Wagaya no Oinari-sama. – 06

「お稲荷さま。食い倒れる」 (Oinari-sama. Kuidaoreru)
“Oinari-sama. Eats to One’s Content”

Episode at a Glance:
On the way to school, Misaki sees Noboru and dwells on the fact that he lives with a “foreign blonde beauty” and a “miko cosplayer” that calls him “Noboru-sama”. At school, she finds out that she’s not in the same class as Noboru, so she decides to pay a visit to his classroom. There, the school Madonna (i.e. idol), Miyabe Momiji, strolls in to talk to a friend, and Misaki takes notice of her as another potential love rival. After badminton practice, Misaki bumps into Noboru and hears that he’s going to the bookstore, so she decides to tag along.

While going through some books at the store, the two of them bump into Kuugen and Kou, who came by because they sensed some weak, but malicious presence that mistakenly gathered here. After Kou makes a mess with her cleansing salt and Kuugen inadvertently rips up a cake cookbook, Noboru is forced to buy a bunch of books before heading home. On their way home, Kuugen is whining about eating cake, but Noboru says he’s never made cake before, so Misaki insists on making it for him as long as it’s okay to go to his house.

After spending the night before deciding on what to wear, Misaki arrives at the Takagami house to cook some food for everyone. While Kou’s eager to learn how to make potato and meat stew, Kuugen becomes impatient about the cake and ends up making a mess in the process. With the cake batter wasted, the three girls take a bath to clean themselves off before deciding to head out to a viking (バイキング), i.e. “all you can eat”, cake shop. At the cake shop, Kuugen chows down like there’s no tomorrow, while Kou spends most of the time preventing Misaki from seeing Kuugen’s fox ears that keep popping up.

As they head home, Noboru and Tooru come running along while being chased by the spirits drawn to the books from before. Kuugen quickly dispatches them, but Misaki faints from seeing her fox ears. Having seen all this, Misaki once again gets her memory erased by Kuugen before they walk her to the bus stop. Unbeknownst to them, Momoji is seemingly following them. The next day at school, Misaki tells Noboru that she wants to invite Kuugen to another viking cake outting thanks to Kuugen’s slight brainwashing, which makes her think that she really likes Kuugen instead of Noboru.

 

Next Episode:
「お稲荷さま。子狐を抱く」 (Oinari-sama. Kogitsune Idaku)
“Oinari-sama. Embraces a Fox Cub”

After being introduced to Misaki back in episode 3, I was looking forward to seeing her again this episode. She’s pretty forthright about her feelings for Noboru, even though she can’t quite tell him how she feels yet. Given all the “competition” around her, Misaki’s imagination tends to run wild most of the time, which is probably the most amusing aspect of her character. This episode mainly revolved around Misaki and her inner thoughts, which probably won’t be very interesting to most people, but was fairly entertaining to me. Given that she’s the only character outside the loop of what’s going on in the Takagami family, it’s interesting to see what she thinks about all the unexplanable magical stuff that she gets exposed to.

On the other hand, Kuugen’s whining was as prominent as ever and it was actually a bit annoying this time, especially when she was begging for cake. As for her new haircut, it actually doesn’t look that bad in my opinion. She never changed into her fox form though, so I’m still not quite sure how that “trim” has affected her appearance there. Also, Kuugen’s male form didn’t show up yet either (again), but I bet he’ll definitely look better with a shorter hair. =)

Style-wise, the use of bold lines and silly-looking faces for comedic scenes was akin to those seen in Special A, which I feel always help emphasize light humour. With that said, I never found the comedy overly hilarious in any way (i.e. I was never floored laughing), but it was simple/subtle enough to put a smirk on my face.

Plot-wise, we see the introduction of Miyabe Momiji, who’s played by the yuri queen Itou Shizuka (Amanda Werner in BLASSREITER, Kuonji Shinra in Kimi ga Aruji de Shitsuji ga Ore de, Wilhelmina in Shakugan no Shana, Ichijou Eika in Sky Girls). Shizuka is one of the seiyuus I always enjoy listening to, given her ability to play quiet, polite characters like Wilhelmina and loud, arrogant characters like Shinra. As for her Momiji herself, it almost seems like she’s aware of Kuugen, so I’m curious as to what she’s up to.

In the next episode, it looks like we’ll see another fox spirit and his child, a suspicious looking man in a raincoat, Kou’s powers going a bit out of control, and Ebisu up to some antics again. I’m still curious as to how those dragon scales on Kou’s skin are linked to her powers, so hopefully I’ll find out next time.

 

Cast:
– Tenko Kuugen (天狐 空幻) / Yukana (ゆかな)
– Kou (コウ) / Hayami Saori (早見 沙織)
– Takagami Noboru (高上 昇) / Mizushima Takahiro (水島 大宙)
– Takagami Tooru (高上 透) / Shimura Yuu (嶋村 侑)
– Sakura Misaki (佐倉 美咲) / Kano Yui (鹿野 優以)
– Miyabe Momiji (宮部 紅葉) / Itou Shizuka (伊藤 静)
– Takagami Haruki (高上 春樹) / Miyamoto Mitsuru (宮本 充)
– Sakura Chiharu (佐倉 千晴) / Takeda Hana (武田 華)
– Yano Megumi (矢野 めぐみ) / Honda Mariko (本多 真梨子)
– Shiori (しおり) / Ishikawa Ayano (石川 綾乃)
– Hashimoto Midori (橋本 緑) / Nagai Takanori (永井 孝則)
– Shop assistant (店員) / Fujii Keisuke (藤井 啓輔)