In this episode of K-ON!! Azusa has another existential crisis. No, seriously. The whole episode is Azusa catching the others alone and trying to engage them in practice, as she feels she's been slacking off way too much. Little does she realize, she's been hopelessly corrupted by Mugi's "magic" cake (and possibly Mugi's womanly wiles. She seems entirely too fascinated by how cute Mugi is...
) As for Mugi, we learn that her notion of people who aren't insanely rich has been formed entirely by comic books.
Azusa tries to find comfort in enticing Mio to practice. Only Mio needs to change her bass strings first, and Azusa ends up thinking she's Mugi and almost goes off to prepare tea. Fortunately, she's saved by Ritsu's inability to use a sewing machine.
Azusa doesn't get an AzuRitsu moment, as Ritsu steals away to show that the tomboy has a feminine side after all. And what does she serve? Manly hamburger steak. We also learn that Ritsu's father's taste in underwear is almost as bad as Koizumi's taste in bathing suits. For those of you having flashbacks to Endless Eight, the bleach is over there.
Finally, she gets a moment with Yui. And Yui is still Yui. Surprisingly, this is the deepest part of the episode. They both bond over a strenuous aquarium scrubbing. And then Azusa has to teach Yui how to read real music, since (to preserve my sanity, I'm assuming that) all Yui can read are guitar tabs. It's Yui who gets to witness Azusa's near breakdown and existential crisis. Which is unfortunate for Azusa because Yui's reaction is "Eh, whatever. I'm me, you're you, Mio is Mio, Ritsu is Ritsu, and Mugi is Mugi," thus making her only slightly more helpful than Doctor Twinkletits. No, wait, she
is Doctor Twinkletits! Have you seen all the stickers that girl carries around?
This has the effect of completely breaking Azusa. Crushing her spirit under the shiftless, cake-scarfing, slackerdom that marks the attitude of the rest of the HTT girls towards life. In the end, we see a broken and brainwashed Azusa ask Jun what sort of cat-ears she'll be wearing with her costume. It's a tragedy. A comic tragedy. In ten years, Azusa will have quite the comedy standup act, drawing from her hatred of slacking off. It will be . . . Hatredy.
Eight
banana cat stickers of psychological validation out of ten.