English Dub Review: Dagashi Kashi “Beigoma, Reminiscence, and…”

Beigoma, let it rip!

Overview (Spoilers Below)

Tou and Kokonotsu are hanging out at the town temple when Hotaru arrives from out of nowhere (Per the usual) to help them play with a traditional Japanese toy called a “Beigoma.” She whips out a plastic barrel, flips it upside down, and removes her skirt (Cool your jets, she’s got another underneath) to put over it as a cover. The game of Beigoma is basically traditional Japanese Beyblades; you take a top wound up with some rope, pull the rope to release its tension and spin it out onto the cover to try and knock out the other pieces. They play around, leaving Hotaru in defeat, but she decides to kick things up a notch for the next round. Revealing her most powerful Beigoma top, she declares that the winner of the next match will get to tell the loser what to do, which she plans to use to tell Kokonotsu to take over running his father’s convenience store. Saya shows up at the last minute and asks if she can play, which naturally they oblige. The fight between the tops is fierce, but it comes down to Hotaru vs. Saya. Saya eventually knocks Hotaru’s top out into the bushes, making her the winner, but also making everyone have to dig around in the bushes to find Hotaru’s top. As they search around the area, Kokonotsu accidentally gets a view of Hotaru bent over in the grass, and is immediately punished by Saya with a quick foot stomping.

The second tale in this week’s episode is a flashback to a young Hotaru. At an old man’s convenience store, tiny Hotaru comes in every day and criticizes the old man’s setup, before lecturing on about snack food to the old man. I guess some things never change. Initially, she aggravates the old man, but he warms up to her when he senses her powerful interest in snack food history. The two start to get along, and Hotaru asks the old man why she never sees any customers in the store. The old man laments that maybe kids just aren’t interested in dagashi anymore; Hotaru, smiling, says she’ll come back every day, and buys some candy, telling the old man to “keep the change.”

Back to the present: Hotaru stands in the vacant lot where the old man’s store used to be. Wistfully, she stares off in the distance, reflecting on the past. As she walks down the street, she calls Kokonotsu and tells him that she loves Shigara Dagashi, smiling all the way.

Our Take:

I quite enjoyed this episode, mostly for its second half. The Beigoma story was mildly amusing but didn’t really allow the cast to express themselves enough to make for good character comedy. The second story, however, was a nice little insight into Hotaru’s character, fleshing out her life a bit more and taking her wacky obsession with snack food and turning it on its head to make it more of a life’s passion. Hotaru is basically the star of the show, as usual, and anything that gives her more depth is fine by me.