10 Second Anime - Saki - The Nationals - Episode 12

Saki - The Nationals - Episode 12

Saki wins but still lacks confidence. The losing schools plan for the individual tournament. Is there a new mahjong monster without monster powers?

Saki lets Kyouko win the second to the last hand, throwing everyone for a loop. They had thought they understood her playing style, but losing on purpose, and then finishing out with a cheap hand despite everyone's full powers at maximum: it's hard to understand. But if you're a fan from way back, you know what happened. She played to keep her score 0 points, like she used to do, but this time, she made sure she spread the other players' points around so she ended up in first place. She explains to Hisa that she tried to follow the game plan of thinking that she was only starting with 1,000 points, so she could gain 99,000 points, but in the face of such strong players, she reverted to her old way of playing with her family. And, ominously enough, she claims that that Kyouko, who supposedly has no monster powers, is her toughest opponent and she was unable to knock her out of the semifinals. Hisa says, she did pretty good for forgetting to take off her shoes and socks. Ah Saki, still ditzy and a bit clumsy.

Speaking of Kyouko, she realizes after the game that Saki kept her score plus-minus 0 between the two halves of play. Her analytical mind, plus knowing how to shift around tile draws to nullify monster powers, may prove Saki right that she should be the most feared player as the tournament progresses.

The rest of the show is our cute girls doing cute things to finish off the winter season. Many of the girls have their places in the individual tournaments, and will have a lot of down time before it starts. Serious planning for serious fun! So, even though our characters are out of the team tournament, we'll still get our chances to visit with them as the show continues.

Next time: Nodoka's old friends from grade school get to show more of their stuff. We last saw them on TV through 2012 and 2013, so it's not like I miss them too much. But this time around, we get to see them with our main girls from Kiyosumi. Way to work in some continuity, plus gratuitous amounts of no-pan!