Chihayafuru Episode 2--Kids are Jerks

We're still in flashback mode, but just because the characters are in grade school doesn't mean that this show can't bring the drama.




We're only two episodes in, and I'm already completely caught up in this show. So, continuing the flashback that started last week, Chihaya's classmates continue to act like snobs until she claims that Arata could beat any of them at karuta. Tachi challenges him to a match during the upcoming karuta tournament with the condition that if Arata loses, the rest of the kids can continue to ignore him. Thus commences a surprisingly tense tournament episode, if you take the elementary school setting into account. But despite that, as already mentioned, the social ramifications are high. The tournament is Arata's chance to show the rest of the class that their judgements are completely unfounded--not to mention mean--and change their minds about him. Not that he really seems to care about that in this episode, since he seems happy enough just to have Chihaya stand up for him, and his participation in the tournament is far more about taking another step towards his dream of becoming the best karuta player than it is about rubbing his win in his classmate's faces (although I certainly wanted to see that).




Last week, I mentioned the love triangle that was starting to form around Chihaya, Arata and Tachi, and that is still going on in this episode, particularly in Tachi's actions. However, this episode adds more to the story than leaving it at simple jealousy towards Arata. Their classmates mention that he'll do anything to win, and he stoops to cheating by stealing Arata's glasses and switching the cards (random nitpick: the teacher knew right away that Arata had the wrong card but didn't notice that Tachi switched the order?) The reason why he's so desperate becomes apparent later: Tachi's mom is present at the tournament, filming the entire thing but when he ends up losing, she tells him that they can't show the tape to his dad and to "only focus on contests you can win." What a horrible thing to say to your kid. So he shouldn't try to better himself? Anyway, its clear that lack of understanding is going to keep coming back in this show, since Chihaya's sister reacts to her win by saying that karuta is boring and lame. I'm actually really curious to see how far her sister got with her "dream" once the show switches back to high school. Anyway, the way that this show portrays the love of a game is amazing. Usually the only time I get this worked up over an episode is during a finale, but this show managed to pull it off in the second episode. I think I already have my favorite show of the season.

Added bonus: Check out this awesome post at Baka Laureate, which goes into more detail about the great exchanges that happened in this episode!

Images from Crunchyroll.com.