Review:
For a show where little happens from a plot point of view, they manage to keep the audience guessing anyway. After Rei lost his match I assumed that was the end of us watching the tournament, maybe the characters would discuss who won later. However, March once again proves that it is committed to the world they are building and not just Rei’s character by having the matches between Gotou and Shimada take up a fair portion of the episode. Admittedly, we don’t spend a lot of time at the board with them but rather we see the match through the other players who are observing and discussing the match.
Kyouko also returns early in the episode and we continue to see what her relationship with Rei is and what her relationship with Gotou is actually like. It’s interesting that Kyouko is being set up as a tragic figure who genuinely doesn’t seem to want the pity of others and yet she is so incredibly pitiful (although she’s also nasty and manipulative). Rei’s descriptions of her early in the episode and the accompanying visuals are striking and really make you consider what we know about her character.
Of course, we also have the sisters and their grandfather who are worrying about Rei because he hasn’t been to see them since before his match and we also get a lot of school stuff because Rei is really on the edge of having to repeat a year. It’s an episode that is just packed with moments and each one is essential to the ongoing drama and they are all connected but its a lot to take in and yet at the same time very little actually progresses this episode.
March Comes in Like a Lion is available on Crunchyroll.
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Thanks,
Karandi James.
Great review! I really need to get round to watching this anime 😂
oo This anime is still going. Good, I plan to check it out very soon.
Stop
I really can’t get myself to like Kyouko. While the episode did made me reconsider what I know about her, it doesn’t change the fact she is nasty. It makes sense though, nasty people are more often than not, pitiful. Maybe it’s because I’m not a forgiving person, and to me it doesn’t matter what someone’s went through, that doesn’t give them the right to inflict pain upon others.
The episode also made me wonder if Kyouko is actually like that- broken, not entirely a bad person- or if that is how Rei saw her. Projecting his own guilt her and making her better than she actually is.
Yeah, I don’t like Kyokou either because she is one nasty person. That doesn’t stop me feeling that she is fairly pitiful.
Still, it is a good question about what Kyokou is actually like if we were to see her without Rei’s filter over the top of things. Of course, we could apply that same question to the sisters because Rei clearly lifts them up in his own mind.