Plot: Aoyama has been kinda flaky lately, so Moe and Miwa bring Ichigo to the school fortune teller, Mariko, to see what’s up. Mariko manages to quell her fears by telling her to trust Aoyama more and be honest about her feelings to him. She also ‘psychically’ sees that she and Aoyama are a great match for each other.
Ichigo meets up with Aoyama later that night, and he’s happy to see her. He apologizes to her for being so flaky and states that kendo club is eating up all of his time lately.
Later, everything’s going great for Ichigo and Aoyama, and she’s so happy about it that she seeks out Mariko to thank her. She finds Mariko at the soccer field and notices that she’s staring at a soccer player named Shunsuke. She quickly deduces that Mariko has a case of unrequited love for Shunsuke and believes him to be dating someone else.
Ichigo overhears Mariko giving Shunsuke some psychic advice to be honest with the feelings of his loved one and admit them to the girl at a park with a fountain on Sunday.
When Ichigo finally meets with Mariko to thank her, she admits that she was eavesdropping on her and Shunsuke’s conversation. Mariko doesn’t want to butt in and ruin Shunsuke’s love for another girl, so she wants to support his efforts and ensure his happiness, even if it breaks her heart.
That Sunday, Ichigo goes to the park and finds Shunsuke. She hides behind a tree and is surprised to find Mariko also hiding. Ichigo encourages Mariko to go be honest about her feelings, like she told her to be with Aoyama, but, Shunsuke being her childhood friend and love, she still doesn’t want to get in the way of his own love.
They’re about to watch Shunsuke meet his crush when Kisshu suddenly appears, demanding Mariko’s crystal ball. They’ve detected Mew Aqua within it and will not leave without it. Ichigo tells Mariko to run, but Kisshu pursues. Shunsuke sees Mariko in danger and jumps in the way of Kisshu’s soul-extracting ability.
He creates a Chimera Animal with Shunsuke’s spirit, creating a giant elephant monster, before nabbing the crystal ball.
Ichigo struggles with the Chimera Animal, and the other Mews show up to help by trying to get the ball away from Kisshu. Mariko also gets knocked out, but Ichigo’s too preoccupied with the Chimera Animal to help her. The Blue Knight rushes in to help Ichigo and gives her advice on how to defeat the creature.
Ichigo manages to take the chimera animal down, but the crystal ball breaks in the scuffle. The ball was merely ordinary crystal after all since Mew Aqua would never break like that.
Mariko and Shunsuke wake up, and as Mariko is about to leave Shunsuke to have his date in peace, he tells her to check her email. She sees that he tried to ask her on a date in the park at the fountain, but failed to get the message.
They confess to each other, after having a bit of a back and forth bicker, and the girls look on in content, happy their friend has found love.
Turns out, Mariko was faking at being a fortune teller anyway and quits after her ball is broken.
Breakdown:
– Yeah, bring Ichigo to a fortune teller to help understand why Aoyama’s being flaky instead of just telling her to ask him what’s up. Well, we needed a plot I suppose.
– Mariko: “Oh sorry. I scare people because I’m unfriendly.” Pbbbahahahahah!
– I like Mariko. She’s actually a pretty good advice giver under the guise of a fortune teller, and I like her personality. Although, is this problem really an issue of trust?
Aoyama’s being flaky and brushing off Ichigo, though not being that rude about it. She’s worried that he’s losing interest in her. That seems like a valid concern given the evidence. She trusts Aoyama. It’s not like she thinks he’s off with some other girl or is doing something bad – she just worries that Aoyama’s no longer emotionally involved.
To her credit, Mariko later tells Ichigo to be honest with him about her feelings, which is much better, but the trust thing still bothers me a little.
– Also, hi, budget episode. I see you’re giving everyone swollen cheeks today.
– Why did Shunsuke’s spirit become an elephant?…..Why did it yell “I’m an elephant!” when it arose?
– Yes, Ichigo, transform right in front of Mariko. Who cares about secret identities anyway?
– What is up with the falsely identifying Mew Aqua? It seems silly the types of things they’ll wrongly detect. Granted, the ball did glow a bit earlier, but that doesn’t really mean anything. Ichigo would’ve sensed it, had it been active enough to glow.
– Yay convenient amnesia! Is that officially a magical girl trope yet?
– This plot was already insanely predictable, but the reason the meeting happened without her knowing she was the girl he was trying to confess to was because she failed to check her email? Wow.
—————————–
I liked this episode because I found Mariko to be a very good character, in spite of being a flash-in-the-pan-we’ll-never-see-her-again character. I believe she had better chemistry with Ichigo and was more interesting than either Moe or Miwa. I’m sad to see her go…..but, that being said, like I mentioned already, this plot is very predictable.
Right when they set up her unrequited love and this nameless, voiceless potential love interest for Shunsuke, you know exactly what’s going on and what will happen. There are zero surprises. The other Mews seemed like an afterthought, yet again, the Blue Knight showed up for all of three seconds just to spout out the obvious trick to beating the Chimera Animal, and even the problem with Aoyama wasn’t very well-written.
Seriously, Aoyama, of all people, was seemingly sneaking around just because he was busy with kendo? He’d tell Ichigo that as soon as it became any sort of issue. She mentioned he canceled a date the previous weekend – he would’ve definitely told her then.
While the animation didn’t technically suffer, the art was terribad in this episode. Swollen cheeks, weird angular designs and warped faces weren’t that distracting but they were certainly noticeable.
These issues didn’t distract a great deal from an otherwise enjoyable episode, but there were still there.
Next episode, Ichigo’s dad finds out that she’s dating Aoyama and is livid about the situation. Will he stand in the way of their love?
If you enjoy my work and would like to help support my blog, please consider donating at my Ko-Fi page. Thank you! ♥
The Anime Madhouse 
Glad you liked this episode. I don’t remember the flaws you mentioned, likely because it’s been a really long time since I watched this episode.
Don’t worry; just one more Ichigo-focused episode and then we get a string of episodes focused on the other characters!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Additionally, this may be off-topic, but I noticed something about She-Ra looking masculine in your Twitter and how people shouldn’t criticize that. What’s going on?
Also, what’s wrong with people criticizing the way animated characters look? People do it when anime like Tokyo Mew Mew go off-model, though they’d probably never tell the girls, “You guys look like you got hit in the face with a truck,” if they were real.
I’m sure there’s a good reason for your opinion on She-Ra that I’m missing, especially since I don’t know who She-Ra is.
LikeLiked by 1 person
They’re coming out with a new animated She-Ra series (She-Ra was a spin-off of the old He-Man series from the 80s) and Twitter’s been active with people saying they dislike it because she looks ‘too masculine’ since she doesn’t have pronounced breasts and has broad shoulders and defined muscles.
It’s in a similar vein to people who complained about Korra’s design from the Legend of Korra because she dared to have defined biceps.
Basically, a bunch of dude-bros are defining femininity for women and are complaining that they can’t get aroused by this drawing of a teenage girl.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with people criticizing how characters are designed, as long as it’s based on logical arguments or even just preference for style. I do it all the time – anime is a huge source of it. Some designs are just not everyone’s cup of tea, and there are many designs that are just insane in regards to proportions. Like in the first streamed Sailor Moon Crystal where the girls are basically sticks and their eyes take up 60% of their skulls. Or in Zetsuai where they make the torsos a big block and the heads sharpened to weapon-grade points.
But it’s not that they’re criticizing the art style – honestly, I don’t much care for the art style itself for different reasons, though I am not making firm judgments since there isn’t much promo art out yet – it’s that people are complaining that she doesn’t look ‘girly’ enough or cute enough for their standards – that she looks too masculine.
My Tweet was about making those criticisms towards a real person. Many people are rightfully arguing that she doesn’t have to conform to their set definition of femininity, especially if it’s just for the sake of people getting aroused by her. I was requesting that these people imagine if we were discussing a live-action She-Ra and that this was a real girl. Would they feel like an ass for approaching her and telling her that she’s too flat and looks too masculine to fit their role suitably?
If they would, they’d hopefully come to the realization that they’re hypocrites for making those criticisms on one but not the other. Why would the cartoon be more deserving of such criticism if a real girl would not be? Just because they have the power to easily change those aspects in cartoons?
If they wouldn’t, then they’re just douchebags because, again, they’re forcing their views on femininity on someone. They’re telling someone they’re not suited for a female role despite the fact that they’re a girl just because they don’t have big boobs or narrow shoulders.
She is a female warrior in a skin-tight leotard with long flowy hair and a skirt, but they’re complaining that she actually has the muscular and bone structure to fit such a character and doesn’t have a big rack on display.
She is well-designed objectively. She’s obviously got some cartoony elements, but overall she looks pretty realistic in regards to anatomy and proportions. I don’t much care for the style because it looks flat (not in that way) the colors are a little drab and there’s a complete lack of shading.
In fact, I’d even say her original design is less realistic because it’s so Barbie-esque.
These people aren’t bothered by that design, though, because it fits their views on femininity and she has her cleavage in plain view.
I’m not irritated as a fan of the series, because, honestly, I’ve barely seen much of it. I caught some of it on late night TV after GI Joe when I was a kid, but I never got into it. I was never really into He-Man either. But when people start complaining because character designs don’t look attractive enough to them or that they’re not fitting their views of a woman (or man for that matter) and feel that’s a legitimate criticism of their design, it starts to bug me.
Sorry for the text wall lol
LikeLike
A woman with *GYAAAAASP* realistic body proportions!!?? Oh, the humanity!!
/sarcasm
LikeLiked by 1 person