Yowamushi Pedal - Grande Road - Episode 5
A short night time ride with Onoda convinces Midousuji to continue racing. The Hiroshima team challenges the leaders.
Meh.
Are you telling me that because Onoda smiled at Midousuji, he's been effectively neutered as a villain, and we needed new bad guys? A haircut and a tooth cap is all it takes to make Midousuji a good guy, huh? Okay...Heh.
It's good to be reminded that otaku power makes great things happen in this show. I'm glad to see the otaku sparkle again. It's hilarious that Onoda thought that Midousuji using the word for ground fodder in military terms came from an anime. Let me ask you a totally random question!
At least we see that Midousuji is aware of his strange behavior. I guess people have been brave enough to ask those questions of him, probably just the adults, though.
The power of anime and smiling with friends makes Onoda go faster!
Manami's smile looks a little more manic than Onoda's. He rides to feel alive, so I have a feeling that smile of his means something different than Onoda having fun with friends.
Those Hiroshima guys looked familiar. I guess that guy is done pumping their tires...
Dammit Onoda, you convinced Midousuji to turn around and ride the rest of the race! Your friendship in anime power is frightening.
Speaking of frightening: Sohoku Anime Club (and cycling) get-o!
Even Kinjou was singing the Love Hime theme! Game over Maki-chan, game over. And who brings a tambourine into a spa? How was this Naruko kid raised?
Oh hey, this show actually has a sexy young girl in it. I remember her.
I think Miki has actually been growing bigger as this show has gone on. Very boin...
It's obvious that Hiroshima guy was hitting on the team manager as a way to throw down his challenge to Sohoku and Hakone. Yup, bad guy. It's one thing to appreciate the honeys like Toudou, but it's something else to try to provoke a response from some girl's boyfriend. Well, Miki grew up around boys, so she knew how to handle that ass.
Hmm.
Midousuji has been neutered, and he's happy to wear all the colored tags, so that's a sign he wants to ride with his friends, and smile. Without a bad guy, we needed new ones, apparently.These Hiroshima guys are going to make a big deal about needing their entire team of six to control the race on that big climb.
It took 20 episodes to deal with the 2nd stage. We have 19 episodes to go for this installment of Yowamushi Pedal, so I'm curious if they'll take the same amount of time so we'll know more about these new bad guys (boo hiss, I guess).
Hakone and Sohoku have all their guys, Kyoto has only four, and Hiroshima has six, and supposedly the team who finishes the stage first somehow gets overall victory. Instead of a 3-way tie, this is our motivation to fight for the line and win it all. Third Stage start!
Cycling Porn.
We've got some good pedaling action with Onoda and Midousuji (who never did answer why he wears a mask), awkward bike handling over barriers, back to sparking for gear changes (lube, man, lube, check into it), the quintessential top tube selfie on a Raleigh frame, and a good look at Shimano shoes and pedals. One of those Hiroshima guys is riding a Colnago too.
Midousuji is doing something weird with his colored tags. In the pro races, which use jerseys for the sprint and climbing leaders, those in second place would wear the jersey "on loan" from the leader if he has to wear a more prestigious jersey. Usually the order of prestige is overall leader, sprint leader, and king of the mountain. Midousuji should be wearing the green tags with Toudou wearing the red tags. Fukutomi, of course, has the yellow tags.
I hope we get an explanation of why the third stage has this winner take all rule. Is that how this race is supposed to be? Usually overall time is just added up from stage to stage, with the top three in this case only separated by a couple of seconds. We didn't get any indication how close that Hiroshima leader finished behind Midousuji, so if he's talking about winning the stage meaning the same as winning the entire race, then I don't know what the rules are. Hey, we've got 19 episode to play with, so there should be enough time to explain that.
I loved the episode for the Gundam flavored improptu racing session, but it was also a reminder that the favorite parts of the show are taking place outside the talk/flashback/time warping dynamics of races. Hopefully something better comes up after this seemingly endless three days will be over.
ReplyDeleteI think the producers planned on using those funny epilogues to add the funny and characterization stuff we saw at the beginning of the series. This show was never a "serious" sports anime, and like you say, we can't just put all those things in the past through flashbacks. Still, those kids did a lot of things on the nights between stages. The epilogues are fine, but my favorite scene was when Onoda's mom came to visit at their hotel. Oh man, I was dying.
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