A calm before the storm episode… through a really weird one. I admit that I didn’t expect such an episode at this point of the series.
So yeah. The fluff in this episode was very unconventional. After the hard-hitting previous episode, you’d expect the fun and games to be over, but instead we get a really uneventful episode in which Kanata waits for a phone to ring. The part in which she was about to wet herself was rather uncomfortable to watch. It was well written however, there’s no doubt about that.
However, we finally know what the final arc of this series is going to be about: saving the country. This has been a very down to earth series, but it had it coming: there were a few very clear hints pointing to this. The first one was the legend of the five priestesses: very basic foreshadowing. And then there’s the matter of the princess of the country being mentioned a number of times. This episode also confirmed that Rio has a very high status, and basically came here, running away from that.
The final five episodes are basically going to take care of that, and I bet that they’re going to be completely different from what we’ve seen from this series so far. I really hope that the creators weren’t too ambitious with it, I’d much rather have seen a finale that would focus on the characters. For this final arc, the creators are really going to have to take care to not overdo it and suddenly have our five-some god-mode themselves through this war. That’s the thing I’m most afraid of.
Oh, and Kanata in this episode proved that airheads can use their brains as well, when she revealed that she knew about the secret practices of the platoon. God, more anime should realize this.
Rating: * (Good)
The finale that focused on characters…you mean,like rideback did last year?
Yeah, pretty much. i think that often series try to be a bit too epic in their finales, so much that they’re ignoring their characters in the process. Ride Back was a pretty good example of how to do it right.
I think some epic is good, just don’t overdo it. Looking forward to seeing how they decide to execute it!
btw, Kalafina the group of the OP, is another project of Yuki Kajiura (another project of her is fictionjunction, whose music is used in animes as gundam, .hack//roots, El cazador, and more top quality soundtracks.) i fell more in love with Yuki ;o
Thank you for pointing out this is the calm before the storm. I’ve been reading all over the place that this episode is a disappointment, and I can’t really blame people for that. I personally thought the whole bathroom thing was stupid. But this is a demure and upbeat episode to try and balance the mood whiplash from episode 7, and I too think we’re headed back for dark places next week.