(spoilers ahead)

Down Again

We return with Kaoru reaching out to Toru for one more time. Rumblings of the future of porn and sexuality in Japan. And the Yakuza unfortunately return again.

Kaoru and Toru’s Fall

Toru has finally hit rock bottom. His business is gone and he is in debt to the Yakuza. While Kaoru has a literal fall, taking a serious stumble off a balcony after some heavy drinking. This hits Junko the hardest of them all. The two women have slowly built a strong friendship and it is heart breaking to see her react to Kaoru’s accident.

Toru also takes the news of Kaoru’s accident badly and responds by aimlessly wandering around. At one point her tries to steal the master tapes of his and Kaoru’s masterpiece. His actions this episode are really aimless as is Kaoru’s role as a whole for this season. In fact a lot of the show seems haphazard right not. For one Miyuki returns to make out with Toru and leave. Not a lot of direction to what the show wants to say.

“More Yakuza” said No One

The Yakuza returns to not only torment and beat Toru up but to also harass Sapphire. It should be no secret that I have hated how the Yakuza have been used. They seem to only exist to torture our characters. Season 1 gave them an arc and touched on the much darker side of underground porn and sexual slavery. This season they are here to just beat up people and look menacingly. For example they trash Sapphire’s offices when trying to collect Toru’s debt. Yes let’s trash the business we want more money from. No nuance, no thematic reason, no character. Just evil Yakuza all the time.

(Toru and Toshi reunite)

Lust in Japan

Outside of the Yakuza rehash, we see the show start to talk about the future of Japan. The police and the law are making changes that will eventually diminish organized crime in the future. Censorship laws have changed allowing for the untouched images of public hair. These “hair nudes” come at a shock for the sex industry, Kawada in particular. It is always interesting when the show widens out and gives a more historical look at the world at large. Sex and sexuality is moving forward and our characters are at the forefront of that in the sex trade.

Overall this was my least liked episode of season 2. Like the season overall it trades porn industry escapades for dramatic overly wrought stories. The drama itself isn’t the problem it is how it engulfs all the characters, usually outside of their control. One more episode left, let’s see how they tie it all together.

Observations

No fast food shots, this is how you know the show is getting serious.
Farewell Kawada’s sex toy, who decides to burn it for some reason.

JAV Star Watch

No cameos I could find. Elly Akira is credited for this episode but I couldn’t find her. Maybe one of our eagle eyed readers can find it.