I still don’t know why a guy named Chen with a Singaporean father and a Japanese mother looks like he wandered out of a cornfield in Nebraska. But be that as it may Kelvin Chen is back in the spotlight here and it would be pointless to dwell on it. I think the trend with Bartender so far is that I prefer the stories that don’t go too heavy on the conventional plot. As such, this one and the prior Chen episode were not among my favorites. And that’s ironic in that I’m a massive whisky otaku and the Yamazaki thing should have absolutely had me tied up and helpless (I mean, I’ve been on that tour myself).
The B-plot here is actually the first introduced. The Cardinal pair draft Sasakura-san to come up with a “welcome drink” for their bar menu. I kind of like the idea that the hotel bar is a really important place for an international traveler, often the firs they visit in a new country. I can’t help but wonder if they’re actually paying Sasakura for this service – they sure as hell should be, but there’s no mention of it. But he struggles to come up with an option, for a very interesting reason. His whole game is based on reading the room – he designs a drink by diagnosing the state of mind and body of the customer at his bar. How can he do that with customers who only exist theoretically in his head, and adopt a “one size fits all” approach at that? It’s antithetical to how Sasakura tends bar.
That’s only the sidelight, though. The main drama is Chen’s father (he’s played by a suddenly busy Hayami Show, by the way) is coming to town to take his son home. He already got him let go from K’s Bar, so Chen comes to Edenhall asking to be hired on there so he can convince him to let him become a bartender rather than inherit the hotel (which is a famous one). The backdrop here is that Kelvin’s older brother was supposed to inherit the family business but died, and so did Kelvin’s relationship with his father as a result.
The drink in spotlight is the Singapore Sling, which has the distinction of being one of the few gin drinks I can tolerate. Kelvin makes his dad a Sling Raffles Style (the fussier version, now mostly a curiosity) and an exhausted Pops is much unimpressed. Kelvin does much better the next time, preparing the simpler Savoy Style this time, but using Japanese Roku gin to change things up. I should note here that Roku is also a Suntory product, which makes me believe they’re a major backer of Bartender and possibly on the production committee.
This is all fine and good, but it’s pretty conventional stuff. Again, Bartender is working better for me when it’s quirky and geeky – the drama just doesn’t pack the same punch, and it highlights Sasakura’s hilariously operatic speech patterns a little too much. We are getting at least one more Chen episode (and the resolution to the welcome drink thing), but I’ll be happy when we get back to full-time nerding out about cocktail recipes and such.
Collectr
May 16, 2024 at 11:25 pmAnime has had a mixed history about using real products. Up until the mid 1980s, real product logos showed up fairly frequently (e.g., Coca Cola and Coors in Heart Cocktail, Coca-Cola again in Gosenzosama Banbanzai). Then, as though the production houses’ legal departments suddenly woke up to (or were reminded about) trademarks, logos were “off by one letter” – using the styling but not the actual word, like WcDonalds in many shows. I don’t mind product placement – I’d rather see Beefeater than Beeteater – but the Suntory advertising has become rather blatant.
Turning ethnic characters into corn-fed blondes is not uncommon. For example, Johnny (Juan) Rico, the South American hero of Heinlein’s Starship Troopers, became a blue-eyed blonde in the 1988 anime adaptation. Was it to promote international appeal? Dunno. That anime never appeared outside of Japan.
I prefer the geekery too. I’ll have to try the “one drop of water” trick (to bring out the nose) in my next glass of Scotch (not Suntory) whiskey.
Guardian Enzo
May 17, 2024 at 12:04 amThere’s a scientific basis for why adding even a drop of water to a whik(e)y can change it significantly. Not always for the better – some are better neat.
Joshua
May 17, 2024 at 9:26 amI do wonder how you’d think about the 2006 version upon a rewatch? At this point, it’s clear here that this Bartender is attempting a sort of running narrative (while still attempting episodic stories) which I’m not exactly sure will pull through in the end. The 2006 “arthouse” version merely chose to jettison any semblance of overriding narrative to just bask in the (purely episodic) vibes of it all with Sasakura getting to know each of his customer’s stories and issues and making cocktails for each one of them.
Guardian Enzo
May 17, 2024 at 9:55 amI would, sure, though as always it’s a question of finding the time. It does sound as if the earlier version may be pitched more at my frequency.
Kayla Minos
May 19, 2024 at 5:36 amEnzo, what is your MBTI?
Guardian Enzo
May 19, 2024 at 8:53 amWhat an interesting place for that question.
Nicc
May 20, 2024 at 8:16 amWhew, a busy week for me and so I’m a tad late here. We’re to Kelvin Chen in this episode as it picks up from the distillery field trip. It seems that it’s only now that he’s become serious about bartending and that’s when his father shows up again and forces him to quit. It seems that his father is still insistent on him being a hotel heir.
Right, it’s the B-plot which starts first. I wonder why the Hotel Cardinal still insists on getting him on their payroll considering that he’s already doing so much for them for free. He really should be charging them consulting fees, indeed. It’s to help create a “welcome drink” for guests, as you said, but it’s a difficult for him to come up with a drink that fits everybody since he’s basically a bartender-therapist who crafts drinks for individual customers.
Back to Kelvin, he’s at Edenhall because he was forced to quit from Kuzuhara’s bar. His dad, Lee, owns a fancy hotel in Singapore, which is no stranger to luxe hotels. There’s the Raffles, the Ritz-Carlton or the Marina Bay Sands. There’s a whole lot that’s packed into a country that’s smaller than New York City. We do get more backstory about their family. Kelvin’s older brother was supposed to inherit the hotel, but then he died. This also meant that they were unable to see the cherry blossoms as a family. When his brother died, his relationship with his father deteriorated. Kelvin wants to work at Edenhall for a while and perhaps pick up the skills he needs to convince his father to stay. The featured drink is indeed the Singapore Sling, created by the Raffles Hotel. It’s an old hotel that used to be surrounded by nut plantations and so the bar where the drink came from is also famous for allowing the littering of peanut shells. The first drink that he prepared for his dad doesn’t work out. He’s got the skills to make a good drink, but he’s missing the hospitality aspect and so this leaves his dad unimpressed with this first attempt. However, he does get a second chance before he has to depart.
Hanging out with Sasakura long enough does indeed help him out. In the meantime, Sasakura is let down that the welcome drink project didn’t work out and so he resets with a gin and tonic. We also see the gang back at Ogura’s place Kyouko and Yuri are preparing for a cocktail contest. It seems to have happened offscreen, but Kyouko has gone from almost quitting to pushing herself in bartending. We also learn that Ogura himself was a philosophy major, which makes me wonder if Sasakura may have learned from him some in between bites of gyoza. Kelvin’s second attempt with the Singapore Sling works out much better as he mixes up the recipe. Unfortunately, it’s still not enough to persuade his dad to stay as a bartender. I agree that conventional doesn’t really work that well for this series and perhaps the next episode will be better.
Guardian Enzo
May 20, 2024 at 8:45 amI have a passionate affection for grand old hotels, and I’d love to see the Raffles. Though I imagine a Sling at the bar there is about $50.
That bit with the two versions of the Singapore Sling (which I was unaware of) was interesting. Seems like making Dad the Raffles version was kind of a show-off move.
Nicc
May 23, 2024 at 6:48 amIt is a striking hotel and it showing up in “Crazy Rich Asians” probably introduced it to a lot of folks. I’ve been there once as a visitor. That was years ago and before the hotel was renovated back in 2017 and so the hotel now is unlikely the same hotel from my memories.
I just checked the online menu and it’s 39 SGD, which is about $29.00. I think the peanuts are still free, though. This was the first time I’ve heard of the “Savoy-style” Sling and that’s just one many new things I’ve learned since watching this show.