This episode begins with Fumi and Akira running into each other, and they sit down and talk about their schools and other stuff. Akira says that since they keep running into each other and basically have the same commute why don’t they just agree to commute back and forth to school, Fumi agrees to commute with Akira.
Later, when Fumi gets home, her mother asks her if she can remember what Akira’s favorite food was? Was it red beans and rice? Up in her room, Fumi struggles to remember what Akira’s favorite food was, and in the process of trying to remember, Fumi is brought to tears thinking about her cousin. The next day, Fumi and Akira begin their joint commute, and they spent time talking about their childhood days. At school both Akira and Fumi have to think about what club they want to join, Akira wants a club that will make her refined, and Fumi decides to join the literary club before she gets pressured into the drama club because she talked to a tall cute girl from that club.
After school, Akira is hanging out in Fumi’s room where they talk about cellphones and school when Fumi’s cousin Chizu and her future husband stop for a visit. Fumi’s mother calls up to the girls, she tells Fumi to come greet Chizu and her future husband, and that she’ll get Akira’s futon ready for her. Fumi starts to cry, saying that Chizu is cold, and Akira rushes to Fumi’s side to comfort her. When Akira and Fumi are getting ready to sleep, Fumi asks Akira to join her, and Akira agrees telling her that she’s really spoiled. While Akira is joining Fumi in her bed we see a flashback of Fumi and Chizu being a lot more friendly than cousins normally are, and we hear Chizu tell Fumi that she can’t be the one. Well, while Chizu told Fumi that she can’t be the one its looked like she was the one for Fumi, at least for a little while. Akira notices that Fumi is starting to cry and she takes her hand and tells her that night is for sleeping, as Fumi is drifting off to sleep Akira wonders if Fumi cared for her cousin that much?
The next day at their schools, we see what clubs the girls decide to join, Akira and her new friend (Kyoto) decide to join the drama club, and Fumi changes her mind about the literature club and she instead joins the basketball club because the girl she thought was in the drama club was instead a member of the basketball club. When the day of Chizu’s wedding ceremony arrives, Fumi tells her parents that she’s ill and must stay in bed to recover. As soon as Fumi’s parents leave, the phone rings and it’s Akira asking if Fumi’s free to hang out? Fumi quickly accepts, and joins Akira downtown for cake and conversation. Akira tells her about joining the drama club, and Fumi tells her about changing to the basketball club. Later, Fumi thinks that Akira is becoming happy and refined by joining a club she likes, and that she needs to back out of the basketball club.
The next day at school, Fumi begins the process of backing out of the basketball club and joining the drama club instead. At Akira’s school, Kyoko and Akira find a love letter in Kyoko’s locker, Kyoko says that she already likes someone, and Akira asks if the someone could be her and Kyoko says it could be! Later, Akira wonders how she was able to guess that Kyoto likes girls?
When Yasuko Sugimoto sees the drama club flier that Fumi got from Akira she takes Fumi and the three other girls from Fumi’s class for a visit to Fujigaya’s drama club (Akira’s club), Yasuko used to attend Fujigaya as a student so she still has friends there. When Yasuko introduces them to the other drama club, Akira sees her friend Fumi and rushes to greet her. It turns out that Yasuko also knows Akira’s friend Kyoko, and it also seems that Kyoko is in love with Yasuko, it seems that Yasuko cares for Kyoko but not in a romantic way. As Fumi watches the other girls get along so well, she says that Fujigaya is perfect, it has gardens, chapels, tea parties, and places for secret meetings (secret dangerous lesbian liaisons). As Fumi watches the other girls run off together she sees that Kyoko is in tears from her meeting with Yasuko, Fumi and Kyoko share glances with each other. Well, that’s all for this episode.
Well, After watching the second episode Aoi Hana I see that we’re getting the heart of the matter and the heart of the plot. It’s quite obvious that Fumi is a lesbian and she had her heart broken by her cousin Chizu with whom she mostlikely shared her first lesbian sexual experience with. From the flashback scene we saw Chizu clearly telling Fumi that she can’t be the one/ or at least she shouldn’t be the one that Fumi loves but we also clearly saw that Chizu and Fumi shared a sexual relationship even after that warning. Now, I’m not going to put all the blame on Chizu but Chizu gets more of the blame for this mess that Fumi does because for one thing Chizu was many years older than Fumi, and maybe the worst thing about their relationship is that they were cousins.
Now, many watchers may say the whole thing is too unbelievable to happen but I saw something like this happen in real life. I know a woman who only had girlfriends for many years but one day meet a guy she liked and she dumped her current girlfriend. Now five years later, they’re married and have two children, and when I asks her about the situation she told me that her time with women were great but she always knew that she wanted her own biological children and a husband someday. So, I find the whole Chizu/Fumi relationship very believable but tragic for our young lesbian Fumi.
Now, I like how the plot is progressing so far, it’s clear that Fumi, Kyoto, and Yasuko (and maybe even Akira, but I don’t she’s really a lesbian) will form a lesbian triangle that will be made up of desire, yearning, longing, and frustration. Ahhhhh, young love, it burns with a passion fueled by the energy of youth, hearts are quickly given and just as quickly broken, but you heal a lot faster when your young. Overall, I’m really enjoying this series, and I eagerly await the next instalment of my lesbian highschool soap opera.
This episode begins with everyone gathered for dinner and they discuss Maria and who gave her the umbrella, she still insists that the witch Beatrice gave it to her. When everyone has finished dinner and are eating desert Maria pulls out an envelope with the family crest on it and she says that Beatrice gave it to her and wants her to read it after dinner. The letter states that Kinzo terminated his contract with Beatrice, and therefor she demands all the gold returned to her plus everything the family owns as interest unless they meet a special clause Kinzo had included in the original contract, if anyone can find the location of the hidden gold Beatrice will waive all her rights to the gold and interest and leave forever. Also, the location of the gold can be found written in the stone next to her painting, and anyone (family or not) has the right to discover and earn the gold.
As soon as Maria finishes the letter, some of the adults try to confront Kinzo about the situation, but he won’t answer their demands to speak with him, all he does is laugh about how the game is about to begin and he hopes it’s a good show. Later, Battler’s mother tells him that there has to be 19th person (he’s only met or knows of 18) on this island, be it Beatrice, or someone else, Maria is the key because she’s had contact with that person. Before Battler heads off to the guest house his father tells him that later on he needs to speak with him because he’ll probably be killed before the night is over. Then the scene switches to Krauss showing his wife a bar of gold from the Beatrice stash proving to her that the Beatrice gold is real.
When George, Jessica, Battler, Maria, and Shannon are making their way to the guest house they invite Shannon and Kanon to join them for cards. When Shannon gets to the servant quarters she finds out that her and Kanon are assigned to midnight watch duty, plus Kanon feels that playing with the others isn’t suitable for furniture like them. When we see Shannon talking with George we see that Shannon and George are very close indeed, George tells Shannon that he has a gift for her, he shows her a diamond ring. Shannon says she can’t accept a gift like that, George tells her it’s an order and his last order to her, she should decide whether she likes the idea? If so, please place the ring on any finger tomorrow to let him know her answer.
As midnight approaches we see a golden butterfly roaming around Shannon, around the house, and around Beatrice’s portrait. The next morning, Gouda appears missing, and all the phone lines are out. Genji shows the lady of the house (Natsuhi, Krauss’s wife) a blood splattered door, when Natsuhi asks Kanon about Gouda he tells her that not only is Gouda missing but also her husband Krauss, along with Rudolf, Kyrie, Rosa, and Shannon. Natsuhi heads off to try and get some information from the old man (Kinzou) and is given a key to his room by Genji. Inside his room, Natsuhi and Kinzo have a conversation about her old family, and if she misses them? Natsuhi pledges that she’s now and forever a member of his family, Kinzou seems to accept her response as genuine.
A short while later, Natsuhi is called outside to look at a shed, they find the shed’s door covered by some kind of bloody seal, Kanon is sent to look inside the shed. While Jessica and Battler are playing cards the doctor is quickly summoned from the guest house, and Jessica, Battler, and George decide to follow him. When they reach the shed they find several dead bodies inside the shed, it seems that Jessica’s father Krauss, and all the other missing people are lying mutilated inside the shed. The doctor determines that they had been killed at least 6 hours prior, and their bodies and faces had been mutilated after death. Jessica is destroyed with grief at seeing her father’s body, George sees his ring on a finger of a female body, Battler’s mother and father are in there too, so is Maria’s mother Rosa, and Gouda is also there. Well, that’s all for this episode.
Well, this episode really surprised me with how fast the carnage and the plot progressed. After the first introductory/ getting to know everyone episode, I expected some carnage and maybe a person or two to die, but I didn’t expect this high of a body count (6 out of 18 dead), maybe 7 dead if Jessica hadn’t give her mother the charm against Beatrice.
It also surprised me that two of the household servants, Shannon and Gouda would meet their ghastly demise in the second episode. What also surprised me was the relationship between Shannon and George; I had thought that Shannon would have been Battler’s girl to get.
When George gave showed/gave/ offered Shannon the engagement ring and she refuses saying she can’t accept that kind of gift for him. George ordered her to take the ring but he also tells her that’s the last order he’ll give her, and then he tells her that if she accepts his offer to just wear the ring on any of her fingers the next day. I thought that the George proposing to Shannon scene was very sweetly done; it showcased their differences in social standing but it also showed how much George loved Shannon.
What I found unusual about killing off a couple of servants so early in the series is by having a bunch of them around in this type of story adds to the number of possible suspects. I could just picture how Shannon could become a suspect in the killings if she had accepted George’s offer and the family was very displeased about a maid servant marrying into their wealthy family.
I was surprised that Krauss and both of Battler’s parents were whacked first, to me; they had seemed to be some of the least offensive people in the whole group. But I thought that Maria’s mother, Rosa made a good candidate for the first killing after she had slapped her daughter around (don’t mess with the witch’s medium). But the killings did serve their purpose for pissing off the major players in the series, Jessica’s pissed because of her father, Maria will be pissed because of her mother, Battler is pissed because of his mother and father, George is pissed because he lost his future wife before he even got to enjoy a wedding night, and the servants should be pissed because they lost two of their own.
I beginning to feel that none of the people are really dead, or will remain dead by the end of the series, I think that this is just a dangerous game with Kinzo and Beatrice as the opponents, and everyone else are the chess pieces. I think that Kinzo could care less whether he really dies as long as he can hook up with Beatrice; He loves her because he had that portrait made of her, and you wouldn’t have a painting made of a woman you didn’t like for some reason. I also think that Beatrice likes/loves Kinzo in some way because she’s going along with the game by giving them some chance of winning. Overall, I loved this second episode, if they keep up the pacing and suspense level I think the series will be great.
Here’s a few new anime & manga motivational posters for the week of 7/6/2009. Feel free to share and enjoy these posters, but please at least give me a link or track back if you’re going to post them to a board or forum, Click on the poster to view at full size, enjoy.
