English Dub Review: Sakura Quest “The Mansion in Purgatory”

They say you can never go home again, but the shadows of the past still speak.

Spoilers Below

Sanae’s tongue-lashing did Maki a world of good. She’s reporting in to help now, but she’s too late to fill in for the missing actress. Instead, shy little Ririko has taken the bit part, and is so nervous, she’s flubbing all of her lines. Maki steps in between takes with a bit of advice, and the introvert performs naturally. The next day, new problems pop up. Rain in the forecast means that shooting has to switch to all the indoor scenes. The twenty children they needed for the mini-zombie were booked for the next day, and the switch is infeasible. At the same time, they still have to track down a house to burn down. While Maki calls her brother to get the kids, Yoshino calls some people. One of those was the owners of the original house the director wanted, and they’re confused. They already gave Shiori permission. On a hunch, Yoshino heads to the house to find Shiori reminiscing. A kind old woman lived here, and she had many fond memories of her. Yoshino chews her out for clinging to the past, jeopardizing a movie that could save the town. Shiori doesn’t take it so well, and runs.

Maki’s brother comes through on the kids. An entire gym full of the little monsters. He didn’t do it alone, though. Maki’s estranged father activated the emergency phone tree to get them all there. He also has a present for her. A video he shot of her playing as a tree in Snow White. He focused so much on her, you barely saw the other children. He actually got scolded by the principal for that. This sparks a trip down memory lane for her, remembering all the steps she took in her life to get to being an actress. It bolsters her resolve, reminding her that she loved acting. That’s good, because the eccentric director has a new change to the final scenes. He wants the heroine to charge into the burning building after her lover. Nobody on the crew (or the company) want to endanger the lead actress. Maki steps up, volunteering as Moe’s stunt double. The scene goes off without a hitch, and the mansion burns to the ground. As the wrap is underway, Shiori stares in silence at the building until the director’s assistant comes up to her. Yoshino petitioned to have the old woman who had lived in the house be thanked in the credits. The director agrees with the plan wholeheartedly, and Shiori’s fond memories will be honored forever.

I have to say, this series has a great plot structure for its episodes. While stories happen in two-episode arcs, they are far from single-plot stories. The main plot exists, but also sparks internal conflict for two of the main girls. This way, you see the main plot through the eyes of their struggle, rather than from a simple narrative or single person perspective. This keeps the storytelling fresh throughout the episode. Just as one person’s story starts to run long, it switches over to the other person, or the main plot presents a new wrinkle that shifts both stories. We also get to see different circles of people because they are in one character’s life, but not another’s. Since we focus on two characters per arc, we don’t have a massive amount of character plot being woven from episode to episode to keep track. You could pick up the series at the beginning of any arc and not be lost.

My favorite scene of this episode was the mini-party the girls threw at the end. The animation was superb, and the characters let their true selves fly. It was a bit more of a warm, intimate look at this group of friends. It was also hilarious to see drunk Yoshino and Shiori. The former was funny, and the latter had so much character to her that it made me wish I was there to drink with them. I also liked the scene where some of the mini-zombies were taunting Sanae. Her reaction, as well as Ririko’s, was cute, though I was wondering where the adult supervision had gone to. Little boys should not be getting away with spanking a woman and chanting “big butt” at her.

There is plenty of good animation and art in this episode, and the voice acting was loaded with depth. It wasn’t perfectly synced at all times, but they got close enough most of the time, so it’s more than passable. I enjoyed Leah Clark and Tia Ballard as they poured out heart from these characters. You get to see a wide range from them over the episode, and all of it perfectly relatable. Beyond the amazing animation from the party scene, there are plenty of instances where they worked hard to make the character animation relay emotion well. An example would be Ririko’s performance, where you can almost see what is going on in her head as she acts it out. It’s a great episode in all, so I give this episode nine casas en fuego out of ten.