After Our Minto/Zakuro Break, It Seems The Boy Shipping Pattern To The Episodes Has Continued; Episode

After our Minto/Zakuro break, it seems the boy shipping pattern to the episodes has continued; episode 7 was Aoyama focused, and it looks like the next one will switch to Ryou. “Romance on the High Seas!” We’re getting the cruise chapter! 🤩 Now the preview image at the end of episode 7 showed Retasu and Ryou, which is in reference to these scenes in the manga:

This is really all we get of this ship in the manga, but the old anime expanded it further, and I have a feeling TMMN will do the same. However, I would like to remind everyone this is not the only ship floating out in the ocean in this chapter, because this also happens:

Oh yeah! 😍 Romance on the high seas indeed, that’s the cruise I’ll be sailing on, Ichiryou all the way!!!! I hope they lay on the attraction real thick, because like I’ve said before, I want to be devastated when this titanic goes down, stringed quartette and all (I’m just a masochist that way 😆) !

I’m also really looking forward to seeing the girls in their formal attire:

Almost as excited as seeing Ryou in his (almost)! 😍

Still my favorite character

The episode we’ve all been waiting for (or at least I have 😁), one complete with an armada of ships (unless you’re team Kishigo, sorry guys, this episode is not for you 😅)! I thought it’d be fun to count off just how many ships we saw during this voyage. These are in order of appearance, and not a ranking order (because we all know who I’d put at the top 😆). Climb aboard the love boat and set sail with me, and get ready for a ton of boat jokes, because why yacht?

1. Leading this fleet of ships, we have the cannon ship: Ichigo and Aoyama.

They kind of had to at least show these two together at some point in this episode since they are the main couple, but for an episode called “Romance on the high sea” they got very little screen time together. 😅

I find it kind of funny that Ichigo doesn’t mention that two of her coworkers she’s going on this cruise with are guys, and one of them she’s seen shirtless, and then made him a snack after seeing him shirtless. 👀 But I guess it’s not technically lying if you’re just omitting information, right? 😆 That seems to be Ichigo’s philosophy in this relationship anyway.

Aoyama completely fails at asking Ichigo out; hey, maybe sometime, at some point, we can maybe, sort of, go to the ocean together, maybe. Dude, when you ask a girl a out, you need to have an exact day and time picked out, she has a very busy schedule, and she needs to know an exact time to pencil you in for (that’s why you haven’t been on a date since episode 3!). Get it together boy! We’re jumping overboard here.

2. Second in this flotilla, a non cannon couple in the original, but I’m starting to think it might be in this one: Mint and Zakuro.

I mean, it’s pretty hard to argue with giant letters that say, “I love Zakuro.” Now, I do believe that it is possible to love and admire someone without being “in love,” or wanting a romantic relationship with that someone, and I think in the original series, that was the case between Minto and Zakuro, but in this series, I’m not so sure. I’m still holding out for my own personal head cannon ship of Zakuro and Seiji 😆 I think if Mint was going to lose out to someone, she would be ok if it was her brother, because then she could really call Zakuro “Onesama.” And look!

My new boy is in the next episode! There’s hope for my ghost ship! 😁

3. The third ship in the convoy: Lettuce and Ryou. I feel like this ship is really pushed by all the Ichiyama shippers because it takes care of the Ryou problem; Ryou puts a kink in the Ichigo and Aoyama ship (because Ichiryou is just so much more natural and they’re freaking adorable together!), so they have to put Ryou somewhere, why not with Lettuce? She likes him! But does he like her? Well, he doesn’t not like her, I’ll give you that. He’s very nice to her, probably more to her than anyone else, but I think that’s because he knows she’s sensitive, and she wouldn’t be able to handle a joke like the others would. He knows she lacks confidence, and so he does what any good friend would do, and he tries to help build her up.

My first thought when I saw this: Ryou, you can’t give alcohol to a minor! Second thought: where’d you get Felix felicis?

A placebo? Clever boy 😏 Way to make that girl fall in love with you. Back to the question of does Ryou like Lettuce the way Lettuce likes Ryou...

The boy is oblivious! 🙄

4. Number four in this cruise line, and my personal favorite: Ichigo and Ryou! I was floating blissfully when these two were on screen together. I love the background jokes these two make with each other, I love how they both just end up staring at each other from across the hall, I love how gently Ryou takes her hand (he’s so timid 😭), I love how sweetly he encourages her (it’s not just Lettuce he speaks nicely to, guys!),

I love how naturally Ichigo just leans into him, I love everything about this scene, even the gut wrenching feeling I got when Ichigo hurt his feelings! 😭 He was so sad!

Ichigo, if you have to tell yourself you only have eyes for Aoyama, you don’t only have eyes for him 😆 Also, you’ve been on like two dates with him, it’s not like you’re married. You might just find you like Ryou more. 😏 Prediction for the next episode: Ichigo is now avoiding Aoyama because she feels guilty about dancing with Ryou, so the other girls set up a date for her. And if we’re really lucky, we might get to see Aoyama and Ryou meet for the first time 😈 I hope it’s as good as the manga meeting! Give me more fuel for my fantasy cruise!!!!!!

5. This is my second favorite ship from this episode: Pudding and Tarto (or should we call him “Tar Tar?”)

What can I say? They’re just adorable kids being adorable together! 😍 I love how soon we’re getting they’re introduction, because it means we’ll get more time develop their relationship. They definitely have the most hope of becoming the next full fledged cannon couple!

6. Brining up the rear of our armada: Lettuce and Pai. Ok, there’s not much to this ship, but I wanted to give the LettucePie shippers some hope anyway. Here we have Pai looking at Lettuce in a way that he hasn’t looked at anything else in the two episodes he’s been in so far.

A glimmer on the horizon! You’re welcome.

Did anyone else think of the scenes in Titanic where Jack is standing by the clock when Ryou was also staring at the clock? 😅 Just me?

🥰

I attempted to make my own vision a reality. 😅 I was a bit limited on what I could do on an iPad; I couldn’t separate the original background song from the dialogue, so it was tricky to pick the right volume so you couldn’t hear background music on top of the song I inserted. It’s definitely not perfect, and if anyone else wants to attempt to make it better, I would love that (send it my way)! I’ve included a link to the song I used, because I think it’s beautiful, and it was worth the buck.

https://music.apple.com/us/album/my-heart-will-go-on-from-titanic-piano-version/1522248794?i=1522248795