Category: Finished Series: Slice of Life/Drama

Congratulations Yakumo. You finally discovered your spark for Rakugo. And all you needed to do was dress up like a woman to do it. This may harken back to what his master said, his Rakugo is too perfect. So this play put on by Rakugo performers was really the thing he needed. By dressing him up like a woman they placed him in a vulnerable position, so much so that he was getting cold feet beforehand. Sukeroku’s advice was the turning point to make Yakumo recognize the audience. I believe that before Yakumo treated his Rakugo as a job, systematically reading his lines without taking the audience into account. With this play they stripped him bare and forced him to pay attention to the eyes watching him. With that we have Yakumo awakened, hitting his Stride at the finale of the play where we see the man we saw at the beginning of the series. Even bringing out the characteristic pipe he will use in his future performances.

Though what amuses me is just how oddly sexual his realization was. Throughout the performance Yakumo was constantly remarking at people watching him, and his remarks sound much like those of an exhibitionist. Coming from someone so disinterested in relationships it’s a rather odd, but it does make sense that his Rakugo would improve from this as it was often commented that he would work well with racy stuff. You could argue that this could be a sign of him “coming out of the closet” so to speak but I would disagree. What seemed to really excited Yakumo was the feeling of control he had over the audience. He did comment on how he could change their focus just by a simple movement. It’s funny to put this in a positive way but I believe Yakumo has learned the joy of manipulation.

Miyokichi and Yakumo’s relationship remains a mysterious attraction. Miyokichi’s desire for him looks genuine but I believe she is aware that he’s rather reluctant. So her advances are forceful, often pushing Yakumo to be with her. Yakumo’s feelings seem a lot more subdued. I believe he cares for her but not on the level she desires. The fact that he’s willing to open up to her about his insecurities and not to Sukeroku shows that he does hold her close. I am having trouble discerning if he’s really sexually attracted to her as while Miyokichis advances are pushed on him, he’s hardly putting up much of a fight. It’s possible that he does desire her but he puts Rakugo above those feelings. Maybe Miyokichi is aware of that and making him get out of his own way? Either way it does seem like Yakumo finds women bothersome, which only makes him all the more popular. Though I don’t think that’s a case for him being homosexual as he seems equally apathetic about men. Besides Sukeroku, Yakumo doesn’t look to have many acquaintances. From my deduction, I would say he prefers solitude in his life which is mindset I can certainly relate to.

Well it seems like I have to eat my words as Yakumo is quite the ladies man. Which is odd when he clearly doesn’t have any interest in interacting with women. Yakumo has a fruitful love life despite his apathy towards love in general. Yakumo and Sukeroku’s relationship has certainly gotten more easygoing as the two work off each other like the odd couple. Yakumo is the more sensible of the two but it seems that his perfectionist tendencies are working against him. Rakugo is a fairly improvisational art and Yakumo performs it too perfectly. In what I can see, Yakumo’s Rakugo doesn’t feel natural, you can see his “acting” in it. Compared to how he will preform in the future, it’s a lot stiffer and too precise.

Ultimately Yakumo just needs to loosen up and find his way of Rakugo. Perhaps a stepping stone to that is this geisha girl whom has taken a large interest in Yakumo. This same girl looks to catch Sukeroku’s attention as well so the predictable outcome would be a love triangle. I believe that Shouwa Genroku is not the kind of show to take the easy route like that when it comes to storytelling and such a development would be rather futile when we could already guess as to who the victor is. I am fairly certain this woman is the mother of the girl from the first episode, and she clearly stated that she was Yotarous daughter. Of course perhaps this relationship is more complicated than one would think? Perhaps this girl was not actually Sukeroku daughter? Or to be truly outlandish, perhaps they were both her mother’s lovers?

As an episode, things were a bit slow as a majority of the time was devoted to Sukeroku’s Rakugo. I really respect the shows insistence to rarely visually represent the story the characters are telling. They allow Rakugo to be show how it’s meant to be shown, with only the performer’s voice and mannerisms to go off. It must be quite the challenge for the voice actors and animators, having so much dependant on subtle movements and mannerisms. The rest of the episode was devoted to the geisha girl coming on to Yakumo. It’s debatable whether she is doing this out of her own interest or if the Rakugo master put her up to it in order to help Yakumo’s Rakugo grow. Regardless I believe there is some genuine attraction she has for him, mainly in seeing her blush and openly state how different he was from other men. It’s amusing in how the she likes him because he doesn’t look at her with desire but that in turn makes her desire him. This could be a matter of wanting what you can’t get or genuine love but whatever it is will likely throw a wrench into Yakumo and Sukeroku’s Rakugo.

From the looks of things this series will be focusing primarily on the past of Yakumo as the stylish opening seems to place emphasis on the characters of the flashback. Rakugo is surprisingly abset this week as World War II causes Yakumo to be left behind as his Teacher and Sukeroku go out to entertain soldiers. To Yakumo this is a repeat of his past as others leave him behind once again and his frustrating position of being able to do nothing about it. However in their absence it has caused a greater love for Rakugo to grow in Yakumo’s heart. In essence since being striped of his postion to perform Rakugo, it made Yakumo realize just how important it was to him once he no longer had to perform it. This is something I have found with an interest. When you are forced into something, chances are that you will not enjoy it. However if you pick it up by your own initiative then you come to love it. This is Yakumo’s true awakening into the art, when he comes into his own as a performer. And with Sukeroku hefty absence from the art, I believe he and Yakumo are on a much more even playing field this time around.

From what I can see, due to the authors previous experience being mainly related to boys love manga, people are insinuating that Yakumo’s and Sukeroku’s relationship could potentially move to become romantic. I personally am not a fan of this assessment, not out of aversion but rather because I feel it undermines the nature of Yakumo’s and Sukeroku’s rivalry. Their connection is one of trust and respect, something much deeper than simple sexual attraction. These two are brothers in a love for Rakugo and to insinuate that that love is dotted with hints of potential lust just feels disrespectful to the dedication of the characters. It would be akin to saying my love of anime is very slightly influenced by a desire for 2D female women and that’s just downright insulting. That said I do find that Yakumo is rather disinterested when it comes to his romantic encounters. Particularly when he reacted far more emotionally to his Teacher and Sukeroku’s leaving him behind than he did for his girlfriend tearfully breaking up with him. Should it turn out that Yakumo is homosexual, it could lead to some interesting story developments. However this is a story about Rakugo and I would prefer for it to not deviate too far from the premise.

So we enter a flashback on how the master became the man he is as well as how he met Hatsuda. It’s interesting to see the man who always seemed to be in control be a person of much more vulnerable status. As a child we see the aspects that he will ebody in the future but he’s also a lot more unguarded with his emotions. In a way it’s like he’s trying to be the man he is in the future but isn’t quite mature enough to succeed. It’s interesting to see the stone pillar of Rakugo was once a man with insecurities much like his current apprentice as well as the man that likely spurred him to take an apprentice in the future. The camaraderie between the two is palatable, in their rivalry that shows no real malice as Hatsuda wishes for Yakumo to succeed as much as he does. One is committed to the art of Rakugo and the other is doing it merely out of necessity. It many ways these two are polar opposites but see eye to eye when it comes to Rakugo. They don’t laugh at each other’s failures or glare at the others success. It just pushes them to do better.

The episodes shining moment was in showing just how bad Rakugo can go, all the more surprising when it was performed by the professional we know from last episode. This really shows just why Yakumo got so angry at Yotarou for falling asleep during his Rakugo as in the past his Rakugo was criticised for being boring. It’s possible that in that moment Yotarou reminded him of one of the worst performances of his career and that certainly would make one furious enough to abandon a apprentice. The Rakugo itself was a rather painful watch as you could see the desperation in Yakumo’s movements and voice, committed to telling a joke that no one was finding funny. As it continued you could really feel him rushing just so he could leave the stage. Then Hatsuda came in and blew away the atmosphere with pure enthusiasm. In Rakugo it seems that the way you tell the story is often more important than the story itself as it requires the teller to infuse a part of his personality into it.

Speaking of personality, the soundtrack certainly has it. I heard a mix of somber pieces and some catchy jazz style pieces at comedy moments. It’s a soundtrack that can be rather emotional yet still can pick itself pick to be silly and stylish. I say the jazz styled pieces are more to my liking as tugging the heartstrings with piano or violin melodies is an easy accomplishment and often used as the standard. But trumpets and spanish guitars are a sweet sound to the ears and are giving flashbacks to Baccanos Hard Bop/funky jazz ost. Despite the cultural relevance not really matching, Rakugo and jazz just seems like a good match as both do have a very loose style in their respective fields. After all Rakugo is very much like a comedian telling a story but seems a lot more personal and improvisational. So in a way it is natural that a music style like Jazz could fit it.