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Yuri On Ice Episode 11 Recap, Our heartbeats flutter to a stop (but it’s gonna be okay, I swear)
If you’re reading my recap posts for spoilers, you can carry on as you do. If you’re here because you’re trying to decide if you should wait until next week to watch because you’re nervous, if waiting a week is going to kill you if there’s too much tension but you don’t want to be spoiled, let me stop you right here. Play episodes 1-10 on permanent loop for the next seven days and then play 11-12 straight through next Wednesday. You’re welcome.
Because yes. It was That Kind of Episode.
From a narrative perspective, this is all as it should be. This is the dark moment, the crisis, the great buildup when all seems lost or at least potentially at stake. And if Kubo were only a mediocre storyteller, I’d be sipping tea and thinking, “yes, well, that’s all well and good, but you know it’ll be fine in the end.” As it is, here’s the GIF set currently describing my feelings.
I feel much the same way I do every time I read/watch Pride and Prejudice and I’m legitimately concerned whether or not Darcy will propose this time, as if the story will have changed somehow. Or even though Haikyuu! S3 got spoiled for me, I’m watching each set of the match with my heart in my throat and a pillow clutched to my chest. It’s not about knowing or trusting the outcome. It’s about the tension, the suspension of not only belief but of sense of place and time and self. Right now I’m in a hotel room in Barcelona, and my poor heart…
But I get ahead of myself.
Speaking of getting ahead of myself, I’m way overdue for a few corrections.
Episode 1: I referred to “the airport scene.” It’s not the airport, as many have pointed out. It’s still the skating area or whatever you call the place where they skated. It simply looked a hell of a lot like an airport. I’ve heard a zillion arguments on whether or not this was before or after the banquet—I suspect it was before—and whether or not Victor meant to refer to Yuri as a fan. I’m coming down on the side of Victor meaning Yuri to be something of a fan but also as someone who was in the Grand Prix Final with him. Since, you know, there are only six. No doubt he knew who Yuri was. This idea Yuri had that he should be so down on himself and removed was his own anxiety and depression talking, though, no question.
Episode 10: There’s apparently only one ring purchased in the store. I’ve watched this argument go back and forth like a tennis match, but some enterprising person who can read Japanese and who has really good eyesight, apparently, read the receipts and the tickets of the other rings, and Yuri only bought one. Victor had the other one all along. I’m not sure how they were matching, unless that was just luck, or if the intrepid receipt reader was wrong. Feel free to go have that argument on Tumblr if you want. I’m sure it’s still raging.
Probably there are a few more I’m due to acknowledge, but those are the ones I can think of off the top of my head.
On to the recap and analysis of episode eleven.
We open with the announcer introducing us to the six finalists, in reverse order of standing. Since Yuri’s in sixth place, he’s introduced first. I love that as part of his intro montage they include The Kiss.
We then have our usual sing-a-long with the intro, but this time it’s different! As a special treat for the final, we get special credits!
It’s straight into the performances, starting with Yuri, but not before a heartwarming moment where Victor reminds Yuri that by simply kissing his ring, Victor is on the ice with him.
Like, that’s a still, but Victor basically stands there holding his lips to Yuri’s hand for twenty-five minutes. Whenever you have a bad day, go back and remember how Victor kissed Yuri’s hand before his SP. Never forget.
Mari and Minako are there, and they will hold up flags for pretty much every skater, but of course they’re super psyched for Yuri-kun. So is everyone at home, with Minami leading the watch party. The announcer reminds us Yuri tanked last year, and Victor fucks his fiancé with his eyes while he kisses his ring again.
Yuri kisses his ring too. Then he takes off.
The thing is, he’s had to shake up his program to try to win, to add a quad to try to beat JJ. He adds a quad flip to please Victor and to top JJ or at least keep pace. He’s not ever done it super well, but he’s determined to try. We know all this because as he skates we get a backstory of how he and Victor had plotted to include the flip.
But while Yuri skates, I gotta say, he didn’t seem super-relaxed. In fact, he’s never really owned this skate, except for China, and even then remember how we discussed he didn’t seem to enjoy it, that it was a duty? You didn’t simply feel the duty in this one. You felt the pressure. There wasn’t a joy here. This skate felt like a mountain to climb. And he didn’t climb it.
He did fine. He didn’t flub the quad flip, not really, but he didn’t nail it. His hand touched down as he landed, which cost him points. He didn’t top his personal best, and it was clear he wasn’t going to beat JJ. Yuri ended the skate on his knees, upset with himself for not nailing the skate like he wanted.
Victor, now, had a different experience, watching Yuri.
He was proud of Yuri for being confident in his decisions, but he felt like his heart was about to explode. He rejoiced with every success Yuri had, but when it came to the quad flip—Victor’s own signature move—he did the flip with him from the stands, as if he couldn’t help himself from joining in. While Yuri ends his skate in frustration, Victor flashes back to being asked by reporters what he has in mind for his next season, he thought about how he approached every program like a new beginning, always surprising everyone, but that held him back. He thought could only find strength on his own, but he doesn’t think that way, not anymore. Now he feels new emotions flowing through him, through Yuri. He wonders what he should give Yuri now?
Yuri’s score comes in, and it’s not what either of them want. Look at these faces.
There’s nothing to do about it now, though, but watch literally everyone else perform, and see how Yuri sorts out.
First up is Phichit. In addition to seeing him skate, we get a bit of backstory on him, which was adorable and beautiful at the same time: adorable because if anyone gets cinnamon roll MVP it’s Phichit, but beautiful because we see him with Yuri (and a pile of hamsters) talking about how this famous movie features a Thai actor but no Thai skater has ever skated to it. About how he was discovered, how he’s moved around to train but now has come back home. How Thailand has come here to represent in the stands. How this is his new beginning. How Phichit had always dreamed of skating to this music at the GPF and Yuri would be there too, and this is exactly what’s happening.
This sort of writing and wish fulfillment right here is why I think people need to only be using the oxygen for recreational purposes and not because they’re seriously afraid Kubo is going to let us down, but again, we’re getting ahead of ourselves.
Continuing on. Phichit skates, does well, but places below Yuri. Phew. I mean, good for you, bro, but Phichit on Ice is the sequel. You’ll get your gold medal next time, eh? On to Yurio.
Yurio basically knocks it the fuck out of the park. After struggling over and over to find his agape, he doesn’t just find it, he owns it. At one point Yakov gasps and whispers, “Vitya?” and imagines he sees a young Victor on the ice. Yurio nails everything. Everything.
And in the stands, alone, Victor watches alone, still and pensive, while the boy who hours before told him he was dead shatters his world record.
Yuri comes upon his coach and lover at this moment, seeing him watch his record get shattered. Victor puts a good face on it, says Chris is up, let’s watch him. Yuri watches Victor instead, who has never watched his old rival skate without him being a competitor before. Chris reminds us he’s older, that this is boring without Victor, that he’s Victor’s age. Victor watches him looking nostalgic; Yuri looks tense, especially when Chris’s score comes in higher than Yuri’s.
We finally get to see Otabek skate, and we also get to see Yurio cheer for him from the stands. While Otabek skates we get a little of his backstory, which is of his struggle and his determination to triumph and overcome. He’s got some great form and high jumps, and he ends up in second place behind Yurio. It’s not looking great for poor Yuri, because who’s up next?
That’s right, it’s JJ.
Oh, but wait. Do you recall that I said this guy had some major comeuppance coming, and I was going to tuck in and get ready for it? This is me. Tucking in.
JJ chokes.
Like, epically chokes. Self-crowned King JJ sails onto the ice and can’t nail any of his jumps. He keeps trying to recover, but he can’t get on top of it. Over and over and over, he can’t get in front of his anxiety until it becomes a spiral. His overconfidence has turned on him, and it is biting him hard in the ass and not letting go.
Yuri delivers a line designed to lead us in empathy, but I’ve hung out with Damon Suede too long. This is me. This is straight up me watching JJ’s GPF short program bomb.
I do see it. It’s the moment where I’m supposed to recognize his humanity, and I do, a little. Mostly I’m ready now that he’s fallen to stop wanting to stab him in the neck, instead settling for the leg. He can show contrition and I’ll stomp on his foot a few times and call it good. But for now this image? This is my joy. JJ’s mental image of his competitors as he falls from grace.
That was great payout. Again, that Kubo delivered this sort of narrative paycheck is yet another reason I’m not really worried about next week.
Yuri watches JJ and, in addition to empathizing, thinks, “It’s like seeing myself from last year.” Except then he amends that saying no, JJ wasn’t stuck in one place like he was. Yuri decides he doesn’t have regrets for taking on his own challenge this time. He’s proud of being one of the final six. JJ’s performance, disappointing as it is, helps Yuri understand that even a failure can be perceived as a victory. Which for Yuri is a pretty big victory indeed.
So I guess I can’t hate you anymore, JJ. But I did enjoy your fall. Sorry not sorry.
The episode ends with JJ’s fans cheering him despite his loss, JJ rousing himself with a last “JJ style,” Yurio covering his ears and shouting, “Shut up, shut up, shut up!” and the screen telling us it’s all to be continued. You think, damn, kind of a bummer of an ending, huh? You wanted a little more pep for the penultimate episode, right?
No you fucking didn’t.
We get the usual outro. We wait for the quick preview, thinking it’ll be a fifteen second teaser. This is not what we get.
It’s a long outro. Over a minute. We get their new standings first, letting us know it’s Yurio, Otabek, Chris, Yuri, PHichit, and JJ. Great, thanks, knew that. Yuri lets us know he’s going for gold in his free skate, we see that his family has all passed out staying up late for the watch party, and everything’s winding down. Including Yuri and Victor, sitting together in their hotel room, with Victor looking fresh as a daisy out of his shower.
They laugh about how Minako and Celestino are getting drunk together at the bar so probably best to stay away. Then Victor wants to know what it was Yuri wanted to talk to him about. And Yuri, very calmly, with a small smile on his face, tightens his fists. As the camera pans away to the building so we can’t see anyone’s face, he says, “After the Final, let’s end this.”
OKAY. BREATHE.
Now. I’m with you. I’m right there with you. But see the opening of this post. I’m with you in the same way said I worry about Darcy not proposing to Elizabeth. I know it’s going to happen but I worry still. I don’t believe for a second that Victor and Yuri are breaking up at the end of this. I am worried he’s quitting skating, which works from a narrative standpoint but sucks for season two. I want my cake and I want to eat it too. I want the whole enchilada. I believe in the power of the Kubo.
I also believe in watching the previews for next week.
Yes, it’s true, the two of them looked stony-faced and pissed at each other through every shot. They also looked this way in every shot right before we got this.
The theme of the show is love. Finding life and love. Yuri’s going to show his love to the world. The song you’re singing in the shower is called history maker, not heartbreaker. Guys, she’s going to pull this one through. Trust me.
People legitimately write me, often, and tell me they worried X or Y book wasn’t going to end well. The biggies are usually Special Delivery and Fever Pitch. I take that as a big compliment, that the books had THIS IS A ROMANCE branded all over them and yet readers thought somehow Mitch and Sam really weren’t going to get back together or that the parking lot incident would go too far south or that shit would get too real in any book I’ve ever written. But that’s the whole point. This is why you get on the ride, to feel that way. You want to feel that way. If you’re not calling the ambulance in act three, the author is doing it wrong.
I’m a lot more upset that there are only twenty minutes of new show left. That breaks my heart more than any possible narrative surprises Kubo could have in store. I want her to end the show in the right way, even if that means ending it in a way that means there can’t be a season two. I get that, man do I get that. I’m currently writing only the second book I’ve been able to write which is legitimately a continuing novel—usually with a romance, the happy ever after is when the story has to end unless they solve crimes on the side. I mean, what else is there for them to do? You want to keep reliving those characters and that world, but the whole point of a romance is the romance. Then you have to say goodbye.
I don’t want to say goodbye. I’m straight up not ready. But this show isn’t exactly a romance, is it? It’s a show about love. And ice skating. I’m really hoping Kubo and MAPPA decide Yuri and Victor have a whole lot more of both ahead of them.
I will be here waiting if they do. In the meantime, I will be here doing my meta posts and tumbling the hell out of everything, and I will be here next week for the final episode. We are also having a crazy world-wide-watch party on New Year’s Day on Facebook, and the week after Christmas I’m doing a post-mortem post on the series on Happy Ever After at USA Today. So we’ve got a lot of Yuri on Ice ahead of us.
Also, real talk: I ordered a Macacchin tissue box. And if you don’t think that sucker’s gonna be anywhere but on my signing table at RT, you’re a very silly person. Commemorative photos will be free, but I don’t drink alcohol anymore thanks to my migraine med, and if you want a pole dance you’ll have to bring your own pole. But I will karaoke “History Maker” with you anytime, anyplace.
Anywhere.
Yuri on Ice Rewatch/Review: Episode 5: Face Beet Red!! It’s the First Competition! The Chugoku, Shikoku, and Kyushu Championship
Sorry that there was such a long break in these manga/anime reports. The spoiler is I’m going to keep doing them well past the end date for this Rafflecopter, and I’m going to do more Rafflecopters, so, see you next level, I guess.
Anyway. Yuri on Ice, episode five.
As I tweeted today, after being at Animefest, I will forever hear “History Maker” and hear huge crowds of world-wide fans singing along and then cheering as the YOI team enter the room, which is what happened for every panel. Also at every panel either Kubo or Hiramatsu videotaped the room going crazy and Yamamoto brandished an American flag, waving it at us and then tucked it under her name plate. They were as excited to see us as we were them. Kubo said hearing us sing “History Maker” like that fulfilled a dream of hers. I think I mentioned in one of my posts (probably the angry one about how crappy the organizers were) that the YOI people stayed hours and hours past the one hour scheduled signing time every day. They were just so full of love. Truly the most wonderful people. Hiramatsu and Kubo wished we would order their books—Kubo’s manga are getting English releases this spring—and I’m probably going to buy his book even though I think it’s all in Japanese just to support him because HE IS SO NICE. They’re all so nice. I hope they are all having trouble walking to their front doors for all the money in the way.
Where was I? Oh yes. Not even through the opening credits. Sorry.
So the thing that really struck me this time watching this episode was how important it is. I feel like before I’ve always felt like I sort of endured it to get to the Grand Prix, but there’s actually a ton here that sets up so much growth for both Yuri and Victor individually and as a couple. Like we start out and Yuri is still crazy critical of himself, obsessed with the fact that he had to go first, that he’s the oldest guy there, that he fucked up last time, that he’s been practicing with Victor but he’s not sure about himself. Meanwhile there’s so much going on around him and he’s completely oblivious to it—things which by the end of the series he would never miss, not ever again. Victor eventually points this out, about how Yuri doesn’t support Minami, but it’s deeper than that. Yuri is shutting out everything, focusing like a laser on his likelihood of fucking up, which becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
I don’t know how much the creators of the show meant this to be a narrative about anxiety, but man, this is the episode where they really start to hit those notes well, I feel. I’ve written several books about people with anxiety but most notably live with two people who openly talk about their anxiety as part of their lives, and what Yuri goes through is exactly what my husband and daughter experience as people with clinical anxiety. It’s like this second skin, this third person you have to watch out for, and if you aren’t careful, it will drive your bus. It’s very much driving Yuri at the beginning of this episode, and the way things are initially set up, it’s going to continue.
Victor, meanwhile, is debuting as a coach and I think he is about as nervous as Yuri, but he shows it differently. He comes off as a dingbat, and I’ve written about him as such, but I think this is an act, in hindsight. I think Victor is scared. I think he wants to do well by Yuri but doesn’t know how, so he tries to keep it light and goes for his knee-jerk which is to play the ditz. Except as usual with Yuri this doesn’t work. He can’t fake his way with Yuri. Yuri just ignores him—literally just blanks him. I mean, Victor tries to shake this off by interrupting Yuri and talking for him, lending his confidence, but Yuri interrupts back and says no, I’ve told you, I was a mess and will be a mess most likely, you don’t understand. So Victor dresses up, to distract, to be professional, to make Yuri hot for him—all of the above? But no dice. Yuri is too set on being a mess. Victor tries to give him a cheerful pep talk and Yuri just walks off.
The only thing that works is for Victor to literally grab him. To hug him, to embrace him and whisper seductively in his ear and remind him, not in his ditz voice but in his real voice, what he should do. And while Yuri skates, we hear this is the voice Victor has used in practice. This is their private voice.
Now, also notice that as soon as Victor does this, Yuri changes. Suddenly this is a private performance. Yuri is sassy to the audience, and he remembers private times with Victor, as if the competition has faded away and there is only Victor and their time at Hastesu together. Even when he makes a mistake, he remembers Victor holding his hands in onsen and telling him his body makes beautiful music. It’s not his best performance of Eros, but it’s his personal best of his skating career so far.
They’re still learning each other, though—Victor reprimands him for not doing his best, which isn’t the right way to go—Yuri needs praise. And then he fucks up more, telling him to focus on his performance and lower the jump levels. None of these bits of advice are wrong, mind you—they make all the sense in the world. But Yuri is stubborn, and he doesn’t want to lower the jump levels. He wants to do both at once. So he’s frustrated with Victor all over the place. And then when Yuri is interviewed and doesn’t answer right away, Victor leaps in to speak for him, lending his confidence again. This might be for the best as Yuri doesn’t seem to know what to say for himself yet. But it’s not ideal, and it seems clumsy.
Yuri is also screwing up, with Minami. Minami is so eager to please Yuri, to show him his skating, which is modeled on a performance from Yuri’s past, but Yuri is too obsessed with his own past mistakes and potential for screw-ups now that he can’t see he’s being idolized the same way he did Victor. So he steps on Minami’s feelings and his motivation and misses a chance to lift himself up too. It’s just a mess.
Victor sees this and scolds him, which initially upsets Yuri, but he seems to eventually figure it out and then encourages Minami. This isn’t enough, though. He starts to watch Minami, with Victor’s words in mind, and he finally sees himself in the younger skater, both skills and flaws. And between Victor and Minami—both of them are required—Yuri finally finds himself. When he arrives for his free skate, he arrives. He is, at last, the Yuri Katsuki we will know throughout the Grand Prix, the one who will eventually get his moment on the podium.
I love the moment when Yuri stalks down the aisle to meet Victor—love Victor’s admiration of his costume and how beautiful Yuri looks in it, the lip balm, the embrace. The embrace in particular caught me this time around. It’s more than just a good luck hug, I think. Victor acknowledges Yuri has overcome his demons, that he’s gotten his shit together and is ready to do this thing. He doesn’t need to be propped up this skate. He’s just going to fucking skate.
I love too that we get Victor’s narration while Yuri skates. I remembered while I watched what it felt like to watch this skate for the first time, to feel that tension. It’s so wild to watch it now knowing everything I know, having seen it so many times. To know what Yuri’s added, where this skate took them both. I love all the cuts to Victor’s super-blue eyes. I love the way Yuri looks so uncertain still, how this really is him still refining the skate and you can tell.
I also love knowing we’re getting a fucking movie full of skating. And that Victor will skate too.
There’s something so sweet and still about this ep, though. The calm before the storm. The brilliance of this competition is the same as the inclusion of episode four. We need to see them here before they take off. And we need that damn wall nosebleed too. I love that Yuri gets a nosebleed not as an anime stereotype for Victor but literally a nosebleed, for effort. And that Victor rejects his embrace because of it. I’ve loved that this whole time. And the next time they do this skate…
Sigh. So much happy sigh.
We end this skate with Yuri not nervous and eaten by his anxiety but giving autographs and reporting he got lost in his skating because it was the most fun he’d ever had at a competition. Then he gives his press conference and basically declares, to the world, that he loves Victor—not just loves him but loves him in this complex, important way only the Japanese language has a word for, and he does it with the exact opposite of feeling as he was radiating when Victor had to step in and finish his sentences for him. He is confident and powerful and amazing. This is our boy, our Yuri. This is why Victor, and all of us, love him so much.
Oh, tomorrow is episode six. Except tomorrow is busy with a lot of stuff, including my birthday, so I might not be able to get there until Saturday. But we will get there. Make no mistake.
Rafflecopter link for the giveway accompanying this set of reviews/recaps. (Full explanation post, pic link as reminder of stuff on offer.)
A single stroke can change your world.
Xander Fairchild can’t stand people in general and frat boys in particular, so when he’s forced to spend his summer working on his senior project with Skylar Stone, a silver-tongued Delta Sig with a trust fund who wants to make Xander over into a shiny new image, Xander is determined to resist. He came to idyllic, Japanese culture-soaked Benten College to hide and make manga, not to be transformed into a corporate clone in the eleventh hour.
Skylar’s life has been laid out for him since before he was born, but all it takes is one look at Xander’s artwork, and the veneer around him begins to crack. Xander himself does plenty of damage too. There’s something about the antisocial artist’s refusal to yield that forces Skylar to acknowledge how much his own orchestrated future is killing him slowly…as is the truth about his gray-spectrum sexuality, which he hasn’t dared to speak aloud, even to himself.
Through a summer of art and friendship, Xander and Skylar learn more about each other, themselves, and their feelings for one another. But as their senior year begins, they must decide if they will part ways and return to the dull futures they had planned, or if they will take a risk and leap into a brightly colored future—together.
Heidi Cullinan has always enjoyed a good love story, provided it has a happy ending. Proud to be from the first Midwestern state with full marriage equality, Heidi is a vocal advocate for LGBT rights. She writes positive-outcome romances for LGBT characters struggling against insurmountable odds because she believes there’s no such thing as too much happy ever after. When Heidi isn’t writing, she enjoys playing with new recipes, reading romance and manga, playing with her cats, and watching too much anime. Find out more about Heidi at heidicullinan.com.