Tanuma is possessed by a youkai. In order to help Natsume, Tanuma, and Taki must search for the mirror fragments that the youkai needs.

Opinions:

It looks like we are getting another good two-parter from the series. Should be nice for the series to focus on the trio of Natsume, Tanuma, and Taki. It’s good for the three of them to have this chance to deepen their friendship as they try to get Tanuma and Natsume out of this mess. Taki may not be technically involved in this, but being their friend there isn’t a chance she’s going to just sit back and hope for the best. The more help they can get the better anyways since not only do they have to find the mirror fragments, but they have to make sure that they don’t get taken out by the youkai that is also hunting down mirror fragments.

With Tanuma being possessed things are definitely complicated. Usually it’s Natsume who gets into trouble, but he’s only partially involved this time. Tanuma shares the same feelings of wanting to protect his friends and that’s why he jumped in front of Natsume. There are a lot of similarities with these guys since they both can at least sense youkai and haven’t been able to be open with others about that. Even now that they don’t need to hide anything they still struggle being honest. Natsume didn’t really want to say anything about his eye and Tanuma didn’t want to bring up his suspicions about being possessed. At least during the episode Natsume wasn’t about to tell Tanuma to stay out of things and they both opened up about their concerns. It’s an important step in Natsume’s development to rely more on his friends and be honest when something is going on. He might want to protect them from harm, but that is the same for them.

In the end this whole problem can be pointed right at Nyanko-Sensei. If he wasn’t such an alcoholic Natsume wouldn’t have been out there and they could have avoided this mess. Though in the end the possibility for free sake will always have that cat out and on the move. Still for a bodyguard he sure can cause a lot of problems. At least he paid somewhat for it when he ran into Taki. Her obsession with cute things brought upon Nyanko a crushing hug.

I’m curious about this youkai that possessed Tanuma. Certainly she doesn’t seem really evil, but is just determined to accomplish her goal. If her friend is in trouble it’s at least understandable that she’d do whatever was necessary. Not that it makes things ok, but easier to accept when the youkai isn’t totally evil. Though if she could avoid trying to steal Natsume’s eye I think everyone would be pretty happy.

It should be interesting to see how the next episode turns out. Clearly they are going to need to be wary of that youkai with a hammer and finding all the pieces. Things would also be good if they can avoid looking crazy while they run around digging up fragments of the mirror XD.
Score: A