As your typical shounen-series, we’ve now gotten to the point in which Lag is going to have to take the examinations of the Letter Bees. This isn’t bad at all. Although overused, even the best shounens as Hunter x Hunter used it, with a number of great results. As long as Lag grows beyond the crybaby that he currently is, there shouldn’t be that much of a problem.

In the meantime, we learn what’s going to set Lag apart from all of the other Letter Bees: he’s going to have a human Dingo. The creators just keep hinting at this, so something really weird is going to happen if this isn’t going to be the case. It’s really standard shounen stuff again: the lead character comes across a cute girl, he helps her and somehow she’s thankful enough to become his companion. Again, while this is definitely annoying, as long as the rest of the series makes up for it, I guess it’s a good enough for setting up the story. And really, I’ve seen many, many series who did this premise worse than what we saw in this episode.

What I found interesting in this episode was how we basically glaze over the past five years, and yet we know that Lag hasn’t been sitting still. While the camera was off,he studied hard to be accepted as a letter bee, and he even met a bunch of them, including the one who likes to eat, whose name turns out to be Connor. I like how the creators made it seem like Connor was going to be a dumb stereotype through the OP, yet he had an actual personality when he shows up.

Also, what is up with the names in this series? “Lag Seeing”? “Niche”? “Love Someone Down”? Ah well, I can imagine how this could be a stylistic choice. The only real complaint I have about this series is the following: based on the architecture, while people don’t live in luxury, they don’t seem to be that poor. Is Lag really the only one who felt sorry for her? Were there really no passers-by who felt sorry for her as well, and tried to help her out?
Rating: (Enjoyable)

Surprisingly… I found very little to rage about in this episode… Instead of that, I should congratulate Touya for finally getting himself an answering machine. Damn, if he had that thing, how different would the first season have looked?

However, the cast of characters still are a miserable bunch. The premise of it was about a new performance for Yuki, while Touya’s father collapsed again. To start with the first, Yayoi makes a bold move: for once, she invites Touya without the intention to kiss or screw him, but rather outright tells him to stop seeing Yuki for her own good. This seems to contradict her behavior up till now, in which she kept calling Touya more and more often…

Later, Eiji indeed reveals that he’s planning to star Yuki in some big event. However, the rule is that each production can only be allowed to submit one idol, so yeah: he pushes Rina aside for Yuki. In response to this, Rina declares that she’s going to start her own production, and move away from her brother. Rina indeed seems like the most stable member of the cast (okay, that’s not saying anything, really), but that also may have been because she’s the most mysterious at this point. We hardly ever know what she’s thinking, are we? Did she work with her brother for so long because it were his connections that allowed her to grow big in the first place, or is there something more to it? I mean, there has to be a reason why she’s the focus of the OP, hasn’t there?

Then there’s the matter of Touya’s father collapsed again. He seems to be fine according to Touya, but it’s gotten much harder on Misaki, who somehow ends up staying longer with him than Touya while Akira leaves prematurely. On top of that, Misaki later discovers that Touya was outright lying to her, and he’s in much worse shape than he said, even needing a pacemaker.

But yeah, one of the big complaints about the first season was simply the following: ANSWERING MACHINE! As it turns out, the creators didn’t forget this at all, Touya just didn’t have one. I wasn’t of course born in those days, but in a way I can imagine a poor student in those days, not being able to afford one. If I recall correctly, the first answering machine was marketed 3 years before. I don’t think that at that point, they were as common yet as ten years later.

And yet, even with the answering machine ready, the problems still aren’t as easily solved, like the end of this episode showed. That yelp of attention of his in the final scene can have a lot of different meanings: is he afraid that he’s going to lose Yuki? Does he finally feel remorse for his father? Or is he just lonely because he can’t see Yuki? Anyway, considering the things he’s done so far…
Rating: (Enjoyable)