A tense situation resolves itself not with a bang but with a whimper.
The bad guys kidnap both Agemaki and the girl with the obnoxiously long name by sprinkling fairy dust.
If it’s really that easy, let’s just eliminate the middleman and sprinkle fairy dust on Zakuro the next time she goes outside. Anyway, Kushimatsu easily sniffs out the plot to lure Zakuro out, but Zakuro rushes into danger headfirst anyway. Riken kinda tags along and only seems to get in the way.
At first, it seems as though the villains might actually have the upper hand, but they didn’t study their handbook of anime mechanics. The “SSJ/limit break/whatever” rule of anime clearly states that when the good guys think their loved ones are dead or facing imminent danger, they’ll draw unlimited strength from absolutely nowhere and destroy your ass.
Can you sense her fighting spirit? And it’s all because one of the stupid sisters had to spill her guts like a Bond villain. Man, wait till you get some hits in before taunting Zakuro. In the end, the evil sisters are clearly outmatched and Lady Rangui has to swoop in to save them.
No! Not another time. Right now! You have them on the damn ropes, Riken’s injured, you outnumber them, you have two of Zakuro’s friends in a trap… just make her surrender for their lives or something. Aw geez, don’t just snap your fingers and disappear-
Just like that, Zakuro saves the day again like a fox. Why did it have to be so easy? This episode was such a letdown for so many reasons. For once, the good guys weren’t exactly invincible — the bad guys actually had the upper hand. For once, pretty boy Agemaki might actually sustain more than a scratch.
But nope. Newp. Everything has to be neatly resolved by the end of the episode. Why do we even bother?
Oh.
Oh.
Fodder for fandom shippers.
Moe Sucks 
I kept wondering why they were so concerned about the door breaking and the water rushing in…I thought that would be their ticket out. For that plot point to be remotely suspenseful they would need to be in either a really tiny cellar or have a huge amount of water built up, enough to flood the room in seconds. Otherwise it’s: water rushes in and swim to safety.
Also, I like the name Susukihotaru it really rolls of the tongue. I tried to delve meaning into their names awhile back. I forgot what Sususkihotaru meant; something firefly which I guess fits her. Fun fact: Mamezou means “Bean Warehouse” which sounds like a fart joke to me.
I think the force of the water was supposed to be so strong, it’d pin them back or something. You can sorta see “action lines” in the water to make it seem like it’s fast moving:
And maybe neither were particularly good swimmers. I dunno. It seemed like a poorly executed episode at such an important plot juncture.
As for Susi-whatever, I’m terrible with names. I know only Zakuro and Agemaki off the top of my head. ;v
The crying faces in this episode reminded me of why I’ve never been a huge fan of Lily Hoshino’s art.
I’ll admit: what I find funniest about Otome Youkai Zakuro is the way Hoshino goes about depicting her female characters. How so? Well, Hoshino does a lot more BL/yaoi than she does of anything else, and in these tales one of the guys always looks like a girl or acts a lot like a stereotypical girl – so much so that in OYZ the female characters actually display greater degrees of agency and lesser degrees of stereotyping (to an extent) than Hoshino’s ukes. At the same time, they aren’t so different as to prevent one from viewing OYZ as a BL story involving traps.
Hmm. I don’t know if all that made sense. At the very least, I find it funny.
I dunno if I buy the agency thing. The only female character who seems to be in charge of her fate is Zakuro, and she’s inching ever so closer to deredere with Agemaki. All the other characters are largely bit players.
Believe me – compared to her ukes, even Susukihotaru has a shit-ton of agency. Which says a lot about her BL.
Well, if that’s the case, it only adds to what seems to be a troubling trope. Togainu no Chi made it fresh in my mind and I’m going to write something short about it.
I would like to say, for the record, that I don’t like Hoshino’s work in general, and her BL in particular. Her work is just so wholly mired in stereotype as to make it impossible for me to draw any enjoyment out of it at all. Think I’ll stick to my salarymen BL.
To clarify slightly: salarymen BL isn’t inherently free from stereotype. But it has proven a better track-record in my reading experience for not being completely drowned in the more odious BL tropes.
BL is, arguably, an inherently exploitative genre as a whole, regardless of what happens between covers of manga. Its all written for women, after all. Content for gay men is known as ‘bara’, and the closest thing to it out there that is available in the West is Legend of the Blues Wolves.
Sorry, this bleeds over into your more recent post.
That’s just too bad. I’m not saying you personally believe the words above but… just sayin’, that shouldn’t be an excuse.
*blinks* I didn’t mean it as an excuse at all. I meant it more that to pick some and put them aside and try to claim that they aren’t at all exploitative (or are less exploitative) is creating a false holier-than-thou moment since it is all exploitative by its very nature. I won’t read nonconsensual stuff, but does that really make me much better than those who do? Probably not – I’m still getting some form of titillation from it, after all.
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