I’ve positively loved the last five episodes of Chihayafuru’s third season, so I don’t derive any pleasure from saying that I kind of hated this one. “The Storm Blasts,” in my eyes, makes an unwise narrative choice to achieve a convenient result, and creates a minefield of non-credibility for the show going forward. Though it’s this episode I’ll be criticizing here, Madhouse’s adaptation is perfectly faithful to Suetsugu-sensei’s manga, so her plotting is the thing that actually troubles me. The mechanical aspects of the anime are great, as usual, but the issue of Chihaya attending her class trip has implications beyond delaying her run at the Queen title by a year. Hit the jump if you’re interested in a breakdown of why that is.
So, Chihaya wins the Yoshino tournament over Taichi by a two card margin. That’s a razor-thin victory against a close friend and rival, but it’s obscured by a series of flashbacks and Harada-sensei’s meditation on “effort vs results.” This is an utterly familiar theme to anyone who’s watched sports anime before, so I’d much rather have received a detailed look at the match itself. How did Chihaya make her comeback, apart from repeating to herself multiple times that her opponent was the same old Taichi? I guess the particulars of the match’s ending will remain a mystery, which is a bit disappointing – but hey, it’s not the end of the world. It’s what happens in the aftermath of her victory that cheapens the experience for me: Chihaya, perhaps the biggest karuta nut in the Japanese archipelago, opts to go on her high school’s class trip instead of riding her momentum and competing in the upcoming Queen Match qualifier.
First of all, Suetsugu didn’t need to position these two events on the same weekend. Even if class trips typically overlap with this particular tournament in real life, this is a work of fiction – she could have pushed one of them back a week without issue. Writing this conflict into the story, then, was a decision meant to test Chihaya’s character, or at the very least to tell us something about her. So when she tells her mother that she wants to go on the trip, which is born from the desire to some day become a high school teacher and karuta club advisor, it’s a massive deal. Chihaya has made karuta the center of her life for the past several years, so prioritizing her new aspiration bathes her character in a new light (especially in the wake of her first Class A tournament win). When I heard her communicate all of this to her mom through drawn-out sobs, I was incredulous, but intrigued nevertheless. Chihaya did indicate a desire to become a teacher on her Future Plans questionnaire, after all, so there was some basis for this development.
So Chihaya goes on her class trip – how can she become a teacher, she rationalizes, without living such a universal experience – and how does she spend all that valuable time? Thinking about Taichi, thinking about Arata, and thinking about karuta. She largely ignores Michiru (her friend and classmate), despite her declaration that she wanted them to make memories together. When she learns that Taichi has skipped the trip to complete in the Meijin qualifier, she literally packs a bag and attempts to return to Tokyo. I can understand her shock at learning of Taichi’s dedication to the game, and how that might cause her to regret going on the trip, but it seems like her resolve to pursue this new path is obliterated in the very same episode that it takes shape. If she’s that invested not only in karuta, but also in staying one step ahead of Taichi, why not take part in a tournament that she assumes he won’t attend? It’s an all-around bad decision on Suetsugu’s part – a transparent and unfaithful attempt to isolate Chihaya for a bit while she focuses on other characters.
It’s not only the present story that’s negatively impacted, either. Chihaya is nearing her third year of high school, when she’ll be under intense pressure to improve academically, choose a university, and pick a future career. If the series falls back on her interest in education at that time, you’d better believe that people are going to remember how easily her resolve was broken in this episode. This whole class trip subplot undermines the course that Chihayafuru will very likely travel later this season. So what did we gain from it in exchange? That’s the problem: nothing. We didn’t see her having fun in Kyoto. There were very few scenes of her talking to someone who isn’t a member of the karuta club. She didn’t give any more thought to being a teacher, even though the class trip was a perfect opportunity for her to talk with Miyauchi-sensei about the subject. We didn’t get the sense that Chihaya has changed in any way.
I’m going to cut this post off here, even though I could write another essay about the disservice done to Taichi’s character by this development. He shouldn’t need to be artificially separated from Chihaya in order to progress as a karuta player! If anything, leaning on that concept weakens his characterization, as it turns the sport into an escape rather than a passion. Let the kid succeed while Chihaya is in the same room, damn it. Boy, my issues with this episode are multitudinous, but hey, at least Arata’s childhood friend Yuu showed up to flirt a bit. And Suou looked like a devilishly handsome gangster in that final shot. Can this show be all about the side characters from now on, please?
