English Dub Review: Sakura Quest “The Dawn Guild”

Get ready, this show is about to get meta.

Spoilers Below

Courtesy: Funimation

The Manoyama Tourism Board just got a big break! A major television network wants to film a reality show in the town. “Moving Mountains” is all about small towns being rejuvenated by the efforts of their people to draw visitors in. The girls got the show’s attention from the mascot contest a while back. This comes at a fortuitous time. The Kingdom of Chupacabra is about to have its 20th-anniversary bash! Of course, as this is a reality show, there’s tons of behind-the-scenes footage of the girls making things work. They aren’t very comfortable behind the camera and are coming off stiff and fake. Maki coaches them, snapping them out of their nerves and getting them back to the task at hand. They have to make this festival work. It won’t be easy. They have to get food vendors out there, for one. Good luck getting the Board of Merchants to help you with that. Second, they’re planning a trivia contest, with the prize being a trip to Guam. Unfortunately, the cost of printing fliers for the event took up too much of their budget, and they can’t afford it. They don’t even have enough people to control parking! As they go about the arduous task of making this all work, the cameras roll “talking heads” footage, asking about each minister’s history, role, and relationship with Yoshino. When he gets through it all, the director has only one problem: Yoshino. Her story is just too plain. She was there by accident and has been making the best of the situation. She’s just… normal. This cuts her to the core, bringing up feelings of failure and incompetence. It shakes her faith in herself. At first, Yoshino and her friends think that they should tell the director about her story of having been crowned queen as a child, and how this made her feel special her whole life. How this small event foreshadowed her return to become a real queen (of tourism). Ultimately, they decide he doesn’t deserve it.

Courtesy: Funimation

The next day, the director jumps in with a big announcement. He believes in this event so much that he pulled some strings, getting a popular band to do a publicity show for the network right there at Manoyama! At first, the team balks at this grandiose gesture. They aren’t sure how it’s going to work. With no crew to staff parking and no guarantee the vendors will play ball, this could all flop hard. The director gets angry… no, Shiori put it best. He’s passionate. Manoyama was his home town, too. He wants this to succeed, but if they aren’t bold, they’re going to fade away. His passion gives Yoshino the drive to call a meeting of the Board of Merchants and the Community Club. She begs for their assistance. At first, the businesses and clubs turn her down. How could they afford to do all this? Shouldn’t they just do what they have to their means? Fortunately, the prize for the trivia contest is vastly downgraded to 500 yen worth of discount coupons. With Yoshino’s new found bravery, she imparts the same passion the director shared with her back on the people, and everyone agrees to work together to make this a reality. Not for the Kingdom of Chupacabra, but for Manoyama. That night, Yoshino is woken up by Maki and Sanae. Something is happening out by the palace. Tons of people are camped out outside the building, trying to get good spots for the event. This looks like things are going to get crazy!

I have to say, this episode was a pleasure to watch. It made so many sideways jokes about the show itself that I couldn’t stop laughing. The script writing was incredible, loaded with wit and style. While this show has made its bread and butter on the warmth of its characters’ soul, this is where those characters choose to leap off the screen to become even more real. Not in anything over the top, but by how they react to the cameras, even when they are more comfortable with them. It was also good to see at the end how everyone in the town was initially against the requested aid. This was a discussion, not wish fulfillment. The turn around started with one or two, but after Mrs. Oribe throws her weight on Yoshino’s side, things fall into place. She solves the problem in a very professional manner. I enjoy watching her sometimes, in her two sides of a crotchety old curmudgeon and a wise, confident businesswoman.

Visually, there is a ton of little subtleties in how the characters move. I could prattle on about this till the cows come home, but if you’ve been following my reviews of the series, you know what I’m talking about. This episode focused hard on those subtleties, making sure that each character came to life when they were in front of the camera. The voice acting kept pace with the writing and added such amazing timing to lines that they were hilarious, yet true to life and how people talk. For example, in the scene to the left, Ririko has decided to wear a Kitsune mask during the team meeting, because she is on camera. Leah Clark’s Maki leads straight from getting people moving to telling Ririko to take it off. Her timing is spot on, and her delivery of the line comes off as embarrassed, frustrated, and yet, professional. Later, the camera crew talks to Brina Palencia’s Ririko about her position with the tourism board, and she launches into a diatribe about the Mothman. It was the perfect blend of her monotonous speech patterns and balls-to-the-walls geekery that made it shocking… and hilarious when the scene cut in the middle of it. The voice acting crew did great work on this episode, and I appreciate it. That earns this episode nine 500 yen discount coupons out of ten. Don’t go spending them all in one place.

SCORE
9.0/10