AND DA AND Episode 6 Review — Totally Nuts
This week’s episode of AND DA AND presented the second episode of a new arc following the defeat of Turbo Granny and a celebratory crab dinner. Last week’s episode was probably my favorite of the season from a slice-of-life and emotional perspective; it combined the universal feelings of teenage angst and yearning with the attempts of two people to connect both emotionally and in terms of location. The music, voice acting, and direction were impressive to the point that I (and plenty of others) found themselves practically begging for Momo and Okarun to find each other and resolve the awkwardness of the episode, a testament to how well it communicated the emotions it sought to deliver to the viewer.
This week’s episode is a bit different and has a new combination of settings and events for AND DA AND. Now that we’ve moved on from the initial conflicts against wayward aliens and Turbo Granny, the story is taking place a lot more in its initial location: the school. Personally, I love schools as a setting for fantasy; the contrast between the normal things like classrooms and uninvolved characters contrasts nicely with things like special powers or in this case the occult. Simultaneously, like with last week, elements of the story that don’t have any fantastical parts can shine in a familiar place.
That being said, Episode 6 had some action as well. The different combination of settings was the mixture of these things with the school setting, the (more proper) introduction of a new character, and the beginning of a more episodic pace within a broader goal: finding Okarun’s balls.
Spoilers ahead for AND DA AND episode 6
Beauty and a Beast
After an initial attempt at searching for Okarun’s balls by him, Momo, and Turbo Granny (who provided some nice context for why people or yokai are likely to have picked them up), we move to the school and get treated to one of my favorite parts of the episode: Okarun (1) realizing that he’s attracted to Momo and (2) confronting some other students while manifesting Turbo Granny’s power. The first bit of it was just precious. I’m glad the anime gave us a little window into his thoughts and conflicting emotions as he simultaneously thinks about whether he finds her cute and instinctively wants to prioritize and protect a newfound friendship. For the second part, I was incredibly impressed with the voice acting. Both the sub and the English dub (if you haven’t checked out the dub, do give it a chance, the voice actors in both versions are performing incredibly) actors for Okarun did a remarkable job sliding from Okarun’s normal voice to his ghostly, Turbo-Granny-influenced voice while mixing frustration and anger into both. His transformations are always cool, and this is the second time we’ve seen this power manifest from feelings of anger, but the emotions immediately preceding it made things a touch more personal in a great way. Separately, his little slide away after meeting Momo in the hallway following this confrontation is the best scene in the episode.
Shortly before and immediately after the opening, we get an introduction to Aira Shiratori, the resident fake personality nice girl of AND DA AND. I always appreciate these types of characters for the sole reason that their overapplied facades are always so easy to see through for a viewer but not at all easy to see through for characters in the series, almost like we’re in on a not-so-well-kept secret. Like the early phases of series like YuYu Hakusho and BLEACHAira’s introduction also exposes that others outside of the initial core characters can and will be awakened to spiritual powers, expanding the cast and adding some more character traits to the wacky mix. Her main character syndrome exposition was hilarious, especially with the foreknowledge that what she thinks is some golden ball is actual just a…well, human one.
A Quick Phase 1 Fight
The second half of the episode features Aira’s attempts to perform a half-baked exorcism on Momo and a subsequent fight against a new spirit, this one targeting Aira and ultimately our main duo once they end up interfering with it. While there was action and some exciting scenes featuring both Momo and Okarun’s powers in this half of the episode, the star of it was honestly Turbo Granny. I wasn’t sure how I would feel about her presence in this cat form within AND DA ANDbut she’s proven to be a hilarious addition to the cast and steals the scenes where she talks or just gets to move around in the beckoning cat doll’s body.
As for the fight itself, it was well choreographed with without question the most acrobatic character we’ve seen on screen so far. Like with Turbo Granny, this yokai made use of warm colors, this time a shade of magenta rather than the deep red that we’d grown used to. What this fight exposed most to me was that, despite having much better control over their respective powers than before, Momo and Okarun are still relatively weak even compared to a yokai that we learned is relatively low on the hierarchy in comparison to Turbo Granny. It made me wonder how much of their victory against her was tied to luck, her penchant for being provoked, and the opportunity to use seals and power via Seiko. This fight wasn’t as fantastic as what we got in Episode 4, but it was a solid start to one and one that I’m sure we’ll see more from next week.
Overall, this was an excellent episode. Episode 4 featured a lot of action with little focus on the slice of life and romantic elements while 5 was the exact opposite. This episode mixed elements of both to achieve a balance that I’m hoping we’ll keep going forward. Moreover, now that we’ve moved on from the initial saga of the series, I’m looking forward to more widespread smaller-scale confrontations like this one so that we can keep learning more about the aliens and ghosts of AND DA AND and expand our cast of characters even more.
© Yukinobu Tatsu/SHUEISHA/DANDADAN Production Committee
