I welcome Rise Kujikawa to the series. Another victim appears and is taken into the TV which will require another rescue. I suspect from that short image of her shadow that this time the guys will be a bit more motivated to rush to the rescue. Seems like Yukiko and Chie will have troubles of another kind since I expect a ton of puns on this subject. Anyways we got to know Rise a bit and gives some room to speculate about what her shadow will be like. Maybe the most important thing though is that they seemed to confirm that people on TV are being targetted though they aren’t close to a theory as to why. The mystery of the midnight channel also remains since they can’t really decide if its the killer warning ‘someone’ or simply a reflection of their desire to capture and kill.

Wow Yukiko was pretty confident that she’s never upset anyone. Of course she’s dead wrong, but would be kind of uncomfortable to point that out. No chance she hasn’t pissed off a few guys with constantly shutting them down. Sure not her fault, but doesn’t mean someone wouldn’t hold an unfair grudge.

Maybe one thing I was worried about was including quite a bit of Rise’s arcana route here. Won’t say what was or was not part of it, but just surprised that they put some in there. It was somewhat the same for Kanji, but just felt like there was more here. Maybe they want to make the main more motivated for this rescue or to make us see Rise as more than just some idol that came back to town. Suppose it could be those things and just wanting to take care of some of Rise’s moments while they have a good chance to.

There was some nice moments in the episode though. I liked Narukami helping Rise dodge the reporters at school and the slightly funny moments with the paper cranes. Those really are his trademark at this point in the series. Can certainly be blunt at times like with Rise’s poor first attempt at a paper crane. Still she did well on the second one and that paper airplane was top notch.

I really liked the ending of the episode this time around. Deserved or not the emotional reaction from Rise at Narukami really seemed to affect him. Plus his expression at the end when she appeared on the midnight channel seemed more than a set-up for his one-liners. As far as he knows he was the last person to see Rise before she was taken. Whether that simply means surprise for him or some guilt I’m not sure. Really it’s not his fault when you think about it, yet they were trying to protect her and right after leaving him she was gone. Maybe hoping for too much, but this could be a key moment for Narukami’s character. A deeper reason to go into this rescue and try to save her. It could be nothing, but I would like to see him at this point be a bit more emotionally invested in saving these people. It’d be easy enough to follow-up with something comical like “well I recorded it this time”, but hoping for more.

Can somewhat understand where Rise is coming from in the episode. A feeling that all anyone sees is the idol image that has been put out there. You see her all the time in commercials, that picture book, etc, but how many of them showed who Rise is at her core? At the start had her manager Inoue talking about the schedule and about her, but not to her. If that’s his idea of support I wonder about the future of this next girl. Talks about how he can’t accept her leaving, but he’s already picked someone new up to work with…But anyways, can see how she might just get tired, though I’m sure we’ll get a much deeper look at her worries next episode.

Too bad about that fan that got beaten and arrested. Well maybe this will be an important lesson about stalking while dressing suspiciously. It may not be right to jump to conclusions, but not fun either way to be a victim of that misunderstanding. Besides not like he wasn’t stalking so getting taken in wasn’t that bad. Certainly Rise didn’t come back to get followed around by that guy. Sure the group was stalking, but they were trying to prevent an abduction. Well I’m sure Adachi will be very well rewarded for taking a stalker in on murder charges. Clearly though Dojima has suspicions and wants to keep an eye on Narukami. With Adachi as an example easy to see why they can’t trust the police, but Dojima has good instincts so you’d think he’d be a guy to rely on if anyone.

Regardless of false accusations that was a nice combo attack by Kanji, Yosuke, and Chie. Chie was on a roll really with this guy and then that hit on Yosuke after he was talking about her thighs. Really that guy just sets himself up for death. If he’s going to say things about someone at least following Narukami’s example and making them compliments are a good idea. Though it is Yosuke so it’d probably never work either way XD.

Well time for another rescue. Hopefully they go all out with this one since the animation quality has been a bit spotty lately. I like Rise’s character so hopefully they do a good job.
Score: A