Mawaru Penguindrum – 03
Want some milk with your curry?
Yeesh… a busy weekend behind, another one ahead of me with tag posts and podcasts and Catherine to very soon be inside my PS3. Last week, I borrowed Revolutionary Girl Utena (a rather popular work from Kunihiko Ikuhara, director of this very series) from a friend and am up to just episode 3 at the moment. I’m really enjoying it in the early going and definitely do sense some similarities between it and Penguindrum. Utena is love; I fell so quickly for her character.
Alright, let’s see what Penguindrum is cooking us up for this week…
The episode starts off in a underwater submerged-esque scene of Ringo’s home, giving way to the show’s core plot point: curry. On the 20th of each month, the Oginome family enjoys curry. However, this October 20th, Ringo’s mom must leave for a work meeting, leaving Ringo alone to make a delicious curry for her Mr. Tabuki.
Seizon SenrMOOOOOOOOOOOO!
Seizon Senryaku doesn’t play out the same as the past couple of episodes. Sho and Kan question the illusion that Himari’s hat is using on them. To prove that she’s legit, hat-posessed Himari dresses as a cow and chugs down milk, which apparently Himari could not drink before. The brothers amazed but not 100% sold, Himari shuts the system down as her hat falls off and she falls over as dead as she was during episode one. Kan puts the hat back on her, Sho falls thru the trap for the 3rd episode in a row, and Seizon Senryaku is initiated once more.
Looking for more clues, Sho and Kan go to Ringo’s home and Kan picks the lock to sneak in. Kan goes in Ringo’s bedroom along with #1, but they really don’t seem to find anything (save some panties) before Ringo comes home and they have to hide behind the couch as Ringo makes her curry for Mr. Tabuki.
A flashback scene shows the moment that Ringo took fascination with Tabuki as he once visited her house to eat curry nearing high school graduation.
Thus explains Ringo’s stalkery ways. He sparkles!
Sho’s stomach growling at the smell of curry almost gives them away, but not noticing the brother’s presence, Ringo sits on the couch and looks at her diary. Her mentioning of the word “fate” gains Sho’s curiosity.
Don’t sneeze, Shouma!
Bringing along her curry, Ringo (with Sho and Kan tailing her) hops on the train and goes to Mr. Tabuki’s house. Her fantasy of him loving her curry takes a wrong turn as a woman answers the door, leaving Sho and Kan intrigued by the “stalker meeting the girlfriend.” The woman (Tokikago Yuri) and Ringo talk a bit, and as she realizes that dinner, no less curry, is already being prepared, Ringo tries to figure a way to have Tabuki eat her curry. When Tabuki arrives back home, Ringo’s last resort is to grab the incredibly hot curry pot and switch it out with her own pot and then run away. Fabulous Max.
Ringo’s reaction on both sides is hilarious…
…only to be succeeded by her attempt to switch out pots
As Ringo walks home convincing herself that everything went according to plan, Himari is walking home, once more upset about her brothers skipping school. As a mean cat carrying a fish was running away from Ringo earlier, it runs into #3 “Threetie” who does a spin move that throws the cat into an electrical pole. The cat and Threetie fight over the piece of fish, and Threetie rolls into Ringo. The pot of curry she was holding flies in the air and pretty much all of it lands on Ringo’s face. Tough luck there, sis.
The brothers fear the scorn of their sister, and arrive home late to a most surprising situation; that Ringo would be joining them for a dinner of Honey Apple Curry. Jrow is hungry… anywhos, Kan basically straight up asks if Ringo’s day was all keikaku doori-y. She admits that thing’s didn’t go just as planned, but that everything went according to the writing. It’s a diary because it’s personal and you don’t want anyone to know about it. Also, you and the brothers have never really met each other.
“Hey guys, heard ya like Curry…”
The closing scene of episode 3 shows Ringo sending a text to her mom about having curry with friends, but that she thinks it’s the best at home. She pulls out her diary, which reads (based off of [gg]’s subtitles): “I went to Tabuki’s home and ate my homemade curry together. Tabuki smiled like a child. I saw a cat that made an evil look on the way home. It was scary.”, stamping Destiny to close out the day and episode 3.
Weekly Marching of the Penguins:
The Takakura’s save up to $300 on Terminex fees with the Penguin Exterminators
Shouldn’t have tried to down them all at once, #2
Yeah… Guys, c’mon… you just gonna let a Pengi starve like that?
Ringo’s Reading Diary Time
Penguindrum Moral Lesson #3: Shower before you go to a Con
All they wants is some fishies
End Thoughts:
Last week, I had claimed Ringo’s diary to be a “self-proclaimed” future, and while that hasn’t been fully answered yet, it does seem like Ringo spins the day’s events so that what’s written still holds truth. She didn’t eat the curry together with him; there’s no mention of the Takakura siblings. He only smiled like a child when Yuri (Noto Mamiko) was with him at the door. The cat making a face was the really only accurate statement in her diary. While the diary was such a focus of discussion after last week’s episode, I do ponder the possibility that it could be just a huge misdirect into making us think there’s significance to her diary, but I ultimately feel it’s wrong not to purchase stock in the diary leading towards the Penguin Drum. Maybe too much value is being placed in it.
Seizon Senryaku (Penguin’s version of Utena’s Zettai Unmei Mokushiroku) did some more funny and interesting things this week then just using recycled animation with new dialogue. It had, out of nowhere, Himari dress as a cow! And it was pretty surreal to see the system suddenly shut down and Himari once more fall over. I do like this week that Sho and Kan acknowledged their presence in the “illusion” and that really the only borrowed scenes are the train ride and Himari’s poses. More imaginative stuff like that will make Survival Strategy fun each week.
The penguins were more background humor this week as, despite doing more funny things, focus was placed much more heavily on the dialogue between the brothers as they were sneaking around Ringo trying to figure out more about the Penguin Drum. I was a bit disappointed that, after #2 holding in all those plums, that we didn’t get to see some sort of implication that he puked them out for added grossness. I still feel a little weird about the whole idea of the Pengis being invisible. It concerned me how in episode 2 only Ringo had any reaction to one of the penguin’s movements, but not noticing that there are plates on the floor with food being eaten from them? I guess I shouldn’t put too much stock in it, or I’m supposed to notice that and question why she isn’t confused by extra food on the floor.
I wanna take a look at the smaller things from this episode. First, the conversation between Ringo’s friend about the guy who dumped Asami Kuho, mentioning that it’s the hottie (Kanba) from the train. Kanba’s not just any guy, apparently good-looking enough to score models. The train’s animation this week was about washing up a smelly person as a couple businessmen discussed the smell of the curry on the train. And another scene showed Kanba putting the family photos face down before they began eating dinner, implying some sort of moral issue that Kanba felt toward the situation at hand.
Episode 4 Preview:
Expect more toilet humor on next week’s Penguindrum episode. Also, this penguin won’t be walking alone much longer. Stay tuned!
About Jrow
Produces the MetaVerse podcast. Also plays games and watches sports of all sorts. Is an actual Pirate King.
POWUH: Meta Team and The Mad Scientist with 5525 comments
The penguins did feel a lot more like the backdrop this time around. They’re still so cute though, especially Himari’s penguin XD
Ringo is crazy, but I love her. I wonder if she has some sort of unrefined psychic skills. Enough to have a rough guestimate of how each day will go, but not enough to…say…know her crush has a girlfriend? For the most part she seems to twist the day to day events to suit her journal, but there’s only so much you can make up.
…unless I’m underestimating how delusional she is. Hurrr.
POWUH: 1100-1199 and Meta's Evil rice-flour Product with 1137 comments
I think it’s the other way round, whatever is written IN the diary, becomes destined to happen, hence all this fate and hating fate and destiny mumbo jumbo
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
Unrefined (or rookie-level) is one way to put it. It is at least showing somewhat more advanced predictions then if me or you went to an IRL “psychic” and they went on about their nonsense and being incredibly vague about what’ll happen to me today.
POWUH: and Yaoi Fangirl~ with 2320 comments
yeah, I’m starting to have doubts on the speculation that the diary is the penguin drum. OR maybe what’s written in the diary can come true, but it doesn’t have to go according to the writer’s way.
Such as, the teacher did ate Ringo’s curry in the end, and he obviously is happy about is since he’s eating it with his gf. Ringo didn’t mention anything about the teacher eating the curry WITH her. she just said that the teacher LIKES her curry.
POWUH: 1100-1199 and Meta's Evil rice-flour Product with 1137 comments
AARRRGHHH MONKEY HAND WISHES!
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
I’d like to see an episode where we actually start off with a reading of her diary, and then watch things unfold. It would be very interesting to spot how things are played out.
The part about her eating curry “together” is so wildly vague that it puts doubt in my mind about Ringo’s ability to tell the future (or at least her own). That’s where I personally draw the line on how Ringo kinda rationalizes that it went to plan.
POWUH: Meta Team and PreCure Mastah with 9203 comments
This was so awesome this week! Ringo’s expressions are right up there with Nichijou styled expressions. I figured the teacher already had a girlfriend I was waiting for that to happen! But yeahhhh she is extreme!
And of course the Penguins always the best highlight of the episodes for me lately, and lol @ The flypaper xD
Himari in cow suit YES!
POWUH: 1100-1199 and Meta's Evil rice-flour Product with 1137 comments
daaang,as if a weirdo birdwatcher/teacher/nerd could score someone like that!
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
I saw the flypaper stuff with #1 in the episode and went, “lol, funny”, and then once I uploaded the image into the blog, I was LMAO. Could be my favorite image from the series so far. I just love him standing in front of the water. xD
Himari in a cow suit will be a nice cosplay addition for girls. Extra clothing to strip off!
POWUH: Metanorn Regular with 79 comments
It’s nice to get a better look at Ringo this week, since it looks like she’ll become an important character. I liked the curry = affection theme of the episode, and it certainly explained a whole lot about Ringo. I only wonder what’s going to come of Ringo and Himari meeting up and becoming friends. And what was with Himari’s hair this week?
The diary sure is odd, isn’t it? I’m sure there’s something special about it, but it doesn’t seem quite as omniscient as Ringo would like. Maybe Ringo is delusional, or perhaps she’s just seeing what she wants to in the diary. I guess we’ll have to wait until Thursday to get more information on this.
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
It is interesting with Ringo/Himari becoming friends since, even though we separate Himari from her possessed form, Himari is still sending her brothers to lurk around Ringo.
Yeah… damn diary. Making me think and giving me doubts and so on. fff… I tried to think of the concept of Ringo being clever and maybe writing it in a certain way to intentionally be able to spin it true, but her excitement of knocking on Mr. Tabuki’s door tells me she wanted so much more and just goes, “yeah, I guess it went that way.”
POWUH: 1100-1199 and Meta's Evil rice-flour Product with 1137 comments
officially my favourate of this season, oh god i love this, dairy is so obviously the penguindrum, whatever a penguindrum is, recurring theme of fate and stuff seems to be the order of the day. Oh and. penguins. Lots of penguins
POWUH: 400-499 with 489 comments
ohhhhhhhh i thought i was the only one that thought that ringo’s
deathnotediary was the penguindrumPOWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
I personally don’t subscribe to the diary being the actual Penguin Drum. Why not an actual drum? Or that tuxedo-looking penguin we see in the opening?
The penguins are really funny! And seeing next week’s preview has me thinking they’ll get to do some super funny things.
POWUH: 1100-1199 and Meta's Evil rice-flour Product with 1137 comments
Actually, we could be set up for the biggest troll of our lives…remember Hat Himari said…”probably”…
POWUH: Meta Team and Ringleader Extraordinaire~ with 6433 comments
I will take you up on that one. There are still characters that have not been introduced. It can’t be the diary necessarily. We’ll have to see.
POWUH: 1100-1199 and Meta's Evil rice-flour Product with 1137 comments
yeah i saw that on the wiki article, lots of undescribed but listed seiyuus
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
Probably. Probably not.
Even Hat Himari who we think of as the most wise toward the topic doesn’t truly know.
POWUH: iLurker with 1 comments
Pity Ringo wasn’t thinking clearly enough to just ask if there was room for another person at the table and 33% more curry in their stomachs*. Does it ever pay to antagonize the love rival? Though I guess in this case there was DESTINY to consider.
Did Boushi-sama have a purpose for this episode’s Survival Strategy meeting aside from repeating “Yeah, your job’s still the same”? Seems like a lot of trouble to go to. Questioning Boushi-sama’s existence as a separate entity seems a little out of nowhere, given what it’s done, but it meant getting to see the utter “what?” of the cow suit and another appearance of Shoma’s I-HAVE-THE-CUTEST-LITTLE-SISTER-EVER face. Will we ever get to see the end of one of these? Or where that trap door goes? Or what they look like from the outside?
Breaking and entering, complete with lockpicking and gloves. Kanba really is a player character, isn’t he?
I like Ringo’s turtleneck.
Is Himari’s health improving? We haven’t seen her go out on her own before. Maybe she’ll go back to school later in the series?
*(2/3)/(1/2) = 4/3; if each pot contains 6 units of curry, adding Ringo and her pot means each person gets 4 units instead of 3.
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
I think with Boushi’s 3rd appearance, the brothers have now adjusted to this new realm and could finally formulate a thought about their surroundings.
I don’t think we’ll see the bottom of the trap door. It’s probably the Sarlacc Pit, who knows…
The turtleneck does look nice, and fits her character type kind of well.
I’d like to see Himari back in class also. Give her an opportunity to do something funny with Threetie.