IN WHICH THE MOON RISES AS IT WAXES

Star*Twinkle Pretty Cure - Episode 5
My Own Review
IN WHICH THE MOON RISES AS IT WAXES


The fifth episode of Star ☆ Twinkle is one that I have been looking forward to as it introduces the fourth member of the team.

Madoka Kaguya has a talent for archery

This episode begins with the star of this episode, Madoka Kaguya, doing some archery. Kyudo - Japanese-style archery - at her family's Tudor-style estate.

Meet Madoka Kaguya. A girl who is talented in archery and playing piano. The top student of Mihoshi Academy and the President of the Student Council. Her father is a politician and her mother a world class concert pianist. What more does Madoka want in the world?

She happens to be quite skilled at it, having won many competitions.

We also meet her mother Mitsuka, an internationally celebrated concert pianist, and her father Fubuki, who is the chief of the Space Research Special Task Force with the Imperial Diet (Japanese Parliament). His current job has him investigating alien sightings…

Hikaru and Lala tell Elena about the whole PreCure thing

 Moving on, Elena walks to school with Hikaru and Lala. It doesn’t take long until a swarm of girls is crowding around our dark-skinned blonde. There also happens to be a second crowd, though at their centre is Madoka.

Like Yukari Kotozume and Akira Kenjo, they have fanbases that coexist peacefully within the same academic centre.

The yellow hair girl is called Sakurako Himenojou -Self Proclaimed Rival to Madoka..Look like another Ranze/Ranko character again!

Hikaru and Lala listen to Sakurako Himenojo giving exposition about Madoka

The girl we saw in the previous episode who caught sight of Lala and Fuwa before makes a return. She is Sakurako Himenojo, who is in Hikaru’s class. She also fancies herself as something of a rival for Madoka, and intends to surpass her. When Sakurako notices Lala, she can’t help but feel déjà-vu; she has seen her somewhere before (remember Lala hanging from the school eaves like a bat and spying on the class?). Hikaru and Lala deny it, though.

Looking at the way Madoka acts at home and in school, you can tell her life is a sheltered one. Always listening to her strict father's orders and setting an example to her peers, it is almost toxic to her.

Madoka asks Hikaru if she is hiding anything

Moving on, Madoka has noticed something odd going on with Hikaru. During the day, she approaches Hikaru and Elena and asks if Hikaru is hiding anything. It seems as if the girls will get away with keeping Fuwa a secret for now, but then Fuwa wants to say bye to Madoka when they are leaving.

Fuwa appears

So when she finally discovered the girls and Fuwa's connection, she was both intrigued and conflicted. Reason? Her father is actually part of the Government search for Extra-Terrestrial life forms and seeing how the town of Mihoshi has sightings of aliens for the last few weeks, Madoka was not sure how to react to Fuwa, Prunce, and Lala when she finally saw them.

That encounter with Fuwa plays on Madoka’s mind, even affecting her marksmanship in archery later on. Her father asks her if something has happened at school that has affected her. She keeps quiet about Fuwa.

I am actually interested that the government has finally stepped in since after 15 years, the Earth was invaded by beings from other dimensions and the Earth itself was nearly destroyed almost countless times if not by the action of the past Precure teams who saved the day.

Hikaru pleas for Madoka to keep Fuwa a secret

Later on, Madoka ends up discovering Lala’s starship wreck in the woods, where Hikaru, Lala and Elena have gathered together. Madoka threatens to tell her Dad about the aliens, but Hikaru begs her not to. Their conversation is soon interrupted, though.

Tenjou continues her search for the Star Colour Pens

Tenjou and a group of knotraiders show up. Hikaru immediately goes to confront them, with Lala and Elena following along.

They ask Madoka to take care of Fuwa whilst they are fighting. However, Tenjou has plenty of soldiers that some are able to attempt to take Fuwa from Madoka.

Of course fate has decided to give Madoka a chance to break out of her shell after waiting to protect Fuwa from the Knot Raiders. Madoka was granted the Star Pen and Pendant and became Cure Selene!

Madoka’s desire to protect Fuwa awakens a new power

With even Purunce distracting the knotraiders, Madoka makes a run for it. Her desire to protect Fuwa brings forth the transformation trinkets required for her to become a PreCure, though she is a little hesitant about using them at first.

DreamWorks logo reference!

 Mysterious moon! Shine in the night! Cure Selene

 

Madoka transforms into Cure Selene.

Tenjou has the advantage in terms of numbers still, but Selene has no problem dodging the henchpeople's attacks.

Hearing Mikako Komatsu singing while transforming was actually pretty cute since I am used to listen to her more mature voice in every show that I watch with her in it. Cure Selene has also several vibes which paid homages to her senior cures like Cure Moonlight's fighting style, Cure Beauty's attire (with a LOT of Cure Macaron on the side), and Cure Aqua's Sapphire Arrow. 

Done dodging the enemy attacks, Selene launches one of her own.

She is also so far the first to use her Star Pen as part of her Selene Arrow which made it more cool. (Hopefully the rest of the girls can have similar attacks in future episodes)

Selene Arrow

Cure Selene is able to defeat all the mooks sent after her, so Tenjou decides it is time for her to retreat.

After the fight, the girls return to their normal forms and the Space Research Special Task Force arrive. They are led by Madoka’s father, of course.

 The final scene with Madoka lying to Fuyuki about Lala, Fuwa, and Prunce was pretty tense and it showed how Madoka does fear her father but remains steadfast to her new friends. I will like to see how it play out in the future as Madoka's father will try to unravel their secret and how Madoka will be conflicted about it.

Madoka keeps the whole incident a secret

Madoka’s Dad tells her that there was an incident, and asks if she heard anything. Madoka says that she didn’t, so the Task Force leave her be and continue their search.

Elena and Madoka insist that Hikaru refers to them by their first names

Lala has no reservations about calling Elena and Madoka by their first names

That brings this episode to an end.

So that brings our full team together, at least for now. This is PreCure after all, there is very likely going to be another member joining the team later on down the line.
Each member of the team got a pretty great introductory episode, and Madoka Kaguya/Cure Selene is no exception to that.
I can definitely see there being clashes with her father in the future, but I imagine he’ll mellow out in the future.

Seems like Sakurako could end up being more of a rival for Madoka rather than a character like Maho Girls‘ Kana Katsuki – or maybe she could have elements of both things. Sakurako’s desire to be better than Madoka could lead to her witnessing all sorts of alien incidents, or something like that.

Madoka is the main star here though, obviously. Her debut as Cure Selene was great, and I very much look forward to seeing what Star ☆ Twinkle has in store for us now that the main cast has officially assembled.

Star ☆ Twinkle‘s introductory episodes have all been great. The story can now kick in proper next episode now that the team has been established. I’m confident in saying that we have a great cast of characters assembled here, so let’s see if the other aspects of this season can match up with that.

I am quite pleased with what we got to see out of Madoka’s character. She has a lot of pressure on her shoulder to uphold her father’s expectations of absolute perfection. She must be at the top of just about everything, and has been raised to follow his “guidance” by doing what she’s told. However Madoka found herself conflicted about how to deal with the situation at hand, of having witnessed and met the very aliens her father (who is the Chief of Space Research Special Task Force) investigating the reports of Aliens spotting, which by the way, is a good thing to see since I made a point about this last week. Hilariously he walked right past Lala with no signs of suspicion, but I suspect he probably thought she was cosplaying, ahahaha. Needless to say, I find it laughable how they haven’t found Lala’s spaceship yet. I mean, it’s not like it’s invisible. Not to mention,  The only reason why he didn’t pay any mind to Lala was that he probably thought she was cosplaying, ahahaha, but I digress.

One of the things I really liked about Madoka’s character was while she retains the common trope of as the president of the student council, she is popular and loved by all, I still enjoyed seeing her more conflicted sides where she wasn’t afraid to be tough to uphold her father’s expectations. She had suspicions of alien activity at school after having noticed Lala is not a student there, and there’s a strange fluffy creature hanging around Hikaru and the sorts. She actually went to confront them, and ended up catching them red-handed when Fuwa carelessly revealed herself (FUWA YOU HAD ONE JOB!). Luckily for them, Fuwa was able to successfully charm her with her puppy eyes into agreeing to keep her and Lala a secret. I am looking forward to seeing how Madoka to learning how to take ahold of her own life and decisions over the course of the series.

Madoka also made her debut as precure this week, and oh my goodness, Cure Selene hands down has the absolute best transformation of the group. Gosh,everything about her transformation sequence, from the way it was presented to the motions and poses they used, was breathtaking. There was a simplistic elegance to it, and it really went a long way! On top of that, I am huge fan of Cure Selene’s character design, making it my new favourite to date, oh and because I just love characters who can use arrows, pretty much seals the deal of my favourite attack, ahaha! It also helped that her voice was solid too. And speaking of which, I made myself listen to the transformation again, and with Elena’s voice in the mix, I can’t tell if they re-recorded Hikaru’s part (we will have to wait until we see her transform on her own again to be sure) or her voice was so damn good, that she actually managed to salvage what was a hot mess. And now with Madoka’s voice, it should be solid all round. That being said, while it’s now bearable to listen to, I still disagree with the idea of making them sing during their transformation, and I don’t think that will change in the foreseen future.

Next week, they will be introducing a jet black pen that will play a big part in targeting Humans. Considering the duo (I forget their name) have already been established for developing stuff for the Knotraiders, either they figured out how to corrupt the pens (making it black) or they managed to make their own to serve their specific purpose. Regardless, this means the girls are going to need to purify it, bringing back the formula of the usual. It’s not a bad thing though. In fact, I would be happy to have both formula play a role in this, besides, I think most of us already knew it was bound to come back at some point or another, and I think next week is actually the perfect time to do so... even more when The Heartless trope returns from the villains of the week!!

MY OWN HUMBLE OPINION
Sakurako: Self-proclaimed rival to Madoka. Miss Exposition. And the Varys on Campus for this season.
The Kaguyas and their expectations: Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown. I cannot but reiterate how strongly I relate to Ace characters with expectations issues myself.
For all that Mrs. Mitsuka Kaguya is a renowned concert pianist, she is absent-minded and commits malapropisms. So probably her elders married her off to Fuyuki for power, against her will...
Anyway, Fuyuki is the cornerstone of the Kaguya household - a stern stone-hearted patriarch who believes in leading with an iron fist. Add the fact that this curmudgeon runs the government division in charge of paranormal activity (in a Hogwarts AU, he would be the Minister of Magic)... It is crystal clear that he wants his girl Madoka to follow in his footsteps. But I see her more as taking after her mum, and not only when it comes to appearance ... (explain that)
Cure Selene, or Madoka, as Artemis? Moon. Bow made from the crescent for archery. Purity. An all-female entourage. Nuff said. (PS. Is she an only child, as further foil to Elena and to cement those expectations issues, or does she have a dashing, bisexual twin brother who takes more after his mum and is following her footsteps in classical music? Nous verrons!)

Kyuudo archery - but a European-style Tudor estate with a French Maid Corps - more Euro or Asian?
So it seems that all that is needed to become a Pretty Cure in this continuity is to swear an oath to protect Fuwa...


IN NEXT EPISODE (6):

With all four Cures assembled (For now!), we can finally get the plot going and it looked like Ayewan (That's her correct name in Latin letters; stop saying Eyeone) has created a "Dark Pen" to create the monster of the week with one Futaro as her first victim! So we finally return to THE HEARTLESS... <3 But which MO will Ayewan employ? And what is the real name of her furry neko cupbearer/butler? Until then, see you in the next post!