We now learn that Manabi’s actually an alien who can deploy barriers and enclosed spaces and project images into people’s mind. Or maybe not.

Amidst the sounds of crickets, a visibly tanned character steps through the school gate, even as the entire school council is hard at work.

It’s Momo! She returns from her month long vacation at Hawaii, showing off the souvenirs that she got. However, everybody is hard at work and basically ignores her. (which becomes a running joke through the whole episode.)

Mikan remembers that at the end of the last semester, they had announced to the school that when school reopens, they would be ready with brand new plans, and it’ll be the start of the student body’s participation. However, now that vacation is almost over, they are far from complete and everybody is stressed.

Mei starts by shouting at the crickets to keep quiet. And proceeds to start slapping Mutsuki awake. Manabi then breaks down too, and starting ranting about having to remodel the room, and chating “forward go!” She even ends up punching Mutsuki repeatedly when Mutsuki tries to stop her. Mei says she’ll stop everything, but weirdly ends up slapping Mutsuki repeatedly again. (poor abused Mutsuki)

Mikan is horrified at what’s happening, and finally ends up breaking into tears. This snaps everyone awake, and everybody gets back to work as per normal, and ignoring Momo as usual.

Mikan suddenly tries to mention about Summer vacation homework, which they all haven’t done. Of course, everybody interrupts her before she can. In the end, everybody goes back to the roof to sleep and rest, after it’s obvious that they were zombies now from lack of sleep.

Mikan dreams of being seperated from the group, who leaves her alone at a train crossing. After several scenes of being alone, Mikan finally finds the group waiting for her outside the school building. The joy that fills her cannot be described. It showed on her face too, as everybody decides to let her sleep a little longer.

The episode cuts to a scene of Takako arriving on the bus. Coincidentally, she runs into Mikan who is shopping for fireworks. Mikan cannot help but praise Takako’s beauty as well. With Mikan’s help and advice, Takako buys the favorite snacks of everybody in the school council, and we are given a scene of manabi totally enjoying her icecream.

With Takako asking about their school festival plans, Manabi brings her on a tour around the school. When Takako mentions that she’s very surprised that Manabi can remember all the details, Manabi explains that she’s able to visualise everything, and she tries to project the same image to Takako.

Manabi thanks Takako for igniting the fire within their school council. However, takako thinks back to a conversation with her school board’s chairwomen. Apparently, her school is going to take over Seiou High as well, and they are thinking of cancelling the school festival. This is because as students who chose to go to school, rather than drop out and have fun, something fun like the school festival should be meaningless.

At the end of the day, Manabi explains to Takako that it makes them happy to see the students being delighted in all the preparations they have made. This keeps them going. Sitting at the busstop, Something finally clicks in Takako’s mind, and she makes a call to her school’s chairwomen.

At night, everybody gathers at the pool for fireworks and much play. Mikan thinks about how everything isn’t just a dream, but instead the hapiness of being together will continue for a very long time.

Thoughts

I must admit, there were some parts of the end that I didn’t understand. Specifically what exactly clicked in Takako’s mind, and how she is going to explain to her chairwomen.

The whole episode was interesting and different though. It was supposed to have a sombre feel, which it did. Yet the humour wasn’t left out.. and was brought to you by *drumroll*…. Momo. Who can forget the scene of Momo calling Mei a tsundere.

Two other points. The injection of the softball scenes with over drama cliches, were meant to put in more humour, which I though was well done. In fact, I was quite intrigued with it’s use, and when all the softball scenes appeared.

Secondly, the scene of Manabi projecting the school festival image was quite interesting as well. Seemed like a good experiment with the use of softball scene, water droplets from the tap, and the clouds. Seems like we can expect big things from the studio next time.

Don’t miss out on the shots of Momo in Bikini!