中二病でも恋がしたい！/ Chu-2 byo demo KOI ga shitai!
Chuunibyou Demo Koi ga Shitai! – 03

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

It has been a month since Yuuta started high school, and he notes how Rikka eats large lunches alone. Yuuta goes to speak to her, where he learns that Tōka is a chef (as a cover), which explains the elaborate bentos that Rikka has. Since it is time to form clubs, Rikka meets the reluctant Yuuta outside, stating she’ll be using the school as her base, thus she’ll start the Oriental Magic Club. However, they get no members at their booth, but when Tsuyuri has a booth next to Rikka’s for a napping club, Rikka decides to merge the clubs as Rikka naps. Yuuta sees Nibutani in the gym in a cheerleader outfit, so he decides to investigate, running into Makoto and the other guys, who are checking out the cheerleaders as well.

Suddenly Rikka is there in a cheerleader outfit, wanting to be tossed into the air and caught. While the other cheerleaders have no clue about what Rikka is taking about when she mentions having flown before, they do toss her and catch the scared Rikka, who says she’s OK when clearly she’s shaken. On the stage, the drama club is doing improv, so Rikka goes up to play-act with the others. However, her getting so physically into her acting means she’s not club material. Back outside, Rikka is puzzled why her club isn’t getting members when it is clearly the best club. So, she makes a call and states that they’ll have a new club member on the following day.

The next morning, Yuuta is awakened by a girl with extraordinarily long pigtails who addresses him as Dark Flame Master. Rikka pops in via the window, identifying the girl, Sanae, as her servant. The girl is in the same school as them, only she’s in the middle school division, but she’s just as into this fantasy world that Rikka has created. Since they need five people to form a club, Rikka decides to use the cat, but Nanase-sensei has to decline that. Rikka says she has another personality living inside her, named Catherine, and even speaks some English to prove it. Nanase-sensei responds in kind, but since Rikka doesn’t know English that well, her bluff has been called. However, Nanase-sensei says they can have an old classroom, providing they clean it up.

Rikka and Sanae have a pretend battle while Tsuyuri naps the whole time. As a result, the classroom takes all evening to get cleaned. Nanase-sensei wishes them well on getting a fifth member, but outside of the school grounds, Yuuta disappoints Rikka by stating that he never said he’d join her club despite him helping her during the day. Sanae pulls a book written by the mage Mori Summer, Mabinogion, saying the book says the wielder of the dark flame (Yuuta) will obey the Tyrant’s Eye (Rikka). Their actions are observed by Nibutani. The following day, Makoto asks Yuuta about the weird club he joined.  Yuuta denies having joined such a club, but Nibutani shows up, saying that she has joined Rikka’s club. As such, Rikka names the club Oriental Magic Napping Club in Summer.

Thoughts/Review:

I meant to say something earlier, but what the heck is with the Japanese and apples? *lol* Just seems odd that I’m currently watching two anime series where apples are playing a role, at least in the OP/ED.

I know the title of this anime mentions love (koi), but I really haven’t been sensing the romance angle between Yuuta and Rikka. Maybe that’s why her innocently feeding him struck me as rather funny, combined with the class’s reaction to that.

As expected, the final, major player in this anime has shown up. Watching her and Rikka carry out their fantasy battle did remind me of being a little kid and doing similar things on the playground. However, we were little kids, not in middle school or high school.

This episode followed the old storytelling device where the hero nice guy helps the heroine weird girl form a club, then ends up a member of it as well. In some ways, I was disappointed by the use of this trope, but then again, the series does seem to parody other anime/manga/light novels, so it isn’t unexpected.

Nibutani’s decision to join the club surprised me. I figured she would confront Yuuta about what she saw and he’d freak out, since the hot babe he’d love to be with would discover his weird past. However, the fact that she watched them, then wanted to join, followed by Rikka renaming the club in Nibutani’s honor strongly suggests to me that Nibutani is like Yuuta, in that she used to do the whole chuunibyou thing, then tried to be normal and popular in high school. That would also explain both of them looking in the train station mirror in a similar fashion, and it would explain Nibutani telling Yuuta that she felt they were a lot alike.

I wonder why Yuuta refers to Nanase-sensei as “Nana-chan” in his mind.  I laughed at how she called Rikka’s bluff. I wonder if she’ll play a greater roll in all of this.

Still, where this anime is ultimately heading, I still haven’t the foggiest. However, the series is amusing and interesting to me, so I do look forward to seeing more.