Gobbledygook Cooking
Summary
Bon appetit! Let's hope some thieves don't ruin this dinner...
Taro: Sonoshi is a supervisor who was sent to keep an eye on Sonoi's group.
And he turned out to be a real piece of work, too.
And he turned out to be a real piece of work, too.
Using the bounty for turning in Tsubasa, Tsuyoshi invites Tsubasa and the other Donbrothers for a meal at a fine dining restaurant. While Tsubasa initially refuses, he relents upon seeing that Tsuyoshi has seemingly changed for the worse after losing "Miho".
During the meal, the gang gets into a huge argument over their issues, which results in the head chef, Takamura, threatening to kick them out. Tsubasa criticizes Takamura's cooking, which catches the attention of Noriko Iida, a famous gourmet critic incidentally dining at the same restaurant as them. At Noriko's suggestion, the two decide to have a cook-off.
Tropes
- Breather Episode: After the last few episodes, this is mostly comedy centered except for the ending shot.
- Brick Joke: During the cooking duel Haruka compares the omelets Tsubasa and Takamura made to being in a field of flowers. At the end of the episode Noriko does the same thing, but this time with the dishes the two made from the fruit inside Denshi-Ki's pocket dimension.
- Cloudcuckoolander's Minder: Tsubasa sets himself as this for Tsuyoshi after observing his friend interact with his new "Miho".
- Cooking Duel: Tsubasa and Takamura engages in this verbally, then physically with Noriko's suggestion. Neither of their dishes were able to satisfy her desire and both got sucked into Denshi-Ki's dimension as a result.
- Creator Thumbprint: Aside from Inoue having a Cooking Duel in almost in every show he's written for, there's also Tsubasa and Takamura falling into a river after getting swallowed up by Denshi-Ki.
- Dissension Remorse: Subverted. Tsuyoshi attempts to smooth things out with Tsubasa by treating him and the Donbrothers to an extravagant meal with the bounty money. Meanwhile, Tsubasa (after learning of Tsuyoshi using a doll as a coping mechanism) pretends to admit defeat on the "Miho" matter in the hopes of keeping the addled man at-ease. It instead causes the salaryman's Yandere side to take over and starts a new feud. Worse yet, Tsuyoshi overestimates the cost of the food and has to pay the debt back with menial labor for his trouble.
- Dramatic Irony: Once again, Tsubasa hangs out with the rest of the Donbrothers as if he's part of the gang, with everyone none the wiser over him being the actual Inu Brother and vice versa. And then there is this amusing exchange between Taro and Tsubasa.Taro: I ran into a Jūto that looked like you. What happened?
Tsubasa: It's a Long Story. Though, why do you know about the Jūto?
Taro: That's another long story. - Internal Reveal: Tsubasa learns about Tsuyoshi's new "Miho", something that deeply worries him.
- It's a Long Story: Tsubasa and Taro aren't in the mood to discuss their recent encounters with Juto, both dismissing the topic with this line.
- Locked Out of the Loop: Exaggerated. Story-relevant topics come up throughout the episode, but nobody makes it a priority to discuss them.
- Tsubasa and Tsuyoshi openly argue about the Miho situation in front of the rest of the team at the restaurant, but the others are too busy arguing over pettier things to hear them.
- At Tsubasa's apartment, Taro outright states that he's met Tsubasa's Juto copy, but the latter doesn't want to talk about it. Taro's equally tight-lipped on how he knows what Juto are.
- Mêlée à Trois: Shinichi and Tsuyoshi get into a tiff over the eggs to be used for the cooking duel, and Sonoi steps in, wanting to use the eggs for his own purposes.
- Pet the Dog: The reason Sonoi wanted the high quality eggs Shinichi and Tsuyoshi were fighting over was so he could give them to the oden cart owner and have him cook them.
- Reverse Psychology: Attempted by Tsubasa to calm Tsuyoshi down when the Miho dispute comes up again, him pretending to admit defeat on the matter. Tsuyoshi instead takes it as a challenge and bickering ensues. Shame none of the others could hear what they had to say.
- Save the Villain: Downplayed. Jiro gets Don Murasame out of the way of GolDon Momotaro's finisher, presumably due to their burgeoning bond.
- "Shaggy Dog" Story:
- The three-way fight between Shinichi, Tsuyoshi, and Sonoi is rendered moot when they break the eggs that were sold. The farmer takes pity on them and gives them packs he originally planned to take home.
- The cooking duel between Tsubasa and Takamura ends with Noriko turning into Denshi-Ki and taking the two into its dimension.
- Status Quo Is God:
- Tsubasa becomes The Most Wanted once again, this time due to being framed for the actions his Jūto self had done. This was despite the fact that the anti-Jūto task force had just let him go in full knowledge that he somehow managed to recover.
- The Juto come up frequently in conversation throughout the episode, but people remain too distant or too distracted to meaningfully discuss them; leaving each other in the dark.
- Villain Forgot to Level Grind: Don Murasame spent the last few episodes on the sidelines after his duel with Don Torabolt, which means he missed out on Taro gaining the Omikoshi Phoenix. While Black Onitaijin Murasame is still able to fight Toradora Onitaijin on an even footing, he gets overwhelmed by GolDon Momotaro and Toradora Onitaijin Kiwami, forcing him to retreat.
- Wham Shot: As Tsuyoshi starts talking with the Miho doll again, the real one, or rather the Crane Jūto, returns home to his shock.
- Work Off the Debt: To Tsuyoshi's dismay, the reward money he got for turning in Tsubasa to the police wasn't enough to cover for the meal they ate, resulting in him temporarily working for the restaurant to cover the bill, and why he was sent to fetch the high-quality eggs for Chef Takamura.
