Month: March 2020

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Let’s Watch Healin’ Good Precure – Episode 7

This is probably the weirdest circumstance I’ve ever started one of these posts under. As I type this it’s 1AM during week one of what is likely to be a weeks- to months-long lockdown of most places and people in my residential state of Illinois because of the COVID outbreak. I contemplated not updating the blog for a while given Healin’ Good Precure‘s subject matter. Yet, I ultimately thought that doing as much as I can to distract both myself and everyone else from the whole Thing going on outside is probably for the better.

That’s the last I’ve got to say on the subject. Let’s get to the mahous.

This is basically a “funny” episode, and the gag it runs on is a fairly simple one. We get introduced to a b-character here by the name of Masuko, the president and sole member of our heroines’ high school’s newspaper club. He introduces himself and slaps together some awful portmanteaus (yes, if you’re wondering, Chiyu does crack up at this)

He has, as it turns out, come to the exact wrong conclusion about Nodoka. That is to say, he accuses her of somehow being the person summoning the Megapathogerms.

Much of the episode details his antics tailing Nodoka and our heroines’ attempts to thwart him. He even hides in a painting at one point, which, this scene just begs the question of why exactly there’s a portrait of George Washington in a Japanese school, but perhaps some questions are riddles for future generations.

As far as distracting him; Chiyu casually breaks a prefectural high-jump record and Hinata calls his newspaper lame and tries to get him to turn it into a fashion magazine. Everyone makes great use of their talents, one could say.

Eventually he apologizes. Explaining his love for journalism with a cute little anecdote about spiderwebs after a fresh rain. It’s cute, and Nodoka is her soft and caring self as always.

Beyond that there’s not a ton else to this episode. Though our journalist boy up there does hilariously try to interview a Megapathogerm.

The fight at the end is fairly peripheral, if solid.

Amusingly, at the end of it all, while Masuko does see the Precures in action and acknowledges that he made a mistake in assuming Nodoka was connected to the Pathogerms, he doesn’t actually put 2 and 2 together to figure out that our three leads are the Precure themselves. On the one hand; of course he doesn’t, but it’s still very silly.

Our shot of the week is this, one of the episode’s last, and a veritable buffet of good faces.

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Posted on in anime, Let's Watch Healin' Good Precure

Let’s Watch Healin’ Good Precure – Episode 6

This week’s episode is interesting. It focuses not on any individual character, but on several. We learn a bit more about Latte (the dog princess and our seasonal mascot), Nodoka’s mother, and Nodoka herself. As a small note before we get started, the regular opening this week is replaced with footage from the upcoming Precure Miracle Leap movie! So be wary if you don’t want to be spoiled!

As for the episode itself; we firstly learn that Nodoka’s mother quit her job when Nodoka was ill. I happen to like this extra little bit of detail; fleshing out Nodoka’s illness and the period of her life that was defined by it makes it feel more like an authentic part of the character as opposed to just a tacked-on element. Nodoka’s mother, as it turns out, was a delivery driver (a job during which she met Nodoka’s father). Seemingly what’s actually meant by this is that she delivers produce by truck, but the ambiguity here does indeed invite you to imagine a young Japanese bachelor falling for his Uber driver.

Importantly though, the show does go out of its way to portray this as a respectable job that people find interesting, which is good! It’s a nice contrast to how such work tends to be treated in American media in the rare instance it’s brought up at all (namely, as a punchline).

A good amount of the episode’s first half is actually spent with Latte and the other mascot animals. Nodoka’s mom was her primary caretaker when the young Precure was at school, and now that she’s working again the dog princess finds herself lonesome at home. This particular plot thread is briskly resolved by the mascots resolving to look out for her more, missing her mother Queen Teatine (that’s the dog in the dress in the first episode if you’ve forgotten), as she does.

Daruizen is this episode’s baddie, and sics an animated strawberry patch on Nodoka’s mom and a local farmer while the former is making a delivery. Nodoka’s illness comes up again here, as when the Precure rush to the strawberry farm Nodoka struggles a bit to keep up. What drives her forward is the knowledge that her mom’s in danger of course, and who could blame her? Nodoka really does seem to have enviably great parents.

Daruizen also sets up what is probably the (unintentionally?) funniest moment of the episode. The Pretty Cure franchise occasionally has comedic timing that many actual comedy anime would kill for.

You fuckin’ got him, dude.

Of course, the Precure soon arrive to put a stop to all this. Daruizen seems to take a particular interest in Nodoka/Cure Grace herself. Initially he derides her as weak while she’s immobolized by some of the corruptive gunk that this week’s megapathogerm generates, and in fact smears some of it on her face, which is honestly just kinda nasty. Then, when she bounces back, seems rather curious about her apparent strength before teleporting away (as Precure villains do).

This is pretty much the end of the episode. The strawberry elemental (yeah) that the Pathogerm infected gives our girls an Element Bottle, presumably closely based on a new collectible doodad of some sort being rolled out in real life, but this is more amusing than anything.

Presumably something will happen once our girls get all nine. My personal bet is on either some kind of augment to their abilities or on a slightly more outside chance; a fourth Precure for the team.

There’s also a small pair of mirrored asides where Nodoka’s mom thanks Chiyu and Hinata for befriending her daughter and, in the Healing Garden, Queen Teatine thinks about the wonderful friends Latte must’ve made. It’s cute, and we also get another shot of that mysterious statue-fied woman down there.

Is this ultimately a filler episode? Yeah, kind of, in that it has little to do with the show’s overall narrative through-line, but it’s the good kind. We learn a little more about our characters and their lives. Solid stuff all around.

This week’s shot of the week is this, the result of me desperately trying to catch the spirit of a nice cut that happens during this episode’s fight sequence. The cut itself is simply too short to capture it this way, but I did get this, which looks like some kind of meme-in-the-making. I kinda can’t stop laughing at it.

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Posted on in anime, Let's Watch Healin' Good Precure

Let’s Watch Healin’ Good Precure – Episode 5

This week’s dose of Precure goodness is an episode about how two of our girls don’t quite “get” each other and how they learn to overcome that. It’s also quite funny, but I’m starting to think that that’s just an inherent trait of Hinata, who this episode is partly about.

The gist is pretty simple. Hinata and Chiyu just kind of don’t vibe with each other. This is mostly on the former’s end, as she seems to mistake Chiyu’s genuine concern for her wellbeing for her being angry, which isn’t actually the case. Speaking as someone with anxiety problems, I get where Hinata’s coming from. If you’ve got issues with this sort of thing it can be hard to sort well-meaning attempts to help from people just being upset. Not helping is that on Chiyu’s end, she’s a rather serious sort, which only furthers the confusion.

Early in the episode, Hinata’s called on to answer a question in science class (about photosynthesis, if you’re curious), and can’t. This sets her flaring in a way that will be immediately familiar to anyone with a generally anxious personality. I don’t use the phrase “I feel seen” often, but, well.

Let’s just say I’m visible.

While Hinata is reckoning with feeling bad over her poor memory, Chiyu gets hit with things of her own.

Yeah.

The girls resolve this in a wonderfully Kids Show fashion, with an aquarium trip courtesy of some tickets Nodoka’s mom won in a raffle. They bond in a similarly goofy fashion, after some false starts, Hinata discovers that Chiyu cracks up at bad puns. And we’re talking awful here.

Astounding

The rest of the episode proceeds in pretty standard fashion. A Pathogerm shows up and gets stomped flat following some antics where Pegitan goes missing. All in all it’s an episode that’s mostly cute as opposed to consequential, but I do like the exploration of Hinata and Chiyu’s insecurities and how they’re beginning to overcome them together.

Some additional stray thoughts:

-A flashback to how the Pathogerms and Healing Animals fought when they first clashed a long time ago gives us an absolutely wonderful sequence where a giant mass of darkness going toe to toe with a dog in a wedding dress. I love anime.

-This is the worst-looking episode of the show so far. It’s far from horrible, but it’s noticeable. This isn’t really that shocking given where we are in the series (Precure shows tend to look their least good from episodes 5 to 15 or so, is my understanding) but it’s still a touch annoying.

Shot Of The Week is another Tiny Hinata. I’m predictable, okay?