As you can tell by the title of Blue Box Ep. 15 “August 26”, this episode features a very special day for one of our heroines. Specifically: Chinatsu Kano. However, it’s not only a special episode because of her birthday. It’s also special because of the people she spends it with, with one person in particular standing out from among the crowd.

Blue Box Ep. 15 “August 26”: Details

Blue Box cours 2 JP key art
There’s a reason why blue skies are so prominent in Chinatsu’s side of the key art.

Blue Box Ep. 15 “August 26” is the third episode of the second cours (you can read my reviews of Ep. 13 and Ep. 14 here) of this romantic comedy and sports anime, and is the 13th episode overall. You can read my reviews for Ep. 1, Ep. 2, Ep. 3, Ep. 4, Ep. 5, Ep. 6, Ep. 7, Ep. 8, Ep. 9, Ep. 10, Ep. 11, and Ep. 12 of the first cours here.

Said anime is the anime adaptation of the manga of the same name by Kouji Miura (I Love You, My Teacher). Telecom Animation Film (Tower of God, Shenmue: The Animation, Astro Note) and TMS Entertainment (Detective Conan, Lupin the Third, Anpanman) are both responsible for the anime, with them doing the animation, and production and planning, respectively. Netflix is the company licensing this anime for its global release.

Production Cast

Takahiro Ōkawa is the director and storyboarder behind Blue Box Ep. 15 “August 26”. As for Blue Box as a whole: Yūichirō Yano is the director behind the anime. Yūko Kakihara is the writer, Miho Tanino as the character designer, and with Takashi Ohmama responsible for composing the music.

Speaking of music: the second cours now features as the opening theme song “Saraba” (然らば) by Macaroni Empitsu. Meanwhile, “Contrast” (コントラスト) by TOMOO is the new ending theme song.

Voice Cast

Blue Box Ep. 15 “August 26” features the voices of Shōya Chiba (Zach Aguilar in English dub) as Taiki Inomata and Reina Ueda (Xanthe Huynh in English dub) as Chinatsu Kano. The other notable voice role in this episode is Anna Nagase (Emi Lo in English dub) as Nagisa Funami.

When and Where to Watch

Blue Box Ep. 15 “August 26” made its airing and streaming debut (aka. simulcast) on January 16, 2025. You can watch this episode of the anime only on Netflix. In fact, you can only watch this entire anime on Netflix due to it being an exclusive there.

Blue Box Ep. 15 “August 26”: Synopsis

Alas, Hina does not appear in this episode.

Alas, Blue Box’s second cours only recently began its run. In fact, Blue Box Ep. 15 “August 26” only made its debut nine days ago as of this writing. Thus, I will present to you Netflix’s official synopsis for this episode instead of a spoiler-filled plot summary. You can read that synopsis below:

Despite it being her birthday, Chinatsu still seems a little down. Taiki takes her somewhere special — but the weather might have other plans.

Blue Box Ep. 15 “August 26”: The Good

Blue Box Ep. 15 "August 26" screenshot 1
Definitely a case of “When She Smiles”, and in sunset mode too.

By this point in the anime, it should be pretty clear that it’s the story we’re the most interested in. For Blue Box Ep. 15 “August 26”, it’s definitely because of how adorable the whole episode is. This is especially so after all the drama we’ve been having in the previous episode. Thus, this episode is a chance for both the main cast and us to relax and unwind. Fortunately, what better way is there to do that than for Chinatsu to have a birthday episode? Not only that, but a mostly private one with Taiki to boot? Yeah, Kouji Miura is definitely demonstrating her romcom writing skills with this little story.

However, it’s not just the story of this episode that makes it so fun to watch. Telecom Animation Film and TMS Entertainment have once more produced a very good-looking episode. Especially in terms of the lighting, but their animators have gone a step further here. Chinatsu’s birthday cake just looks absolutely amazing. It’s hard to tell from the screenshot above, but there’s an amazing level of detail in the cake, especially for the strawberries. They look like freshly cut strawberries in a way that made my mouth water. This is all the more notable because this is not a food anime. It doesn’t have to look this good…but it does.

Blue Box Ep. 15 “August 26”: The Bad

Blue Box Ep. 15 "August 26" screenshot 2
Silly isn’t bad, you know.

Alas, if you’re looking for sports action, then Blue Box Ep. 15 “August 26” isn’t for you. This episode is entirely romcom and just plain comedy. Adorable to be sure, but not one to get your heart pumping in the way the badminton and basketball parts of the story did. If you want some of that, then might I suggest watching Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, Solo Leveling, Kaiju No. 8, DDDD, DAN DA DAN, and/or Zenshu. Those anime should have more than enough action to satisfy the action junkies among us until that sports action makes its return.

Tune back in to THS to find out more about Blue Box and other anime when we do.

Keep Reading:

Blue Box Ep. 14 “What’s The Connection”: Hina Confession [Review]