Recap: With the new rules in place, both Mizusawa and Hokuo are guaranteed to get into the championship tournament. However, Chihaya isn’t satisfied with just that. With Hokuo’s only decent person Retro in agreement, the matches end up completely even. Can Mizusawa win against an equal match?

This episode is moving a little bit slower than your average Chihayafuru. This is mostly since the entire first half was dedicated to the philosophies behind playing to win or playing for skill. Our ever-lovable Chiahaya delivers another crazy pep talk laying down the pressure. She wants to be #1 in Japan, and how can she do that if they start to lose now? Chiming in to support her, Sumire’s efforts didn’t go to waste, as her eavesdropping on Amakasu really fires up the three most vulnerable players. I’ll admit him calling Kana “Boobie Girl” was almost hilariously offensive, but I suppose that speaks well to Chihayafuru’s character design that the girl singled out for being chesty is still a reasonably proportioned person.

It’s almost funny, by the way he looks and the way he talks, Retro could easily been a character written for the audience to hate. Despite that, hes shown to have more honor and dignity than all the other players on his team combined, and throughout the show you really start to respect him. In a way he’s like a mirror of Taichi, skilled, proud, but also just not able to get strong enough to break through to the next level. I’m really excited to see the rest of this matchup as a win by Taichi would go a long ways to help bolster his confidence in the long run.

Still, as fun as it was to see Sudo back, I find his entire presence very unfair. Shouldn’t their be some kind of impartiality to the reader? It seems hardly fair to allow a guy who went to the school just a year prior to read for a match with his old team. Hopefully this will only be a minor advantage. Chihaya has grown greatly as a player, and I doubt this will affect her deciding matchup against Amakasu. That guy is insultingly laid back so he really is due for a good smackdown. Hopefully Chihaya’s playing in this episode is more indicative of her simply trying out new styles, and now knowing what she needs to do she’ll finally gain the upper hand.

For a lot of sports shows I kinda hate when they leave us right as things are getting good, but for once I’m really pumped about it. Idno if I’ve ever said anything about it but the music in this show is fantastic and really gets you in the mood for a good match. I imagine the whole next episode will be devoted to this epic if unnecessary fight. Komano’s been stuck in the background for the most part this tournament, so I hope we get to see how his match is going, and can’t wait to see Kana crush that douchebag. Seriously, it’s not nice but at least Amakasu called her that in passing, who goes and calls a girl that kind of thing to her face. Go Mizusawa!