English Dub Review: Natsume’s Book of Friends “Temporary Home”

Overview (Spoilers Below):
Strange things start happening at Natsume’s home, like Toukou’s plants getting destroyed, and a strange yokai starts wandering around his house. Natsume then learns more about Reiko and her life in this town. He also learns how to get rid of the yokai wandering around the house.

Our Take:
I’m pretty sure Natsume will have a hard time sleeping for a few days after this experience. We’ve seen Natsume encounter the yokai in different locations, such as the abandoned school in the season one episode, “Shigure and the Girl”. Now, he’s about to get a haunting of his own in this week’s episode, as his foster home receives another visit from an unusual spirit. I’m definitely getting “Poltergeist” vibes from this episode now that I thought about it.
The episode involves a haunting at the Fujiwara residence from a yokai named Karime, who seeks revenge against Reiko for banishing it long ago. Natsume and Madara notice this occurrence when they almost get killed by an axe, and Mrs. Fujiwara’s garden is destroyed. With Karime on the loose, Natsume turns to the one person who may have the answer to this predicament: Shigeru Fujiwara.
“Temporary Home” offers another yokai-of-the-week scenario that may seem like another mild distraction from its seasonal plot. However, that’s not the case. It does involve Natsume battling a ruthless revenge-seeking yokai inside the Fujiwaras’ house, but it also has Natsume learning more about Shigeru’s past. He, too, experienced the strange haunting years ago, which caused his mother to fall ill and his father to get injured.
Shigeru also met the girl who helped him deal with the haunting, but at the cost of his room getting obliterated. That girl is, in fact, Reiko, who used an exorcist circle to banish Karime from Shigeru’s house. This doesn’t surprise me since Natsume and Reiko are the only two people who can see the yokai. Plus, Tanuma, Natori, and Taki weren’t around during that time. However, it was interesting to see the episode have Reiko be connected to Shigeru’s past, not just Natsume’s.
“Temporary Home” provided some actual development for one of the Fujiwaras amid its “haunted house” routine. The result is a much-needed improvement over the last couple of episodes. The episode is decent enough to deliver another piece of information from Reiko through Shigeru, but also further expands on Natsume’s concerns about lying to the Fujiwaras about his gift. Aside from the young Shigeru’s annoying voice, this is another suitable episode that combines the ghostly shenanigans with the show’s heart, that’s big enough to end any curse in existence.