episode 6 had to offer.

The episode opens with the titular “fluffle of rabbits” (which supposedly is an actual term for a group of rabbits in parts of Northern Canada, but honestly that just sounds completely made-up. I mean rabbits don’t even live in Nothern Canada, or are they? but I digress) surrounding Sharo.

Sharo’s costume and her holding a flyer is a direct callback to a scene from season 1 episode 7 “Call me Sister” where Sharo has encountered Wildgeese while distributing fliers for Fleur du Lapin. It’s not really explained in the episode, but this time Sharo is on the job to pass out fliers as well, but is tolerating the rabbits for the sake of Chino.

The fact that rabbits (other than Tippy, Anko and Wildgeese) kind of avoid Chino is also a previously established trait, namely in season 1 episode 6, but it’s not mentioned very often. However it’s interesting to rewatch that part of season 1 episode (06:00 - 06:30 and 08:20 - 09:00), because it establishes a metaphor which is crucial for understanding the current one.

Basically the rabbits rejecting Chino symbolize her lack of sociability (called komyusho コミュ障 or “communication disorder” in Japanese). While Chino thinks that the fact that the rabbits don’t run away has to do with Sharo being present, it’s actually explained by her personal growth over the last year or so.

In fact the theme for the entire episode can be summarized as “growth”. It’s fitting that rabbits are also a symbol of growth... in numbers at least.

After the OP, the story suddenly switches to Chimame’s middle school as they decide on a natural look for their graduation photo album. It’s another reminder of the passage of time, and the fact that Chimame-tai are about to become high schoolers in a few months. But it’s still October, and at least the manga takes its sweet time to get there.

By the way this pose is similar to Chimame “victory pose” from season 1 episode 5.

Megu decides that her hair type resembles Sharo’s and decides to ask her for advice. It might be hard to notice with their usual hairstyles, but if you look at Clockwork Rabbit Sharo you can see the resemblance. Coincidentally Sharo is getting a haircut right outside her home, so Megu hides behind a fire hydrant. In the manga she hides behind the corner of a building which I guess didn’t make sense given the geometry of the location. Then again, how large is this fire hydrant that Megu can easily hide behind it?

Sharo and Chiya eventually do spot her, and start fighting over who gets to do Megu’s hair. It turns out that they both cut each other’s hair, even though they’re not particularly satisfied with the result. The point of contention seems to be them cutting the bangs in a straight line, which is called pattsun ぱっつん in Japanese. Koi has previously mentioned this concept in volume 3 chapter 2 titled “Pattun Horizon”, which was adapted as part of season 1 episode 10. In that chapter Cocoa has a sleepover with Chiya and Sharo, and gets a matching pattsun to commemorate the occasion.

By the way there is an entire character song about Sharo having her hair cut by Chiya and it’s called 空色サロン (”Sky-colored salon”). It’s a really good song from the recent Blend of Letters album so check it out.

In the end, Megu gets her hair styled by Chiya’s grandma, using the same “thing” (probably a brush) she grooms Anko with. This also includes perming her curls straight. Unfortunately we don’t get to see how it went, and the scene switches to Maya right after. By the way, this manga chapter is called “Megu loses her tornado” (メグ、トルネードを失う).

Meanwhile Maya goes to a hair accessory shop to cover up her ahoge (”idiot hair”). Rize also happens to be there (implying that she might also be preparing for a graduation album photo) and tries to help Maya. She seems to carry some sort of hair conditioner with herself, although Maya’s ahoge is too strong for it. In the end they decide to buy matching hairpins.

Even though Rize holds a yellow hairpin and Maya a purple one, the back of the packaging is identical for both and indicates yellow color (黄). This is probably a mistake. The barcode number 8/08 140 2/14 160 indicates Maya and Rize’s birthday and height respectively (similar to Aoyama’s bounty in episode 3). I wasn’t able to read the QR code but maybe it encodes something as well.

Later when Rize scolds Maya she flicks a finger at her forehead (called dekopin でこピン in Japanese) while calling her DekoMaya (でこマヤ). Rize is basically implying that Maya has a big forehead, however it only got exposed because of the hair decoration she put on.

Finally it’s Chino’s turn. Apparently Chino usually cuts her hair herself. However this time she notices Tippy looking unusually fluffy and it turns out it was Cocoa who trimmed his fur (which is normally also done by Chino). Since angora rabbits were bred for their wool, it grows very fast, so unlike most other rabbit breeds it’s necessary to regularly trim it.

Chino becomes resolved to let Cocoa cut her hair, which makes her quite surprised and happy. Like Sharo and Chiya before, Chino is willing to put her trust in Cocoa, which shows how much their relationship has progressed. Cocoa tries to imitate a hair salon beautician, in particular the phrase “kayui tokoro wa gozaimasen ka?” (”does it itch somewhere?”) seems to be a staple phrase among Japanese hair stylists. This might be how Mocha used to cut her hair back home. Chino comments that Cocoa’s hair has grown longer, however it doesn’t look much longer than in previous episodes when in manga it was obviously longer:

The theme of growing hair corresponding to growth of a person is explored here. Mocha has very long hair, and Cocoa is thinking of growing her hair just as long to overcome her sense of inferiority. However regardless of hair length, we still see Cocoa being as immature as ever. For example she offers to hit her with a pico-pico hammer (pikohan) in case she makes a mistake. This toy is commonly featured in Japanese variety shows, and even in videogames, in fact it was invented in Japan by Masudaya toy company in 1968.

As I mentioned in episode 4 review, in the manga Cocoa only finds out that Chino has decided to go to her school at the end of this chapter. In this scene Cocoa doesn’t know it yet, and Chino when asked about it says she thought about joining Megu and Maya in Sharo’s school. This causes Cocoa to inadvertently cut Chino’s hair wrong. In the anime the dialogue is changed completely, but the end result is still the same. Chino learns that it’s inappropriate to joke around in certain situations, and Cocoa learns that longer hair doesn’t necessarily make you a good oneechan.

In the end Cocoa and Chino cut each other’s hair and Takahiro reassures them they did a good job after all. In the manga this hairstyle was labeled as つるてーん (tsuruten) which I think comes from the expression つんつるてん　tsuntsuruten which is used for clothing which is too short, for example pants being so short that lower legs are exposed. Perhaps it’s implied that they cut their bangs too short and too much of forehead is exposed.

In the end we get to see Chimame-tai’s final form. Megu’s change is the most radical as she did get a straight perm after all.

Now onto part B. It’s based on the same chapter as the opening scene with rabbits and Chino, namely volume 6 chapter 4. In the manga this scene follows directly after, which explains why Sharo is still wearing Fleur uniform there.

The original bread festival happened in season 1 episode 7 and was also advertised via distribution of leaflets. Here’s the original poster for comparison:

Compared to the original poster, Rabbit House is now spelled correctly, and “Welcome come on” is now written in English. Also Tippy is now singing a weird jingle (papan-pan-pan-pan-matsuri) which brings to mind Cocoa’s bread-themed Rabbit House theme song from Sing For You as well as Cocoa’s character song パンパカパンのパンのパーティー which features “welcome come on” and I guess was inspired by Cocoa’s bread festivals.

Soon, Aoyama and Rin turn up, still chasing each other since the previous episode. However the previous episode omitted an important detail about Rin from the manga chapter, which is that she doesn’t really like coffee. In the anime it’s revealed later, but it explains why nobody seems to care about Chino’s “special blend”. In response Chino turns into delinquent mode, with Wildgeese on her head instead of Tippy.

The way Chino speaks changes too. Normally Chino always speaks in polite register, using desu and -masu verb forms at the end of the sentence. This is one of the defining characteristics of Chino since she’s the only character in the series to do this even in informal situations.

In this scene Chino switches to plain register, ending her sentence with da ze, which is a plain copula da followed by ending particle ze indicating forcefulness. This sentence ending is well known from the catchphrase yare yare da ze of Jotaro Kujo from JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure.

When Wildgeese is replaced with Anko, Chino goes into a stupor. In the end it turns out Chino was playing along, and it was another of her “pranks”. Rize comments that Chino became just like Cocoa, perhaps recalling Cocoa’s breakdown in season 2 episode 10.

The bread festival is about to begin, and Chino still seems to be upset, even though Cocoa praises her (too late). Cocoa herself also seems to be unsure of her bread’s quality (especially compared to her sister).

For some reason, Sharo is in the mood for some coffee and orders Chino’s special blend. This causes everyone else to order it too. Maybe Sharo felt bad for Chino in the earlier scene and took one for the team?

Anyway, Chino’s coffee is very pretty and features a flower made from whipped cream (for which there’s an official tutorial how to make it). I guess this ties into the theme of BLOOM, however in the manga it was also a flower and it was probably written before the season 3 title was decided.

Sharo tastes Chino’s coffee and ends up in “paradise”. You might notice, with the field of flowers and flower wreaths it also fits into the BLOOM theme.

Seeing this reaction, Rin also decides to order coffee. Rize responds with “but you said you don’t like coffee”, but she never says this in anime. Unless it was supposed to be an off-screen conversation? Anyway, Rin also enjoys Chino’s coffee, and the “warmth” she put into it. Chino, who originally had a rather cold personality takes this praise to heart.

It turns out that there were many customers other than the regular characters (which doesn’t happen often in Rabbit House). Lots of children too, who seem to particularly like Chino as has been previously established. Chino shows them how to make latte art, promising to make a “fluffy rabbit” which might be a reference to the rabbit she draws in the ED of this episode.

Cocoa also has a self-reflection moment when she decides she doesn’t have to be like her sister because Chino looks up to Cocoa anyway. Cocoa explains that can’t distinguish Chino’s blends of coffee because they’re all similarly delicious to her. Considering she misidentifies one of Chino’s blends as instant coffee in the first episode there are reasons to doubt this confession. It works on Chino though who can hardly contain her happiness.

Despite all the praise heaped on her, Chino is still not sure if she’s changed. However as she comes out to take down the signboard, a lone rabbit approaches Chino and doesn’t run away.

Under the warm sunset colors, Chino gives a “warm” welcome to the rabbit, referencing the episode’s title (though it was just one rabbit, not a “fluffle” of them) and giving a conclusion to this arc. As I explained in the beginning, the rabbit is a symbol of Chino becoming more approachable over the past few episodes. She is also now seen as a grownup by those who are smaller than her, such as children and, well, rabbits.

So that was a “growth” episode of Gochiusa BLOOM, and the next episode (which is Halloween-themed) promises to be quite important as well.

Oh, and poor Rize’s pasta... Nobody seem to have ordered or even mentioned it. I’m sure it was delicious as well. Can we get a Rize appreciation episode please?

#gochiusa #gochuumon wa usagi desu ka?#is the order a rabbit?#review

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