English Dub Review: Hinamatsuri “Life Is About Survival”

The ninth episode of Hinamatsuri transports us from the big city to a tiny island while forgoing our main characters to focus on someone new.

Overview (Spoilers Below):

Life Is About Survival opens with a bang by introducing a brand new super-powered child who has become stranded on a deserted island. Over the course of many, many days, Mao learns how to survive on her own – with a little help from a couple coconuts!

Meanwhile back in the big city, Nitta is on a mission to ease the transition of power in the mob. Unfortunately, Hina wreaks havoc with the plan, and he winds up getting promoted (and almost becoming the new head of the family!). Hina throws a party in her own special style to celebrate.

Our Take:

Well, I’m pretty sure this is an episode that only a show like Hinamatsuri could manage to pull off. We spend almost 10 minutes with a never-before-seen character. Moreover, this is pretty much solo screen time, which means she doesn’t really even get to interact with anyone besides the coconuts she keeps around for company.

Life Is About Survival subverted my expectations at once by showing how adept Mao is at wilderness survival – powers sure do come in handy for things like catching fish and starting fires. Instead of the depressing beginning I anticipated, Mao’s segment starts off happily enough (framing her stranded status as merely a ‘vacation’), but slowly morphs into revealing her inner struggles with staying upbeat regardless of her dire circumstances.

Mao is an easy protagonist to root for – she keeps up a positive attitude despite her uncertain position. We don’t necessarily learn much about her in a typical way since she has no one to play off of or introduce herself to apart from her imaginary coconut friends. Still, people are often their most honest selves when they’re alone, so we can infer that Mao is a genuinely good-hearted and imaginative soul. She actually reminds me a lot of Jeliza Rose, the main protagonist from Terry Gilliam’s strange and controversial movie ‘Tideland‘.(Definitely check it out if you haven’t before!) Basically, Jeliza Rose also constructs imaginary friends who serve to voice the concerns of her sub-conscience.

The other portion of the episode deals with Nitta’s life in the Yakuza. I’ve been a bit curious about why the show hasn’t leaned into this interesting character background more often, so I was glad to see more of Nitta’s gang-related drama. I felt like the plot dragged a bit in the middle – the joke about Nitta becoming the leader is fun, but not super clever or unexpected. At least Hina’s party scene in the finale serves to lighten the mood in what has become Hinamatsuri’s calling card: hilariously absurd.

The dub this week brings in a new actress to voice Mao. Despite having no previous knowledge of her character, she does a very respectable job bringing genuine emotion to Mao’s plight. I really had to feel for this poor girl who hates being alone getting stuck on an uninhabited island. (The fact that she is friends with Anzu and Hina helps us feel more familiar with her, too.)

All in all, the ninth episode of Hinamatsuri shows off much of what makes this show so special and enjoyable. Mao is an exciting and relatable character who also brings a unique sense of imaginative humor to the cast. Nitta and his conflict of raising a little girl while being heavily involved in the Japanese mafia is something that I haven’t seen before. And that’s one of the reasons I love Hinamatsuri – it takes characters I care about and puts them in outrageous situations for optimal comedy.