36 - Ch. 27 - The Weather's Nice Out

[MangaDex]

 

[UdenEmpati]

Anzu is getting the reality bitchslap from Kishibe that she well-and-truly needs. I truly hope she'll be actually receptive to it, and not simply continue running away—if this story is one of breaking cycles of abuse and trauma, then both her and Ikoma getting away from the monsters of their familial past in their own ways feels like the logical direction the plot is progressing toward.
But I'm no stranger to tragic endings and a lack of catharsis, and Anzu isn't the only character in the story. So.
Kishibe working her back around to his best memories of her father was a good move, though. She's being poisoned by Yui, and has been this whole time; and I don't blame her for her developing this jaded, misanthropic outlook on everything, but she is young and there's still time to turn things around. I'm betting the New Year will see something significant happen for the whole main cast, possibly starting with Anzu stumbling into the group outside the hospital (thought it was going that direction in this chapter, but then we switched gears to Yui back home alone.)

That said — curious about what that loose photograph in the safe was, though. Those seemed like very important items, as relatively mundane as they are. But Yui keeping anything out of apparent sentimentality is incredibly noteworthy in itself, so I'm excited to see that revisited, and also what photos are in that album as a whole.

I imagine Yui won't be "redeemable", in the end—but I'd honestly be okay with seeing her get some sort of closure in all of this, as she's as much a victim as she is Anzu's monster. In that light, we already have the "irredeemable" in Ikoma's dad who's still in the wind, so hopefully we the reader get closure on their stories and that we can be confident that their children are free of them by the time the curtain closes on this story.




Thanks for the TL as always.

 

[skywardgem]

"Music is like a pushpin" is about as perfect of a metaphor as it gets for how music is treated in this story lol, sweet to see Kishibe bring up that fun bit of wisdom from Soutaro

any reunion Anzu attempts to have with the rest of the band + Natsumi is probably going to be at least a lil painful, but as long as they've all got music it's only a matter of time until those pushpin memories pull them all back together... I am very much looking forward to what their next show will be like lol

thanks for the chapter, killer work as always!