Free! Theoretical Dolphin Kick!

Episode 3

The swimming club is back together and it seems that Rin is going to join his schools swim team too.

Everything seems to be going in the right direction!

***SPOILERS***

Haru finally got a cold, he seems to think someone is talking about him but Mako points out that it was probably from swimming in the outdoor pool last episode.

They can't swim relays with three people so the search is on for another member.

So the guy who joined the track team, Ryugazaki, is the next (again) in line for Nagisa's bothering but he figures out what he wants before he's said it and rejects him again getting off the train a stop early to run to school for the last bit.

They have the bright idea to join a gym to swim year round but they won't get the funding unless they actually start winning things. This kind of motivates Haru, year round swimming and they only need one more member. He is a little hopeless though, he kind of threatens people into it.

Rei, this is now apparently why it is fate that Ryugazaki should join their team. He has a girly name. Nagisa brings the rest of the group to annoy him, why would this guy ever join a group full of very annoying Nagisa... Actually I would, he's cute.

I love Rei! Can we keep him and get rid of Haru? Haru who seems to be drawing Rei?!

Rei is told that he's spending too much time going through calculations in his head and he won't improve if he doesn't stop it. Meanwhile Kou has asked the captain of Rin's swim club if they can use their pool and he said yes which doesn't seem to make Rin happy.

Nagisa won't give up he even decides to run to school with Rei. Turns out that Nagisa basically compliments him to death. Rei even makes Haru seem like a normal person.

Poor Rei doesn't seem to have got his dive properly sorted out. He also can't actually swim.

And after seeing Haru swim he decides he wants to swim like him.

Safe to say the moment they keep away from Haru other then to have him be a strong and silent type we are all good. I love Rei and Nagisa together they are so funny.

The episodes are getting better, nothing in this one bored me, in fact there were some really genuinely funny moments in there as well. If you haven't guessed I also have a favorite character now.

Now that we are getting away from the human drama and into some fun with the swimming and club itself it has actually freed up the atmosphere of the show and brought it back on itself. When I said last review it was a little too much Home and Away for me I meant bright and fake. I don't really like Australian soaps they always have some smug fakeness to them that the British soaps don't have. The British soaps have many other problems but not that one. That was how Free! felt, other shows might be just as bad in their way but the bright fakeness of it all annoyed me.

Now we are getting to know characters and actually enjoy spending time with those characters I'm happy.

Nagisa was really funny and we have a challenge! A member of the swim team that can't actually swim. Good fun.

There is something about this anime that will probably keep me watching, but at the same time there is something about it that bores me from time to time. It really isn't my cup of tea but then again some of the characters are exactly the type of character I usually love.

It is a bit of a mixed bag.

As I said above this episode was helped by getting away from focusing on the characters and opening it to be focused on the club in general. Haru on his own is still pretty boring but looking at him only when he's doing something and with the others dragging him around he isn't so bad, in fact his recruiting tactic had me laughing my head off.

Episode 3 really has been the best of the bunch so far and addressed a lot of the cons I've had so far about other episodes.