Score: C+

This was a decent episode. Honestly, after the last one this feels like a remarkable episode! It only really fulfilled the objective of developing Ageha’s background a bit more. I would not say that Ageha herself grew or changed in this episode. She just got more affirmation that she’s on the right path in life and that she’s overcome any issues of her past. The episode wasn’t frustrating like last week, so I’ll take this anytime!

This girl is often taken away from loved ones

The flashbacks were interesting because they really were just flashes. And it wasn’t like they were being used to set up a current issue for Ageha. She’s completely overcome any issues she’s had regarding her family separating. The relationship with her sisters is extremely strong. There’s no envy either towards her sisters since she actually did some modeling in the past and is perfectly happy to put her nursery teacher aspirations ahead of that. I didn’t get any feeling that she feels lingering regrets over choosing the path she did or any desire to explore it.

Nothing wrong of course in spending some time confirming that a character has gone through their arc and is stronger for it. I would think this is perfectly fine if it was done for someone like Sora that has had so much focus. But Ageha hasn’t really had that. She’s had a few focus episodes to be sure. But I’d say overall she and Tsubasa have had significantly less focus. Ageha so much so that her having siblings and a separated family is only coming up now. It’s certainly interesting how things have played out here with Ageha.

Here we go again!

I swear that I remember talking about Ellee having matured as a character. But that doesn’t apply to shopping I suppose! Was getting terrible flashbacks to the shoe incident. Ok, I do get it. People have their own tastes and fashion certainly matters. Pretty sure I’d draw the line to going to several different stores looking through clothes just to have everything shut down as not being good enough! There are only so many hours in a day to dedicate to something like that! This girl is a Princess but seriously! Either they need to switch gears and shop online or that kid needs to get way less picky!

It obviously set up the very convenient meeting of Ageha’s sisters. Honestly, I think that probably could have been handled better if they were intentionally going to visit Ageha. But it’s fine. Thankfully Ageha’s sister is such a genius that she can design clothing that this picky princess will actually like! Can Ellee’s kingdom hire this woman to design all the clothing Ellee will ever need? It will save so much trouble in the future when she potentially gets even more picky!

Bet they didn’t plan on making a child cry today

Credit to the show for letting some issues naturally arise with the fashion show. Who would have guessed that throwing a kid out into a mass of screaming and cheering people might freak her out? Is Kakko any good at his job? You’d think someone that handles models for a living would consider that possibility. Instead it was just “hey here’s a cute kid, let’s throw them into a fashion show!” Obvously the show doesn’t tackle the question of whether it’s even a good idea to throw a small child into that situation. But at least it showed some problems even if it didn’t consider them ahead of time. Thank goodness Ageha has the remarkable talent to both calm Ellee down and join in the show. Seems a bit iffy since she wasn’t wearing designer clothing and just mildly adjusted her own outfit, but let’s roll with it!

Well, he had a good time

Minoton is simple and predictable. A step back from the enemies we’ve gotten so far. No harm in him being the type that likes working out and is very serious. But he’s basically just playing to type right now. There’s no much going on there. He isn’t acknowledging his actions as harmful or even considering the morality of kidnapping a child. I’m sure they will eventually get there. But right now, he just doesn’t seem to be hearing anything being said to him. They try to challenge him like other enemies and he just smugly leaves without seemingly registering any of it.

A few good moments here

This was a solid episode though. I did appreciate Ageha finding further confidence in her position. And it did fill in some blanks regarding her past. Because she’s had painful experiences, she tries to keep smiling all the time and as often as she can. That’s not a bad stance in the slightest. It wasn’t the perfect episode, but it did a lot more than the previous one. This episode did have a point and did add some new information. Let’s see where things go from here. Or at least let’s see how the show kills time until the next major point of development.