Sparks of Tomorrow ‒ Episode 12
This episode begins with Inako being placed in charge of a portion of her brewery's upcoming sake production so she can make her mother's final sake recipe, and everyone on staff is so cool with this that I wonder why this was ever a point of contention. I get that Inako's character arc centers on her finding the confidence within herself to express and pursue her ambitions to her father and community, but the complete lack of conflict around this pursuit now that she isn't getting married off to Yosuke makes the time it took to get here feel like a waste. I see the appeal in storylines that focus more on a character's internal growth than the creation of external change, but there needs to be some external friction to make this process land with any real impact.
Meanwhile, Kihachi is building the electric nishki with Yosuke's assistance and resources, which is confirmed to be a computer on par with today's technology, albeit at a much larger size and with a greater energy burden. The disregard for the pace and ways in which technology actually progressed after electricity became a widely available energy source continues to be frustrating for me. The idea that people living in the early 20th century would prioritize the development of computers when so many other technological developments would be more immediately impactful to their daily life is both absurd and a gross oversimplification of all of the steps and less consumer-facing inventions that led into the development of computing technology.
This episode closes with Kihachi learning that Yosuke is developing this computer to make a robot version of Kihachi's late brother Seiroku, whom Yosuke is in love with, and is now prepared to sacrifice Kihachi (who's seemingly drugged and dressed in a bridal gown) to perfect this Seiroku duplicate. It's really not okay for a stereotype of a queer man to descend into predatory villainy as a result of grieving the man he was in love with, and I'm really disappointed that the folks at Kyoto Animation on this project would take this character in such a socially harmful direction. In any given episode, Yosuke jumps between cartoon villainy, depressive grief, and overt horniness no less than three times, and it makes this character feel super incongruent.
This episode, and Sparks of Tomorrow at large, is such a misfire on nearly every level, and I cannot wait for it to be over soon.
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Lucas DeRuyter finds sparks of inspiration in all parts of his life, which would explain why his portfolio features such a broad array of interests and writing formats! To read what he's ruminating on more regularly, you can keep up with his regular contributions to ANN's This Week in Anime column.Sparks of Tomorrow is currently streaming on Netflix.
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