Recap: Kirino brings home her boyfriend for the Comiket after party, much to the dismay of Kyousuke and her father. Caught in the crossfire is Kuroneko, who is ready to put an end to the tension.

Jel’s Thoughts: DRAMA! This episode tries to weave together the various relationship threads this season has been establishing, but in reality it just rolls them up in a ball and throws it at our face. The thing is, I actually think this arc of the story could have been pretty interesting. Whether it’s the overprotective older sibling or the younger sibling jealous for attention, I don’t think a little tension is uncommon when your brother or sister first takes an interest in dating. Had this been a more natural, honest look at that kind of relationship, I think I would have enjoyed it quite a bit. Sadly, it wasn’t.

Instead we ended up with more of Kirino’s manipulative fake boyfriend schemes and another pointless Ayase appearance to ship tease the imouto and yandere fans, respectively. THANKS Oreimo, you made me say “ship tease”. Now I need to go take a shower. Even if you do decide to bite on the fake boyfriend thing, I’m not sure how we’re supposed to feel sympathy for Kirino when things finally go down. The whole situation is entirely her doing, and it seems very unlikely she’s going to learn from it.

Of course it’s left to Kuroneko and Saori to bail the episode out, both of whom have become better viewer proxies than our leading man. Saori can save an entire scene with facial expressions alone, and it’s possible Kuroneko’s main role now is to be the one that says “WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE???” when the Kousakas start getting all touchy-feely… well that and be the grossly under appreciated love interest. I hope when all is said and done the only thing we remember from this episode is the final two minutes, as her adorably bold confession was pretty much the only thing I’ve been looking forward to this season.

That being said, my opinion of Kyousuke (and Oreimo in general) has taken a hit since those OVA episodes when I really wanted these crazy kids to get together. We’ve had to put up with so much stupidity to get here that the confession felt a little anticlimactic. The next episode or two could go a long way to rebuild my enthusiasm and hey, how about that new ED? As far as I’m concerned though, Oreimo has used up most of its benefit of the doubt. Being somewhat familiar with the novels, I’ll forgo my usual speculation and leave it at that.