The following contains spoilers for SAKAMOTO DAYS Episode 7, “Jurassic Dude”, available on Netflix.
Summary
- Lu and Shin argue over hierarchy at the shop, highlighting their similarities and sibling-like relationship.
- A ridiculous case of mistaken identity leads Lu to be kidnapped by a group looking for Shin.
- Shin’s past at “The Lab” is revealed, introducing dangerous new characters and a hostage situation.
In the seventh episode of SAKAMOTO DAYS, we finally get to learn more about the deuteragonist, Shin, who has only been defined as a former colleague (and lifelong fan) of Taro Sakamoto so far. A very silly case of mistaken identity leads to Lu being kidnapped by a mysterious group looking for Shin.
The episode was more of a precursor for events to come, but had some high moments that included the appearances of several characters, including Heisuke Mashimo, and the members of The Order, who have now begun to move.
RELATED
Sakamoto Days Reveals More Cast Members Ahead of Episode 7
Two more voice actors have been announced for the roles of Kashima and Natsuki Seba, who are set to appear in Episode 7.
Lu and Shin Get Into an Argument
Hitting Where It Hurts
The Sakamotos are off at Hana’s school for a Parents’ Visitation Day, so Shin and Lu are left to take care of the shop in their absence. Lu’s tendency to wear Shin’s apron to do the dirtier tasks around the shop irritates him, and an argument ensues. When Shin tries to establish that he’s next in the store/family hierarchy when the Sakamotos are away, he hears Lu’s thoughts and challenges her to say what’s on her mind, since he can already hear it.
Lu describes Shin’s constant listening to others’ thoughts as being in the purview of perverts, and that being around him knowing his ability makes it difficult for her to feel at ease. Shin’s demeanor changes, and he leaves, walking right past Mashimo, who comes in to ask for more free pork buns.
The Most Ridiculous Case of Mistaken Identity
Lu Comes Face to Face With Shin’s Past
While Shin is gone, a group of six unidentified men wearing full hazmat suits (or spacesuits) walk in looking for him. Since Lu is wearing Shin’s apron, the hazmat crew’s intellectually destitute, negative-IQ leader, Tanaka, decides that Lu must be Shin, because, “see it says so right there” on the tag. Despite his colleagues trying to alert him that they had taken the wrong person; since they were provided with a clear photograph of their target, this guy was adamant that the apron reconciles the red-haired Chinese woman in front of him with the blonde-haired teenage boy they were looking for. There’s a limit to foolishness, but this guy is a proper genius who can, by some amazing miracle, still recognize people when they “change the colour of their hair”. They toss Lu into their Toyota Quantum and take her to away.
While Tanaka muses about finding the lab’s only successful experiment eleven years after he ran away, the driver, Natsuki Seba, wonders if they might have snatched the wrong person. Of course, Tanaka doesn’t want to hear it. When he says some of the same things Lu said to Shin during their argument, she drop-kicks him in a shame-fueled fit of vicarious rage. It is only after being drop-kicked does Tanaka finally understands that he has the wrong person, making for a great instance of someone having sense literally knocked into them. When Shin returns to the shop ready to apologize, he finds the store trashed and Lu nowhere to be found, making him regret their argument like she was before those dudes from “The Lab” got her. Lucky for him, Sakamoto reveals that the store name tags are GPS tags.
Road Rash
Don’t We All Love a Good Chase?
By now, viewers of SAKAMOTO DAYS understand that the series takes place in a world where the idea of a teenage psychic who can really hear the thoughts of those around him is the least crazy thing you can encounter, but sometimes it can take you out of the moment when you’re forced to just avoid asking probing questions about how some of the stuff is happening. Don’t worry about how Sakamoto and Shin’s motorbike came falling out of the Stratosphere, there’s a totally lit chase scene coming, and if you happened to enjoy playing a certain 1990s videogame series by EA about violent illegal motorcycle street races, you forget about how and why to enjoy one rather unexpected Easter egg when Sakamoto kicks at the hazmat guys, now on their own bikes.
Anyway, at this point, both Shin and Lu feel apologetic about their respective parts in the argument, which is one of several moments in the episode where we’re being shown just how similar the two of them actually are. In that sense, Lu and Shin feel like bickering siblings, but as much as they argue, they look out for each other. When Sakamoto and Shin are done with the small fries, the driver of the Quantum decides it’s his time to shine, removing his hazmat to reveal a young man with an eerily calm personality named Seba, dressed in all black – a suit capable of invisibility. Shin’s encounter with Seba is very short as he’s knocked off the roof of the moving vehicle onto another, and the invisible man quickly deals with the threat of Sakamoto by destroying his motorbike.
About Shin’s Past
The Lab Has Been Taken Over By (Dangerous) Weirdos
Shin tells Sakamoto about his childhood, being raised by “weirdo” scientists ar a place he calls “The Lab”, but those people weren’t dangerous or violent like Lu’s kidnappers. The place where Shin was raised is a secret area of the Okutabi Science Museum, a place filled with fossils, dinosaur enthusiasts, and very persuasive staff, who convince Sakamoto and Shin to put on dinosaur-themed headgear and take cute photos together. Meanwhile, a terrifying man named Kashima, decorated with stitches all over his hands and face, a face he usually keeps hidden under a reindeer head mask for some reason meets up with Seba and Tanaka to retrieve “Shin”.
Tanaka tries to pass Lu off as Shin, but Seba throws him under the bus when he tells Kashima that she’s definitely not who they were sent to retrieve. Since The Lab is under new management, the entry password has changed, so Shin accidentally activates a sophisticated security system involving guns popping out of the mouths of the bear exhibit, and the Tyrannosaurus Rex skeleton coming alive to attack them, hence the episode title. Initially, Sakamoto wanted to take it home relatively unscathed to show Hana, but unfortunately it was too dangerous to hold back against, so now we can add beating a dinosaur (dinosaur’s corpse?) with his bare hands to the list of Sakamoto’s achievements, but that was only because the initial plan involving his trusty electric gun failed and T. rex ended up wrecking it.
Hostage Situation
Why The Lab Needs Shin
Sakamoto and Shin arrive just in time to protect a scientist from being executed, potentially. The scientists who raised Shin are being treated by Kashima’s assassin group, who have forced them to perform top secret research. They’ve kept them in captivity for over a year, with the strange research being led by the psychotic mad scientist, Mad Horiguchi, while Asakura, the man who was, for all intents and purposes, Shin’s father; the actual director of the Lab, is kept locked up in the facility’s holding cells, where Tanaka and Lu meet him. There’s no time for Shin to catch up with his former family as they immediately push them into nearby lockers to hide from Horiguchi, who is twisted and flippant as he performs acts of cruelty. It is also made very clear that Horiguchi is connected to “Slur”.
Shin leaves his hiding spot to intervene, briefly thinking about his childhood in the Lab. Despite being a weird old guy, Horiguchi is really fast, and injects Shin with a strange drug that reverses his speech, but doesn’t really impede Sakamoto’s understanding. Episode 7 was strange, as Shin’s backstory was quite interesting to learn about, and seeing the growing connection between him and Lu amidst some of the more high-octane stuff that went on was a definite positive, and it ends in just the right way as Shishiba and Osaragi from The Order arrive at the location, setting up excitingly for the next episode.
SAKAMOTO DAYS is available on Netflix.
