As Fall 2022 is starting to shake out, patterns (as always) emerge.  It’s a pretty boom-or-bust season thus far – either shows are dead-cinch keepers or one or two episode drops.  Not a lot of bubble series, in other words.  Koukyuu no Karasu, however, is very much the exception.  This show would be on the bubble just about any season, no matter how strong or weak – it’s just that sort of series.  And none of the first three episodes has moved me in one direction or the other – they’ve all been very much cut from the same cloth.

As that implies, I sort of like it.  Everything about it is middling so far – the visuals, the casting, the writing (that’s why the bubble fits it like a glove).  There is a quality to Raven of the Inner Palace though, a spark of something genuinely interesting.  I feel like there could be another gear here, as there often is with this sort of series.  That’s one of the reasons why I’m not ready to make a call yet despite it  not having really been won over.  It may not be blowing me away, but it’s not doing anything to put me off, either.

One development taking place is that the Emperor’s frequent visits to Shouxue are causing unrest among the other court ladies – who he tends not to visit as often as they’d like.  If you’ve read The Pillow Book by Heian courtesan Sei Shounagon (set in Japan, but in a very similar social environment), you know that politicking among the consorts and their retainers was constant and contentious.  Rumors have started that the Raven Consort put a death curse on the Empress Dowager (which makes no sense, as she points out to the visiting Flower Princess).

It’s the Flower Princess at the heart of this week’s mystery, which surrounds her ex-lover who died putting down a rebellion in the provinces.  In this mythology whistles are hung from the rafters, which the dead cause to sound when they return to visit their loved ones in the spring.  The Flower Princess’ lover has never done so, and she asks Shouxue to summon his spirit (she can only do this once).  But she can’t – the man’s soul is not in the underworld.  That’s because it’s in a jar belonging to a sorcerer who specializes in possessing people (here a missing courtesan, also the leader of the cult at the heart of the aforementioned rebellion).  He also may or may not be a member of the former ruling dynasty.

This is another pretty good (Koukyuu’s specialty) mystery, diverting without ever being riveting.  I feel like we’re just marking time till things really heat up between the Emperor and Shouxue, but also that it could be quite interesting when that happens.  At this point I’m confident Koukyuu no Karasu is going to be one of the series that winds up in the “Patron Pick” (name tentative) poll.  The problem is going to finding a few more shows to lump in there with it.