Kaguya-sama Love Is War Episode 2 Review: 'Kaguya Wants to Trade', 'Chika Wants to Go Somewhere', 'Miyuki Wants to Hide His Ignorance'

I can’t get enough of the amazing opening for Kaguya-sama Love is War, Love is WAR, LOVE IS WAAAR! While Miyuki and Kaguya seem to get cuter in every little story, Chika gets a tiny bit scarier as the episodes go by…

Japanese Original Episode Title: かぐや様は交換したい, 藤原ちゃんは出かけたい, 白銀御行は隠したい

Plot

Miyuki decides to finally get a smartphone, but little does he know that it was actually Kaguya’s plan all along and now they both desperately want to exchange their LINE IDs. Then again, their pride is once again in the way. After trying to tempt each other into asking, Chika mentions that Kaguya’s phone doesn’t support any apps so after a lot of drama they end up exchanging mail addresses. In the following story, Chika suggests that it would be a great idea to go on a Student Council trip during the summer and thus a battle between where to go begins as Kaguya prefers the seaside but Miyuki wants to go to the mountains. Lastly, Miyuki is asked for love advice from one of his classmates, but since he is a virgin with no dating experience whatsoever, he just ends up saying whatever pops in his head, which weirdly resonates with his situation as well, and surprisingly his advice actually helps the guy start dating the girl he likes.

Episode Highlights

‘I always wonder what they talk about in the council room:’ If only the rest of the students knew the shenanigans and immature fights happening between these two, Kaguya and Miyuki wouldn’t be idolized so much. Probably Chika would have more fans though.

Kaguya is a cunning little girl: It seems like she plots a lot of things in the background in order to influence or prompt Miyuki into making new decisions and taking initiative, but unfortunately her attempts are futile most of the time. Nevertheless, she actually managed to get his contact information which is definitely a step forward for the relationship of these two.

Chika is a little scary: I knew that something would be off with that girl. She can’t just be the happy airhead of the group. The cute TANK CLASS girl that also happens to be weird and a bit creepy.

Kaguya’s reactions were gold: The scene of Kaguya overhearing the conversation between Miyuki and his classmate was amazing. I loved how she was denying and exclaiming how stupid both of them are, but when Miyuki acted out the ‘wall-down aka slamming’ move, she totally fell for it. Oh Kaguya, you so cute!

Themes & Trivia

LINE app: LINE is a freeware app for instant communications on electronic devices such as smartphones, tablet computers, and personal computers. LINE launched in Japan in 2011, reaching 100 million users within eighteen months and 200 million users only six months later. It is the most popular messaging application in Japan.

Barnum effect: The Barnum effect, also called the Forer effect, is a common psychological phenomenon whereby individuals give high accuracy ratings to descriptions of their personality that supposedly are tailored specifically to them, that are in fact vague and general enough to apply to a wide range of people.

Summer Triangle: The Summer Triangle is an astronomical asterism in the northern celestial hemisphere. The defining vertices of this imaginary triangle are at Altair, Deneb, and Vega, each of which is the brightest star of its constellation. The term was popularized by American author H. A. Rey and British astronomer Patrick Moore in the 1950s.

Tanabata: Tanabata (Japanese: たなばた or 七夕, meaning “Evening of the seventh”), also known as the Star Festival, is a Japanese festival originating from the Chinese Qixi Festival. It celebrates the meeting of the deities Orihime and Hikoboshi (represented by the stars Vega and Altair respectively). According to legend, the Milky Way separates these lovers, and they are allowed to meet only once a year on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month of the lunisolar calendar.

Mount Osore: Mount Osore (恐山) is the name of a Buddhist temple and folk religion pilgrimage destination in the center of remote Shimokita Peninsula of Aomori Prefecture, in the northern Tōhoku region of northern Japan. The temple is located in the caldera of an active volcano and is believed in Japanese mythology to be one of the gates to the underworld.

Comments

The way the show opens as well as the music and the introduction of the Shuchiin Academy really reminds me of Ouran High School Club.

Also, in case you were wondering why we saw the same introduction of the story and the characters in this episode was because as someone mentioned on reddit: ‘The first chapter this episode adapts was one in which Kaguya changed magazines, thus that chapter reintroduced the concept to the new audience’.

Are you an idiot too?

I enjoy so much the pacing, the dynamic between the characters as well as the subtle humor in this. Probably the best romance related story I have seen in a while.

NEXT TIME: ‘Shirogane Miyuki wa Madashitenai’, ‘Kaguya-sama wa Ate Raretai’, ‘Kaguya-sama wa Arukitai’