[Kaoru Chujo]

Episode two solidified my enjoyment of this series. It may not have a lot of action -- or even any action, this time around -- but it is full of the insides of people, their feelings, relationships, and possible intentions. We knew even before the show started that Masa would find himself joining, but how he and everyone else feels about that is what's interesting.

I liked how Mochizuki concentrated on Masa and Yaichi in the first episode, just showing us some other characters, then gave us more of those other characters in episode two: Ume, his daughter, Otake -- and introduced Matsu and the farmer and the courtesans. Maybe we'll get to know them better soon.

Whether the gang is complete already depends on whether they consider the guy in the countryside an actual member. I'm not sure he does.

The thing I probably like best about this show is hard to define: mood? feeling? There is some feeling running through it that gives it aesthetic unity. The music, the pacing of the movements and dialogue, the backgrounds, the lighting. Even the OP, using a different idiom as it does, helps set the feeling, for me.

Great OP, by the way. And great background music, well used.