How cool, an Iggy-episode. It seems that he was infected with cogito after all. This, in combination with both Real, the infected autorave from the previous episode and a little bit of Pino turned this episode yet again into an incredible one.
As predicted, Iggy doesn’t return to Romdeau, but the cogito-virus drives him crazy. He only wants to live for Real, so he’s planning to kill the bastard who drove her away, and keep Real only for himself. In extreme ways. He locks her up inside the same sort of container that the Proxy from the previous episode was put in. (Claustrophobia, anyone?) All of this is inspired by the infected autorave from the previous episode, who, in her turn also gets inspired by Iggy in order to kill the one who took her raison d’être away. The girl then begins to chase Real, Iggy attempts to kill Vincent, which obviously doesn’t go too well. The four persons meet up with each other, the autorave attempts to self-destruct though Iggy sacrifices himself in order to save Real.
In essence, this is just the same formula as good guy turns bad, attempts to kill main character, climax, good guy turned bad gets the idea that it wasn’t such a good plan to leave the other good guys and kills himself in order to protect the other good guys from certain death. But this episode manages to delve so much deeper in the minds of the characters involved, that it makes up for everything. Both the girl autorave as Iggy as Real get so much character development. Everyone’s reasons are so full of details. I just loved it.
Take Real for example, the was so getting used to Iggy being with her that she took his existance for granted, up to the point at which she started ordering around, and stopped caring. When Iggy is away, as in the beginning of the episode, she really didn’t know what to do, and started ordering Pino around. Of course, this really didn’t help, so she sought help in Vincent. Then Iggy confronts her with this. And only then she starts to realize. Combine this with the fact that she’s just been betrayed, she’s locked up inside an extremely tight container and the fact that Iggy’s yelling at her, and it makes for some incredible moments.
It’s also great that Iggy just continued to serve Real, even though he was infected. He just acted normally, despite the cogito-virus. Only when he begins to think about his own raison d’être, and starts noticing how Real doesn’t notice him, it goes wrong. Pino, on the other hand, managed end up just fine. She’s being treated like a normal human, even though she’s an autorave, and just look at how playful she became. The fact remains that Iggy remained just Iggy. You can’t say that the Iggy from the past died, because he kept acting the way he did, even though he was infected. The way Iggy brings this to Real is just amazing.
Also, the dying speach-scene. The one in which one of the characters is about to die, and talks his last words, who’ll probably be some inspiring words, lots of drama and the person dying completely forgiving everyone and apologizing for the bad things he did. Still, Iggy is an autorave, a machine, still infected with the cogito-virus. During that scene, he kept switching from normal-mode to cogito-mode, so in the middle of his speech, he suddenly started screaming at Real, accusing her of being the source of all his suffering, and at the same time apologizing. The effect that this had was extremely interesting to see.
I’m not too sure about the relationship between Real and Vincent. Please, don’t let Real be a tsundere! Only now with Tsuyokiss and Zero no Tukaima, I’m beginning to realize how much I hate tsunderes. Still, I do have to admit that Vincent looked too cute in his attempts to win Real’s heart. He’s got no social skills at all, so he has to try in his own ways.
Pino was once again amazing. It’s great to see that she still has her bunny-suit, and puts that on from time to time. At the end of the episode, we also see that she has learned from the past, and knows what sadness looks like. Still, she hasn’t managed to fully understand it. She also was great when she replied to Real that she’d rather want to know that feeling. Oh, and let’s not forget Vincent looking for firewood, when Pino comes running to him with a couple of mushy mushrooms. ^^;
Overall, this episode was great. Especially the conflict between Iggy and Real, when he bashed her completely into the ground with his arguments. He was right about everything, and Real realizing her own mistakes was amazing to see. This anime’s just turning better and better by the minute. I can’t wait for the next episode.
Psgels said “Please, don’t let Real be a tsundere!”
She is obvioulsy one,sorry to disappoint you,but I think we should really stop this tsundere hype.After all anime seasons I watched always had a lot of tsundere characters and among them there were really great ones;it is just that now a word exists to describe them that associate them with Shana or Rin from FSN.I think everything is just overdone,after all tsundere is a pretty vast term,we could easealy said that most if not all of the RL girls are tsundere since they have a totaly different perosnnality when talking to stranger and to friends/lover.
Besides this episode was good,the only thing that afraid me about Ergo Proxy is that they might be some bad episodes in the 16-20 that makes the ending just a little boring.This is generaly a problem that have most of the serious shows wich run two courts.
True. I’ve indeed been thinking about it, and only now I realize that it’s not the Tsundere that I hate, it’s badly developed relationships. Add that do the fact that most anime with badly developed relationships decided to abuse the Tsundere, and you get me overreacting. I almost forgot that characters like Merryl Strife from Trigun and Vita from Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha A’s are also Tsundere.
In any case, the episode indeed was incredible. It’s indeed typical with two-season-long anime. ep 13-20 are either incredibly good, or incredibly bad. There’s indeed enough mystery to make for a good ending, though Raoul, Deadalus and Monad sure have to do something worthwile to throw in some more plotholes. Or Moscow must have some nice relevations.
Was I the only one who upset over Iggy’s death?
Then again, I am pretty emotional or sentimental or whatever.
What is a Tsundere anyway?
Yea, I just watched this episode (This is my second time around watching Ergo Proxy…I watched it last year, and have been meaning to rewatch to catch some things that I am sure I missed.) and I cried when Iggy died. It’s really an emotional scene. However, my tears could have something to do with the emotional state I am outside of the episode, as well. Anyway, this was a great episode.
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