Remember a couple of episodes back when Ms. Yukimura (Tamlyn Tomita) was talking to the Nogitsune via possessed Stiles (Dylan O’Brien) all nonchalantly and about its poor choice of a host body? Turns out that Kira’s (Arden Cho) mom knows all too well about the demon, and as we learned in the Teen Wolf episode, “The Fox and the Wolf,” the whole reason for the Nogitsune’s existence is all because of her (Read: It’s all Mrs. Yukimura’s fault).
Mrs. Yukimura gives Kira and Scott (Tyler Posey) a history lesson about the origin of the Nogitsune, which takes us us all the way back to 1943 at a Japanese American internment camp. Kira’s mother, Noshiko, who is a dead ringer for Kira (Arden Cho also played young Noshiko), falls in love with a handsome soldier, Corporal Rhys (Skyler Maxon). Their romance gets sidetracked, however, when a whole bunch of them start to fall ill and the camp isn’t able to provide the proper medication (the doctor had been selling the drugs on the black market).
When a young boy dies due to the pneumonia, the lot start to riot and threaten the doctor around his car. Among all the havoc, One of them throws a Molotov cocktail at Rhys (no!) who was trying his hardest to keep things civil. The corporal goes down in flames, and he along with the Japanese Americans who were injured during the riot get sent to Eichen House where he ended up dying. Two soldiers later take all of the dead bodies, including the presumed dead Noshiko, into a field where they plan to hide the whole incident by burning all the bodies to dust.
Noshiko’s Kitsune powers slowly start to take over and starts to heal, and while that’s happening, she calls upon the Kitsune-Tsuki do deliver a Nogitsune and to take over her body so that she can avenge all the horrible things that had happened, but instead of the Nogitusne possessing her, the dark spirit went into the dead body of Rhys instead.
Back in present day, Mrs. Yukimura helps Kira assemble a shattered sword that will help her defeat the Nogitsune, and the only way to accomplish that is to kill Stiles because Stiles is no longer in his body and that he is only Nogitsune now. She goes on to reveal that the ancient ritual Scott, Stiles and Allison (Crystal Reed) performed to locate the Nemeton is the very ritual that awoke the demon spirit in the first place. It was their sacrifice that brought back the oni and Nogitsune.
BEST BITES
• The love story between Noshiko and Rhys was soo beautiful and heartbreaking at the same time. And how funny was it that Mrs. Yukimura spent what looked like hours telling Scott and Kira the story about her past love life when they were on a time crunch to save Stiles?
• Arden Cho looked stunning as young Noshiko and I thought it was a great idea to have her play the character. Doppleganger alert!
• There was one scene with the Nogitsune that we did NOT like at all. The scene where the Nogitsune rises from the pile of dead bodies and goes to kill the two soldiers, the way he was walking was like he was dancing and his arms were slowly flapping up and down like a bird. I couldn’t help but laugh.