Recap

We get even more backstory about Emi, as well as a weird techno remix of a perfectly fine Chopin piece. Later, Kousei finally takes the stage, and the battle with his demons begins.

I think we’ve officially reached the point where I can say April is dragging. While the show has always been a bit slow, its pace seemed measured. Anything we learned was new, and even if it did not further the plot, it helped us understand the characters. While we get both of those things this week, it still just feels like the amount of time we spend retreading old ground far outstrips the actual development we see. Learning about Emi’s determination as a child doesn’t do a whole lot to tell us anything unique that we couldn’t have inferred by her talk with her instructor and her emotion in playing. It simply seemed to be a padding, especially since the scene ended with the very same images of the last episode. I did enjoy the sudden burst of Emi’s feelings as she grabs Kousei, but there’s no reason that couldn’t have been what we started out the episode with in the first place. Kousei’s scenes also had a lot of repeated dialogue. We already knew about the twisted codependency Kousei and his mother had, showing the same two scenes of people deriding him and his mother are completely unnecessary. I’m hoping once this performance is done that his interactions with people start to kick into high gear again. It’s kind of the nature of this competition format that Kousei is separated from his friends, who have been the most interesting characters to work with so far. While seeing Emi and Takashi has been good for learning about his past, I’m not sure how they will be able to have a continuing influence on his future.

Perhaps I am a bit of an old man when it comes to music, but I don’t think you should mess with a classical piece if it’s going to take away from the impact of it. Listening to this weird marching drum slash techno remix of Emi’s Chopin performance just totally took me out of that entire scene. If this is a show about classical musicians, let it be about classical music. I’m fine with Kaori’s flourishes because disrupting the old standards was what the Romanticism movement set out to accomplish in the first place. You can mess with the timing, and the intensity, but the substance of the work needs to remain in tact. It’s acceptable when we get to Kousei struggling with his demons as that’s been established in the story. It’s messing with our enjoyment of his performance because it’s messing with his ability to perform. I hope this kind of thing isn’t commonplace in the future.

I’m calling some major BS on our Kousei drama bomb of the month. We’ve seen multiple examples of Kousei’s mother getting rid or making him not do any type of activity that could injure his hands. It makes a lot of sense that she would be paranoid about this. It’s for this reason that I find it absolutely ridiculous that, even as an abusive parent, she would herself strike his arms. She knows how much damage could be done from a single broken bone. I’m not saying she is perfectly logical in all her actions, but if her attempt is to beat obedience and make him play perfectly, having her injure the very arms she means to exploit is the height of ludicrousness. She obviously is not completely together, but her single minded goal does seem to guide her behaviors in a twisted way. I’m also finding it a bit hart to take in that he tells her to die and the shows like AND THEN SHE DIED. In the beginning, emotions about his drama were better handled, everything this episode was like a heavy hand to the face.