Moé Moé Rabu

In a slice of life anime, you don’t see much romance development throughout the series, and ARIA is no different. However what it does do is skim through the theme and show us that such romance developments are possible and what better way to show that than through Aika and Al. This chapter is definitely one of the more memorable ones in the manga and personally I find it to the be the most romantic scenes between two characters. That is of course if you don’t count Akari and Cait Sith, the chemistry between Al and Aika is much more appealing.

Impressions

But Aika really is cute when she shows her deredere side and it makes her look more girlish as well. Of course Aika’s hardworking and more tougher side is also good, but we see the other side of the coin, it’s like a whole new person. Al is also a wonderful male character but it was rather surprising to find out that he is afraid of the dark, given his job as a Mole. He would never be one of the typical dense male anime type since he is quite mature himself (not to mention he is older than even Akatsuki and Woody) but I think it’s his kindness that makes him such a great character. Deep down he probably has feelings for Aika as well, but it still makes you wonder if he knows about Aika’s feelings, or he is actually dense. But I’m willing to believe it’s the former. Oh and by far this has to be the best scene of 2008 (yeah I’m getting a little ahead of myself here).

Alice was also cute this episode with all her blushing faces at the start. To me I still think she is a little too inexperienced to become a Prima and that she needed more practice dealing with customers. But she is the Orange Princess, so I’m sure she’ll get better sooner or later. Gotta love the little antics of Aria-shachou and Maa-kun to add to the humour of the show. Well we’re reaching the near end of the series, but I’m still hoping it will go longer than 12-13 episodes. There is still plenty of manga chapters that the series can cover, but having seen the titles for the next few episodes, I don’t think it’ll go any further.

Preview: