Da Capo / First Impressions

Summary:

Unaware that Koko had confessed to Yoshiyuki, Yume and Otome are surprised find that their brother has already left for school one morning. He had actually hurried so that he could meet with Koko to walk to school with her, and as Anzu and Akane are trying to get them to hold hands, Yume and Otome catch up with them. Yoshiyuki tries to explain the situation to his sisters, but Yume feels that who he goes out with has nothing to do with her, and she walks off. At school, Yoshiyuki is looking up date spots when Koko invites him to eat together with the lunch she made for him. Suginami offers to tell them the perfect lunch spot, but his suggestions involve the mysterious places in the school. This reminds Yoshiyuki of the stairs leading underground that he discovered in Sakura’s office, and the mention of this piques Suginami’s interest so much that he drags Yoshiyuki with him to explore it. At the end of the passageway at the bottom of these stairs, they find a girl sleeping in a capsule. When Yoshiyuki inadvertently presses a red button, alarms start going off, and the girl soon awakens.

To Yoshiyuki’s surprise, the girl who calls herself Minatsu is angry at him for activating her and questions why he did it. She had wanted to sleep for a long time and is furious that she was forcefully woken up because of an accident. As she punches him, she says that there are two things she hates in this world: bananas and humans. Minatsu is taken away when their teacher Mizukoshi Maika shows up, but she makes sure to get Yoshiyuki’s name before she goes. Part of the staff at the Amakase Laboratory, Mizukoshi explains that Minatsu is a robot, and this surprises Yoshiyuki because he had seen all those emotions in her. Mizukoshi also wants Yoshiyuki and Suginami to forget what they just saw and reminds them that afternoon classes are about to begin. This means that Yoshiyuki missed having lunch with Koko after all, and so he’s starved later. However, he does manage to pay attention during class because the topic is on the development of robots, and it reminds him of Minatsu. He even asks class representative Maya if she thinks there are robots in this world that have human feelings, but she doesn’t think there are.

Yoshiyuki is left wondering if robots who feel human emotions can also see dreams, but he eventually decides that it has nothing to do with him since he won’t see Minatsu again. However, the next day, he finds out that Minatsu will be enrolling into the school, and Mizukoshi wants Yoshiyuki to help her keep her robot secret. Minatsu still doesn’t like Yoshiyuki, but Mizukoshi thinks that it’d be good for him to become friends with her and gives him an operating manual. In trying to read it, Yoshiyuki forgets about having lunch with Koko, so he later treats her to a crepe in the park. Their hands meet as he passes it to her, causing them both to get really embarrassed, and they end up sitting together on a bench for most of the afternoon. Yoshiyuki wants to hold her hand, but he gets worked up trying to touch it and still isn’t able to. On their way home, the two run into Yume showing Minatsu around the island, and after Minatsu figures out that Yoshiyuki is Yume’s brother, she asks why they have different family names. Yume and Koko then get suspicious of how Minatsu and Yoshiyuki know each other since Minatsu just transferred in today, but luckily for Yoshiyuki, Minatsu’s wristwatch suddenly interrupts with a loud beeping.

Minatsu panics because she can’t find any bananas in her bag, and as a result, her eyes quickly turn red and smoke starts coming out of her ears. Before Koko and Yume can figure out what’s going on, Yoshiyuki picks up Minatsu and runs off. Barely able to speak, Minatsu explains that she has to have the Bananamin found in bananas every eight hours or else she’ll overheat. Desperate to find some bananas, Yoshiyuki gets lucky when Anzu and Akane pass them with some choco-bananas, so he grabs these and gives them to Minatsu. She gets better after eating them, and although she still doesn’t like bananas afterwards, she does admit that being covered in chocolate made them easier to eat. Minatsu also reluctantly apologizes to Yoshiyuki for causing him trouble, and the two are then found by Koko, Yume, Anzu, and Akane who want an explanation about what’s going on.

 
 
 

Yea, so forget what I said about this show not wasting any time with the story. As great as it is that they have a Miharu-esque robot character who runs on bananas (or rather, Bananamin), I don’t think they should have focused on her for most of an episode if the series is only going to be 13 episodes long, unless it turns out that she plays a critical role later on (which I doubt that she will). I know there should be a proper introduction for all the main characters, but there’s got to be a better way to do it than the girl-of-the-week format. I had hoped the writers would abandon it for a single season series like this, and Yoshiyuki accepting Koko’s confession in the very first episode made me think that they might, but I’m not so sure anymore. Combined with the fact that Yoshiyuki and Koko didn’t get any further in their relationship this episode, and I was left feeling under-whelmed.

Assuming we’re going to continue the introduction episode trend, next week’s episode should be either Nanaka’s or Anzu’s and I’m guessing it’ll be Nanaka. At this point, I’m just hoping that one of these introduction episodes can tie into the main story somehow.

30 Comments

  7. Wow… that just seems wrong on so many levels.

    Though on the other hand I’m relieved that it’s actually not focusing on the apparent ‘main heroines’. With all the romance anime this season, there will hopfully be at least some innovation. Perhaps we’ll actually see something interesting and unexpected happen.

    Wererat42
    Reply

  9. I agree. I can’t see that Kokko ending up with that guy. Its either one of his sister or that popular girl. I can’t to see them break up.Yes i am pretty cold. I had higher expectations but its already letting me down.

    Sniper
    Reply

  15. Hahaha — they’re definitely keeping the “flavour” of the joke from the game. ^^;;

    I don’t know if they’re just trying to get the obligation episodes out of the way first, or if they’re actually going to delve deeper into her story (which could probably be addressed without adversely impacting much else, if they wanted to). Mintasu has somewhat prominent placement in the OP, but it doesn’t necessarily mean anything.

    I fully expected, though, that we’d see very slow progress between Koko and Yoshiyuki as we go through the early episodes (the OP hinted as much) as, whichever way they do it, it’ll certainly play into the climax later on.

    relentlessflame
    Reply

  28. Damn, 2 eps in and no decent Nanaka screen time! Koko and Yoshiyuki haven’t advanced either….. If there’s no Nanaka or decent plot development the next episode I might just drop this cra- show…… Haha yeah I admit my opinion is very biased but hey.

    FlameStrike
    Reply

  29. Sigh, Da Capo is a great series but why do all the introduction episodes stink so badly?! Hopefully the drama starts up sooner this time around.

    Also, was holding hands really that big a deal to the main couple? Yeah…

    Chris
    Reply

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