Last week I made note of the fact that Cross Game is really a unicorn in the Adachi Mitsuru canon (at least the most important series in it) in that it explodes out of the gate with a gut-punch premiere and never looks back.  In the same way it’s unfair to compare Iwami Manaka’s performance in Fruits Basket to Horie Yui’s, I think it’s unfair to compare Mix to Cross Game.  Certain standards are simply too high to ever reasonably expect them to be matched or surpassed, and thinking otherwise is only setting yourself up for disappointment.

That’s not the end of the story though.  If Cross Game was love at first sight and a whirlwind affair that never turned sour, Mix is more in Adachi’s usual style – a slow seduction.  Like most of his series it really only reveals its charms over time, and without quite realizing it you find yourself falling in love.  I can only lament again the heinously misguided decision to cast Kaji Yuuki in the beyond crucial role of Touma, because he’s a consistent discordant note every time the moment turns eventful.  Even so, though, after three episodes Mix – and Adachi – are working their magic to full effect.

Mix is unusual for Adachi in a different way, though, in that there’s a mighty big elephant in the room and its presence colors everything that happens.  Adachi generally doesn’t do sequels (Short Program is the only series that comes to mind, though there were a couple of anime-originals for others), and the fact that the Touch connection is always being teased has the effect of making the narrative backward-looking a good percentage of the time.  As if to mirror most modern anime viewers the kids in the main cast don’t really know about any of this, but Adachi makes it clear through his writing that he’s always factoring it into every major development.

I found the above to be more acutely palpable this week than in the first two episodes.  The anime’s sub-title of “Meisei Story” (notably not “Touch II”) tells the tale here – Meisei is a major character in this narrative.  The thing is, Touma and Souichirou don’t really know or care much about what happened at Meisei 30 years (at this point in the narrative, it’s 2016) ago.  It’s just the school Touma’s dad talks about in dewy-eyes nostalgia, and to them it’s the place with the lame manager who won’t let Touma pitch and seems to defer to the son of the school’s financial benefactor.  Why should they feel any emotional connection to it?

Therein lies the rub.  What happens when they get to the high school, and Nikaidou is still there, a year ahead of them?  Or worse, if they get to their third year of junior high and the manager still refuses to let Touma pitch as a punishment for insubordination?  As the captain notes, maybe that’s a message that Meisei isn’t the right place for Tou and Sou.  It’s a classic Adachi drama to be sure, but it’s given additional traction by the factor that we (well, some of us) know, but the kids don’t.  That all this is connected to Sou and Otomi’s father is made pretty clear in the narrative already, though just how is not.

The rest of the episode is devoted to unhurriedly fleshing out the characters, and not just the leads.  Touma, in classic Adachi protag mode, disdains the idea of a smartphone but both his siblings note that there are constantly girls asking how to contact him.  Meanwhile “pest” Natsuno-kun shows considerable mettle by going to the manager and complaining not on his own behalf, but Souma’s – for which he’s rewarded with a blank resignation form.  And let’s not forget Tou-chan’s friend Koma making note that he Touma has the “right to compete” for Otomi’s affections – as if Adachi-sensei has ever given us a chance to forget that anyway…