Yakuza Fiancé: Raise wa Tanin ga Ii

Episode 11

This might be a bit strange, but I have found that my favorite part of a story is often the denouement. That pause when the dust has settled and characters are processing what they just went through has the potential to be ripe with character beats, giving the audience a chance to reflect with them on what has changed, what has stayed the same, and what the future holds. With that in mind, it seems only natural that “A Pet that Becomes Unruly as It Grows” is my favorite episode of Yakuza Fiancé thus far.

With Ozu and his goons neutralized and the threat of Azami kicked down the road, Yoshino now must deal with the twin pains in her ass known as Kirishima Miyama and Shoma Toriashi. She promised Kirishima she'd be his girlfriend if he made it through the evening, and she fully intends to make good on it. But she's not sure what that means for their relationship. Much to Yakuza Fiancé's credit, it doesn't bother with the blushing and faffing about but dives straight to the heart of the issue: for most people, dating indicates having a physical relationship. Tsubaki asks Yoshino if she's going to be able to kiss and have sex with Kirishima, and Yoshino doesn't have an answer.

While Yakuza Fiancé is schlocky fun in general, this episode does remarkably well in depicting humans figuring out their relationships, allowing them to communicate and talk out their feelings. Yoshino isn't comfortable talking to Kirishima about sex yet, so she turns to her more experienced cousin. But she's not even looking for answers so much as trying to sort out her own feelings. She may be a hardass in a lot of ways, but she's completely inexperienced in terms of romance and sex. Checking in with a family member who is older than her but close in age is a great way for her to unpack her expectations.

It's also very illuminating about her relationship with Shoma, who is displeased about her and Kirishima officially becoming a couple. Kirishima picks a fight with him, and when Yoshino breaks them up, she pulls out a sewing kit demands the two take off their shirts. She explains that when Shoma got into a fight, she used to make him go to his opponent's house and fix the buttons he'd ripped off. For a moment, I bristled at this – how is it Yoshino's responsibility to manage the relationships of her unruly older brother figure? But then I realized that she's grown up as the only girl surrounded by violent, hypermasculine men. Negotiating her position among them is her only way to have any power within the organization; otherwise, she would have just ended up a spoiled yakuza princess like Shiori Akaza.

As an aside, I was very impressed that not only did Shoma and Kirishima have nipples, but they were realistically varied in shape and placement!

In one of the episode's best scenes, Yoshino and Shoma sit on a park bench and talk like two people who know each other very well. I feel like the assumption has largely been that Shoma's antipathy toward Kirishima is largely motivated by jealousy. Still, when Yoshino asks Shoma outright if he likes her, he just says, “Gross.” But then she throws her arm over his shoulder, and the two talk about how they could get married, and it probably wouldn't be a bad life. Rather than a simplistic case of him being in love with her but her seeing him as a brother, this scene puts their relationship in a new light. There's no question that Shoma and Yoshino love each other, and it seems like they see it more as familial than anything else. However, they're both aware that they aren't blood-related, and their relationship could shift, and that would be okay too. It's a beautifully intimate depiction of how complex and hazily-defined human relationships are.

Not that I want to give an impression that all is settled at the end of the arc. We've gotten plenty of hints at something simmering under the surface, and they continue in this episode. Yoshino's father supposedly died in a car accident at the age of 20, but it's starting to seem like maybe it wasn't entirely accidental. Plus, Yoshino has spent her entire life attached to a strong male – first Hotei, who raised her, then Shoma as her foster brother, who attended school and commuted with her, and finally Kirishima as her fiance, once Shoma went off to college. Almost like someone is always guarding her! In fact, Renji delivers a severe beatdown to Kirishima for letting Yoshino get caught up in something this dangerous. It's possible he just loves his granddaughter and wants her to be safe, but considering what happened to Yosuke, there may be a much more direct threat to her life.

With just one episode left, it seems unlikely the anime will reveal much else. This would have made a perfect finale, all things considered; a pause for breath, a chance to exhale before the action resumes.

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Yakuza Fiancé: Raise wa Tanin ga Ii is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.