A Pygmalion-like episode as Onsen-Mark decides to teach Ryuu how to be a woman. Her father is not keen on this state of affairs and when Ryuu plans to stay and Onsen-Mark’s apartment, he goes in her place telling Onsen-Mark that Ryuu has set off on a voyage of discovery (one that bears a striking resemblence to the events of Treasure Island, Moby Dick and Mysterious Cities of Gold). However Ryuu escapes from where her father had tied her up and beats up her dad.
After the break, we see Ryuu listening to educational tapes that Onsen-Mark has prepared. But when she still ends up punching Ataru, both he and Mendou offer their dubious services as experts in the feminine. Shinobu and Lum end up getting involved too. This leads to various linguistic gags on the differences between male and female speech in Japanese and, what I guess is, another Attack No. 1 parody.
Onsen-Mark’s next step is to bring in the heavy guns and gets Ran to provide Ryuu some training. When that proves a bust, he asks Sakura to help, but she tells Ryuu that there aren’t set ways to be a woman, that is just a male idea. She should just focus on what makes her more intelligent, and in Sakura’s case it’s eating!
Meanwhile, Ryuu’s father convinces the girls of class 2-4 to boycott Onsen-Mark’s classes for interfering Ryuu’s life. But even when the Headmaster interferes, he continues his tutoring of Ryuu via the tried and tested method of montage. Until…
To test out her new found femininity he takes her to a wrestling show. But when one of the wrestlers accidentally tears her dress, she wants to punish him. Which is the cue for Ataru, her dad, Shinobu, Mendou and Lum to show up and convince her to be herself. And so the six of them beat the two wrestlers up. Well except Ataru, who ends up getting electrocuted himself in the melee…
More of the same good script, vastly inconsistent animation combination I’ve come to expect from this production batch. Though it does benefit from Oshii boards. I’m beginning to see why this was the point I stopped buying the VHS tapes back in 1999, though I wasn’t such an aesthete in my animation watching back then. I certainly don’t recall noticing such a shift as I am watching them like this.
Still another fortnight or so of this to endure before I get the next batch. Though the bunch of clip episodes I’ll probably write very little about.
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Screenplay: Kazunori Ito
Storyboard: Mamoru Oshii
Director: Osamu Uemura
Animation Director: Toshihiro Hirano