Katanagatari – 05

So after the trolling of episode 4, what has Katanagatari got in store for us this month?  Our heroes are after the Zokutou Yoroi blade this time which is currently in the hands of a pirate captain named Azekura Kanara…..however the definition of what a ‘sword’ is are getting a little loose.

So Zokutou Yoroi is a sword that boasts an absolute defense.  Katanagatari takes that to the extreme and makes the blade a fecking giant armour!  I thought episode 3’s Sentou Tsurugi was pushing things a bit with its 1000 blades, but this just takes the biscuit.  In what way is a suit of armour classified as a sword!? 😆 Regardless that’s what Zokutou Yoroi is so we’ll just have to run with it.

As usual the action scenes aren’t really the point of Katanagatari and this month was no exception.  Shichika dispatches Azekura quite handily once he gives up on using sword styles and just goes with brute strength.  Azekura for his part was dull as dishwater, with a generic dead-little-sister backstory; although I did chuckle when he claimed all he wanted was Togame as his prize if Shichika lost – Togame’s reaction was priceless!

I think I would have preferred going with Togame’s ideas to get rid of armour-guy – chucking him into the sea and hauling him out after he’s drowned or heating the armour until he cooks, both seemed like perfectly reasonable methods to me!  Shichika was quite horrified at the idea of doing such things though – wonder why?  Then again if they had of done that the episode would have been quite short and we wouldn’t have had that great little impassioned speech Togame gave in the middle of the fight to inspire Shichika 😆

The rest of the episode was mainly Togame x Shichika shipping (which I’ll get to in a bit) and an odd meeting with another Maniwani head – this time its Maniwa Houou, commander of the Bird Corps…….who has to be one of the weirdest looking Maniwani ninja yet!  However no fighting this time, rather Houou proposes a temporary alliance/truce so the two groups stop fighting each other (ie: Shichika stops killing off their heads).  Of course I expect this to come back and bite Togame on the arse – alliances/truces with the enemy never work (unless its DBZ, and even then they all threatened to kill each other once they finished dealing with whatever threat to humanity was currently attacking :P).

Of course the most amusing thing about this meeting with Houou was that someone finally pointed out to Togame that her ‘Cheerio!’ catchphrase was actually a foreign word for ‘goodbye’ and that she should be saying ‘Chest!’.  Togame’s reaction of pure embarrassment and horror at possibly being seen as an idiot had me giggling – Shichika’s bemused expression was hilarious as was Togame’s frustration when he said he thought that she had been saying it wrong all along 😆  Appearances are very important to Togame which is why she takes such great care about her clothes and appearance – to be perceived as stupid is probably one of the worst things that could happen to her, and to have an enemy point out her slip-up must be salt in the wound.

Anyway, the main thing I enjoyed about this episode was the development on the Shichika x Togame front.  Shichika is finally starting to show some normal emotions when it comes to Togame – he does repeatedly say he loves her, but it always seems to be in a similar manner to the way I say I love chocolate (actually Shichika seems a bit less impassioned than that).  However in this episode it seems like Shichika has reached puberty!  He starts teasing Togame by tripping her up, tugging her obi so she goes flying and pulling her hair –  all classic things little boys do to girls they like in the playground 😆  Shichika’s quite obviously jealous of the idea of Togame taking off with Azekura, although he doesn’t seem to be able to quite pin the emotions he’s feeling down and gets a bit confused.  Shichika gets distracted to the point he almost loses the match against Azekura, but once Togame clearly states that he just needs to stop thinking and follow her order to win he perks up quite a lot.

Shichika and Togame spend a lot of time together and are very comfortable with each other, but emotionally they’re not quite there yet mainly due to Shichika’s stunted social skills and ignorance of anything that may be classified as romance.  Togame isn’t a shining paradigm either, initially she was using Shichika since a swordsman who fought for love rather than material gain would be less likely to betray her.  However as time has progressed you can see that Togame has come to care for Shichika in her own way – perfectly highlighted by her motivational speech during the fight with Azekura.  I’m looking forward to seeing how their relationship further develops.

Next month it appears that things have taken a turn for the worse as our pair run into the Maniwani while stranded in a snowy land, violating the terms of their truce – should be interesting!