K-ON!! - Episode 7

I know some people have been eagerly anticipating the coverage of this particular storyline within K-ON!! ever since its second season was announced and now, finally, here it is.

As we join this instalment we find Mio in a rather jittery mood... Not because of barnacles or skulls, but because she feels like someone is watching over her, stalking her even. We soon learn that this isn't the first time that she's had this feeling either, which throws us into full-on flashback mode as we see the exact circumstances of Mio's last stalker experience, and how it relates to the then student council president Sokabe - A girl who also just so happens to be the founding member of the "official" Mio Akiyama fan club. Yes, they have membership cards and everything.


Anyhow, even though Sokabe has now moved on and gone to college, Mio's fan club continues to thrive despite the apathetic nature of its new president - An attitude which changes as said president requests the chance to hold an official fan club event. So, Mio's fan club tea party is born (from the ideas of the other girls of course, Mio has little input), coming to live as a full-on event featuring a question and answer session, a slideshow of Mio's childhood and even some music... new music at that - I guess Kyoto Animation's swimming pool of money must be looking a little empty, so it's time to roll out a new single. Despite her natural reticence to being in the spotlight, Mio somehow ends up at least somewhat enjoying the whole thing, and thus they all live happily ever after, as you would expect from this show.

Really, it's difficult to find new things to say about K-ON!! from week to week - Once again, this episode was fun, almost touching at times, and had enough genuinely good jokes to make me laugh a few times as it went on its merry way. This must also easily be the most self-referential episode from this franchise yet, as we can easily equate Mio's fan club and their reactions and tendency to buy tacky merchandise to some of her character's own otaku devotees, which brought a wry grin to my face in itself. K-ON!! thus far also really seems to have made looking towards the future a recurring theme of its episodes too, which makes you wonder what they're planning as this series continues - Would they dare to take the adventures of the light music club's girls past and beyond the world of their high school? This is KyoAni we're talking about, anything could happen.