Ah, its finally happened. Most parts of this episode was a calm before the storm, but at the end of the episode, Shinkurou and Murasaki are finally forced to leave their home and run away from the Kuhoin family. Something’s telling me that the best part of Kurenai is about to begin!
It’s amazing you can do with solid writing. The entire episode was clearly building up for something: for a random Kurenai-episode, it just missed the intense dialogue, drama or comedy that made the previous episodes great, and instead it went for a very quiet and peaceful approach, in which Shinkurou, Murasaki and the other went to visit a local shrine. They had fun through the afternoon, and went to have dinner at a restaurant together, as a way of saying goodbye to their lifestyles of the past few episodes, because the day after that a bunch of random Kuhoin-goons came up and beat the crap out of Shinkuro, and as an added twist: there’s a chance that Murasaki isn’t a legitimate Kuhoin-child: only her father’s two sons are legitimately registered.
I liked those two goons: they’ve got a personality, and throughout the episode, you can actually see them as they gather information on the situation. As it turns out, they underestimated Yayoi’s fighting ability so they retreated
Enter Lin, cue evil music. The thugs did present some interesting banter and were actually pretty smart when they decided to retreat rather than fight on. Most thugs in anime have the IQ and personality of a turnip and inevitably exist just to be fodder for the hero (and show off what a badass he or she is by mopping the floor with said thugs).
As for Murasaki and her legitimacy as a Kuhoin, I thought it was implied that the family “disowned” their daughters and disguised their heritage simply so that they could be used to continue the next generation of Kuhoins by way of sons (the whole women being used as tools thing). I’m not sure of the whole dynamics of what happened to Soujuu and Renjou but I was also under the impression that the Kuhoins practiced incest to keep their bloodline “pure” (and if so, is Murasaki of product of such a practice?). It’s certainly implied that Ryuujii wants Murasaki for exactly that reason since she is his sister (gross but such practices continue in some parts of the world, AFAIK). Please correct me if I’m wrong since the whole bloodline thing does confuse me a bit regardless.
Ugh!…didn’t think about teh whole incest thing..but its possible….lets hope its not that though…. 🙂
good episode….nicely done transition from the old life of fun and play to the impending possible chaos to come…..looking forward to it….
Ep 9 just dropped… and…
Yeah, basically that’s what the Kuhouins are doing to their women… =/