Food Wars! Shokugeki no Soma

Episode 10

If Shinomiya, the red-headed glasses-wearing sempai who “instructs” Soma and Co. on day two, had a handlebar mustache, he most definitely would be twirling it. Food Wars! does many things well, but one of the most noticeable is that all of the villains, or at least antagonists, are truly unlikeable in a variety of ways, from Erina's puffed-up ego to Shinomiya's abuse of power to the teaching philosophy of whoever founded the school. (Actually, the two characters are quite similar; clearly that's a type I dislike.) In this episode Shinomiya sets before his “students” a recipe (or “recette” as he calls it, being the kind of pretentious fellow who feels the need to inject useless French into his speech) that he wants them to follow exactly without asking each other for help. When timid Tadokoro is unable to muscle her way to the front of the ingredient choosing mob and ends up with an inferior cauliflower, he punishes her for it. Her crimes? Being herself (shy) and coming up with a way to fix the problem.

To western viewers, and certainly to me as a teacher, the style of instruction and the way that Totsuki is run as an institution of learning seems contrary to what we would expect. Here there are intense discussions of graduation rates, student retention, and the goal is to help all students to make it through. Totsuki, on the other hand, prides itself on its excessive exclusivity, and certainly seems to subscribe to the philosophy that punishment and fear is the best way to reach students. This has been slowly creeping up on me as an irritant about the series, and the glee with which Shinomiya wields his power, expelling students (or “firing” them) is off-putting and contrary to everything I know about reaching students. He's not so much an instructor (guest or otherwise) as a tyrant, and his reaction to Soma's challenge of his methods is astonished anger that a mere student would have the gall to question him. It's not a healthy environment in which to hone one's skills, as evidenced by the fact that both Soma and the Aldini brothers learned their craft in kinder environments and continually outshine their Totsuki-bred peers. While the concept of “elite” and “exclusive” has more allure in Japan than in, for example, North America and we can understand that on an intellectual level, it can make watching this episode a frustrating experience. On the other hand, it is always good to have an antagonist you can really enjoy hating, and it does very firmly put us in the hero's camp.

As with other episodes of this show, this one suffers a bit from trying to balance out tense cooking scenes with more lighthearted ones. The Soma/Erina Hallway Showdown does a much better job of this than the gathering to play cards which follows, and we begin to see Erina as a girl with a massive ego who has never felt challenged before rather than someone who is just mean for meanness' sake. Time spent in both male and female baths is semi-useful (in terms of plot rather than fanservice, in which case we see much more male nudity than female, and Soma clearly gets an eyeful of a sempai's junk), giving Soma a chance to get to know someone important and allowing us to see Tadokoro finally relaxing and feeling a bit confident. It's in the transitions that the story falters, failing to smoothly segue between scenes in such a way that the comedy and the more intense portions of the show compliment each other. Instead they simply exist side-by-side, which sadly does not do the episode any favors, no matter how cool it is that Soma can juggle sixteen cups at once.

This really is a bit of a transition episode in and of itself, given the note that it ends on. Soma's proven to (most of) the students that he's a force to be reckoned with, so now he needs to step up his game and do the same with the sempai. That he's doing it in defense of someone else again is a shounen hero convention, but one which he embodies nicely. Now let's see if he can carry it through to victory next week.

Rating: B

Food Wars! Shokugeki no Soma is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

Rebecca Silverman is ANN's senior manga critic.