Recap: Tomoko explores different means of relieving her sexual frustration.

Jel’s Thoughts: I just mentioned last week how it was cool that Tomoko wasn’t totally absorbed by her sexual frustration and this week, right on cue, we get an entire episode devoted to it. And boy do they dive in, head first, off the top of a skyscraper, aiming for a little cup of water on the sidewalk. It’s been a long time since an episode of anything has left me this conflicted and unsure of how I feel, to the point where I can’t even tell if they missed their mark.

First let’s get the most important point out of the way: Sexual assault is not funny, and any use of it in a humorous context can and should raise some big red caution flags. While it was clear to the audience that Tomoko was not actually being assaulted on the train, it didn’t make her actual fear any less real than any of her other misguided feelings in the first few episodes. Seeing that kind of emotion ultimately tie-in to a bait and switch joke made me feel very uncomfortable. The same goes for suggesting the idea that Tomoko would be longing for validation so much that she would actually view being assaulted as a badge of honor to brag about to your friends. I found both of those scenes very unsettling and difficult to process, and even if that was the author’s overall intent I still felt like they carried the concept a bit too far.

What keeps me from being disgusted by this episode is the overall message in context with what we’ve seen so far. Last week firmly established that WataMote considers itself a satire, and it uses Tomoko to show the consequences of totally absorbing yourself in the Otaku (for lack of better term) lifestyle. Probably the best example so far has been how she half heartedly flirts with her brother. She isn’t really attracted to him, but carries on almost entirely out of a sense of duty to the culture she’s devoted herself to. As disgusting as it is, there are a lot of people in this particular culture that get off to the depiction of girls getting groped and assaulted on trains. I think we are again meant to see how that has tainted Tomoko’s thinking. Her reasoning is never glorified, in fact it is immediately shown how foolish she was for thinking that way.

The second half of the episode was considerably less controversial as buying fancy underwear is good clean fun. Perhaps the episode’s ultimate conclusion, that Tomoko just needed a good “massaging”, was the simplest solution all along. Even that kind of attitude feels a bit insensitive after the train scene though, and I can’t help but think too many people are going to watch this episode and miss the point. Could the writers have handled this subject matter with greater care? I think so. Did they intend to open up this degree of discussion and analysis? Probably not. But I think it was clear enough they were trying to send a message, and they at least accomplished that much.

Lifesong’s Thoughts: I like black comedy and I’ll be the first one to say that I don’t really mind anything being turned into comedy. The way I look at it there are some things that people need to be able to lighten up about just so that those topics be talked about at all, that is what satire is for after all.

I feel like the production staff should be given some credit for going all in on Tomoko’s sexual frustration. I think if they had tried to hold back at all that could have been taken as them taking molestation lightly. It was the creepy nature of everything going on that made the events of this episode work. Personally I feel like it was handled with as much care as possible given the context.

Zigg’s Thouhts: Rape isn’t funny. Ever. And what that means is that the entire first half of this episode is not funny either. In fact, it goes beyond ‘not funny’, sailing past ‘creepy’ and into ‘unfortunate implications’ pretty easily. The mere suggestion that Tomoko ‘wants it really’ is enough to conjour up some of the nastiest, darkest excesses of human nature, many of which are unfortunately reinforced in anime and manga. There were multiple occasions while watching this sequence where I had to resist the temptation just to turn it off and go do literally anything else.

To be clear I don’t think that sexual assault should be a subject that’s off limits for stories to explore, and in fact the concept of a girl so sexually starved she teeters on the edge of doing something very stupid could be a dark, powerful drama if told correctly. But a half hour comedy anime series is not the place to try that and the fact our payoff is a dumb joke about pointy objects tells me more clearly than anything that this was a horrendous misstep for the series.

The second half of the story is dumb but at least it’s not offensive and I do like the fact that Yuu continues to be a part of Tomoko’s life, taunting her with her generic anime girl sexiness. The jokes are just sort of lame and the entire thing is tiresomely predictable. I do think this section does a much better job of expressing Tomoko’s awkward teen sexuality, obsessed as she is with adult trappings like lacy underwear rather than realising it’s her personality which isn’t netting her boys.

Really, the only part of this episode which works entirely for me is the very end, where Tomoko’s dad finds her passed out, playing porn games and gripping a sex toy. Rather than freak out, he tenderly tucks her in in a rather lovely moment that perfectly highlights the awkward gap between childishness and adulthood teenagers live in. It’s a spot of beauty in an episode that’s filled with ugliness and while I’m not punting Watamote yet, this was a serious blot on its record.