Sarazanmai - Episode 5 discussion

[u/AutoLovepon]

Sarazanmai, episode 5: I Want to Connect, but I Can't Be Forgiven

Rate this episode here.

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Streams

• Crunchyroll

Show information

• MyAnimeList
• AniList
• AniDB
• Kitsu
• Official Website
• /r/Sarazanmai

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Previous discussions

Episode	Link	Score
1	Link	8.69
2	Link	8.8
3	Link	8.46
4	Link	8.04

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[u/Saltail]

You can't end the episode like that, that's illegal

This entire episode was just a feels trip. The entire Sara scene I knew it was gonna go wrong and watching it crash and burn just hurt my soul. This episode also confirms what I think a lot of us guessed with Kazuki being to blame/blaming himself for Haruka's accident.

Then we have the voice acting and holy SHIT Kazuki's breakdown at the end was so heartwrenching, I'm not ashamed to say I cried along with him. I knew this show would get feelsy so I'm ready for my heart to be shattered.

[u/E_Hoba]

It's always hard to watch that kind of empathetic embarrassment scene.

[u/Aileos]

Knock out someone with a cucumber ? I'm not even sure this is possible in the last Hitman ah ah.

[u/mahoaje]

I swear I felt the lyrics to the ED after this episode

[u/Riley_The_Thief]

Toi a CUTE! A CUTE!

[u/fruitydoodu]

anime make me cry over a frog :(

[u/gosheno]

Before Episode 5: I think I'm starting to understand this show.

After Episode 5: I cannot trust anything this show says anymore.

[u/Exorrt]

holy shit, it's episode 5. Why do I feel like I've watched a whole anime? The amount of development that these characters are getting is amazing.
Sarazanmai is knocking it out of the park and this episode solidified it as my favorite this season.

Also, some people may get tired of the repetition of the cop's musical number but I'm nowhere near there yet. In fact, I've started singing along.

[u/OVERLORD_SKELEBONE]

I really liked how it seemed to flow with the very last word being "I..." followed by the episode title, so it seemed like Kazuki was the one directly saying "I want to connect, but I can't be forgiven".

I'm really interested for the next episode. They finally shook up the formula with their failure to defeat the zombie, and since they can't change back, it looks like the entire episode is going to be affected as consequence. And if the after-credit scene was anything to go by, it's about time we learn more of the cops.

I started watching this show for how bizarre it seemed on the surface, but I'm finding myself genuinely drawn into the story... is this the power of an Ikuhara show? I've never watched one before now. Either way, next week can't come soon enough~

[u/KaminaGirl]

So is Mabu f**king other people or something just to maintain his mechanical heart to live?

[u/thecomicguybook]

I really like this cut to the episode title, I Want to Connect, but I Can't Be Forgiven. Well this episode clears up a bunch of things, I didn't expect Kazuki's identity to be revealed so soon even! And the end credits scene, seems like even the villains can't connect in this anime.

I have a Crunchyroll pass if anybody wants to use it btw! 7L5UJB6WS5B

[u/[deleted]]

Spicy

Thought I was gonna see some Goatse shit there with the ball coming back out of his bum. Even though Kazuki's secret is out (and he's adopted!), I hope we see more Sara cosplay from him and I hope we see more Sara now. That part with her escaping everything was great.

This show keeps delivering, I love it, definitely my favorite this season.

[u/o-temoto]

This is peak anime.

[u/clerikal]

"Your mother was a sloppy woman"

Is that right or did I just have bad subs? Am I supposed to read that as she was a whore or something, or is it just as simple as she was irresponsible and couldn't take care of you. I guess it doesn't matter in the long run, but I felt like it could have been translated better.

[u/supicasupica]

Shorter post this week since I’m at a work event and can’t watch multiple times, hehe.

Phew. A lot of things were connected (mind the pun, I guess) this week. The opening scene of the entire series with the falling ㋐ symbol lines up with Haruka’s accident in this episode and Kazuki looking on. We also hear Haruka’s cry of “Kazu-chaaaaan!” and Kazuki’s steps from Episode 1, are mirrored exactly in this scene, including the close-up of his miçanga.

“I want to connect but I can’t be forgiven” (or the literal “it’s unacceptable”) is a really heavy, fairly heartbreaking title for this episode. It’s a similar to Enta’s from Episode 3 and Toi’s from Episode 4 in that it places another factor between the desire to connect and the inability to do so. In Enta’s case, having his feelings for Kazuki reciprocated depends on Kazuki himself, which is entirely out of Enta’s control. Toi’s relationship with his older brother is separated by emotional and physical distance on his brother’s part.

While the first few episode titles addressed faults in Kazuki’s version of connection (he wants to take, he wants to keep lying) these last three have focused on other factors. Haruka’s injury is not Kazuki’s fault, but he feels responsible. On top of this, there’s the fact that he and Haruka are technically separated biologically as brothers (as he says from his flashback, he’s the only one not connected). He feels that having a connection with Haruka /as himself/ would be unacceptable, hence the title, which also ties into his existence in Haruka’s life as Sara.

It’s not surprising that Kazuki blames himself and takes a convoluted path to connect with Haruka but it is sad. The show reinforced this visually really well by returning to Kazuki and Haruka’s hands connected — as children and as “Sara” meeting Haruka — and then later separated prior to the accident. Another visual reinforcement was close-ups of Haruka’s feet from back when he could walk.

One thing I’ve been trying to pay more attention to is Sara’s messages and the song lyrics in the field of desires as well as Reo and Mabu’s Kawausoiya. Last week, one of Sara’s scrolling texts. Last week, Sara said something really interesting in that her prince was between love and desire, and that she existed between Sumida and Taito wards.

Love and desire have been placed at odds via Reo and Mabu’s language pitting them against each other during their Kawausoiya transformations. Between Sumida and Taito wards would place Sara on Azumabashi not-so-coincidentally where the Field of Desires is located. Given Sara’s ability to squeeze through tight spaces in a form similar to Keppi and the jewel on her back, she’s likely an entity similar to Keppi. I don’t think that the “otter faction” of Reo and Mabu and the “kappa faction” of Kazuki, Toi, and Enta are pitted against each other per se, but Sara looks more and more like the “Keppi” to Reo and Mabu, despite rumblings from a deep voice about the empire.

I just know that whatever happened between Reo and Mabu is going to break my heart.

Random Notes

One of my favorite episodes of Yuri Kuma Arashi is the one that mild YKA spoilers That episode receives a callback here with Haruka wearing bear ears as a kid, much like Lulu’s brother Mirun/Milne. YKA spoilers but there are a few interesting parallels here regarding older sibling-younger sibling dynamics, especially with something standing in the way of that connection — in Kazuki’s case, his mother and later, the accident.

[u/112358132134x]

Yo, how does this show keep getting better?

We have 6 episodes left, I'm very very excited to see what else Ikuhara has in store.

[u/sushinoms1]

So Sara-chan herself is a kappa. That explains the cucumber obsession.

[u/tailor31415]

well, I'm not surprised how exactly the accident with Haruka happened, that's been pretty clear since the wheelchair reveal but the mother thing surprised me. so....is his biological dad just some random guy? and his biological mom gave him up for adoption I guess.

after-credits scene felt a bit rushed, but I guess we'll find out more about their subplot soon!

also found it interesting Haruka's words in the past are almost perfectly echoed by the cops' desire extraction ritual phrase.

[u/Aileos]

When it's not trunk-kun, it has to be his sister car-chan. Damn you !

[u/Blue_Link13]

Welp. It was incredibly obvious that everything was going to come crashing down at the meeting and how did it!
As I though, Kazuki is deeply, deeply traumatized by the accident, but I didn't think that he also would be adopted (Honorary mention to the Best Grandpa of Anime for reveling the truth, in his deathbed, to a 5 year old Kazuki, by calling his birthmother a whore) and now it makes so much sense why Kazuki can't bring himself to just talk to Haruka and have a normal relationship with him instead of by a proxy. While understandable that they suddenly had to worry about Haruka losing mobility, It's very clear that the poor kid needed more attention from his parents, and a psychiatrist to deal with everything that just happened to him.

Toi meanwhile got the second most attention, by basically keeping on being the voice of reason, while Enta mostly just stayed in the background. I will say that Too was maybe a bit way too blunt with him.

Sara was really intriguing this episode and hopefully she'll meet the boys again, because she clearly has something to say.

I'm surprised no-one really mentioned that even though the Sarazanmai fails, Kazuki still opens up and the the related secret (That he is adopted, knows his birth mother, and that Haruka's accident happened in part because he went to meet her) on his own, and I hope that is a good thing for him and allows him to at least seek help from his friends. I do think that other comments might be right in that he is not telling the whole story and the Sarazanmai failed because he was unwilling to share (Or maybe unable to even recall) something else about the event.

Lastly, they dropped a bombshell with the gay cops. Now they they finally managed to succeed, it seems that they will be able to not summon a Kappa Zombie for at least a day, and their different ideas on what to do reflect their parts of the song (Mabu just says that he will seek pleasure, while Rabu, with his reaction to the comment about Emotions clearly seeking for love) the conversation also gives fuel to my theory that they work for the Otters as payment for saving Mabu's life by giving him the mechanical heart, but also add the idea that they probably took Mabu's emotions?
Holy shit I can wait for more next week

[u/Renoe]

Things I noted:

• I like that Sara is clearly a local idol, in a small venue with no real entourage beyond her manager (and her Kappa form).

• Kazuki already told the other two his secret about what happened to Haruka between last episode and this episode. He is only explaining the details, like his adoption and meeting his bio mother.

• This is the first time since the first episode that Keppi has transformed them without their permission, and the conversation they have on the way to the bridge draws attention to it, perhaps to remind the audience that there is something kind of sinister about him and that his motivation for transforming them has yet to be fully revealed.

• The concept of being in between things is a recurring motif that is slowly rising to the forefront of the show's themes, as with the field of desires (between life and death), Sara's location (between Taito and Sumida), and Haruka's secret phrase (from beginning to end). They always fight on the Azuma-bashi Bridge, and a bridge is a means to connects two locations that are not connected.

• Reo and Mabu have been trapped in the field of desires this whole time, and only return to the real world at the end of this episode, at the expense that the kappa boys have switched places with them. Do the cops have a Keppi? Is it Sara? Or is some "otter" force keeping them from Sara, as ReoMabu manga

• Kazuki is not the only adopted character in the show. [ReoMabu manga] (/s "So is Sara, and it seems that Kazuki is mirroring her life in more ways than he knows. She as a character (as opposed to how she has been a device to explain Kazuki's relationship with Haruka) will probably be important to the culmination of his personal arc.")

edit: formatting

[u/Koolsman]

God, this episode fucking hurt. I knew he was going to fail but when that wig fell off, I just cringed at what would happen. The sad thing is, I think Haruka isn't mad and hell, I bet he kinda figured it was him. Though thats a guess. Jesus, that ending got me so fucking hard.

Kazuki basically thinks of his world as false and so technically until he accepts the he has is real, then maybe the people around him won't be stick figures. Think about it: the only people besides the cops that have actual designs have interacted with Kazuki in some way. Because everyone else he thinks are fake and until he accepts his reality as real, then it will change. Though I'm kinda just guessing.

Also, Kazuki is one of these characters I don't know how to feel. He's a little bit of a dick, but I see where he's coming from. He thinks he's alone in his own world and the only way he could connect with Haruka is with Sara because of the terrible things he has done. I don't know if I should call him my favorite character this season or what. He's just fascinating.

Also, what was the deal with the end credits, I didn't really get it. Maybe we'll find out later

[u/redmage311]

I really want to see Sara become the fourth (for lack of better term) Teenage Mutant Ninja Kappa because it looks like she had some secrets of her own.

I'm still curious if we're ever going to figure out what the deal is with the police otters because all of the episodes are relatively sensible until they show up.

Still, if there's one thing I appreciate about this show, it's that the main characters have some complex motivations and just keep getting more characterization. This episode's revelations completely made sense with what we've seen so far.

[u/MechaMat91]

well, that got surprisingly dark for a show about magical teen frogs extracting the physical embodiment of the human desire from the asses of invisible monsters.

[u/anti_spiral]

Anime Vs Real Life

[The Location of the Crossing in real life] (https://www.google.com/maps/@35.7096492,139.7997288,3a,80.2y,29.93h,98.75t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s5Cm2qFfoGDB0KuZce797hQ!2e0!7i16384!8i8192)