Black Clover - Episode 81 [Review]

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Black Clover - Episode 81 [Review]

Coinciding with Langris' onslaught against his brother last week, Team G technically won the match because Team E's crystal got destroyed in the process. Elsewhere on the map, Leopold came this close to taking the enemy's crystal, but it looks like this is a day for the bad guys instead, which brings us back to the Black Bulls' stare-down with Langris. This episode rewinds a few moments to show us exactly how Asta and company managed to fly across the battlefield so quickly (Charmy catapulted them with her sheep), though I was wrapped up in the moment enough that I didn't think twice about it at the time.

This tournament is certainly going in a few unexpected directions now. Langris has gotten on Asta's naughty list, so our hero is demonstrating an uncharacteristic anger. The Wizard King is not opposed to letting these kids get a quick and dirty fight out of their system, but he also wants to keep everything within the confines of the exam. Since Asta and Langris' teams would be facing each other in the semi-finals anyway, their match is getting moved up to now, which seems weirdly unfair to the other teams waiting for their fights! I'm trying to think of another shonen anime that's done something like this. The Wizard King's just like, "Well, shoot. The emotions are running high now. Gotta keep that momentum going!"

So because Asta went and got all hot-headed against Langris, who's still digging his heels into the ground with overcompensating douchebaggery, his teammates have to get whisked into an unexpected battle as well, and this is where we get a lot of new Zora content. It turns out Zora's distaste for the Magic Knights comes from his dad, who was a peasant like Asta who managed to get in to the club with hard work. Zora's dad revered the Magic Knights and relished the opportunity to fight alongside them, but when he eventually died, Zora overheard his teammates mocking him for not being a wealthy noble like them. The idealistic vision of who the Magic Knights are supposed to be—compassionate warriors fighting to protect the weak—was ground into the dust. It turns out that this special group of heroes is inescapably tied to wealth and nepotism, even when it pretends not to be.

Langris makes an especially good antagonist for Zora, who rises to the challenge with a strong appetite. Langris is everything Zora could possibly hate about the Magic Knights, and by the end of this episode, Zora goes from looking like a bitter prankster to a genuinely swell dude biting back at the establishment's failure. It's not that the idea of the Magic Knights is bad, it's that vile people are constantly allowed to make a mockery of the name. This is an angle that Black Clover has always lightly explored, that the people who are supposed to be the good guys are low-key responsible for many of the world's problems, and I hope it can keep pushing these ideas. Even if someone like the Wizard King truly is a stand-up guy, is there a chance he's been complicit in some of the kingdom's ugliness and simply hopes to plant the seeds of progress in a new generation? Or perhaps he's secretly been scheming to fix the system from the inside? This thread has to go somewhere.

Things are getting much more intense in the Royal Knights exam, and this episode offers a healthy variety between the more atmospheric action and the flashbacks fleshing out Zora's story. Once again, the class themes are among Black Clover's greatest assets, allowing characters of different backgrounds to coexist meaningfully and sewing some honest-to-goodness world-building into the narrative. Thankfully, this tournament seems to have finally found its pulse.

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Bungo Stray Dogs - Episode 29 [Review]

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Bungo Stray Dogs - Episode 29 [Review]

You may think that the most terrifying thing about the great Russian novels is their length or sheer number of characters, and in the real world, you could be right, but in Bungo Stray Dogs, the scariest thing about them is their author. At least, that's the case for Fyodor Dostoyevsky, author of Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov, among other classics of the late 19th century. Other antagonists in the series have been alarming or clever, but over the space of this very strong episode, Dostoyevsky proves himself to be far more than those small words encompass. He's a master manipulator, and he's not without what he sees as compassion or mercy – what's scary is that he only sees death as the ultimate expression of both of those things, and as a compassionate and merciful man, he has no choice but to grant it to those he encounters. Dostoyevsky is operating by his own special moral code, and not only does he not care if it doesn't conform to yours, he has ways of making you believe in it, too.

All of this is further evidence of the fact that original series author Kafka Asagiri is well-versed in the works and lives of the authors who make up the characters in the story. In the case of Dostoyevsky, his group, Rats in the House of the Dead, is a reference to his semi-autobiographical tale of his time in a Siberian prison camp, House of the Dead, published in 1862. (It was serialized between 1860-62, but that's when the compiled edition came out.) Apart from being Leo Tolstoy's favorite Dostoyevsky work, the philosophical novel details the experiences and spiritual rebirth of its main character as he comes to understand the evils of incarceration and physical punishment as a tragedy for all of humanity and the countries that use them. This, coupled with the fact that Dostoyevsky was given a false execution in 1849 before being sent to Siberia, makes the character's stance that death is the ultimate mercy a reference to the distaste expressed for other modes of punishment. This is most clearly seen in the way Dostoyevsky treats the unnamed teenager who is a member of Ace's team – the boy is kind to him, tells him his hopes and terrible past history as a victim of first human trafficking and then Ace, is the last person left alive after Dostoyevsky has wiped out Ace's men (or rather, convinced them to wipe themselves out)…and is killed at the last. Any other character in this show, including Mori, would have offered the boy a second chance at life. Dostoyevsky thinks that the only true escape for him is death.

Ace himself may also be a reference to another of Dostoyevsky's works, specifically The Gambler, a short 1866 work published right after Crime and Punishment inspired by Dostoyevsky's own gambling addiction. (In fact, the novella was intended to pay off gambling debts.) Dostoyevsky's own preferred game was roulette, which we see potentially referenced in the card game he plays with Ace for his life, although of course he's really playing in order for Ace's – although Ace doesn't realize it, the moment he stepped into the room he was gambling for his life against Dostoyevsky's ability and intelligence, a sort of Russian roulette that his own overweening pride did not allow him to recognize.

Essentially Dostoyevsky himself is the embodiment of his most famous work: he sees crime and metes out punishment. That he clearly doesn't see himself as doing anything wrong is alarming, especially because he's going after all other ability users in Yokohama, both the Mafia and the Agency…and presumably the remains of the Guild as well. That he's teamed up with Nathaniel Hawthorne, as we saw at the end of season two, feels like a reference to the punishment dealt out in The Scarlet Letter to Hester Prynne, or rather, the self-satisfaction of those who inflicted it, as Dostoyevsky himself is at risk of becoming just such a character.

Sometimes a good villain can really make a show. Bungo Stray Dogs is perfectly good on its own, but Dostoyevsky might just be the character it needs to be even better.

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Fruits Basket - Episode 5 [Review]

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Fruits Basket - Episode 5 [Review]

What do Fruits Basket and Clannad have in common (besides making people cry)? Their initially obtuse alternate-language titles share the same meaning! At long last, Tohru delivers Furuba's title drop, and this is the reason why I was so happy that they moved the pickled plum parable up into episode three. Now that we understand Tohru's view of the world as a place where plain little riceballs feel like they don't belong, this episode expands the metaphor to make it clear that she was talking about her own loneliness just as much as Yuki or Kyo's. "Fruits Basket" just means family, and for all the crumbly riceballs of the world waiting for people to discover their inner beauty, family is something they have to find for themselves and fight for a little selfishly. After weeks of encouraging others to be their messy selves, Tohru finally finds the inner strength to reach out for what she's always wanted.

For most of her life, Kyoko Honda was the only family Tohru had ever known. Her new friends Uo and Hana are kind to her, but they also have families of their own to take care of, and losing this vital connection with her mother in such a sudden and tragic way has left our heroine a little shell-shocked. Even though we see Kyoko encouraging her to take things easy, it's obvious that Tohru derived most of her life's purpose from taking care of her mother, who she idolized completely. All those years of putting others first don't make it any easier for Tohru to recognize when she needs to start taking care of herself instead, and unfortunately, the Soma boys are equally bad at self-care for entirely different reasons. Most of the audience is bound to side with Shigure this week, as he raises his eyebrow at everyone's immediate acceptance that Tohru should go live with her "real" family. She doesn't consider asking to stay, and she doesn't even choose to commemorate her last night in the house by going out to dinner. The boys don't consider asking her to stay either, and they barely even wish her farewell because they've immediately slipped so deeply into acceptance and depression. It's all very strange given how quickly these three became close, and once again, this all comes back to the cast's inability to consider their own desires. As Kyo puts it, "it was abnormal for her to even be here at all." Why should Tohru live in a house with three men she barely knows? But if the life that you accepted as "normal" is less than you deserve, maybe pursuing that "abnormal" life is the right choice after all, despite all the social or familial pressures not to rock the boat or cause a scene.

Those pressures crash down on Tohru hard when we see exactly why the Honda family was so reticent to take her in. They're a petty and suspicious bunch of back-biters, terrified of the judgment of their neighbors and casually enamored with symbols of authority and order like the police force. This also raises the first of Fruits Basket's many uniquely Japanese societal conflicts, since it's not uncommon for people to lose their jobs or other opportunities purely because of a relative's criminal record in Japan. Thankfully, when Cousin Creep takes things too far by trying to grill Tohru on her potential indiscretions with the Somas, Grandpa Honda puts his foot down. He tells Tohru that he chose this family, even if they have their problems, but it's not a freeing environment for a young and sensitive person like her to grow up in. Admittedly, Grandpa's still having trouble telling the difference between our heroine and her mother, but this lends Tohru an unintended strength by reminding her that the intimidating power Kyoko exuded lives on in her as well, and it might be okay for her to call upon that fighting spirit for herself. And since she's given so much love to the Soma family, it only takes a small cry for help from Tohru for Yuki and Kyo to swoop in and bring her back where she belongs.

I'll be honest, I was an absolute mess watching this episode. I think the message that it's okay to pursue a life that makes you happy without shame is vital for everyone to hear—but especially for young girls, because I knew a lot of women like Tohru growing up, who would open-heartedly take on everyone else's burdens alone until they could no longer recognize that it was making them miserable. Whereas I was initially worried that Kagura's chapter wouldn't be able to fill a full episode last time, I knew that chapter six of the manga would absolutely need an entire episode to itself, as the first truly great dramatic climax in Tohru's story. She's taken a very tiny step toward fighting for the life and family she wants (she was already starting to berate herself for being selfish right before Yuki stepped in), but every long journey starts just that small, and now Tohru will be taking those steps hand in hand with more people who love her and want to see her grow.

On the note of manga adaptation, however, this episode made some significant changes that I liked and some that I didn't. It would take a long time to break down all of them, so the simple version is that this episode shifts away from telling its story almost purely from Tohru's perspective like the Furuba manga did, and instead broadens its scope to give Yuki, Kyo, Shigure, and even the Hondas more screen time. On the positive side, Fruits Basket will evolve into a broader ensemble drama over time, with many episodes where Tohru doesn't even appear, so it makes sense to start establishing this bigger scope now, and the added material was charming and in-character for everyone involved. On the negative side, there was a powerful sense of melancholy and suspense to both the original manga and the 2001 anime adaptation, where the weight of Tohru's denial about her true feelings built and built until the relief of her breakdown became transcendent. In this version, we get that catharsis mere minutes after she steps into the Honda's residence, which was disappointing. Ultimately, I think the pros and cons to these approaches even out, and the preserved strength of the underlying material is so great that it doesn't matter much.

My favorite detail in this episode that wasn't present in the original manga was how Yuki and Kyo found the Honda house. Yuki leaves first in a panic and wanders around in circles until Kyo gives him the clarity he needs to find the house, because he was listening more closely to Tohru's parting words. Just like the pickled plum in a riceball, the Honda family nameplate was buried underneath an innocuous bland exterior that took some effort to uncover. Then Yuki helps Kyo in turn by reminding him to consider Tohru's feelings before he acts on his own desires, so they can both step in only after she reaches out for them. It's a great sequence that illustrates how Yuki and Kyo's strengths can support one another even when they hate spending time together, on top of delivering a clever little metaphor for how hard it can be to push past the facades of selfless people like Tohru and make sure they're really doing okay.

On a final note, this episode is great not only for its powerfully simple emotional core about chosen families, but for its surreptitious level of crafty foreshadowing. This is the first we've heard about Tohru's father Katsuya or the extent of her mother's delinquency, and it paints an immediately complicated picture of the life they must have led, given that both sides of the family seem to have abandoned them even after Katsuya's death left Kyoko to raise her daughter alone. And now that Kyoko's ghost has been raised once again, her similarities to Kyo have also grown exponentially. First they had similar names, then they had similar hair, and now they have similar histories of impulsive violence and similar words of affectionate advice for Tohru to be a little more selfish. Is it all just coincidence, or could Tohru's late mother and her childhood idol possibly be connected somehow?

Then there's Shigure's role in all this, or more accurately his lack of a direct role. He's the only one in the Soma house who immediately understands that nobody wants Tohru to leave, but he keeps his mouth shut despite his supposedly important arrangement with the head of the family. This means that it's more important to Shigure that Yuki and Kyo actively fight for Tohru to be in their lives than it is that she just live there, or else he probably would have convinced everyone of that himself. Now that Tohru has officially chosen the Somas as her new family, for better and for worse, her life can only grow more colorful as many more members of the Soma family come to see what's so special about this riceball in a fruits basket.

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Dororo - Episode 14 [Review]

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Dororo - Episode 14 [Review]

It's interesting that this episode of Dororo isn't marked as a two-parter when it clearly ends without a resolution. It doesn't seem to be a translation error (as much as I'd like to blame Amazon Prime, considering how mad I already am at them for releasing this episode so late). But while streaming services (particularly Amazon) have their problems from time to time, these reviews evaluate the quality of the show's content itself, and in that respect, this episode didn't disappoint. While the story still dangles loose ends that leave it feeling more cryptic than I'd like, this week offers a satisfying story about the many variations that families can take.

The theme is all about family this week. There's the family you're born with, as shown through a somber flashback to Dororo's parents as they discuss what to do about the samurai treasure that will eventually become Dororo's legacy. Dororo's mom refuses to learn the location of the treasure, even though it would have ensured her survival, because her dedication to the family's shared ideals is more important. There's also the found family at the center of this story—Dororo and Hyakkimaru. The obvious family connection they share is as siblings, especially since Dororo frequently calls Hyakkimaru “big bro.” But they take turns protecting one another; Hyakkimaru through his impressive strength, and Dororo through his life experience and understanding of human love, which he attempts to pass on to Hyakkimaru by communicating how much he cares about him in various ways. At the old monk Biwamaru's prompting, Dororo attempts to initiate a discussion about the future with Hyakkimaru. Their closeness is most visible in Dororo clinging to Hyakkimaru or sharing his bed, but this failed discussion, which implies that Dororo wants to keep traveling with Hyakkimaru indefinitely, shows more clearly than ever that he sees him as his new family.

In “The story of Sabame,” there's a strange new family structure made up of humans and monsters alike. Between Sabame's wall-eyed stare and fishy story about a natural disaster that completely ignores the oil spilled right by the site of the burned temple, we know from the beginning that something is off about this ostensibly kind rich man. He treats Dororo and Hyakkimaru like kings (perhaps giving them a taste of what life would be like if they follow Biwamaru's suggestion to seek out Dororo's buried inheritance), but it appears that he wants their lives in exchange, to feed a (literally) monstrous woman and also children with his houseguests' bodies. It'll be tantalizing to spend the week (or longer, depending on Amazon's whims) dissecting the meat of the mystery so far. My theory is that whatever happens, it'll result in Hyakkimaru finally regaining his sight—Sadame's eyes are just so attention-getting.

What of the enormous monster baby that clung to Dororo or the motherly ayakashi who pointed out the oil spill to Hyakkimaru? This seemingly familial pair generates more questions than they answer. It's difficult to evaluate a two-parter when it leaves so much unresolved by design. Instead, it's the reward of the episode's overall message that makes me regard it so highly. Not all of the families featured are functional or healthy, but each unit shows a different side of the same struggle—sometimes people act against their own interests in order to find acceptance within a family unit. Everyone wants a group to which they feel like they belong.

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Black Clover - Episode 78 [Review]

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Black Clover - Episode 78 [Review]

The first round of the Royal Knights tournament has now concluded, meaning it's up to the winning teams to face off against each other. I'm still really lost as to who all is participating in these exams, because there are so many side characters left watching on the sidelines, and I figured that the first round's focus on weeding out fodder at least made sense considering there's bound to be hundreds of Magic Knights in the running. I've been flipping through this part of the manga every week, feeling like a crazy person for not being able to find some explanation like "you have to volunteer to be in the tournament" or "the Wizard King hand picked his favorite prospective knights" or something. I feel like I'm being told to just go with it after I've ordered chicken and been delivered only bones (and not even all the bones).

Anyway, it's time to commence Round Two, which begins with Asta, Mimosa, and Xerx (henceforth referred to as "Team B") competing with Magna, Sol, and Kirsch ("Team C"). We can even begin referring to Xerx as Zora, since his true name gets dropped in a flashback partway through the episode, so I'll just start calling him that from now on.

Going into this fight, the conflict appears to be between Mimosa and her brother Kirsch, as well as Zora's eagerness to fight a member of royalty, but what quickly takes center stage is Asta trying to get Zora to act like a team player. At the outset of the battle, Asta unleashes his new demon form, but only long enough to release the traps that Zora laid down ahead of time. I really like Asta this week, because he's more cheeky and smug than usual. He's not trying to rat Zora out for being a cheater, he just wants Zora to let his teammates in on the pranks. I think this is a good compromise for Zora's "arc" or whatever he's going through, where teamwork and friendship won't necessarily fix his bad attitude, just coexist with it. I like seeing Asta's enthusiasm as he puts his own team at a momentary disadvantage so they can form their secret prank cabal and make Zora feel like part of the gang. It's an ironic yet positive twist on the purpose of the tournament, which is to measure teamwork.

So far Kirsch and his cherry blossom magic are the stars of the opposing team, though as of this week we don't see him interacting with Mimosa all that much. He's the token snooty royal and the first victim of Asta and Zora's new traps. Kirsch thinks he's got the trap spells covered, but falls into a hand-dug pit on accident because he's so focused on magic that he can't predict a practical trap. Asta takes him out with his anti-magic (still not an interesting way to win every fight), and I hope Kirsch isn't completely out of the fight already, because he's the only thematically compelling opponent on hand right now.

We're getting into the thick of this tournament at last, so every match from this point forward should have something going for it. I'm a little frustrated at how poorly the conceit of this arc has been holding up, since tournaments are already blank slates that you don't have to bend over backwards to explain but this one still feels undercooked. Otherwise, we're getting back to the most engaging aspects of this story, like classism and Zora's complicated relationship with the Magic Knights. I'm fairly happy with where that stuff seems to be going.

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Dororo - Episode 13 [Review]

Dororo took a week off between cours, and it was sorely missed. Between its expressive visuals, minimalist color palette, and evocative musical score, this was one of the best shows of Winter 2019, so it's great that it's sticking around another season. The show wastes no time returning viewers to the story at its most affecting, giving us moments of true elation and tragedy all in one short episode. In “The story of the Blank-faced Buddha,” the show returns from a focus on Hyakkimaru back to Dororo for a real emotional gut punch.

Now that we're in the second cour of the show, there are new opening and ending sequences to match. I'm wistful that the “party is over,” but these new sequences are just as promising, and the ending sequence, which features blurred visuals evocative of Hyakkimaru's view of the world, gives me hope that we'll see him regain his sight as the anime progresses. But that's not happening yet: as Dororo points out early on, Hyakkimaru didn't regain anything after fighting the fox spirit last time. Instead, he got insomnia as he struggled to deal with his sudden family drama (and it's good that Mom survived her suicide attempt). Dororo wants Hyakkimaru to chill out, so he even lies about the presence of a demon near a relaxing hot spring in order to coax his stubborn big brother into visiting.

Instead, the pair run into Okaka, whose name's similarity to “mama” (Okaa-san) is no coincidence. Okaka takes on the appearance and voice of Dororo's mother, revealing a more vulnerable side to this normally tough and proud child. Dororo has been on his own for so long in a world that's dead set on dealing him a bad hand. His bond with Hyakkimaru is linked to an obvious anxiety that his “bro” will leave him behind. Dororo was intent on helping Hyakkimaru unwind, but he finds his own solace, however temporary, in Okaka. Never mind that Okaka is actually a sculptor twisted by an obsession with carving and re-carving (and slicing off innocent travelers' faces in the process) the face of a giant possessed Buddha statue. The face-stealer is loosely based on Tezuka's original Dororo manga, as an interpretation of a Buddhist myth that many Westerners may have seen before in Avatar: The Last Airbender, when Aang battles a version of this monster. But Hyakkimaru's lack of vision provokes an interesting weakness in the monster—you can't mimic the face of a mother that a child has never seen. It's another example of how Hyakkimaru's disabilities can prove to be strengths in this show. It makes me hope that Dororo gets an English dub so blind Western fans can watch it.

Okaka is far beyond redemption, but through Dororo's smile, she experiences a final moment of solace. I love the nuance of the animation, which shows Dororo's pained smile performed out of kindness at the same time that he's essentially losing his mother for the second time. Dororo finally receives some kindness from an increasingly talkative Hyakkimaru just when he needs it most, and the pair does visit the hot spring after all. The episode ends on a note of surprise rather than resolution when it becomes apparent that there's a burn on Dororo's back that seems to be in the shape of a map. Hyakkimaru's plotline is fully taking a backseat to Dororo's this week, but this show needs both of its protagonists to shine. Maybe this new discovery will bring the duo some good fortune for a change.

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JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Golden Wind - Episode 25 [Review]

It was only ever a matter of time before Trish's Stand revealed itself, and this week we finally meet the legendary Spice Girl! We generally don't spend time thinking of Stands as gendered beings, but this one talks and inexplicably has boobs, so she kind of embodies a whole new character on her own.

Spice Girl's ability is to make objects soft and malleable, which turns out to be useful in the Notorious B.I.G. fight because the enemy can't aimlessly destroy everything that moves anymore. I presume that Trish's powers are naturally born like the Joestars, but she hasn't had them for long so her current journey is about getting into the spirit of proper Stand battles. That's my favorite aspect of this episode; watching Trish steadily put the pieces together and go from frightened teen girl to wisecracking badass who's too cool to look back at her own explosions. Okay, maybe it's not that extreme of a transformation, but this is definitely a turning point for her. What sets Trish apart from other unsuspecting heroes who have to toughen up in the heat of battle is that she's been around Stands for a while. She's seen danger and has had to watch Team Bucciarati fight on her behalf before, but she never expected herself to participate in the action. It does seem like she should have been more ready for a day like this to come, but it's too late to cry about it now. The gang's sense of resolve is starting to rub off on her.

As far as the Stand battle itself goes, I don't think the finale of the Notorious B.I.G. fight is nearly as compelling as its beginning. This two-parter was front-loaded with so many great creepy ideas, but now that the abject horror has mostly evaporated, we never got around to understanding how the majority of the enemy's powers worked, let alone what was happening during the climactic resolution this week. Everybody's getting their hands cut off now, and I can't tell whose abilities are responsible for what. Notorious B.I.G.'s movement-seeking powers were the only aspect to get fleshed (heh) out, and most of the other trippy stuff was just for spooky flavor. I do like the detail that it can't ever be killed, so the solution is to dump it in the ocean and let it fight the waves forever. The waters of Sardinia are about to become the next Bermuda Triangle.

Obviously this is a big episode for Trish, even if I found the fight itself underwhelming, as she's starting to feel like a proper member of the team and not just a macguffin to keep the plot moving. The gang felt uncomfortably trimmed down when Fugo left, but now it's clear that a new person might be able to fill his shoes. I hope the show can hold on to the emotionally raw side of her character, since her relationship with her dad is such an important aspect of this arc. It's hard to tell right now if this is a full-on transformation for her character where she's just cool and confident all the time now, or if we're still in the midst of a balancing act. Where the story goes from here could make an episode like this come across a little ham-fisted in retrospect, but it's hard to deny character development when it comes delivered in such a neat package.

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Fairy Tail: Final Season - Episode 303 [Review]

So that's twice now that a member of Fairy Tail has prevented someone from ending this war. First was Happy when he stopped Natsu from killing Zeref, which was a dumb thing to do, but understandable to a degree – he didn't want Natsu to die as well. While that hardly showed much thinking things through, it was in line with Happy's character. This week, though, this week, Mest pulls something that's far less understandable or acceptable. Happy's actions may have been selfish, but Mest flat-out sabotages Brandish's Makarov-sanctioned negotiations with August. Fairy Tail as a guild may not put a lot of stock in power structures, but that's mutiny by anyone's reckoning, and Makarov's no Captain Bligh. It was also an awful thing to do to Brandish – she'd decided to help Fairy Tail, turning her back on her own country in order to end Zeref's war, and not only did Mest make light of that sacrifice, he also demonstrated his lack of respect for someone willing to help his guild by making hers the hands that held the knife. It's just a low blow all around.

It also may be one that gets Natsu and Lucy hurt, because the consequences of his actions aren't only that he screwed over Brandish's negotiations, but that he triggered August into using his powers. Granted, those may be cancelled out by Irene's use of Universe One at the end of the episode, because her spell rearranges the very land and she cast it on all of Fiore, but someone's still going to get a taste of whatever it is August did. The chances that it's Mest feel quite slim.

August's spell may have a slightly better effect on the other major moment of emotional frustration this week, the apparent death of Gajeel. I freely admit that Gajevy is my favorite couple in the show, despite how they started (followed closely by Jerza; aren't portmanteaux fun?), but even if they aren't yours, this week does a really good job of making their parting heartbreaking. It goes back to the idea I discussed last time, about how in fiction partners often make a big deal out of sacrificing themselves for the other to go on living. Levy and Gajeel have both made it clear that that's not acceptable to them, but it doesn't stop either of them from trying. Of course, Gajeel wasn't planning to die – he perhaps was banking on shortening his lifespan in a similar way to Levy's via massive Bane Particle ingestion, but he certainly didn't expect Bloodman to just drag him to hell like that. When he then stops Levy from following him (and Lily ensures that she can't), though, he's just doing the same thing he was upset that she did – sacrifices himself and leaves her behind. The hope I'm selling here is that Irene cast her spell while Gajeel and Bloodman were in transit between Fiore and the underworld, meaning that they'll pop out somewhere very much alive. Even if that happens, though, Gajeel and Levy's parting is very effective, making use of flashbacks to show how they grew to love each other and one heart-rending image of the family Gajeel hoped to have with her. It's all enhanced by some truly great scream-crying from Levy's VA, Mariya Ise, who strikes just the right note of heartbroken desperation.

All in all, things really look bad for our heroes right now. But there's one potential game changer in the wings for the next episode: Cana has finally brought herself to eliminate the lacrima holding Mavis' physical body. That means that the First Master is back on the scene, and while her being in her real body could reactivate the curse she carries, it also gives Fairy Tail an edge against Zeref. He's never had a chance to really deal with his feelings for Mavis, and those are in large part what's driving him, brother be damned. How will he react coming face-to-face with her again? How will she? The name Mavis is one that she shares with the heroine of Marie Corelli's (totally bizarre) 1895 novel The Sorrows of Satan - perhaps she can bring those same sorrows to the man trying to destroy her people.

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One Piece - Episode 879 [Review]

Okay, so in the manga we got the news that Luffy was the unofficial Fifth Emperor shortly before the full reveal of his new bounty. The whole chapter was loosely structured around a gag where Luffy gets depressed because the number on his wanted poster dropped to 150 million berries for some unknown reason, only to realize at the end of the chapter that he misread a decimal point and was now worth 1.5 billion. It already barely worked in the manga, where the punchline was pretty obvious if you took five seconds to think it over, but it's even more awkward in the anime because that chapter is being split into two episodes, and they've had to shift some scenes around. Now the setup for the joke is coming after the Emperor business, and we're given a full twenty minute episode to scratch our heads and ask "Wait, why would a new Emperor's bounty go down?! That doesn't make sens--OH!"

But it's an exciting time to be alive nonetheless! 1.5 billion is just over Katakuri's bounty, so it makes sense that Luffy would get this kind of bump, and if we take the Emperor title seriously (which I do, haters to the left), then I assume he's still the runt of the big-hitters. The audience hasn't been told Big Mom or Kaido's bounties yet, because they represent the ceiling of the pirate world and the story doesn't want to put a price on that just yet, but I've always adored bounties as One Piece's alternative to classic shonen power levels. It's got the same smashing-your-action-figures-together excitement of "This guy's a big deal! But this guy's the biggest deal! And this guy's the biggerest deal!", but instead of feeding into the fanboy compulsion to objectively measure strength, it's all about status and infamy. Your bounty informs your place in the world, and there's great character writing to be found in how characters choose to live up to their reputations.

Elsewhere, the world is still gearing up for the Reverie, and some surprising characters are crossing paths. Koby, Luffy's bespectacled pink-haired friend from the earliest episodes of the series, is now a captain in the Navy and protecting Dressrosa's royal family from pirates. Even if everyone present is technically on the side of the World Government, they can't help but form an impromptu Luffy fan club over his most recent accomplishments. Rebecca and Koby's interactions in particular are super-cute, and it's fun learning that even the new and improved Koby still needs his glasses to read the paper (assuming he can read through his tears of happiness). This transitions us into another lengthy disposable flashback, this time recapping Luffy and Koby's relationship.

These past two episodes don't flow particularly well with the protracted padding, but the new material they offer is great. It's nice to get back to the usual camaraderie of the crew hanging out on the ship, and the Reverie promises the secondary characters who don't travel with the Straw Hats a chance in the spotlight. We've made so many friends on our adventures whose stories can still be important way after the fact, and there are nearly infinite ways for them to interact with one another. I was disappointed that the anime adapted the montage of the other Emperors reacting to Luffy's new profile completely straight, since I thought that would have been an ideal time to embellish—especially with Big Mom's scene, where we're bound to be curious what a post-Luffy Totto Land looks like. I'm hoping the anime can find more opportunities to flesh out the story beyond just recapping old episodes, because there's so much great stuff to mine from these characters and scenarios now that the focus doesn't have to be on suspense so much.

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Boruto: Naruto Next Generations - Episode 101 [Review]

The latest arc kicks off its endgame in this week's Boruto: Naruto Next Generations. In search of Jugo, Karin and Suigetsu encounter an injured Sumire, whose distrust of the duo leads Suigetsu to knock her out just before Team 7 appears on the scene. Following a heated argument between Boruto and Suigetsu about what's best for Jugo, the group decides to wait until Sumire wakes up to launch their rescue operation. Later, under cover of night, Boruto, Mitsuki, Sumire, and Suigetsu are able to infiltrate the Land of Rivers' research compound as Sarada (in the guise of Sumire) and Karin act as decoys and lure the Curse Mark twins into the woods. Although Sumire is able to free her teammates and inject them with a Curse Mark serum, the twins eventually catch wind of the gang's plan, and the as-yet-unnamed brother intercepts the girls shortly after their escape. Meanwhile, the head researcher attempts to murder Konohamaru in his sleep, only to discover that he's already escaped from the facility. Boruto and Suigetsu eventually find Tosaka, who leads them to Jugo, but before they're able to free him and make a break for it, Tosaka plunges syringes into their backs, grins maniacally, and welcomes them to his research lab.

Since Taka's occasional turns in the spotlight made for some of the parent series' most compelling episodes, it should come as no surprise that Karin and Suigetsu—and their various dynamics with the members of Team 7—serve as the latest installment's highlights. As the most talkative and forthright members of Sasuke's old team, Karin and Suigetsu tend to be the most fun to watch. Given how headstrong and determined Boruto and Suigetsu are, it makes sense that they'd clash on the subject of Jugo's best interests, and their arguments feel genuine and believable. Whereas Suigetsu has arguably changed the least of any Taka member, Karin has probably undergone the biggest change in personality. While the Karin of old cared about nothing but winning Sasuke's affection, the character has become far more levelheaded and collected in her adults years. Her Sakura-esque fits of rage are nowhere to be seen, and she now claims to view Jugo and Suigetsu (whom she was endlessly annoyed by in her younger years) as the closest thing she has to family.

Despite the rescue mission being underway, there isn't much in the way of action this week. Still, watching the remnants of Taka and Team 7 formulate and carry out a stealth mission is fairly exciting. While there aren't any large-scale clashes, the episode is able to convey a genuine sense of peril when the gang infiltrates the research facility—as if things could go horribly south at any second. Personality-wise, the Curse Mark twins continue to function as stock-grade anime-original villains, but there's never any doubt as to whether their abilities pose a significant threat. Tosaka's big reveal isn't terribly surprising, since guest characters are often reluctant friends or enemies in disguise, but learning more about his grand plan in the coming weeks should prove interesting. Whether he's a shades-of-gray antagonist or full-on evil is still up in the air, but based on how much fun he's been, the answer will hopefully be the former.

Although the fisticuffs don't begin in earnest until next week, episode 101 serves as a nice breather before the final battles commence. It's nice to see Taka (almost) fully reunited, and its members' interactions with the kids are both fun and fascinating. With almost all of the big surprises out of the way, Boruto's latest adventure now heads into its climax without overstaying its welcome.

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Black Clover - Episode 77 [Review]

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Black Clover - Episode 77 [Review]

We've got two new matches on the docket this week, the first of which features Luck and Klaus on a team together. Notably, Luck has upgraded some of his spells and Klaus has been doing some push-ups after Asta inspired him. There's not much to say about this one, but it's over quick. The most important fight this week is clearly Noelle and Yuno's team-up, which features way more substance than any of the other tournament matches so far. You have Noelle and Yuno bickering, Noelle's sibling rivalry coming to a head, and Yuno facing off against one of his own Golden Dawn comrades.

Noelle and Yuno's dynamic is pretty straightforward. They have the same royal/peasant relationship that Noelle has with Asta, except Yuno is skilled with magic, which makes Noelle feel even more inadequate. This isn't a source of conflict for the episode so much as an anchor to make the moment that cements Yuno's trust in Noelle even more meaningful. Yuno's strong enough that he probably could have taken the other team's crystal by himself, but Noelle wants to fight her brother and thus the tournament has an opportunity to reach emotional stakes beyond just winning and losing.

Honestly, that alone would have been enough story momentum for me. The tournament has been on auto-pilot until this point, so any emotional weight would have been refreshing, but there's also a more significant attempt to flesh out the side character participating in this fight. Yuno's opponent is Alecdora, a fellow Golden Dawn member who resents him for the preferential treatment he receives from their captain, William Vangeance. We get a flashback highlighting why Alecdora looks up to William so much—a little story about how William saved his life once and reminded him of a painting he saw as a child—and this gives us some added texture to the cult of personality that's been forming around William. However, Yuno could not be less impressed by Alecdora's jealous pity party.

Both Noelle and Yuno's victories this week have some punchy thematic work going for them. Noelle's fight is about how she doesn't need her siblings' acknowledgement anymore, since she's now been acknowledged by much cooler people like the Vermillions and the Black Bulls. Approval is one of those weird things where you might know that you shouldn't seek it from certain people, but it's hard to move on from that cycle until something better comes along. Truly, the power of friendship is the only constant in life. Yuno's victory is equally savage, but considerably less sweet. Alecdora believes he's more deserving of William's attention because he's working to make William's dream come true, to which Yuno replies, "I don't know anything about other people's dreams. The only dream I see is my own." That's so cold! Hopefully that pragmatism at least spares him from William's Voldemort-y side.

This is closer to what I expected from a Black Clover tournament arc, where the character work gets to be front and center. The animation is still keeping things chill, though it's not a drawback this week like it has been in the past, and there's a surprising amount of focus being put on the ancillary characters. I don't know if we'll see much of Alecdora or En Ringard, but the show went out of its way to fill us in on what they're fighting for, just to make the episode feel a little more dense. There's a good mix of humor, tragic backstories, and big uplifting speeches—just enough to deliver an entertaining episode.

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W'z - Episode 13 [Review]

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W'z - Episode 13 [Review]

Seeing as I likely won't get another chance to stand on this particular soapbox, I wanted to take this opportunity to point out something that's been bothering me for years now: Hand Shakers is a terrible title for this show, and it makes no sense. Everyone in this series is holding hands, not shaking them – there's a difference. If this were a show about colleagues who all gained super-powers after a brief but cordial introduction, then that would be one thing, but the name of this franchise should be something like Hand Holders, or Palm Pals, or Finger Feelers.

Now that I've finally gotten that off my chest, we can continue on to the W'z series finale. Back when Hand Shakers ended in 2017, I was bowled over by how stunningly anticlimactic its conclusion turned out; W'z no longer has novelty on its side, so while its ending is just as lame and unsatisfying as its predecessor's, I'd be a fool to have expected anything else. To W'z's credit, “My wish is surely…” at least attempts to tie a bow on the story, instead of just leaving things open for an OVA or God forbid another sequel. It still isn't any good, though.

First, the fight against Midori and Seba. We get a lot of buildup for Yukiya and Haruka's big plan, but it's poorly explained. It just amounts to calling on the two new Hand Shaker pairs from this season for backup, though Gai, Masataka, Senri, and Hana only show up for a brief moment to blast the bad guy and his butler with some energy beams before disappearing again. Then Yukiya and Haruka do their thing, by which I mean there's a lot of ugly CGI and characters flipping about with Nimrods, and the show tries to make Yukiya seem like the kind of level-headed badass that even scares a villain like Midori, but it doesn't work at all. Instead, when Seba and Midori retreat and promise to return with a vengeance, it feels more like Team Rocket is blasting off again.

With the villains having unceremoniously retreated, the three central pairs of Hand Shakers are put in charge of wrapping up the story. Tazuna, Koyori, Mayumi, Nagaoka, Yukiya, and Haruka all gather together and start waxing philosophical about the true nature of being a Hand Shaker, which has something to do with overlapping hearts and harnessing the power of a wish or some such nonsense. Tazuna explains that two of the three pairs have already met God, and since Yukiya and Haruka beat Seba and Midori, they must be at a similar power level. Apparently, this meansat if they all hold hands on top of each other's hands, then by their powers combined, Yukiya should be able to make his wish to magic away all of the story's conflict.

So that's literally what he does—Yukiya's wish is to “get rid of all the unwanted wishes granted by God”. Nielsen mentions that this wish is some kind of “repeat”, which I didn't fully understand; maybe it's a reference to the 13th episode of Hand Shakers I never saw. Either way, Midori loses the big gem in his chest, and he no longer has the ability to take advantage of Ziggurat, so I guess he's done being a bad guy. Seba then shares a sexually charged moment with Midori, where he princess-carries his teary-eyed master like a man carrying his groom across the threshold on their wedding night. The romantic subtext of the Hand Shaker pairings has never been subtle, but this pair has had such little presence in this series that their amorous little coda felt totally out of place (and more than a little weird, seeing as the two met when Seba was a full-grown man and Midori was maybe ten).

Everybody else gets their own happily ever after, too. Mayumi and Nagaoka are still doing their thing, and Koyori looks to finally be aging, which will be good for Tazuna, who probably gets asked plenty of uncomfortable questions about his tiny girlfriend. As for Yukiya and Haruka, they're just going to keep holding hands and spinning records, “meshing” together for all time. It's a nice enough note to end the series on, but it's also unearned. Nothing in this story has mattered – all of the stakes have been contrived or downright nonexistent. Mayumi and Nagaoka never needed rescuing, Midori and Seba were defeated with ease, and Yukiya's entire character arc consisted of learning to be less awkward sometimes.

This is why I think W'z is actually worse than Hand Shakers. That first season might have been literally unwatchable at times, but its superhuman level of failure merited a certain level of notoriety. W'z is technically superior, both as a work of animation and as a story, but all that means is that it's graduated from being a mythically terrible garbage fire to merely an everyday sort of bad. It's not horrible enough to be memorable, but not good enough to warrant any praise or recognition. Years from now, when my great-grandchildren wander the wastelands of our former civilization in search of answers to why humanity fell so far, I'm sure they'll be told stories of the legendary Hand Shakers. I'll give W'z maybe a week before I start to forget it even existed at all.

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The Morose Mononokean II - Episode 13 [Review]

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The Morose Mononokean II - Episode 13 [Review]

Spoiler warning for the manga version of this arc.

Ashiya Hanae not only starts out this episode possessed, but ends up getting possessed twice: first by Sasa, the spider yokai, then by his own father, Sakae. Episode 13 is the perfect coda for all the speculation about Sakae that's built up over this season, suggesting even more father-son strife in the future, should we get a third season. It's left me eager to dig into the source material—even if it does things much differently from the equivalent manga chapter. Either way, The Morose Mononokean II is powerful for how its supernatural drama ties into more universal concerns: Who are we, and how much does our upbringing factor into our identities?

Being "doomed to become your parents" is a thing that even people with wonderful relationships with their families worry about, because nobody likes to think they're set on an irrevocable course by fate. We all like to think we're autonomous individuals, and that our choices are our own, with our backgrounds and histories playing only a marginal role that's less important than our individual wills and desires. This becomes much worse if you know your parent was not a great person, and you still see aspects of them in yourself. Ultimately, that's why the saga of Ashiya Sakae is so compelling, because of what it means for Ashiya Hanae. How much can Hanae escape his father's legacy, both as an employee of the Mononokean and as a person moving forward?

Hanae starts out this episode under Sasa's hypnotic control, trying to open up her cage to set her free. Given how powerful she appears to be and her malicious attitudes toward humans, she'll be a real threat if she's set free to menace Hanae and Abeno. The latter has to use his hypnotic "influence" to avoid being killed by her; in the manga, she almost has Hanae do this under her influence. But suddenly, Hanae is able to shake off Sasa's influence—only to be possessed by a new entity, giving him a deeper voice and yellow eyes. But if those eyes aren't enough of a clue for us, Sasa recognizes this person; it's his father Sakae, using Hanae's own body and abilities to enact his revenge on yokai. Now Abeno has to fight for the suddenly much smaller and terrified Sasa.

We never quite get an explanation for Sakae's beliefs other than that he sees yokai as "beneath him" as a human, and he's proud of himself for shaking off "Aoi's influence." This is the first direct confirmation we get that he worked under Aoi—something Abeno later confirms looking through the coded pictures Aoi put in the "record" on Sakae. She had to keep Sakae's employment from the rulers of the Underworld, because she knew that they wouldn't trust her employing a human. Then Sakae did nothing but prove them right by killing and imprisoning yokai. Now he wants to force his ideals on his son. It's only through proving to Sakae that Hanae wouldn't want this—that he's a nonviolent guy who loves yokai, despite fearing them at first—that he's able to back down. When he doesn't believe Abeno's words, he sees the truth through the memories in Hanae's brain.

At first, this seemed like Sakae's own memory, but we learn later that the "Sakae" that Hanae saw as a child was really Aoi in disguise. She has the ability not only to shapeshift, but to make herself visible to humans who can't see yokai like Hanae's mother and sister. So Hanae has never really met his father, only an idealized version of him. Still, his father "exists" in his mind in some form, which is able to take over in sufficiently stressful situations. It's like a higher-stakes version of the way people might sound like their parents when they get angry. I like the way that this subverts the usual "lineage" prophecies in similar anime. Hanae does indeed come from a powerful bloodline, but one that could be a hindrance to his goals rather than helping him. His powers can easily take a turn for the worse, so he needs to suppress them to some extent. And Abeno needs to suppress the knowledge of this connection in order to protect him, hoping Sakae doesn't pop out at any inopportune moments. Since Sakae does seem as least somewhat motivated by protecting his son, I hope he doesn't take things too far. But this still poses the question of why Sakae is able to do this from beyond the grave. Did his spirit go into his son when he died? Does he have the ability to come back from the afterlife via Hanae's mind? Or is he not really dead? Is it only because he bound Sasa, so maybe a "piece of him" was residing within her?

Despite all these questions, The Morose Mononokean II manages to tie enough of a bow on things to feel like a conclusion or at least a pause in the action. The manga version of this scene greatly differs, because Sasa actually dies, the nature of Sakae's "possession" is even more ambiguous (he's never stated to be living in his head), and the overall tone is one of more foreboding and sadness than the comparatively optimistic anime. I like some of the anime's changes, like Sasa surviving; Fuzzy's speech to her about how humans saved him is really sweet, a solid reminder we need at that moment as to why Hanae is worth all this trouble. Sasa's arc in general was a nice reminder that even the most seemingly "evil" yokai still have understandable motivations, and they deserve the chance to keep living just like humans. It's a nice way for a finale episode to sum up the themes of the season in a way that still leaves room for more. But Abeno's reaction to Sakae's connection to Hanae rang false for me. He seems far more relaxed about this in the anime than I expected; the manga's tone worked better for me in that case. I understand the need to keep an upbeat tone for the finale, but this feels like something that will be handled very differently if we get a season three.

Episode 13 is far from a perfect episode, particularly in how it tries to adapt a tonally-disparate manga chapter to work as a season finale for the anime. The manga chapter works more like a cliffhanger, so making it feel like a proper ending was always going to be a struggle. Still, there's a lot of promise here to get me excited for the possibility of a future season. I always enjoyed The Morose Mononokean, but season two felt like far more "essential" viewing for the story. Even when the plot structure got somewhat confused, it always nailed the emotional and character beats underneath. Now that I'm hooked, I really hope we get more in the future, because I can't wait to see where it grows from here. Until then, we'll always have the manga.

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One Piece - Episode 878 [Review]

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One Piece - Episode 878 [Review]

With Whole Cake Island behind us, it's time to gear up for a new story arc. The Straw Hats' next destination is the samurai country of Wano, where Zoro and the rest of the crew are waiting for us, but before we get there we'll be jumping around the rest of the world and catching up on what we've missed since slinking into Big Mom's domain. Normally at the end of an arc, we'd get all these big-picture info dumps while the Straw Hats celebrate a well-fought battle on whichever island they just saved, but we didn't earn a party this time around, and the upcoming story developments are significant enough to warrant their own mini-arc in the form of the Reverie.

The Reverie is a political convention held every four years, where established government figures and monarchs all come together to discuss world events. This is an event that's been talked up in the series for quite a while, and a multitude of important characters have notable agendas, like how Fujitora wants to propose the abolishment of the Seven Warlords program, and the people of Fishman Island want to formally join the World Government so they don't have to align with pirates like Big Mom for protection. Many long-term story threads will come to a head here, and disaster is low-key inevitable.

But that stuff is just barely getting started this week, and the main bulk of this episode still focuses on the Straw Hats. At least half of this episode is filler in the form of a re-animated Luffy/Shanks flashback, and I could probably recite this story from memory at this point, so I'm the last person who needs a refresher. I'd say this is an especially unremarkable take on this flashback too—it looks like the Episode of East Blue TV special where they use more modern character designs, but it isn't nearly as well-directed or animated—it's simply here to kill time. I guess they have to make room for filler somewhere to keep themselves from overlapping with the manga, so these transition episodes are the sacrificial lambs.

Back in the present, news has spread about the crew's exploits in Totto Land, and it seems Morgans has written a massive puff-piece all about Luffy. The most exciting surprise is that the paper dubs him the new "Fifth Emperor," putting him in the same league as Shanks, Big Mom, Kaido, and Blackbeard. Whether this qualifies him as an official Emperor or not is up for debate (Sakazuki of the Navy rejects the announcement) but no individual person gets to decide who is and isn't an Emperor, since it's a matter of world power and reputation more than anything. According to the paper, Luffy's a mastermind who deliberately blew up Big Mom's tower, led groups like the Sun pirates, Firetank pirates, and Germa 66 to victory, and singlehandedly defeated two of Big Mom's strongest officers—Cracker and Katakuri. The paper also acknowledges the Grand Fleet that pledged allegiance to Luffy at the end of Dressrosa, so as far as the world is concerned, Luffy is a super-powerful genius who commands an army of 5,000 men and fears absolutely nothing.

Luffy and Sanji are both getting bounty upgrades as a result of this adventure, though sadly Luffy's new number is being held until next week. Sanji is now a man of 330 million berries, so for a brief moment his wanted level is slightly higher than Zoro's. But that doesn't mean everything is going right for Mr. Swirly Brow! Earlier in the episode, Luffy discovered a mysterious can in his pocket, and it turns out one of Sanji's brothers snuck in a Germa 66 transformation raid suit as a "gift" to Sanji. Sanji's annoyed by this and tries to throw the can overboard, but Luffy and Chopper are eager to see him transform into a Power Ranger and shoot laser beams. This surprise also comes around the same time that Sanji realizes the name on his wanted poster has been changed to "Vinsmoke Sanji," even after he went through all that trouble to properly disown his family. Life's just punking him at this point.

I feel like in another story Sanji would have disowned his family and that would have been considered closure, but here it's almost the opposite. Sanji got to re-establish his separation from the Vinsmokes, but in the process of dealing with them, their fingerprints are more visible on his life than ever. Sanji hasn't used the raid suit yet, but you know there's got to be a scene in the future where he has to choose between being stubborn or using this new tool, even if he doesn't like where it comes from. It's too complicated of a situation for me to definitively say this is a good or a bad direction to take his character, though it would have been strange for the story to introduce the Vinsmokes just to tell them to screw off and make them disappear again. Sanji kept his relationship to them secret for a very long time, and now the luxury of that secret is gone.

It's a shame that the anime is holding on to the exact size of Luffy's new bounty at this time, since it goes hand-in-hand so well with the Fifth Emperor reveal. This is a fairly weak episode all things considered, but I really like the compromises being made in upgrading the Straw Hats post-Whole Cake Island. It's a nice payoff to what was already a spiritual victory at best. I love the contrast between the chaotic mess that was the Big Mom assassination plot, and the perfectly executed middle-finger that the rest of the world assumed. It takes guts to fail upward this hard, and Luffy's a man of guts if nothing else. Nami is also getting a power upgrade in the form of Zeus, the right-hand-cloud who was seduced away from Big Mom. It's not clear how Zeus can operate independently of his original master, since he was given life by Big Mom's own soul, but I like that Nami now has a super-powerful (but still kind of dopey and cute) ability that's also technically its own character.

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PERSONA 5 the Animation - Episode 28 [Review]

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PERSONA 5 the Animation - Episode 28 [Review]

Christmas comes late (or incredibly early depending on how you look at it) in this PERSONA 5 the Animation finale special (that's not even the last anime we're getting). Those of us who played through the game can see how this adaptation handles everything that happens at the end, and those experiencing the material for the first time get to see how the story generally wraps up. Either way, it's a question of how much loyal fans will be rewarded after waiting all this time.

The good news is that after two cours and a poorly-paced previous special, ‘Stars and Ours’ finally seems to have a handle on executing its material in anime form. There are obviously a ton of last-stage revelations to get through, but the episode never feels like it's rushing through the big important information. There is one major case where a huge moment misses the mark enough to lessen its impact that I'll cover later, but at least the show still moves by smoothly in the process. This episode has a little bit of everything Persona 5: dungeon crawling, fights with monsters, existential dialogue, and even a few real-world antics with our team of kids just being friends at the end. It's all juggled well with almost no scene wearing out its welcome.

I say ‘almost’ because there are certainly some structural stumbles. The biggest issue with this special episode stems from how all the Phantom Thieves besides Ren are portrayed. Since their personal character development was already covered in past arcs, they're reduced to surprisingly little personality for this last outing. Even their particular quirks and tics seem extremely reduced in favor of taking turns sharing exposition or reflecting on the story's themes of thinking for yourself. It's an ironic message given that everyone sounds like they're trading off the same lines for this episode.

Anyway, the ultimate reveal of Persona 5's ending ties back into the cliffhanger from the previous special, where society struggles with a seemingly irrational inability to recognize the crimes committed by the likes of Shido and definitively "cancel" him for it. There are definitely shades of where our own culture stands on ousting public figures who fail a trial in the court of public opinion, though my knowledge of how this affects society in Japan is limited compared to the examples I know about in America. The trickier issue with this plot point in-universe is how one of the first revelations of this episode lays the blame for these shortcomings not at existing societal structures, but rather at the hands of a tangible antagonistic force. So, the societal problems in the story that mirror our own are here caused by the presence of an actual supernatural villain.

That's a difficult conceptual pill to swallow, depending on how you approach Persona's particular brand of escapism. On the one hand, I can see this fitting with the general fantastical teen power fantasy Persona 5 has traded in from the word go. Just as in this game, you have the ability to forcibly reform corrupt authority figures and magically make them confess their crimes, it would seem cathartic and liberating to do battle with an actual presence that could make society less frustrating once defeated. The main problem is that Persona 5 doesn't offer any real-world analogue for overcoming the corrupt God of desires that's causing its world's issues, beyond basic platitudes about free-thinking individuality.

The reveal of that supernatural villain is also the big stumbling point of the episode that I need to talk about. There are many layers to the story's endgame ‘Fake Igor’ reveal, tying back to recognizing Igor's personality and character from previous games in the series and playing on the audience's meta-knowledge about recasting his voice actor. It set the stage for an absolutely mind-blowing reveal in the game's version of events, but the anime version comes up short by comparison. I feel like it spends too much time focusing on explanations from Caroline and Justine and their subsequent fusion back into Lavenza, with the fake Igor stuck standing in the background not communicating the proper level of malice or threat. On top of that, the anime version has seen viewers spending much less time with Igor, Caroline, and Justine than players of the game, so people experiencing this version exclusively aren't going to be as invested in them. This revelation already depended on how familiar you were with Igor in the Persona franchise, so being even further removed from that context dilutes it more.

The final fight against the revealed Yaldabaoth at least hits the mark as suitably epic. The design and direction makes great use of this boss' CGI model. It's got real impact and just looks cool as hell. I'm thankful that the final Persona battle of this show ended up being one of its few good efforts, impressively illustrating just how a fight against something of this massive scale would even look in real-time (compared to the game's turn-based attacks). And it would be difficult for even the most struggling production to miss the massive cool factor of Joker's final attack: summoning Satan to shoot God in the face to save Christmas! It's another important moment the anime absolutely nails.

But then after that grand finale, we have to come to the epilogue of Persona 5, which has more of its own problems. The big issue is how things get resolved: Sae convinces Ren to turn himself in for his crimes, so he can testify against Shido and have him brought to justice. The insidiousness of this development is how easy it is to shrug off, because it fits into our ideas of how society usually works, but the problem is that the message of this story was always that society shouldn't have to work like that. For all their trials and efforts, the Phantom Thieves don't get to be hailed as heroes, the system is trusted to bring down Shido instead, and Ren happily sacrifices his own freedom ‘If it'll help reform society’. He gets out of juvenile hall just a few months later, of course, a reward for assisting prosecutors and owing to the efforts of all his Social-Link friends on the outside, but even that keeps speaking to the unfairness of this ending. "Everything can work out just fine, so long as you work with the system and have connections in all the right places!" It flies in the face of the societal upheaval the Phantom Thieves were working toward all this time, as they pass the baton on to ‘responsible adults’, like their teenage rebellion was just a passing phase.

I should make clear that I still have a lot of fondness for the original Persona 5 game's story, but its ending has always been one of the least interesting things about it. This anime version, for better and worse, retains all the issues of that ending. This finale overall looks great and moves its story well, only dinged in structure by most of the main characters not having room to express their individual personalities, and missing the punch of one of the story's biggest revelations. But the bigger issues with Persona 5's ending lie at the heart of its source material. Like the fleeting fires of youth it was portraying, the final takeaway from PERSONA 5 the Animation seems to be that the journey is much more interesting than the destination. Just one more reason why this story made a better video game than a TV show.

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Fairy Tail: Final Season - Episode 302 [Review]

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Fairy Tail: Final Season - Episode 302 [Review]

This season of Fairy Tail has a consistent issue where it tries to introduce too many plot threads in a single episode. I can see why it'd want to try that approach – there's a ton of characters all doing a lot of things, all of which are important and happening concurrently. Giving each its own episode would not only potentially raise the number of episodes needed to cover the material, but also feel like the show was choosing sides, so to speak, in terms of which were the most important. The unfortunate downside is that you get episodes like this one, where maybe one major thing is allowed to happen and everything else is in various stages of happening, with none of the plots getting quite enough development.

The winners of this week's plot lottery are Levy and Gajeel, and now that I've written that, I admit to qualms about my word choice. The two of them are engaged in the fight against Bloodman, a wizard made entirely of Bane Particles, which are deadly to wizards. Gajeel's all right because of his particular skill (iron lungs make for difficult Bane absorption), but Bloodman's not going to concentrate his attack on only one person. That means that everyone fighting with Gajeel, including Levy, is in danger of dying, and that's not something Gajeel can stand. What he doesn't realize (or want to acknowledge) is that Levy can't stand for that either, and she's not just going to sit on the sidelines and watch him fight, or worse yet, leave him alone to fight himself. They may have had a questionable start to their relationship (which Gajeel seems to acknowledge this week and definitely feels guilty about), but they're one of the few officially committed couples in the show at this point. Either would sacrifice their lives for the other.

That's a vaguely selfish way of thinking, of course. It leaves one half of the couple alive knowing that they're only that way because the other died. As of the end of this episode, it looks like Gajeel's going to be the one left alone, and I don't see him handling that well. Of course, Levy didn't only save him with her actions; her magic protected a lot of other people as well. But Gajeel is likely to see it as entirely his fault if she dies, and while that might motivate him to kick major ass, it could also cause him to lose his way.

While all of that is going on, there are other plots simmering. The least acknowledged is Mavis trying to get Cana to free her real body from the lacrima that imprisons it, but we also have Saber Tooth and Blue Pegasus regrouping and getting their feet back under them after Sting suffered an emotional setback. Probably the most fun this week, though, is Brandish solving Natsu's travel problem by simply growing Happy to an enormous size so that they don't have to walk to meet August. (Or is it so that she can snuggle a giant kitty…?) Mest, who snuck along for the trip, rightly assuming that Natsu is the least suitable person to send on a diplomatic mission, is less impressed with his companions' attitudes and trusts Brandish as far as he can throw Giant Happy, but that doesn't necessarily mean that he'll be an asset when their discussion with August gets going. He's clearly thrown by August's power level, which Lucy and Natsu seem to be ignoring, which could make him as much of a threat as Natsu himself if he lets his nerves get the best of him.

Whether or not that happens remains to be seen, along with whether Levy lives or dies and if all of the foreshadowing that's going into Irene's appearances is a red herring or not. This may not be the best-structured episode, but it's still moving things in exciting directions as the story inches closer to its endgame.

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Banana Fish - Episode 20 [Review]

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Tsurune - Episode 6 [Review]

Did this episode of Tsurune give you K-ON! flashbacks? That's because Kyoto Animation's Naoko Yamada directed and oversaw storyboarding for this episode, “The Reason for Shooting.” After last week's fairly formulaic training camp comes an in-between episode about the team ramping up for their first tournament. We learn about Masa's motivation, cover the team's aspirations, and get to know the opposition in a fluid episode that feels more like a part of a whole than a standalone chapter of the Tsurune story.

Yamada's fingerprints are all over this week's animation. Her preferred shots—feet in motion, steepled fingers, a chin lift accompanied by a wide-eyed expression—pepper the visuals. The music, which ranges from rambunctious to intense to sentimental, also plays a larger role than usual in setting the scene. This episode is about contrasts, which makes Yamada's focus on the details fit particularly well. Her shifting camera angles are a visual expression of the changes occurring in the kyudo club as the archers' feelings shift, as they grow closer to one another and more determined to excel in their sport. The most obvious contrast of the episode is between our protagonists and the Kirisaki kyudo team.

Six episodes in, Minato is still a mystery. We don't know what triggered his target panic or how we got that scar. Now we're uncovering not answers, but even more questions by viewing him through his rival's eyes. Shu Fujiwara is lauded as a first-year prodigy, but unlike his twin companions, he doesn't trash-talk other archers. “Are you acting this way intentionally?” he says, finally calling out their behavior when they reference “that one guy who self-destructed” last year. A scene depicting Shu at practice is delivered back-to-back with Minato telling Seiya that he's sure Shu doesn't remember him anymore. However, it appears that even after Minato lost confidence in himself, Shu never stopped seeing him as a rival. Shu must know the missing pieces of the puzzle that we can't yet see, which is why he feels so strongly.

Another contrast exists between Masa and his grandfather. I was wondering at first if it would be revealed that Tommy-sensei is Masa's grandfather. But unlike kindly Tommy, Masa's grandfather sounds like an exacting archery teacher and an extremely difficult person to love. When Tommy asks Masa if he teaches to surpass, forgive, or forget his grandpa, the latter replies that he teaches as a form of revenge. It's an explanation of Masa's laissez-faire teaching style—it has always been in contrast to the invisible strictness of his late grandfather. Re-watching Onogi's question about making his bow turn naturally post-shot after learning Masa's backstory puts the scene in a totally different light; Masa wants to help, but he doesn't want to be overbearing.

Tropes can make anime predictable, but they also make it a lot easier to review. This episode didn't fall strictly into any familiar plotlines, so it's difficult to label. It's a transitional episode, marking the gap between training camp and tournament as neatly as the study break for clubs that happens right before exams. It will probably make more sense when we're not watching week to week. For now, we can only look for new clues among Yamada's many visual details.

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Banana Fish - Episode 20 [Review]

There's still a lot of Banana Fish that feels weirdly dated, if not outright offensive in 2018. The episode starts off with a perfect example, as Yut Lung compares the Corsican mafia's ambitions to being like "the new Jewish community," which opens up an ugly can of worms of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories; if we're meant to dismiss this assertion because it comes from the mouth of a villain, the show doesn't reinforce that framing. This is also during a scene where Yut Lung is dressed even more like a girl than usual, making him a "villainous crossdresser" who also happens to be spouting anti-Semitic rhetoric.

But depending on your tolerance for these routine speedbumps in the Banana Fish viewing experience (and if you've gotten this far, your tolerance is probably high), you tend to overlook these problems to enjoy the more timeless aspects of the story. The pulse-pounding mob battles are the kind we still make movies about today, the interpersonal relationships alternate between heartwarming and heartbreaking, and even when the details of the series feel uncomfortably dated, the emotional core is what keeps things chugging along. This might be why even though so much of Banana Fish feels like a product of the 1980s, it continues to have a healthy fandom in 2018. It's certainly what keeps me coming back to this show.

Episode 20, "The Unvanquished," takes its name from a William Faulkner novel, but the title feels like it fits this episode even better. No matter what challenges come Ash's way, he remains "unvanquished," persisting to fight another day. It's also the first action episode in a while where it feels like everything works out in Ash and Eiji's favor, with neither of them ending up in the enemies' clutches. (Thank goodness, as I thought Eiji was screwed there for a while.) They're not out of the woods just yet since it's clear the baddies will regroup, and Yut Lung is newly emboldened to prove himself to Golzine too. Still, it's significantly better than where the last two episodes left us with Ash.

I was surprised how quickly the "party" portion of the episode flew by. The previous episode set it up as a major confrontation, but Sing, Eiji, and friends deal with it pretty quickly, rushing the blinded Ash out of there. Eiji is at his toughest yet, managing to land a bullet in Golzine's shoulder. It doesn't kill him, sadly, but it would feel like poetic justice if Eiji were the one to take out Golzine—he's the boy Ash chose over his captor, the boy that nobody ever believed was capable of surviving in this world. Maybe it's too early for Golzine to go down yet, though we only have four episodes left, and he's a significantly less interesting threat than Yut Lung. Meanwhile, Ash kills a dude while still temporarily blinded by following his ears. In the end, Ash and Eiji are back together, with Sing and Cain helping them. Of course, it isn't long before they're found in the sewer hideout again, but we get some softer moments first that focus on the relationships between our good guy gang.

Ash and Eiji get another tender moment with appropriately romantic music, proving that Ash is learning to trust Eiji's judgment. It's always cute to see Eiji mother his boyfriend, but it's all the more heartening that Ash lets him do it this time. He notably doesn't act this way with any other character. On the other side of things, Lao, one of Sing's underlings, forces him to explain why he keeps siding with Ash, the guy who killed Shorter. None of them trust Yut Lung, but they're not sure why Ash is any better. Sing explains that Ash is the only one who can "control downtown", otherwise it would be taken over by another guy like Arthur. Of course, we know there's a little more to the story than that, but this establishes that there might be strain going forward with the Chinese side of his gang.

As for Yut Lung himself, we delve deeper into his relationship with Blanca. Yut Lung understandably suspects that Blanca took the job with him only to keep a closer eye on Ash. He certainly seems to be looking after him so long as he's with the mob again, even telling Ash outright about his new contract with Yut Lung. Blanca also refuses to kill Eiji, citing that he isn't a threat to Yut Lung yet—but I suspect it's also because he's too curious about Eiji's relationship with Ash at this point. (He also knows Ash would lose it in a way that would hamper Yut Lung getting away.) Blanca agrees to renegotiate the contract to do whatever Yut Lung says, but it's still clear that there's tension between them throughout the episode. Yut Lung believes they can do anything, but Blanca knows that Ash and his gang are too much for Yut Lung to take down on his own right now—and he turns out to be right. Even with Blanca correctly predicting that Ash is biding time, he doesn't see what happens next, from Cain's rescue to the lengths Ash will go to save Eiji. He eventually threatens to torture Yut Lung while keeping him alive, which finally gets the two of them to agree to exchange hostages.

Yut Lung is doing all this to get the upper hand on Golzine. He knows their alliance can't last forever, and he doesn't want it to; he can't be anyone's underling, least of all Golzine's. As a Yut Lung Fan™, this episode certainly left me with a mix of emotions. I didn't want him to prevail over our favorite boys, but I would also love to see him get one up on Golzine and the Corsican mafia. He's a far more interesting villain with a real set of motivations beyond just being evil (though there's that too), and I suspect that he'll be a more compelling adversary for Ash in the long run because of their similar backgrounds. Of course, a petulant Yut Lung will motivate him even more, so I'm fine with this outcome. What's important is that Ash and Eiji are back together again for now, and their friends are temporarily safe too.

"The Unvanquished" is a pulse-pounding adventure of an episode, never letting up for even a moment. Even during its quieter scenes, we know no one is truly safe. I also loved the way it embraced New York as a setting, from the sewer chase to Ash and Blanca's showdown in the Museum of Natural History. Honestly, I was hoping for even more museum fights. Maybe they'll go to the Met next time, a classic New York film location that I've gotten to visit myself. Even if the show's portrayal of American cities is a little dated, watching these characters zoom around and make each setting their own is half the fun.

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Bloom Into You - Episode 8 [Review]

When you notice how "warm" someone feels to you, and you think it's just about differing body temperatures—well, "denial" is more than a river in Egypt. That's where we're at this week, as Yuu and Touko huddle together under an awning during a downpour. This is far from the first time that they've touched each other, so it says something that Yuu's reaction has changed. Yuu's feelings for her senpai have been blooming for a while, but this week they really blossom.

Bloom Into You starts out focusing on a different relationship this week though, the one between Sayaka and our two main characters. Our newly sympathetic "rival," who might now be my favorite character, runs into an unexpected old "friend" while shopping: the senpai she dated in middle school. The girl is still insistent that her old attraction to Sayaka was an aberration, and she wants to be reassured that she didn't somehow "turn" Sayaka gay. Luckily, Sayaka—likely emboldened by her new friendship with Miyako—does what every self-respecting lesbian should do in this situation and rub it in her old girlfriend's face. As Touko rounds the corner, Sayaka grabs her and pretends that they're together. Normally, I'd be skeeved out by this deception, but I think Sayaka's doing it for a good cause. I understand feeling nervous about telling the girl you like that you're gay, worrying about where that conversation might lead. Touko also admits later that she doesn't "mind" touching Sayaka, something that I'm sure set the poor girl's head spinning for days later.

The more important relationship this week is between Sayaka and Yuu, who've been paired up for the student council's relay team. Most clubs don't take the school relay too seriously, but in typical Touko fashion, she really wants to win. However, Sayaka's resentment of Yuu is getting in their way. So Yuu decides to be the one to reach out by inviting Sayaka to get food with her at "Y'Donald's," which might be the weirdest anime variation on "McDonald's" I've seen yet. While the two don't become best friends, they do seem to reach an understanding about each other and their mutual friendship with Touko, as well as recognizing that they each have feelings for her. Sayaka doesn't outright admit this but doesn't deny it either. Of course, Yuu tries to deny her feelings like she does all episode. I hope that more people stepping up to tell her the obvious truth finally helps lift the fog from her eyes.

Another thing this interaction reveals is that Sayaka knows Touko better than Yuu does. Yuu gets to see some sides of Touko that even Sayaka doesn't get to see, but there are some ways that Sayaka is clearer about her friend, and one of those has to do with Touko's relationship with her "real" vs. "fake" selves. Yuu hopes that after the play, Touko might act more naturally, but Sayaka knows that won't happen, because Touko doesn't want it to happen. It's not just that Touko can get somewhere by play-acting as her sister, but that she genuinely wants to be like her. She hopes to fake it until she makes it, until she becomes her sister to the world as much as possible. That's why she had such a strong negative reaction to Yuu's confession last week, and that will likely be Yuu's uphill battle going forward—along with acknowledging her own feelings.

Those come into focus in this episode's second half, titled "Rained In." The students leave school to find a downpour, and they're all struggling with what to do if they find themselves umbrella-less. Yuu thinks she's set heading home with Akari, but when she sees Akari's crush struggling in front of the door, she encourages her friend to go share her umbrella with him instead. That leaves Yuu stuck, and while the idea to call Touko occurs to her, she exhausts every single other option before running into her. It seems to me that if Touko were "just" her friend, she wouldn't feel that way. The only people I've felt that apprehensive about spending time with were crushes or people who had unrequited crushes on me.

The scenes between them later are sweet and affectionate, building on previous scenes like last week's and their first kiss early in the series. A lot of what makes these scenes work so well is the soft lighting and how their feelings flit across their faces, as well as the little gestures of affection that the camera focuses so closely on—as though viewers weren't doing that already. But what sells the scene most is Michiru Oshima's score, which was already playing at the top of its game throughout the show. Bloom Into You uses music so masterfully because it also uses the score sparingly. The only time the music plays much this week is during the scenes focusing on relationships, whether they're platonic (Sayaka's with the main two) or romantic (between Yuu and Touko). It tells us things the script can't without being too obvious, like the playful melody during the Yuu-Sayaka scene showing that they're finally getting along. In Yuu and Touko's scenes, the swell of the notes underlines their budding romance.

I've said in the past that I had trouble emotionally connecting to Yuu and Touko's romance, but I think this episode finally fixed that problem. It was hard during their rainy day scene not to feel your heart beat along with the romantic music, straining for those two to touch more every time the camera panned to their hands. As Yuu's feelings get more and more obvious, I'm finally as invested as Bloom Into You wants me to be. The show's visual and aural presentation does a lot to sell that, blooming beyond the limitations of the manga to make their love truly heart-rending.

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Boruto: Naruto Next Generations - Episode 83 [Review]

This week's Boruto: Naruto Next Generations answers a number of questions that have been lingering since the beginning of the current arc and shines a sympathetic light on the show's latest set of villains. With the cat now out of the bag, Ohnoki reveals that the artificial beings are being created as stand-ins for Stone shinobi in combat situations. Five years ago, the Hidden Stone was attacked by a group of rogue ninja, resulting in considerable loss of young life. This incident prompted Ohnoki to sanction the creation of Akuta, which he intended to use as a private army for the village. However, as the current Tsuchikage, Kurotsuchi forbade him from continuing the project any further. When Ohnoki refuses to allow the kids to see Mitsuki, a skirmish with Ku ensues, during which Shikadai is captured and imprisoned alongside Kurotsuchi. Amidst the chaos, Boruto saves Ohnoki from being crushed by a falling pillar and takes off with the old man as his friends and Ku give chase. Meanwhile, Sekiei gives Mitsuki the grand tour of the gang's base of operation, concluding with the resident scientist discovering that a curse mark resides in the center of his body.

While there are a few small action sequences scattered throughout the episode, the latest installment is primarily concerned with explaining the why of the current storyline. Although the end of the previous episode revealed that Ohnoki had a hand in Ku's scheme, there was always the possibility that this was a trick on the old man's part or an example of end-of-episode misdirection, so learning that the former Tsuchikage is fully complicit comes as something of a surprise. Of course, the franchise overseers would never allow Ohnoki to become a full-blown antagonist, and the reasons for his actions are believable, if somewhat contrived. The Stone's hitherto-unmentioned plight also highlights one of the series' recurring themes: uneasy peace. Kurotsuchi opts out of the Akuta project because she feels it violates the alliance formed by the Hidden Villages, but Ohnoki realizes that not every village is equally equipped to handle unexpected high-level threats. (He even cites the Otsutsukis as an example.) There's a good chance Ohnoki will come around to Kurotsuchi's way of thinking and see the error of his ways by story's end, but this doesn't invalidate the issues he brought up, and seeing how the various village leaders deal with post-wartime threats continues to be one of the most fascinating aspects of this sequel series.

The Mitsuki/Sekiei friendship is once again front and center this week. While their interactions this episode don't exactly tread any new ground, they help make Sekiei more sympathetic and add depth to what was originally a fairly one-note character. The most poignant moment comes when Sekiei shows Mitsuki his childlike drawings of his friends and emphasizes that his purpose is to protect the people his master cares about. Whether Sekiei will make it through this arc remains to be seen (although given the relatively short lifespans of artificial beings, smart money's on ‘no’), but he's shaping up to be one of the franchise's most three-dimensional guest characters.

As a decidedly busier affair than last week's installment, episode 83 immediately gets down to business and outlines exactly what's at stake. With Ohnoki's health in decline and the artificial beings constantly on the verge of death, the theme of mortality is inescapable, and it's hard to believe we won't be bidding farewell to at least one familiar face after all is said and done.

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Double Decker! Doug & Kirill - Episode 10 [Review]

Double Decker still has time to find ways to weave episodic detective stories into its runtime, even as the overarching plot still builds up to the oncoming finale. Doug's recovering in the hospital after his rescue, giving Kirill and the others a chance to run across some new Anthem-related antics there. There's plenty going on in this episode from the plot to the social themes this show likes to play with.

The plot concerning the hospital mystery has some appreciable layers to its setup. The kid Kirill meets, Gus, provides a nice personal connection to tether the cast to the situation emotionally. At first pass, I wasn't crazy about Gus's various character foibles, even if I could guess that his habit of propositioning women had some deeper impetus. Indeed, the reveal of what he's trying to do for the benefit of his dying dad turned out pretty sweet. But the humor mined from it is too simple, rooted in the show's recurring ‘Kirill looks like a woman’ gag that it's well worn-out by this point.

But the other parts of the drug-dealing doctor storyline work well as that setup gets expanded. As a drug, it would make sense that medical professionals of a less scrupulous nature might be experimenting with Anthem on a medicinal level. The doctor behind the scheme, the hopped-up patient that Doug and Kirill encounter, and Gus's dad provide some varied perspectives on using the drug in this way, and figuring out how they all fit together provides the mystery hooks needed to keep the audience invested. There aren't any huge shocks in the revelations that ensue, but the emotional pathos still lands, and it's neat that the plot point concerning the AMS bullets from last episode rounds back into the story as well.

I was at least pleased to see Double Decker touch on the possibility of the Anthem drug's legitimate medicinal possibilities. To its credit, the show has made a clear effort to avoid some of the black and white framing of its cop-show brethren; Doug's acknowledgement of classism and poverty driving crime is the clearest example of that. But with any series where the villains are powered by some kind of evil superdrug, there's a danger of equating drug use with criminality entirely, sympathetic or not. This week, Double Decker sees both Doug and Kirill bring up the more nuanced reality. “It's men that make a drug a poison or a cure,” as Doug says. However, I'm not sure the episode's final say on the subject landed for me. It makes the point that Anthem and its side effects are still too dangerous to be indulged, and the doctor's shady way of conducting his experiments ends up causing more harm than good. But the possibility is still there, though unexplored, with our heroes decrying Anthem because it would make the user a ‘monster’. Some acknowledgment by the end that research into Anthem as legit medicine could be worth pursuing would have been nice.

The character depths that get mined in this episode come out cleaner and provide some strong entertainment too. The best point that comes up is the revelation that Kirill is actually an educated expert on genetics, even having written an influential paper on the subject while in college. Kirill's always come across as ditzy, but I always felt he was smarter than he lets on, so this reveal totally works for me as an expansion on his character. Besides, the sequences that follow between him and the others are delightful as the rest of Seven-O tries to reconcile the dissonance of the Kirill they know with the knowledge he demonstrates. It's the stronger side of Double Decker's humor in action.

Other characterization lands on the more serious side, letting Kirill bond with Gus over their fixation on their family. I'm still unsure what the series is doing with Valery, but keeping the character in the picture as we head for the finish line is wise, and it also keeps Kirill more endearing. The ultimate point this episode makes about treasuring time with our loved ones is simple but effective, reflecting well on the main cast and the guest stars. So overall, this was a satisfying episode of Double Decker. My only major issue is that it couldn't follow through on its more nuanced points about drug use.

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Fairy Tail: Final Season - Episode 285 [Review]

It may have been another series that said that magic always comes with a price, but Mest sure is proving that true in this week's episode of Fairy Tail. Mest (or Doranbolt) has always been a bit of an oddity in the show, which is really saying something given the unusual nature of most of the cast. But Mest's magic is memory manipulation, one that can be used against himself in a way that most of the others' powers can't be, and even if he means to use it responsibly, that's not always going to work out. Case in point is what Mest shares with Erza, Lucy, Natsu, Gray, and Wendy (along with Carla and Happy) this time: that ten years ago he erased his own memories as a Fairy Tail wizard in order to infiltrate the Council and learn about the Alvarez Empire. Fortunately he gave Makarov the “key” to lifting the spell, but there were clearly some very weird years there with Mest remembering and forgetting his true mission repeatedly.

What's important, however, is that he went undercover at Makarov's behest. The canny old man was aware that the Alvarez Empire is a major threat – present tense definitely applies – because it took all of its continent's 730 guilds and consolidated them. That mega-guild has made threatening verbal gestures towards Lumen Histoire, Fairy Tail's most powerful spell which is comprised of Master Mavis' body locked in a crystal. Given that Makarov is leery of the Empire – and that in fiction anyplace given the designation of “Empire” is rarely good news – this implies that exactly zero good could come of them taking Mavis and activating the spell. Also, who wants the body of a friend stolen by a probably evil empire, nefarious purposes or not?

That, then, is the real reason Makarov disbanded the guild. After Tartaros ripped through, he didn't think that there could be any feasible defense should Alvarez come knocking, and therefore the best way to protect his family was to send them away. In part the information Mest brought him helped him to come to this conclusion, but the fact that Makarov immediately departed for the Empire with his own research as well means that there are many layers of secrecy here that probably aren't concealing anything positive. Since that was a year ago and Makarov remains missing (i.e. in Alvarez), it seems safe to assume that whatever he set out to do did not get done, if he's even still alive.

So that sets us up for our next adventure with the guild: infiltrating the Alvarez Empire in order to retrieve Master Makarov. Or rather, former Master Makarov, because before Mest takes Erza down to see Lumen Histoire, she gets nominated to be the newest guild master. It's a very Fairy Tail process: basically Levy just writes her name down on the new guild registration forms because it's clear that she's the only person who can keep Natsu and co. in line. Since she can't really argue with that, Erza ends up taking the job, whether she wants it or not. She does seem keen on getting rid of it as soon as possible, however, although she proves her worth for the position by strategically deciding to take only Team Natsu and Mest into the Empire to rescue Makarov; bringing the whole gang would just be asking for even more trouble.

All of that does make this one of the show's more serious episodes. There is still room for humor, of course, with the brawl Natsu and Elfman start filling that role, as well as Juvia's jealous panicking over Gray, assuming you find that funnier than I do. The guild rumor mill has also churned out a good one about Gray's supposed romantic activities over the past year, which is probably the humor highlight. We also get a little nod to the cathartic feeling of being back home that we saw last week when Mira comments that Elfman started the fight in order to feel punished for his perceived role in the Tartaros debacle, which is a nice thread to pull through.

It does look like humor and bikinis will play a bigger role next week, but hopefully the series can keep that emotional line alive. Remembering why the guild is so important to everyone is part of what makes this series good.

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GeGeGe no Kitarō - Episode 34 [Review]

Remember, everyone: your flatulence is a weapon, and one you must take great care not to misuse. It can't all be farts saving butterflies and stopping bank robbers, after all. It's also kind of an odd moral to this otherwise serious episode of GeGeGe no Kitarō, and one I assume was thrown in to make some of the more difficult subject matter a little less harsh for the audience, because although the show has touched on bullying and anti-immigrant sentiment before, Rat Man's storyline this time might hit kids a little closer to home. It's time for the annual yokai retreat, and the other yokai tell Rat Man that he's not welcome this year, due to his totally gross gaseous emissions in the hot spring last year, which effectively ruined things for everyone else. Rat Man doesn't appear to understand that he did anything wrong until the trip gets cancelled entirely and he's told to stop complaining about it because he wasn't going to be allowed to go anyway. That hits Rat Man hard – he's even got a bag packed for the trip, so he clearly didn't expect that his bad behavior would have any effect. And in all fairness, it isn't necessarily something that he could control, as anyone with a gastrointestinal disorder can tell you. But he's hurt and angry and he needs someone to blame who isn't himself, and conveniently for him, there's an easy person available: Agnes.

As an outsider, and one who some of the Japanese yokai see as having brought trouble to their shores, the witch is the perfect person for Rat Man to blame. With a little help from Carmilla (who, yes, he should never have trusted, but she fed him), Rat Man helps to orchestrate a yokai rebellion, handing Kitaro an ultimatum: Agnes must go. From an adult perspective, or that of a child who currently has reason to be afraid, this looks very much like political commentary. Much like the episode about the Middle Eastern refugees, GeGeGe no Kitarō mines current events and uses the supernatural elements of the show to frame them in a way kids can understand. Agnes is “from away” and “not one of us,” therefore, she doesn't deserve the protection afforded to Japanese yokai.

Taken differently, this can also be read as a way to interpret the social waters of the average middle school. Rat Man feels excluded from what he saw as his group, thrown over for someone new and different. While he may understand that he did something wrong, he can't grasp why it was bad, and that leaves him with frustration, anger, and sadness, which in turn leads him to make some very bad decisions. That he's ultimately able to save the day, to enable Kitaro to break Backbeard's hold on Agnes (literally, since she's trapped behind the lens of his gargantuan eye) is his redemption both in his own eyes and in those of his friend group – sure, he's gross, but he's a gross that ultimately belongs to them.

It's too bad that the rest of the episode's events, primarily Backbeard kidnapping and turning Kitaro's friends against him, isn't handled quite as well. That's not to say that it's not good; it just doesn't quite flow with the rest of the narrative. None of the yokai Backbeard takes seem to have any strong feelings towards Agnes either way, and while Sand Witch is perhaps the most beloved by the other yokai, there's not a ton of rhyme or reason other than recognizability on our part. Of course, what he's really interested in doing is appealing to Agnes herself; he knows that she's basically kind-hearted, and he wants to her to see her new protectors' in-fighting as her fault. This is where he figures without Agnes' own strength of character, however – the minute she sees that Kitaro is willing to call her a friend and fight for her, Backbeard has lost any fear he might hold over her.

That's also behind her decision to finally tell Kitaro what's going on next week. It's clear from the end of this episode that Backbeard has major plans for Agnes, plans she's been keeping to herself. Now that she feels she can trust Kitaro, I fully expect her to try to leave and the rest of the gang to keep her right where she is, but we'll have to wait and see. At least now we know that they can always have Rat Man fart on someone to save the day.

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Goblin Slayer - Episode 8 [Review]

I was right to not take the Goblin Slayer's apparent death last episode too seriously, as it's resolved in the first minutes of this week. One bed-sharing-based healing ritual with the Priestess and the Sword Maiden later (what a conveniently sexy solution), and our hero is up, no worse for wear, and ready to get back on the goblin-slaying horse. The show does attempt to parlay this into more information and backstory on the Sword Maiden, specifically that she's a survivor of goblin captivity, which would cement why she knew to take the goblin threat seriously and turn to the Slayer right away. But it runs into the same issue where every new piece of information just reinforces the same simplistic 'this world is cruel and violent' message, with a side order of remarking on how inherently weak women are while the Slayer doesn't seem to care about any of it. It was an opportunity to get deeper with its themes that turns into a misfire.

The good news is that after that sequence, this episode actually recovers as much as the titular Slayer. There are a lot of points where it seems we're heading down too well-worn roads, like it's just going to be another workmanlike daily-life travelogue, but there's actually a better balance this week. I like the way the show subverts the previous episode's “if we get through this alive” cliche by having everyone survive anyway and actually get to go enjoy the meal they were promising each other. This series has gotten much better at subtly demonstrating the character development of the Slayer through his slow-burn warming up to the other party members.

This is even more concentrated as we get to see just a few maintenance interactions with the Slayer and the Priestess between adventures. She actually discusses wanting him to open up in conversations and he demonstrates a willingness to do that. As much as we're aware of the character's trademark curt responses, it's impressive to see him consciously take steps to be more personable. It ties in well to other parts of this episode, giving us even more information on the Slayer and how his background feeds into his actual character. This episode opened with a flashback to his childhood training montage and how he got started on his hardcore goblin-slaying path, with a mysterious mentor playing Riddles in the Dark with him (complete with “What have I got in my pocket?”). It demonstrates how fearful he was as a child, learning to take steps forward despite that fear. He brings this back during his interactions with Priestess, admitting that he still feels the same fear that many characters in this world must feel, but choosing to do what he does anyway.

It all feels like characterization we could have used beforehand, if his faux-death scene last episode was supposed to land, but due to the sequence of events, it still works fine this week. The parts of Slayer's personality that he's letting show feel realistic. It's something the series has come to excel at, illustrating these personalities without shoving them in your face. Yes, the personalities of the Elf and the Dwarf still come off as rote as possible, but it's still an easy rapport where we can watch them grow together and learn to work as a team, so it's just enough to keep the story engaging.

This all pays off in the last part of the episode, where we still find time for some dungeoneering. Interestingly, it's another goblin-free outing this week, as we see the team fight a Beholder instead. They play up its elements of otherworldly horror by not referring to the big eyeball by name, but any seasoned D&D player knows this monster. This is actually a solid example of that tabletop RPG element being exercised by the show well. If you're still coming out for Goblin Slayer, then the on-brand dice-rolling and play-making is probably a key part of the appeal. What's cool about this part is how it strikes a balance between the meticulous planning and procedures that form the most efficient path to winning while still providing action-packed excitement. The plan the party pulls off portrays them as a well-oiled machine, going along with the Slayer's schemes and knowledge while still getting to show off the ‘cool’ parts of their skills. It's all structured around some decent suspense too, keeping the audience interested in the plan's mechanics. I've criticized Goblin Slayer for a seeming lack of confidence in its storytelling, but by this episode it feels more like it's come into its own in that regard.

While this episode's beginning still lingered on some points that it's struggling to execute, at least front-loading that stuff (as well as getting over the weak finish of the previous episode) made it easier to appreciate the things this episode did better. Much like the complex plans that lead the team to victory, Goblin Slayer is a show of many moving parts. Some of these parts are weaker than others, but this time around, the good compensated for the bad and resulted in an ultimately enjoyable outing.

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JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Golden Wind - Episode 8 [Review]

As expected, Golden Wind had Guido Mista's backstory waiting in the wings for us, much like Abbacchio's story from a few weeks ago. Young Mista looked a lot like Phoenix Wright's dad-phase, and he lived a carefree life (while always conspicuously lifting up his shirt to show his abs) until the day he tried to stop a sexual assault, and a series of point blank shots from the assailants missed him. He took this as an act of fate, killed the men, and joined the same path of noble crime as the rest of our heroes. While I don't think this flashback quite carries the same sympathy as Abbacchio's, I'm pleasantly surprised by how quickly the show is addressing the members of Giorno's new gang. When they were first introduced, I felt like they may as well have been nobodies, but now it's clear that their goals and personalities were far better defined than I was ready to give them credit for.

We're raging on with Part Two of Mista's Bizarre Adventure, as we chase down Mario Zucchero's partner, Sale. The episode is pretty much the movie Speed, with the action taking place on top of a truck going up a winding mountain, complete with an exacerbated driver who can't catch a break from either our hero or villain. Sale's Stand is Kraft Work, and its ability is to freeze objects in place, so his opponent's hand might get stuck to an object, or a bullet might get trapped in midair. There's something amusing about the immediacy of gunplay being subverted by a guy slowly tapping a suspended bullet while monologuing about how it's going to shoot his nemesis eventually.

With Mista's backstory now covered, it makes thematic sense why the Sex Pistols would skip the Number 4 due to bad luck. I just chalked that up to being a one-off character quirk, but everything about Mista is defined by chance and luck. A huge chunk of this episode's suspense comes from that superstition, with the darkest hour coming when he has four shots left in his revolver. If you were thinking logically, then of course you would think four meant he was better off than three, but the show stops you and says, "But four is bad news." You kind of just have to roll with it.

The Speed comparison really gets my imagination going about how JoJo's would fare in live-action (sacrilege, I know), especially now that the series' cast consists of more normally-proportioned adult men. I just love the melodrama that gets strung out of the same elements you might see in an action movie. Nothing in Hollywood is this weird or this exciting. I was kicking with glee when Mista finally gets that last shot off and pushes an already lodged bullet further into Sale's brain. There's that moment of suspense when you're just waiting for the bad guy to fall off his feet and die. It's the staging that really gets me over any of the animation-specific oddities.

So far it seems as though I'm just going to like everything Golden Wind does. The thrills have been astonishingly reliable, and even the aspects I was ready to brush off, like most of the Passione gang, have really come through. There's still some incoherent nonsense to sort through and understand, but everything's been so punchy and entertaining that I'm definitely still along for the ride. Maybe all these fight episodes will blur together as we get further into the season, but so far I'm having a blast.

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Radiant - Episode 8 [Review]

Sometimes your greatest opponent is yourself, and sometimes it's a bald man in boxer shorts. In the case of this episode, it's both. Just as Seth thinks he's making progress in his training, Yaga decides it's time to correct his perspective on magical power. Seth is forced to wear a pair of black silver gloves that prevent him from using magic, and on top of that, he's stuck cleaning the outside of Artemis in order to work off his debt. While scrubbing the city wall, he runs into the Bravery Quartet, who are trying to break in. The ensuing fight helps Seth to realize that having power is worthless if you just use it for yourself, and this epiphany is enough to convince Yaga to get rid of the black silver gloves.

In having Seth wear a pair of magic-restricting gloves, Radiant borrows yet another common plot point from the genre playbook. It's a familiar case of the hero needing to temporarily lose his powers in order to grow stronger in the long run. Sometimes this means learning to fight without relying on a special ability, but in Seth's case the lesson is more ethical than practical. As Yaga explains, growing stronger doesn't really get you anywhere unless you use that strength to achieve something of value. As is often the case with Radiant's “story with a lesson” episodes, this is relatively bland stuff for a veteran anime fan, but it's an idea worth presenting to younger viewers, and this episode does a decent job of getting the message across without belaboring the point.

In order to do that, the show once again calls on the services of the Bravery Quartet, who have somehow found a way to one-up their previous outfits in terms of silliness. The humor here isn't exactly subtle, but the episode commits to it, and it actually works. The image of Don Bossman and company shooting beams out of their butts while monologuing about the merits of magical underwear is so willfully ridiculous that I can't help but laugh at it. While the competition isn't exactly tough, this is still one of the best jokes Radiant has delivered in the last few weeks, and it's a good tonal fit for the show. When your protagonist shouts about his motivation on a constant basis, you might as well make the comedy as broad and colorful as possible. Even though the Bravery Quartet boys just reiterate their old views here, it's good to have them back.

This episode also manages to improve on its predecessor in a key area, though it's a modest step forward at best. Where last week's monster-hunting detour felt completely irrelevant to the overall story, it feels like Seth at least learns something of value here. Radiant's story gets more engaging whenever it asks the characters to reflect on what they're doing, whether that's Alma looking back on her decision to take care of Seth or Seth realizing that there's more to life than just being the strongest guy in town. These are the kinds of moments that make a show feel like it has something to say, and they may be Radiant's best hope of standing out from the crowd. Character development is a good thing, people. Let's get some more of it.

This is a solid “back to basics” episode for Radiant, and it comes at a good time. As it works to regain its momentum after a mid-season slump, the series is returning to the formula that worked for it early on: take familiar genre storylines, present them reasonably well, and throw in a simple thematic lesson or two. If it takes four grown men fighting in their underwear to make that formula work, then so be it. The question now is whether or not Radiant can use these basic building blocks to piece together a real plot. Comical bad guys are all well and good, but it'll take a stronger antagonist to really revive this series. Now that Seth is finally getting his magical act together, it's time to bring back the Nemesis and the Inquisition.

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Sword Art Online: Alicization - Episode 8 [Review]

The end of episode 8 brings to a close the series' adaptation of novel 10 (the second Alicization novel) by ending exactly where the book ends too. Strictly looked at from an anime-only standpoint, this was a solid but unexceptional episode. Kirito held his ground against the school's most elite student, who had achieved the pinnacle of his particular sword style. Later he finds out that the noble pricks have wrecked his flowers and discovers just how far the system of Underworld can be pushed by the power of imagination, while Liena completes the mutual promise she made with Kirito made by defeating Vola in the final ranking match, concluding with Kirito getting to award her the bouquet of flowers. Kirito and Eugeo advanced in glossed-over battles and got a couple of cute juniors as room attendants as they advanced up to Elite Disciples for the next year. And all's well at the Swordcraft Academy, although those nobles aren't out of the picture yet; the next episode's title suggests that they will come back into the picture for a pivotal role.

This episode shines more if you're familiar with the source material, as it cleans up potential problem spots from omissions that the adaptation has made so far. One of the biggest is that the anime doubles back to avoid eschewing the complexities of the Sword Skills or the importance of fighting styles, by also connecting that element to the impact that imagination can have in a swordfight and hinting at a development that will become critical later on; that image of the Gigas Cedar appearing when Kirito was steeling his resolve is bound to be revisited. Tangibly connecting fighting spirit to the weight of blows is a relatively common gimmick in anime, but this is one of the rare times that I've seen it tied to a specific mechanic in a game world.

Then there's the mysterious voice that Kirito heard during the flower incident. It clearly wasn't Alice's, so I'm certain it's meant to be the character whose introduction was skipped when the Zakkaria content was short-changed. This is an excellent place to work that character back into the picture, lending a greater sense of mystery to what's going on. Her words combined with Kirito's tearful ruminations also fill in another gap by explaining the significance of the flowers; making them symbols of Kirito's own relationship to the world adds a welcome extra layer of emotion and raises questions about what else they may come to represent about Kirito.

Beyond all this, we get one good duel scene and a decent part of one, but that's something that Sword Art Online has always done well. The two noble bullies are still comically over-the-top, but the series is still doing enough right to balance out minor problems like that.

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Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san - Episode 8 [Review]

This week's Honda-san once again proves that the show is strongest when customer interactions are front and center. Aside from the final minute or two, the entirety of episode 8 is built around Honda helping an assortment of quirky (but very believable) customers. From the affable yakuza to the Naruto-obsessed father-son duo from the U.S., each exchange features pitch-perfect comic timing and elicits an amusing reaction from the eager-to-please Honda. Honda and Armor's conversation about dealing with children dredges up some interesting revelations about both characters, with Honda admitting to always being dead inside when helping customers. In a brief segment toward the end, Honda's editor Azarashi (Seal) attempts to sell him on a live-action adaptation of his manga, suggesting that the original plot remain intact but Honda be played by a handsome actor. But Honda has a hard time picturing his personality being implanted into an easy-on-the-eyes hottie.

Although the theme of loving bookstores loosely ties these various skits together, episode 8 is primarily geared toward showcasing as many customer interactions as possible, and the results are consistently hilarious. As is often the case with the show's strongest installments, the bulk of the action is limited to the bookstore this week. While learning about the ins and outs of the Japanese bookselling scene can be both funny and informative, the series' most memorable material generally stems from Honda's dealings with quirky patrons. Even though overeager foreigners are becoming a tad redundant at this point, the Shonen Jump-loving father and son are two of the funniest examples of this particular archetype. Likewise, the extended encounter with the good-natured yakuza is equal parts uncomfortable and fascinating—particularly if this interaction was lifted directly from the real-life Honda's experiences.

The segment in which Honda discusses his approach to children in the store is endearing and illustrates a side of Honda he's largely kept hidden. From the way he tells it, kids seem to be the only patrons he genuinely enjoys waiting on, as they represent a sense of whimsy and innocence that's absent in many of the adults he deals with. He's not the only employee who finds children paying with exact change or making sincere efforts at politeness adorable, as Armor reveals herself to be even more enamored by their presence. Strangely enough, none of the workers share any stories about misbehaving or unsupervised kids this week, although we see multiple children innocently wander into racier sections of the store.

Honda seems to think that bookstore lovers are a dying breed, but the success of this show's parent manga may serve as a sign that he's wrong. The episode itself provides numerous examples of bookstore loyalists—like the man who carries 90 books home rather than ordering them online or the imprisoned yakuza who yearns to visit the store upon his release. Featuring some of the show's best customer interactions to date, episode 8 is Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san at the top of its game.

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SSSS.Gridman - Episode 8 [Review]

Sometimes you don't know where to start with an episode, and it's entirely a good thing. There is so much going on in this episode of SSSS.Gridman that just picking one favorite thing seems impossible. As major as the revelations from the past couple episodes were, there were also some contestable elements to how they were doled out. But just two episodes later, all that information comes into play in major ways. The status quo of the series is shifting as much as the monster-manipulated cityscape it takes place in, and the characters and their choices are being forced to adapt quickly.

So let's start by analyzing the big point this episode hinges on: Akane fully reveals herself to the Gridman Alliance, declaring her intent to attack during the school festival. It's a direct challenge that can only happen now that all the players know each other. I talked previously about other tokusatsu series that presupposed their character interactions on the secret superhero worlds they occupied, and this is the next step up from that. Beyond the obvious increase in the scope of threats, it also allows the show to proceed into uncharted territory. One central conflict in this episode is Utsumi and Rikka disagreeing on whether they should actually fight Akane now that their supposed friend is being so transparent about her goals.

Rikka directly calls out Utsumi's enthusiasm for guiding the Gridman Alliance into giant mecha/kaiju battles on a regular basis, a challenge to the enjoyable conceit of the show. Of course a bunch of adolescent kids and their robot would want to have exciting battles, and it's what the (big) kids in the audience want to see as well. But is it the best decision to make every time? The setup of this episode with Akane stands to challenge that assumption. She's revealed herself and given them several days to prepare, so does that obligate them to pursue a peaceful possibility with her? Yuta has seen how sociopathic she can be, but with Utsumi and Rikka still considering her a friend, there's attachments that won't be overcome simply by throwing big fighting machines at her.

Basically, Akane is playing the same for-kicks game Rikka calls Utsumi out for enjoying. She's set up this particular ultimatum for maximum drama, she literally shows off her new toys to try to impress the other characters, and by now she seems to revel in playing the ‘bad guy’ everyone knows her to be. As we've learned about her godhood status, the concept of her treating everything as playthings increases in scale. That's the point where her threat-level finally clicks for Rikka; when Akane claims that everything in the city was created by her, down to the characters' feelings for her. It's a hard enough shake to Rikka's core that she literally hits the ‘stop’ button on the bus the two girls are sharing.

The solution Rikka's apology lends to this heroic dilemma gives this episode its other strong twist. The absolute rule of Saturday-morning heroics is that the villains act first and the heroes react. Deploying Gridman ahead of the Kaiju's arrival to evacuate the school and head off Akane's plot is such an outside-the-box solution for this genre that it succeeds at surprising the audience as well as Akane. It's another escalation that can only be made possible by the relentless plot shake-ups SSSS.Gridman has dropped in our laps over the past few weeks.

All these storytelling tricks are fine on their own, but they wouldn't go half as far without the show's impressive presentation. The visual direction of SSSS.Gridman is on fire this week again. The expected quiet everyday scenes of the days leading up to the festival work as well as they always have, and now they get that extra oomph from Akane's direct confrontation. Various camera angles are used to enhance the surreality, especially in the Neon Genesis Junior High Students' amusing habit of lending oddness to any otherwise normal scene they occupy. The scene between Akane and Rikka on the bus does a brilliant job of playing off their interaction from episode 4, only now instead of just sitting behind Rikka as a power move, Akane is invading her personal space as a demonstration of her power. The character animation on Rikka and Yuta in the subsequent scene where she comes around is incredibly smooth, selling the casually awkward relationship they've developed. And of course, the long-awaited arrival of the fully-combined Gridman is greeted with all the visual fanfare one could hope for.

And I can't forget about the mecha fight this episode! As much as I've defaulted to regarding the Ultraman-esque Gridman as a mecha, Akane calling the Full Powered Gridman a straight-up robot is a wonderful acknowledgement of the show's escalating absurdity, as well as a great way to sell how her plans have been upended by the team's unconventional choices. The scene that follows is a marvelous media mix-up, pushing the show's usual 2D/3D juggling act to its hardest limits yet. More experienced fans will probably have a killer time just pinpointing which mecha sakuga and choreographic cuts belong to which animators or are being referenced by them. The actual process of the fight jumps between ground and sky, cutting to civilian-scale shots when necessary and just celebrating the kind of Saturday-morning excess that made us love cartoons and robots as children. If I had any complaint to make, it's that the fight ends too abruptly; of course I wanted more.

It feels like I'm calling every other episode of SSSS.Gridman its best yet, but that's because these escalating plot twists keep raising the show's own bar. This episode worked so well for me because it took the opportunity to analyze some of its heroic tropes on a meta level, which I'm an absolute sucker for. But it layered all that under increasingly strong character work, making the dynamics between characters more complex because of the dramatic reveals. It tops all this off with spectacle that understands the references it's making to its source material and action worthy of those predecessors. It's a confident show, and I'm having so much fun following it.

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Release the Spyce - Episode 8 [Review]

In “Intelligence on Organization N”, Fu, Goe, Momo, and Yuki get the opportunity to head out to Okinawa for a beach vacation, though their real mission is to rendezvous with local intelligence agency The Shisa and continue their pursuit of the mysterious flower at the center of Moryo's evil schemes. Along the way, the gang sneaks into a booby-trapped island fortress run by the insidious Nirai Kanai syndicate, Momo fights a man who uses literal snakes as weapons, and Goe battles (and subsequently befriends) a Viking. In other words, it's just another day at the office for the Spyce Girls.

While this is the first time the story has departed from the familiar streets and alleys of Sorasaki City, and despite the strange characters and plot elements the girls encounter in their assault on the Nirai Kanai base, this eighth episode really is business as usual for Release the Spyce, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. The past few episodes have been heavily indulging the group's interpersonal drama and the more big-picture plans that Moryo's been cooking up. While that's all well and good, it feels like it's been a while since we've gotten to see a core team of Tsukikage pull off a mission together, and this episode's relatively straightforward plot presents the perfect opportunity. “Intelligence on Organization N” is one part silly beach episode and one part 60s-era Bond flick, with a dash of “Enter the Dragon”-style martial arts exploitation to round things out. It's unabashedly goofy from the moment the girls' swimsuit antics lead to them meeting the Friend of the Week, a spunky young girl with auburn hair and a dark complexion named Ouka who sports a horned helmet as proof of her proud Viking ancestry. She's also working for the Nirai Kanai because they've kidnapped her grandfather, and she uses their sound-wave technology to control an army of snakes.

It's such an idiosyncratically goofy character to drop in the middle of this otherwise suspenseful mission, but it's just charming enough to work. The same could be said for the rest of the episode, which doesn't go out of its way to break new ground in the show's storytelling formula, but we do see Momo go toe to toe with a man who punches people with snakes while Yuki beats several people up with a selfie-stick, so I'm not too concerned about this episode's relatively carefree approach to tone. Goe and Ouka's fight is well-done, and the scene even takes a moment to call back to Goe's berserker rampage from last week, which I appreciated.

Yuki also seems to be losing her affinity for the superhuman boost provided by the spice, which ties directly into her emotional confrontation with Momo late in the episode. Our plucky pink go-getter is proud to have taken on the villain of the week all on her own, but Yuki tempers Momo's enthusiasm with a sharp slap to the face. Despite the fact that Momo technically disobeyed orders again to take on the snake man, she also proved her own capabilities when she won the fight without needing any help. When Yuki punishes her, it feels like the first time we've seen her truly lose her cool, because her admonitions over Momo disregarding her safety are clearly coming from Yuki's own anxieties about losing her place in the Tsukikage. It's a good scene that displays the kind of solid drama between Momo and Yuki I wish we'd seen more of – Momo and Yuki's relationship has fallen by the wayside in Release the Spyce's middle section, and I feel like this climactic moment would have played better if we'd had the chance to invest more in their dynamic.

Thankfully, outside of those hiccups and some occasionally middling animation, I was quite pleased with Release the Spyce this week. My only other issue would have to be with the cold-open, which featured Hatsume and Theresia dropping all pretense and duking it out. Hatsume removes the Moryo drugs from Theresia's system, and I'm sure the next episode will catch us up on what she and Mei were doing when the Okinawa mission went down, but otherwise this opening scene felt completely ancillary to the rest of the episode. Also, a friend of mine got her Masters studying Norse culture, so I would be remiss if I didn't inform folks that, unfortunately, real Norse warriors probably never wore those nifty horned helmets. The more you know!

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One Piece - Episode 863 [Review]

Carrot's new transformation was never meant to last long, and already it's starting to tire her out. Thankfully Brook is there to take a page from her book, running across the water to take out a few ships of his own and catch her before she's completely done. I was already kind of iffy about the Carrot fight from last week, wishing the better cuts of animation could connect more without being sandwiched between so many flat panning shots, and now this episode has even less spectacle to work with as we focus more on dialogue and story than straight action. Carrot's Sulong form reaches its end, and now it's up to the Straw Hats to fight Big Mom face-to-face while she sleeps it off.

Elsewhere, Sanji and Capone are arguing over how to handle the cake as they make their way over. Capone wants to poison the cake and finally put an end to Big Mom's reign once and for all. It's the logical choice, since even if our heroes manage to escape Totto Land, we wouldn't want to know Mom is still kicking around. But we're not dealing with logic here. Sanji's determined to beat Big Mom purely on the strength of his cooking. It's that Dragon Ball logic of "No, we have to win the fun way!" that might infuriate audience members who don't want to see their protagonists be such prideful selfish dimwits. (But I love it.)

However, the real meat of the story lies with Big Mom. The longer her rampage goes on, the more you start to see Mother Carmel in her face, like a ghost that's followed her around for her entire life. Thanks to Prometheus, she now has giant flaming hair with a jack-o-lantern smile, and she's looking more like an otherworldly monster than ever despite the fact that she's gradually regaining her original consciousness. (At the very least, she can speak in full sentences again.) Our currently standing crew isn't a match for her up close like this, and now she's tearing the Thousand Sunny to pieces while our shipwright is far-off in the distance, waiting in a completely different arc.

I find this stage of Big Mom's descent into madness so powerfully compelling, especially in the manga where the stark black & white expressionism speaks to me in Rorscach-like ways. Big Mom is the abyss, the point where humanity and inhumanity are one and the same. She's the coked-up version of so many familiar human flaws—addiction, hypocrisy, and the need to impress imaginary versions of people we create in our heads. Within Whole Cake Island, there's a sobering acknowledgement that we are often creatures of impulse, and there's a primal fear that it's all we truly can be. Specifically, that panel of Big Mom landing on the deck is deeply etched into my subconscious. It's the image I most heavily associate with Whole Cake Island.

This is a strange episode that's abundant with unique directorial choices in shot composition and music, and yet the whole thing feels so unwieldy and distant. That sort of works in its favor by making the episode feel disorienting and off-kilter, but I don't think the energy's been exciting enough in the past few episodes to earn that sense of exhaustion. We need to feel like we've flamed out in a blaze of glory (the importance of the Sulong fight scene), and now we're trying to get our next high off the remaining fumes.

We're in a strange place with the anime right now, where the story is juggling a large variety of tones and ideas at once, so the pacing has to be a lot more careful than just padding everything out for dramatic suspense. Easily my favorite material this week is the stuff with Big Mom on the ship, but all of that is sadly packed into the last couple minutes. This is an episode of sluggish roughness that occasionally lights up with moments of brilliance because the story beneath the surface is so profound.

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Release the Spyce - Episode 5 [Review]

Release the Spyce takes us back into the hunt for Moryo and the drugs that are flooding into Sorasaki, with Momo and Yuki working to track down clues that link the criminal syndicate to the mysterious company known as Kytuen Science. The girls brave an attack from one of Moryo's most intimidating goons yet, we're one step closer to fully revealing the identity of Tsukikage's traitor, and Momo even learns a lesson about taking some time for herself once in a while. The resulting twenty-four-minute adventure is another perfectly entertaining, well-directed, and mostly well-animated spy romp, though the heavy emphasis on the Moryo stuff this week goes a long way in highlighting that spark of flavor that has ironically been missing from Release the Spyce so far.

I think it's telling that my personal favorite chapter of Release the Spyce was last episode, which mostly ignored the the Moryo shenanigans unless it was using them as a means to the end of a character's emotional journey. When the nitty-gritty of the lore and plot are used as fuel for character-focused storytelling, I think Release the Spyce really sings. When RSP goes all in on its spy-ficton indulgences though, I find myself checking out a little, and not for lack of effort on the show's part. “Phantom Protocol” has all of the mainstays you could want from a spy piece: fancy gadgets, a fight with a muscly henchman that takes place on a train, a conspiracy that seems to reach into every corner of Sorasaki's criminal underworld, and a possible traitor that's luring our heroes deeper into Moryo's clutches. The mysterious woman in charge of Moryo even has a cute bird with its own little villain-scar, which remains an adorable touch.

Unfortunately, while all of these elements should make for a thrilling caper, Release the Spyce just can't seem to imbue them with the energy and suspense that the show reaches for. The ground-level gangsters, Emo and Marco, hardly make for threatening antagonists, and Moryo's brutish assassin Dolte is too easily taken down both times she tries to make a move on our heroines. The train fight between Momo, Yuki, and Dolte is likely the weakest action sequence that RSP has delivered so far, feeling uncharacteristically flat and sluggish for a series that usually has no problem making such scenes feel breezy and fun. There's also little for the team as a whole to do; the girls all make a big show of using Hatsume's invisi-cream to sneak into Kyuten Science, but not much comes of their infiltration, and the too-brief raid on one of Emo's drug operations is little more than an excuse for the other girls to throw Momo a birthday party. That's cute and all, but it's hardly the best use of the narrative's time.

The birthday B-plot is the other main focus of the episode, and even it feels weak in comparison to what's come before. Now that Momo has discovered the world of spies and spice, trained her body and mind to work with the Tsukikage, and overcome her rookie instincts to become a valuable member of the team, Momo's central conflict this episode is that she's not taking time to rest and relax. Sure, RSP makes an effort to tie this into Momo's continuing struggle to feel worthy of Yuki's mentorship, but I think there's something amiss with the story's sense of escalation when our protagonists' issues can be solved with a nap and a birthday cake.

It may sound like I'm down on Release the Spyce this week, but it's only because I still feel the show is capable of more than it's accomplishing right now. It's still a good-looking action series with fun characters and a great soundtrack, but it's also failing to make an impression with its story. The post-credits stinger names Hatsume as the mole selling Tsukikage out to Moryo, and putting aside whether or not this is a red herring, the biggest point of concern is that I had to double-check the show's wiki to remind myself who Hatsume was, because she's had so little to do outside of whipping up gizmos for the other girls to use. Hopefully next week's episode will give Hatsume and other members of the cast some more opportunities to stand out from the pack, and with any luck that more personal connection to the traitor-plot will give Release the Spyce a much-needed kick in the pants.

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Goblin Slayer - Episode 5 [Review]

So I believe this is the first episode of Goblin Slayer without any goblins in it. No goblin slaying of any kind takes place. Instead, as its title implies, ‘Adventures and Daily Life’ is about establishing the working routine of this world and the people who go about their business in it. And yes, that same well has already been visited in past episodes, but Goblin Slayer has never shrunk from reiterating itself. That sense of ongoing routine is baked into its premise, after all. And while I continue to be less than impressed with the show's insistence on presenting things as rote as possible, this episode at least succeeds at its clear goal of selling that ‘real fantasy world’ aspect.

The most clear story thread present in this episode concerns a pair of rookie adventurers taking on another classic early quest scenario: killing giant rats in a sewer. They lose their sword and talk to a procession of other characters about their options, eventually leading to a sit-down with the Goblin Slayer himself who gives them some good advice. The idea seems to be that this duo's interactions with the Slayer and other characters builds up this world to make it feel more alive. In that respect, adding this breadth of details works. But the episode still succumbs to the dry, flat sensibilities that have kept the show's engagement minimal in its least entertaining moments.

The episode's first half in particular is quite guilty of this. Large portions of it simply feel like the Goblin Slayer chatting with established characters to remind us of who they are. “I'm running into everyone today” he remarks at one point, commenting on how procedural this all feels. There is more of a sense of something developing with the rat-killing duo as their plotline comes and goes, but it's all still very meandering. It's not ever clear why we're taking this detour with these characters, save for it serving as a demonstration of how adventurers in this world can fail a quest in a way that doesn't lead to their horrific deaths. The story's insistence on not giving anyone names also frustratingly obfuscates if these two are meant to be characters who may recur later or simply a flavorful addition to an otherwise dull episode.

I keep circling back to discussing this duo rather than remarking on the titular Goblin Slayer's portion of the episode simply because his contributions feel so unremarkable. His repeated catchphrase throughout this episode is “I didn't do anything”, intended as a humble reaction to being thanked for helping people, but it comes off more like an apt observation of how uneventful his scenes feel. He gets some decent world-building bits, like dispensing more realistic fantasy weapon advice to the rat exterminators. And the whole portion at the end with him sitting in on the promotion exam turns out to be ripe for setting development that feels like it might actually lead somewhere later down the line. That's further served by all the information we glean from the discussion between Guild Girl and her Priest friend after Goblin Slayer leaves the room.

The show also continues to get some entertaining mileage out of its main character's one-track goblin-slaying mindset, with his line about the best way to replace a lost sword being to ‘steal one from a goblin’ getting a good laugh out of me. Given how tonally distaff the show can be sometimes, I find myself questioning how seriously I'm supposed to take it in any given moment, so some genuine humor is appreciated. The point of that may be to contrast with the ups and downs of how things turn out for the adventuring duo, with the guy's savage attack on a giant cockroach giving way to a jovial tavern celebration of their triumphs. As with the horrors pointedly demonstrated in the first episode, this one seems to be pushing the idea that such events are commonplace in this world.

But framing the happenings of a fantasy town as boring and routine doesn't necessarily make for the most interesting half-hour of television. This episode feels like a collection of framing stories that would have been better used between more adventurous parts of episodes where more stuff actually happened. Putting them all together in this way just comes off like rote filler in a show that isn't running long enough to need it. It's kind of neat that this fantasy story is constructed with enough moving parts that an episode like this could be done so early, but just because they could do something like this doesn't mean they should.

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Sword Art Online: Alicization - Episode 5 [Review]

With episode 5, the series makes a much-needed transition back to the physical world to show what happened in the wake of Johnny Black's attack from the end of episode one. This episode doesn't quite explain why Kazuto is in Underworld, but it does set up most of the context necessary for that explanation next week. Still, as setup episodes go, this is a quite effective one that ties in some threads from various other parts of the franchise.

This episode corresponds exactly to the first 37 pages of novel 10, though it's the least direct adaptation so far. While some scenes are copied practically word-for-word from the source material, others are new. The most significant thing dropped is a more detailed commentary on AIs and how Yui carries out her searches, but I thought that bogged the story down when I was reading the novel, so it's not missed here. I was also pleased by how this version keeps the supporting cast more involved, such as with Klein driving Asuna and Suguha around during the investigation. The most significant addition is that various characters are shown using the Augma devices from Ordinal Scale so they can interact with Yui on location in the physical world. It's a slick way to integrate the movie content without disrupting the original story at all. Another addition is the opening scene that specifically links the incident with Johnny Black back to the raid on Laughing Coffin in Aincrad, as shown in the GGO arc. It's an example of a scene that works better in animated form than it might have worked in print, making for a sharp inclusion.

From a pure storytelling perspective, the most significant moment is the formal introduction of Rinko Kojiro, the coworker/lover of Akihiko Kayaba who was mentioned briefly in the epilogue of the Mother's Rosario arc as the person who had passed on the designs for the Medicuboid from Kayaba. She's a crucial link in the overall story, and not just because she provides the means for a disguised Asuna to sneak onto Rath's Ocean Turtle. (The “rath” creature from the poem “Jabberwocky” has been described as both a turtle and a pig, hence the significance of Rinko's observation about what the Ocean Turtle looks like. In other words, it's another overt reference to Alice in Wonderland.) A picture of her provides another link to Ordinal Scale, and her flashback scene to her time with Kayaba also provides some of the keenest insight yet into what Kayaba may have been trying to accomplish with the game Sword Art Online. Kayaba indicated at the end of the very first arc that Aincrad was based on a childhood dream, but this flashback scene clarifies that he never got to finish that dream and find out what was at the top. That raises the tantalizing suggestion that Kayaba's participation in the game as Heathcliff was more about trying to complete his childhood dream than just wanting to monitor the game's progress from the inside. It also adds new meaning to his plan to make himself the final boss on floor 100.

But, again, her introduction and the discovery process are all setup for next episode's reveal about Kazuto's status. Certain assumptions can be made from the doctor's concern that Kazuto could have suffered brain damage after his heart was stopped for five minutes, but the how and why will have to wait for the next episode. Asuna also deserves some props for being able to pull off the deception even with the technical assist, including some remarkably good English. The attention to detail on clothing designs is another high point, as the avatars in the opening scene in ALO were clearly updated and various characters were wearing outfits in the physical world that I don't think we've seen before; the cat heads on Suguha's outfit were an interesting detail. The one technical downside is that the CG rendition of the helicopter was a bit too artificial. The return of some of the franchise's core musical themes and the scene where Yui encourages Asuna to follow in Kazuto's footsteps were also nice touches, as was the symbolic scene where a strand of Rinko's hair slides out from being tucked behind her ear – the same kind of strand that Kayaba had brushed back in a tender moment in the flashback. It's a simple scene that's nonetheless loaded with meaning.

As both setup for what's to come and an effective adaptation of the source material, this episode warrants a high score.

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Fairy Tail: Final Season - Episode 282 [Review]

Welcome to the action episode of Fairy Tail! Not that most episodes aren't action-packed, but this one marks the first major battle with most of our main cast. That's not surprising, since prior to the end of last week, we had no way of knowing if Team Natsu, let alone all of Fairy Tail, would ever come back together, so in some senses, this is a big deal because it does away with half of that concern for good. With the reveal that Gray was working for Erza in investigating the Avatar cult, we now have all five humans and two cats who make up the group back in the fold, six if you count Juvia. (I'm torn on that one, personally.) And you know what that means – it's time for everyone to strut their stuff and show off just how much they've grown in the year since they were last together.

In some ways, that's what makes this episode fun and exciting. It would have been easy to write off Lucy's new Star Dress transformations as just fanservice, but now that we've seen her use Taurus, it's clear that that is not the case. The outfit may not offer much support (bras need to cover the entire underboob area to provide support, artists), but it has drastically upped her physical strength. Given how people have generally regarded her as the weak link magic-wise, whether or not that's strictly true, this is a major coup for Lucy. Her magic may not be as flashy or destructive as her teammates', but she's clearly grown as a magician just as much as they have.

Wendy gets to be the second most impressive in terms of magical power changes, because frankly we expect Gray, Natsu, and Erza to be ridiculously overpowered. Like Lucy, Wendy can now really hold her own with more than just support or healing magic, and Carla's doing pretty well too with her new human form. (The scene where she smacks a guy with her tail is kind of great.) Yes, probably the girls' new power-ups still pale in comparison to the guys' and will still be more back up than main attackers, but it's still impressive how far they've come in a year. (Amusingly, they're also more circumspect about showing off as well; Natsu and Gray immediately start boasting at each other.)

In terms of getting the gang back together again, it's nice to see Gray apologize to Lucy, because she went through some awful stuff at Gomon's hands. What's more amusing is to see Natsu charge in between them while they're talking; while I wouldn't suggest romantic jealousy, it's still clear that he resents being left out of the conversation, and I wouldn't put it past him to have been counting on holding Lucy's poor treatment over Gray's head. Gray clearly has missed Lucy, and that's good to know, because it does imply that the relationships within the guild were not superficial. That doesn't excuse not contacting each other, especially within Team Natsu, but it is a hopeful sign.

Meanwhile, Avatar's plans to summon Zeref by creating a site of mass murder is one that, while perfectly in line with their creepy cult, may be a little difficult for some people at this particular moment. What's more important than their plans is what it says about Zeref's reputation; those who are familiar with Fairy Tail Zero will see the disconnect, but others should be paying attention for it, because it will be there. The mention of the Book of E.N.D. is another major piece of the story's end game worth keeping an eye on, because as things get going, it's a name you're going to need to remember.

With all of this foreshadowing and happy reunioning going on, it's too bad that the art and animation aren't as good as they could be this week. The prime offender is, of course, Erza's horse and his creepy horse grin, but Gray's consistently off-model (especially his pants), and there are a lot of shots where the characters look unfinished. Luckily the story is good enough to offset this, and with more answers coming next week, it seems that will continue to be true.

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One Piece - Episode 860 [Review]

Capone "Gang" Bege: Pirate. Crime boss. Murderer. Absolutely stellar husband and father.

Our heroes have hit a low point in their attempt to soothe Big Mom with the most delicious wedding cake in the world. Luffy's fight with Katakuri is currently a bust, and Charlotte Oven has stopped the cake-baking team in their tracks. The heart and soul of this episode belongs to Chiffon and the new life she's carved out with Capone and his crew. She's determined to repay her debt to the Straw Hats, even if that means letting her brother kill her, but since this is One Piece, such a scene is merely an opening for her actual loved ones to rush in and fight, no matter how dangerous or reckless it is to do so. The Charlottes are so messed up as a family unit that even a crew of backstabbing mafia bros look amazing and heroic in contrast. Capone and Chiffon were paired up in a political marriage just like any of Big Mom's children, but like Sanji and the Straw Hats, they've developed a real family now, and their enduring love will see them through the end of this battle while the rest of the Charlottes self-destruct.

This is an especially slow and padded episode, but I'm impressed that the emotional core manages to shine through so clearly regardless. Chiffon is great. Capone is great. Sanji and Pudding are great. (And I love seeing Pudding graduate from blushy tsundere to unabashed horndog—character development!) The tides are turning back in our favor confidently, and the show knows how to wring this small amount of story material for all its worth. I felt like the soundtrack choices were notably effective throughout the whole episode, and the numerous subplots that we jump between all make sure to show our heroes regaining control of their circumstances.

Moving away from the shore of Cacao Island, we briefly revisit the Sunny crew. Not much has changed for them as they remain in the clear, but we're teased about what's to come with them—especially Carrot, who spends her time looking up at the afternoon sky, wondering if tonight could just so happen to be a full moon. We know something happens to the Minks during a full moon, so it's time to prepare for some were-bunny action!

And then we conclude the episode by wrapping up Luffy's Nuts Island shenanigans. As long as Luffy has a grip on Brulee, Katakuri can't actually escape from the mirror world at all. If Luffy was simply concerned with surviving this adventure, he could just leave Katakuri behind and one of the arc's strongest enemies would be effectively taken out of the story. But of course, Luffy isn't smart in that way. Rather than rejoining his crew early and helping out in the Big Mom chase, he decides he wants to go back and fight Katakuri some more, believing that winning the fight and growing stronger from it would make him a much more effective captain for future battles. When else is he going to have the chance to beat a man worth one billion and learn some of that future-reading Haki for himself?!

This is where the recent structural issues come into play. I don't dislike the recent Nuts Island detour on its own, but either Luffy's decision to return to the mirror world is another disappointing hit of the reset button or this is an essential character choice for the arc that's let down by the numerous episodes of dillydallying before it. The Katakuri fight is too damned long as it is, but it does have an integrity that's necessary for understanding the pathos of the story. Luffy doesn't have to fight Katakuri anymore, but he wants to. It's like the golden bell on Skypiea, where a huge chunk of the final battle persisted because Luffy had something personal he wanted to accomplish.

This is a thoughtful and sharply directed episode that ends this particular story act on a high note. The Katakuri fight should resume next week, and the cake is now finally seaborne. Despite how bloated it felt in pacing, the quality of its material and execution do a fantastic job compensating. Everything's coming together for our heroes in a delightfully messy way.

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Boruto: Naruto Next Generations - Episode 80 [Review]

After last week's battle-heavy action extravaganza, Boruto: Naruto Next Generations slows things down in one of its most reflective episodes yet. Having overexerted himself in his fight against Boruto, Sekiei is growing weaker by the second as his body deteriorates. While Kokuyou returns to base for help, Mitsuki sits with Sekiei and shares everything he's learned about being human. Shortly before passing out, Sekiei forces Mitsuki to tell him the truth about what happened on the night the group departed the Leaf. Despite learning that Mitsuki intentionally saved the guard's life and left a message for Boruto, he agrees to keep his friend's secret and vouches for him when Kokuyou returns with Kirara and Kako in tow. Meanwhile in the Hidden Stone, Kurotsuchi is attacked and subsequently captured by Ku, who claims that he needs her to step down as Tsuchikage.

In the first distinctly Mitsuki-centric episode in a while, we're given a bit of additional insight into what went down at the main gate on the night Mitsuki left with the Stone shinobi. As his actions at the end of the previous episode indicated, Mitsuki willingly chose to accompany Sekiei and company, although their plans had apparently been to capture him had he refused. This arc continues to do a good job of not revealing too much information at once, and despite everything we learned this week, there are quite a few questions that have yet to be answered. For a while, it seemed like a foregone conclusion that Mitsuki was playing these guys, but now it seems entirely possible that he went with them out of genuine curiosity about the nature of his existence instead of going undercover on behalf of the Leaf. We're also left in the dark as to the exact nature of Ku's grand scheme, but so far, the mystery surrounding his plans helps lend an air of menace to the character, setting him apart from many of the franchise's anime-original villains.

Mitsuki's blossoming friendship with Sekiei continues to be one of the most interesting facets of this storyline. As Mitsuki shares his observations of humanity with Sekiei, both boys regard his findings as strange and alien. As naïve as Sekiei seems, Mitsuki's comments reveal that he isn't much smarter when it comes to everyday customs and interactions. Even after Sekiei reveals that he knows about the messenger snake, the two are quickly able to get past this as Sekiei takes Mitsuki's definition of friendship (i.e., two people sharing secrets) to heart. Though Mitsuki never betrays emotion of any kind, he certainly appears to have inherited his parent's ability to bring people around to his way of thinking.

Featuring virtually no action to speak of, this week's Boruto is an intriguing character study of one of the series' most fascinating personas. Even with the titular character gone for all but the final few seconds, episode 80 is no weaker for his absence. Despite finding friendship and acceptance in the Leaf, Mitsuki often stands out from his contemporaries, but in Sekiei, he's finally found a kindred spirit of sorts.

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Boarding School Juliet - Episode 5 [Review]

Boarding School Juliet's fifth episode takes us into a multi-week sports festival storyline, introducing us to new foes while giving Romio and Juliet more opportunities to develop their relationship and experience all of the traditional woes of being forced to hide their relationship, lest their reputations be ruined and the school be enveloped in a bloody gang war. This amounts to a parade of the usual anime romcom clichés, such as the episode's first story, which sees Romio wanting Juliet to make him a bento, except there's just one catch: Juliet just happens to be a terrible cook!

This is one of the most overused anime sitcom plots that I can think of, and the only thing BSJ brings to the table is its usual mix of madcap Dahlia Academy shenanigans. Juliet gets the dorm cook to whip up a passable meal for Romio, but Char steals it for herself, until a passing branch catches her boob (because why not?), and the errant bento flies into the hands of Scott. Scott challenges Romio to a duel for it, everyone goes a little mad over the boxed lunch, and everything resolves exactly as you might expect. I don't necessarily fault Boarding School Juliet for playing it safe with familiar story beats; this is cotton-candy comfort food, after all. What drags this segment down, along with much of the overall episode, is how uncharacteristically janky the show's animation and direction turned out.

Throughout “Romio and the Sports Festival”, the main cast are consistently off-model, and their movements are noticeably stiff; extras are stuck frozen in place while the camera pans across static backgrounds, and several scenes go out of their way to hide characters' mouths (though one of these instances was admittedly setting up a joke, with Char faking out Romio to snag the aforementioned bento). None of these aesthetic issues are glaring enough to ruin the show's visual presentation completely, but many gags do suffer from some wonky timing, and the brief action beats don't fare any better. When it premiered, Boarding School Juliet stood out because of its pleasing production values, along with Romio and Juliet's adorable chemistry, and the show struggles to make a case for itself when one of its two central pillars starts to crumble.

Thankfully, Romio and Juliet remain as cute as ever, which is what saves this episode from feeling completely ancillary. While I didn't dig Romio's pushy insistence on having Juliet feed him a homemade lunch (and the tacky way the episode presented his request as cornering Juliet for sex didn't help either), I was relieved to see him reassure Juliet that she can be comfortable in her own skin around him, which means she doesn't have to be a good cook to make him happy. The bit with him repeatedly eating and spitting out Juliet's burnt cookies was one of the jokes that landed this week, as was his reaction to being invited to practice running a three-legged race with her, which was to scream in delighted panic for hours.

This practice session also shows Juliet and Romeo bonding over Romio's failure in the big race at last year's sports festival. Not only does Juliet want to win this festival for the sake of her own ambitions, she also wants to instill some confidence in her boyfriend – she tells him that she cares as much about him having fun and enjoying the festival as she does about winning glory for herself. It's a really sweet scene, probably the most well animated/directed sequence of the entire episode.

The big plot point that looks to be carrying us to next week involves two new rivals from the White Cats, Aby Ssinia and Somali Longhaired. Groan worthy cat-breed names aside, (“Ssinia” isn't even a word!) the characters are perfectly fine - they're the kind of pompous rich-kid antagonists you'd expect to see planning a hostile takeover of the dorky summer-camp from across the lake. While I don't appreciate their tomfoolery as much as Char's, next week promises plenty of snobby treachery to go along with the sports and romance, and I think I can get invested in that, provided the show reclaims some of its visual mojo first.

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Bloom Into You - Episode 5 [Review]

One of the best moments of this episode of Bloom Into You was when it suddenly became Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san. It opens with Yuu working at her family's bookstore and recalling all her friends' book-buying habits. One loves manga; others are more "serious" and prefer literary magazines or academic journals. It culminates in Touko approaching the counter with a lesbian romance title, with Yuu worrying that Touko is judging her reaction. While we knew that Yuu's family worked at a bookstore before, this really digs into how working there has shaped her as a person. This scene finally does a little something I wish Bloom Into You had done episodes ago: give Yuu a personality.

I think that's key to why I've struggled to connect to Bloom Into You's central romance so far. Yuri anime characters can sometimes feel more like ciphers than real people. Arguably, that's part of the appeal; as with BL, the reader needs to be able to project onto the protagonist to a certain degree, which is harder to do the more distinctive you make their personalities. But Bloom Into You feels like it wants to challenge itself with a more realistic slow-burn romance, where its characters struggle with a different set of teenage feelings than the usual "BUT WE ARE BOTH GIRLS!" melodrama. The problem is that slow-burns require both characters having interesting personalities. Both Touko and especially Yuu just feel like too-perfect archetypes. Thankfully, that's starting to change; on Touko's end, with the slow reveal of how nervous and hollow she feels outside of her Type A class president role, and with Yuu, smaller touches like her love of reading and connections to other friends are beginning to show. I hope Koyomi's writing aspirations go beyond this episode, since that's definitely a way we can see Yuu outside of who she is with Touko.

We also get more and more clues that Yuu does indeed return Touko's feelings on some level. Maki's continued role is the most obvious one; there's no trope quite like the "friend who sees what's happening before you do" to put wind in the sails of a romance. Even if Yuu hasn't realized what she feels yet, Maki's observations ensure that the audience does. The fact that Maki seems totally disinterested in romance, still insisting that's not really who Yuu is, pushes this point further. I think what Yuu struggles with is is related to "love languages"—affecting how she feels love as well as how she expresses it. Not everything will feel like the pounding, doki-doki, passionate love, but it's clear the way that Yuu is always thinking of Touko means something. I wish at this point she'd realize what that is though, because five episodes in, this particular plot is starting to drag.

I also struggle with if I'd find Touko's behavior creepier were she a boy. She seems to have accepted that Yuu feels differently than she does, but she continues to push for the possibility of a relationship. At the same time, there's also an aspect of her that feels achingly familiar if you were ever a crushing teenager, especially this week, when she goes to Yuu's house and gets to sigh over her crush's pillows. When Yuu says her sister bringing her boyfriend over shows how serious they are, you can feel Touko's excitement at the implications for her and Yuu. This is a lot of what sells Touko as a character, since she's been a bit of a cipher so far too—even if that's changing faster than it seems to be with Yuu. At least Bloom Into You gets the feelings right, even if I sometimes wish I cared more about the result.

I talked a little about the music last week, but I really want to discuss it further, since it's a key part of what makes this show work so well. Also, its absence from the first part of the episode gave it a weird over-seriousness, while its bouncy, playful return made the second half feel all the more fun and refreshing. Bloom Into You has a pretty prolific anime composer working on it: Michiru Oshima. Oshima is likely best known to anime fans for her work on the first Fullmetal Alchemist anime, possibly her most eclectic anime score, and more recently for the Little Witch Academia soundtrack. She also worked on the recent Masaaki Yuasa film The Night is Short Walk On, Girl and its TV predecessor The Tatami Galaxy, which are the scores that Bloom Into You's music reminds me of most. For someone with an extensive catalog in both anime and live-action Japanese film, Oshima's scores often sound similar across different shows (again, with Fullmetal Alchemist being a notable exception). Despite that, she shapes them to each individual show's world. It makes sense that Bloom Into You would sound like another slice-of-life series with a slight romance focus, but Oshima's music still fits into the show's gentle world more than Tatami Galaxy's madcap one. She varies it just enough to fit it in, and the result is a score that elevates what could be a more pedestrian yuri series into something more special.

Still, Bloom Into You has a long way to go before it can be truly great. It needs to do more to develop its main characters, especially Yuu, beyond genre archetypes. That will make the moments when they do get more affectionate all the more satisfying. Yuu and Touko already feel like far more realistic teenagers than many other yuri characters, but the story just needs to go that extra mile to become a great romance in its own right.

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SSSS.Gridman - Episode 5 [Review]

SSSS.Gridman is an extremely indulgent show. The very first second of this episode is dedicated to Akane in a bikini, as lovingly-drawn as other instances of fanservice in Studio Trigger shows. But beyond that surface presentation, this opening scene also shows off how much the staff of this series seem to love animating their characters in general. The socially-maladjusted villain of the series has consistently gotten next-level character acting animation, and her resigned backwards flop into a pile of garbage as she talks about how much she doesn't want to go on her school trip is just another instance of the artists' care. It's that kind of quality that contributes to these characters becoming so endearing already.

Anyway, it's time for an obligatory swimsuit episode, though in this case we get a slightly-more original river rafting trip rather than a simple beach sojourn. Aside from seeing the show's now memetically popular female leads in revealing bikinis, this whole episode seems to be dedicated to the crew showing off in various ways. The forested mountain area the trip takes place in provides distinct scenery from the oppressive cityscapes the show has reveled in so far. There's some recursive acknowledgement of atmospheric appreciation, as Yuta and Utsumi remark on how the omnipresent frozen Kaiju feel just like part of the background at this point, only to have a part of this episode's background actually turn into the Kaiju they fight this week!

That Kaiju is the source of plenty of its own spectacle by the end of the episode. First of all, the detail of the creature's size is incredibly clever, given this show's origins. In tokusatsu shows, most of the monsters and robots and heroes that fight have to be around the same scale, a necessity of using human actors in suits for everything. But SSSS.Gridman, being an animated production, has no such restrictions, so it can drop a truly massive Kaiju down to fight and then ask how Gridman would deal with it. It shows how the series works both when it's paying homage to its source material and also when moving past it in ways that only this production can.

So it's a bit disappointing when the answer to how Gridman would deal with the massive monster turns out to be simply “equipping a new toy and shooting it a bunch”. Don't get me wrong, I'm ecstatic to see Borr finally join the fight, and there is some truly gorgeous animation bringing all this together. That theme of the crew showing off what they love drawing in this series continues to come through, with the combination scene and the Macross-esque missile barrages from both Gridman and the recurring Anti being particular highlights. From a pure spectacle angle, it's all a blast to watch, watching the animators indulge themselves as much as the audience. But narratively, it is frustrating that the question posed by the unconventional Kaiju wasn't answered in a more fulfilling way.

That seems to be the main issue holding this episode back, as it winds up being more style than substance. It feels at times like the crew was spending so much time drawing cute girls, cool monsters, and sexy robots that they neglected to move the plot or characterization forward enough for a serial story. Akane gets the lion's share of the small amount of character work this week. Combined with the care they take in animating her, it often seems like she's coming away the true focal main character of the show. It might beg the question of how she can work as an effectively detestable villain when the staff clearly love her so much. However, as the episode goes on, her standoffish nature even toward classmates who are trying to include her, her use of any chemistry she has with Yuta or Rikka simply to ply information from them, and especially her callous treatment of Anti (who clearly has his own attachment to her) all work to hammer home that she's the bad guy in spite of her appealing points.

Unfortunately, the same attention to detail doesn't seem to have been afforded any of the other characters this episode. Utsumi has been frustratingly underutilized for several episodes now, and Yuta and Rikka's potential romance is limited to some furtive glances and pining by Yuta. It threatens to cast a shadow over the show with a nigh-obligatory development carried by two characters that don't have much chemistry yet. Yuta and Rikka generally strike more sparks in their dynamic with Akane; perhaps it's in the same grand cartoon tradition that the villain just turns out more interesting than the heroes. There also just isn't much movement on the overall plot this week, limited to Akane confirming her suspicions that Yuta is Gridman in a nicely understated way, and some portents about future events are seemingly teased with an effective “What the heck is going on?” explosion at the end.

Alongside the spectacle, the other point this episode succeeds at is conveying many appreciable little details. For all the franchise's embracing of how technology enhances our everyday lives, the inconveniences of working it into an extremely analog countryside are demonstrated here. Yuta can't transform without Junk, so the Neon Genesis Junior High Students have to actually buy the computer from the shop and transport it to him. The briefest shots of them carting its components around on dollies is an understated highlight, and the Gridman Alliance all pooling their pedestrian talents to make a simple phone call was an amusing touch that showed how they worked well as a team, even as their own character development was still lacking this episode. But fun as these parts were, they still felt like simple snippets of the crew behind the show having fun, while there was no time for themes and deeper character work this week. That's hardly a bad thing once in a while, but I hope the crew behind SSSS.Gridman haven't set aside this show's potential richness just yet.

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Karakuri Circus - Episode 4 [Review]

Episode 4 of Karakuri Circus concludes the climax of the arc that started last week, with a newly reinvigorated Masuru making a bargain for his life with Eiryo and his Kill Team (which has now been translated as the much more intimidating “Slaughter Team”). Meanwhile, the increasingly intimate Shirogane and Narumi find themselves battling Uncle Zenji's traps and hired thugs; eventually, all three of our heroes end up in the quagmire of a jailbreak, a Karakuri fight, and a mass of bombs that are set to blow the entire castle to smithereens. It's a plot that's both entertaining and messy, with every tender moment and triumphant victory offset by a weak narrative shortcut or an underwhelming set piece. The episode ends up breaking even, mostly due to its shocking final scenes, but “Swirling Tiger” nevertheless serves as a perfect example of the facets and foibles that make Karakuri Circus such a fascinatingly flawed gem.

Masaru has quickly grown into a fiercely steadfast little hero, though this week's story has a few too many stops and starts in concluding his struggle against Zenji than I would have liked. I enjoyed Masaru recruiting the Slaughter Team to his side, even if it meant bringing back that terribly convenient Exposition Journal, but I was disappointed in the way the show handled him turning the tables on his uncle. He storms the castle in an appropriately heroic fashion with Eiryo, but then Zenji almost immediately flips the script on him by capturing Shirogane and Narumi, though it only takes another moment for Eiryo to convince Masuru that Zenji is obviously lying, which results in an overdramatic villain laugh from Zenji, and all of this sees Masaru and Eiyro just leap off to rescue their friends directly anyway. Zenji doesn't even get any direct comeuppance from one of our heroes; his exit comes simply from staying in his control room when the castle explodes later. It's an unsatisfying payoff to an arc that was already a little weak in its foundation.

But as was the case last week, things pick up on Narumi and Shirogane's side of the story, with the two once again trapped (this time in Zenji's cage) and growing closer to one another. I found it clunky the way this scene executed the double-flashback combo of Shirogane remembering both her time imprisoned as a youth and the way Shoji Saiga treated her with the same kindness as Narumi, but I'm a sucker for sap, and I made some audible daws during Shirogane and Narumi's cuddle session, not to mention when Masuru was finally reunited with his true adoptive family.

The fight scenes that followed were easily the weakest of the series so far, unfortunately. Narumi's rage-fueled use of hard qigon to bust everyone out of the cage was pretty satisfying, but his actual fight with the Kidnap Team goons was barely animated and generally uninspired. Masaru and Shirogane's joint use of Arlequin was a bit better, though I don't know how I feel about Masaru being able to so easily take over for Shirogane; the script makes it clear that he's nowhere near as skilled, yet he's still able to destroy the other Karakuri in a single blow, which feels like the show is robbing Shirogane of some of her spark. It's also yet another example of a killer Karakuri design essentially being wasted on a battle that lasts lest than thirty seconds, which is a shame.

While the action in “Swirling Tiger” may have been forgettable, that final scene certainly wasn't. With Shirogane out of commission, Masaru and Narumi end up trapped in the burning rubble of Zenji's Karakuri Castle, with the boy being sheltered from the flames by his swiftly fading mentor. The entire sequence is framed as an emotional farewell to a self-sacrificing Narumi, which initially felt odd considering we're only a tenth of the way through the story, but then Narumi wakes after the fire to find himself clutching Narumi's severed arm, the rest of him seemingly consumed by the fire. The image is surreal and incredibly goofy, yet oddly affecting too. Granted, I don't believe for a minute that Narumi's actually dead, since shonen anime tend to follow the rule of “They're only dead if you see the body, and even then they're probably just going to come back after a brief pit-stop in the afterlife or something”.

Still, both Narrator Masaru and Tragic Little Masaru seem to believe that Narumi's gone for good, and the fact that Karakuri Circus can pull off a scene like this so early in its run is a testament to how well a messy story and weak aesthetics can be buoyed by a good cast. With Masaru having experienced such personal loss, and Shirogane being injured and also likely in mourning, the show seems poised for some manner of narrative shift or time-skip. Even though the series wasn't at its best for much of the week, I have become endeared to this world and these characters, and I'm looking forward to seeing where Karakuri Circus takes us over the next thirty-two weeks.

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Black Clover - Episode 56 [Review]

There's really just no winning when it comes to adapting this Black Clover novel. It's more significant than a one-off flashback—it's a story that runs concurrently with the anime's events thus far, so the audience is tasked with keeping up as Fanzell pops in and out of the Black Bulls' lives. This is mostly to explain why Noelle and Finral also know this man, but I think the show could do more to ease us between the present day story and the past. It makes me wonder what this subplot would have looked like if they had adapted everything chronologically, but that doesn't sound satisfying either.

And so, we enter Round Two of the Fanzell mini-saga. This time Fanzell's encountering the rest of the Black Bulls (with an off-handed mention that he and Yami have met in the past, due to Fanzell being a former Diamond Kingdom commander) and confronting his flip-flopping pupil Mariella once more. The plotting is very haphazard, with one of the main points of contention being that the Diamond Kingdom has kidnapped Fanzell's fiancée, the third of these novel-original characters and the creator of Noelle's magic wand. We're told that Dominante Code (the aforementioned fiancée) is in the Diamond Kingdom's possession, we get a big battle between the Diamonds and the Bulls, and then plot twist: the whole battle was a scheme to rescue Dominante off-screen! We hadn't even met this woman yet, and now she drops into the cast with extraordinarily little fanfare. If there's any situation where a story is allowed to take its time introducing characters, it's in a quasi-filler exposition flashback within a long-running shonen series.

I'm also still having issues with how Mariella is characterized. There's such a game of "I'm betraying my master. BUT I still have respect for him. BUT maybe I'm actually betraying the Diamond Kingdom," with no clear logic behind any of these changes. She's stoic, but also extremely upfront and blunt about how she's feeling at any given time, so there isn't any actual character consistency to speak of in her turnarounds. It's not like she's an emotionally distant person who simply makes a mistake and feels guilty about it, nor is she a cunning mastermind who's setting the Diamonds up for betrayal—even when she's on the bad guys' side, she's still high-key bragging about how strong her master is. If the show was going for any sincerity in her arc, it would help if it could at least wait more than five minutes between each time she changes her mind.

This episode is another example of Black Clover just not keeping it together as a story. I don't care to find out what happens next for these new characters, and contradicting the already extraneous nature of these flashback episodes, we're also not offered enough breathing room. It's tiresome enough that we're jumping around through the series' timeline, filling in blanks we didn't need filled, and then we're ultimately left with means without an end. It's an uneventful flashback that derails the present day story so that we can get to know characters whose development is bafflingly undercooked. Blah.

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Banana Fish - Episode 17 [Review]

It's nice to have Ash and Eiji back together again, isn't it? I feel like I've been starved for affection between these two, and episode 17 delivers in spades. Luckily, that's not all that it has going for it, or else it wouldn't be that exciting of an episode. "The Killers" is a showcase for the series' current best villain, Yut-Lung, that also introduces a new challenger for that title.

After hovering around the shadows for the last few weeks, Yut Lung finally gets to exact his revenge on his horrible family. He strikes a deal with Golzine that basically involves them using their skills to go after each other's enemies, like the evil mafia don version of "I scratch your back, you scratch mine." Both succeed, but since Yut-Lung is a multidimensional character we care about more, his family's destruction gets more actual screen time and feels far more thrilling. My only complaint would be that this feels like it happens far too quickly. For all the build-up we've had over several episodes, it's a bit anti-climactic to see Wang-Lung dispensed with over the course of just one scene. Then again, Yut-Lung does have six brothers and hopes to wipe out each one's entire family, so I'm guessing this is only the beginning.

But ultimately, this isn't Yut-Lung's story, it's Ash's and Eiji's, even if episodes like this can make you sometimes wish that it was the other way around. It's obvious Yut-Lung's desire to wipe out the entire Lee clan would eventually means killing himself too, and we've seen more and more indication that this might be what he wants. While he's not doing anything to try to reverse course, he does seem to be aware on some level that he's a twisted person who's drowning in loneliness and despair. Whatever's leading him to want to end his existence, it makes him more sympathetic than I had ever expected when he was first introduced. So in some ways, it makes him a more interesting character than Ash, who for all his trauma and pain still feels unrealistically perfect at times. Yut-Lung also is super-smart and capable beyond his years, but that's eating him away inside at a much faster pace. Ash still has a survival instinct and basic goodness that's probably more due to his upbringing than any sort of "cursed" aspect of the Lee lineage.

At least in between all this dark stuff, we get some sweet scenes. I'm glad that Ash has finally realized how much he needs Eiji emotionally. It's frustrating that they needed to both be captured and separated from each other in order to see that, but I'm glad they finally got there. It felt like MAPPA was trying to make up for all that separation by really turning up the romantic ambiance, with that soft orange lighting during some of their scenes alone. While some things have improved, you don't have to read between the lines much to see that there's trouble in paradise. Eiji is reluctant to tell Ash about how he met Yut-Lung, and even when he does, he withholds details about how Yut-Lung will go after Eiji as long as he's the key to Ash. Eiji doesn't want Ash to worry too much, but he also knows that Ash will baby him and get overprotective, suggesting that the two still have some trust issues.

Adding to that is Ash's mounting paranoia this week, leading the boy who always trusts his own instincts to begin doubting them. He can't put his finger on why, but he just has an eerie sense of constantly being watched, making him even clingier about Eiji, which probably isn't helping these trust issues. Of course, Ash turns out to be right, introducing what I've heard from many manga fans is one of the series' best characters, Blanca.

Blanca is an assassin hired by Golzine to track down Ash, and he seems to have a history and a bond with his target that initially makes him reluctant to take the job. Spying on Ash makes him reconsider, because he's curious about what the boy has been up to and sees him as a worthy opponent. There are suggestions that Blanca might have taught Ash his own gun skills, complimenting him for following his methods. All this makes it puzzling that Blanca is willing to kill this boy he seemingly helped train and raise, but the "checking in on a former pupil" part makes sense. If only that "check-in" wasn't so deadly in nature…

Despite the title "The Killers" sounding like it could describe any Banana Fish episode, it's a reference to a 1920s short story by Ernest Hemingway about Prohibition-era mob violence and the inability of ordinary people to do anything to stop it. I don't think I have to explain how this relates to Banana Fish and this episode in particular, full of cascading mob hits. As the bodies stack up, the complexity of our cast of characters does too (except Golzine, who's as one-dimensionally evil as ever). I hope he dies soon. Ash has enough more interesting opponents to make up the difference, especially after this week.

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Run with the Wind - Episode 5 [Review]

The biggest struggle for any ensemble show is developing the cast without leaving anyone behind. By episode five, “The Ones Not Chosen,” Run with the Wind has this down to a science. As the dorm begins to divide into factions of enthusiastic and reluctant runners, the show begins to delve into the specifics of students' motivations (or lack thereof). As forward momentum continues to push the team toward its ultimate race goal, brief but meaningful scenes offer up significant individual character development. Through glimpses, these moments define why runners want (or don't want) to be part of the team.

King already has a lot on his plate. As a senior in college, he's spending a big portion of his time on job hunting. He applies to the aptly named “Dream Top Co.”, but things don't work out in his favor. Most of us can relate to the tedious depression that is looking for a job, and King's relatable stew of emotions draws him out from the background of the show for the first time. What's finally going to bring him relief? Well, this is a show about running, so I have one guess.

It bothers me that King's arc is a cliffhanger because I don't think it has the weight to be a two-parter. But I'll save my judgment for the resolution next episode. There might be some additional reason for cutting his story in half while jumping around to other characters' perspectives in the same episode. This episode is particularly heavy on Nico-chan-senpai, the laid-back ex-smoker who spends this week trying to convey his motivation to Yuki. From his easy dialogue to the odd wire figures that litter his room, Nico's personality comes out through his quirks. Likewise, framing Yuki in contrast to Nico makes each character stand out more. It's all in the details this week, with Shindo's country accent coming out in his inebriated impromptu pep talk and the shots of each boy's sleeping habits. (I was particularly amused by Musa's sleeping cap and Prince's bed of manga.)

These focal scenes on Run with the Wind's B-team align directly with Kakeru's thoughts regarding who should be “allowed to participate” in a track meet. In real life, running is one of the most accepting sports around. Because it occurs on an individual level, it's easier to adjust racing for people of different paces and ability than it is for most other athletic events. It's typical for official races to divide runners into groups based on their predicted pace, or for people who use canes or other equipment to get an early start time. Haiji may be a demon coach, but he also divides his team into similar-speed groups, so even Prince, who runs like an Abnormal Titan, at least doesn't have to deal with the indignity of getting lapped.

More than their ability, the show differentiates the characters by their reasons for running. Joji and Jota want to be popular with the ladies. Nico wants to improve his health. And it's clear that Prince, who muses about how much this is like a “real track team,” wants to be a part of something too. They're not all track stars like Kakeru, but they each get something out of running. I hope that ends up being the message of the show, not that anybody can become super fast, but that everybody can at least feel better when they run or feel “clean,” as Nico puts it. I like the acceptance of different abilities and motives, and that Haiji is turning out to be much more welcoming than he initially seemed, but these are hardcore practice sessions with one-hour warm-up runs. My muscles ached sympathetically when the boys decided to go on yet another run after practice—they're going to get injured if they don't rest!

From the morning run to afternoon practice to a late-night drinking session, we get to spend all hours of the day with this eclectic running club. The lighting in each scene establishes the atmosphere for this beautiful show, and visual cues that carry from one episode to another show a story progression of their own—I'm thinking of Prince's butterflies, Nira the dog's excited sprint, and the multiple times a day that the team gathers around the table for meals. This show is slice-of-life in many ways, but its team perspective on running—which is frequently a solitary practice—elevates it to something multifaceted and new.

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Golden Kamuy - Episode 16 [Review]

With a title like "The Great Plan to Infiltrate the Asahikawa 7th Division!!" (complete with exclamation points!!) you'd expect a lot more plot movement than we actually get this week. Episode 16 fully lives up to its title in that there's a lot more planning than actual infiltrating. Still, it's a pretty thrilling quarter-hour of planning, and even if all the characters end up in the same places they started (including poor Shiraishi), it's a harbinger of more excitement to come.

The episode bounces between our two main factions: Sugimoto/Hijikata's and Tsurumi's. (There's a brief detour to talk about Cikapasi's little found family, who are obviously going to become more Important as the story goes on.) This has been the case with most of the series so far, with a few episodes that zero in on one group over the other. What struck me about Golden Kamuy is how well it balances its moral universe with fleshing out its large and growing cast of characters. The show has done everything it can to make Tsurumi as interesting as possible, and I didn't always feel that way in past reviews. Still, you're never unsure of who you're "supposed to" root for among the characters. Tsurumi and Hijikata's motives are understandable, but not as sympathetic compared to Sugimoto and Asirpa's. They're still fundamentally twisted in their own ways, but we love learning more about Hijikata and especially Tsurumi's twistedness.

Case in point is the introduction of Lt. Gen. Anisaka in one of the 7th Division scenes. Anisaka is a genius weapons creator, and he's arrived with some new guns for Tsurumi's group. (He even makes a gun out of Nikaidou's new leg!) While Anisaka and Tsurumi joke about whether Anisaka's line of work is "cursed" or "beautiful", Sgt. Tsukishima begins to piece together a darker side of the 7th Division's goal. This is especially true after Anisaka reveals Tsurumi's previously secret goal of wanting to create poppies that survive in cold weather, all the better for making money off opium. Tsukishima realizes that centering Hokkaido's economy around items needed for war—guns for killing or morphine for wounded soldiers—would only mean bigger wars. It's dark enough subtext if you know what's to come in the 20th century, but also what happened before the events of the show. Golden Kamuy spells out that parallel for us when they mention how Britain's part in the opium trade had turned public opinion against it. What Tsukishima predicts is exactly what had happened in China throughout the 19th century, with Western imperialistic influence over the opium trade resulting in two wars. More recent to the time of Golden Kamuy was the Boxer Rebellion against that influence.

It's a reminder that Golden Kamuy is an explicitly anti-war narrative. For all that it revels in blood and gore, it's also clear that war has a destructive force on everyone involved. This can be forgotten sometimes because Golden Kamuy has such a dark sense of humor, which is on full display this week. After Tsurumi waxes rhapsodic about the "beauty" of blood spurting on the battlefield, Anisaka tells him that he's messed-up in the head. Tsurumi cheerfully responds that this is true, because he doesn't have his frontal lobe! These moments can seem like they make light of topics like war-induced brain injury, but the jokes also starkly remind us of the cost war has had even on its strongest proponents. Dark humor more often than not is a way for us to process the upsetting sides of life, and I think that Golden Kamuy's jokes follow in that tradition.

On Sugimoto and Hijikata's side of things, most of the episode is spent trying to rescue Shiraishi. While a lot of the group finds him irritating and might prefer not to have him around, Sugimoto disagrees, and they all realize he's still pretty useful even if they've traced his tattoos. He's the only one who can get them into Nopperabo, after all. The first attempt to rescue him is unfortunately met with failure, largely because of Shiraishi's lingering guilt about betraying Sugimoto, which keeps him from taking Kiroranke's offer of rescue quick enough. The 7th Division finds him anyway, and the group needs to find a new ally to help them break him out of Asahikawa. That comes in the form of Suzukawa, a "marriage fraudster" and another tattooed convict. They need to find someone who's important enough to gain that information about Shiraishi's location, without being so high up that he'd be instantly recognizable. They find the right guy in Hijikata's old enemy, the warden Inudou, and Suzukawa convincingly fakes him.

There are more reminders of how Sugimoto and Asirpa are slightly more "moral" than the rest of the group. While they disguise Suzukawa, Asirpa gets sleepy and winds up nodding off on Hijikata's lap. This causes Sugimoto to recognize Hijikata as the man in the herring longhouse and therefore realize Shiraishi's betrayal. Kiroranke says he thinks Shiraishi expects Sugimoto to kill him for it, and everyone else agrees that this is the sensible thing for Sugimoto to do once they find him. But Asirpa wakes up and reminds Sugimoto that he shouldn't kill anyone he doesn't need to, and while Sugimoto looks conflicted over it, I'm guessing he'll probably choose Asirpa's side over propagating more violence.

For all it gets done this week, perhaps the most important part of this episode of Golden Kamuy is how much it excites me for the rest of this season. The first few episodes felt like they were going through the motions, starting right where the last season stopped with no attempt to remind us why we were here. There are fewer and less-glaring animation mistakes, but other than that, not much change from what came before. While episode 16 is ultimately just more setup, its new developments pop with the action, thoughtfulness, and humor that initially got me invested in this series. Golden Kamuy is always full of new plot twists, but now that energy extends to the show as a whole.

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Tokyo Ghoul:re - Episode 16 [Reveiw]

I don't want to sound like a broken record every week, so I'm going to ask you, dear readers to take it as a given that this season of Tokyo Ghoul:re has atrocious pacing issues that I don't foresee going away. I'll be sure to comment if they do let up, but trying to condense about two cours worth of material into one is just not going to work without incredibly judicious and smart rewrites. Instead, this anime has taken the route of either excising material or rushing through it, and irrespective of my feelings on Tokyo Ghoul as a story, it's a shame to see any adaptation come out so patchwork. I feel bad for the people actually working on the show, because I speculate they're doing their best with a situation they had no say in. But I still have to call a spade a spade, and Tokyo Ghoul:re's anime continues to feel rushed and rough.

That said, this episode didn't blitz through its material as mind-numbingly fast as the previous three, and it afforded itself some time for contemplation, much to my relief. The Quinxes, for example, actually say things. It's not much, but we get a glimpse of how they've been handling things since Shirazu's death. For Urie and Saiko, their grief has manifested as a stern determination to not lose anybody else. Saiko was something of a cypher back in season one, mostly a source of comic relief due to her NEET lifestyle. In the interim, she seems to have become more serious about being an investigator, and she and Urie have a better rapport. I feared earlier that Urie had slid back into his cynical obsession with gaining power and prestige in the CCG, but his anger and desperation reveal that like Saiko, he has grown to appreciate his comrades above all else. His driving concern during this whole operation has been Mutsuki, who he finally finds alone in a pool of blood in the cave where Torso had dragged him. We don't know much of anything about what happened to Mutsuki, and if I had to guess, there's probably a ton of material in the manga that got cut out. Given that this is Tokyo Ghoul, however, it was probably extremely traumatic—something like Torso finally pushing Mutsuki past a point of no return, and Mutsuki killing (and eating) his captor. The last thing Tokyo Ghoul needs is more torture porn, so I'm totally okay with skipping past that, thank you very much. However, Mutsuki was my favorite of the Quinxes, so I do hope he gets more of a focus in the future. I just hope I'm not inadvertently dooming him by doing so.

The big reveal of the episode is the true nature of the guys who have been commandeering the CCG this whole time, the Washus. Turns out they're ghouls! Surprise! It's actually not that surprising after Eto hinted about as much in her final book, which was clearly a tactical play meant to lead to this conclusion. I'm not quite sure how to feel about Tokyo Ghoul leaning fully into this conspiratorial plot, especially because the Washus, while important figures in the context of the CCG, haven't been important characters with much focus. I understand the desire to escalate the conflict, but this development doesn't feel earned, and Tokyo Ghoul works better on a smaller scale anyway. I care about Kaneki's struggle to love himself and deal with his trauma. I don't care about him being used as a pawn in some three-dimensional chess game between competing ghoul factions. I will say that the Washu revelation falls in line with the all-too-common narrative of an elite class sowing the seeds of conflict between different oppressed groups in order to reap the benefits themselves. And now that the line between what constitutes “ghoul” and “human” is basically nonexistent, this unending war seems even more pointless.

Amon is already wise to all this, and it looks like his intervention last week was done in order to protect Mado and bring her over to his side. This becomes rather easy after Mado passes out from shielding Takizawa. I understand why she'd feel guilt about what happened to him—their rivalry drove Takizawa to prove himself in an ultimately fatal way—but I don't get why she doesn't react more to Amon's presence. Maybe she knew all along? I'm sure they'll have a big scene together at some point later. It's just wild to me that they don't even exchange words here, and it feels like a consequence of the story having so many moving pieces that it doesn't know what to do with all of them. It's comforting to see that Amon remains a good guy though, and that memories of his encounters with Kaneki pull him back from going completely berserk. After the dust settles, it'll be interesting to see if he and Kaneki end up finally working together.

The other big scene this episode is Kaneki saying goodbye to Arima. This takes up a good chunk of the running time, and I appreciate that there's an effort to wallow in the sadness of the situation. Unfortunately, Arima's dying breaths are saddled with a veritable ton of exposition, which detracts from the mood. Turns out he's another half-human half-ghoul (and who isn't these days?) who was born as a result of a breeding program spearheaded by the Washus, except that in most cases, the child doesn't become a badass one-eyed ghoul like Eto. Arima was born strong, but he was also born to die, with accelerated aging already claiming his eyesight (and hair color). And apparently, this makes him the One-Eyed King that Kaneki was supposed to kill, all as part of a plan orchestrated between Arima and Eto to turn Kaneki into some kind of ghoul folk hero. To what end, I don't know. I think I'm supposed to feel sad for Arima, but mostly I'm angry at him for being another awful parental figure who manipulated Kaneki under the pretense of a greater good for all ghouls. Our poor hero just can't catch a break.

Despite all of its twists and turns, this is a strangely hollow episode. The raid on Rushima is over, nobody knows who won, and at this point, it doesn't even matter. The Clowns show up, but they're not even some of the well-known Clowns. The big Clown is out on the prowl now that Cochlea is busted open. The Washus are all dead except for obviously-a-bad-guy Matsuri. Eto is dead, maybe. Kaneki is now the Chosen One. So much is crammed together that actions are now divorced from consequences, so it's difficult to discern where all of this conflict is leading, and it's difficult to care. This is still an improvement over prior weeks, but this is a story in dire need of some focus before it spirals out of control entirely.

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Fairy Tail: Final Season - Episode 4 [Review]

Although this episode covers the usual decent amount of manga chapters, I have to admit that I'm glad the Evil Gray storyline doesn't drag on past this episode, because it gets dark. The Avatar cult is a particularly vicious group of foes, made up of so-called black wizards (magicians who use black magic) who aren't kidding around when it comes to fighting dirty. Gomon's specific magic is manipulating torture devices, and even without Mary's pain magic or Abel's use of Mr. Cursey (from the debacle on Tenrou Island), that's dangerous enough. Poor Lucy takes the brunt of it this week as Gomon pinpoints her as the weak link, not necessarily magic-wise, but certainly on the emotional front. This leads to some very upsetting imagery as he prepares Lucy for torment – specifically the moment when he strings her up by her wrists and spreads her legs. It really shouldn't be such a relief that he's “only” planning to chop her in half with an axe. (The fact that he doesn't need her legs apart to do so still makes for some worrisome motivations on his part.)

Of course, what Gomon isn't counting on is that Lucy is Gray's weakness as well. Our favorite ice mage has, as it turns out, been undercover in the cult in order to help put a stop to them from the inside, and it's strongly implied that he and Levy were working together on this at Erza's behest. He's not willing to break his cover to keep Natsu from being pounded, because he knows that Natsu can take it. But Lucy is another story; she doesn't have the physical strength to make up for the sealstone depriving her of her magic and she's frankly at risk for something much worse than just a punch to the nose. We could argue, really, that the jig was up the minute Lucy slapped Gray before Mary hit her with stomach pain (or cramps) – Gray is visibly taken aback and not quite sure how to handle the situation once she's involved. Him being shown with his eyes closed from that point on until he leaves the scene is really very telling.

The kicker here is that if Natsu understood what the word “sneak” meant, none of this would have happened. (Probably. This is still Fairy Tail after all, so something would probably have gone wrong.) The minute Virgo tunnels them into the cult's stronghold, Natsu starts bellowing for Gray at ear-destroying volume, ensuring that every single person in the building knows that someone has managed to infiltrate their stronghold. It's very Natsu, and in his defense, it never once occurred to him that Gray might not jump at the chance to rejoin Fairy Tail. After all, Gray isn't Wendy; he's been around much longer and a part of Team Natsu from the start. He, Natsu, and Erza are effectively siblings, orphaned a second time when Makarov disbanded the guild, so why wouldn't he want the chance to come home?

That doesn't mean that it isn't still a relief when we find out that he's able to manipulate the black markings on his body at will and had only done so to cover up his old guild mark. The moment when Gray freezes Gomon in his icky, icky tracks is like letting out a breath you didn't know you were holding. For poor Lucy, Natsu, and Happy, it may be a little late for true comfort, but the important thing here is that it happened.

That's really the highlight of this week's episode – the swift end to the brutality Lucy is about to suffer with a helpless Natsu looking on. The moment poking fun of people who get tattoos in Japanese or Chinese without knowing what they really say is also pretty great, but it's really that release of tension that makes this episode worthwhile. Not only does it reassure us that Gray's still who he always was, it also gives us hope for the eventually recreation of the Fairy Tail guild. That's not worth some of crap Lucy, Natsu, and Happy went through, but it does go a way to making it better.

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Boruto: Naruto Next Generations - Episode 79 [Review]

The gang faces two harrowing battles and gets hit with a shocking revelation in an action-packed Boruto: Naruto Next Generations. While engaged in battle with Kokuyou, Boruto's group is joined by Cho-Cho and Inojin, who arrive just in time to lend a hand. Ino-Shika-Cho then advise Boruto and Sarada to continue their pursuit of Mitsuki while they keep Kokuyou busy. Hoping to head them off, Sekiei entrusts a couple of Akuta with guarding Mitsuki, intercepts Boruto and Sarada, and engages them in combat. Although he initially has the upper hand, Sekiei eventually depletes his energy, but just as Boruto is about to deal the finishing blow, he's stopped by Mitsuki, who helps his new “friend” to his feet and guides him to safety. To further punctuate his point, Mitsuki slaps away the forehead protector Boruto attempts to hand him, hits Boruto with a burst of Snake Lightning, and leaves with Sekiei and Kokuyou. Upon seeing how thoroughly defeated Boruto is, Kokuyou calls him a husk and reasons that he's not even worth killing.

This week's installment serves as the current arc's most action-packed installment to date. While Kokuyou and Sekiei are far from the most creative villains the franchise has given us, their signature techniques are unique enough to prove entertaining and put Boruto and company through their paces. Consistently on-point visuals and reasonably fluid animation also help make this battle-heavy episode a fun ride from start to finish. Also of note is that our heroes lose both of this week's big fights, illustrating that the current crop of Genin have a long way to go before they're ready for the big leagues. In all likelihood, Mitsuki is running a long con on the Hidden Stone shinobi in an effort to learn who their boss is, but seeing Boruto at such a low point will hopefully make the eventual payoff feel all the more rewarding.

Sekiei's blooming friendship with Mitsuki is proving to be one of the most fascinating aspects of this storyline. Like Mitsuki, Sekiei is somewhat socially oblivious while also being good-natured and energetic, making them a natural pairing. Although Mitsuki's loyalties are probably still to the Leaf, it's hard to believe that he isn't becoming fond of Sekiei on some level. On the flipside, Boruto and Garaga have yet to fully work out their differences, with the latter stubbornly refusing to assist his summoner until the absolute last second. Predictably, the giant snake gloats after Mitsuki coldly rejects Boruto's olive branch, though he seems slightly hesitant to do so. (He also doesn't make good on his vow to eat Boruto in the event that Mitsuki chooses the Stone shinobi over him.)

Now that we're fully into this arc's third act, it would be great to see more episodes like this one. After devoting a significant number of episodes to outlining the stakes and core mystery, the time has come to get to the bottom of the villains' scheme and lay the smackdown on the mastermind. While episode 79 hardly breaks new ground in the shonen action department, it's an above-average battle episode that leaves the audience eager to see what comes next.

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One Piece - Episode 859 [Review]

With the first stage of the cake baking finished, the Big Mom chase is getting ready to transition into the next phase. There's a refreshing new direction for the majority of our concurrent subplots, but as usual we're still waiting until the story can get its original momentum going again.

There are two main plotlines we're concerning ourselves with the most this week:

1. Luffy's Nuts Island Adventures—With Brulee in tow, Luffy's left Katakuri trapped in the mirror world without an exit, but while he's waiting for his Haki to recharge before he re-engages with that battle, he must dodge Big Mom and a handful of her more powerful children. There's a lot that this sequence offers, since it gives the Katakuri fight a chance to move between multiple locations beyond just the mirror world. This feels like the kind of detour the audience is likely to quickly forget, but then eventually go "Oh yeah! Remember when ______ happened?" It really pushes the comedy and surrealism of Totto Land. Brulee is our heroes' new overwrought hostage to take Caesar Clown's place, and we're weaving between several of Big Mom's tougher daughters as Luffy stays on his toes long enough to get back to the Katakuri fight.

I love the idea of baking little pocket set pieces like this into the narrative, but I wish that it was a more meaningful change-up for the story. Imagine if Katakuri had to follow Luffy to Nuts Island, and the rest of the fight took place with a raging kaiju Big Mom in the background? Rather, this set piece is more about compensating for how inconvenient Luffy's Fourth Gear is, and your regularly scheduled mirror world fight will resume shortly as if nothing had happened.

2. Sanji and the cake—The wedding cake is officially on the move, which means the Sanji crew has to get it by Oven without raising any red flags, which turns out to be futile anyway because Oven finds Chiffon untrustworthy to begin with. Chiffon's father, Pound, is also in the mix, and so there's a whole 'nother layer of family drama going on between a man trying to meet his daughter for the first time in years, and said man trying to fend of his ex-step-son because nobody in the Charlotte family has any respect for Big Mom's former husbands. Trying to keep his presence low-key, Sanji has to intervene by moving so fast and hitting Oven so hard that he's invisible to the naked eye. It's pretty much Sanji's only unique feat of strength in the entire arc, and it's really badass, but it comes at the cost of Chiffon being awkwardly forced into a damsel role so that the men can beat each other up a little. One step forward, three steps sideways!

These past few episodes have been a pallet cleanser to extremely mixed results. There are a ton of ideas that are interesting, but not especially productive towards the endpoint that the story is actually building to. The family drama stuff is tender, but also poorly defined. The only thing that really separates Big Mom's children from each other is that some of them have turned over to Team Straw Hat by pure happenstance, and some are still antagonistic out of an unexplored sense of family pride. Oven doesn't have his mom breathing down his neck in this scene. He's a jerk because he wants to be, and there are currently so many other places we could be drawing conflict from in a situation like this. Whether a given Charlotte kid is misguided or straight-up evil seems kind of arbitrary.

For all of its faults, this episode certainly isn't boring. I think this is the messiest stretch of the Whole Cake Island climax that we get, and it comes just as the anime's recent boom in quality is starting to calm down. Production-wise, this is a perfectly average episode. But "average" by Toei standards isn't really helpful once the story starts to get this tedious. A little more TLC could have gone a long way here.

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Black Clover - Episode 55 [Review]

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Black Clover - Episode 55 [Review]

I had heard whispers of something like this going on, but now it's finally time to suss out whatever the hell is up with Black Clover's light novels. It turns out there was quite a bit of important canon information relegated to Black Clover: Stubborn Bull Book (a collaboration between Yūki Tabata and Johnny Onda). I wish I could speak to even a little authority on the matter, but details are extremely scarce in this hemisphere. There's no English release whatsoever, and it leaves this current stretch of the story in a funky position. The manga just acts like you're supposed to recognize these new characters on the spot, and now the anime is trying to adapt the novel but must do so by shoehorning in a very unexpected flashback.

Last week's cliffhanger saw Noelle and Finral traveling to meet with a man named Fanzell Kruger, hoping to find a lead on healing Asta's broken arms. Fanzell was the man who taught Asta how to swing a sword way back at the beginning of the story, before Asta took the Magic Knights' entrance exam. It's good that the anime is going through the trouble of showing us this never-before-seen backstory, but an episode-long flashback to fill us in on this random yet important character relationship is still extremely disruptive. I was just getting into the groove of the subplot about fixing Asta's cursed arms, but that story's now on pause so the show can tidy up its inadvisable synergy efforts.

This episode is a mess. The visuals are a dump and the character arcs are nonsensical. Fanzell is a devil-may-care runaway from the Diamond Kingdom who has a subordinate named Mariella, with the plot-twist being that Mariella is still loyal to the Diamond Kingdom and tries to assassinate her instructor—all while Asta helps Fanzell get his mojo back just in time to defend himself. We remain at arm's length with these two new characters (both of them are pretty aloof), and the story is astonishingly non-committal about both of them. Mariella is betraying her teacher, but she still cares about his honor and reputation. She's just as expressionless when she's antagonistic, so you don't have a sense of her priorities whatsoever, and Fanzell is your Red-Haired Shanks type cool uncle character, but it takes the wimpiest pep talk ever for him to reclaim a sense of meaning in his life.

This is a strange episode that's necessary for understanding the story as we move forward, but it's astoundingly ineffectual. It's not the most contrived "actually, this really important event happened off-screen" expositional flashback I've seen from the genre, but it's easily the least interesting. This episode is sentimental yet vapid, disorienting yet generic. There's a novelty to it existing at all, but there isn't much to say about it at the end of the day.

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