Yofukashi no Uta – 5 [Well, That’s a Problem]

Hello everyone, and welcome to another week of Yofukashi no Uta! This week sees a much needed shift in focus from our male lead, Ko, over to Nazuna. We get a peek into what her daily life is like, and how Ko’s introduction to her life is affecting her. Is it good? Is it interesting? Well let’s dive in and talk about it!

Starting off, this week Yofukashi introduced me to an idea that I can’t believe I hadn’t considered. Do you remember when I said that Ko was being forced to choose between day and night? Akira and Nazuna? And how Ko has seemingly chosen the night, but there’s a chance he could bring Akira over as well? Well the opening of this episode made me wonder, is Nazuna being given the same choice. We see just how alone and unfulfilling her days are. How late she sleeps in, how inconvenient it is, and how little the sun actually appears to bother her if she can wake up in it. So is there chance that instead of Ko being dragged into the night, into becoming a vampire, that Nazuna gets dragged into the day with him and Akira? It’s still to early to tell but I like that the option exists.

Getting back to Nazuna’s boring day, it’s interesting to see just how empty it is without Ko. How unfulfilling it seems to be. And not even in a sexual way! Yofukashi makes a lot of jokes and innuendos about it, but it’s also been very clear about the difference between love and lust. I think that also extends to meaningful, personal connections and one night flings. I will talk about it more in a bit when I get to her job, but Nazuna doesn’t appear to have many, or any, friends. She seems disconnected not just from emotion and love but from human society at large, existing primarily on its edges. It makes you wonder if she has any desire to get in and that’s why she interacts with people so much, or if its just a coincidence.

As for her aforementioned job, lets take a moment to talk about that before we dive into Ko. This job is… It’s weird. I appreciate that Yofukashi thought about how Nazuna was surviving here, I really do. I kinda figured her having this huge apartment and the money to do all this stuff was just going to be ignored. A “This exists for the sake of the story, ignore it” sort of thing. So to see it get brought up and mentioned was a nice surprise. But 40$ massages? Really? That’s so cheap. How many massages does she do each night, how cheap is this apartment. I’d almost rather it not be mentioned at all if it was going to be this ridiculous. At least her interactions with Ko for the past month are coming back in some way though.

Speaking of Ko, he’s having a weird week! Still trying to figure himself and this whole “lust” thing out. But what makes it interesting for me this week isn’t Ko refusing to accept that, he clearly does. It’s more that he’s starting to wonder if feeling that way about a friend is “ok”. Suffice to say, this isn’t the angle I was expecting Yofukashi to go. It almost feels like Ko has taken a step back in his quest to become a vampire. Because while true love comes from more than just physical attraction, you do need to be comfortable with some physicality I feel. If he starts to friendzone himself by getting to know her, by realizing he doesn’t care for her as more than a friend, then this story is going to take a turn.

Luckily for him though, Ko doesn’t appear to be that far gone yet. We can see through his reactions to Nazuna’s mentions of “others” that Ko still feels a bit of jealousy towards Nazuna’s past partners. And while Yofukashi hasn’t gone to deep into this, my hope is that with the introduction of this massage parlor that it will. I would love to see its interpretation of jealousy, from both Ko and Nazuna’s perspective. To watch them both wrestle with and talk about it openly. Bit of this have happened via Akira and the one night stands, but nothing that I would call substantive. It’s like Yofukashi has flirted with the subject but not yet dived into it and had them resolve it as a couple. Instead leaving them to stew in and ignore it.

Anyways yeah, all in all this was a perfectly fine episode of Yofukashi. I can’t say the series hasn’t lost some of it’s luster for me, it has. That honeymoon phase of finding an unexpected gem in a season has worn off and Yofukashi hasn’t done anything to really regain that yet. It is managing to sustain though. I still remember to watch it each week, I still enjoy the color palette and the idea behind the story. I’m just waiting for something of more substance to happen I think. For Yofukashi to become more than just another “Will they, won’t they” romance and give me a sign that yes, this couple will actually go somewhere and do something beyond their initial confession. Because to me, that’s where the meat of any good romance lays. Hopefully we will get to see it.

P.S. She looks really cute with her hair down.