That was good... you fail

Leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave

Almost didn't recognize the guy Bunko's teacher punched.

Surprise one gets older and looses a lot of weight.

and half his teeth after the punch

True XD

Now, I need to see Utaroku cross dress. Just to make sure.

he was hot

Utaroku looking like a woman is just a trick your mind is playing on you, he doesn't actually look like that.

Utaroku: "The end... (Dead)"
RIP Utaroku. But you can't die before grading Mameda's test.
The plot thicken. Will Mameda pass the final test? Let's tune in for My Master Has No Tail next week!

Hearing Utaroku perform made me want to watch Showa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu again <3

Slight error with the translation regarding the crows. It's not that she wishes to kill 3000 crows, but that she would see all crows within the 3000 worlds dead. Pretty sure the 3000 worlds thing is a bit of Buddhist rhetoric although I'm not sure if it refers to a belief in a literal 3 thousand worlds or if it's just an approximation thing similar to "yaoyorozu no kami" not referring to a specific number of kami but just indicating that there's a lot.

Nice episode

Big props to Utaroku from saving Mameda from that ghastly group and that asshole with deep pockets! One episode left...

guy made a hot girl

that old fart is pushing his luck.. am pretty sure Bunko would knock his remaining teeth out in the next episode.

Utaroku is probably the closest example to an actual master Rakugoka in this show. The others are good at mimicking others, but he straight up transforms into the person he's acting as. Not only that, be he's a textbook example of what a master of his craft is like. Suffering and potentially destroying his body to enhance his mind.
It reminds me of one of the most memorable rakugo performances I ever did see, the Shinigami by Kyotaro Yanagiya. Whenever he pulled out his little cane, the transformation into a God of Death really made the performance feel haunted. Brilliant work.

Utaroku is definitely the most interesting out of all the Heavenly Kings. "You don't have to be interesting" - this line may sound like a contradiction, but it is not actually! People can be funny without being interesting at all and two of the most well known manners are the following: 1. using your vibrant energy to overwhelm the atmosphere and make things jolly without saying anything smart or meaningful; 2. faking interest by using content that everyone knows but say it the way OTHER PEOPLE say it - what Utaroku is doing being a 'fake' person (what I call it) or an actor. This is the trick also utilised in businesses today to make customers happy and make them partners.

Did I miss an episode, or did they really zoom pass the evaluation of the the pink-haired rakugoka?

You must have missed the latter part of episode 10, specifically...

Thank you. That helped a lot.

I believe the old dude is about to lose more teeth soon...