English Dub Review: SUPER HxEROS “The Two Kiraras”

Overview (Spoilers Below)

The Tokyo HxEROS crew is excited to show the Saitama branch around Akihabara. Shiko suggests the group split up based on highest to lowest H-energy, but Kirara is too embarrassed to reveal such sensitive information. Instead, they end up playing rock-paper-scissors, with the resulting group of Retto, Sora, and Maihime being shown around by Toma and Yona, while Momoka and Kirara are left with Shiko and Moena. Shiko blames Kirara for separating both of them from Retto, while Moena tells Momoka they’re headed to a secret place she believes the Saitama members have been dying to see (it’s a sex shop, of course.) Meanwhile, organized Yona takes her group to an owl cafe, where they spot a fluffy feathered pair that looks shockingly like our figurative lovebirds, Retto and Kirara. Momoka is enjoying her jaunt at the sex shop, which Moena explains only has gag gifts on the first floor, while “the good stuff” is sold higher up. An embarrassed Kirara flees the scene, only to have Shiko follow her, surprise her with an, ahem, “mushroom” toy, and state her intent to pursue Retto outright. As for Yona’s group, they’re following their owls encounter with a trip to the arcade. Sora and Maihime take on enemies in a shooting game, while a VR “studying” experience catches Retto’s eye. Yona pushes him to try it, and follows him into the room, with the goal of providing a more tactile experience. She reveals, well, everything, physically, but also the emotional reasons for her pursuing him so boldly (a combination of Shiko misleading her about how handsy the Saitama branch is, as well as wanting to shed her “good girl” image, which has followed her even into this more sexual job.) She apologizes to Retto for the misunderstanding, but lets him know that if he didn’t have feelings for another girl, she’d give her a run for her money. The group disbands for the day, but Retto gets lost while searching for a restroom. Instead of finding Sora and Maihime, who he left with, he ends up heading back home with Kirara. The two want to confront their feelings after the events of the day, but nearly miss their stop in the process. While scrambling to get off the train, Kirara loses her hair pin, which she always wears, but can’t quite remember where she got it from. Retto wants to retrieve it, and asks the conductor to let them search once the train reaches the end of the line. But why is he so concerned? It turns out, the gift was symbolic of the first time he confessed his feelings toward Kirara, even if his initial note was set up to be a bit of a prank. Kirara said she’d always treasure his gift, and she did, even though she didn’t remember the promise. Retto reflects on the conductor’s advice towards him that this is one of those times when the man has to take the lead, and suggests the two of them take a taxi home.

Our take

While anime makes most things look incomparably impressive compared to real life (looking at you, food in Miyazaki movies!) this depiction of Akihabara is one instance where it falls short. I understand not making every scene as crowded as the real places are to reduce strain on the animators, but the buildings and especially the arcades are waaay more impressive than these scenes make them seem. Again, I realize the true purpose of these scenes are to fast track us to the attempted encounter between Retto and Yona, but seriously, there’s WAY more to Japanese arcades (particularly in this neighborhood) than weird, semi-private VR experiences that double as hookup rooms.

Since there’s a few possible interpretations of “The Two Kiraras” in this show so far, I wasn’t sure if it would be another Chacha-centric episode, or if we’d get another visit from the manifestation of our protagonist’s desires in the form of her younger self, and somewhat unfortunately, it’s the latter.

Thankfully, it’s just a brief moment with this weird loli angel/devil on her shoulder following the encounter with Shiko, before we’re treated to a far more wholesome moment with the flashback to Retto gifting Kirara her hairpin as a “proposal”/birthday gift. While I don’t quite understand how writing “battle me” to look like “marry me” is a prank (what if she had read it the other way and came to fight, bro? what then?) I’m willing to write that off as more of an example of how kids are bad at pranks rather than a serious plot hole. While the entire series has been set up for these two to eventually end up together, this kind of interaction is genuinely sweet and shows that they’ve always cared for each other, instead of just had weird…um…”urges” towards each other.

At this point, the show is just teasing us about the new HxERO gear and outfits from the main sequence, but they’ll surely make their appearance in the next few episodes. There’s also no action in this episode, or mention of the Kisechuu at all, beyond Chacha using them as way to wake up an asleep-at-his-desk Anno, but presumably the villains will be back at their nefarious schemes the next time we tune in. In addition to our team’s “final forms”, as it were, we seem to be closing in on Kirara reckoning with her past, unlocking her suppressed personality and memories, and likely releasing her full power as an HxERO as a result.

Overall, this week’s offering was pretty tame compared to the rest of the series, but still managed to move things slowwwly forward to the finale, which truly can’t come fast enough.