©なれなれプロジェクト/菜なれ花なれ製作委員会
After last week's debacle, my expectations for the show were significantly lowered, so this seemed like the perfect time to hit the hot springs. Thankfully, the episode didn't spin its wheels as much as it implied, but that doesn't make it any less of a fluffball. Under normal circumstances, that wouldn't bother me too much, but given the trajectory of the last few episodes, it's hard to know what direction the rest of the show will take—and I can't say this episode provided much clarity on the whole thing.
With the video store gone, Anna decides to rebrand their YouTube channel and create a sub-channel dedicated to PomPoms. When the girls also win tickets to the local hot springs, they do some channel promotion by going around cheering on random people (and cats). While I appreciate the need to do what they can to capitalize on the content, I imagine the couple involved must feel a little awkward when they decide to cheer on a guy who wants to bungee jump to propose. I can only hope that their presence doesn't pressure his girlfriend into accepting. However, social boundaries aside, it's at least quite funny in itself and probably the most fun episode I've had so I can't be too harsh on it.
When it comes to the obligatory hot springs portion of this hot springs episode, the girls run into members of Kanata's old cheerleading squad. Considering the topic of Kanata's yips wasn't mentioned at all in the previous two episodes, I was wondering how all this was going to play out, but surprisingly (or perhaps unsurprisingly), the topic barely gets mentioned. While the squad members tell Kanata that she needs to let go of the past—and Kanata vaguely mentions that she's still not fully recovered—that doesn't come up at all in the actual conversation. Not only that, she helps one of the other girls with her cheerleading routine, which makes it all the more strange considering the last time we saw them interact was Kanata biting it during a fitting. I guess there's always the possibility that she mentioned her recovery to them before this meeting but even then, it still feels like a conversation we should have seen happen rather than happening off screen.
Speaking of what happens off-screen, I should probably also mention the awkward post-credits scene, to say the least. When things settle down, Suzuha decides to take a hot spring bath alone, joined only by Shion. After Suzuha mentions that she still feels a little awkward around Shion, she says that she feels the same way and asks if she can make an embarrassing request. By the next morning, the two of them are talking more casually and calling each other by their first names while the other girls are completely confused. Since this isn't the kind of show that's committed to actually being gay—and the last few episodes don't give me much faith that it could handle that well if it tried—between the mood of the scene and everything else, it's hard to see how it could be anything other than a confession and now the two of them are dating. I'm sure the show will be happy to prove me wrong next week, but until they say otherwise, I'm going to keep doing it and no one can stop me. But even if it turns out that they decided to become closer friends or something, doing it off-screen seems like an odd choice—and even odder to do it as a post-credits scene for an episode where the two of them barely got any focus. Hopefully, there'll be some clarification one way or another, but regardless of how it actually plays out, doing it in such a vague way doesn't really feel like a good writing choice.
But aside from all that, there's not much else to say about this episode. We learn a little more about Megumi's condition, and how she used to lead another cheerleading squad called the Bellflowers before she started having heart problems and ended up in a wheelchair. But she doesn't get much of a focus in this episode, either, so it feels more like a setup for some future drama than anything else. The only important thing here is that the girls have decided that their new plan for the channel is to focus on making cheerleading videos for people who ask for them—and that seems like a nice way for the show to find a little more balance between character drama and cheerleading activities. At the same time, though, it also feels like something that should have been set up much earlier in the show than midway through. So if that turns out to be the formula for the rest of the show, it makes me nervous about how well it can handle that setup. But for all those fears, I can at least say that as far as this episode goes, it was less frustrating than anything that happened last week. So I'm willing to consider that an improvement at least. Still, I can't say I'm completely back into it. While I'm still hoping for the best, I'll probably continue to tread a little more cautiously.
Rating:
Narenare-Let's Cheer for You!-is now streaming on Crunchyroll.
