Bakumatsu Kikansetsu Irohanihoheto – 07 – Soutetsu?

This episode definitely was different from all episodes thus far. There was almost no action, it just involved people talking and preparing for the next episode. It turned out pretty well, in my opinion. This was an excellent episode, though I do suspect that the action junkies will be put off by it.

So many things happened during this episode. The most important of them is probably Soutetsu. He’s left the Kakunojou Troupe in order to take care of a few things. He first goes to Akizuki’s home village, and there he lets the local residents bake strange kinds of vases. Apparently, they have to be just perfect, as he rejects quite a lot of them before he finds the vase he’s looking for. I don’t know how, but apparently this is the way to summon a demon. Shouten-sama and his assistant find this out as well. The question now remains: on whose side is he? This gets even more mysterious when we see him meeting up with Nakaiya Juubei, of all persons.

Meanwhile, the rest of the troupe wonders where the heck he went, and they thing back to the time at which he joined them. This provide a few nice flashbacks. It seems that Yuyama and her two companions ended up in the theatre-business, when they found that they had talent and needed money. At a certain point, Soutetsu started following them, and at one point, he asked to be their scriptwriter. Afterwards, the rest of the troupe came.

Nakaiya Juubei, meanwhile, hasn’t been sitting still himself, as he’s preparing yet another demon. With this, he attempts to brainwash Katsu, who was meeting his superior about his recently destroyed headquarter. He succeeds. Kanna plays an interesting role in this. He thinks he’s helping Nakaiya into breaking in the building and holding Katsu hostage, though it seems that his help wasn’t needed after all.

Also, I loved it when Glover gave the Japanese a handshake, and they didn’t understand what it meant. ^^

You’d wonder about the meaning of the red star. I’m not sure whether something about this has already been said in the anime, but I think it’s a crucial part into summoning the demons to the current world.