Yuri!!! On Ice Ep 9 – 10 Review – Yankee to Fairy

*gurgle* I’m sorry this post was slow coming out…Picking up from my previous post where I attempted to prove why Victor is gay, I will move on to the other skaters…

In this post: Rainbow mop and Russian fairy

This will be quite short since I included the engagement scene in this post.

You know who I’m talking about, right?

Let’s start… Lee Seung-gil, what influenced you to choose that fabulous outfit?

Seunggil is the person I wish we get to see more of, just because he’s such an interesting character. He’s a poker face ice prince with a strong determination to win, pushing his limits by doing a mambo (which I think he realise is very challenging for someone like him). He’s also very meticulous, and calculating his score while doing his jumps? Man, this boy could join the math Olympics.

I see what you did there.

We also know that he could land jumps nobody else could… but then this had to happen.

Seung-gil wanted to win so desperately he went out of his way to do a mambo, but on his free program the pressure got to him…He lost his cool and was too anxious. It plucked heartstrings. He wanted to win so bad, but because he got too nervous…

Maybe trying to do everything on his own is Seung-gil’s personality flaw. He talks to no one and doesn’t see the point of befriending other people, but in turn when he lost or felt pressured no one is there for him either…not even his coach seemed that close to him. She didn’t even notice him trembling and just looked at his score in disdain…didn’t even console him when he cried (just look at her face when the score came out). Maybe she thought Seung-gil wants alone time to deal with his problems, or she thought Seung-gil could bounce back from his failures and didn’t try hard enough. But still, he just seemed like a lonely character. Too lonely. (maybe Phichit? In the sequel? Will #seungchuchu happen? Or will it continue to be a ghost ship?)

But wait a moment…

Sara?! Crispino?! The one who declared she will start dating?! Is calling him?!

Will it happen or will it not?!

Seung-gil’s story is heading to a bright future. Let’s give him some personal space and say hi to our yankee-turned-fairy Yuratchka, or Yuri Plisetsky.

The focus shifts back to Yuratchka in these two episodes. We saw how he gradually changed and opened his world up to more people. He also became more feminine. A hell lot more feminine. But he still looks like soggy chicken noodle.

Is this what you call “getting dragged”…?

 

How’d you like that, Katsudon?!

Also him and Otabek. HIM AND OTABEK. I ship them even more than I ship seungchuchu or chuchujiji or victuuri. I still don’t know what their ship is called though. I heard something like yuri x father but it’s really weird…

And to end this post on a good note (and because it’s a rule that my Thai bro has to be in every Yuri on Ice post on this blog), here is the ice skater who happens to be the god of selfies, and the prophet of the Victuuri fandom, Phichit Chulanont.

At this point I have completed all reviews from episode 1 to 12. Check them out by clicking the yuri on ice tag. See ya there!

Yuri on Ice Ep 12 – Guys, we made history

I’m quite late writing this…but I’ll do it for Vitya’s birthday.

Episode 12! Last episode!

And…

I think at this point everyone cried.

Since the next event for figure skating is the 2017 Four Continents in Seoul, Korea, I expect the next season will be set there. The competition is in February. Ah, can’t wait!

Review:

.12!!! Also, one more point and Phichit would’ve got fifth place. Well, Chris, I’m giving it to you this year.

It was very emotional. Everyone’s worked their hardest, and even though not everyone gets a medal, they’re all winners in their own rights.

The episode felt quite rushed, though. I know they only had 23 minutes to wrap everything up, but that felt so rushed! However, the conclusion was satisfying since they’re announcing another season.

Again, superb animation and music. Nothing to comment.

It was also very cool they got Stephane Lambiel (a Swiss figure skater) to voice himself in the anime. French is a beautiful language. (He did spoke French, right? Or is my ears fooling me?)

Recap:

Love, love, love Otabek and Yurachka’s thumbs up. I also love Otabek’s monologue. It’s like he’s not only motivating himself but also others who walk the same path.

Sing your song, fulfill your dreams. Only you can make it a reality.

Phichit… well, he’s the supreme entertainer till the very end. If you decide to hold that fluffy Phichit on Ice show, I’ll gladly go anywhere in the country to watch it. I’m so happy for you even though you went in last. For him, it’s more about fun and joy than about winning. And it’s amazing he made it this far despite having only one quad, compared to JJ and Yurachka’s 400+++ something quads.

I have a pen.

That distance we call the friend zone.

JJ, even though Yurachka stole your gold, you still gonna marry your girl right? Right?

Good job, mah Canadian friend. Good job.

Yuri, it’s by freaking .12 but you were excellent. You tried very hard and even broke the world record. Both you and Yurachka deserves gold.

Kimi ni Todoke…

Yurachka, you actually care about piggy, don’t you? Don’t play dumb. Congratulations on breaking Victor’s world record your first senior year. You might even surpass Plushenko and Yuzuru and everyone in the future. Keep shining, Russian Fairy. Sorry for calling you flamingo and soggy chicken noodle. (Lol how he  Yuri’s davai but responded to Otabek’s davai.)

Chris… Your Merci was a killer. Gotta please the fans, huh, Swiss beast?

I confess I don’t like you at first, but this one scene…

I had a lot of fun with the fandom this season. We spammed Tumblr, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and everything possible with millions of posts. Thanks for the good time, guys! Don’t we all feel sad we’re going to have to be apart from these guys? But waiting tests true love, so now we wait for another season!

Merry, merry Christmas, and happy birthday Vitya! You’ll be 3 decades old soon!

MY UNCLE IS IN AN ANIME – Yuri!!! On Ice EP 11 Review + Recap

Since it’s almost exams week (next week, to be precise) I will keep this quite short. In this post we will discuss: YuriO nIce, BEKA, Poor JJ, Why Yuri wants to leave Victor, Why Yuri got so upset he missed a jump, and Phichit Chulanont with my uncle.

Off to first topic: Yuratchka and Otabek        

Since there’s rumors of a sequel and Victor and Yuri’s story might end this season, there’s many speculation that the two protagonist of the next season might be Yurio and Otabek. The season will be title, instead of Yuri On Ice, Yurio Nice.

This episode we see Yuratchka’s similarities to Victor, as remarked by Yakov. We also see how he broke world record in his In Regards to Love: Agape. And the reason he was able to do that was because he met many people and knew many kinds of relationship: Lilia Baranovskaya, his grandpa, Yakov, Yuri, Victor, and the person who impacted him most in the second half of the series: Otabek Altin.

Otabek is Yuratchka’s first actual friend. And how they interacted was golden. I love, love, love, love seeing them together. Especially when Otabek is like a gruff knight on horseback and Yuratchka is a little grumpy princess lol.

STILL on the topic of Otabek (AKA Beka, AKA father)

Aside from that really awesome lady in a particular arc of EDEN: It’s an Endless World (I know Uighur is not in the Middle East but still), Otabek is the only other character in the Japanese pop culture who’s Middle Eastern and who’s really well-developed. What sets Otabek apart from other skaters is that we know he isn’t talented. He wasn’t born for the ice like Yuratchka, Victor or Phichit, but he worked harder than everyone to get to where he was. He had what Yuratchka used to lack at the very beginning of the series: determination. You don’t have to be born for it to be good at it, that’s what he showed us.

Trivia: Samarkand is a city in Uzbekistan.

Trivia 2: They speak Russian in Kazakhstan.

Poor JJ, why did he screw up?

JJ won gold on both his qualification events, but on the Grand Prix Final he messed up really badly, and the best explanation for that is pressure. Pressure was what got to Seung-gil and Yuri and Leo.

Look at dainty Eros Yuri in the corner lol this image makes the characters look like a gang of villain with bad fashion tastes

In an interview with a coach for the Thai National figure skate team, the coach said “Ice skating is a difficult sport, if you cannot concentrate sometimes you can’t even do the jumps at all.” I empathize with screwing up because of pressure. In JJ’s case it was especially bad because like half the audience is his fan, and the one who skated right before him was Otabek the Dark Horse (who glared at him like JJ is a mortal enemy, even I got goosebumps).

But what really saved him was his girlfriend, or more accurately, his fiancee. JJ is a very lucky man to have a girl like that at his side. We know his performance got to his ego really badly, but hey, someone like King JJ never gives up. Especially with his love and the people of Canada on his side.

Why Yuri wants to leave Victor, and why he got so upset missing a jump

What I am quite sure of is that Yuri wants to leave Victor because he felt Victor still wanted to skate. Another reason: from the “Is Victor Nikiforov homosexual?” post, we see that Victor does not stick with something for long, and Yuri might feel that Victor lost interest in him or something. (So sad, so sad indeed.) But so far this is just speculation. I think they’ll clarify this on the final episode next week.

Yuri got upset he missed a jump because Victor said something along the line of “I trust your decision” but then Yuri messed up on what he decided on, and that was like letting Victor down. Either that or he felt that it’s the previous Grand Prix Final all over again. Another moment that plucked at my heartstrings.

So we’re at the final part: What is my uncle doing in Yuri on Ice?!

No he’s not my actual uncle, but Thai people call him uncle. He’s the Prime Minister General Prayut.(I don’t think I should put a picture of him here, but feel free to google pictures yourself and compare them with the screencap.)

The second instance where he’s seen in a talk show…well, that’s a real talk show that comes on free TV every morning. Here’s a picture along with their FB page.

Applause for the research team for Yuri on Ice. You really did well.

(By the way, in the interview with the Thai figure skating coach I mentioned above, they mentioned Japanese people coming to the rink to ask questions. That rink she referred to was the one Imperial World seen in the anime.)

Talking about Phichit, he’s really the healer of this anime. Others have such dramatic stories but Phichit just clears your mind and make you feel fluffy inside. Just look at how cute the boy is.

…I think I’m getting a heart attack…hrghhhhh….

Animate Bangkok is getting Yuri On Ice stuff into their store…I hope there will be many Phichit merchandise.

Overall, I’m looking forward to next week’s final episode…if I survive the exams. Wish me luck! ❤

Yuri!!! on Ice Ep 5-8+ Ep 10 Review – the big question

Finally at the last part of episode 5-8. Now, we tackle the big question.

Is Victor Nikiforov gay?

Is Yuri on Ice a shipping anime or is it legit LBGT+? I’ll state my claim right here.

Victor is gay. And there is evidence to support it.

But first before we get to LBGT we have incest. Let’s pick up one last person I kind of left behind, the siscon Michele Crispino.

Michele (or Micky) is an Italian figure skater who is overly obsessed with his little sister, Sala. Alright, another siscon! But one thing that’s different is that Yuri!!! on Ice takes Michele’s love very seriously instead of treating it as comedy like other brother x sister anime.  Because they take Michele’s feelings very seriously, it turned into a 5 minute love story that is better than Twilight.

I can be as brave as a knight for you
If you want I can be a shadow of the night
No one loves you like the way I do

This song is him being a knight.

And this is him being a shadow of the night. (I listened to this song like…20 times. Love the Michael Buble vibe. This song is my second favourite, after Still Alive.)

It is very admirable of him that he could do anything for his little sister, and had been doing so all their lives, but is able to let her go once he realised Sala wants to break apart from him.

.

.

So now we get to Victor.

Victuuri is not just a ship. So far, we saw that all short programs convey what is inside each skater’s mind. So what is Victor’s SP supposed to say?

“Aria: Stay Close to Me” is in Italian, and I am clueless about its translation, however one blogger pointed out that the pronouns for first person and second person are both male. This means Stay Close to Me is a song sung by a male, for a male. In other words, Victor Nikiforov knows about his own sexuality.

Here is a verse by verse analysis of the translation.

Yuri!!! on Ice Ep 5-8 Review (Pt.2) – meaningful SP and the big question

In this post: PewDiePie on Ice, Evil Witch, JJ the Ice Kisser and why Phichit did not go to jail

In the previous post, we covered chicken nugget, Flub Leo, Jiji boi, and Ass-on-Ice Chris. This post will (probably) have 3 parts since I decided to put Yuratchka and Seunggil together with episode 9-12 post. Part 3 will be (mostly) dedicated to Yuuri and Viktor. Crispino will be there too, so don’t worry, I didn’t forget about him.

So where should we start? How about we start with the star of this post… Phichit Chulanont?

Beware: badass Phichit coming through

Phichit Chulanont won his first gold at the Cup of China competition…while in real life Thailand figure skating hasn’t gone that far yet. As you know from my prior post, he’s based off Filipino skater Michael Christian Martinez who’s in the world competitions. Moreover, Mike’s the only guy from Southeast Asia and from a tropical country to qualify for Olympics.

From what I see he has very intense expression and skates to the music very well.

Initially we would think Yuuri is the one winning the China Championship since he’s the protagonist training under Russian legend Viktor Nikiforov, right? So why does Phichit, who only has one quad, win against Yuuri?

Even if I’m pretty much clueless regarding how they score jumps, I could make a guess.

These are the scores for their SP, which are like, 20 apart. But it’s ultimately the FP that decides who wins. It’s the FP that made Leo flub from third to last, and it’s the FP that made Phichit go from fourth to first.

So…let’s take a look at Yuri and Phichit’s strengths.

Yuri: flawless jumps, great presentation, more experience, very high stamina

Phichit: fiery step sequence, great presentation, positive attitude

…and killer smile.

More killer stuff below.

The historical context of Phichit Chulanont’s “The King and the Skater”

The movie “The King and I” (in which Phichit’s SP was based on) was banned in Thailand for a few reasons.

1. Historically inaccurate.
2. Portrayal of the king as a comic figure.
3. Biased?
4. Lese Masjeste

(Thailand bans a hell lot of things anyways. They censor swimsuits on TV, didn’t let a drama movie air, and so on, and so forth.)

So…what’s the Yuri on Ice version like? Here’s the summary posted on twitter by Mitsuo Kubo and translate by Beyond G-Haro.

This plot by Mitsuo Kubo actually corresponds with a real historical event. I’m surprised they knew so much about Thai history. wow.

Phichit’s timing in performing this piece in his skate could not be any worse. Despite its catchy lyrics and cheesy Disney theme, this song still refers to something the Thai government never let pass through censors. (Actually, they see it more like comedy and they know people doesn’t think a lot about it, but some conservatives did not want to show the musical to the public.) I know they just can’t cancel an anime episode because of an unprecedented event, and Yuri on Ice universe and ours is separate, but Phichit, the timing of your competition really was the worse for you.

This post is very long. Proceed at your own pace.

Yuri!!! on Ice Ep 5-8 Review (Pt.1) – meaningful short programs and the big question

In this post: Donald Trump, cinnamon roll, and ketchup

Warning: hell lot of pictures

This post came out a week slower than expected… I apologize about that. It’s almost the end of the year and Yuri on Ice is slowly reaching the climax—the Grand Prix final. But, before that our protagonist Katsudon Yuuri will have to first actually get into the competition. That means defeating a hell lot of other skaters.

Episode 5 opens with the Japan nationals. Here, we’re introduced to Minami Kenjiro.

Ahem, I mean…

Dang you Kawaii Nugget Ketchup. Minami Kenjiro is a 17 years old figure skater from Japan who defeated Yuuri in the All Japan Championship. He’s a huge fan of our Katsudon and honestly, he feels like a representation of us fangirls. Yuuri remarks the little boy reminded him of himself in the past because he skates so innocently…or something.