Sunday 13 January 2013

Minami-ke Tadaima - Episode 2

This week's instalment of Minami-ke Tadaima concerns itself primarily with the series' two more... "gender conscious" characters, that being Makoto and Touma.

In Makoto's case, he seems as determined as ever to throw off his feminine "Mako" alter-ego, although Kana is entirely apathetic towards his plight and serves only to reinforce the fact that he wouldn't be able to hang out at their place in his male form.  Besides which, any resistance seems to crumble anyway as soon as Haruka arrives on the scene, so it seems that Mako is well and truly here to stay.


As for Touma, an ill-conceived April Fool's Day prank at her house sees her threatened with not being served dinner, a punishment that sees her decamp to the Minami household.  Her brothers are one step ahead of her however, calling up Kana to task her with making Touma see the error of her ways by playing a prank on her in return.  Of course, truth is stranger than fiction when it comes to these things, and thus the perfect prank inn Kana's eyes is telling Fujioka that Touma is a girl, something that he plays along entirely with much to Touma's abject horror.  Meanwhile, Touma's brothers are worried about her lack of femininity, which leads her down a path of becoming a stuffed toy maker and clothes designer.

Minami-ke has rarely been one for bringing forth belly laughs from me (with some notable exceptions), and thus I can be quite satisfied with the fact that this episode is simply fun above all else - once it dips into its extended character roster beyond the three Minami sisters it has plenty of material that is predictable and repetitive in nature for the most part, but still capable of serving up enough light-hearted amusement to be worthwhile watching.  It isn't going to win any awards for its comedy and originality, but there's a certain something to this series when it hits its stride that ensures that Minami-ke remains a fun experience.

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