Thursday 9 January 2014

Golden Time - Episode 13

Any romantic prospects between Banri and Linda seem to have been extinguished, but regardless of this thoughts of her simply won't leave Tada's sleeping brain as she appears over and over in his recurring dreams.

With the summer well underway, such thoughts are quickly relegated during the daytime, not least when it comes to the festival and Banri and Koko's first big moment in the spotlight as part of the festival club.  Perhaps understandably, Koko is beyond nervous about the thought of dancing in public (not helped by everyone calling her RoboGirl, I would wager), and it takes some determined - and rather bizarre - tactics to coax her out of her shell and towards her dance with destiny.


Once this obstacle is cleared, it's onwards to a summer of fun... or at least that's the plan, but it seems as if fate has other ideas, with the post-festival fireworks rained off, a trip away with Mitsuo and the gang cancelled at the last minute, and even an attempt by Koko to do a little home cooking for Banri not going quite to plan.  Above all else though, Banri still seems to be reticent about his romantic relationship with Kaga - is it that Linda is still playing on his mind, or is he convinced that Koko will leave him for someone better in spite of her devotion to him?  Either way, it seems as if the hidden side of his subconscious isn't done with seeding Tada with self-doubt just yet.

After the Christmas break, this week's episode of Golden Time exhibited both the best and worst of this series (and I don't just mean Crunchyroll's incompetent audio mixing) - some of its vignettes were entertaining or downright funny, and the show's cast is still pretty charming for the most part.  However, some of these moments of comedy or drama feel clumsy and forced to the point where they're too stilted and unnatural to feel believable, and these occasions jar when set against scenes where characters bounce off of one another in a far more pleasing way.  It's stronger moments still outweigh its weaker ones enough to work as a whole, but it's not by as clear a margin as I'd like by a long way.

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