This is mostly a note for myself to remember for the future, but these are the episodes I've enjoyed the most so far from this portion of the series:
Episode 260- The family finds a snail in their vegetable delivery, Korosuke finds it adorable and keeps it as a pet... He also spends half of the episode being trapped inside a vacuum cleaner and nearly dies of starvation, but the first half was very cute to watch. They also have this one throwaway joke I'd talked about that made me laugh a bit.
Episode 261- Buta-gorilla brags about having a dramatic dream where he was a samurai and defeated Korosuke, who was a villain, in battle. Korosuke is so bothered by this that he tries to force himself to dream something cool when he goes to sleep, to no avail. Kiteretsu takes pity on him and creates a device that allows the user to observe and alter the dreams of other people... it becomes a comedic plot about the other character's strange dreams and how Kiteretsu and Korosuke play around with them, very fun episode.
Episode 264- The strange american kid episode I had talked about before.
Episode 267- This episode was primarily about a historical statue that looked shockingly like Buta-gorilla, but it has a very cute scene of Kiteretsu, Korosuke, and their parents hiking at the beginning of the episode that I really enjoy. It's adorable and I genuinely love the family dynamic the four of them have together.
Episode 270- Korosuke finds out that Benzo is actually completely bald and is just wearing a wig, he is trying so extremely hard to be a good kid and not blab about other people's secrets, but it torments him so much to know. Shenanigans ensue, absolutely ridiculous plot.
Episode 272- Due to a mix-up with airport luggage, the kids now have a suitcase full of cash and a loaded gun. It ends up being all fake money and a fake gun, but this part happens unexpectedly and it did make me laugh...
Episode 273- Buta-gorilla and Korosuke get stuck in a well, and then proceed to get stuck wandering around in the wilderness. The comedy of this episode is really good and very funny, though there was a part where Korosuke and Kiteretsu's mom was tearing up with genuine worry over Korosuke's whereabouts, and it was a bit heartbreaking to watch. Also, it's where this cute bit was from.
Episode 275- Buta-gorilla digs up a watermelon-colored bowling ball from his yard, eventually learning it belonged to his dad who had a horrible addition to bowling. There were numerous small throwaway bits that made me laugh, one of them was in the beginning when Buta-gorilla thinks the bowling ball is actually a bomb.
Episode 277- One of my favorite episodes. It is primarily about Buta-gorilla being put in charge of the class while the teacher is away, going crazy with power in a very comedic way. However, the B-plot is about Korosuke trying to join Kiteretsu on a school field trip, but it turns out the trip was for the next grade up and he ends up totally lost. That whole plotline is pretty simple, as it is another one about him getting into a fight with Kiteretsu and feeling abandoned, but it is very heartwarming and gets to me... it is also where this scene comes from.
Episode 278- The kids go to a festival and find a vendor there selling masks that look exactly like Korosuke. Of course this leads to a lot of teasing, but also a mystery as to where the masks had even come from. It ends up being rather heartwarming and does some interesting things regarding how Korosuke's blueprints in the encyclopedia, and it is also littered with numerous funny moments. Korosuke's antics about being excited for the festival in the beginning were funny, and Benzo's shenanigans here made me laugh.
I haven't watched past episode 278 just yet, and admittedly I do need to go back and watch some of the earlier episodes once again to recall them better. I do have a good handful of other episodes I like outside of these (episodes 123 and 293 especially, and also the very first episode) but this was definitely the portion of the series that made me think, "they really got into a groove with the writing here, huh?" Like I'd said sometime before, it's so interesting to me how the show gets such a good grip on itself so late into the series... usually, you see the opposite happen.
