Heartcatch Precure – 43

The start of this episode showed Tsubomi rushing into the hospital for her mother. My first thought was “ah damn, here we have the sick mother trope again, along with the tendency of series to put random characters in a hospital near the end of the series for some extra tension”. However, when it turned out that Tsubomi’s mother was pregnant, it completely made my day. What an awesome twist.

Of course the idea that Tsubomi is going to get a little sister is adorable beyond belief, but it also completely ties in with the major themes of this series: family. The entire series has been establishing the importance and warmth of a healthy family, and this really is a great time for the main family of this series, Tsubomi’s, to get expanded. And not to mention Tsubomi’s character development! You could really see that this episode changed her into an even more responsible girl. A lot of this episode was spent on Tsubomi filling in for her mother at the flower shop, exactly for that reason. And to make things even better, you always see Tsubomi blossom up when she gets to talk about her passion: flowers.

I could get worried that there is little time left for this series to spend on un-plot-related episodes, but with episodes like this I just can’t fault the creators. Nevertheless, I do want to poke this show and remind it that it does have a cast of villains that it needs to take care of. At the same time though, the way in which these past episodes have been so down to earth at this stage in the series could be a hint that the creators have planned something very interesting for the finale. Since Suite Precure starts at February 6th, and this series will probably have one more hiatus (the infamous new year hiatus that every show has), that means that we’ve got six episodes left. Enough for a smashing ending.

And on a side-note: it’s also great that we learned how Tsubomi got her name. Could that perhaps be a shout-out to how moronic some of the parents of the previous Precures must have been? “Yes, when I looked at your mother and realized how much I loved the English language, I decided to name you Love. Deal with it.”
Rating: *** (Awesome)