It makes total sense to run away from Arata and Chihaya, for entirely different reasons though. You should run from Arata because he is better than you at karuta, and has no empathy if you lose. He will stare down at you through his glasses with his cold blue eyes and make you feel like an ant. You should run from Chihaya because she will stalk you to the ends of the earth, jump you and kidnap you, if you don’t want to be enlisted in her beloved club. You should treat Chihaya with caution because most of all she is kind of psychotic. Arata is just in a league of his own and couldn’t understand how ants must feel.
Yusei “Porky” Nishida quit karuta after being defeated by Arata, and opted to join the tennis club instead. Chihaya ropes him into joining the club since they need a fifth member to become official. Meanwhile, Taichi is teaching Desktomu and Kana the basics, such as when you can “send” cards to an opponent’s side, but it will take a long awhile before Kana and Desktomu can even handle the sport enough to help the team win. I think Desktomu’s introduction was a little bit more interesting and unpredictable than Nishida’s, considering the attached to his desk angle, and the fact that he had never even played karuta and was a beginner when he joined, it was cool to see someone with no background in karuta find reasons to care.
Nishida is an old hand at karuta but ran away from the sport when he was little because he was beaten by Arata. He is chased down and tackled by Chihaya when she recognizes him as a former karuta opponent, triggered by seeing him eating pork buns. Hence why she calls him “Porky.” as he ate them as a child as well. Here it actually makes more sense for Chihaya to adamantly want Nishida on their team, but not quite as much fun to watch happen as Desktomu’s intro. Taichi and Chihaya mutually manipulate (they can be quite evil when they want to be!) Nishida into playing a match against Chihaya to prove to him that he still loves karuta, and is only using tennis as a replacement. So Nishida’s episode is more straightforward and logical in the sense that he is experienced and just needs to be reminded that he really wants to join the karuta team.
Of course the reason he quit was he was just scared of Arata. It is really crazy how Arata tends to destroy other people’s confidence without even trying, but his level of talent is just that intimidating. The number one thing about this show I find most amusing is that Arata frightens everyone half to death with his god-like abilities, even though he rarely appears on-screen very long. The show has done an excellent job of making it feel like his “presence,” is there even when he is not onscreen, that he is the driving force behind Chihaya’s demonic ambitions.
At this point it is no surprise that Chihaya is so oblivious to people’s feelings that she nicknames Nishida Porky, and doesn’t stop calling him that even when he objects to the moniker. That is a running gag through-out the episode, although I am sure Chihaya doesn’t even understand that it might hurt his feelings since “Porky” is unflattering to an overweight person. Luckily, Nishida seems like a fairly thick-skinned, strong-minded character with enough skills, brains and athleticism that Chihaya’s social idiocy won’t get in his way too much.
Errant Princess Says,
An excellent episode, if yet more proof that Chihaya and Taichi are bad people. Nishida is the Salieri to Arata’s Mozart. In all honesty though, Arata probably has a lot of enemies he isn’t even aware of.
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