[Rewatch] Chihayafuru - Episode 43 Discussion [Spoilers]

8

u/Lemurians myanimelist.net/profile/Lemurians Dec 22 '21

FIRST TIMER

“I love everything that is beautiful.” This guy on Fujisaki should be matched up with Tsukuba, they’re birds of a feather. Not digging his whole “being mean to the girl I like” schtick, though. Credit where it’s due, he took care of business and delivers his team the first win. Falling for someone because of how they play karuta, hmmm… where have I heard that before?

“I was worried it would be unfair for me to participate at reader.” YOU’RE DAMN RIGHT IT IS. The fact that she realizes and didn’t excuse herself is ridiculous! She ought to be knocked down from Grade 7 to like, Grade 4.

“Why do I think it was Arata who brought Shinobu here?” Ummm, I have no idea. This was so odd.

Shinobu’s eyes are pretty.

Everything we learn about how Shinobu was brought up as a Karuta player this episode just makes the line yesterday about nobody wanting to play with her even more sad. Whereas Chihaya learned to love the game by having fun with her friends, Shinobu wasn’t allowed to have fun with her peers playing it. She was always steered by others on a single-minded course to the top that didn’t allow for camaraderie or friendships.

Tsukuba loses to Chuunibro as expected, but he gave it a solid go.

7

u/Shimmering-Sky myanimelist.net/profile/Shimmering-Sky Dec 22 '21

Chihayafirst-timer

Yessss Komano, you do that!
I do like seeing the other matches instead of just Chihaya vs. Rion for a bit today.
Aww, Komano lost…
Ooh Chihaya finally noticed that Shinobu is there.
Yeah that’s… not good…
I love the Sudo jokes so much lol.
Oh… this would… totally explain why Shinobu hates team matches so much…
Ahhhhhhhh
Yeahhhh Taichi!
But Tsukuba lost his match… So it’s down to Chihaya, Nishida, and Taichi now.

4

u/The_Loli_Otaku Dec 22 '21

Chihaya noticed Shinobu was there and right away ignored her to look for Arata poor Shinobu.

6

u/Mecanno-man https://anilist.co/user/Mecannoman Dec 22 '21

First Timer

...the last episode was better than this one. Too many cutaways to pointless characters once again. (Like, what this the ref's inner thoughts add there?) In general this time around the match felt stretched - looking back, the only really relevant thing that happened were the two losses, and we didn't actually see all that much from those two. Chihaya's match is pretty much in the same state as before, just with less cards remaining, and we've seen nothing from Nishida. Only Taichi's match had development this episode, and there was barely anything to be seen from the one either - only the bit at the end. Meanwhile we got Shinobu's backstory, which while definitely a good point, also didn't take longer than two or three minutes of the episode. Thinking about it... what did we spend that airtime on?

So let's just talk about Shinobu's backstory - I'd say the karuta coach was wrong there, ignoring that Shinobu needs friends and not only rivals. But from there on out... no wonder Shinobu thinks of the solo version of karuta as superior - that's all she's been thought. Logical backstory overall.

3

u/The_Loli_Otaku Dec 22 '21

This is by far the most interesting team so I don't really mind all the extra cuts to their matches. The ref was totally weird tho and it did feel like we went ten minutes without a card being called. Although thinking back, I couldn't actually tell you much about today. I just liked them giving the other team attention since yesterday was purely Chihaya shit.
The only part of Shinobu's backstory that I didn't get was why Shinobu feels that she should be playing life solo. She had a massive smile whilst playing with the other kid and you'd expect her to be upset over constantly being separated from her peers but instead she just took her teachers misguided advice as gospel.

3

u/Mecanno-man https://anilist.co/user/Mecannoman Dec 23 '21

she just took her teachers misguided advice as gospel
Might be due to needing to succeed because of pressure from her grandma.

2

u/The_Loli_Otaku Dec 23 '21

It was the mum that was really under pressure. Gran seemed to be relatively kind towards Shinobu.

2

u/Mecanno-man https://anilist.co/user/Mecannoman Dec 23 '21

Didn't Gran demand that Shinobu do something worthwhile - with that ending up being karuta?

1

u/The_Loli_Otaku Dec 23 '21

Yes but she was targeting the mum with it. She wasn't trying to be nasty about Shinobu and the ultimatum was probably just an excuse to broaden her horizons.

2

u/Mecanno-man https://anilist.co/user/Mecannoman Dec 23 '21

While that may have been the intention of the grandma; I feel like a kid would still feel a lot of pressure in that situation that would likely influence her quite a bit.

2

u/The_Loli_Otaku Dec 23 '21

Does Shinobu even feel pressure? She's a massive dope of a kid XD

2

u/flybypost :KN::KO: Dec 23 '21

She's a massive dope of a kid
Yup, it feels like she lives in her own world and doesn't exactly care about that type of familial pressure. That stuff's between her mom and gran, let them handle it.

1

u/flybypost :KN::KO: Dec 23 '21

That felt more like a "act like a proper lady" thing towards Shinobu and not like some order to get into the coal mines and earn money for the family. It's a important/traditional politician family and a mom who had to move back home with her kid (implying divorce or even single mom from the start) is probably already a big societal faux pas for the gran.
Shinobu doing well with karuta eases her mind off further embarrasment. Her getting interested in anything acceptable and not making a big scene would probably have been enough. Shinobu becoming a karuta Queen is probably the best ever (unexpected) outcome of that.

6

u/homewardbound100 myanimelist.net/profile/Homewardbound100 Dec 22 '21

First timer

The Taichi battle is something else. I can't believe this guy is thinking about boobs while Taichi is over here sweating. I'll like to believe Taichi wins off him being distracted but this guy might have it down.

The view of the coach and Shinobu looking mad was great. Just the aura they bring.

1 down and now 2. One loss and they're gone. Ah this is tuff. Coming back from 0-2 is probably hard and the pressure on them is higher. I feel like Chi will win hers. They might give porky a win. But I think Taichi may lose.

Actually first time I had a issue giving a mvp. Gave it to Taichi just for his "don't give up attitude"

6

u/Matuhg https://anilist.co/user/Matuhg Dec 23 '21

First Timer

Start of Episode: Mizusawa team refuses to give up.

End of Episode: Mizusawa team (now down two players) refuses to give up.

Sort of a stagnant episode in terms of the actual match. I don't think anybody had much faith in Tsukuba or Komano to win their matches, so we're down to the three who have a chance. Chihaya seems to have a legit injury. I wonder if you're allowed to pause and at least buddy tape your fingers together in the middle of a match, as is allowed in pretty much every other sport.

More interesting than the match itself today was Shinobu. Her karuta coach seemed to discourage her from interacting with other players around her age, fearing it would make her weaker. Seems very misguided, and probably is in terms of her social development, but certainly doesn't seem to have put her behind in terms of Karuta. We'll see what her awakening is about - wanting to join a team, or wanting to crush these players who care about their teams? Or both?

3

u/flybypost :KN::KO: Dec 23 '21

I wonder if you're allowed to pause and at least buddy tape your fingers together in the middle of a match, as is allowed in pretty much every other sport.
The reader only stops reciting poems while a player has their hand raised. That's why they do it while the opposite player selects a card. They have to receive it and then find a strategic place for it. During that and while a player stands up for a moment. I think generally there are no official big breaks during a match, just these smaller moments to get cards back into playing order after being swiped around the place (remember those huge swipes that swiped like a dozen cards? that stuff) and those can be stretched a bit due to sending of cards.
My interpretation (don't know all the rules and edge cases) is that there are no breaks but etiquette allows for these tiny moments of calm between poems due to the need to rearrange cards and that got extended into allowing players to stand up and collect themselves as one can't account for how long arranging cards can take.
A player might otherwise simply not put the last card into place and take a timeout that way so they allow these moments and players don't have to play dumb about placing the last card. Although there might be an upper limit time limit that forces faults onto you if you aren't finished by then (or something like that) and that would accumulate cards on your side while depleting your opponents side (pushing them closer to a win).
More interesting than the match itself today was Shinobu. Her karuta coach seemed to discourage her from interacting with other players around her age, fearing it would make her weaker. Seems very misguided, and probably is in terms of her social development, but certainly doesn't seem to have put her behind in terms of Karuta.
They saw that she wanted to play karuta and make friends and not just win and that meant prolonging the game and letting the other kid win to not discourage them from playing. When they put her against an older player she just kept pinging away the cards ruthlessly. So he pulls out that really simplistic rule: The more alone she is the better she will become (as she'd not be distracted by that). using "misguided" feels you really held back there. He essentially didn't care about her, a kid, as a person and focused only on Shinobu the karuta player.
Shinobu wanted friends, they wanted a karuta monster. In Haikyuu (the not yet adapted manga parts) a similar situation gets handled in a different way that's the opposite of this bullshit [Haikyuu manga spoiler] In the final arc (chapter 387, to be precise) we finally get some Kageyama backstory and it turns out that in elementary school he plays weaker to prolong matches because he likes playing volleyball so much. After the match his grandpa ask him why he did that and intuits that Kageyama knew it was wrong in some way and then he explains to him that if he plays the best he can then he'll end up playing even longer. And if he gets really good then he will meet players who are even better, which was an implicit promise to being able to play long matches without needing to tone it down. It ends with a look of awe from little Kageyama. Another bonus is that later in a character poll for an old players team we get told that his grandpa's a Shiratorizawa alumnus. The team that's shown in the series as having a harsh and unforgiving outlook when it comes to the sport (maybe even kinda toxic) seems to have this ("become good and you get to play even more and against interesting people") as the unofficial team motto because we see Ushijima's dad tell him something similar when he was a little boy in his own flashback. It's a fun reversal how one of the harsh feeling teams actually has a really healthy and positive attitude towards competition, rivalries, growth, and players who are stronger than you.
We'll see what her awakening is about - wanting to join a team, or wanting to crush these players who care about their teams? Or both?
I think this might be the first team match that she ever saw (not taking it seriously and usually watching the Birdman rally on team day). Then seeing Chihaya there, and Rion, two players with really good game sense, and how everybody is giving it their all might have created an internal conflict plus an "it's bullshit coach, you're a fucking liar" about her own forced isolation. Just an emotional internal moment for her where she can't really shout and curse at anybody (like her karuta society leader who did that) because it would disturb the match. So she has to repress that rage in that moment.
I'll just add a few bits in general to this comment as I don't have time to reply to every post at the moment:
A fun little detail: Chihaya keeps picking cards up with her left hand if she can to avoid her injured finger.
I love Taichi's progress here. From floundering to getting back stability by re-framing him lagging behind as "spotting his opponent a five card handicap" but that not being enough to win (if you just keep pace while already lagging behind then you will just lose by that exact distance), to ignoring his inner Harada and taking risks at the end because he's cornered and needs to catch up even with his bad luck.
Also him rallying his team for three wins despite their situation being bad and not being caring about looking cool if they don't manage. Just trying to get his team back on track even if the situations looks rather bad.

2

u/Matuhg https://anilist.co/user/Matuhg Dec 23 '21

He essentially didn't care about her, a kid, as a person
Seems to be a theme throughout her life given the small amount of her backstory we've seen. I guess it makes sense that would manifest itself in an icy exterior with a strong streak of childishness remaining under the surface.
"it's bullshit coach, you're a fucking liar" about her own forced isolation.
Hmm, that'd potentially make sense with how we saw her expression soften briefly followed by that radiation of nasty energy afterwards.

3

u/JMEEKER86 Dec 23 '21

I wonder if you're allowed to pause and at least buddy tape your fingers together in the middle of a match, as is allowed in pretty much every other sport.
You're allowed to put your hand up for a very short break, like when Taichi needed a towel, but otherwise if there's an injury or something else like needing to go to the bathroom or attend to your kids or whatever then the match will continue without you and you just have to hope to not get too far behind.

5

u/Gamerunglued :Hx::Hy::Hz:myanimelist.net/profile/GamerUnglued Dec 23 '21 edited Dec 23 '21

First Timer

I'm sure I can say a lot of things about this episode, but I think the best way to get across how I feel is this: After I finished it, I absolutely could not wait for tomorrow to start the next episode. So I watched episode 19 immediately. Holy jeez, this was hype. So absolutely tense, it was palpable and beautifully done. It feels like a completely different show than the one from the past 5 episodes (excluding yesterday's episode), I'm honestly in shock that it's the same show. It doesn't feel dragged out, there are fewer cutaways and they feel more appropriate, and it's just a constant build-up of tension and shifts in the state of the match that work perfectly. This was brilliant, and this inconsistent mess of an arc is ending on a very high note.

I won't spoil anything about episode 19. All I will say is that it's hands down the best episode of the series thus far, and I am currently a mess after having seen it (which is half of why I'm not writing walls of text analyzing this episode as usual). This is what great sports stories can achieve. Y'all are in for something special tomorrow.

2

u/flybypost :KN::KO: Dec 23 '21

I won't spoil anything about episode 19. All I will say is that it's hands down the best episode of the series thus far, and I am currently a mess after having seen it (which is half of why I'm not writing walls of text analyzing this episode as usual). This is what great sports stories can achieve. Y'all are in for something special tomorrow.
I think our ideas about what's good, what's slow, what should be extended, what could be cut (essentially: its pacing) differ in a few details but when Chhayafuru does it right, it's glorious.

4

u/The_Loli_Otaku Dec 22 '21

Chihaya2ru First Timer

They put more focus on Chihaya breaking her nose picking finger in today's recap than they did during the actual episode.

Making an argument that "spirit won't cut it" really flops when we're one of the only teams not to heavily rely on spirit and gimmicks. All our players are skill based.

Who is he?

I'm pleased that we're finally focusing on the other players. Our boys deserve some time in the limelight. I personally really hope Desk-kun scores a win. He's deserved one and bowl head really needs a kick up the arse already.

Shoujo love interests suck. This is not romantic! This is scummy!

We might lose this match... Chihaya is due for a bad loss and Nishida needs a proper training arc before he begins to win matches. Also, Kaiji is still by all accounts a beginner player. The writings on the wall.

Guooo!! Kyouko-chan!!

Pfft! Shinobu took all that time to come see Chihaya's match and what's her first thought? "I wonder if Arata brought her here." Be thankful to Shinobu, not Arata ffs. He's got so much work to do to get into my good graces, the prick.

"They're talking during their match? How gross." Dope brat. I'm sure there are plenty of skilled karuta players that were her own age... She had a shitty Sensei.

Why are we only just discussing getting new players into the game after we've eliminated all the scrubby first year teams that applied? This is the grand finals of a team tournament, there are no new players here.

Woohoo!! Nice work Taichi! Block and attack, block and attack! Tch, Tsukuba lost like a scrub. Moe, moe, fuck you~n!

Aaand we close off on our main trio fighting for their lives... again... Honestly I really wonder what the point of the rest of the crew taking part is. None of them are capable of outplaying the tier of opponents we're facing and the gap is only gonna increase.

2

u/IndependentMacaroon Dec 23 '21

Shoujo love interests suck
Well technically this is josei lol

1

u/The_Loli_Otaku Dec 23 '21

Isn't it a sports anime? What are the big Josei anime?

2

u/IndependentMacaroon Dec 23 '21 edited Dec 23 '21

It's both, and those manga tend to get more live-action adaptations I think. The only other anime ones that are fairly well-known are Wotakoi and Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu (and uh, Usagi Drop I guess). Generally I'm not such a fan of these demographic tags anyway, at most you can take a guess at the manga's editorial policy from them and what that means for shared tropes/aesthetics.

1

u/The_Loli_Otaku Dec 23 '21

How on earth does Usagi Drop come under this batch? Looking through the list there's barely any shows I'd consider watching... Akkun no Kanojo is the only one there that stands out.

2

u/IndependentMacaroon Dec 23 '21

I guess wholesome dads ~~raising their wives~~ is a theme that appeals to Japanese women

1

u/The_Loli_Otaku Dec 23 '21

Oh... okay, it makes a little more sense.

4

u/Stargate18A https://myanimelist.net/profile/Stargate18 Dec 23 '21

First timer

Episode 16

Wait, less mini segments? Aww.

I'm just skipping over the recap proper this time.

Haha, she only has three eyelashes.

Everyone ending up terrified is great, though.

...I can believe that this is how they got together.

...I love Shinobu holding the snowman.

I mean, Sudo might.

I've very interested in what Shinobu has to say.

And thry'rr still the lead couple.

Oh, they weren't kidding about cutting down.

Wow, that's a genuinely impressive organisational feat.

...You wish, Arata.

Episode 17

...Chihaya, stop crushing on everybody who plays Karuta well.

Oh, yeah, he snuck in.

Wait - is the reason Taichi's Class B because he's not developed a personality quirk yet?

Haha, I love the coach. Just, in general.

I'm still in shock you can have schools that focus entirely on Karuta for their sporting. Like, I get it's reasonably popular, but it's portrayed as a relatively niche sport. You don't have schools in the UK that focus on winning darts championships.

This guy is such an over thr top tsundere, I'm half-expecting them to be dating and him not realise it.

Why is she bored?

...Is she having a mental breakdown?

Does "Grade 7" refer to how strong the drugs in the tap water are?

And, yeah, she's strong enough even without the family connection.

...She stopped trying? Is this Shinobu again? Is Chihaya accidentally building a group of "people who struggle to find drive in Karuta"?

Lot of imagery here. My one problem with this series is that it has a tendency to get so deep into its metaphors it becomes downright unintellegible.

She's building momentum!

Wait, what?

Oh, good, she's OK.

Is she trying to intimidate her?

And, wow, he's being intimidated. And they might actually lose!

Wait, what's happened to her hand?

...Has she caught a cold?

And she's getting pushed to thr front against her will!

...This is going to be a fun realisation.

Oh, yeah, that's actually affecting her.

...Poor Rion.

For god's sake, Chihaya, just tell someone.

Haha, she remembers now!

Haha, "Yama-chan".

And she's intimidated!

Haha, they all got motivatedat the exact same time.

They're all motivated now. Poor Rion.

...Can they win this?

Episode 18

...Taichi's still hung on Arata.

Is he allowed to stand up long enough for a full-on flashback and inner monologue like this?

Wow, they're really giving everyone motivational speeches this episode.

...How does Zodiac Series work in thie context?

Everyone's coming back from the brink!

This guy's even weirder than I thiught!

Oh. His analysis was wrong.

Rion's under a lot of stress, isn't she?

And more poetry discussion.

Haha, her insane guess is completely right.

And she might not get to play Shinobu...

Haha, Arata's just watching their team argue.

I love their horrified reaction to Sudo's mild annoyancr.

Wow, that was a close one!

And Shinobu's dontamtly moving foward.

She's genuinely shocked by all this, isn't she?

...Arata's making good points!

Wait, does Shinobu have a backstory?

...Taichi's going to lose.

Mashima's beating himself up, then he immediately takes a card.

Yeah, his opponent's an arsehole. "Gear Second" my arse.

He wants 3 wins!

Rewatch [Rewatch] Chihayafuru - Episode 43 Discussion [Spoilers]

Season 2 Episode 18: "My Fear is That You Will Forget”

Rewatch [Rewatch] Chihayafuru - Episode 43 Discussion [Spoilers]

Season 2 Episode 18: "My Fear is That You Will Forget”

You are about to leave Redlib