Mawaru Penguindrum – 13
Isn’t It Electrifying?
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Happy w/e day I post this or you read this it is! This is out a little later than I’d like it to be (heck, I couldn’t even watch it over the weekend), but nonetheless here we are talking about Penguindrum life after Himari’s (2nd) death.
Note: I’ll be away later this week thru next, so for the Pengi readers out there, I’ll be seeing you in a couple weeks for episodes 14 & 15. I’ll actually be seeing real penguins at the zoo! Should be fun. |
Sanetoshi tells Kanba to not give up hope. In the cases the kids are carrying is a bunch of apples and Sanetoshi pulls out a vile of medicine (as seen in the OP) which apparently can cure Himari.
Reflecting upon the crimes his parents committed, Shouma thinks all of this is punishment for their crime. A flashback takes us to the siblings eating dinner when the police ring the doorbell. As Sho and Kan are concerned about what’s going on, Uncle Ikebe calls and tells them to leave the house for a couple of days. On that day, the Takakura family had changed. Sanetoshi later injects the medicine into Himari after conversing with Kanba about the price.
Flashback: The siblings are staying at a hotel. Ikebe calls telling them to turn on the TV. They see their house on the news as police are searching the premises and also their parents who are considered prime suspects in the subway attacks.
In present time, Himari wakes up. Shouma revisits the Mary story, saying the goddess didn’t save her out of pity, but that it wouldn’t be fun if the punishment ended here. Goddess, you bitch.
Sanetoshi returns to the Hole in the Sky Annex, likely talking to us about the word fate as a girl runs laughing ahead of him. He met a girl 16 years ago and mentions how seeing her changed him. He wasn’t all alone in this world; he found someone he could share the scenery and the music with. However, they weren’t meant to be. She rejected him.
Why did he save Himari? It’s a secret, but he wants to see if fate does exist. He bids his love farewell as the penguin veil falls back to Himari’s bedside.
Tokyo Sky Metro celebrates 10 years of operation today, but hasn’t forgotten what happened in the past. Taking phone calls, Masako claims brightness and darkness must coexist. “Oh no, it must be crushed soon.” Jrow rages, wants Masako dead. Bitch. Anyways… Masako gets a call from Sanetoshi and he tells her that he knows who has the other half of the diary.
Ringo and Tabuki talk in the Frog Park about the Takakuras and their parent’s involvement in things. They don’t seem like the vengeful type towards the parents, and Ringo continues on about wanting to have become Momoka, but she’s come to terms with it by sending her Dad a text about wanting to meet the new family, even keeping a secret from mom. Closing out with a monologue from Ringo about loving fate, Kanba refuses to accept that his parents were responsible for what happened.
Weekly Marching of the Penguins:
The 3 Pengis back to doing what they do best
Esmeralda seems bored by the television
Today’s Slogan
End Thoughts:
After wondering last episode if Himari was done for good, she’s back before the episode ends. She’s already been brought back once, and last episode wasn’t playing the death scene so incredibly dramatic and overwrought that the episode was a really effective way of adding more backstory while Himari gets a revival. Seeing the penguins chilling together provides this nice sense of family, even though most of the episode talks about how the Takakura family broke apart after the parents’ involvement in the subway attacks.
Sanetoshi gives off so much of an Akio vibe to me. Having the ability to cure Himari, and toying with others while trying to figure out if fate actually exists; he feels very much like the actual goddess to me. Hey, Mary was a man last episode. And that girl running ahead of him? Can’t not be Momoka. Same hair color, they won’t show the eyes (that are the same as Sanetoshi); they kind of put it on a tee for ya. It makes me curious of Sanetoshi’s past and how he was rejected by (what I presume to be) Momoka and how he became the guy he is now.
Seeing Ringo text her father and re-explain her meaning of fate was a big scene for her and how far she’s come since following the diary in hopes of completing Project M. Her convo with Tabuki was interesting because I got the sense that she wanted to be nice like Tabuki was about not seeking revenge, but that she has a slight hint of resentment about the situation and the Takakuras. Ringo’s role in the first half was very well-defined, so I’m a little curious that, with putting some closure on Project M by talking it out with Tabuki and accepting her father’s new family, how she becomes involved in things in the second half of Penguindrum
Episode 14 Preview:
About Jrow
Produces the MetaVerse podcast. Also plays games and watches sports of all sorts. Is an actual Pirate King.
POWUH: 1100-1199 and Meta's Evil rice-flour Product with 1137 comments
METAPHORS! SYMBOLISM! PATHETIC FALLACY! HIDDEN MEANING! ATTAAACK THE POOOOOR VIEWERS!
POWUH: 400-499 with 406 comments
Yeap. That HAS to be Momoka. I really don’t know what is going on in this show anymore at all; at least I am really bad at speculating the reasons for everything.
Man I do enjoy this series a lot however.
POWUH: Metanorn Regular with 107 comments
The girl that has to be Momoka is wearing the same dress as her too.
POWUH: Metanorn Regular with 79 comments
One thing that struck me about the Goddess’s line this episode was who was telling it to us. Seeing as Shouma was telling the story of the lambs to us last episode and told the end of the story in this episode, does that mean that Shouma considered Himari’s revival a punishment? If so, does that mean that Shouma resents Himari deep down, or that he’s projecting his guilt about his parents’ actions onto her, or something else entirely? He smiled for a moment last episode while he was staring at his dying sister, and I can’t help but think there’s something really wrong with this boy deep down.
This episode was an interesting halfway point for the show, and I can’t wait to see where we go from here.
POWUH: 400-499 with 489 comments
This show revolves around apples. IM ALLERGIC TO APPLES. Besides that, this episode was awesome … like the other 12 episodes before it.
POWUH: 800-899 and Flying Sage with 856 comments
One interesting thing about this series (that, let’s face it, is filled with interesting things to muse over), is that it is taking up the story of those wronged and examining their capacity for forgiveness. On the one hand we have Ringo and Tabuki, who have somewhat accepted what has happened, even though their lives were profoundly affected by the bad behavior of others. On the other we have Masako Natsume, who seems to be nursing a grudge against Kanba (even though she still loves him). As you state above, Ringo describes the very natural feeling that it would be easier to not know the connection between the siblings and what happened to her own sister, since it would be easier to hate the parents for what they had done, as well as love the siblings as friends, without the complication of the relationship between the two.