Love Live! Sunshine!!

Episode 18

The trend of each Aqours member getting their own dedicated episode continues this week, with Yoshiko and Riko sharing the spotlight. For the first time in a long time though, this episode truly felt like filler. It may be a treat for fans of either of those characters, but the episode seemed otherwise flat and rote, falling back on well worn jokes instead of anything more meaningful.

Kicking off with a dual setup, we see Yoshiko running down a street, chasing after her windswept umbrella while mumbling a character bit about how she (the Fallen Angel Yohane) can teleport. We also get a reminder that Riko is terrified of dogs, even sweet living marshmallow Shiitake. Eventually, the two storylines converge. After some requisite shots of the school idols practicing and brainstorming a theme for the next round of the Love Live!, we're introduced to the main plot point. Yoshiko has found a dog, but she can't take it home with her. After exhausting the rest of her pup-sitting options, she turns to Riko. Predictably, Riko balks. She eventually relents, but she's hesitant to interact with the dog; she hides in the hallway while the dog is out of its crate, then buys a toy for him to play with only to toss it timidly into his carrier. Despite her fears however, Riko starts warming up to the dog and even gets defensive when Yoshiko asks to take him home. Their squabble is short-lived, though— the dog's owners have been looking for him and want him back.

This is where the episode sours a little. Both girls are understandably sad to lose the dog (both have even named him), but rather than be happy that the dog has been reunited with his people, they're bitter and upset. Yoshiko goes so far as to speculate that his owners might be lying about the dog's identity and decides to stalk their home in the hopes of seeing the pup. When we do learn why she's so attached to the dog, it's supposed to be a bittersweet revelation. Instead, it feels poorly conceived (and doesn't come close to achieving the same emotional response as her season one episode), as though the writers panicked and remembered at the last minute that they needed to come up with some kind of end-of-episode introspective conclusion.

It's a little too late. It's a throwaway paragraph in a sea of puff, much of which feels a little too mean-spirited to recover from. Between Yoshiko siccing the dog on Riko twice for laughs, despite her phobia, then being petulant when she loses the dog, it just doesn't really work, and none of it is quite as funny as the writers probably intended. There's even a tiresome and repetitive bit where Yoshiko keeps correcting Riko to say “Yohane,” only to predictably trip up later when Riko grants her wish. It's a tedious setup for a minuscule payoff, not quite worth the time it takes up.

When Riko finally does muster up the courage to pet Shiitake, it's a cute little moment, but the journey doesn't quite live up to the destination. Her story also pales in comparison to her season one spotlight, (though hopefully this doesn't count as a Riko episode?) which pulled deftly from the themes of the series and found a way to seamlessly integrate with the main Aqours storyline.

That's not to say this was a “bad” episode, by any means. It certainly wasn't more frivolous than say, an episode full of girls bopping around an aquarium corralling sea lions. But whereas Love Live! Sunshine!! has almost always managed to stick its landings, this one was slapdash and hurried. It's a disappointing let down for a season that has largely done a great job balancing its cutesy activities with thoughtful character development. In a series where fans expect each character to get her worthy moment in the sun, this one just didn't quite shine like the others.

Rating: C+

Love Live! Sunshine!! is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

Bamboo is a big fan of Shiitake. Follow her on Twitter.