Persona 4 – 17

It’s just like baking, except your ingredients are demons and the cake is…also a demon.

As both a blogger of Persona and an avid gamer, I feel it is my duty to present this to you and your lovely eyeballs. I may suck at fighting games, but that doesn’t stop me from drooling over each and every update for Persona Ultimate in Mayonaka Arcade. Enjoy!

So the lateness of this post is entirely my fault …for, uh, reasons that you’ll see within the next two weeks. I hope that my explanation was vague enough for you. On to Persona.

VR. So the fight from last episode continues with Yosuke going on an old man rant, everyone minus Rise and Kanji being useless and Yu going through his collection of Persona trying to defeat Shadow Naoto. However, Yu gets hit with the aging ray and he turns old (Rise still thinks he’s cool though). While Kuma, Yosuke and Yu have an old people conversation, Shadow Naoto talks to Naoto about how she’s an orphan and was taken in by her grandfather (a detective). Naoto had no friends, but her grandfather let her help with cases and the next thing she knew, people were calling her a young detective. However, everyone still treated her like a child.

With that, Shadow Naoto goes to attack, but Kanji saves Naoto saying that he sucks at making friends as well. As Kanji fights, Kuma remembers that his Persona conveniently can make everyone young again and so he does. Yu uses a high level Persona and damages Shadow Naoto… who then begins to self-destruct, so everyone runs away. After everything is done exploding, Naoto apologises for always ignoring her other self and she gets her own Persona. After that’s done with, Naoto states the obvious in the act that the case is not over.

Yu comes home to find Adachi drunk and eating cabbage in his house. Being Adachi, he tells Yu all about the fact that Naoto was taken off the case and then went missing (but was recently found). Dojima tells Yu not to worry about the case (…not that Yu appeared to be worrying in the first place) and goes off to bed. Nanako seems worried, but Adachi tells her that he’s the smartest at the station, so things will be awwwwwright.

“God, I love staring at him eat cabbage. It’s like he’s putting money in between his teeth like a prostitute. So sexy.”

Time passes and Naoto is back in school still in the guy’s uniform. Also, he wants to talk about the case. After the team gets together, Naoto recalls her kidnapping and says that the culprit is definitely working alone and is male. She notes that the time between being shoved in a sack and being shoved into a TV was surprisingly short. As for Mitsuo, someone had to have told him about the TV world and the reason people are found hanging from antenna is because that’s just how they end up after being killed inside the TV.

Naoto admits that she was actually scared when she was inside the TV and Kanji feels the moe. Yu tells Naoto that she has balls and she officially joins the team. The next day, Naoto has doctors examine Kuma and the team to see if the fog is affecting them negatively at all. It isn’t. Also, Kuma can’t be x-rayed. Kuma then reveals that he has the team’s results, but before he can reveal the girl’s three sizes, Naoto runs off and the team minus Kanji and Yu chase after. Alone, Kanji talks about how amazing Naoto is. However, this wouldn’t be Persona without implied bromance, so Kanji adds in (blushing) that Yu is his bro.

At school, Naoto gets a love letter (from a girl even though everyone knows that she’s a girl) and she’s disinterested. Yu asks to hang out after school though and the two go eat the Rainy Day special at Aiya. After the credits, someone is typing on the computer saying to stop helping people.

Pink writing..hearts…it must be from a girl. Wait…why is this in Kanji’s writing then?

Bonus Screenshots:

Rise can’t resist that oyaji moe

Once upon a time, Kuma was helpful this one time. The end.

OHKO…against the ENTIRE DUNGEON.

“Wow Kanji, you untied those bindings real fast…do you have experience with S&-” “SHUT UP AND LET ME SAVE YOU.”

End Thoughts:

That was a lot less tense than I expected. Hmm. I’ve already gotten used to the battle format of Yu simply switching his persona to resist certain attacks by now. I was only caught off-guard when he fused Beelzebub, signifying that he’s at a pretty high level. At least level 81. Why is this so surprising? Because at the very end of the game, I couldn’t have been any higher than level 65. <_< There must have been a lot of grinding going on offscreen for this to have happened. That, or it just goes to show that my playstyle is to blitz through everything with a huge amount of luck and brute force. Anyways, it makes me wonder how Yu could possibly top this when we’re only at episode 17 and the case isn’t over. He blew up the entire dungeon to smithereens, so how could any future boss ever trouble him? I guess all that’s left is for his friends to finally become a bit more useful. Kanji’s persona, Kuma’s healing and Rise’s scanning ability were the only really useful contribution from Yu’s friends this week :/

Naoto joined the party after the battle! Finally! She’s pretty adorable when she finally acts a bit more womanly and blushes. I love all the fuel they’re throwing into the KanjixNaoto shipping fire as well with all of his over-the-top reactions. I’m sorry, but no one in this show will ever be more moe than Kanji. Move over Nanako, because I’d like to see you try to reach the cuteness levels of KANJI TATSUMI. I’ll be looking forward to more interactions between the two. In fact, I’ll be looking forward to Yu going further along Naoto’s social link as well. I like the dynamic that the two of them have since they’re both on the more stoic, serious side but they don’t mind being a bit silly together. The meat bowl scene at the end was absolutely precious. :3

As per usual, I appreciate the little original touches the anime adds (Adachi and his cabbage, the guys growing old, Margaret’s weird story etc.) since hearing the same discussions about the killer is pretty boring. I know who the killer is. I know how this whole thing ends. If I’m the type of person who can barely battle the same monster twice to get to a higher level, I obviously am going to be fidgeting while watching the same reasoning explained twice as well! DX The repetition made this episode a bit dull, if not for the little added touches of novelty in the anime. That really saves the episode from being boring overall. I can only hope these garnishes continue to bring out the best flavour in the remaining episodes.

Oh wow they are really pushing the Kanji and Naoto thing. Maybe it’s because I’m so used to Yu having a massive harem in the game (or at least that’s how I played it xD), but I don’t think the two were so heavily implied as a couple. I don’t mind this though. The two are absolutely adorable~. Plus Yu already has Yosuke. For those of you wondering about Rise’s reaction to Naoto’s medical info, apparently Naoto has the biggest bust size of all of the female characters. Not that you can tell. She looks completely flat, but I guess it’s an interesting bit of info there.

I was surprised at Yukiko and Chie’s reaction of “DO NOT WANT” after Yu turned old. Are they not interested in him, or do they just not like old people? LOL At least Rise accepts Yu as an old man. The entire fight sequence felt a bit drawn out to me. I’m happy that Kanji was a main player in it, but the rest of the characters (again, minus Rise and Yu …and then later, Kuma) could have been playing cards for all of the help they were. Well, Rise was only slightly better than Yukiko and Chie, but honestly, the two could have done more than just hide. Needless to say, my annoyance with them way overshadowed whatever else was going on.

Okay, so I have my complaining and minor fangirling out of the way. What else is there really to talk about? I guess I liked Yu’s display of Persona this episode. I don’t think I ever use any of the ones he summoned, but it’s good to know that all of the Social Links he formed are paying off. …I’m just dreading the day that he summons Mara (if he ever does). …Yet, at the same time, I really want to see what kind of screencap OC would come up with if/when he does. (You hear that OC? The pressure is on! xD) …I can’t believe that this only has 6 or so episodes left. Time just flies.

Preview: Looks like it’s Dojima and Nanako back story time. …Wait. Are they skipping over the cultural festival?! PERSONA, IF THERE IS ONE THING YOU EVER DO FOR ME, ADD IN THE CULTURAL FESTIVAL.

About Tag Team

We live, laugh, enjoy and strictly believe on "more the merrier". When together, we usually come up with very chatty, conversation-based episodics and interesting posts.