Aqua NEEDS Therapy! Psychologist Reacts to Oshi No Ko Season 2 Episode 4 

You know it's a great episode when Ed takes twice the amount of time to watch an episode.

im glad akane's empathy is made clear in the anime, alot of manga readers tried to deny this side of her. her empathy is off the charts.

Kana when she finds out who Aqua's mother is: "I am my own worst enemy"

I like that the 3 unknown names at the end can be either people or movie making related names: Hajimaru means "Beginning" doubling as a movie title, Hikaru means "Light" as in light for filming and Sozai means "Materials" as in props for the movie, very cleverly made. Aqua does need Therapy, but hey, at least he have Akane on his side tho :)

oooh i knew this would be a long one. This episode gave me legit chills in multiple spots. Get Aqua some therapy fr bro doesnt need to act tough for his family he needs to work through his trauma 1:15:40 i literally blurted out loud "oh no" haha Ed's reaction was the same i had when i first watched the episode

54:00 well it's actually hard thing to put together there is basically no paper trail as her pregnancy was interviewed by Dr. Gorou himself and the twins were registered as the Saitou and Myako children from the start. The later also explain their connections at least to insiders as the two being nepo babies from the company founder/owner would be bad PR to the public. personally i think that the age is the greatest blindfold, no one expects a prominent idol getting pregnant at 15 so the timeline doesn't match. for a celeb this would be shocking even on my region where teen pregnancy is the norm (for reference out of my thirty two female cousins only four made to eighten without a child, and about half had two)

at 18:54 in the opening, I haven't seen many people talk about it but Ruby's smile disappears and she frowns, compared to Aqua's section where he smiles. Does that indicate that something is happening with Ruby this season or maybe we deep dive more into her character? I'm curious, coupled with the ED, it leads me to believe that we probably at least explore Ruby's character more ^^

In terms of therapy and treatment for trauma: do note that most of them are made for neurotypical people (and the self-help books and meditation promotions out there aren't geared for a neurodiverse brain). For example, neurodiverse people might not at all benefit from meditation and that's not a failure on the part of the patient, just that the brain is different. As much as people wish it, there's no one-stop solution for everyone for all possible trauma.

Man, this episode wase just sheer quality in every single aspect. The presentation, the depth of the story and what was represented and the intensity at which it was presented was absolutely perfect. And as a bonus, we got Chef Ed cooking the finest meals, exploring the story in its absolute depth. Ngl though, i love Kana but this really solidified Akanes beauty as a character. Her understanding of psychology, how this translates into acting and reading people as well as her empathy and genuine kindness make her an amazing character. Also as fellow psychology enthusiasts, she is probably the most relatable, with her ocnstantly reflecting and analyzing. The first half of the episode may appear mild, but i do believe that it holds quite a lot of value that we can apply to our own lives. It presents the importance of being diplomatic in social interactions through finding the balance between being assertive and respecting yourself and your needs and adjusting to others wishes. Compromise and not thinking in simplistic black and white ways truly is essential to have high quality relationships I absolutely love that we now explored Aquas depth with more clarity. We could finally see his different aspects of self and how his trauma restricts him with absolute clarity. The duality within himself, the conflict between Goro and Aqua, the survivors guilt, his selflessness and his emotionality beyond the mask of being nonchalant. All of this really reminds me of Carl Jung and his theory of the complexity of the self, with our shadow self and how it unfolds if we do not integrate it into our own consciousness. Overall, seeing it so clearly expressed just how dissociated Aqua is from his core self and how his lack of survivors guilt defines his thinking was nothing but brutal. This does make me question what kind of trauma plays into it from his previous life as Goro, as you could pretty much always observe a certain subconscious neuroticism about Goro

Ive been waiting for this for so long

1:15:40 I started laughing so badly when i saw Ed´s reaction- i knew it was coming but holy that was a good laugh.

Akane Supremacy! Akane truly Best Girl. Onwards to ep 5 Ed!

To Ed’s poll question of “have you ever had an anxiety/panic attack?” Yes. Too many! Panic disorders are bullshit! I’m thankfully at a stage where I’m weeks to months between attacks depending on triggers, so I can understand Aqua doing his best to intellectualize his emotions to avoid them. To me, they feel like breathing in nothing while everything either closes in around you or gets too big and you’re exposed. I thought I was going to die when I had my first one. To those who have never had a panic attack: I hope you avoid ever having to face one. But at the same time, I feel a sense of comfort when I see panic attacks portrayed in media. I always felt like an idiot who was hyperventilating over nothing after they passed, so having media that say: “yeah. They’re fucked up. -100/10 don’t recommend. Go lay down” makes me feel less self conscious about it. So uh- any bitches out there with a panic disorder: you’re not alone.

The one thing anime always makes me wonder is if headpats are a real thing. I have no active memory of ever getting one as a child nor if it would feel nice.

Its crazy how people feel bad for kana when we have all this shit happening in this episode, like what she got you feeling bad for? shes jealous? Im sorry but TIMING PLEASE.😭

1:15:45 From best girl to trauma girl in 1,5s XDFDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD

I'm over 40 now and I still have symptoms from an event when I was 4. Stuff lasts for a life time.

Thank you very much for not leaving me any excuse for not seeing the OP thing. At the very least I don't _remember_ having an anxiety attack before, so if I have, I can only imagine it wasn't as severe as the one Aqua went though here.

2:07:30 If Director Taishi knew about the "traumatic experience" Aquamarine had as a baby, doesn't that mean.......

"Play with my balls" Oh, are we making a Kuroko no Basuke Abridged jokes now? Speaking of, if you do ever wanna do sports anime reactions, I definitely recommend Kuroko. It's pretty damn good. Other than "Kuroko no Basuke" which is basketball, ya got "Haikyuu" which is volleyball(it also, funnily enough, has a Stage Play adaptation), "Daiya no A" which is baseball, "Hajime no Ippo" which is boxing, and more recently we've had "Blue Lock" which is Soccer. Of them, I'd say Blue Lock or Kuroko would be the best ones to start with. Blue Lock would probably be the most interesting of the bunch psychologically, though. It's only got one season though, and I dunno when S2 is supposed to air. Kuroko is the only one I listed that has the benefit of being a finished adaptation(three 25 episode seasons and a movie), and is also pretty interesting psychologically. Interestingly, both preach completely different messages. Kuroko's whole message is about the value of teamwork and how forgoing it shall inevitably make you weaker than someone with a complete sense of trust in their team. Blue Lock, meanwhile, almost spits on that philosophy. It preaches about how valuable selfishness is for greatness, and how anyone lacking a strong ego simply cannot be a great.

There's a George Carlin bit, and it's not about Shellshock, but it is something he talks about in it. The bit itself has to do with how people have have gained a habit of using softer language to protect themselves from harsher parts of reality. Like how Shellshock didn't just go from Shellshock to PTSD, but it evolved to be softer and less impactful sounding over time. First, it was Shellshock. Then, it was Battle Fatigue. After that? Operational Exhaustion, which he jokes about it sounding like something that'd happen to a car more than a person. THEN, after all that, we arrived at classifying it as "Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder" pretty much right in time for the Vietnam war to hit. To which Carlin says "The pain is completely buried under jargon. If we had still been calling it "Shellshocked," I bet ya those Vietnam veterans would have gotten the care they needed." It's a great bit, just like all Carlin's stand ups are. Funny, thought provoking, and tragic once you realize dude died almost 2 decades ago now, and just about all the complaints he made in his bits are still valid today.😂

Ngl, ED makes Oshi no ko even more special. Extra peak, thanks to his analysis 👍 He makes us learn things we would never know we needed. I'm curious where it goes from here now, and what will happen next episode. Question, are you ready for Re:Zero S3 episode 1 in next month ? (Supposedly it becomes available throught streaming method the 30th august). Can't wait for that analysis as well. I'm Hype, like a LOT for it.

Oh, group projects. Normally, I've been fine with them, until... so, it was basically my senior thesis, specifically the equivalent of one at my college, and it was a two-person group project. We managed to divide the labor fairly well... until around the end of the year when my partner basically dropped off the face of the earth for a couple weeks without saying _anything_ and I had to basically complete the rest of the thing solo. Apparently, it was because his grandfather died and he was going through a bunch of stuff, but all I knew was that one day he suddenly stopped doing his work and responding to my messages even when he was _fucking online._ So yeah, that was a fun experience.

FYI: That baseball field that they show in the intro is actually the tokyo dome! The same one that Ai wanted to preform in

Hi Ed I think you should react to the music video of the op FATALE.

From the wheel, Aqua is a caregiver and an everyman. To understand what aqua is fighting for you have to go back to when he was still the doctor. How he views himself and what he wishes for the people around him.

In a meta sense this is the episode that I realized that Akane will probably lose the Aqua bowl. She peaked too early. If this moment happened almost at the end then this would definitely be the winning move for Akane. But hey, I'm okay with that since I prefer Kana anyway. I still like Akane though, just not as a girlfriend for Aqua, I feel like they only enhance each other's edginess/manipulative tendencies while Aqua is genuinely happy and carefree whenever he goofs around with Kana (baseball etc.).

Panic attack no, but i did have emoitions boil over into me just crying for an hour, closest i had to an attack would be a wave of Existential Dread that made me lock up for a few minutes. My problems are stress fueled procrustination, and having a smartass mask I wear all the time.

1:25:04 I haven't seen a lot of people discuss it, but the choice of shots in this sequence is interesting. One is clearly "the Akane group", but she's not actually in one of them, and another is about an interaction between her and someone else. So what these three shots suggest to me -- "Yuki hugging Akane", "working on the video", and "Akane on a happy date" -- is that when he thinks of "happy memories" involving Akane, the overriding theme is _seeing her recover_ from the dark place she was in. The Kana group, meanwhile, is "playing catch with her", "chatting on the balcony as Pieyon", and "being teased in the van about his work relationship": scenes where she's having a relaxed conversation with him while smiling. In other words, Kana is first and foremost someone he likes spending time with and talking to, and Akane is first and foremost someone he's happy _for,_ and happy he was (unlike Ai) able to protect.

As a Manga reader, Ed you really have to stop guessing the entire plot a hundred plus chapters ahead 🤣🤣🤣

Hajimari is the name of the movie that Ai was in it with Aqua

when i watched this when kana was like "what would you do if your mom were to die" i was just like...bor....thats the absolute WORST thing you could have said to him mans literally watched his mom get stabbed and she died in his arms

1:22:39 "NATEMCWIPPY" was being spoiler scum in the chat. Don't read his chats anymore!

Kana isn't piecing anything together. She's too busy being jealous that Akane gets to be with him and she doesn't.

Never had a panic or anxiety attack. I have been in situations though where anxiety was just mounting on itself for months and months and building. Fortunately the climax was with a large group of people who were in the exact same situation and because of the situation and the people who were there, we all were able to push passed it.

Aqua= Suffers for his art. Everyone else draws pleasure from their art. Kana is the light version of Aqua... I think.

"Who's Hikaru?!" Well, literally translated, he's Light. So I guess this story is a Death Note crossover now.😂

Trigger warning: panic attack, tendencies to commit self-deletion, gore I’ve had a panic attack before. One of the worst experiences of my life. I am deeply, constantly tempted by my depression to… well, you can guess. One day, I had been at work, and took longer on my break because I was talking myself out of committing to ‘it’. Not only that, my doctor never told me that caffeine has a negative interaction with a medication he had prescribed me for a crippling lack of focus and motivation that renders me barely functional. And I had been drinking 10 shots of caffeine a day just to get a mere hour of normality, so I was going through extreme paranoia when I already am likely pathologically paranoid and anxious. Then one of my coworkers rebuked me for taking longer, and as I tried to confide why, they had no sympathy and criticized me for allowing my serious consideration of suic*** to impact them and my other coworkers… they’re probably right about that, but I couldn’t handle such callousness in the state of weakness I had been in. I had found a paper cutter in my panic attack in the employee back room space and there were just rows of cuts all along my arms. I was sobbing and begging, rambling to the friends who were trying to calm me down. I kept saying deliriously that I was so sorry and it was all my fault. I remember being unable to walk, and rinsing the blood off my arms… Anyway, feel free to ask me to delete this. I just felt like sharing.

Damn Ed. This season of Oshi no Ko, you're really fishing to be spoiled or something. Ya can't be asking chat auestions about unknowns, unless you just don't give a damn. I will say, you absolutely should give a damn with this story. But, keep asking chat questions, and the odds are someone is gonna answer.

Akanes way of acting gives me major psycho vibes, when she interacts with Aqua. You see it as empathy and I see it as obsession, in short with how in-depth she dives into psychology of characters for a role lends me to believe that everything we see from her is an act and it lasts as long as the role itself does. Her saying those things FOR aqua make me trust her less as I can see her being his greatest adversary in the end of this series. on a scale of 1 to 10 I normally trust her as a 4-6; but if Aqua is a part of the area then it drops to a 2-4. I still await her mask pull back stab. I know its coming just not when.

Pretty sure the Doc was working through trauma then Aqua had his own trama from the death. Like with Rudy Trama from the past life will carry over.

Saw the latest vod of Dungeon Meshi where you were reacting to trailers so just came to say this in the comments: Senpai is an Otokonoko = 10/10 Grimgar of Fantasy and Ash = 10/10 Makeine = 9/10 so far

Maaaan. People are so critical of Kana. And they are so critical of you being curious about stuff beyond the anime. They should chill.

Akane has to much stalker energy for me to trust. She is Evil or Misled Ed.

Also its too bad Akane is completely despicable as a character and she belongs in Prison.

Yes my atk prevented me from trying to get a drivers licence. It brought to mind why I of all people should not be on the road.

Ruby: "You triggered my brother. Prepare to die." 😂😂😂

This is why I disagreed with the assessment of letting the manga author and the script writer directly communicate. There is so much else that needs attention, and there need to be people that tell you if something is doable with the resources available. This magically resolved itself because of anime magic, in real life this is chaos, there need to be people in between that communicate the ideas to something that is actually doable in a certain frame of time.

What makes you think he and Ruby had one in the first place? I certainly do not think they ever have yet. Both faked it until they made it so nothing was done.

Pls Finish Oregairu season 3 😢😢

How did the whiteboard even get broken? Cooked too hard on it?

39:14 in a group project i usually do it on my own. based on my experience if you depend on the group, the project will failed.

2:04:35 "Does this come from Ai?" No one should know wtf those folders are. I really hope no one ruined anhthing for you. :/ 2:06:40.Ah. I see now. Y9u iust want manga reader to tell you the answers. My bad. I get the reacters who get pissed about spoilers mixed with the reacters who...well, I can't think of any other reacters who want to be spoiled.

1:31 No, never had it

2:07:47 Did you mean insidious?

I like your vids, but your chat always talks a lot of s**t about things they don't know

its why akane is my favourite. shes very kind and empathetic.

1:35:40 tbf it could be that Kana wants to be the one who comfort Aqua. It’s still comes from jealousy, but with this angle wouldn’t be as bad imo Kana is easily misunderstood, even in season one she blurted out about Akane coming back as an actress after the incident are a “threat” to her career. But she weirdly meant that as a compliment lol😅

I'm tired of the Aqua x Therapy agenda, People need to understand that therapist aren't an automatic win button, some clinically depressed people go their whole life switching therapist without finding one that is able to bring them relief. Aqua himself was put under therapy most of his new life without finding peace. therapist aren't superhumans that can make your depression go away, they're just able to give you tools to help you cope with it, and that doesn't mean those tools with work with everyone.

Great analysis!

After I watched this episode, I knew you'd love it. You called it right from the start! Also for the poll, yea i think I've had an attack before. Was in front of my bosses boss so idk i think that wasn't such a great time to have it.

Here we goooo

I don't know if I have ever had a panic attack. For me its hard to know what I'm feeling. Listening to you list the symptons though, I would say maybe? I remember feeling some of these things when I had to present big projects in front of the whole school/class. Amazing analysis as usual, love watching these!

39:14 I do like to work with others (like my friends for example), but I have a hard time working with people who don’t have a similar mindset to me or who don’t agree with me a lot😅 I’m also a perfectionist so I’m very picky about the project and want it to be the best but the others might not really understand or care much about the project so I end up doing most or a lot of the work, stressing out a lot and exhausting myself…. Sometimes I do think that I should relax and take it easy, but perfectionist in me cant 😔 I feel like maybe I should also try to take in other peoples input and ideas more too

keep up the good work ed

52:14 this is the part where me and a lot of the viewers catching strays for no reason

1:00:50 the better looking kana and akane

holy yap

Ever since I read these chapters in the manga, I needed to see you to react to them. Not disappointed in the slightest.

2:06:40 yes, Hikaru is the dad. a lucky son of a bish.

Home ec Communications class That is it... nowhere else was I actually involved in a group project. In home ec; we made dishes together like cookies and such... democracy style we each had a vote then went forward and no one was left out because everyone was designated a task. Smooth as butter. Com... yeah well I was among the only 10th graders in a class full of 11th graders. We were to make a skit and we did work on it... Then the teacher was yonked because child on the way or something serious like that... Subs the rest of the way meant the activities went unfinished. What there was of that project was made to work by everyone designating me as the focus for some reason so I was a kinda straight man dead pan comedian doing lines and such where my delivery made stuff funny or interesting; it also got around my stage fright by having the others to focus on in each scene. So when people ask about group projects I always say "what group projects"... home ec felt like it was just me (in a good way) and com had an incomplete project... so did not feel like it was a group project. All the college I have had was just me doing stuff and no one being a partner.