xxxHOLiC◆継 Episode 09

SPOILER Summary:

Watanuki sees Haruka-san in his dreams again and thoughts shift to Kohane-chan. At school, Kohane-chan comes up in a lunch conversation between Himawari, Doumeki, and Watanuki. With all the negative press and public backlash against the young girl, Watanuki decides to make a bento for her and bring it to her home. Doumeki, for whatever reason, decides to come along which does not please Watanuki. Back at Yuuko-san’s place, Watanuki prepares the meal for Kohane-chan. After some teasing, Yuuko-san asks if Himawari-chan is going Kohane-chan’s place as well. Learning that she will not go, Yuuko-san remarks on that being a good thing.

When Doumeki and Watanuki arrive at Kohane-chan’s place, they find the wall around the yard covered in graffiti slamming the girl and red paint splashed on the house. An injured Kohane lets the two into her home and Watanuki embraces her, apologizing for not coming by sooner. As Watanuki works to set the table, the phone rings and a man’s voice repeatedly says “die.” Since the voice mailbox is full, the message didn’t record. Kohane says she’s fine with that, but Watanuki isn’t, telling her he cares for her. She’s a bit surprised by this, but understands how he feels as she looks at things from Watanuki’s point of view.

Kohane-chan’s mother arrives home, having finally secured a new TV program for her daughter. She’s not happy to see Watanuki and Doumeki in her home, and angry that Kohane-chan is eating tamagoyaki. She slaps the food away from Kohane and in anger, ends up throwing hot tea into Watanuki’s face. Doumeki and Kohane take Watanuki to the bathroom for some immediate burn treatment. Kohane tells her mother that her mother can do things to her but not to those she (Kohane) cares about. Back at Yuuko-san’s place, Yuuko-san has taken over treatment of Watanuki, stating that the treatment provided to Watanuki on the scene means that he’ll have no scars from the burns.

The day of the TV program arrives and Kohane’s mother is still uptight and angry about things, especially Kohane’s unresponsiveness to her. At the studio, other psychics are not happy to be appearing with Kohane-chan, but when they are given the impression that this is a setup to put down Kohane-chan, they agree to appear. The TV show has a clip of a supposed haunted home. Four of the psychics on the panel claim to see a male ghost there. Kohane-chan is silent, but when prompted, she responds that there is a man and a woman there. The other panelist are irritated by this and more so when Kohane states the woman had been murdered some 21-years before.

Thoughts: As I’ve said before (and likely will mention again at some point), one of the hardest things for me to do is divorce the original manga story from its anime adaptation. As such, when I see changes from the original manga story, I think, “Why did they do this? It makes no sense other than for the writers’ ego so they can leave their mark, as it were.” I thought that when Kohane-chan is at the TV program with the other psychics. The way this was presented wasn’t so much the problem because that works better for the anime. However, in the manga, the group went to the house as I understand it. They did not sit in a studio and observe things on a TV. By being IN the actual house with the ghost, Kohane-chan was able to see both ghosts and one was apparently behind the announcer. In the anime, just how does she know about the 2nd ghost? Oh well.

Speaking of Kohane-chan, considering the manga only just recently dealt with the issue of her powers and her ultimate wish, I wonder how the anime writers are going to deal with that, since it is related to Tsubasa.

Still, if I can divorce anime and manga, despite a couple of issues, the episode was pretty good. The writers are emphasizing the negative aspects of Himawari-chan and I get the feeling that this is how the series will end with the resolution of her story.

BTW, where was Yuuko-san’s payment for services rendered? Other times when Watanuki has been injured in the manga, it has been implied that the cost of this is added to his tab.