Simoun – 08 – Political and Religious Messages

Simoun just continues to get better and better by the minute. These dramatic shots were greatly executed. Especially Aaeru was great. In fact, Simoun’s just awesome in its ability to portray heavy emotions suffered by the characters. Higurashi really can learn from this. I’d love to see a crossing between the two shows. 🙂

In any case, last episode, we left off with the priestesses and the important people from Plumbum arriving for the conference. We start the episode with Anubitufu, who finally introduces himself. He’s the captain of the Arcus Prima, indeed the biggest warship that Simulacrum posesses. This must mean that the Arcus Niger, from the previous episode, is something other than a warship, as these two ships looked like they were the same size. Three Chors are stationed in there, the Chor Tempest, the Chor Kaputo and the Chor Riboru (the current top-Chor, Vyüra’s in this one). Waporifu then reflects about what happened back in the previous episodes.

We then switch towards the pre-conference meeting. Harukonfu wonders why there are so many priestesses. He believes that they only serve as translators for the Plumbum officials, though the priestesses answer that they are needed to watch over the important conference. The Plumbum officials get a bit startled when they find out that the Tempus Patiem-priests (or the Simoun Sybylla) also will attend the conference.

Meanwhile, we switch to the Chor Tempest in their ballroom. The overall atmosphere is kindof gloomy. Rödoreamon tries to make Mamiina feel better, who immediately bites back at her. Yun also doesn’t understand Aaeru’s reason to be a Sybylla (not wanting to go to the spring). Then, the Chor Riboru decides to invade into the ballroom. This ballroom always belonged to the Chor Tempest because of their status, though now that that’s gone, the member from the Chor Riboru just do as they please.

Once they get sent out, Furoe comes running towards them with a message. It’s been decided that only two priestesses will attend the conference, so the third one will stay with the Chor Tempest for the moment. Both parties introduce themselves, Furoe introduces each of the members of the Chor Tempest, and Angurasu (the priestess) repeats the name of each of them. Except Aaeru, who gets a bit pissed about this. Angurasu then tells a bit about the country of Plumbum. It’s supposed to be very cold. Mamiina then reveals that she only became a Sybylla because of the war. When she was young, she wanted to be a Simoun pilot, though this seemed impossible due to the fact that she came from a poor family. Because of this, she kept wanting to pilot one of these more and more. When she finally got the chance to fly and it seemed that she had talent, there was no way back for her. She now hopes to be Neviriru’s pair, so that nobody would ever dare to look down on her ever again.

Later, we switch to the conference. In there, the priestesses give a very obvious hint about what is going on. I would have liked this scene to be a bit more subtle. In any case, we switch back to the main prayer room with Angurasu, Furoe, Aaeru and Kaimu. Angurasu suggests that there probably was another god or belief before Tempus Patiem and Animus (this should probably be handy information for later in the series). Angurasu then is startled by the fact that Aaeru doesn’t consider herself as a priestess. She just wants to stay away from the spring because she can’t choose. Neviriru, meanwhile, is watching all of this.

Then, we switch to Limone and Dominüra. Limone’s studying a bit of the Plumbum language, and she finds Dominüra quite bothersome. What follows is Angurasu taking Kaimu as hostage and heading for the Simoun-dock. Then the good stuff begins. Aruti’s getting angry when she sees that her sister’s a hostage. The characters then realize that this was entirely planned out by the Plumbum officials. Angurasu plans to use Kaimu into setting off together with one of the Simoun. At least, that’s what everyone thinks. The thing she really plans is even greater.

Events really get juicy when she plants a huge bomb near the Simoun. When she’s about to set it off, she mumbles that it isn’t wise not to make decisions. She then sets the bomb off, while yelling Aaeru’s name, as hard as she can. To make things even better, the other Plumbum priests and officials suddenly commit suicide. Then some unexplainable events happen, along with some awesome ones. Apparently, Angurasu planted her bomb very conveniently, so that only the Chor Tempest’s Simoun remain unharmed. In that case, why can’t these Simoun be used by the other Chors?

The good part, however, is that Aaeru heard Angurasu scream out her name. Limone explains that this means “the love for god”, the highest form of love in the Plumbum language. Aaeru’s reaction to this is great to see. It does make sense, though. When Angurasu didn’t want to speak out Aaeru’s name, it was because of the meaning of her name. When she found out that Aaeru doesn’t see herself as a priestess, she got startled, as she assumed that one who’d name herself Aaeru would surely love god more than anything.

Neviriru’s the one to bring Aaeru out of her shock, when she accepts Aaeru as her pair. The episode ends with six simoun heading out of the Arcus Prima.

This anime’s definately got a strong message against terrorism in the world. This is probably one of the first times in which we’ve seen enemies on true suicide missions, in which their only purpose was to fool the enemy, kill themselves and do as much damage in the process as possible. All because they loved their god more than anything. Aaeru, as she doesn’t believe in Tempus Patiem, really has troubles seeing this.

As usual, we had a huge number of different characters, each acting their own way. A small summary for each of them:
Limone: Acts very friendly towards Aaeru, the fourth episode really made Limone respect Aaeru, and she shows this. She’s cold towards Dominüra, though. Then again, she was smiling when she got introduced towards Angurasu.
Rödoreamon: Apparently, she had no idea how selfish she was when she was a kid. She feels sorry for Mamiina. I think she only became a Simoun Sibylla because her family status forced her to.
Aruti: Most of the anime, we’ve seen her as a serious girl, though she changes completely when she tries to talk to Kaimu, her older sister. She’s also enraged when she finds out Angurasu kidnapped Kaimu.
Morinasu: She likes not to worry too much, the previous episodes showed this. Though this does make her strong, in some way. We could see that when she tried to hold back Aruti from trying to rescue Kaimu.
Harukonfu: I wonder how he’ll react after this episode. After all, he firmly believed in the success of the conference, and seeing these people commit suicide can be quite a shock.
Paraietta: She acts like a decent leader. She does the things she needs to do to keep the team from slacking off or behaving badly, though she doesn’t have the charisma of a leader. I guess that that’s Furoe’s part, as she’s the one to introduce Angurasu to the members of the Chor Tempest. It’s also amusing that whenever there’s a scene that features both her as Neviriru, you can always find them close to each other.
Kaimu: When Aruti asked her to come along with her, she declined. Why?
Guraghief: He seemed quite happy to announce that the Chor Tempest would be flying.
Anubitufu: At the end of the episode, I don’t think he would’ve thought to see the Chor Tempest in action.
Yun: She believes in her own ideals. She knows she hates war, and she set to her mind that she would fly the Simoun just like her friends did. She keeps mentioning this whenever she has the chance.
Dominüra: When I first saw her, I really thought she’d be an evil character. But she actually ends up being a very sympathizing one. She just hangs out with the rest of the Chor Tempest, and she really is part of the team now. She still tries to familiarize with Limone, even though her attempts aren’t really working.
Furoe: She may be a whiny brat, but she’s very active in the Chor Tempest. She tries to find out things on her own, she likes to take the initiative and she’s very outspoken.
Mamiina: She’s devastated by the last episode, though this episode showed that she’s mostly an attention-seeking girl. She lived her whole childhood without being recognized, and now she wants to be acknowledged. Naruto tries this by pulling all kinds of pranks, Mamiina tries this by being the best and not being shy to tell everyone about her childhood.
Aaeru: She’s been extremely straightforward since the start of the episode, though during this episode, she breaks. She also was the first to notice that Angurasu was planting a bomb inside the Simoun dock.
Neviriru: I think the last episode got her out of her crisis. She’s been using this episode to check up on Aaeru, and the way she acts. She then realizes that the two of them were very different from each other, except for the fact that they both have trouble to choose.
Angurasu: a pitiful child. She’s been grown up, only living for her god, Animus. For that, she’s even willing to kill herself.

I love the way that each of the characters has her own reasons to be a Sibylla. Neviriru’s reasons are still unknown. Aaeru wants to fly the Simoun because she doesn’t want to go to the spring. Paraietta lives for Neviriru. Furoe’s reasons aren’t known yet. Rödoreamon was forced in because of her family. Rimone wants to make perfect Ri Maajons. Dominüra wants to be accepted in the Chor Tempest, though her reasons for starting in the first place are still unknown. Aruti’s in because of her sister. Kaimu’s reasons are still unknown, same with Morinasu. Mamiina wants to be acknowledged and Yun doesn’t want to betray her friends.

Overall, I don’t think the Chor Tempest will be disbanded. After all, the anime would kindof lose its purpose if this happens. The episode itself was awesome, except for the few convenient coincidences and the obvious hint that was shown at the middle of the episode.