It appears that the Yashiro here in Adachi and Shimamura is a different character from the one in Ground Control to Psychoelectric Girl. In fact, this Yashiro claims that she’s here on Planet Earth to look for her compatriot whom we can presume is her counterpart from Ground Control. I guess these two shows exist in the same universe? Curiously, this Yashiro doesn’t reveal her face, explaining that it’s not ready yet (whatever that means). I only bring this up because it stands out to me as weird. The Yashiro in Ground Control showed her face plenty of times so I don’t get the mystique here, even if we’re technically dealing with a whole new character.
None of this really explains what Yashiro is doing here. Even if I get the nod to Ground Control, what purpose does this character serve in the actual narrative? Right now, it feels like she could be swapped out for someone else or cut out entirely and not much would be lost as a result. If anything, Yashiro’s presence is more distracting as you have this seemingly grounded romance series and then all of sudden, there’s this (possibly) alien running around.
At the very least, Yashiro’s scenes aren’t half-bad. She’s such a strange addition that she will elicit a chuckle, albeit for either the right or wrong reasons. And while anyone else could do her contributions to the plot, she nevertheless contributes. There’s a great metaphor during the fishing scene where Yashiro talks about how you cast your line, wait patiently for the desired result, and restart if it doesn’t happen. That surprisingly becomes relevant as you watch Adachi and Shimamura’s relationship. Later, Yashiro running into the pair further articulates Adachi’s desire to be with Shimamura and only Shimamura.
For the most part, this episode is about Adachi’s feelings toward Shimamura and her confusion over them. The signs are growing more telltale as the episode progresses. You have Adachi wanting to rest on Shimamura’s lap, holding her hand, getting flustered whenever she looks closely at her friend, and fantasizing about the two of them kissing. It’s not yuri, I don’t know what is. Throughout all this, Adachi gets confused about these feelings and even tries to deny them as romantic. While Adachi obviously needs to be honest with herself, I buy her grappling with her sexuality. That’s common for teenagers to go through. Plus, there is something amusing how Adachi insists to herself that she’s not a lesbian and yet her commenting on how pretty Shimamura is, how she’d totally kiss her if the opportunity arises, and how she wants to feel closer to her is all evidence to the contrary. Akari Kitou also does a great job voicing Adachi’s confusion, raising her pitch or speeding up her delivery to sell how flustered or evasive the character is over her sexuality.
Would Shimamura reciprocate Adachi’s feelings? I imagine she would (or else, we wouldn’t have a show…) though it is harder to tell if she currently feels just as attracted to Adachi as Adachi is to her. That the role of narrator shifts over to Adachi at some point even feels like a deliberate move to make Shimamura more ambiguous. Clearly, she enjoys being with her and gets dispirited when they aren’t able to hang out but that’s admittedly not blatantly romantic. Like, I have to wonder. When Shimamura teases Adachi over something, is she flirting with her friend? When she lets Adachi to hold her hand or sit on her lap or between her legs, does she really not realize how intimate that is? It all could very well be unintentional but part of me does think that Shimamura is doing this on purpose. Going back to the fishing metaphor, this could be her casting her line and waiting for the desired outcome. And she’ll keep casting on until that outcome finally happens.
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