Gintama – 202-204

Gintoki has a unique life full of oddballs!

Ah Gintama! You have returned to give fans so much to laugh about! I discovered Gintama a few months back and tackled the first hundred episodes. Why do I like Gintama? Well, the best parts are the parodies; being a huge fan of Shounen genre they take jabs at Bleach, One Piece and Naruto; even some Eyeshield 21, which killed me comedy wise. Also, surprisingly they have some great action moments as well, especially whenever Gintoki gets a sword he becomes a total badass character. Anyways, time to review the current episodes! Enjoy the crazy ride with Gintama!

A quick rundown of the series for anyone unfamiliar with Gintama before I start off with the current season, it mainly revolves around the main character Gintoki and his two friends Kagura and Shinpachi. The three of them do odd jobs around the city; the era blends a bit of old school Japan and futuristic science fiction, thanks to the aliens that now live among them.  Throughout the series Gintoki has helped countless people, either by fighting or just helping them with problems and thus becoming their friends afterwards.

Episode 202 takes place a year after the series ended, fifth season to be exact. However, Gintoki tells Shipanchi it has been in fact two years! And things are strange for Shinpachi as all of his friends and family are suddenly acting very different than usual.

Gintoki- “Yo! Shinpachi! You would not believe the vacation I had! Look at these pictures, bro.”

Gintoki- “Two years and my hair grew so damn long, you should check out Kagura!”

Yes, that’s how everyone reacted, Shinpachi!  Kagura got all hot on us!

So, we jump right into what makes Gintama so fun, the random parodies! We start right off with a poke at Dragonballz. Good start to the insane fun, then Shinpachi gets to see an older Kagura walk in, who he doesn’t recognize until she starts talking. But poor Shinpachi feels something is wrong with the two year gap between himself and his two friends; even his sister is somewhat different.

Shinpachi wishes this was just Inception!

So apparently Shinpachi was signed up to join the Shinsengumi, thanks to his brother in law Isao Kondo, after he married Shinpachi’s sister Tae Shimura. Seeing this caused Shinpachi to freak out, and run off. Hell, I would too as Kondo is a weird ass guy. That is until he runs into Kyubei, no not the white fluffy magical demon from hell, sorry! This Kyubei confesses to Shinpachi and some more hilarity takes place. The episode comes to an end with a cross dressing Katsura showing up… to fight Kyubei.

Blushing Kyubei has something to hide…

Shinpachi- “It’s a man! Nooooooooooooo!! Time to cut off that hand!”

Episode 203 starts right from the cross dressing battle with Kyubei and Katsura, where Shinpachi is dragged to the Shinsengumi headquarters, which has been taken over by Sougo Okita. Shinpachi also learns the truth behind why everyone is acting extra insane.

Okita- “Time to take over the universe! Muhahahaha!”

Toshiro- “I think it’s time for us to get some new fans!”

Shinpachi and Toshiro escape the Shinshengumi and later discover why people are acting nuts. It’s because of an alien virus that’s giving people warts that take over their body. Sounds really nasty when you think about it, huh? The only way to cure the warts is to use a paper fan. So, Shinpachi teams up with Toshiro until he gets annoyed with everyone and smacks them with his fan. Gintoki arrives on the roof and hits Shinpachi after he was about to be taken over by the warts; the episode ends with Gintoki doing his best Ichigo impersonation from Bleach.

Shinpachi and Kagura do some bonding                    Colony drop, is this Gundam?!

Kagura-“This blows! Nooooo!!”                                 Gintoki saves the day!

Episode 204‘s story centers around Gintoki, Shinpachi and Kagura getting lots of postcards from everyone in the series, even from a few bad. The second half is Valentine’s themed, which teams up the Kagura with Tsukuyo and Ayame who fail to give chocolate to the ones they love.

Gintoki-“Damn it, this really sucks, my fans love me too much.”

Shinsuke- “I sure Miss you a lot! Love, Shinesuke”                               ( Dawww isn’t he nice? )

Gintoki- “THAT’S IT, I CAN’T TAKE IT ANYMORE. RAAAAAAAARR!”

Lovely hearts! She must be visiting the Met’Amour gift shop?

Girl squad team up and take down the enemies Errrr give out candy!

So, Kagura wants to give candy to Shinpachi and Gintoki, but has a really hard time doing this! Does this mean we will find out who she likes? Hahaha, I don’t think we are ready for Kagura to start falling in love yet… well, maybe. So, she finds out even girls like Ayame and Tsukuyo have a hard time on Valentine’s Day as well, then again Ayame has always had a few screws towards Gintoki.

Well, these girls take chocolate to the extreme! And sorry, girls are not made of chocolate.

After all the girls failed to give the candy out to the guys, Kagura stops at the house and gives Gintoki some candy from Shinpachi’s sister. The episode ends with Ayame, Tea and Tsukuyo watching the sunset together.

Gintoki would chew your arm off if you take his chocolate!

Good luck next year girls! You can do it!

Extra Sweets

Terribad photoshop skills there, Ayame!

How can you even think of saying no to DAT FACE?!

Kagura decides to take some time to escape the insanity of Gintoki and Shinpachi.

Gintoki- “Huh?! We have to do four hundred more episodes?!”

End Thoughts:

Ah, this was so exciting, the return of Gintama! This show always provides me with countless laughs! I think the random factor of each episode draws me into watching more. Not to mention the over the top characters like Kagura, who always cracks me up with anything she does; older Kagura was great for some random fanservice. I was sad to see her change back to normal; however the Kagura we all like doesn’t need to change that fast! Shinpachi isn’t my most favorite of the trio, but he still manages to make me laugh with how he overreacts to everything. And of course my all time favorite Gintoki! He is also really random at times; I nearly died when he busted that Ichigo transformation at the end of 203! Damn good stuff.

These episodes were slow in some spots, but I liked the random postcards from the villains, quite funny! To think they really want to hurt everyone, yet sent postcards to them; I found that to be really funny and not really in-character. However moments like these keep me watching; also the parody elements, I think there was either a Gundam reference or Code Geass with Okita in episode 203. So, that plays a huge role in why I watch this, just not knowing who they will poke fun at next.

Animation isn’t anything amazing as far as I can tell not much has changed since Gintama went into break mode. This is also a good thing too, I mean if they did change some designs and gave everyone details; it might not be the same for the fans. The music is still the same and the Opening and Ending songs are so good! I think I have enjoyed every Gintama opening song, not the endings to much though.

Preview!

Chocolate doesn’t count as healthy food, Gintoki.

Next week?! Expect more random fun from the comedy trio! Thanks!