げんしけん 2 Episode 03

SPOILER Summary: Sasahara, Kousaka, and Kuchiki enter the building where ComiFes is being held. Sasahara talks with Madarame, who’s outside in the line with Ohno and Tanaka. Kuchiki’s job is to use his pass in order that he can score copies of doujinshi titles that might otherwise be sold out by the time Madarame gets there. Kousaka and Sasahara go to their table, where they find the boxes with their doujinshi as well as fliers and other stuff for their sale. They set up shop after taking a gander at the printed version of their doujinshi.

Takayanagi shows up with the Manga Club’s latest doujinshi and he exchanges doujinshi with Sasahara. He warns Sasahara that Haraguchi (whom he calls “Haraguro”) is also there, having scammed his way in with some other large doujinshi group who are allowed to have more than three tickets. Sure enough, Haraguchi shows up and wants to see the doujinshi. Sasahara offers him a free copy, but after he thumbs through it, he gives it back and tells them he hopes it sells out.

The doors of the building open as ComiFes officially opens and they manage to sell a few doujinshi. Ohno arrives in cosplay with Tanaka to help sell doujinshi. Sure enough, her presence does help increase sales. Tanaka and Kousaka take off for something secret which leaves Sasahara with a bad feeling. Madarame arrives to spell Sasahara, who gets to casually wander the floor while taking a break. He returns to find Madarame has fled leaving an irritated Ohno and Ogiue to sell doujinshi.

A little later when Madarame returns, Sasahara wonders how Kuchiki is doing with making all the purchases. He explains to Ogiue about the rush people sometimes get buying all this stuff and end up just going in circles. As he explains, Ogiue blushes as she has an apparent romantic thought about Sasahara.

Meanwhile, as Sasahara wonders about Kousaka and Tanaka, and as Ohno assures him all is well, they appear on the scene, only now Kousaka is dressed in drag as a female character from Kujibiki Unbalance to match Ohno’s doing the same (but for a different character). Sasahara sees a nightmare developing in front of him, but Ohno and Kousaka combined are able to generate a great deal of interest and sales. As Kousaka works his magic, Madarame wonders if seeing Kousaka in a miniskirt school seifuku (uniform) should be a nosebleed scene.

Kugayama finally arrives on scene and because he’s now a published doujinshi artist, they initially address him as “sensei,” which is how published authors and mangaka’s are addressed. He quickly scans through the doujinshi and says he’ll look at it slowly later as it is embarrassing to look at it right then. Sasahara lets him know how sales are going and says he’s glad they did the doujinshi. With Kugayama agreeing, the feud from episode 2 is officially done.

Sasahara decides to go an pay the big doujinshi artists that Haraguchi had set them up with initially a visit to apologize. He first meets up with Kouji-san and after he apologizes, Kouji gives him a copy of their doujinshi. Sasahara is embarrassed that he didn’t have a copy of their doujinshi to exchange, but Kouji says that it is OK since they have cases of copies of their doujinshi while Sasahara likely only had a few copies of the Genshiken doujinshi. Learning from this error, Sasahara returns and grabs a few copies of their doujinshi before finishing the rounds with the other doujinshi artists he had to turn away.

As Saki arrives on scene, Genshiken has sold all of their doujinshi copies save for the ones they placed aside as keepers. Saki takes a look at Kousaka and is at a loss for words, but clearly is not happy. Kuchiki arrives in a state of delirium over his buying and gets the wrath of Saki as a result. Madarame asks if Sasahara is going to get the application for the Winter ComiFes, but after both Kugayama and Ogiue pass the decision onto him, Sasahara decides to pass on doing another doujinshi. The group then takes the money they made and head out to a karaoke place where they proceed to spend their entire earnings on food, booze, and singing in their private booth.

Thoughts: Kousaka’s crossdressing cosplay was even more wrong and funny in the anime than it was in the manga. I think showing this in color is what set it apart from the start, combined with good direction. The artists made Kousaka look more like a girl than Shimoku-sensei did in the manga.

I liked how the anime writers are setting up future stories by having Yabusaki make a cameo and look at Genshiken’s manga. Also, the writers continue to hint at the attraction between Ogiue and Sasahara, this time making Ogiue “look” at Sasahara and blush. That’s how it should be when you already know where the story is going, which wasn’t there in the manga.

The only thing I saw missing was Saki getting a look at their doujinshi and being offended at its content. Otherwise, an enjoyable episode.