Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Comedy wa Machigatteiru. Kan – 06

「あらためて、比企谷八幡はかたりかける。」 (Aratamete, Hikigaya Hachiman Yahata wa Katarikakeru.)
“Once again, Hachiman Hikigaya Makes a Speech.”

Not much happened this week – leaving us to examine the wreckage of aftermath from the previous two episodes. Hachiman resolves himself to assist Yukino indirectly by running a competition to organise a better prom plan in parallel to her attempts. However, he reveals that he intends to create a plan considered so abominable by the Parent/Teacher Association that they would have no choice but to go with Yukino’s plan – under the assumption that they do not want to avoid outright cancelling the event. To that end, he calls on board fond and memorable faces from previous seasons – Zaimokuza, Totsuka and Kawasaki – every individual more than willing to help out due to help that the Service Club rendered them in the past. The power of friendship is a beautiful sight to behold.

Interestingly, we see a bit of hypocrisy when Hachiman gives a disapproving reaction to Komachi’s plans for her graduation – protesting that she would be mingling with boys. This pretty much mirrors Yukimom’s stance in the meeting. Only he catches himself in contemplation, before he continues to voice his objections. I think this helped Hachiman realise the perspective of the Parent/Teacher Association and where they were coming from. And he is able to take note of the kind of compromises he would like to see in Komachi’s graduation – which he’ll probably look to apply to what will eventually be the real prom.

Finally, the suffering for Yui continues on. Having had her time to cry, she’s made up her mind to help out Hachiman – and Yukino by extension. Yui is still vying to express her affection towards him – wholeheartedly supporting him at the meeting, holding his hand, pretending to sleep on his shoulder. But she believes she’s living on borrowed time, and that the day will come where she no longer has a place like that next to Hachiman’s side, as reflected in her internal monologue. Where she wishes that the time can last forever, but cries because she has a deep realisation that it won’t. And can you really blame her? Even Hachiman and Yukino are engaging in this silly pretense of ‘Let’s compete’ and ‘I’m not really directly helping you’ as a way to skirt around conveying their actual feelings to one another. When Iroha and Totsuka call out Hachiman, they definitely refer to this less-than-honest farce that has developed between the trio. And to be honest, I can agree with their point of view. It is rather frustrating. However, I do suppose that awkward high schoolers are bound to interact in these kind of protracted ways. So until we reach the terminus – where matters regarding prom are resolved – I don’t expect further progression to be made on this front. I just hope it won’t be a slow burn like this till the very end.

Anyway, that’s about everything I wanted to discuss. As always, thanks for reading this post – and see you next week to see how Hachiman collaborates with Zaimokuza and his friends, as well as witness how he seeks to negotiate with the Student Council about his secondary plans for prom.

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