「貴方の頭上に光が輝くでしょう」 (Anata no Zujou ni Hikari ga Kagayaku Deshou)
“A Light Probably Shines Over Your Head”

After getting a request to volunteer for the town festival, Shinkurou finds himself participating in a musical play, thanks to Tamaki and Yamie. Flaunting her supposed experience, Yamie says that she’ll probably steal the lead role since she used to be in a children’s choir, much to the surprise of the other two. At school, Ginko doesn’t recall the Marutomi Park festival ever having a play, but Shinkurou invites her to come take a look anyway. Shinkurou also mentions that Yamie will be singing.

Back in his room, Shinkurou along with Murasaki, Tamaki, and Yamie are going over the script and picking roles. The conversation then shifts to whether Yamie has more colourful clothing, but as soon as she starts talking about her mourning dress, Shinkurou quickly cuts her off saying the discussion is over. As for Murasaki, Shinkurou says she needs a role that won’t stand out too much, which leads to him calling Benika just to confirm whether or not she’s even allowed to participate. Yayoi cuts in on his phone call saying it’s dangerous, but after Shinkurou says it would make good memories for Murasaki, Benika gives the OK.

Later on, the four of them are rehearsing and find someone terribly out of tune, so they decide to take turns singing to see what’s wrong. Yamie turns out to be the root of the problem and Murasaki puts it bluntly by saying she sucks. Yamie takes offense and decides to quit, but Shinkurou suggests that the two of them practice alone, which causes Tamaki to laugh hysterically at their “supplementary lessons”. With them gone, Tamaki finds out that Murasaki’s mother taught her how to sing, so she tells her to invite her mother to the play. When Murasaki says that’s impossible, Tamaki questions as to why, but Murasaki changes the subject.

Outside in the hallway, Shinkurou finds it strange that Yamie sings so poorly when she used to be in a choir, but it all becomes clear when Yamie explains that she only played with her neighbourhood friend Jun-chan, who was in a choir. As for herself, Yamie says she wouldn’t waste her time joining a choir and starts going off on a tangent in her conversation, which frustrates Shinkurou to no end, so he decides to find someone else to take her role’s place. Out of desperation, he begs Yuuno to come help sing, which she agrees to.

Yuuno arrives and they start practicing again, but the others quickly find out that she’s even worse than Yamie. Yamie starts laughing sadistically at this point, saying that she’s better than that, while Shinkurou and Tamaki think about the grave they dug themselves into. Yuuno wonders what’s wrong so Murasaki tells her she sucks as well. Shinkurou however tells Yuuno that it’s just a difficult part of the song, to which Yamie comments on how differently she got treated for singing poorly. As things continue down the path of ruin, Shinkurou kicks everyone out of his room so he can help Yuuno improve her singing skills.

Outside, Yamie sees Yayoi spying on them and after finding out she’s not busy, asks her if she can sing. Yayoi boasts that her highest score at karaoke is 95, so Yamie pesters her to demonstrate. Yamie then shows her lack of skill, so she asks Yayoi to teach her. As they practice, Yayoi points out that there are problems with Yamie’s facial expressions too, let alone her singing ability. This causes Yamie to go off on a tangent about how she forgot how to smile, so Yayoi cuts her off just as Shinkurou did earlier. When Yayoi comments on her clothes, Yamie starts the same spiel again, but Yayoi surprises her by saying she knows the story about her clothes and the journalist.

Meanwhile, Tamaki and Murasaki are eavesdropping on Shinkurou and Yuuno, while discussing the differences between a man’s love and a woman’s love. The two of them think about how the current situation will get nowhere, so they decide to reassign roles amongst themselves. Inside Shinkurou’s room, he is literally being sung to death, so he tries to perform a duet with Yuuno to overcome this “obstacle”. Sometime later, Murasaki comes crashing through the door and the full-length musical begins. Having drastically improved sometime between then and now, their performance is shown to the committee members who approve, but then Shinkurou and the others put on a play with English names, which confuses them (…and me alike o_O).

During this time, Benika is trying to call Yayoi, who’s not picking up because she’s busy acting, so she rushes over to Shinkurou’s place. At the same time, Ginko has headed to the park, only to find out there’s no festival, so she rushes over to Shinkurou’s place as well. There, she runs into Benika and finds out that this was all setup by her, since this year’s festival is supposed to feature comedians. The two of them head inside and break the news to the others, who are all in dismay except for Yuuno, who is happy she got to be so close to Shinkurou. The others then start acting spontaneously, while Shinkurou is exhausted and wants to sleep.

 

Next Episode:
「女」 (Onna)
“Women”

Wow, this episode was nothing like I expected it would be considering the preview from last time, but boy was it ever epic. I couldn’t help but laugh through most of it, because the comedy was just so witty and well scripted. Even right from the get-go, Shinkurou was joking about whether the other tenants in his building could be categorized as girls or not. (“Are they girls…? Are they not girls…?”) With that said, this is undoubtedly my favorite episode of kurenai thus far, even though it’s more of a side story than anything else.

First off, the singing. Yamie and Yuuno’s singing was so horrid to the point where it was ridiculously hilarious. The scene where Shinkurou and the others found out that Yamie can’t sing a proper tune if her life depended on it was pretty funny to begin with, but revealing that Yuuno was much worse shortly after was such a perfect setup. Keep in mind that Yuuno is played by Shintani Ryouko though, who actually sings the ED song for kurenai. Given that, we know Ryouko can sing, but she does a darn good job pretending that she can’t. The inconsistent pitch, tone, vibration, etc. was everything you could imagine from a person who is terribly bad at singing, but thinks that they’re good. When you run into those people in real life and want to spare their feelings, you’re pretty much thrown into the situation Shinkurou was in. It’s awkward, uncomfortable, and most of all painful, but I’m not in his shoes this time, so I’m free to laugh all I want about it, which is what makes it so great to watch. XD

The honest and direct Murasaki never fails to amuse either, as watching her tell Yamie and Yuuno that they suck was pure gold. While it was pretty humorous watching Shinkurou try and restrain Murasaki to prevent her from telling Yamie what she felt about her singing, it was probably just as funny watching Yuuno quickly stare down Murasaki and freak her out so that she’d think twice before saying anyone sucks. Since we already know Murasaki’s scared of Yuuno, her initial reaction and subsequent pancking was absolutely priceless. Yamie on the other hand was pretty amusing to listen to as she talked about her clothes, but was cut off on two separate occassions because both Shinkurou and Yayoi could see where those conversations were going. In that regard, it was these well screenplayed reuse of jokes that made the episode so much better as a whole.

As for the actual musical part of the episode, it was sung fairly well. I found some of the lyrics pretty amusing too, but I’m not sure if that was simply due to the snowball effect from all earlier comedic scenes. (I mean, at that point, everything was pretty amusing.) The animation during the musical part was a bit strange though, with the characters moving in an almost fluidic manner. It actually looked alright to me, but when they all gathered in Shinkurou’s room, the overhead view animation scene was too weird. It’s just something you’ll have to see for yourself to know what I mean.

Next episode is titled “Woman” and it looks like Tamaki is taking Murasaki out somewhere. Given what happened this episode and the lack of narration during previews, I have no idea what to expect anymore, so I’m just going to stop making assumptions. =)

 

Cast:
– Kurenai Shinkurou (紅真 九郎) / Sawashiro Miyuki (沢城 みゆき)
– Kuhouin Murasaki (九鳳 院紫) / Yuuki Aoi (悠木 碧)
– Juuzawa Benika (柔沢 紅香) / Ishige Sawa (石毛 佐和)
– Inuzuka Yayoi (犬塚 弥生) / Ookubo Aiko (大久保 藍子)
– Mutou Tamaki (武藤 環) / Sanada Asami (真田 アサミ)
– Yamie (闇絵) / Kimura Haruka (木村 はるか)
– Kuhouin Renjou (九鳳院 蓮丈) / Kuroda Takaya (黒田 崇矢)
– Houzuki Yuuno (崩月 夕乃) / Shintani Ryouko (新谷 良子)
– Murakami Ginko (村上 銀子) / Masu Nozomi (升 望)
– Benika’s subordinate (紅香の部下) / Ooyoshi Makoto (大好 誠)
– Committee man 1 (委員会の男1) / Ueda Youji (上田 燿司)
– Committee man 2 (委員会の男2) / Marutakara Yukiharu (丸宝 行晴)
– Committee man 3 (委員会の男3) / Toriyama Hiroshi (鳥山 浩)
– Preview narration (予告ナレーション) / Marumatsu Ken (村松 健)

21 Comments

  1. Looks like another fine episode. Kurenai’s biggest strength is it’s dialog, which is up there with the best of em. I simply cannot put into words how much I look forward to each episode.

    Divine, I agree with you that the preview of this ep was misleading. BTW, your synopsis of the previous episode (05) may be a bit off…..with regards you Yuuno saying that she was ‘tainted’, I think she meant that her bloodline was, not that she herself had killed before….well that’s what I think anyway.

    I’ll say it again…. this is without doubt the best show of 2008. Anyone who thinks otherwise is shallow. Wish the art was a bit more consistent, though.

    Cheers!

    Lithium17
  2. Yeah, Lithium17 is right.

    Besides, the Houzuki leader said in that ep that they stopped killing in his generation.

    He only plans to teach Yuuno and her sister the techniques so that the family’s “legacy” of martial arts will be continued. From what he said before though it seems clear that he never had Yuuno partake in any actual usage of the techniques.

    vio55555
  3. @vio5555…. thanx for the back-up

    Check out the horrid color combo clothing Yuuno’s has on….. Try to imagine someone wearing that in real life…eek!!

    Also, zoom in on pic no.34 …..weird face Yuuno. My only gripe with this series, especially when you compare it to the beauty of pic no.11

    Lithium17
  4. @Lithium17 & vio55555:
    I agree with you guys regarding what Yuuno was referring to. After re-watching that part, it did sound like she was referring more to her family heritage than anything she actually did herself.

    Thanks for analyzing even closer than I did and pointing that out. If you notice anything else along the way, please share your thoughts then as well. It’s much appreciated. =)

    divine
  5. agreed!! a thoroughly enjoyable show! one of my TOP THREE. but man, i wish the subs came out faster,,everybody’s probably grinding out for FINALS. GOOD LUCK YALL!!

    BTW= SOOOOO pleased to see in the “POLLS” that everybody couldn’t give a rats ass about GTA4.. talk about boring seizure inducing dreck.

    BROOKLYN otaku
  6. Yeah. I was kinda dissapointed when I found out the anime version was more slice of life before but after the first episode I changed my mind. This series is AWESOME!This is only one of two series this spring that I actually find myself watching the raw even though I can’t understand a single thing.(The other one being Macross Frontier)

    tabs05
  7. https://randomc.net/image/kurenai/kurenai%20-%2006%20-%20Large%2021.jpg

    I was wondering at first what this scene would have to do with being “sung to death” until I actually heard Yuuno sing, which was just as bad, if not worse, than a former officemate of mine whose singing was worse than than a crow (and when anyone pointed it out, his reply was somewhere along the lines of “you just don’t appreciate good music” or something :X), though amazingly he’s good at playing keyboard instruments.

    Sailor Enlil
  8. kurenai is the best show of the new season. I’m someone that watches the big boys and thoroughly enjoy them, but kurenai has a mix of comedy (good comedy not cheap like in other shows), action (very short but well done), and drama (it’s simple yet it’s complex due to the characters) that outdoes the other animes of this season, I would say that I’ve enjoyed this season more than most, lots of good shows this spring. Overall kurenai has a interesting mix of being a mature show in how they approach character interactions, yet it is playful enough to make the audience laugh out load at the situations.

    Overall this show makes me feel like it’s not trying to wow us with wft moments, or dazzling visual splendor, it respects the audience to enjoy the well thought out dialog and actions.

    Ducky07
  9. I never thought this show would have the whole episode dedicated to pure fun and humor. I guess the poor Yayoi will spend more time inside the apartment complex from now on.

    Matroid
  10. This show is absolutely amazing. It has been a while since there appeared a show to rival my top 3. Samurai Champloo, PlanetES and Mushishi =0

    I hope to make it top 4. Random Curiosity has brought to my attention so many good shows, thank God for you =)

    Good anime really brightens up anyone’s day and can really teach you a thing or two. Makes up for the rest of the garbage out there =D

    I hope this show will end well, its guaranteed to make my all-time fav list!

    Typer
  11. I just can’t say enough about the character interactions in this show. Absolutely AWESOME. Although I like Shinkuro’s neighbors more than his Yuuno/Gingko.

    Does anyone know how many episodes this is going to be?

    Meh
  12. @Divine….
    Actually I had problems with ep05 as well (my Japanese ain’t the best)…so I got the sub which cleared up some stuff. The reason why many people were confused is probably because the way Yuuno said it was a bit abstract.

    @Meh….
    I’m guessing 12 or 13 episodes, but not too sure.

    @Typer….
    IMHO, Nothing comes close to Mushishi….NOTHING…. not PlanetES, not Ghost in the Shell, not even Battlestar Galactica. Mushishi is visual storytelling at it’s very finest. (Purely personal opinion)

    Lithium17

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