A Pervert Club Origin Story, with Heart

There’s something deeply wrong with the faculty at this school. Not in a predatory way. More in a “how did nobody notice the third-year with a vintage film camera who treats gym shorts like a religious artifact” way.

Kuguri Kaya sweeps into Episode 6 with the energy of someone who has been waiting her entire high school career for a teacher who looks exactly like Hiwamura-sensei while wearing gym shorts. The setup is classic: an ambiguous photo, a threatening tone, a demand delivered in an empty classroom. Abikura immediately assumes blackmail. It’s not. It’s worse. She wants to photograph Sensei’s “eroticism” and needs Abikura as a catalyst.

The twist lands perfectly. Kuguri isn’t some antagonist. She’s the viral photographer KuguriN, and she’s been stalking Sensei since spotting her at the pool in the previous episode. Her obsession has a purity to it that the show mines for genuine comedy rather than discomfort. She tried photographing Sensei alone and the photos came out flat. It’s only when Abikura is present that Sensei “sparkles.” Kuguri has the self-awareness to know exactly what kind of weirdo she is, and she owns it completely.

“She only sparkles when YOU’RE with her!”

The line would sound romantic in any other context. Here it’s a pervert’s artistic manifesto.

The Third-Year Who Changes Everything

What makes Kuguri work immediately is how the show positions her against the existing cast. She’s not just another eccentric. She’s a specific type. The artist who treats her craft with absolute seriousness while producing work that makes everyone else deeply uncomfortable.

Abikura calls her a pervert. She fires back, offended. Her Instagram is full of serious photography. She uses a vintage film camera that’s “harder to use than you think” and “the film’s expensive.” She refuses to reveal her identity at school because people would pester her for photos. She only shoots what she wants to shoot.

“Dammit. I’ll admit that’s kinda cool.”

Abikura’s grudging respect is the audience’s. Kuguri’s dedication has a weight to it that cuts through the absurdity of her stated goal. She’s the kind of artist who would absolutely thrive in a school club system if she could find people who tolerate her wavelength.

And then Sensei agrees to model. Immediately. Enthusiastically.

“But it’s part of the creative process, isn’t it? I really respect people who can create art!”

The show has built Sensei’s character carefully across five episodes. She’s physically weak, socially oblivious, and pathologically dedicated to her students. But that dedication has always been reactive. She makes elaborate props for school events. She practices swimming in secret to protect children. Now, faced with a student who wants to take artistic photographs, Sensei sees another avenue for teacherly support. The fact that the “art” involves her being photographed in gym shorts while Abikura pins her to the floor doesn’t register as a problem. It’s creative expression. She’s helping.

The comedy isn’t that Sensei is naive. It’s that her value system genuinely doesn’t include the self-preservation instincts most adults have. She’s a model teacher even in gym shorts. Kuguri says this with awe. It’s meant sincerely.

The Photography Battle Has No Right to Work This Well

Yukishita enters the club dynamic and immediately hates Kuguri’s approach. Not on moral grounds. On artistic ones.

“Having her strip doesn’t instantly make it a good photo, you know?”

Yukishita’s position is that clothes create eroticism through suggestion. Kuguri’s position is that nudity is the purest form. They’re arguing philosophy while Sensei stands between them asking them to stop fighting. It’s a classic “two perverts, one oblivious subject” triangle, and the show commits to it with a three-day photo competition that escalates exactly as you’d expect.

Yukishita’s session: a classroom at the far end of the school, full nudity, Abikura holding a reflector, balloon ice cream that melts and gets everywhere. The ice cream sequence deserves special mention. Sensei complaining about brain freeze while sucking on a popsicle in ways that make Abikura visibly distressed. Yukishita demanding she “spread ’em” for closeups. Abikura finally snapping and throwing a blanket over Sensei because she might catch a cold. The pacing is immaculate. Each escalation gets a reaction, then the next escalation tops it, then Abikura’s protective instincts override his embarrassment.

Kuguri’s session: the school pool, an old-fashioned school swimsuit with the drainage flap, Kuguri asking Abikura to put his hand inside said drainage flap to “soften her expression.” Sensei agrees. Abikura complies while questioning every life choice that led him here. Kuguri gets her flushed, glowing shots.

Both sessions produce photos that the other photographer grudgingly respects. Yukishita’s nude shot “captures the theme perfectly” despite being “crude.” Kuguri’s swimsuit photo has “vibe power.” They’re both talented, both deeply weird, and both completely unwilling to admit the other has a valid point.

The Photo That Settles It All

Then Abikura enters his own photo into the competition. He’s not even officially competing. He just took a shot of Sensei working at her desk in her normal teaching clothes, backlit, focused on her earnest expression.

It wins. Instantly. Both Yukishita and Kuguri concede.

“Showing us an innocent photo like this instantly makes ours look unsavory, doesn’t it?”

Kuguri says this without bitterness. She recognizes what Abikura captured. The woman he fell for isn’t the swimsuit model or the nude art subject. It’s the teacher who pours everything into her work, who made origami perfect attendance medals by hand, who thanks him for helping her become better at her job. The photograph represents how Sensei wants her students to see her. It represents how Abikura actually sees her.

The moment lands because the show has spent five episodes building to it. Abikura’s crush started as physical attraction mixed with protective instinct. But somewhere between the camping trip disasters and the pool coaching and the mechanical pencil gift, it matured into genuine understanding. He sees her. The photograph proves it.

“Fank you too, Abikuwa-kun! You’b helbed me out sho much…”

Sensei’s emotional breakdown when he gives her the perfect attendance award early is pure Weak and Wimpy Sensei. She can’t even maintain her dignity through a simple thank you. But the tears are real. She means every mangled word.

A Small Moment That Says More Than the Competition

The subplot with the kissing students is barely a subplot. It’s maybe three minutes of screen time. But it does something important for Sensei’s characterization.

She and Abikura are heading back to the classroom when they spot Kawabe-kun (student Number 5, mentioned earlier bragging about his summer kiss plans) actually going through with it behind the school building. Sensei freezes. She watches. She witnesses a real kiss between two high school students, on the lips, with an arm around the waist, and her brain short-circuits.

“I haven’t done anything like that yet…”

The line is muttered, almost to herself. Abikura has to physically guide her away. She’s unsteady on her feet. The show plays it for comedy, but there’s something genuinely sad underneath. Sensei is probably in her mid-twenties. She’s never been kissed. She’s so sheltered that watching two teenagers make out sends her into system failure. Her whole life is teaching. There’s nothing else.

When Abikura catches her after she stumbles, she asks him to support her. He puts a hand on her back. The moment lasts maybe three seconds before she recovers and apologizes. But it’s the only physical contact in the entire episode that isn’t driven by some elaborate pervert scheme. It’s just two people who care about each other, one of them completely unaware of the other’s feelings, sharing a brief moment of genuine connection.

“I am kinda envious of him, though. Being able to do that with the person he likes.”

Abikura’s admission hangs there. Sensei doesn’t hear it, or doesn’t process it. She’s already moving on to summer break logistics. The gulf between what he feels and what she perceives remains vast. But the episode leaves the door open. Summer break. A training camp. More time together outside the classroom structure.

Where the Club Lands

The Photography Club forms with four members: Kuguri as president, Abikura as reluctant co-founder, Yukishita as the convert who found taking pictures “fun,” and Mukubayashi joining because she wants to hang out with “Hiyorin.” Mukubayashi gets the best entrance line of the episode: “Gah! What is this, Pervert Club?!” upon seeing Kuguri and Yukishita in their “compromise” maid outfits (they lost the bet, so they’re now maidservants in sexy cosplay for Abikura, which he desperately wants nobody to know about).

The club’s founding philosophy, delivered by Kuguri, is genuinely good: “Everyone’s free to take photos of whatever they want, however they want.” A smartphone is enough. Photos preserve memories. It’s wholesome, framed against the absolutely unwholesome way the club came together.

Kuguri exits the episode by announcing a summer training camp while still wearing the maid outfit, walking through the school hallways without a trace of shame. She’s going to be a problem. A delightful, committed, deeply artistic problem.

The episode’s final tease is Abikura wondering if he and Sensei can “grow a little closer over the summer.” Kuguri’s training camp announcement answers that question before he can finish thinking it. This show knows exactly what it’s doing.