天下制覇

The two dangers of being an adolescent mochi mochi.

Impressions:

The show continues to tread some strange line in a field I don’t even want to imagine. Mudo’s wet t-shirt was something frightening unto itself. I’m not even certain they’ve said Kaoru’s (his yaoi pal) name before this point, but they really bludgeoned you over the head with it this episode. Guchuko’s uses for the dog house without actually getting inside it are also rather entertaining. I’m waiting for her to start using it to store her kills in personally. I enjoyed the B side of the episode with the plants as well. It doesn’t surprise me in the least that Guchuko outclasses Potemayo at every turn, though I still have absolutely no clue what those were all about. Maybe they’re like some form of freakish Chia pet, only mobile and spawn in refrigerators.

Summary:

Rain pours down outside. Kyo is excited about it, because this means that Guchuko will finally have to seek shelter in her dog house. They watch her go up to it, but instead of using it, she jumps on it and starts waving her scythe around… doing some form of rain dance or something.

At the Moriyama’s Potemayo is watching the rain excitedly. She sees a leaf fall and starts pacing. Sunao runs in and she tears off her shirt and tries to jump outside. He grabs her and pulls her inside and chastises her for trying to play in the rain, but his father is out there taking a bath.

At school, Kyo is lamenting with Pote about the rain and what Guchuko is doing in it. Cutting back to Guchuko, she’s doing situps on the doghouse’s roof. Mudo is trying to chew out Sunao for letting Pote go out in the cold and possibly getting sick. He thinks back to him and his oversized yaoi buddy running through the rain and taking shelter. After a little bit, he thinks that it’s letting up, but his yaoi buddy is enjoying the time too much with him and doesn’t want him to go.

Back at school, the girls aren’t fooled at all by the story and we see the real side… where Mudo’s wet shirt showed his nipple through it, making yaoi-boy freak out. Mudo still hasn’t really figured it out, but the other guy (Kaoru… maybe I’ll remember his name) is laid up now, ill from the overexcitement. All his family looks like him with the giant lips, even his dog.

After class, everybody but Sunao and Pote are at Kyo’s house to observe Guchuko’s doghouse escapades. Once again, she comes to the doghouse and checks it out, and then uses it to scratch her ass on the corner.

Mikan heads home, leaving Mudo to carry Nene’s crap home and generally serve her. She says that it’s good to give pets shelter and gives Mudo his own tiny house, much to his distress. Her maid calls her away to get dressed up, and her fetching look with her hair up makes Mudo think that she’s cute once again. Kaoru’s Mudo sense goes off and he calls out for Mudo from his sickbed.

Mikan is walking home with Sunao and Potemayo. She thinks back to how she enjoyed laying out in the rain, even though people thought she was dead or something. The rain starts up a little bit again and Pote perks up. She starts playing on Sunao’s head, but he puts up an umbrella. She smacks the umbrella away and then scrambles on top of it, but it quickly collapses.

Elsewhere, Yasumi is being yelled at to bring the laundry in. He reaches up and grabs Mikan’s bra in surprise. Even at dinner, hours later, he’s still in shock.

At Mudou’s room, it’s covered in posters of Potemayo, but visions of Nene suddenly flash through his head. Kaoru’s hyperventilating even more at the thought of Mudo with a female.

Potemayo is yipping at the rain, wanting to go outside. Sunao finally relents and lets her play outside for a little bit. They head outside and she runs circles around him and leaps all over the place while he takes in the rain.

The next day, it’s bright and sunny again. Guchuko is sitting in a tree, warming up uncomfortable. She heads to the cool shade of the dog house, but only as far as the doorway.

The second eyecatch this time was Guchuko’s pillow spot in the tree minus Guchuko. Foreshadowing of her eventual move?

Moving to the flip side, Sunao’s alarm is going off. He wakes up and finds Potemayo in bed next to him with a clover-thing attached to her head.

As Potemayo washes her face, he grabs the clover, making her immediately start growling and then glare at him in anger. Through breakfast, Sunao tries to think what the hell this thing means. He thinks that a seed might have taken root on her head, and now it’s flowering and she’ll eventually wither. Lost in his daydream, he was ignoring Potemayo and she gets pissed again at him.

On the way to school, Sunao thinks that it’s okay for now, though wonders if Guchuko has one. On cue, Guchuko appears, with her clover having three leaves to Pote’s two. Potemayo immediately jealously growls at her while Guchuko’s worms snicker.

At school, Potemayo is still grumpy about it. Kyo has her own theories about what the plant is, though she’s off in left field somewhere, as cutely hairbunned Nene is quick to point out.

After class, Kyo continues her ‘investigation’ into what it could be. Mikan thinks that maybe it was brought on the rain, so they showed Pote with a hose and then give her plenty of milk to drink, but that makes her sick and her clover starts shrivels instead.

Sunao leaves her in the nurse’s office and goes out to get clocks with a soccer ball. Now he’s in the nurse’s office and Potemayo is back in the care of Kyo, who immediately abandons her to the love and care of the other female classmates. As Mudo looks on, Nene narrates his fantasy of his life with Potemayo. She was very well drawn and animated for that creepy little interlude.

Nene can’t resist one parting shot at traumatizing Mudo though. Classes all over, Kyo and Mikan release Potemayo into the wild, completely forgetting about Sunao. They go running off to fetch him from the nurse’s office after remembering, as poor Mudo and Kaoru pass.

Having fetched Sunao, everybody is eating together in the courtyard. Suddenly they hear the other students talking about how much better the clover is on ‘this one.’ Potemayo flies into a rage and takes off. Off course, they’ve treed Guchuko again, who is munching on a riceball. Potemayo growls at her, but Guchuko just turns away. Potemayo starts barking and jumping, but Guchuko completely annoys her.

Later, Potemayo is trying to communicate… something… to Sunao. Mikan figures out that she wants to make her clover bigger. Sunao lays the law down though. Mikan gives her a little pep talk about a beautiful blooming flower. Potemayo goes running off to grab a book from some unsuspecting teacher and shows them exactly what type of plant is growing on her head.

Mikan is walking home with Pote and Sunao, only to quickly be lost in another strange daydream after saying how much more beautiful it’ll become every day.

At home, Sunao is thinking about something becoming beautiful, especially Potemayo growing up and ‘blooming’ as it were. The next morning, Sunao wakes up, and Potemayo’s clover now has three leaves. On the way to school though, they see that Guchuko’s has already blossomed.