Hello everyone, and welcome to another week of Vinland Saga! This week continues Einar and Thorfinn’s quest to grow wheat, as well as delving a bit further into how they both feel about this whole “slavery” thing. Sound fun? Good, cause it is. Now lets dive into the episode!
Starting off, a fun fact for everyone. The opening scene of this episode might feel like it comes out of nowhere to some, shoving us into the end of one of Thorfinn’s nightmares. What might surprise you to learn however is that this is the last moment of a 2 minute short released on Youtube, for free! From what I heard it was because they animated it but couldn’t figure out how to fit it into the episode. Whatever the reason, it’s a small bit of action and a longer look into exactly the kind of stuff Thorfinn dreams about. Becoming his old self again, how many families and people he killed for no reason, his usual sort of PTSD. I recommend you go take a look, I’ll link to it here for you!
Getting into the actual episode, this week continues Thorfinn’s struggle with his past as we get more and more of his PTSD. And god do I love this PTSD. Not because I want Thorfinn to suffer, I quite like him. Rather I love Vinland Saga’s presentation of it, and how as he grows and becomes a better person, his past haunts him more and more. It’s as if the more he learns about how to lead a good, upstanding life, the more he figures out exactly what it was he was taking from other people. And as he figures this out, he fears becoming that once again. As we see throughout the episode, Thorfinn not only questions whether he has changed but rather if he can change at all. It’s very self depreciating.
But of course you can leave it to Einar to not let that happen. Continuing to care for Thorfinn he, with the help of old man Sverkell, show him that he already has changed. That no warrior could plan this field, that no one would look at him and even think he was a warrior. Look at his reflection and ask, is this the face of a monster? They convince him that, yes, having lost his rage and bloodlust he is indeed empty. But emptiness doesn’t have to be the end. Rather it means he is free to come anything he wants. He just has to figure out what that is, and truly commit to it. It’s a nice kind of redemption. Where a lot of anime either don’t address it at all or do so at a surface level, Vinland Saga is requiring Thorfinn to actively want to change.
Of course the secret to this is probably going to be those words from Thors that he can’t remember. And for once, I don’t know either. This is one of those things that, it’s been so long since I read it, that I can’t remember. Was it about how he wanted his son to live his life? Is it about Thors’ passivism and how violence is never the answer? Maybe it’s about Vinland itself, a new land and a new hope away from it all? I’m really not sure. But whatever it is, I suspect it will be what gives Thorfinn his new purpose. What fills him now that the rage towards Askeladd for his father is gone.
Speaking of rage, in an interesting parallel to Thorfinn losing his, Einar seems to gain some. On it’s own this isn’t much, it’s normal to feel anger at people destroying your farm. Especially when it’s your ticket to freedom and a good life. What I liked though was how it affected Thorfinn. How he had to talk Einar down, helping him cool his head and arguing that he himself has done much worse so does he deserve to be angry. Only then to fall into the same trap Einar did once Einar was threatened/going to get in trouble anyways. It shows that he isn’t infallible, that Thorfinn can fall back to his old ways if he isn’t careful, and that any changes he makes moving forward are conscious decisions on his part.
So yeah, all in all I quite enjoyed this episode of Vinland Saga. It’s never the most exciting or action packed episode of the week, sure. I dare say it has some of the least action in the season. But it is certainly the most consistently thought provoking, with some of the best written characters of the last few years. Every week I find myself looking forward to more and every week I am rewarded.
