For weeks now, I’ve kept trying o find a reason why Karuta is interesting. With this, I’ve found it: the team matches. With the way this episode went down, there will be plenty of inspiration to fill an entire season.
Here’s the thing: throughout this episode we breezed through three different teams. That’s incredibly fast for a sports series’ standard, and yet the creators made all teams unique, and they did so in a completely non-formulaic way: the first got character because of their strongest player intimidating Desk-kun. Then the second used their scary faces, and the third actually had a pretty interesting tactic that you wouldn’t expect from an opposing team: one that puts a ton of emphasis on communication. And then the next math will be between some old acquaintances of Chihaya.
This was the same in the first time this series went to a tournament, when Arata, Taichi and Chihaya still were kids: the creators really put in a ton of details to make these matches varied and interesting.
On top of that, this was just really well delivered. Every single character here stood out and got some development. Everyone was growing more into their roles and stood out. Desk-kun had a very relatable reaction of being unable to do anything. Kanade stood out because of the outfits, Yuusei was surprisingly witty with his remarks, Chihaya showed some flaws in this episode, and Taichi was still on the roll as the team captain, trying to keep everyone together. He may not be comparable to Chihaya or Yuusei, but his leadership does make him un-rivaled.
I really like how this show combines hard work with talent here. I mean, if Yuusei and Taichi didn’t stop playing, they would probably be much better than Chihaya is right now. Chihaya’s skills stand out because she has been practicing non-stop since her childhood, and kept trying to get better, eventually overtaking all of the ones she knew as a child because they did stop playing.
Rating: ** (Excellent)