hontou ni Stripey Insists Sisters Cry Oniichan Now

Kampfer 03

Summary:

It's Natsuru's first day on the girls' side of the school and attracts a lot of attention. Sakura rescues him from the harrassment after his class introduction so that she can harrass him herself and confess to him again. Natsuru is about to return Sakura's hug when his bracelet starts to glow and he flees to the roof but it stops and he stays a she. Back in class, the girls are all fangirling about the hottest thing in town when more trouble arrives in the form of Nishino Masumi of the Newspaper Club, a childhood friend of Akane, who interviews him and comes up with an article speculating Natsuru is a lesbian. The class committee trio starts making money out of him and he eventually runs away only to run into another trio who capture him for classic gym storeroom sekuhara. Back home and still a girl, Natsuru shares cake and tea with Akane but the latter soon leaves after Natsuru wonders about how to respond to Sakura's confession.

The next day the class committee trio tries to railroad Natsuru for more activities but Sakura saves him, denying he's the sort to love only one girl with all his heart. In the canteen, she feeds him but his bliss is ruined when Shizuku joins their table and starts the rumour that he is dating a guy with the exact same name, i.e., himself. In the resulting commotion, his bracelet starts to glow and he flees to the library, meeting Akane (who had advised him on this course of action earlier) who has already heard the latest rumour and is majorly upset by his arrogance. In the course of their argument she falls on him and is seen by Sakura who thinks he is a cheating bastard and declares she will make Kampfer Natsuru hers.

Reaction:

I enjoyed this episode the least of the three so far. While I like yuri, I reacted badly to the OTT use of it in this episode. I can buy how some of the girls will react the way they did but so many of them? Come on! I also didn't like how the fangirls were shown to be seriously dysfunctional walking stereotypes - I much prefer the type of yuri I've been seeing in Aoi Hana and from what I'm seeing in Sasameki Koto where the girls are quite ordinary and well-adjusted people. I was probably most uneasy with the gym storeroom scene which was basically a joke taken too far, like most of this episode.

What I did like in this episode was, surprisingly, the Akane scenes. When she brazenly invited herself over for tea and cake but got crushed unknowingly by Natsuru who even called after her with what was my favourite line in this episode: "But you still have cream on your face!" Shizuku's rumour about Natsuru dating himself was certainly brilliant - it created trouble for him wrt Sakura but while it's an impossible rumour to proof positively - though it's also impossible to disprove without revealing his secret!

What Others Are Saying

• I am in complete agreement with 53RG10 on how awareness of penis makes this "some pseudo weirdo yuri…can't be fully enjoyed knowing one of 'em is a dude…"
• divine enjoyed how Natsuru struggled with the situations he was put in. I agree that there's a lot of potential in this but I would have liked them to be less icky and for him to have more time and scope for some sort of internal struggle and deliberation, i.e. more Sakura x Natsuru alone together time, instead of being constantly interrupted and carried by the momentum of events.

Related posts:

1. Kampfer 05
2. Kampfer 12
3. Kampfer 06