AWTY 215 - Baby Jobs-a-Lot (Dance Dance Danseur)

Hello and welcome to our weep there yet in exploration and editor in anime. I'm your anime idiot, patrick dugan.

And I'm your anime expert, D hollander gonzalez.

And I'm brenda mccullough, your anime rat king. I live in garbage, but I'm the king of it's. My garbage.

I'm chewing through your walls.

I'm scrambling through the dry wall. I'm meeting your wires. I'm middle executing myself on them and shocking myself. I like the tingle. I live on the edge.

Gives me a rush.

Give me a rush already. Starting out deeply uncomfortable inability to deal with the concept of rat king.

I could have gone the other way where I'm just a massive rats all tied together.

See? Yeah, that's the one I don't like.

Okay, we're tangent. I know an artist who makes a beret that has a rat king pattern on it. It's actually quite lovely. It's just wild as hell.

Agreed to disagree. But hey, we're watching an anime. We're watching something I got recommended on twitch a while ago for animes of the year. And oops, we're in a different year now. So we're watching dance, dance, dance.

I didn't know how to say that last word, so I'm glad you did.

Me either. I just had to do it as a bit to get past my inability to pronounce.

It sounds good to me.

If anyone's not at the show for more than four episodes, they know I can't say words good, so you're covered. You're not the worst.

Hey, the reviews say that as well, so don't worry. But yeah. Are either of you familiar with this? I didn't see it on any popular list, truly. It was just someone was doing a twitch stream of recommending anime and I was like, oh, got to protect my business. So I jotted a couple down and that's the only place I heard of this. So I don't blame you if neither of you are aware.

I haven't heard of this, but looking it up, I am excited because if there's one thing about me, it's that I love ballet, which you might not suspect. I was actually talking about this when we were hanging out on New Year's Eve, but I love consuming ballet content, especially like, docuseries and tiktoks of ballerinas talking about being a ballerina or breaking their point shoes in, because I think it's all extremely interesting. And now I know who to blame for it. I think it just occurred to me when I was very young, I watched barbie and the nutcracker, which the Rat king in that is played by Tim Curry. Hey, big get for that one, big boy. I find ballet content extremely interesting, so I'm looking forward to watching some people dance.

Hell, yeah. Brendan, are you familiar?

I don't know what this is. I know nothing about ballet at all.

Cool say so interesting. One of us is, well, might be very excited about Watch, and the other two are roughly aware that there is an art form called ballet, and perhaps we'll learn more in the first three episodes.

As you can tell, The nutcracker is the only thing I can pull out of the top of my brain.

That's one whole ballet more than me. So you win.

Thank you all the way. Reference. And then I remember Christmas. I got it. You can tell we're culture to sell with our anime podcast.

I mean, I have tickets every Sunday night, but I can't go because I'm recording. What are you sacrifices? It's like I requested to record in this time window or something. So, episode one, we start out with a young boy, June Pay. He's a little lad. He's asleep at the ballet with his parents, who are adults watching it. And then they're like, okay, it's over. Hey, dummy, wake up. And he wakes up, but, oh, no, there's a surprise extra performance. whoa. And just a buff man runs out on the stage and starts doing some solo ballet shit. June pei is like, wow, I'm so gay. This is an awakening. Wait, no, sorry. I just love ballet.

What is it that I like about this? Is it the attractive man with a tattoo on his ABS? Or is it the ballet?

Yeah. Watching the pretty women do it, that just put me right to sleep. But once I saw a man with chest hair and visible ABS, I found passion for the first time in my life. Weird.

I don't want to unpack that.

We don't need five warriors. Listen. Spike Spiegels everyone's. Gay awakening. I get it. Is fine.

He did have the vibe.

Yeah, he looked a lot.

But as he's watching this man, he sees sparkles because the spark of his life, great recurring themes set him up early. So we flash years ahead. And it's middle school, so you know, those boys, they got to be rough housing. Cause I guess you might notice there's some conflict already because one of these boys rough housing is June Pay. He's talking about doing he does martial arts that I wrote down later in my newt notes. It's Jean kundo. And he shows off a big old kick, and everyone is impressed.

Wow.

Including a girl on the piano, miko. They're in chorus rehearsal and they're all goofing off, but they get into it. June pei clearly in love with miko. He's like, she plays the piano. But I'm like, intrigued by her style.

The way she plays the piano. Again, not going to address her, but the way she plays the piano is so good.

Why am I so intrigued by her? She consumes me. Yeah, it's hormones. My guy.

Because he says, I'm intrigued by her style. Is it her beauty mark on her face? My dude, that's just clearly you being attracted to this young lady. That's okay. But their second years in school, and they've been friends. She moved there eventually. So we go back to June pay's house he's in his dad's ballet rehearsal space sitting on the piano because he loves piano girl. Do you get it? And his sister comes in and is like, hey, so we need to clear out some of dad's stuff because dead dad Chuck got it. And she's like, yeah, we got this ballet bar. Do you want to do anything with it? It was your idea, after all, to get it. Because he used to want to do ballet. He's like, nah, that was for stretching out for better kicks to my enemies.

I like how it was his idea to get the ballet bar. Even though his sister was in ballet. She's the one who was doing it as a kid.

So he's like, no, I'm too manly for it. So no one is convinced. So we get a flashback to young junpei being dazzled by that performance. And he asked his dad to do ballet. But his dad is like, oh, buddy, do you want to try one of those boy sports, like martial arts or anything else?

You could still do big kicks.

Do big kicks, but for violence instead of you. But he's like, but, dad. And he dances his little baby heart out. And he shows he wants it. So his dad's like, all right, I'll.

Give it up to his dad. A, because he's dead. What am I losing? But B, looks you. But yeah, he dances hard out and shit. He's got it. I mean, he's gotten the stuff.

At this point, it hadn't really occurred to me that their dad was dead. Because when she goes in the room and she says like, June Pay says like, you could have knocked first. And she says, this isn't your room. It's dad's room. I just took it as like, this is his office, and he's not home. So then in this flashback when they show that he died before that, I was like, oh, how nice. Both of his parents are alive. I was wrong. oopsy daisy.

A supportive parent. That's a death flag if I've ever seen one.

Shit.

So we see him signing up for baby's first ballet lesson. And all his classmates are there. And they just got out of boy club, soccer club. And they're standing outside the youth fitness center, community center, whatever it is. And they're like, ballet girl clothes on a girl. Gross. Hey, what are you doing here, June Pay? Did you sign up for one of those girly sports like ballet? And June pei headbutts him to be like, no, see, I'm a boy. Boys do violence. See, example. This is what you all wanted, right? Google. So we see. Shortly after that, his dad died of a heart attack. And at the funeral, his uncle, who owns the jeep, kundo dojo, is like, well, your dad's dead. And you're like seven. That makes you the man of the house. You got to toughen up. You're going to start taking martial arts with me. My boy.

Yeah.

So good quality childhood. No, you're done with that. You don't have a dad anymore. You're your own dad.

You know, it's a good environment where you're the man of the house now. It's like, I'm five, sir. I'm a literal baby.

Yeah, you have an older sister, but she's a girl. So what are we going to do? Rely on her?

Your grown adult mother and your older sister protects themselves.

If not for you, if you're not out there working, you got to stay in security at night because everyone's going to be breaking in. You got to get a job at the fish market. You're going to be hacking heads off a fish because you got to get used to death, because don't forget the violence. You're also doing martial arts.

He hands him a pickaxe and says, time to work at the coal mine.

Imagining a little baby and all these different work environments in the outfit and stuff in it a hilarious mental image on my part.

Baby works a lot. Coming to a theater near you. This is when he's like, all right, I got a man up because two adults confirmed that to me. That's enough for me. And he cuts off all his long hair. I forgot to also say, when he was young, his dad was like, people already have trouble telling if you're a boy or a girl. Do you want to also do girl things because he has long hair?

His dad also kind of had long hair. Didn't his dad have a ponytail?

Yeah, but he had a beard, so it cancels it out. Slight bubble.

I shouldn't say beard, but he cuts his hair short, and he's like, well, it's boy time now. Got to butch it up for school and whatnot.

Change form into boy gender normative roles.

Power off.

So he steps outside. He's about to go to the Jikuno dojo, and he runs into miko, and he's like, a funny coincidence, running into you right outside your house. Who's looking for you? Could you do that kick for me again that you did in class earlier? And he's like, yeah. All right, baby, was this. So he does the kick, and she's like, oh, wow. That wasn't as good as the first one. You say that's a martial arts kick, right? He's like, yeah, because I'm so tough in stuff. And she's like, I call bullshit because I know that to be a ballet move. That's a 540 kick. You can't hide it for me. So come here. And they go to her ballet studio or her mom's.

Yeah, I just want to say she says the words that every young teenage boy ever wants to hear, which is, I was really impressed by that high kick you did earlier. Yes, of course she is. I'm great like that just invented all the wrong ideas into his head.

There are, like, several instances in the show where the characters do things and other characters are impressed by them. And I'm like, they would be getting laughed at right now if this was real life. If that kid did that fucking kick in the middle of choir practice, the.

Hell are you doing?

Everybody would be like, sit the fuck down.

Calm down.

Stop it.

It's just really living in the mind of a middle schooler of like, if I can jump up and I can touch the ceiling above the door frame as I walk through it, all the girls are going to be like, wow, mad vertical leap. Oh, got to have sex to be.

In the NBA someday.

But yeah, her mom runs a ballet studio, and she lives above it. And they go inside, and it's just a lovely rehearsal space. And he's like, wow, I have so much room compared to the tiny space at home. I mean, monster trucks, roller coasters. And the teacher comes in, is this Mia Coast mom? I kind of lost my mom.

Milk.

Okay.

Milk. Big milk.

Yes, MILF. I hope she's not real mean about anything.

Anyways, I get paying a monthly fee for an attractive older woman to be mad at me. I get it. I fully understand.

I would believe that. That feels too specific to be a joke, Brandon.

Like I said, I understand.

So mom comes in, and Miako's like, oh, look, he wants to take classes because he shows promise. And he's like, no, never said that. No, I did one cake once. And Mia goes, like, we need another boy for the recital. And, oh, we don't have enough people for our club. Very specific, but it's not that dynamic. But she's like, we need more boys to really stand out. Taking it off.

It's on the card.

And I want to try a boy girl dance. And he's like, oh, my God, she wants me so bad.

I'm a stud.

And mom says it's too late for him because miko says he's a prodigy. And she looks at him and is like, so you've never actually taken ballet, right? He's like, yeah, too late. If you were a prodigy, he would have been doing it before you were ten and not now. A middle schooler who did one kick once that she saw he's a prodigy, but the skills. And she's like, no, get out of here. But he's like, no at all. Show you. And he starts just jumping around. Because again, he doesn't actually know ballet.

He's just been imitating that dance that he saw that one guy do when he was five or whatever.

So he does that, and he's like, how do you like me now? And she's like, Again, that's not real ballet. You just jumped and spin around, and he runs away.

That must have been so embarrassing to watch. Also, like, the second hand embarrassment of watching this 14 year old boy prance around thinking he's doing ballet and that he's doing so good.

He's a god at it. I appreciate that he wasn't actually good at it. And she's like, yeah, no, you got some natural talent, but that was garbage.

You're jumping high. Cool. But that's not ballet.

The number of people who are like, hey, I can do voices and do just the shittiest voice for me, I only done a way that's like, hey, look, I I can just do what dolls you you people do because you're all just having fun, right? This is fresh.

Honestly. Yes.

Oh, no, I don't have one.

I was Brian.

How'S that?

I'm sorry, seth, are you on the call? I didn't realize.

Oh, God.

Boy gender dance.

Anyways, family Guy voices are the first. Just kidding.

So goes home, asks her mom if June pay was really that bad. And she's like, well, yes, I show up right after school tomorrow if I'm going to teach him anything. And miko is like, okay, yes. And then she leaves. And then her mom is like, that boy is a star. Yeah. Just the shitty dynamic of, wow, you are good at this.

What?

Everyone thinks feeding into someone did their shitty stewie. And me, I'm like, fuck. That was actually really good, though. Oh, God.

Going to be really good.

I need to shape this mind, I.

Mean, to myself for, like, a solid minute. Still laughing. Thank you so much. I really appreciate.

He has to go. He shows up the next day during a little girl's rehearsal because, again, it's for little girls, not big buff men like him. So ask for better demonstration. And mom really starts correcting him on the proper posture. And again, if you need a MILF to be mean to you, this is a good show to be watching. But just all the posture and he's actually starting to do real ballet. But he's late for kundo. Oh, no. He has other boy obligations. Whatever will he do? But he freaks out because, again, emasculation, he has to do the boy thing. But he's like, I'm good at martial arts, but I don't feel that spark I get when I do ballet.

I love you as good at martial arts. We see him going there. I don't know if he's good at it.

Yeah, again, when he demonstrates it, he does a ballet kick, so I can't imagine he's great. So in school, he hides that he's taking ballet. miko sees him, like, deflect this and is frustrated because he says he still won't do the performance that she needed him to sign up for and all the reasons he still can't go, oh, I have a soccer camp that day. I have all these other club responsibilities. And then over the credits, there's talk about his dad being a stunt coordinator, and that's why he was into martial arts and also ballet, and how his mom hears that he's skipping martial arts, and his ballet teacher tells him to quit soccer. And they sneaked it in right at the last second after the credits best place to do it, they introduce the other ballet boy arrivalry. Just what we needed. And that's episode one.

Yeah. Also, at the end of episode one, mommy teacher gives him a ticket to see Swan Lake. So that's where we start. In episode two, he's there with miako, and she's explaining the story to June pei before they go in. And the gist is that a prince falls in love with odette, who is cursed to transform into a swan, and a bad guy curses the prince to fall in love with the bad guy's daughter, odeal, instead. So during the ballet no, before they go in, june Pay is pretty much only focused on how cute miako looks and how he's out one on one with a girl.

Home and home and hom and home.

I think after that, we get the opening, which I don't love the song, but I think the opening itself is cool because it's in, like, first person perspective from a couple of different people.

Yeah.

It's a real neat style, like, how they went about it. It's interesting.

Yeah. So they're watching the ballet, and just like when he was a kid, junpay falls asleep.

Nailed it.

Now it's intermission, and she asks him if he's bored, and he's like, the dancers look like they're having a good time up there, but I feel like I'm watching a school recital. And, like, while they're having this conversation, he's looking at his phone, and she gets mad at him for that, and he says, well, I got to have a social life. It's important. And she's like, no, ballet is the most important thing. No time for other things, which I think not great.

Not the healthy attitude.

Yeah. But I think it is, like, a reflection of, like, a real kind of view people have on things like ballet. At least from what I've seen. It's like, oh, no, my school is a ballet school. This is all I do. I don't have time for other things.

Yeah. Weird. Somewhat related in high school, I got shingles, and I found out that it is common among ballet dancers because of how stressed they are, because stress lowers your immune system and typically brings out shingles. I got it for much, much dumber reasons. And we'll get into great. We'll talk later.

So June Pay asks if her mom made her think that, and she's like, well, my mom's pretty much already given up on me, so not really. And it seems like he wants to say something about that. But she sees some people she knows, and she knows them from another ballet school she goes to, not her mom's. And she kind of introduces him to them, tells them that he does ballet at her mom's school, and he tries to put more effort into paying attention during the second act. And then there's a dance with O'deal and the prince, and he's like transfixed. And the animation when they're dancing is very nice.

Again, doesn't care about when the women are dancing. There's a hot guy on stage is locked.

Cool man arrived. The villain shows up with his daughter and then the daughter and the prince dance. And he's like, ooh. afterward, she's surprised that he enjoyed it more. And then he asks what makes the three leads different from the others? And she says that they're star dancers of the company or might even be guests from abroad. And then he's like, hey, you go on without me. I'm going to head home by. And then he runs off. But he really goes to a park by himself to practice what he saw. And he tries to practice being graceful and regal. And just as he, like, pulls this first move, he notices that miko followed him and she's practicing Odell's part. And he thinks about how he'd see her as more of an odette. And yet here she is doing the Dark Princess dance. She's dynamic, and she asks if he wants to dance with her. And he tries to lift her, but they fall over and she just laughs and says, like, I meant, did you want to dance with me at the festival? Not right now.

I never dance with a boy.

Gross. Unless it was to impress other people. June pei is practicing at the studio. Miaco's mom comes and gives him proper ballet clothes. There's a goofy scene where he puts them on wrong and comes out of the bathroom in front of miyako and some little kids. How embarrassing. At school. She giggles when she sees him, when she thinks of that. One of his friends, hyoka he says to introduce him to her, but a girl in his friend group is like, no, Miecho is a loser. She's in the loser group.

They never expand on that, which I was curious about.

No. It seems like June Pace friends are like, the cool, like, almost nerdy Wells.

They suck.

Yeah. They're not good friends. They talk about how she lives with some kid who won't come to school, luo. And junpay knows the name because he heard a mommy ballet teacher say it when he was dancing in the studio. Later, they're practicing together. June pay gets embarrassed. Mommy ballet dancer notices that he's a little shorter than miyako and kind of makes fun of him for it. He's stretching out, and miyako is very impressed with the shape of his foot when he points it. And then later on at home, we get a shot with just his dogs out. Big foot shot right in your face.

Quintertino's favorite anime.

Yeah. And he thinks about miako and how he wants to dance with her to make her happy. And then he runs to the studio to do some gesture. But he sees Luo dancing inside and he's beautiful. He's got gray hair and piercing blue eyes like someone else I know. It's victor Nikivara from your house.

It's victor nikivara.

What a straight coincidence.

What Hannah circumstance.

But while Jean pe is watching him in the window, luo notices, and so he moves to go back upstairs. And miyako's mom is sitting on the stairs and says she has a proposition for him. And a cop saw June pei and accuses him of peeping peeping on the ballet studio. Mom comes outside and asks what he was doing there, and he goes, hormones. I'm going home. meow. Hey, that's a goofy scene. But the song The hedgehog movies are fun. Okay, I'll fight for them. She offers to walk him home, but he declines. And before he leaves, he asks mom about the guy in the studio, and she says it's rothbart from Swan Lake who's the villain. She says, that ominously, and is like he's like, what?

Setting up your students against each other? Good teaching, good hey, well, there are.

Two boys in a clubs meant for girls, so naturally they have to start out as enemies.

There can only be one.

But also, more boys need to do ballet.

More boys need to do ballet, but I'm going to pit them all against each other. Fuck these kids. That's what their mom that's what her mom says. So the next morning, he goes back to the studio and miaco calls him by his first name. And she says that they should do that so they can be more comfortable together. They talk about lifts, and mom says it's too hard to do them in a growing body, so they won't do any for now. And instead, they're going to do, like, a different sequence in place of the lift. And she says, Show me how you can be at Prince. And he goes to grab Miako's waist, but it was too hard. And she's like, oh, it's okay. But then lua walks in, very dramatic and pretty, and miako is excited to see him. He sees June pei and turns to leave, but mom stops him and says to remember their promise.

The way she talks to him is like a demon she captured of like, remember a blog?

So she tells Luo to show June Pay the proper sequence. And they do it, and it's lovely. And he's like, not afraid to touch miko. He's comfortable with it. And then he gets a little angry and he's like, I'm more of a Prince than Jun pei. Why am I rothbart? But, like, we don't really have the context for that. Like, if they're supposed to be, like, doing a dance together or anything, I don't know. June Pay thinks about how he can't be friends with him because Luo already looks down on him and he's like, why are you even doing ballet, June Pay? You suck. You're garbo. June Pay notices his beautiful eyes as he's yelling at him. He's like, you have the most beautiful eyes.

I I feel the sparkles again.

Oh, so weird.

I also get distracted by romantic infatuation when someone's yelling at me that might, again, might be something I've done. Package.

The theme of this episode is Brendan.

Revealing, unfortunately, every episode. Sorry.

So when he notices his eyes, he's like, hey, are you, like a foreigner? And mom says he's a quarter. Like, not Japanese, anyway. Jun pei, you're the prince, and it's time for you to practice with miko. So he grabs her waist without hurting her. How exciting. Step in the right direction. But he gets all in his head with Luo watching. And then June pei is walking home, and he keeps thinking about how much better Luo is compared to him. And miyoko catches up with him and walks him home, and they're talking, and he asks about Luo, if he's been doing ballet since he was a kid. And she said, yeah, he had a really strict teacher. To the point where he wanted to quit. I can't hold on. Okay. To the point where he wanted to quit. I just felt like I swallowed quit really weird, and it fucked me up. So June pei gets heated about that. He's like he shouldn't quit. He's so good. And Mia Co is like, yeah, I felt the same way. So she apologizes for lua being rude to June pei. He doesn't have great social skills, but you're great at talking to people. You're always laughing with your friends, she says, and that maybe he and Luo could be friends. And it's at that point, junpay is like, oh, you wanted me to do ballet for luo's sake. Like, not that you wanted me to dance with you. Then he's like, do you like luo? And she kind of gets flustered, but then she's like, no, he's my cousin.

Could never.

No, I'm just worried about him because I love him. But June Pay walks away. I'll dejected anyway.

Slowly, unchecked. Technically. Not incest off the bingo.

I hope not.

Also, the scene was happening right by train tracks, and we heard, like, a train coming. The whole time, I thought she was going to walk away into the train.

It was going to take a hard.

Turn, and I was waiting for it.

Yeah. We always live in fear now. At some time later at school, mia Co asks June Paywa, he's not coming to the studio. And he's like, I only skipped a couple of days. I just have other commitments. And he keeps saying he can't perform in the festival because he's got other stuff going on. Besides, Luo should be your prince. You don't need me. Later, he goes to the soccer club room, and Hioka is like, banging along to a song on a desk, like, drumming. They chat about the song, and hika is like, we should start a band. You're not busy? Okay. Sorry. June pei walks home that night listening to a message from his uncle, because he hasn't been going to jeep kundo either. So these people. Are all over him, and he dances in the street. It's very dramatic.

People desire me.

This is crazy. Oh my God, I have to dance my feelings out. Then the next day at school, one of June Pace friends comes up to him and says, luo came to school today. And that's episode two. And I am so sorry that I just can't seem to talk right now. Jesus Christ.

2023. It's the year of the struggle because we've been doing stellar's the first one. Oh, and we get the ending on this one, and it's like, oh, yeah, similar to the opening where it's nothing mind blowing. I'm not going to be running to YouTube and playing it on loop, but it's like neat little papercraft style, which was very nice.

Yeah, like a scrapbook.

Yeah. Not expecting it from the show. It was pleasant. Episode three starts right off with Luo joining the same grade as junpay, but not, you know, not necessarily the same class. So June Pay is like, at the door of the classroom spying in as he's being introduced by the teacher. He's like, I can't believe he's here. He's going to expose that I do ballet to all my friends and rat me out. And we see the teacher yelling at Jumpay, like, hey, get back to class. Get out here. And I got the opening. I see Luo is in class, and he's very quiet, and he doesn't really participate at all in every class. They're like, let's get someone to read out loud. Let's get someone to do this math problem. Let's go with the new kid. And every time Luo passes up and does not do it, which I didn't know was an option in school, I would have loved him. I could have done that. And some kids are talking, like making fun of them. Like, does he see even no Japanese? Is he just an idiot or does he just not want to do it? Or what's his reason? And we see the only class he participates in is English, where he reads out an English textbook out loud. And he's able to do that flawlessly. And the teacher says his pronunciation is even better than hers. So a little bit of his backstory there. And one of Junpay's friends is in his class. hoca Hyoka, I believe he doesn't deserve a name. He doesn't.

He's a bastard child.

Bastard child. Fully boy starts calling out Luo in class. Like, the teacher doesn't stop him. He's fully just yelling at Luo in class and like calling him out and stuff. And Luo just keeps ignoring him. And he's like, oh, maybe he doesn't understand Japanese. And so we see later after school, he goes to soccer practice and meets up with Champagne, is complaining about Luo too, and being like, he's stiff and ignoring me. And he thinks he's better than everybody, which is the natural mindset to have.

He wouldn't respond when I was antagonizing him. During class. What's that about?

What's his problem? And then we see after school, Jim pei's friends, now it's like, three of them, so it's, you know, more of them. ketchup aluo, and just straight up start harassing him. Just straight up bullying him, thinking he can't speak Japanese and are like, he yelling at him in Japanese. We know he can. So they're just screaming in his face. And we see this continues for the next few days. Again, Jupy's friends are bastard children.

Bad, hate them, not great.

And they just keep bullying Luo. And jupe is wondering why he was so bold in the studio. He was so powerful and assertive in his movements, but he's so diminutive pulled in at school. Maybe this is why he doesn't go to school. My dude. junpei remembers his teacher saying, or his bombing teacher saying that to do ballet, you have to throw everything else away. Soccer, jeep, Coudo friends, you got to throw it all away. He's wondering if this is what Luo did. That's why he is acting the way he does, but he doesn't want to betray his friends and all the people that are looking up to him, like his uncle at the jeep guard studio and stuff. So he can't betray them, but he starts understanding what his teacher was saying. And at school, though, Luo is getting teased again. He got a zero on a test, and Jumbay's friend says he even spelled his own name wrong in kanji and kanji, how do you even spell your own name wrong? He looks it up on Quaggle with you.

There's also a part, I think it was in episode one, where Jun pei was running past the danny's that was clearly supposed to be denied. And I was like, Why did they.

Show that we all latched onto a different fake brand? Because I saw a TV named it zony.

Why are they doing this?

It's a weird familiarity of, like, uncanny valley of, like, here are the words that are close to stuff, you know, so you're comfortable in the setting. It's like they're not important. It'll play apart. But so he looks up luo's name on the Internet to see how it's spelled in kanchi. And when he looks up his name, it's a pretty unique name. And what comes up is an actress that looks pretty similar to Luo. So naturally, Luo takes the phone and throws it against the wall and smashes it, as you do.

Hey, I support him. I shouldn't support violence, but I feel like it's that point where it's like, he's had enough.

Hey, we allow property destruction. That is okay.

It's not the body. It could be replaced. Also, this kid's a bully. Fuck them.

Yeah.

If Louis destroyed, like, a random kid next to him in class, like, his phone, I would be more annoyed.

Yes.

So at soccer practice, we see the bully friend come in all annoying lil smashed my phone, and then I got in trouble. They called my parents, not his. What's the deal?

What's that about? It's not like I've been bullying him for the last week.

Oh, God. To have that self awareness as a teenager, you'd love to see it. We never do. But you would love to. So his friends like, hey, wait a minute. You all have phones and give me one of your phones. And he takes someone else's phone and looks up luo's name again to see what he wasn't allowed to look at. We get a quick shot. But it turns out when he looked up the name, it brought up an article about an actress that looks very similar to Luo, who was wrapped up in a scandal where she was a teen idol in Japan and then went to America and got a shotgun marriage to a rich and powerful man. And then they had a child, and it turned out that child wasn't the child of the rich and powerful man. So the actress had to flee the country back to Japan.

Thank you for reading her back story.

Yes, because I did it goes fast. I had to pause it and I did the whole thing and she left the child with her mother. So basically, yeah, this is luo's mom and the reason why he didn't want anyone finding out. So we see that in june's friend. june's friend calls him over to the bully. Oh, yeah. They call Luo back over to them to bully him further and tease him about his mom. Now that who it is. Like a sore spot. Let's prod this further and dig in deeper and wonder why he's so mean to us.

I know you, like, super retaliated by breaking my phone, but I'm going to keep fucking going.

Yeah. At this point, it's fully from, like, idiot who's ignorant of trying to be someone's friend who's just full on bullying now and sucks to watch. June Bay tries to talk.

Yeah, not a fun episode of television, folks.

No, this is like a very special episode, except worse.

Very mean episode. junpei tries to talk to mioko about it, and she just ignores him because he's been skipping practice and has been ignoring her. So she doesn't want to put up with his nonsense anymore. And he asks if loa can just go back to studying at home, go back to home schooling and not be at school anymore. And she also stops asking he also notices that she stopped asking him to come back to practice. So before, she would be hounding him to come to practice. And now she just doesn't bother with all anymore. And like a typical teenager, he's oblivious to why. But we see june pei stops by the studio after school one day and looks in on the practice, but doesn't join in. And then we see the next day at school, the bullies are forcing Luo to join the soccer club. They bring him back to the clubhouse room, but Jim Bay is in there, and Jim Bay is like, just leave him alone. Stop picking on the kid. And they're like, no, you got to get it. This kid's Bomb is famous. She used to be an actress and then was lost her fame because of a scandal and stuff, so we got to tease him about it. And so one of them lunges at him, and lou gets scared and fumbles over a chair. And once he's on the ground, they just proceed to kick soccer balls at him. Real shitty stuff. Jim pays, wondering why Luo was so graceful and so confident in his movements back in the studio. But here, he tripped over a chair and fell down, and he seems much more clumsy. And then miyako is there, and she threatens to get the teacher if they don't stop. So they just push Luo out of the room, and he runs off. miyako runs after him, and then chimpay runs after her big conga line. And as he's running after her, she stops by the building and jumping, asks, is he dumb? What's his deal? Like, I thought he'd be smart and good, but he's bad at school. And she says he gave up everything. He only knows ballet. That's all he's really good at fine dining and breathing. And she's saying chunky's got relationships and his social status, like he talked about that's more important than ballet. lua gave all of that up for ballet, so he's not great at other stuff. And we see jumpe. We cut to jumpe practicing ballet on the ballet bar back in his dad's office before sorting this all out again. Much like a teenager, to reject something so fiercely that he unconsciously performs and does to work out his thoughts, he's doing ballet. And to express his emotions, he's doing ballet, and he refuses to do ballet. Like, something that is truly in his blood and he refuses to do.

There's some angry high kicks going on.

But someone might think he's not manly and bully him like he is in his head and, oh, my God, it's part of a system. Who would have guessed?

Why? What if they think I'm gay?

We see. chunfei wonders what it means to be cool and what it means to be truly manly as he's sorting out all of his emotions through dance. And then he gets a text from his bully friends saying they got something planned. And in class, Jim pei watches a video of luo's mom doing her back in her idol days, performing her famous song from years ago. And all of his friends are watching it, like, laughing and making fun of it and notices, like, oh, she's got ballet hands. So he's again still focusing about ballet, and he thinks back when he sees his mom or luo's mom, he thinks about his dad, the funeral, and what it means to be manly, and he's really struggling with that inner turmoil all episode. And then we see them go to an assembly, and there's announcements and performances and all this stuff. And then comes to class two one, which is luo's class, and they're going to put on a performance, but no one's really on stage. And then all of a sudden, we see someone get pushed out on stage in a girl's school uniform. And it's Luo, and he's in his mom's school uniform. It's not even their own schools. So they went out of their way to push him into this uniform and push him on stage. And once on stage, the music starts playing from his mom's song again, relentless bullying.

Why, like, why go this far?

I don't understand it because he doesn't talk.

He clearly talk, and he can't read. Fuck this kid. Am I right, folks?

I kind of get the bullying. Now I understand why they did it.

No.

So they started all chanting, sing. And the crowd starts chanting as well, which is also just shitty. And Luis was on stage just, like, having a full breakdown and kind of panicking. And we see Jim pei, like, walk out. Watch it. And we see a teacher cuts them off, and he's like, all right, kids. Now comes to the staff room. You're all getting in trouble. It's like, thank God. Finally. And we see everyone's just laughing at Luo on stage, who's still just kind of, like, paralyzed in fear. And then as all the kids are being escorted away, luo kicks off a shoe, and it ricochets off the window. And everyone gets quiet and looks at him. And he's on stage, and he starts performing ballet. And mia kazare is like, oh, shit, my cue. And runs to the piano and starts accompanying him on the piano. And everyone is just kind of shocked and stunned to see him performing because he's killing it. He's really good at ballet. So everyone's like, oh, wow. And of course, the bullies are like, oh, my God, he does ballet. And one of chunky shitty friends is like, oh, my God, can you believe it? He's doing ballet. And looks at Chunbei, who is silently but fully crying, just like a waterfall coming from his face of tears watching luo's performance. And afterwards, miako goes backstage to find Luo to comfort him. It's like, wow, looked like you were having fun up there. You looked like you were enjoying ballet again, like when you were little. And he's kind of catching his breath. He's like, no, I like it more. I liked it more than when I was little. And you see, he's kind of getting, like a rush and getting back into it. And then after school, we see the bullies again, corner Luo, start bullying him again and pull out some pantyhose, saying, like, you got to dance for us again. You got to wear these tights. And Chunpei swoops in and grabs the pantos from it's like, nah, these aren't tights. These are pantyhose. It's different, you idiots.

You can't dance in these. You absolute buffoons.

You won't go turtle swine. And chupi puts the pantoes on his heads and he's like, but don't worry, I'll dance for you. And he's got like, a silly face because of the bandhios and starts dancing. And while he's dancing, they all start laughing at him, thinking like, odd, Chunpei. He's doing a bit. I love this guy. And Jim pei, while he's dancing, is again being his truest self while he dances and emitting all the things he's had bottled up, saying he loves ballet, he's going to keep doing it. He doesn't like Luo, but he's so moved by luo's performance, and he wants to get better to compete with Luo that he's going to quit soccer, quit jitkuno and do ballet full time. And if they hit him for that, that's their problem because it's something he wants to do. And he's going to do it all still while wearing the patios.

Got to cover the seriousness with humor. Boy I get it.

What's that? It's not like this is the exact coping method about me being queer in high school.

Too real. Moving on. And yeah, all chimpanzees buddies are like, what are you talking about? And Chimpanz is like, these are my choices. This is what I'm doing. You can support me or you can get lost. And all of a sudden they're like, why would you do that to us? How could you do this weird thing? And to choose that over us, that makes us question our friendship. You're weird, man. And it's like, okay, now you are actually considering your emotions now.

Okay, you guys are a bunch of freaks.

Yeah. The worst part is fully believable teenage behavior. It just sucks to realize. So they go away, and we see Chunpei after school looking at his phone, seeing that he was kicked out of the Chat group of all the soccer gun. So not only is he out of soccer club, he's out of friends. He lost all of that, honestly. Good. They all sucked. And junpei admits that he wanted to be manly in front of everyone, but the most manly thing he can do is stick into your beliefs. And regardless of what other people think, like Luo did. So they all leave. And after school, we see. He goes back to the ballet studio, see his teacher saying, I'm coming back. I'm committing to the practice. I'm doing it. He's like, who the hell are you? Because he's wearing, like, a big hoodie. It's like it is. I shouldn't pay. And he pulls off his hood, and he fully shaved his head. And she's like, what the hell would you do? What kind of prince shaves his head, you goddamn idiot? And starts to yelling at him. And that's episode three.

Yeah.

So our weeb there you are, weeb dancing. Oh, boy, are we holding closer tiny dancer.

I want to dance with somebody. You want to dance with somebody?

We human or are we dancers?

Dance. Dance. Just something.

This is the Fallout Boy anime is a joke that I wanted to make at the beginning of the episode, and.

Now I'm sorry to steal your thunder.

No, no.

The laziest possible way.

I missed my chance.

Yeah. This, especially episode three, not fun. Yeah, this is like, fine narrative. It's nothing we haven't seen before. I love that there are these sorts of outlets for the middle school age boys to be like, oh, I don't need to be manly, okay? I need something to start showing me that, and I'm glad that this exists to be one of them. This is a little too gender 101 for me. It's a little too much of boy doing girl thing, but confuse because you.

Like, why accepted in the general society for men to do ballet?

Yeah, it just feels like I don't know. I want to see the deep queer stuff. Come on, this is children's stuff. But yeah, it was just a little too baseline and then just full on excerpts from my high school experience in episode three that I was like, this wasn't fun.

Yeah.

So that's a no for me.

Yeah. I think that I almost feel like junpay is an unlikable main character just because of how much he's taking these free ballet lessons under the condition that he'll do this festival. But he continuously is like, I'm not going to do this festival. Ballet is for girls. And I'm like, Why are you going to the fucking lessons then? So it drives me a little crazy.

Fully checked off. unlikeable main character and sundare for him because he's so flustered all the time by miako and refuses to really minute. And it's like she clearly is not interested in my dude. It's typical of these genre sorts. He sucks. But so we can have a place for his character to grow and mature from. But for the first three episodes that we see, he just sucks. We don't see much growth.

They frustratingly. Did a very accurate representation of a middle school boy.

Again, like what I said earlier, I think it's less with children. Like, children will do as many hobbies as they want, but then it gets to a point in ballet where it's like, okay, you have to either choose to do ballet and this is what you're doing, or something else. You have to devote all of your time to ballet, and that's a commitment. And I think it's interesting that they show Luo. I mean, we don't know his whole backstory, but it seems like he was pushed into making it his only commitment before he could learn how to read. So that's interesting to me. But yeah, episode three was hard to watch because it's a thing I experienced too, of, like, this overly fake friendliness as a form of bullying and it is, like, really painful to watch because it takes a certain type of person to be bullied that way. And I was that kind of person. So it was like, oh, this hurts me. I don't like it definitely not something.

I realized in hindsight of like, hey, wait a minute. They weren't my friends.

Hey, they were bullied.

Wait, I was just a mobile punching bag for them that hung around, desperate for any kind of attention I got.

Damn. Anyway, Brendan likes to be bullied by women.

I like consensual bullet.

To bring up the mood a little bit. Let's talk about brendan's.

Listen, I was bullied in a library in middle school. Then the librarian came out and was like, hey, I rescued you. And I was like, a nice older woman saved me. And then she was like, hey, you got to stand up for yourself. What are you doing? You can't be this sort of punching bag. And then instead of feeling motivated, I felt weird, and now I want to.

Get pumped in a library. Anyway, Brendan, how do you feel about it?

I think we talk about air. Was the mom my favorite character despite her three minutes of total screen time into all three ups? Yeah, what about it? She was very pretty much my type. Yeah, it's the problem with these type of shows because, yes, these kids are outlandishly shitty friends and bullies. Again, though, that is accurate to moodle school and stuff. And can we judge the entire series based on the first three episodes, which is typically the low point for any series? No, but we've done it for the last three years. We'll continue to do it.

But yes, it's almost like the show has a flawed premise.

Here we are. But that's the thing. I feel like we do three episodes because if you're not in it by episode three, it's like, what are you doing?

It's the thing of like, I can see where the story is going. I even had a note where it's like, we have childhood inspiration. We have a rival and a love interest, both within the same hobby. That's all you need for protagonists to be motivated to commit their whole life to it. It is pretty by the books with the shit with the writing and stuff. There isn't anything too really unique. I mean, the most unique thing is the dad was a stunt coordinator for Bruce Lee, and he does juke coup doe, which is Bruce lee's, you know, martial arts philosophy. And so I'm like, that's neat. It doesn't really come up ever. Like, no, it's just the thing he's abandoning.

And yeah, because they talk about the dojo all the time. But then we see him more involved with the soccer club that doesn't get that treatment of, oh, I'm hanging out on the soccer field every day.

I feel like it was, like, just someone creating the series. I really like Bruce Lee. But I want to make a thing about ballet and I want an excuse to put it in here. Somehow. It just feels really out of place. But yeah, it seems like a typical sort of sports anime, especially, like a young sports growing as a person and skilled in the sports at the same time. But it's about ballet, which is not super common, though. There are, like, four ballet animes on our list. We watched one of them already. We have another one on the list we'll probably get to eventually.

Hey, it's like Christmas anime. We probably watch about 90% of the existing ones.

So if this is good for someone younger and it does inspire them of like, fuck it, I'll do that hobby, even if it's not a gender normative one for my specific gender, like, yeah, if that inspires you, good. That's great. It is pretty by the books, though, and at least for me, the general art style of this whole series. I very much understand that it is particularly honed to ballet and really to exaggerate their body proportions and different parts of the body to highlight the forms of ballet. iq does the same thing where these boys have just, like, giraffe necks to emphasize how tall they are and stuff. So I understand it's very much for the premise of the ballet and stuff. I don't like it. They're very thin and spindly and at least chunky. In particular is massive eyes, massive ear. Like, every part of his face is huge. All the features are very big except for the actual head itself and, like, his body. And it just feels weird to me, and I don't like it.

The eyes you have a dancer skull, darling.

They feel like betty spaghetti toys.

The style of the eyes bothered me because they had a highlight going straight across the curve, their eye, and it looked like they were always on the verge of tears. And I was like, what's going on? I don't like that. That's bad.

Yeah, that's the first thing I noticed. And then I noticed the proportions. I was like, I get that it's for ballet, but I don't like it.

If you like, sure.

So, yeah, it's by the books. If you like.

It good.

If you need ballet anime, here's one. Not the best.

Watch princess two.

Two instead, watch Ballet Girls. Honestly?

Yeah, either of those.

I did like Princess Two. Honestly.

I'm so glad.

It was a fun time. It has weird stuff going on. Oh, no, I liked it. It was fun.

Listener if you have an anime on the caliber of Princess tutu, please send those recommendations in. Our email is rweebaria@gmail.com, or you can reach out to us on TikTok or tumblr at rweebether on both.

Hey, if Princess tutu is the bar now, I got plenty of that. You can find me on TikTok and Instagram at Honey, period. D or on tumblr at honeyd. All one word. And honey is spelled H-U-N-N-I-E.

Going to be real. That little crocodile in the ballet uniform was really caring. Princess tutor for me for the most part, but goddamn, I love that little character. abts burning on Twitter. It's answered almost better than Silence, which is a video game podcast I did for, like, seven years or something insane.

Thank you to camille ruley for her artwork, and thank you to Louisong for themed song stories. You can find all of louie's music at Louisong bandcamp.com. Thank you, and we hope you'll join us next week as we learn to live with anime.

Or, hey, watch barbie and the nutcracker.

Or, hey, watch the nope, cut that part out. I don't have any no, keep it.