Eureka Seven Ao – 13

This episode disappointing? Hah, Ao finally had the time to see his mother again and answer some of the big questions of the plot, and this worked out really well.

As expected, this is a time travel plot; everyone just labeled Eureka as an alien. Apparently Eureka traveled through time twice, this being the first one. Also, Renton got mentioned! This episode was all about relating back the things that Eureka did 10 years ago, which made for some very good character development for the ones involved. Also, why was Elena so upset?

Also, this episode showed even more that this is Eureka Seven with an Evangelion inspiration. First of all there was this one facial expression from Truth (who really kicked ass in this episode by the way), and then there was this remarkable Secret-design from Eureka’s past. Coincidence?
Rating: **+ (Excellent)

45 thoughts on “Eureka Seven Ao – 13

  1. Awesome episode. It answered some of the questions. We can assume that Truth is the Secret 10 years ago because of the similar arm/attack. He somehow transformed into a human child when Eureka averted the Burst and was raised by the professor.

  2. I was really happy that Renton was mentioned. Also it was nice to see that Ao was wearing Renton’s old clothes.

  3. Wow… this episode was just, awesome.
    I was really excited the whole time.
    The way all the questions are starting to connect with each other is plain amazing.

    1. Also, like psgels had said, I also love how the characters clearly had a lot of character developments going for them these past 10 years.

  4. haha, that secret design was far too blatant for it to have been a coincidence. I’d prefer it if they all looked that impressive, though.

  5. Oh no…don’t Bones. Don’t you f*cking dare pull the “Eureka’s spirit transferred to Naru’s soul” twist.

    Anyway, I am feeling pretty awesome about predicting the time travel twist from episode one. But this is a pretty weak episode. I kept groaning every-time they took the focus away from Eureka. It was almost as if all the other characters were trying there hardest to keep her from stealing the show…which they failed… miserably. After all Eureka is the only interesting character in this show.

    1. I think it’s more like Naru got connected to the Scub Coral internet like a lot of other people in the Eureka 7 world and got in touch with Eureka that way, allowing Eureka to send a message to Ao. Would have liked her to have elaborated more about the Secrets but I guess that’s too much of a spoiler this early in the season. That’s one theory anyway. I was wondering if it could have been a fake message but that pillar of light that seems to signal some kind of link with the other world seems legit. I wonder what’s happened to Naru?

    2. If you only come here to complain about everything regarding this show, why don’t you stop watching it? According to you, every episode is weak, the overall plot is weak, the supporting characters are weak, the main characters are weak, yada yada yada… Seriously. This is not to say you aren’t entitled to your opinion, however, if you could leave your negativity and attack dog mentality at the door, that’d be awesome.

      1. Totally second that, i don’t understand why someone who seems to hate the show insists on watching it and annoying us with his complete dissatisfaction .. just stop watching it AidanAK47 XD

        1. While he’s typically in love with being a complete utter cunt, AK47 is right here.

          Eureka is still the most interesting character on this show, despite 13 episodes of establishing everyone else. Truth comes close, admittedly, but that’s only because he is mostly mysterious. Once that’s gone…

          1. I love Eureka too, but it’s pretty unreasonable to compare a character that’s had 52 episodes worth of development (and more) to the 13 episodes of development this cast has gotten. The only reason you’d groan about the lack of Eureka airtime, is b/c you like her. I get that. I would’ve loved more airtime for Eureka too. But that would then leave less of a chance for any development for any other characters (whether there’s to be anything significant about them… I can’t say… I’m not Bones) This is Eureka Seven: Ao, not Eureka Seven: Eureka. You can’t complain about a lack of Eureka AND complain about lacking character development at the same time.

  6. Lots of mind boggling reveals. And lots of anime references. XD I wonder if Elena is the one doing the designing. She is the anime otaku of the show after all. 10,000 and 2,000 years. Really? XD

    I wonder what it meant when Eureka said that Ao’s Nirvash looks just like the Nirvash that Renton was building. Is Renton somewhere in that world too?

    Damn, Eureka is hot.

    1. I think the show tried to convey that Renton is building another nirvash in his own time and it will be sent to the past somehow. Thats why there are 2.

      1. Um…it looks to me like Eureka (still pregnant with Ao) came to Ao’s Earth piloting original Nirvash. Next episode or so, she somehow goes back. But very soon after, she pilots the new Nirvash that she said Renton was working on and somehow came back to Ao’s Earth, gave birth to Renton and, two years or so later, disappears trying to bring the Quartz from the Okinawa Scub Burst event to her own world, leaving that new Nirvash behind to become the Mark I that Ao winds up piloting 10 years later (now?). Time travel has a way of messing up everything. XD

    2. ya Im suprised that psgels didnt get the aquarion reference(I laughed out loud when she said “this is no time for jokes”)

      Renton is in the original E7 world, she’s hopoing he’ll come to get her.

      1. Yeah. The thing is the time travel is pretty random. I wonder if it works both ways. It could be that this younger Eureka, on her return trip, could wind up in a time period out of sync with Renton. And what she said about it being likely that Renton will probably come looking for her seems highly likely. The two could go jumping back and forth between worlds and never find each other. I wonder that’s what Eureka meant in that vision where she asks Ao to send her back to where Renton is. Is Ao supposed to be some kind of time continuum tuner or something? Maybe Ao getting born in the past is what’s causing all these Scub Coral time travel events in the first place.

        And then there’s Elena, the enigmatic anime otaku. It’s a pretty good bet that she would have watched Gurenn Lagann.

  7. I guess this episode was relatively more interesting, but I still don’t see the reason for all the hype. Most of the plot seems to be needlessly esoteric and most of the characters aren’t really compelling or developed in any real sense. The whole thing feels like a doujin manga about E7 which itself was a clusterfuck…I wish Bones would make an original show like Xam’d that doesn’t rely on franchise history so much.

    About what someone said about Eureka stealing the show, that’s pretty clear to me – all of the other characters just feel paper thin, but maybe its just the length of the series and how it has to do so much so fast.

    1. Well, in my case I didn’t see that at all. Paper thin? The characters all had a lot going with them even before Eureka stepped into the show. And even after that it just made them delve more into their pasts.

      Well, we already know from episode 1 that Eureka is the main key to this series, so what’s so bad about her getting the spotlight after all the foreshadowing?

      1. Trass you are mistaken there. These characters are paper thin. Just because they are given a past does not mean they are well rounded characters. Hell, what is the point of goldilocks being in this show? Those characters were introduced and with half the series over we haven’t seen them do anything. One of the pilots only identity trait was spouting anime references(Now she’s the same as truth. Her only thing is being mysterious). The other pilot’s only trait is her daddy issues. What about the red haired woman? We know she created some propaganda scandal but that pretty much doesn’t tell us anything of her personality. Truth? He’s mysterious. That’s his only thing. As for Ao well…he doesn’t really have personality traits. He’s like Shu from guilty crown. He just follows the plot. (Exactly why did he start attacking (Looks up guys name) Gazelle? I didn’t understand that. Was there bad blood between them? When did this happen?)
        These characters really are paper thin. I also have to ask, why is that animal Noah in this show? I don’t understand the point of him.

        1. The bad blood happen when he was hated and bullied by the villagers and their kids, it’s discussed very early in the show.

        2. I’d disagree. There isn’t anyone in AO as immediately interesting as Renton or Anemone or Holland from the original series (hell, even Talho) but most of the cast have at least a bit of depth, and are pretty likable to boot. Elena has a serious identity crisis going on, Gazelle and co. are both down to earth and either corporate dogs or wild cards depending on their situation, and Ivica has proven himself several times over as an awesome human being. Mama’s pretty intriguing too, although we haven’t seen as much of her.

          Also need to keep in mind that Eureka Seven is twice the length of AO, so they had more time for character development, etc. The one person I really have a problem with is Truth, since we have no idea how his powers work yet and he comes off as incredibly cheap as a result. But it looks like we’re going to come to understand him soon, so hopefully he’ll redeem himself?

          1. That’s kind of the problem, Elena is just a big enigma, Chief while is a good stoic man, you have yet to find a reason to really care much. Gazelle’s gang as well, distinct personalities, but kind of where it ends.

            It like a basketball team that has a lot of good players but no star, they might surprise you here and there, but without stars, you’re going to lose overall

          2. Hm..is this a case of squeezing in too much content into too short a season? I mean, has any episode of Ao so far been wasted filler? I’m expecting a bombshell or two to go off with regards to Elena too.

          3. I agree with this. I find the characters to be entertaining, and interesting except for truth for reasons stated above. I am also not a fan of Naru. To me the characters have depth to me, we know a lot of their motivations especially Ivica and the red haired “Mama” They just weren’t built up as these amazing heroes from the start like E7 did(with Renton Idolizing Holland and the E7 crew, only to to find out that Holland was an abusive asshole who wanted to boink eureka or whatever). . . of course he had developed to change over the course of the series but he had a LOT of time spent on him to do that.

            My only issue is that there really isnt much time spent on the characters to really develop them I mean the usual bones wtf is going on type of story telling takes a while but with only 26 episodes and that large of a cast, you cant really go on JOURNEYS with most of the cast, develop them and have the bones-esque type story.

            Howver, I still think they do enough given the time frame, XAM’d btw while it had good character, the story/plot was paper thin and it left a bad taste in my mouth. . .like it was missing something, In my opinion, Story>>>>Characters. If you can tell a good story over having super developed characters, it’s better overall.

            Eureka had taken over the show since the beginning, in the constant talk about her (not to mention the show’s name. . .EUREKA haha)

            Still I think the characters are good enough to keep me coming back and entertained every week, their motivations are laid out, and we know what drives them, they don’t do overly stupid things, out of character, their struggles are compelling and interesting to watch, their may be not enough time to really do serious character studies on them, but that’s not really what the show is about. It’s mostly about the plot…you can see it in the Japanese military guy with truth, he does only serve as a plot device at this point, Bones is only using the viewers(Japanese Viewers) world knowledge and probable emotions with the whole Japanese-Okinawa-American Military Presence thing to add depth to that guy and conflict in the story. THAT is something I’m not so keen on.

            But for some more of the good parts which out weight the bad, we have the president who is just oozing with a great story that will obviously be looked into more, we have the vice president dude working with the red haired chick against the pres, then we have gazelles group who while annoying NOW, they are building them up to have importance later. . .when those factions clash … I got annoyed at gazelle in this ep, it was like “gtfo retard!” I thought his being in the way of some reveals was cheap. . .if you don’t want to reveal anything at a point in the show, don’t tease us with shit we already know? I’m talking about the secrets are not our enemies thing…DUH! Truth has been saying that the whole series through one way or another, if you’re going to have Eureka bring that up then either reveal that part! If you’re gonna have Gazelle be a reveal-blocker-tease plot device then don’t mention that reveal when you’ve been hinting at it the whole series…

            That issue is just with the writing of the plot than the writing of the characters, which can only be seen if you disconnect yourself from the original E7 which is understandably hard to do. Which is why people have a hard time liking the show. Even though its LEAGUES better than Fam. . .but of course FAM had loli moe pandering bait as main characters with waaaaay less depth and “give-a-shit” factor that the E7 characters, but no one could really see past the moe pandering to enjoy the story (even after they CRIPPLED Claus!) I stopped watching fam around episode 5 or 6, I still enjoy AO so it’s doing a lot more things right than wrong.

          4. Excellent post; couldn’t agree more. While Ao does have it’s flaws, them being some flat side characters, to say that each character is half baked is ridiculous to me when the show has been doing such a good and consistent job with developing the characters and the plot minimally at the same time. As far as I see it, the only problem people have is that a lot of questions are being raised and the answers haven’t come yet; something that’s to be resolved in the second half of the show.

            Truth is probably the show’s weakest point though. He gets more aggravating by the episode, I swear.

        3. I am mistaken? How is that so? I think I clearly said “in my case I didn’t see that at all”. Notice the “in my case”. They are not paper thin in MY opinion.

          I can understand if I speak about plots and you say I am mistaken about what I said, but I cannot understand how ‘my opinions’ about something can be called a mistake. You know, it’s like me saying “I like fried chickens, they’re delicious” then you come and say “You’re mistaken, fried chicken is not delicious” just because you don’t like fried chicken. Get what I mean?

          But that’s off the point lol

          “Those characters were introduced and with half the series over we haven’t seen them do anything.”

          Are you seriously saying this? Wow, I feel like we’re watching two different shows here.

          “One of the pilots only identity trait was spouting anime references(Now she’s the same as truth. Her only thing is being mysterious). The other pilot’s only trait is her daddy issues. What about the red haired woman? We know she created some propaganda scandal but that pretty much doesn’t tell us anything of her personality.”

          So those are ‘paper thin’?

          “Truth? He’s mysterious. That’s his only thing.”

          Do you actually believe the show will leave it at that until the end of the series? Do you prefer Truth and all his issues to be explained as soon as he appeared or something?

          And what’s with you and mysterious things? Surely sooner or later they will be explained (either properly or not). To me, holding plot points by keeping them inside characters without telling us the details which makes those characters seem mysterious isn’t that bad at all…

          “(Exactly why did he start attacking (Looks up guys name) Gazelle? I didn’t understand that. Was there bad blood between them? When did this happen?)”

          Hmm… again, it’s like we’re watching different shows lol. That scene in particular was very emotional to me, I could relate to Ao and his actions easily. This episode really sucked me into its atmosphere.

          And you don’t like how Ao follows the plot? …What kind of MC doesn’t follow the plot of the story? If it’s his personality, It’s very clear in this episode that he wants to keep Eureka for himself, he doesn’t want any other people to take her from him, even with all of the people going for her with each of their reasons, not even his own father. Yes, he loves his mother and he’s ‘selfish’. I don’t know about you, but I call it a personality.

          But yeah, Noah is just there to decorate things maybe? lol it’d be nice if he’s used in some point of the story, but I won’t hope too much. I’m guessing he’s just there as a mascot. Well, he’s an animal. I don’t complain about a ‘pet’ not playing a part in the plot.

          1. You stated that the characters in your opinion were not paper thin. This isn’t the same as saying something like you think chicken is delicious. It’s more like me saying “In my opinion Batman looks like a big fluffy bunny rabbit” sure it’s an opinion but does that mean it’s correct?

            “Those characters were introduced and with half the series over we haven’t seen them do anything.”

            This refers to goldilocks but by all means please explain what they have accomplished that required them to be focused on.

            “So those are ‘paper thin’?”

            Name their other traits that I haven’t noted. You may find it quite difficult.

            “Do you actually believe the show will leave it at that until the end of the series? Do you prefer Truth and all his issues to be explained as soon as he appeared or something?”

            Of course not but being mysterious doesn’t make him interesting. Think of it this way. Why should we be interested in Truths origin? The anime expects us to be interested but Truth doesn’t display a personality that makes us think “How did this guy become like this?” The mystery around him doesn’t need to be revealed but nothing says that we can’t get hints that are not vague nonsense.

            “Hmm… again, it’s like we’re watching different shows lol. That scene in particular was very emotional to me, I could relate to Ao and his actions easily. This episode really sucked me into its atmosphere.”

            I concede this point to you. If there really is a point behind it then I guess I wasn’t paying attention because of lack of interest.

            “If it’s his personality, It’s very clear in this episode that he wants to keep Eureka for himself, he doesn’t want any other people to take her from him, even with all of the people going for her with each of their reasons, not even his own father. Yes, he loves his mother and he’s ‘selfish’. I don’t know about you, but I call it a personality.”

            No. That’s a issue. Not a personality.

            “But yeah, Noah is just there to decorate things maybe? lol it’d be nice if he’s used in some point of the story, but I won’t hope too much. I’m guessing he’s just there as a mascot. Well, he’s an animal. I don’t complain about a ‘pet’ not playing a part in the plot.”

            Figured as much. He takes up this shows screen-time that could be used for better things.

          2. @Aidan. Why on earth do you want to use a single word to describe a character? You are complaining that a character is paper thin but yet want to use a single descriptor to describe them. Do you see the problem there?

            Do you have a single word that describes you and how you act all the time???? Ao seems to me to be a very real boy that acts in many different ways depending on the situation, as real people do. He’s certainly alot more complex than Renton who all that he had for him initially was that he was a wimp and had a crush for Eureka.

        4. I disagree that Ao has no personality. He just doesn’t have a stereotype that can be easily related to. Also, comparing him to Shu was a bit much: Shu’s problem was also that he just completely changed character and motive every other episode. I’m not seeing that with Ao.

          1. Psgels, what words can we use to describe Ao? Courageous? Not really. Smart? Nope. Whiny? Brooding? Kinda. Caring? Thoughtful? Heroic? Curious? Joyful?…I don’t know about you but I can just call him stoic. I come up blank on everything else.

          2. ah but one word description=1 dimensional. Ao is a fine character, just doesnt really have someone to create tension/conflict with at Generation Blue(That’s the other weird thing about Eureka7 AO, conflicts are mostly under the table between side characters with little screen time ). He’s got a sense of purpose yet he’s still searching for his purpose, I think that’s interesting. He’s got this pent up emotion from his past

          3. @Scruffy, I believe I said words. Not word. In other words I don’t want him to fall under a single descriptor.

    2. Actually I thought Xam’d was kind of clusterfxxk with it plots and chracters going all over the map, more so than the original E7

      Bones usually does an original a year, havent heard plans this year though, since Un-go didnt do well last year

  8. I just noticed something. The scene where a ghostly Naru transforms into Eureka. Eureka tells Ao to return her to the place where Renton is. Can somebody verify? Hm…so Eureka didn’t go back to her world. She’s trapped somewhere else? WTF?

  9. Wow, yeah, Ao isn’t in the future like I presumed, this is all happening in the past due to that time mix up. Ao was lost in the past, ha! This is all so awesome! I’m in anticipation.

  10. I usually have a pretty broad sense of humor, but must admit that the one of Polar bear caf completely escapes me.. so everybody else is loving this?

  11. Who ever owns this blog can they give me there email so I can send you my theory it’s to long to put in a comment and I really want your feed back on it. I think it’s pretty good. Lol

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