Hot Summer Martha (TV Drama)

Hot Summer Martha (ホットサマー・マーサ) is the seventh episode of the TV Drama series Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan. It adapts the one-shot Hot Summer Martha.

In this episode, Rohan Kishibe discovers a strange shine while walking his dog Bakin. After a strange event, Rohan returns home, only to meet a woman named Eve in his own bed.

Summary
The episode opens on a school of fish swimming in the sea, which is quickly revealed to be a scene from a virtual reality set. Rohan Kishibe is recalled out of the scene by two agents who have come to his house to advertise their VR set. One of the agents praises the sense of realism brought by the device and explains to him that his company have good hopes for the sales of their product. Furthermore, they expect that Rohan's full endorsement will boost the sales, given that he is a popular manga artist whose works reach across several generations. Rohan concedes that the video was indeed very realistic, which pleases the agent, but also criticizes that it doesn't offer the full experience. He notes that he was able to breathe and wouldn't be able to die even while looking at an underwater world. The agents candidly dismiss Rohan's criticism, and even suggest that he would be able to gather material from all over the world for his stories with the VR headset. This vexes Rohan, who angrily explains that he always seeks the real thing to bring realism into his stories, even the most bizarre ones, otherwise his readers would stop reading his works. Rohan then laments that even he cannot make proper research on death as it would prevent him from continuing his manga. The agents try to quickly leave, and the senior whispers that they will simply write a fake review and apologize to Rohan later for the "mistake". Rohan stops them, asking if they plan on deceiving his readership. Though the agents deny it, Rohan turns them into books with his ability, Heaven's Door. Rohan explains that his gift allows him to turn people into books, read their bios on the pages, and write on them if he wishes to imprint commands into their souls. Rohan reads the bio of the senior agent, seeing that he planned on exploiting Rohan and use a fake review, and thus commands him to use Rohan's review of the VR headset as is. Rohan looks at the junior agent and notes that he is a fan, and thus humourously writes an autograph on his forehead with a marker.

Six months later in July, Rohan himself confined in his house in the middle of summer. Talking on the phone with his editor Kyoka Izumi, Rohan laments his inability to gather material outside for his stories and dismisses a suggestion to have online interviews because it would be hard for him to get a real feeling of the other person. At the same time, Rohan brings water to his little dog Bakin and accidentally spills some water which he quickly wipes away. Izumi misremembers the dog's name is "Dokin", prompting Rohan to angrily correct her. Izumi happily says that she didn't expect Rohan to get a dog and asks if he's received the box of treats for Bakin. Rohan quips that Bakin didn't like them, to which Izumi compliments the dog on his gourmet palate.

Izumi asks Rohan to switch to video calling and shows him a sketch of "Hot Summer Martha", a new character Rohan plans on putting in his manga "Pink Dark Boy". Izumi suggests that Rohan's design is problematic from a copyright standpoint and that he could be accused of plagiarism and thus suggests to change the design of the character. Rohan angrily answers that a design involving three circles is something that even the ancient Celts used. Still, Izumi insists because Hot Summer Martha black color and round ears make it too similar to a certain character. Rohan retorts that the big balls are its eyes.

Rohan is interrupted by a woman calling him from his frontyard. Coming to his window, Rohan salutes the woman, a fan smitten with him and who is elated to see him again. She shows him her pet snake and bearded dragon, to whom Rohan apparently gave autographs already. Trying to be as polite as he can, Rohan tells her not to trespass on his property and she leaves. Izumi asks what is going and Rohan explains that she followed him from the veterinarian's office. Izumi wants to have a word with the fan, suggesting to Rohan that he changes the locks and adds security cameras to his house. Rohan tries to refuse but he accidentally bumps on his desk and spills ink on one of his pages. Rohan loses it, exasperated by the mask he has to wear whenever he talks to somebody. Rohan regrets not being able to go outside and experience the world, and decides to stop his online meeting with Kyoka to take Bakin for a walk. In her office, Kyoka notes that Rohan has been acting strangely because of the stress, and remains determined to change Hot Summer Martha's design to avoid the cancellation of "Pink Dark Boy". She also orders new security devices for Rohan.