みなみけ～おかわり～ Ep. 05

SPOILER Summary: Kana and Chiaki are left alone as Haruka is out with Maki. Kana is looking for something to eat in the kitchen drawers and finds a small, locked treasure chest. She tries to get into it and fails. She tries to enlist Chiaki’s help, but Chiaki isn’t interested until Kana speculates that maybe the hidden treasure in the box are naked pictures of Chiaki as a baby. With Chiaki’s assistance, they are finally able to break into the box, but then Kana accidentally steps on its contents, which is a small glass rabbit on a necklace. The ear is broken, but as Kana tries to fix it, the other ear, tail, and head all break off.

As Chiaki tries to make the repairs, Kana enlists many of their friends to look for a rabbit. Fujioka is doing so when he’s seen window shopping by Haruka and Maki. They are puzzled by his looking for a rabbit but go on. Hosaka hears this and decides he needs to catch a rabbit for Haruka. Meanwhile, Haruka remembers she has something to give to Maki to be given as a present. As she returns home, Kana gets reports from the people she dispatched and discovers that none of them are finding what she needs (since she didn’t specifically tell them “glass rabbit”).

Once Haruka is home, Kana and Chiaki play for time to allow their friends to score a rabbit. They do what they can to keep her out of the kitchen, but eventually she goes in there, sure that she placed the gift in there. Kana decides to beat a fast exit to go look for a glass rabbit while Chiaki continues to run interference. However, the game is up when Keiko calls in with a report. Realizing that Chiaki and Kana must have done something to the gift, Haruka returns to the kitchen to the very afraid Chiaki, where Haruka requests to know what happened to the rabbit.

Kana goes all over looking for a new glass rabbit but fails. She returns home to discover the place is dark and Chiaki is sitting seiza-style in the entry way and sobbing. Haruka is at the end of the hallway and Kana is very afraid as Haruka begins to speak. A knock on the door has Kana answer it and there are their friends with all sorts of rabbit stuff (and an eel) for Kana.

Thoughts: You know, I’m just really not digging this series. I’d heard some people going on about how funny this episode was. I had a couple of chuckles and that was it. That’s because this is just a pale, undead imitation of the original Minami-ke. I miss the masterful “Chiaki-sama” for a start.