Chatty AF 240: NANA Watchalong Part 2 – Episodes 8-17 (WITH TRANSCRIPT)

TONY: She’s constantly talking about other men. She’s constantly thinking and talking about how hot other men are and how, you know, “Oh, my God, he’s cute!”, “Oh, my God, she’s cute!” I mean, “He’s—” Well, yeah. Well, “She’s cute.”

VRAI: [crosstalk] Yeah, yeah. No, no. Yeah, no, we have to talk about this!

DESTINY: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it’s, like, insane!

TONY: [crosstalk] But just constant thoughts about other people…

[Introductory musical theme]

VRAI: Hello, and welcome to Chatty AF: The Anime Feminist Podcast. And welcome back to our newbie-friendly watchalong of Nana! This week we are talking about episodes 8 through 17, if you are watching along with us at home.

My name’s Vrai. I’m the daily operations manager here at AniFem. You can find me on Bluesky being sad about vampires @writervrai. And with me today, I am joined by two lovely, wonderful people. Once again I have Tony and Destiny. If y’all want to introduce yourselves and tell folks where they can find ya.

TONY: Hi! I’m Tony. I’m a contributing editor here at Anime Feminist. You can find me on Bluesky @empty-visions.

DESTINY: And hi, I’m Destiny. I’m the host of Getting Animated, which is just an anime podcast where I gush about all things anime, particularly shoujo and josei and all the girlypop stuff. [Chuckles]

VRAI: Yay! Alright, so, if you haven’t watched Nana for a—If you have seen Nana or you just want to listen to this and don’t want to refresh, that’s cool. Just as a CliffsNotes, episodes 8 through 17 basically covers from the end of the prologue, when Nana and Hachi actually start moving in together, Hachi gets a job, and then we move through Shoji cheating on Hachi with, against all odds, a girl named Sachiko, and then Hachi finding out about Ren and Nana’s history and them going to the Trapnest concert in Hachi’s hometown. And that is where we will be stopping for this batch.

But before we get into the meat of it, because we didn’t have time last time with all the table-setting, I need to freak the fuck out about the fact that the Jackson Hole bar (A) exists and (B) is real, because I’m from Wyoming and Jackson Hole to me is that place where my dad went to have his union board meetings once a year and all the rich people live there and my mom met Harrison Ford one time.

DESTINY: [Chuckles]

VRAI: I can’t.

DESTINY: That’s so cool.

VRAI: Well, you went there, right?

DESTINY: Yeah! I actually went there [on] my last trip to Japan. It was a trek to get out there. It took so much time, and it was raining when we got there, so we had to walk in the rain to get there. And then when we finally got there, there was a line out the door, and they were just kinda like, “We don’t have any seats, so if you want to come in you’re gonna have to just stand at the bar and eat.” And we were like, “Sure, I don’t care.” And then once— [Chuckles] Because, you know, we’re two foreigners, obviously we’re Black and we clearly look out of place, they saw… [Chuckles] they saw us standing there and they’re like, “We’re gonna get you a chair and a table.” And I was like, “Oh, wow, really?” And they’re like, “Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just give us like 10, 15 minutes.” So, that was a really cool experience. They were so, so, so nice.

And then we saw people who were just dressed up like they were in Nana. And you couldn’t tell if that was just their style or if they were doing it for the bit, but they looked so cool. A group of friends came, and the group of friends, I knew, were definitely Nana fans because they were taking pictures next to the manga and stuff like that. It was a great time. And the burger was actually really, really good. The menu has an actual drawing from Ai Yazawa on there, which was… I was like, “Oh, my God! This is so cool!” And then they have little troves around the restaurant. It’s a very small space, so they have Nana manga that seems to be signed and stuff in a glass box on the floor, so if you’re not looking for it you probably would walk right over it. And then they have a whole wall that just basically has Nana pictures. And that’s, like, really it. And the menu, of course. But it was such a cool experience. I couldn’t believe it, especially because it’s just crazy to see this is where they go and hang out and eat and just chitchat, and then I’m here eating and chitchatting. It felt really surreal. I was so geeked. [Chuckles]

VRAI: That’s so cute. Well, and if I understand right, it is a place that Yazawa herself liked to go and that’s why it’s in there.

DESTINY: Yes, yes. It’s like a place where she would just go there to chill, herself, which honestly makes sense. It’s such a… Especially if it wasn’t busy, I could easily find myself going somewhere like that just to read a book or… It’s quiet and it’s just kind of… Because it’s so small, it’s kind of cozy in the sense of, like, if I was writing a book or reading a book or just needing somewhere to kind of chill out for a second, I would go there. It’s very cool. It’s a very cool place.

VRAI: Yeah, I’m totally curious now if it’s always wall to wall like that or if there was some kind of big event that evening or some kind of Nana anniversary thing going on in the city. That’s so neat.

DESTINY: Me too, because… It’s crazy because there was a lot of local people there, and so it felt like this is like a local hangout spot. But then there was also a bunch of young people who were there who were just like, “Oh, we’re just here because you could clearly tell we like Nana and this is our place to hang out, as well.” So it was really cool. We sat next to these two ladies who… they were on, like, a friendship date type of thing, because we ended up talking to them and they’re just like, this is their first time and they were so inspired by the manga and they love the manga so much that the fact that they were able to do that together as a best friend thing, I was like, “Oh, my God!”

VRAI: That’s so cute!

DESTINY: Such a cool place. Yeah. Super, super cool.

VRAI: And honestly, so much of this arc is about spending a little bit of time indulging in the fantasy for readers of moving to the big city and going out on your own and finding all of these cute vintage things that are inexplicably cheap, and then kind of bursting the bubble off that. [Chuckles]

DESTINY: Oh, yeah.

TONY: Oh, my gosh. If that has not been me this month.

DESTINY: [Chuckles]

VRAI: Mm-hm.

TONY: Whoops! There goes my clothing budget.

VRAI: Yeah, it reminded me a little of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend of all things, where you’re kind of going, “Where is she getting all the money for this? Are we just not…?” and then it’s like, oh, no, that did matter. That mattered very much.

DESTINY: Yeah. It’s actually pretty funny: my husband has me as Hachi in his phone, and I think this episode or at least episode 8 was the one that made him change it, because it was literally Hachi and Nana, they’re shopping… At this point, they moved in together, so they’re shopping for furniture and they’re looking around for different things. And this is actually one of the pinnacle moments of the series because this is where she gets her name. This is where Hachi gets to be called Hachi. 

They’re shopping, and she’s clearly just overly excited, and that’s honestly very me, in the sense of, like, “Oh, my God, look at this!” Like especially if you take me to Marshalls or TJ Maxx, I’m like, “Ah, I need everything!” And the fact… There’s a scene where she’s like, “Do you like the strawberry glasses?” and Nana’s like, “I don’t care. I’ll get whatever you want.” But it’s like, “No, but I want you to like them, too!” And it’s just that whole dynamic of them two and the fact that she’s like, “Oh, you’re like a dog.” And it’s in the most endearing way, right, like, you’re a dog. 

I know a lot of people are like, “A dog?” but especially as someone whose favorite animal is a dog, there is a lot of positive notions with that, too, where it’s like she’s just so excited and she wants you to be happy as much as she’s happy. And this is really where I feel like when Hachi’s personality gets to shine. I think her personality shines the most when she’s with her friends. Not around men! But with her friends. [Chuckles]

TONY: That’s really interesting to me, too, because she’s also changing because her friendships are changing, right? She’s making more friends with people who are also moving to the big city but have maybe a different set of values and a different way of looking at the world than she does—well, not than she does but than her friends do, right? She’s getting to know the members of Nana O.’s band, and they don’t look at her the way that Junko and Kyosuke do in this kind of slightly coddling, slightly older sister way, so she can kind of be a little bit of a different person around them, right, a little bit more supportive. 

She doesn’t really talk that— I don’t remember her talking a huge amount about Shoji with them, for example, right? She’s developing these other aspects of her identity that I think allow her to grow so much during this section. But also, as she’s doing that, it’s only possible because she’s working herself to the bone at this job that she hates [Chuckles]. 

And it reminded me of so many scenes, if anything, in Aggretsuko, right, just being sexually harassed by your boss, fighting for scraps with older women in the workplace, and just the kind of honesty about what it’s like to try to scrape together enough money to make it in the city.

VRAI: Yeah, I do love the kind of subtle little implicit dig of, like, this magazine for young people that has no interest in the thoughts of the young person they have acquired to do menial labor. The strawberry glass scene is so interesting because it’s like on the one hand it’s a thing she really likes, but she’s so afraid to have an opinion…in a vacuum.

DESTINY: Outside of you, yeah. And I think you made a really good point when it comes to, like, her friends are treating her very differently. Even while she’s going shopping, right, Nana is telling Hachi, like, “Oh, you still have to pay rent.” [Laughs] “Cute, but you still have stuff…” They hold her accountable in that way of being, like, no… Because, you know, immediately, as soon as she got money, she’s like, “I’m gonna go out to eat somewhere fancy!” which, you know… This is also the part where I’m like, no, I get it. As soon as I get paid, I’m like, “Yes!” I am ready to go ball out. But then it’s Nana coming in and saying, “Hey, actually, you owe rent. You have things to do,” just being that person where it’s like they’re not coddling her but they still hold her accountable. And I think with Junko, Junko genuinely just coddles her.

TONY: Coddles her until it’s time to just let it all out, in ways that are really fricking messy!

DESTINY: Exactly! It’s like Junko harbors feelings or thoughts about what she thinks Nana should be doing or maybe not doing the right thing or whatever, but she’ll mention it but not really, making Nana kind of feel like… so, in an example of being like, “Oh, I did something wrong, but Junko didn’t tell me I did something wrong so maybe I didn’t do anything wrong. But she did say this.” It’s like that mind game back and forth, versus Nana, who would be like, “What are you doing? Why are you doing this?” And I think obviously it’s because Junko knows Hachi so well, in the sense of, like, “This is one of my closest friends, I know how she is, and I’ve known her since she was young, so I have this history with her and that’s how I’ve always kind of taught her or been around her,” while you have this new person, Nana, who could thoroughly be like, “No, this is not the right way” or “Yes, this is the right way,” and still treat her in a way where they do tell her what’s right and wrong but also in a more direct way that Nana actually needs to hear as an adult.

TONY: And I think that that also allows Nana to then grow, because she’s able to push back and is just very honest about situations with Shoji. And he doesn’t want that. He doesn’t want a girl who’s actually honest with him about what’s going on in her life and what boundaries she has and when she’s available, when she’s not, and has a separate life from him. He just wants her to be available at all times, to be with him whenever he needs it, regardless of the fact that, you know, as she points out, he doesn’t have nearly the financial insecurity that she has, right? And the fact is she pushes back on that, and it’s clear that those moments of her pushing back are part of what make him just really distance himself from her.

VRAI: Mm-hm. And it’s interesting because probably in their hometown they were probably about class-wise on the same ground, because Hachi is clearly not… like, she’s not rich but she’s comfortable because they live somewhere rural where things are cheap, which I think is different than—I think that is a slightly distinct thing. And maybe I’m defensive because that’s kind of where I come from. I think it’s a slightly distinct thing from when people say someone is comfortably middle class and they mean, like, in a really rich Upper West Side neighborhood, whereas if Hachi’s family moved to a big city they would be poor as fuck. But they are not. They live somewhere where nothing is, so they’re comfortable and she’s never had to think about going hungry or not being able to save her money to do things that are fun. 

So, she knows that you need a job and she has working parents, but she’s never had to have that pressure of “Oh, things cost a lot and are harder to get, and I am on my own with…” She still has some safety net (her mom sends her that lump amount of money), but it’s scary for her in a way that it’s never had to be and in a way that it isn’t for Shoji.

DESTINY: Yeah, I mean, if we think about the beginning of how she even ended up here, is she’s following people, right? Like, Hachi… it wasn’t really her dream or her goal to get here, versus the other people around her. And now that she’s here, she’s having to understand what that comes with, you know? If you’re somebody who doesn’t really have a purpose or you don’t feel like you have a purpose or you’re trying to understand what that is so you’re just kind of coasting along with other people… I think I also grew up in a very small town, and so, growing up in such a small town, I felt that pressure to try and figure out what you’re going to do next because you don’t want to stay in the small town, but then everybody else is leaving, so then you’re like, “I need to leave as well.” 

But it’s a completely different experience being in the big city and having to try and adjust to things that you have never had to adjust to. I mean, even watching her try to find her new apartment and going shopping and little things like that—

TONY: And, oh, my God, the seventh-floor walk-up? Been there. Oh, my god.

DESTINY: Yes! Exactly. This is all so new to her and honestly not even really a part of her plan. So, it’s just been such an interesting dynamic between her and Shoji in how they both operate in these spaces.

VRAI: Although, I do have to ask, and I’m sure the manga is never going to address this because I think it’s just a background “Well, this is just how life is,” but, like, is Hachi throwing up all those burgers she’s eating? Because she’s really got some fatphobic background stuff in her head.

DESTINY: Yeah, she does. Yeah, she does. [Chuckles] It’s, uh…

VRAI: She seems to exclusively eat hamburgers from Jackson Hole.

DESTINY: Yes, that’s like the one thing that she eats, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And as someone who has… I have hyperfixations on certain things, like especially food… If I like a certain food, I will just eat it all the time until I get sick of it. And I feel like it’s one of those things with Hachi, too, where she has those, like… “I’m just gonna eat this. This has enough nutrition for me for the day.” It’s one of those things where she’s just like, “It’s easy. I can do it. Number one thing I’m gonna do.” And I think again—

TONY: She usually cooks when she’s just trying to support somebody else, if anything.

DESTINY: Yeah. It’s like she doesn’t think about herself, of, like, “Oh, you know, I should cook myself a really good meal for X, Y, and Z,” because I know for a fact, right, if Shoji was like, “Hey, I’m starving. I wish I had a home-cooked meal,” she’d run out to the store and make him an entire three-course meal. But she’ll never use that energy for herself, which is just… It’s a lot. [Chuckles]

VRAI: Yeah. But at the same time, like you said, Tony, she grows a lot during this arc, and I think it’s so telling that both she and Sachiko, who is really like a clear parallel to herself in her first relationship with that married man, they both step up and take accountability of “I made mistakes and did things that were wrong in the situation” and Shoji doesn’t. I love the moment where Sachiko clearly has that moment of, like, “Oh. You’re trash.”

TONY: [Laughs] Yeah. I mean, and it’s kind of ambiguous right now whether he’s still seeing Sachiko. It’s kind of implied that they’re still seeing each other.

VRAI: I kind of assume she’s… like Hachi is assuming again and that Sachiko dumped him for being gross!

TONY: Yeah, no, I could see that, too. I hope she did. God, I hope she did, because Hachi really… her inner monologue is a little delulu.

VRAI: Bless, yeah.

TONY: I love her but she is delulu. But, yeah, I think that there’s a lot of accountability on Sachiko’s part eventually. I mean, she runs away apologizing to Nana, right? And the whole body language in the scene where Shoji calls her his girlfriend signals that she’s just overwhelmed and unhappy with this whole situation and that is not a nice thing for… She’s not happy to hear him call her his girlfriend. It’s not a happy moment for her. And I think that Shoji himself is… I mean… Yeah, I don’t know, Destiny, what do you think of Shoji? Because I remember you said the last episode you have thoughts on Shoji that you would share when the time came.

DESTINY: So, Shoji to me… Shoji to me is that dangerous Nice Guy, where he’s like, “I’m a really good guy,” but it’s like actually, no, no, you’re not actually a good guy. And my whole thing with him is like I really wish that— Like, Nana— Sorry, I say Nana but I’m trying to say Hachi because I want to separate the two of them. But Hachi… my girl has a lot of issues, right? [Chuckles] There’s a lot that she’s learning about herself in this time. This honestly should have been a time where she chose to be single. 

This was a time for her to really grow. But she’s decided to be in a relationship, and I wish he would have communicated a lot more to her, and I feel like he left a lot of that burden onto her. And because she’s so in her own head and she’s always constantly thinking, just living in essentially her own fairy tale world or a whole world that she’s made up for herself with her own assumptions… These are all her assumptions; these are all her thoughts. It just frustrated me so much because he could have really addressed… Like, he could have been with whoever he wanted to be with. He could have been with Sachiko if he wanted to. And he could have done it the right way, but he instead was just like… He had all these feelings that he wanted to tell Hachi but just never felt the need to actually come out and say it to her, and he would get upset and then… It was just like this constant back-and-forth that was just so frustrating. 

And I’m just like, yes, Hachi should definitely have said something, too, and sat down, but I also realize she doesn’t have the emotional intelligence to do so and Shoji kind of did in the sense where he knew that there was a problem and he wanted to talk about it, but instead he just didn’t. And he easily was just looking elsewhere.

And something that I thought was really funny was like… Nana was— Oh, sorry, I keep saying Nana. But Hachi, while she’s working at this place, she kinda has a crush on her boss. And she talks to Junko and she’s like, “I kinda like this… My boss is kinda cute.” And it’s insane because she’s clearly with Shoji and they’re trying to make it work and [obscured by crosstalk].

TONY: [crosstalk] She’s constantly talking about other men. She’s constantly thinking and talking about how hot other men are and how, you know, “Oh, my God, he’s cute!” “Oh, my God, she’s cute!” I mean, “He’s—” Well, yeah. Well, “She’s cute.”

VRAI: [crosstalk] Yeah, yeah. No, no. Yeah, no, we have to talk about this!

DESTINY: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it’s, like, insane!

TONY: [crosstalk] But just constant thoughts about other people…

DESTINY: And it’s insane! Junko has to be there to be like, “Don’t you have a partner? Isn’t this crazy?” And so, to see her kind of be like, “You’re right! And I’m gonna stay committed, and I’m gonna do this stuff,” all for this to happen to her with Shoji and Sachiko, it’s just… it’s befitting for her. You almost couldn’t write a better story. She’s over here thinking about cheating, and then it ends up just falling into a weird space for her, so I just… yeah. Shoji, for me, I wish he was just… He’s one of those nice guys that just are not actually really nice.

VRAI: Mm-hm. Yeah, it feels so telling that he has a moment where he thinks to himself, “I’d better stay away from this girl because I’m attracted to her and that would be wrong of me,” and then he doesn’t.

DESTINY: And then he literally just doesn’t! He literally doesn’t.

TONY: And his friends even call him out on it. Like Kyosuke… Between Kyosuke and Junko, Kyosuke has actually been [less cruel] to Hachi in some ways, which is not what I was expecting. Kyosuke was the one to be like, “Girl, why did you say that to Hachiko?” after Junko says all of her stuff. And Kyosuke was like, “Dude, you can’t… What are you doing cheating on your girlfriend? Come on, dude.” Which, there’s the implication that— I mean, and it doesn’t seem necessarily like Kyosuke has cheated on anybody before. He’s definitely been a womanizer but that’s not quite the same as cheating on people, right?

DESTINY: Yeah. Yeah.

TONY: And even after that, Shoji is just looking for reassurance from Kyosuke that just because Kyosuke is somebody who’s had sex with many people, he must be totally cool with cheating. And, I don’t know, that’s such an interesting equation of being sexually promiscuous and lying all the time.

VRAI: Mm-hm. I mean, it’s the extension of the logic that got him and Hachi together in the first place, [which] is “Well, you know what men are like.” And this is him being like, “Well, you know what men are like, right?”

But I will say, on the subject of Hachi fantasizing about other dudes, my hot take is I truly have not seen any moment that convinces me that Hachi is attracted to men. Like, she likes to flirt… She likes attention from other men. She likes the idea of a romantic future. She likes this fantasy because her whole life is about living in fantasy, and she knows, as somebody who has no stable sense of identity, that if she performs this role of the cunning woman, which we can unpack later, that she can get this positive attention, she will perform a role that society deems is appropriate for her, and she sleeps with Shoji because she loves him and because… you know, she describes it in these very emotional terms of, like, “We’re melting together. We’re becoming one person,” but she never describes it in terms of, like, “Oh, man, he’s hot.” She never really talks about men like that. She talks about, like, “They’re funny! They’re cool! Gosh, he’s so charming! I like when he pays attention to me!” 

But it’s very starkly different than how she talks about Nana or Misato, where she’s like, “Wow, her voice is so sexy! Wow, her hair is so beautiful!” This girl is on the comphet train so hard she has a lifetime pass! And I think Nana O. is maybe attracted to women and putting it off as part of, like, “Oh, I’m a rock star. This is just for fun and I really love Ren,” because she’s only ever been with one guy. I have thoughts about her. But so, she reads as maybe bi and hasn’t explored it yet, but right now I really do not think that Hachi likes men.

DESTINY: Really? That’s such an interesting take on that. I think that’s really cool. Like, I… Because when it comes to the way that she treats men, I do believe that there is this weird overtone when it comes to them like she’s… it’s like that thing of “Well, of course I’m gonna like him” or “Of course he’s gonna like me.” It’s that “This is just how it’s supposed to be!” And it’s that societal thing. I’ve always thought of Hachi to be like bi but more scared to lean into it, lean into the fact that she likes women, because I feel like men—and this is me for my own injection of my own sexuality—I feel men are so easy [Laughs] in the sense of, like… They’re so easy. They’re just… Yes, of course you’re gonna like me, not even to be in a conceited way but it’s just like I know how this dance goes. 

But I feel like when you like a woman for the first time, it’s kind of like “I actually don’t… I don’t know what to do. I feel like…” like you’re a deer walking for the first time, like you’re kind of just confused on how you’re maneuvering through things. And I think that’s Hachi this entire time. We all know that moment where she’s watching Nana perform on the table, and this is like the moment she’s just like [Gasps]. You can literally see how she’s losing her breath as she’s watching Nana perform. It feels like time stopped for her and she doesn’t know what to do with that feeling or with those feelings. And even when she ends up sharing the bed with Nana, because she believes there’s a ghost in the apartment, that whole—

TONY: Which is a classic romcom trope, you know.

DESTINY: So romcom. And the fact that they’re just in bed together and they’re holding this really sweet moment, it’s like she wants more of this, and I feel like she just never has ever pictured that it could be more than this. And it’s just so sad.

TONY: And she also punishes herself when she imagines it, right? She has that moment where she imagines Misato and Nana O. together, and she’s like, “I wonder how women have sex. Hm… Would Nana be on top?” And she’s like, “No, no, no, I can’t think about that! I need to find myself a boyfriend now before I continue to have more of these unexplained feelings!” She literally uses— That is not me exaggerating what she says. She literally says that. [Chuckles] Which is like… you could not be more explicit that this is somebody who has major, major feelings for women that she is intensely repressing.

VRAI: Yeah, I think you could argue with my point, I think, that maybe Hachi is also attracted to men. I don’t think you can argue at all that she’s attracted to women.

TONY: Yeah, no, this is a girl who’s attracted to women and who is repressing it like there is no tomorrow.

DESTINY: I was gonna say, remember when Hachi ends up calling her mom and how she’s like, “I don’t know if I want to be here anymore! I can’t do this anymore!” and she’s stressing and her mom is basically like, “Stay there. Stay in Tokyo. Figure it out,” and then from there she’s determined: “I’m gonna have a happy married life with Shoji.” [Laughs] That’s kind of like… She talks to her mom, her mom’s like, “You need to stay there. You need to figure it out,” and her first instinct is like “I need to have a happy married life with Shoji and we’re gonna live happily ever after, and this is how it is, and he’s gonna get famous and have this great job and dah-dah-dah…” It’s like she has only one-track mind, and so for these feelings for women to come out of almost nowhere for her… because I really feel like she has not experienced this until she met Nana. I think she has never really felt like this. I mean of course she had Junko her whole time, but I think that is a strictly platonic friendship. 

But I think when she met Nana, even for the first time on that train, something clicked in her, and then the fact that she ended up moving with her and then finding out she’s in a band and just the more and more and more, and even every time she’s just like, “Hey, Nana…” she can’t help but doesn’t know what to do with these feelings. She’s always just been told to do one thing. And so, now that she has a completely different… She doesn’t even know that’s an option. I feel like she can’t even imagine that to be something she does.

TONY: And because she can’t imagine it and because she can’t understand her own feelings, it leads to her lashing out, right? With understanding your feelings comes knowing how to navigate when those big feelings come up. Right? If you’re just constantly repressing them and pretending they don’t exist, then you’re not going to be able to control when they affect your behavior in negative ways. Right? And so, her repressing her bisexuality or her lesbianism is a major factor in the conflicts that she has with Nana. Right? I mean, it’s probably part of why she’s constantly meddling in Nana’s love life, probably projecting her own desired outcome with Nana onto Ren and just being like, “Well, I just really want Nana to have a happy romantic relationship because I love— Oops! No, no, no, it’s not because I love her; it’s because I… I… I just want… I just want what’s best for her.” You know what I’m saying, right?

DESTINY: Yeah. Yeah.

VRAI: Mm-hm. Absolutely.

TONY: “There’s no way I’m living vicariously through Ren.” Right? You know.

VRAI: Yeah, and she keeps moving the goalpost in ways… It’s like she’s trying to protect this thing that is… Because, you know, she points out in her narration over and over again that she and Nana keep going through these romcom tropes, and she keeps trying to protect this relationship as different from her romantic relationships that have hurt her, because at first she’s like, “Well, you know, what we have isn’t… If you were a man, you would have totally been the man of my dreams. But we don’t have sex, so—”

DESTINY: [crosstalk] Ugh! The language. [Chuckles] Crazy!

VRAI: “So, you know, what we have is special and different.” And then she’s like, “Well, it’s fine because we’re both women, and women don’t get jealous,” which is immediately shot down because Misato shows up and she is fuming over this [obscured by crosstalk]. I thought it was very sweet that she called her up to apologize. I love that about this series, that it so often follows up this conflict between women with resolution and communion. I think that’s a step that— I don’t even think it’s universal to shoujo, but I think there are contemporary romances that understand that women are pitted against each other but then don’t necessarily invest in that step afterwards of building up the relationship after the conflict has passed. So I love that here and how well it’s done.

TONY: Yeah, no, I think that speaks a lot to Hachiko’s growth because I think that getting to know Nana O., she learns to be more direct with people, to tell people honestly more what she’s actually thinking, and sometimes be called out on it, you know [Chuckles], and to stand up for herself at times, but also to acknowledge and take accountability when she’s actually in the wrong. Right?

VRAI: Yeah. And I think I may be… I think Hachi’s a great character, but I also think I’m projecting a little bit because I know the Western fandom really hates her.

TONY: Why? How dare they?!

DESTINY: Really? Do they really?

TONY: That’s fucked up!

VRAI: We have a whole article on the site about it. [Chuckles]

TONY: Oh, my god.

DESTINY: Oh, wow. Maybe because I’m on the side of TikTok that absolutely loves her. [Chuckles]

VRAI: And you know what? Maybe—

DESTINY: I can understand it, though.

VRAI: Maybe it’s a small contingent and a lot of people are on this wonderful side of TikTok that you’re on. I hope that that’s what the truth is. I want that to be true.

DESTINY: [crosstalk] But, you know, I… I get everyone’s frustration when you see Hachi and the actions that she takes, because… and I think that’s the best part about Nana, because you watch all these different characters go through different situations and they don’t always pick the right one, right? It’s so funny. My sister has this saying where, like, in life a lot of times you’re at a fork in the road and you can go left or you can go right. And us, the viewers, are always watching and yelling at Hachi to go right. We’re like, “Go right! That’s it! It’s clear! Go right! It’s right there! We see it for you!” 

But she goes left and she continuously goes left. And then she’ll go right one time and then we’re like, “Ah, yes! We love her!” But then she goes left again and you’re like, “Well, why are you going back? You were so far!” And so, I can understand people’s frustrations with Hachi in particular because she… you know, like we just said, she’s in a relationship but then she’s also thinking about falling in love with her boss and then she’s having a dream that her boyfriend is cheating on her with some girl named Sachiko and then she doesn’t focus on her partner. She wants him and wants to build this life with him, but it really feels like it’s just for show, really. She doesn’t actually…

VRAI: Yeah, what she wants is the house.

DESTINY: Yeah.

TONY: Yeah, she wants the sense of security and stability and the sense that her future is assured, right? Which, you know, is where so much of comphet comes from, is there’s this very stable, clear path that you can take that runs through marriage and kids and house and whatever, right? And Shoji is part of that and allows her to fulfill that. I feel like that might bring us a little bit to Junko’s advice, but I don’t know, did you want to address something, Vrai?

VRAI: Well, no, I really want to talk about Nana O., but I think that’ll probably take up the rest of the episode, so, yeah, I think we should talk about Junko first because I feel for her to an extent because she does the worst possible thing in that situation but I can see how she got— It’s a testament to the writing that I can see how she got there, where she and Kyosuke spend a lot of this arc really quite genuinely— Like, it’s played for jokes but they’re pretty genuinely concerned that Hachi is going to be suicidal after she gets broken up with.

TONY: Which, Hachiko says, if I didn’t have Nana O., I would have been. Right? She confirms that they were probably right to worry about that, right? Even if they’re looking— Which is so interesting because they’re also thinking about her before she knew Nana O., and we’re seeing just how much her relationship with Nana O. has healed her, right?

VRAI: Yeah. And Junko hasn’t really been around Nana O., so she hasn’t seen some of that. But so, you can see years of her biting her tongue when she’s been frustrated. And that’s fine. It’s a little at a time, a little at a time, and then it builds up to this situation where she probably feels both scared for her friend and relieved now that that moment is over and also frustrated because she feels like she has been having… Like, you know, Shoji sucks, but these are theoretically both her friends, and she feels cornered into “Why do I always have to be the mom to my friends who are my age?” So I can see why she explodes even though it’s not fair to Hachi.

TONY: Yeah, and I mean, it’s hard for me not to see overtones… these might not be intentional, but of women of color, especially Black women, having to clean up the mess of non-Black men all the time or of just men generally of all races and kind of being expected to be the caretaker and be the emotional glue that holds things together when the other people are just being so messy and she’s not really allowed to be messy.

DESTINY: I feel like Junko also… The fact that she went to… She chose this college. This is where she wanted to go. I feel like she was kind of trying to break away from Nana in her own way. I think she was like, “You know, this is my dream. This is the things I’m gonna do,” and then to find out not only did Hachi say, “Well, I’m also going to the city as well, and I’m also going to go to the same school as you and…” Kind of like, “Okay!” And now you’re also—

TONY: Wait, wait, hold on. Is Hachi in college? Oh, oh, oh, you mean art school. I’m so, so, so sorry.

DESTINY: Art school. No, no, no, you’re fine! So, the fact that she kind of was just like, I’m gonna follow you here, and then now it’s like you’re also infiltrating my friend group, right? And I think it was like, “Yeah, I was excited about this in the beginning but clearly it’s ending in disaster and I’m the one who has to deal with it.” 

I will say, you know, I was really disappointed in Junko because I’m like… again, it’s exactly how you said it, in the way of I understand where she’s coming from; however, it just wasn’t fair and that’s your best friend from [when] y’all were little. It’s just… You should have moved a little bit differently, because Shoji’s your friend but you didn’t know him like that. It’s a very different type of friendship that you have with Shoji versus Nana, and I felt like that loyalty should have been a little bit more toward… even if she’s frustrating and whatnot, I just wish… especially if you were worried about her mental health, I wish she would have handled it a little bit better. 

But she’s also young, and also… That’s the thing, too: she’s young. She’s the same as Hachi in the sense of just trying to figure out what she wants to do next and things like that. She has her own life to live. And just because she is that person of color in your life doesn’t mean that she’s older or should be treated like she won’t make mistakes as well, because a lot of people don’t like Junko. Knowing that people don’t like Hachi, a lot of people don’t like Junko. I’ve seen that in a lot of fandom spaces. They just think she’s a terrible friend, and I don’t feel that way. I feel like she’s… she tries, yeah. And she’s just not perfect.

TONY: But yeah, I don’t know, I’ve really been there with her, like in situations where you’ve seen somebody really going through it, in the shithole, right? Because let’s be real: if Junko knew about Nana getting into these relationships with much, much older men who, like, she doesn’t even know their goddamn name and being taken advantage of, that would really shape your view of the person and also make it so that you probably feel all the time like you’re walking on eggshells a bit trying to figure out how do I care for this person while knowing that they are going off and making wildly self-destructive choices and being often taken advantage of because of their enormous lack of self-worth, right? It can be really, really hard to figure out, okay, how do I talk to them honestly when they are in the shitter for so long, right?

VRAI: Yeah. Well, and I can also see frustration of, you know, she’s also, “Hey, I also moved to the big city for my big transformative, brand-new adult adventure,” but everybody has spent the entire series talking about basically making her preemptively middle-aged. So, but, oooh, now that I have grown-up advice, you don’t want it.

DESTINY: Yeah. I think Junko’s tough love is still love all the same. There are times where maybe she should have said things a little bit differently, she maybe should have done things a little bit differently, but something that I always see when people are talking about how much they hate Junko is they talk about, like, you know, “She treats her like a child, which is stunting Hachi’s growth!” Whoa. She’s not her mother. [Chuckles] Hachi’s also an adult. Let’s reel it back a little bit. We’re infantilizing…

TONY: [crosstalk] Yeah, it’s not Junko’s… Yeah, no, it’s not Junko’s responsibility.

DESTINY: [crosstalk] We’re infantilizing Hachi. Yeah, we’re infantilizing Hachi, making her incapable of being an adult and making the decisions that she wants to make and chooses to make. Yes, she acts childish at times, extremely codependent, she has all these issues, but she’s still an adult. All the decisions she makes are her choices. And Junko is someone who I think at the end of the day if she’s in a pinch will never abandon her—abandon Hachi. 

Even if she’s really mad at her, I think… Even if she fell out with Hachi for whatever reason, she would probably call her back in like two weeks or something. You know? She’s like, “I need a breather but I’ma come back to you. If you really need me, I’m always gonna be there for you.” And sometimes you need a friend like that. Sometimes you’re not always gonna have a friend that’s going to be like, “It’s okay! Don’t worry about it!” And sometimes the tough love aspect of it isn’t always gonna be when you need it, right? Like, it might be in a situation where she’s really tough on her in this situation but then she might be a little bit soft on her on another situation. Hachi needs these people or needs that type of friendship, and I think that’s why they stayed friends for so long, is because she needs someone to reel her back in when she’s living a hundred thousand percent in her delusions. [Chuckles] 

And Junko has lied to her, kind of brushing off Shoji’s behavior and kind of acting a certain way, but I also feel like that’s her being like, “I know how she is with her delusions. If I tell her, ‘Oh, yeah, maybe Shoji is acting a little weird,’ she might actually think like, ‘Oh, my God, he’s cheating on me! He has a whole ‘nother wife! He’s doing this, he’s doing that…’” It might cause her friend to kind of fly off the handle, so she might have to be like, “Do I tell her the truth or do I not?” And I think she finds a lot of solace in her partner because he’s starting to understand Hachi for who she is, and it feels like Junko finally has someone in her corner to be like, “What do you think, as someone who’s unbiased in this situation?” And it’s not always going to be the right choices that she makes when it comes to their friendship, but I just hate it because everyone always hates Junko and says she’s a terrible friend and I’m just like, “You try having a friend like this!” [Chuckles]

TONY: It’s hard! It’s really fucking hard when your friend is delulu!

DESTINY: Yeah.

VRAI: Yeah. And I do think Junko is wrong about how she frames this— She says the wrong things and I think she’s definitely got some unpacked… like everyone [else]. You know, we live in a society. Everybody is misogynistic and has to unlearn it. And [now] Junko says some weird things about the genders, but not any more than literally anyone in this series. Like, I don’t think it’s fair to be extra hard on her for that, even though I think, “Oh, you handled this the worst way it could have been handled at this point in time! Oh, no!”

TONY: I mean, one of the things I really admire about the series is I think that it’s kind of turtles all the way down: everything that a character says has to be viewed with a certain amount of suspicion. There is no character that is the author stand-in here—except for maybe Hachiko’s monologuing that’s clearly from far in the future, where it seems like she and Nana O. had a huge falling out, based upon the monologuing, that I am like… I’m getting my popcorn ready. Even as much as I really don’t want to see them fall out, I’m going to be there with my popcorn. [Chuckles]

VRAI: Actually, I am curious: is the frame narrative added for the anime? Because, you know, since the manga is famously unfinished, it’s one of those things where I could see the adaptation being like, “We need a bow to tie this up with.”

DESTINY: Um, kind of. It’s kind of like that. Um… I’m trying to think about it in a way where I’m not giving too much, but it’s kind of like that.

TONY: So, do those narrator moments happen, where Nana’s like, “If I had just done things differently, maybe our future would have been so different,” you know, like things like that? Are those—

DESTINY: Yeah.

TONY: Those are in the manga. Okay.

DESTINY: [crosstalk] She does have… She does have those moments a little bit, where it’s like an introspective kind of thing.

TONY: Because those come across as… coming across as way in the future.

DESTINY: Yeah, but they’re like way, way in the future. Yeah, when she does those things, it is kind of in-the-future type of thing where she’s looking back on it. I mean… I don’t think this is a spoiler too much, but the whole series is technically her looking back at everything. Right? So, it’s her just kind of digesting all the thing and everything that has gone back, and so you’ll see her kind of digest everything that has happened and kind of relive… As she’s reliving it, she talks about it like, “You know? Hey, Nana, I wish dah-dah-dah-dah we would have done this differently,” sometimes. So, those are those moments that do come in time to time.

TONY: And those moments often feel a little bit less suspect than anything else. It seems like we are supposed to look at those as a voice of reason or wisdom in the narrative.

VRAI: Yeah. And one thing I really like about the narration for this set and that I think is a really pivotal part of this arc and clearly, like you said, Nana—or Hachi—musing over “Well, could things have gone differently?” is this starting to break down the mystique around Nana O., you know, where Hachi’s like, “Oh, I even thought that your pain was cool, and I didn’t even think about you as being weak and as a human.” And I think that’s— The parallels between them are so fascinating and I’m so fired up about it because I think that it’s very easy to categorize things into, you know, Hachi is the femme who’s a pile of mess and… well, Nana O. is not butch in any sense of the word, she’s a hard femme, but she’s the cool girl who’s got it together and she’s independent and hard. But Nana O. is very brittle in a lot of ways, in a very almost not-like-other-girls kind of way. Like I said before, she says she’s not into women but she clearly likes the attention of flirting with them and she clearly enjoys fussing over and kind of being the cool boyfriend for Misato as this impressionable younger fan who fawns on her. And she gives Hachi that speech about being manipulative rather than being straight out, which I think is fair and good advice that Hachi needed, and I think we’ll have time to keep— But at the same time, she’s, as far as we know, been with one guy. She’s been with one guy her whole life.

DESTINY: Her whole life.

VRAI: [crosstalk] She hasn’t really seemed to have dated anybody else. Yeah, her whole life of twenty, her ancient twenty. And Ren sucks. No, no, but, like… And I really, really stuck on the Sid Vicious thing that came up, which is… I have to get on my soapbox for a little bit. 

So, for folks at home who may not know, the movie that gets referenced, Sid and Nancy, is like this fictionalized version of the relationship between Sid Vicious and Nancy Spriggan, who was his fan, and they had sort of a famously toxic, abusive relationship that people who are fans of Sid Vicious like to categorize as being sort of a mutually destructive thing, when a lot of people, including Sid Vicious, talking about it going back are like, “Oh, yeah, no, he beat her and also he murdered her.”

TONY: He what?

VRAI: The movie—

TONY: Holy shit.

VRAI: He murders her! Yeah. And, well, what’s significant about bringing up Sid and Nancy is that the movie frames it as her being suicidally depressed when he leaves for a while and she spirals and then they have this toxic downward spiral. You know, did she maybe introduce him to the hard drugs that he got addicted to? And in the movie, she begs him to kill her, and then it’s left ambiguous of, like, “Oh, she died, but who did it? What happened? Was there a struggle? Did he mean to do it? Did she really just want—” And first of all, I would like to say from the bottom of my heart, go fuck yourself, Sid Vicious. If there are no Sid Vicious haters left in the world, I am dead. I do not care for nihilistic punk. And his connection with Siouxsie and the Banshees degrades an incredible goth act. Thank you for coming to my band tonight. 

And the fact that I really want to know how much—The reason Sex Pistols is in here to an extent is because Vivienne Westwood dressed Sid Vicious. There’s a connection there. And the lock necklace that Ren wears is something that Sid Vicious wore. And I really need to know how much this is just Ai Yazawa being enamored by this rebel outsider tragic love story punk thing without a whole lot of connection to the actual history and how much I am supposed to actively despise Ren, which I do.

DESTINY: I think with Ai Yazawa and the way that she views this, I do think it’s a bit of curiosity. I think it really does… uh… I think it definitely interests her, and she saw a lot of that toxic back-and-forth really appealing and interesting. I don’t know if she necessarily wants you to hate Ren as much as you should hate Sid.

VRAI: [Chuckles]

DESTINY: I’m not sure if that’s how she feels, but I do think… Because Ren has his own problems, some that is also brought up in the manga that we don’t really actually get to see in the anime, which is so depressing. There’s a lot to him that you do learn. Like, I don’t really feel like this is a spoiler because they don’t really talk about it in the anime that much, but he does have a drug problem. That is something that is brought up in the manga. I think they vaguely talk about it in the show, but it’s not really talked about. And… I mean, there are a lot of things that you do dislike about Ren, and if I’m not mistaken… Next time we do this, I’ll double-check before I say— I don’t want to say it and then it’s…

VRAI: Yeah, please.

DESTINY: … not in it. But, you know, Ren is also one of those—

VRAI: [crosstalk] Give me your manga wisdom.

DESTINY: [Chuckles] He is one of those super messed-up characters, just like everybody else in the series, you know? And you either love him or hate him, and when I think about Nana and Ren’s relationship, it is wildly toxic and not something that should be shipped, although people love them.

VRAI: People be people. Mm-hm.

DESTINY: Yeah, it’s completely unhealthy, it’s codependent as hell, and, yeah, it’s just… And it’s so funny because I feel like with Nana, of course she loves Ren, but I also feel like she just also loves the misery that comes with loving Ren. I think she just loves all of it, and she can’t seem to break away from it as much as she wants. And it’s… I think that whole thing of, like, “I love him even though he hurts me, even though we’re bad for each other,” I think that is what Ai Yazawa took from Sid and Nancy.

VRAI: I bet, yeah.

DESTINY: Like, of course it’s super upsetting. It’s so upsetting because you see the real story of Sid and Nancy, you’re like, “Oh, my God!” But I think that’s what drew her in to Sid and Nancy and why she wanted to put Nana and Ren so coded by them, so much, because she felt like she just really wants to eat that part of it up, which is so interesting. There’s actually… Speaking of this, it’s so funny that you say that, because there was a discussion that I saw that was happening in the fandom. When Vrai was telling [about] Sid and Nancy and just talking about it, it was so funny because I had just… I was scrolling through the comments when they were talking about this because I was like, “Oh, man, this is such an interesting thing,” because the language around the two of them is always so like “I’m taking you with me,” a lot of death energy, so it’s so funny. And I didn’t even know Nancy died like that, to be honest with you. I had no idea. So, finding this out, I’m like, [Gasps] oh, my God! This is crazy!

VRAI: And I mean, it’s… I am actually interested to see where the series goes with this, because Nana is so deeply, deeply empathetic to its female characters and the problem so often with tragic rocker narratives is to blame the women. I mean, God help us, look at all the conspiracies around Courtney Love for the sins of not saving Kurt Cobain from his own struggles with suicide. Like, this is a problem.

TONY: [crosstalk] Or, obviously, Yoko Ono.

DESTINY: Yeah, I was about to say that, too! I was about to say that.

TONY: I swear, almost every situation, the woman is blamed.

VRAI: Speaking of beloved rockers who beat their girlfriends…

DESTINY: Mm.

TONY: Mm?

VRAI: Yeah, John Lennon.

TONY: Oh, yeah. Oh, God. Ew.

VRAI: Yeah. But yeah, it’s… And yeah, because this is definitely a context that Yazawa is… I don’t even know if “romanticizing” is entirely the right word because she’s clearly fascinated by it but also her writing is smarter than that, and so I’m really interested to see how that tension continues to play out in the text. You know?

TONY: Yeah, absolutely. I also was going to say earlier about Nana O. is… I mean, I thought her reaction to Shoji cheating on Hachi was very, very telling. Right? That she immediately was like, “Nana, now is your time to catfight with the other girl! Win your man!” And it’s like, okay, anger is in fact an appropriate response, but that is not… I think Hachiko actually ended up having the far wiser response, which is to say, “Fuck this dude. Bye.” [Chuckles] You know?

VRAI: Yeah, in a lot of ways Hachiko has become more mature about interpersonal relationships than Nana is.

TONY: Yeah. It was an incredibly wise moment on Hachiko’s part, right? But also Nana’s anger and her frustration with Shoji. You know, one wonders to what extent she’s projecting a little bit onto the situation or to what extent she’s defending a friend, defending Hachi like Hachi is her girlfriend who’s been harmed by this person, so you gotta defend your… There’s so many different layers to that reaction that I find really fascinating.

VRAI: And to Nana’s credit, once Hachi says, “I don’t want him,” she’s like, “Alright, I’ll kick his ass.”

TONY: Yeah.

DESTINY: Yeah. Yeah.

VRAI: I also… Speaking of that scene, I think a lot of… So, I love watching the smart directing because this is not an “Every scene a painting” sort of show. There are definitely stretches of it where it doesn’t look bad but it’s very pragmatic and functional, and then when it’s time for the really big moments… Like, that shot of the smoke draining the color out of Hachi’s world as the realization comes down on her is fucking breathtaking.

TONY: [crosstalk] I love that moment so much. It’s incredible.

VRAI: Ugh, it’s so good! Did we have any… You know, last time you had some those amazing quick-fire thoughts. Are there anything either of you want to go through quick before we wrap it up for this time?

DESTINY: Oh, I really enjoyed the music. The music now is starting to be a part of the show, because I think before, in the first couple episodes, the music was something that was kind of lingering in the back but you didn’t really get a chance to hear it. So, obviously Nana doing her awesome concert on the table was the moment that was like, oh, yeah, this is a music show. This is rock band. This is fun! So, that’s really cool. I really enjoyed that.

TONY: That’s so important to me. Yeah, no, I 100% agree because so often when I’m watching music anime, I feel like— I feel like— I’m a musician, right? And, like… Okay, I’m gonna say something that’s gonna make certain people in our editorial staff mad at me, and that’s okay. But when I watched given, for example, I just was like… I was supposed to have this deep, powerful emotional reaction to the big song at the end of the series and I just felt nothing and I was just like, “Oh. He’s singing a song now. Nice.” Right? Versus the songs in Nana are just… they hit so hard, and the lyrics are so thematically relevant and the… When Shin comes in playing the bass, by the way… Get that boy some housing. Get that boy help.

VRAI: Yeah, we’re gonna need to talk about Shin and Ren as foils, I think.

DESTINY: Yeah. [Sighs] Yeah.

TONY: I was like, oh, so they actually know what they’re doing. It reminded me a little bit of Sound! Euphonium and the rehearsal episodes, right?

VRAI: I did have a total moment of “Oh, my God, this is what 2000s music anime were like!” It really took me back to watching Gravitation as a kid, when you were like, “Alright, we paid for one song and we’re gonna play that song in every music scene. You get one! And it’s gonna be a banger!”

TONY: Literally. No, but that is what it’s giving, though, unfortunately! [Laughs]

VRAI: Everyone is so spoiled now. We’re so spoiled now by, like, Zombie Land Saga, where it’s like, “Alright! New episode! Here’s the new song with the new choreography and a whole new concert sequence!” And no. No, back in the day we had one insert song and we liked it!

[Laughter]

TONY: And it’s so funny because these songs are such bangers that I never get sick of them, whereas I feel like when I’m watching, like… If you asked me to remember a single song from Ave Mujica, I would— Okay, except for maybe the song that… No, no, I can’t, I’m sorry. It’s just so funny because I love It’s MyGO!!!!! songs but Ave Mujica is just like, “Okay, whatever.”

VRAI: They’re extremely vibes but I would say musically not as distinct as [“Haruhikage”], which I remember with the clarity of ROSE.

TONY: Oh, it’s so good, it’s so good. She’s so good.

VRAI: But yeah, I think there is some—I mean, don’t get me wrong: I think it’s very cool when a music show can showcase a variety of music, because that’s what it’s about. But there is something to be said for just developing variations on one leitmotif like this.

DESTINY: Yeah, and then watching the voice actors, too, right, perform it in very different ways where it’s like, oh, she’s doing it here and then she’s doing it here. It came across really… I really just enjoyed the music throughout, and I’m happy that we’re starting to pick up and watch the music kind of unfold now.

TONY: I was gonna talk— I have a couple things that I found kind of funny. Just funny moments, little moments that just tickled me, like when Nana is kind of seeing Shoji and after first moving in with—excuse me—when Hachiko is first seeing Shoji after moving in with Nana and, you know, he invites her back to his place and she’s just like, “I’m in the middle of a dream,” and then she looks at him and she says, “But not today!” and runs out. I was just like, “Fuck, yeah, Nana! Set your boundaries! You don’t always have to have sex with him!” And of course, that is partially framed by so many other characters as like, “Oh, and that’s why he cheated on you, because you couldn’t satisfy him every single night.” Bleh. You know. I found that moment very funny.

VRAI: No, that’s a great scene. There’s so many good comic scenes in this run.

TONY: Yeah. And the other moment that I found very funny is when Kyosuke and Junko are having their little horror fantasies about Hachiko dying by suicide and, you know, they see the little angel Hachiko like [Assumes a soft, faint voice] “Goodbye… Goodbye!” [Returns to normal voice] You know? And then they see the reality and she’s just totally fine and chipper and just being like, “Yeah, we’re going to this concert! [Chirps energetically]” And they’re just almost disappointed to see her so happy and annoyed with her to see her so happy.

DESTINY: Yeah, no, that was hilarious

TONY: It’s just this complete misunderstanding of where she is now because frankly Junko has not really been present with Hachiko for very much of this run, because Hachiko has been living her best life getting to know Nana O.’s friends and making them her central friend group, right?

DESTINY: Yeah. I think that’s something I didn’t truly understand. Like, I know she’s busy but I was also kind of confused because obviously Hachi has always integrated herself into Junko’s friend group but Junko really didn’t really integrate herself into their friend group, which always felt kind of weird to me even throughout the entire series, where Junko kind of [is] just like, “Hachi’s my friend,” which is fine, right? Like, you have your friends and then your friends have their friends, and you’re not always going to know every friend. 

But I always felt like because Junko was always forced to be this mother figure for Hachi that she would almost feel inclined to know more about it. And I mean, she kind of did. I think she did end up going to her apartment to see her apartment to make sure Hachi was doing okay, but it’s just kind of interesting to see how she really keeps them separate

TONY: Well, I think it speaks to what we were talking about earlier, where it’s just like she wasn’t planning on having Hachi in her life in this way, and so she seems like she’s keeping her distance a little bit, right?

VRAI: Yeah. And I mean, I don’t even know if it was like, “I don’t want to be as close of friends anymore with her,” but I think it’s a very normal experience of people you get close to through proximity in childhood and then once you’re both really busy… because their time together goes down once Hachi loses the job at the retro store that was not financially solvent and has to actually work a super busy job where she’s exhausted. They’re both just super busy and it doesn’t become a priority to put that time together because it’s like, “Oh, well, we don’t really like the same things. We love each other because we’ve built up all this history, but what are we gonna do that we both enjoy?” And so, I think, yeah, it’s one of those things that’s kinda normal.

TONY: And Hachi just so enjoys cheering Nana on, right? [Lowers voice] Because she has feelings [Returns to normal voice] but also because she seems to genuinely love the music, right? It’s not just because lovey-dovey feelings but because she wants to be there to support her. I mean, it’s so telling that she’s like, “Do you guys have room for a tambourinist?”

DESTINY: Yeah! Those are the parts of Hachi that I really love so much, because that’s when she gets to be herself and you get to learn more about this girl besides her just being infatuated with love or just infatuated with men. She’s more than that. She’s more than just her feelings—or just her feelings for love. Especially as someone who’s a lover girl herself and loves romance and loves love songs and all that stuff, it’s good to see that she has other interests outside of that, outside of other people. What does Hachi like? You know, of course she likes shopping and cute stuff and she tries to be as dependable as she can for her friends, but also she loves music. Right? I remember Nana walking into her room and being like, “Oh, you like this band?” [Laughs] First of all, can you imagine your ex on your roommate’s wall as soon as you walk in and you’re just like…

VRAI: Oh, nightmare!

TONY: That would drive me insane.

DESTINY: And they’re just like, “Isn’t he so great? I love this band!” And you’re just sitting there like, “Oh, my God.” And then you notice because— It’s so funny because Nana notices that he’s still wearing the locket that I think she gave him or something on his new band, on the cover, so walking into her room, so many feelings are just being drug up. And poor Hachi has no idea. She’s just like, “I love this band!” It’s just like, oh, my God! Oh, my God!

VRAI: I feel like in a series that is— And not to say Nana’s entirely grounded because it is occasionally leaning into that “Wow, things worked out really well.” But in a slightly less grounded series, Hachi would have become their manager.

DESTINY: Oh, for sure. Speaking of managers, I love Yasu! I will say I love Yasu every episode! I love him!

VRAI: Yeah, actually, Yasu rules.

TONY: I love— He’s fantastic, first of all. I’m really curious what’s going on between him and Ren. You had a take, Vrai, that you think that another character also loves Yasu.

VRAI: [Chuckles] Oh, um, yeah. Well, I mean, who knows, because— Which, by the way, it’s the weirdest scene ever that we have not acknowledged. It’s so weird that when a series that’s extremely homoerotic but probably not going to ultimately go anywhere with it acknowledges that queer people exist.

TONY: Okay, what scene are you referring to? Because it might have gone right over my head.

VRAI: That scene where they’re at the diner and they’re like, “Oh, I didn’t think you’d necessarily be into that but I thought Shin might be,” and he’s like, “Actually, I’m straight.” I’m like, “Okay.”

DESTINY: [Laughs]

TONY: Oh, that scene.

VRAI: No, but I do think that Nobu has a little crush on Yasu and it’s very cute.

DESTINY: Yeah. I could see that. I mean, everyone loves Yasu because Yasu is the greatest, and I will always put it out there to say how much I love Yasu. I just… He’s such… He’s like the most grounded character in this whole thing! I love him so much. He comes with such a clear head. Every time I see him, I’m like [Sounds an angelic chant] because he always thinks with reason.

TONY: He’s also just very recognizable to me as like… You know, I know so many party girls here in New York City who are also very professional types, but also deeply kind and wise and connected to people who are not that kind of professional type, right? You know, and he just reminds me so much of those people.

VRAI: He reminds me of Isabella in ParaKiss, too, where she’s just the leagues-more-mature person, to the point where it’s almost like why are you hanging out with these people? And in her case it’s because she’s in love with George, which, like, fair enough.

DESTINY: Yeah. He’s so mature. It’s so funny because he feels like he just— It’s almost like he’s the Junko of the group but in a little bit more of… he takes on the very older brother, cool, looking out for you, but he won’t really intervene that much, which I think is where it really plays into that brother dynamic where it’s like, “I’m gonna let you walk out there and do what you have to do and be the type of person that you’re gonna be. But if you need me, you can call me and I’ll be there for you. But I’m gonna let you make your own mistakes. I’m not gonna let you ever get too far, but…” I just… I really love him as a character.

VRAI: Yeah. And I am bracing for when we come back around to “Oh, he does secretly have feelings for Nana,” which in a less well-written series I’d hate.

DESTINY: [Chuckles]

VRAI: But it’s okay, Yazawa. I’ll go on the trip you’re planning for me.

DESTINY: Yes. You guys will see. You guys will see. I will not say anything.

[Chuckling]

VRAI: Yes, this is your prerogative: to sit and hoard the spoilers and laugh maniacally when we say things. That is the best part of being the expert.

TONY: Oh, absolutely. Yes.

[Laughter]

VRAI: Alright, any last things we wanted to touch on?

TONY: I just love this show so much, and I was crying like every other episode. It’s good.

VRAI: [crosstalk] Mm-hm. It’s really good!

TONY: Intensely relate to so many characters. Yeah, no, it’s good. Love it.

DESTINY: Yep, and now we’re gonna start getting into the thick of it, which really makes me nervous and excited for you.

TONY: I’m so ready for mess! Yeah! Mess!

VRAI: Tony loves a mess. Oh, they love a mess more than anything.

[Chuckling]

TONY: Oh, you know I love mass, yes.

VRAI: Yeah, and next time I believe we are loosely… so that we’ll cover the anime in about five episodes and maybe that sixth manga cast, next time we’re loosely planning to do episodes 19 through 28, which may change by… give or take one episode, depending on if there’s a better place to break off an arc, because this this ended up being a really nice place to stop, with them at the concert.

DESTINY: Yeah.

TONY: [fond] At the concert holding hands!

VRAI: [fond] Holding hands forever!

TONY: [fond] And thinking about how they never want the moment to end! Aw!

VRAI: [fond] Gay!

[Returns to normal voice] Ah, so, yes, if you are watching a lot ahead of time, that is your homework for next time, AniFam. If you liked what you heard here, you can find more of it at our website, animefeminist.com, where you can find more articles and podcasts. If you really like what you heard, consider going to patreon.com/animefeminist or ko-fi.com/animefeminist. Even a dollar a month helps us to keep doing what we do, including paying our wonderful transcriptionist to provide a written version of this to keep it accessible for folks, which is really, really important to us.

You can also find us on the socials by going to our Linktree, which is linktr.ee/animefeminist.

Thank you so much for joining us. And remember: again, Sid Vicious sucks.