We’re creeping up on the end of the season, so I guess it’s not surprising that Tonikawa would layer in some MacGuffin stuff at this point.  That’s always a mixed bag with me, since I love the slice of married life stuff so much.  But we’re going to get there sooner or later, and since any further anime beyond this season is purely theoretical, I’d like to have a few answers before it ends in a few weeks.  And we got at least one interesting one here.

In point of fact this ep was sort of a MacGuffin sandwich, with that providing the bread.  The cold open is a fascinating tease more or less confirmed at the end of the episode, but in-between there’s a whole bunch of fluff to enjoy.  That starts with a visit from Yanagi-sensei, who’s surprised by how unsurprised Nasa and Tsukasa are that she’s getting married to Taniguchi-sensei.  That’s not why she’s visiting though.  I’m with Nasa in being a little fuzzy about that, but it all involves putting mounds of ginger on your fast food gyudon.  Now as it happens I had fast foot gyudon for dinner last night (Sukiya – always Sukiya) but I only use a dollop of ginger.

There probably aren’t a lot of series out there that would do an extended riff on that topic, but hey, that’s why we love Tonikawa.  That and the very cute bit about Tsukasa’s cluelessness about everyday practicalities (like batteries) pretty much fill up the A-part of the episode.  Then we take a little turn when Nasa-kun steps on the scale in the baths and is in for a rude surprise.  Oh, to be so horrified at weighing 65 kilos – but then Nasa is a zygote and mentally still a flatbelly, so I guess it tracks.  It’s not hard to see why this might happen – he’s literally settled down, with a phenomenal wife who’s also a terrific cook.  Comfort is comfortable, but it does lead to this sort of thing.

Even for a kid like Nasa, if you don’t use it, it atrophies.  Fortunately for him a teen can get the body back in shape annoyingly fast, so if he’s serious about it (and honestly, he’s serious about everything he does) he’ll tone up fast enough.  At this point things turn a little more serious with the arrival of Tokiko (ninja style), who bemoans the lack of invitations (which she clearly doesn’t need).  After helping herself to some somen she suggests that the three of them go on a camping trip, a notion which Nasa takes to rather more than Tsukasa does.

We’ve always known that Tsukasa was not who she plays at being, but these flashbacks tell an interesting story.  It seems pretty clear that it was Tsukasa who was offering  the ohagi to Tokiko, who was a little girl in the ruins of WW II Japan.  The details of how we get here from there are still TBD, but it would certainly create an odd relationship dynamic between Tokiko and Tsukasa.  You’d imagine Tsukasa would be used to that though, if she really is who she seems to be – how many times has she repeated that sort of thing in her life?  It paints her relationship with Nasa in a rather poignant light – and makes you wonder if she’s repeated that sort of relationship, too…