anime episode summaries

Yawara bids Jody farewell. They promise each other to fight in a match someday. Unfortunately for Yawara, she is still pretty unknown and has no previous records so fighting in a huge international match is still a long way. Jigoro arranges for Yawara to appear in several tournaments so that she can make a name for herself. In order to fulfill her promise to Jody, Yawara agrees. The entrance examinations for Mitsuba College (?) are coming up pretty soon, too, so Yawara spends the whole night studying and then the rest of the day doing judo. Although fatigued, Yawara manages to win her first few tournaments. Jigoro challenges Sayaka, too, to meet his granddaughter in a match. Matsuda is worried about Yawara health because she hasn’t been sleeping and taking care of herself well.

Yawara and Jody start their match. Jigoro sees the reporters snooping around and forces them to become the match’s officials (Matsuda-san is the timer and Kamoda-san is the linesman). Jody and Yawara are impressed with each other’s strength. Neither one has met an opponent that can match her in skill until now. Elsewhere, Sayaka challenges the Korean champion to a match but it all ends in a tie. Back at the Inokuma dojo, Jody injures her arm and so her match with Yawara ends in a draw, too. Yawara promises Jody that they’ll continue their match in a competition some other time once Jody’s arm heals. That evening, the reporters get treated to dinner in exchange for not writing the story on Jody’s and Yawara’s match. Jody teases Yawara about Matsuda-san being her boyfriend.

Yawara and the Blue-eyed House Guest

Yawara and Jody.Jody Rockwell (last year’s judo world champion) came all the way from Canada to see our Yawara. She challenges Yawara to a match but Yawara refuses. The judo team blocks Jody’s way (they were no match for Jody though) so that Yawara can escape. When Yawara gets home, her grandfather tells her he enrolled her in Saikai College (the athletic school). As usual, Yawara gets upset because she wants to go to Mitsuba Women’s College (a home economics school).

Jody Rockwell visits Yawara’s house. Since Yawara doesn’t want to fight Jody, Jigoro (the grandfather) challenges Jody instead, saying he wants to see her strength before he let his granddaughter fight her. As the match commences, Jody moves forward to attack grandpa but when she feels his aura, she then breaks down, cries, and gives up before anything even happened. Grandpa decides to take her in since she was able to ascertain his strength even before they fought and that makes her a suitable sparring partner for Yawara. Yawara worries because Jody eats a lot though. The next morning, Jody and Yawara train together. Yawara worries because she should be studying for Mitsuba’s entrance exam instead of practicing judo. Jody tells her she’s not going home to Canada until she fights Yawara.

Sayaka and Kazamatsuri-san are attending a ball in Belgium. Sayaka says the only reason she came to Belgium was to challenge Belgium’s own judo champion, Belkens. However, since Belkens is out of town, Sayaka settles for Stelkes who is just as strong as Belkens. Sayaka easily throws Stelkes though.

At school, Jody asks Yawara to train with her even when she’s studying. Yawara finally has enough and tells Jody off. Yawara regrets her decision and Jigoro tells her that Jody even stayed up all night just to study Japanese so that she can speak with Yawara. Yawara feels guilty and surprised that although Jody spent the whole night studying, she was able to do morning practices. Yawara apologizes to Jody and agrees to a match (everything was all planned by Jigoro though).