What impressed me the most was how this episode actually made use out of earlier characterization and plot elements. This is just "standard good-writing", of course, but I do feel that a weakness for this anime has been the lack of appropriate "fallout" or "followup" on certain character and plot developments (to use a recent example, how we have yet to see any
real negative repercussions arising from the movie scam of three episodes ago).
So it was nice to see Hanasaku address that weakness by how it:
1. Remembered Nako's character development from the previous episode, and factored it seamlessly into this one.
2. Remembered the special older waitress outfits from a dozen or so episodes ago, and had them play a role here too.
Hanasaku is far from perfect in this regard, but at least not
all notable character and plot developments are just falling into the memory hole.
Another thing that I liked about this episode is that I think it struck the right balance for the characters of Ohana, Nako, and Yuina.
I actually felt that Nako came off a bit better in this episode than in the previous one, as here we see her, in my opinion, trying (and largely succeeding) to blend the best elements of her public persona and her private persona. So she is more confident when talking to people outside of her immediate family, but she's also still thoughtful of the feelings of others and genuinely sweet.
Ohana was entertainingly "sparkling" and "festing it up" as per her persona, but she also showed some keen self-awareness, and greater perceptiveness of the feelings of others, and so I get a sense that she's maturing a bit, which is good to see.
Yuina was simply loads of fun. I really enjoyed her in this episode.
However, as tends to be the case with the Hanasaku Iroha character episodes or arcs, the character that comes off the worse is actually the one that the arc is focused on.
While I appreciate Okada's attempt to interject some serious personality drama into this anime (so much so that I actually saw shades of
True Tears here), I fear that the price for that might be too high, as it frankly made Minko come off terribly, even perhaps regressing the excellent character development Minko had received in many recent episodes. This was a shame, too, since I felt that this episode was also hitting a good balance with Minko... until that final scene where she simply let loose verbally on the rest of her classmates.
During my high school years, I was a Student Council President. No matter what role you're put in, as a student, you don't make totally unilateral decisions like this. At least not when there are people working with you that are
strongly against those decisions, and you know that for a fact. Everybody involved in a large project like a cultural festival should have their feedback seriously considered, and the morale of the fellow students working with you is
not an unimportant matter. Intentionally pissing people off is a surefire way to downgrade the quality of whatever school event or function you're trying to pull off.
Plus, at the end of the day, it's just a school event. It's not like someone's job or career is riding on this. The main thing about these events is to adequately please your guests (if you have any) and
to create pleasant memories for yourself and your fellow students. Minko has totally lost sight of the latter, it seems.
So as somebody who does have some experience with this from my high school years, I have to disagree pretty strongly with how Minko is handling this.
Then there's the point that Roger Rambo rightly brought up: Minko's in no position to be faulting another girl for having her cultural festival motivations all tied up in a boy she likes. Frankly, the exact same is true of Minko herself.
Now, it's possible that this arc will resolve itself with Minko learning a valuable life lesson, and correcting herself (I'd love nothing more than to see that arise from Ohana confronting Minko shonen hero-style, actually
). If so, then this will all be worth it. But if not...
Now, on the topic of Ohana's dream... As silly as that may seem (and I can understand people disliking it), I actually think it conveys a very important point. I think that Ohana's dream represents how she wishes that she could go back to her and Ko just being good, close platonic friends again. I think Ohana truly misses that, more than she herself likely knows.
So Ohana's dream feminizes Ko, makes him a fellow waitress, and hence
destroys romantic/sexual tension in the process. Ko is made like Nako so that Ohana can go back to being close friends with Ko, all romantic pressure faded away.
It's an interesting route that Okada is taking with Ohana's relationship with Ko.
Anyway, for whatever reason, Hanasaku Iroha's school based-episodes tend to strike a chord with me. I'm looking forward to the next episode.
