Chito was the star of this week’s Flying Witch, as both Chinatsu and Makoto let him take the lead on a pair of walks around the neighborhood. It takes a special kind of show to make “follow a cat around for a while and then take a nap” a compelling episode premise, but Flying Witch’s excellent cat animation and cat behavior won the day. I agree, Flying Witch. Cats are pretty funny.

You can check out my full review over at ANN, or my notes below!

Opens with a nice, peaceful breakfast between the whole cast. The pre-OP scene is just one easy moment of texture and atmosphere, like the cat lying in the sun

Ah, that’s why they focused on the cat. This is a familiar-focused episode

Unpacking weird stuff

The cat engaging in very cat-like behavior. Getting disgruntled at other people doing things when it’s trying to nap, pawing at the edge of that sliding door

Chinatsu sneaking after the cat

Speculating on all of his cat errands

Some really nice cat animation here

And Makoto gets wrapped up messing around with old things, reading old books. A very relatable experience

The cat inspects whatever they were burying and pats it with his tail, then moves on. Mission accomplished

I really like the seriousness with which this episode is treating the cat doing normal cat things. Because cats themselves seem to take their activities extremely seriously, so the episode is matching their tone

Also some nice matching musical cues – the cat beating its tail along with the chimes

And Chinatsu thinks Chito laid a trap for her

Makoto and Chito are heading out

Makoto talking Chito is also great. And this cat animation is so convincing

Of course Chito has all of his own reasons for visiting all of these places

The cat chasing a butterfly, leaping after it

When I read the episode title, I figured we’d figure out why familiars are actually useful. Which is kind of the joke

Commenting on the houses and the history of the place