Polar Bear Cafe Episode 48
What They Say:
Sloth sets out for a hot spring, the café crew takes a trip around the world, and Mr. Hana is confused on what to get Sasako.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
With a mixed episode previously, especially because of its focus on the whole coffee squirrels and apprentice stuff that is absolutely the weakest part of the series for me, Polar Bear’s Cafe inches a bit closer to its conclusion here in a way that’s rather appropriate. Bringing Sloth into the picture, everything can move down to a crawl for a little bit with him. We’ve had some cute episodes with him in the past, especially when we got to see just how much Sasako does to help him out and make his life a little less stressful, so seeing some new material with him is definitely a pleasure.
Panda ends up running across him one day and discovers that he’s on his way for a bit of a vacation by going to a hot spring, which of course just sounds absolutely lovely. This comes at the same time that Penguin is at the cafe and wanting to do some karaoke so bad that he just can’t help it, going so far as to drink tea with honey in order to get his voice in the right mode. When the two sides meet, much to Penguin’s chagrin, it just slows everything down even more. And ticks off Penguin because Polar Bear opts to join them on the hot spring trek, which is going terribly slow. Thankfully, Penguin does realize that the journey is half the fun of any trip and they all manage to work that angle well enough so that they have fun while getting there and enjoy the bath that they do get to. Of course, there’s also the problem of getting Sloth back home, which is a pretty long journey all of its own.
Before the second half gets fully underway, we get several live action segments that are just hilarious as the gang does a bit of a world tour, ending up in London as well with the little puppet pieces we get for the end of episode segments. It’s hilarious seeing them getting around a bit. When the second half does get underway, it shifts to dealing with White Day as Handa is doing his best to figure out what to get Sasako after the events of Valentine’s Day. Of course, he asks Llama for suggestions on what to do and it just gets weird from there. While Handa does his shopping, it’s nice to see a little bit of a tentative nature about Sasako as she wonders if she’ll see Handa at all. Which leads to her leaving early and the two coming across each other with him helping her out in a way neither expected. It’s simple and sweet, though part of me wishes that Handa had just really done something intentional and right to try and woo her.
In Summary:
Polar Bear Cafe has a pretty good episode here as it deals with some of the primary characters but also a good number of supporting ones in a fun way. Sloth is the main focus in the first half, but it’s more about the core cast as they come along for the trip and the fun they have with it. The second half gives us just a little bit more of a taste of what Sasako and Handa are like and it’s almost painful as you really want Handa to just get with the program and do his best to woo her and make some progress. Even Llama is a bit disillusioned with him by this point I’m sure. The best part is the little puppet piece that takes the gang on a trip around the world as it just made me grin big and love all the little gags that come from them being paper models. Very, very fun stuff.
Grade: B
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Sony KDS-R70XBR2 70″ LCoS 1080P HDTV, Dell 10.1 Netbook via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.
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