#AniTwitWatches Round 5: Wandering Son 1 – 2

Hello again, friendos – it’s time for more #AniTwitWatches.

If you don’t know what that is since you’ve never had enough time until our buddy COVID-19 set in (or even if that’s not the case), check this. I skipped round 4 because it was another (!!!) show I’d watched, but School Days was round 3 and I’m using the same basic structure for this.

This is an LGBTIQ+ series…so with my own tussling with my concept of “gender” and “sexuality” over the past few years, this is going to get even more intimate than ever…you’ll see what that entails below.

Fun fact: Apparently, the name Wandering Son (hourou musuko) is a pun on houtou musuko (“prodigal son”)…blame Wikipedia for how I learnt that.

• This is the 2nd round of #AniTwitWatches I’m joining. Apologies in advance if I’m missing any Ns or Bs (maybe Es too) – my keyboard’s having a very slow and specific death but occasionally makes the effort to ressurect itself, so I’m using a 2nd keyboard to put them in when it doesn’t want to bother. (That seems to have been plaguing my posts for a while though…I do have another computer I can use if this becomes permanent, though.)
• Just to preface this, Wandering Son I’ve been voting for because of the fact I was told once by my mother – I don’t remember how long ago – that I was first detected to be a boy and so I’ve lived a much more gender-neutral lifestyle since then, although there’s nothing wrong with me, biologically speaking, and after long hours of thinking about it and learning more about the trans experience (as mentioned in the intro), I have no desire to be a boy anyway.
• …okay, whose idea was it to team up Ei Aoki and Mari Okada?! (Update: See my thoughts on Mari Okada in that post in the previous dot point, but as a fan of more action-oriented stories, I’m more of an Aoki fan than a Okada one.)
• Note I did read the first volume of the manga (it’s by Fantagraphics and has a nice greenish spine, similar in colour to green tea) and it’s mostly a series of panels i a manner more similar to an American comic rather than the “manga style”, so some of this might not be new to me.
• There was this one dress-up day one time – I believe it was fundraising for the Fukushima triple disaster (aka that earthquake/nuclear explosion/tsunami 9 years ago) – where I borrowed a gakuran top my dad had in storage. (That wasn’t a cosplay thing, but rather his actual uniform at one point.) That’s probably the only time I thought so-called “guy’s clothes” were “right” for me in a way that goes beyond words (“grok”, I believe the sci-fi term is), so I completely get how Sarashina felt like wearing a gakuran that day. (Then again, I’ve always felt a similar way when I’m in Hong Kong – even though I wasn’t born there and never lived there outside family trips, that’s where part of my family has plonked itself down for a few generations – and having such a feeling would imply I was truly “home”, so take these instances with a pinch of salt.) Update: I was going to call Sarashina GNC (gender non-conforming), but I don’t remember/know if that’s true or not.
•  LOL, the little pic snap the friend did when she left.
• The sister (Maho) barging in on (Shuichi) Nitori reminds me of O Maidens In Your Savage Season…that infamous 1st ep.

Episode 2

• There’s almost a documentary style to this…what with the opening with th characters’ opinions and all.
• I suspect the reason why this OP was chosen was for its “ありのままの君でいて いいんだよ” line (roughly translated, “You are fine as you are” – I linked the Google page for the song so that you can get the context).
• The seniors looking for Chiba are specifically 2nd years, if I heard Takatsuki right.
• *splats on bed face-down with knees on ground* – LOL, my mood exactly.
• Sasa is the smol girl, right?
• I love how the nurse just walks past and tells them the office is not a hotel.

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Wandering Son isn’t that eventful, so this isn’t as satisfying as banging out a School Days post…but hopefully you’ll enjoy the ride nonetheless.