Category: Finished Series: Action

Yeah, this really was meant to be a hard to watch episode. Finally Kotetsu mans up and settles down in order to raise Kaede… and then his partner breaks down. This was something that was bound to happen: Barnaby’s rise in popularity couldn’t last forever, and with this he didn’t just find out that Jake wasn’t the murderer of his parents, but someone has also been screwing with his memories.

Of course he doesn’t know yet that Ouroboros is as corrupt as hell, so he can probably only guess what the hell happened there. It’s a really scary thought of suddenly figuring out that half your memories may be fakes. My guess is that his mind was probably changed in those relaxing chamber thingies, in order to 1) divert attention from the real killer, 2) boost Barnaby’s popularity, 3) boost ratings, and possibly even 4) get rid of Sky-High, who still is by far the strongest hero out there. Just try figuring that out from Barnaby’s position, though.

Now, thanks to Kotetsu this episode wasn’t as enjoyable as the previous ones, but the creators were really deliberately trying to turn him indecisive. With this, I can understand the creators’ decision to make him retire a bit more: he will probably retire, but this will most likely happen at the end of the series. Just randomly quitting right now would be too irresponsible to Barnaby, while not quitting would be too irresponsible to Kaede.

These are some very interesting dilemmas here, and I hope that the creators won’t a) use something cheap by turning Kaede into a bad guy or b) come with some very convenient solution out of nowhere that allows Kotetsu to solve both. If this doesn’t happen, then the finale has just become even more potentially interesting.

Also, who the hell in that village has magnetic powers?
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Okay, and with this we may very well have the best episode of Tiger & Bunny yet. Holy crap, that was bittersweet.

What’s awesome about these past episodes is that they only show how much this series had been planning in advance. Both this and the Sky High episode were some of the most anticipated episodes around. Instead of showing them in the first half, the creators really saved them for the later half of the series, when the cast has already grown significantly.

Yes, there will be a catch: while it would be an awesome twist if Kotetsu really kept true to his words, there has to be some catch for Tiger left. But that doesn’t prevent this episode from being completely awesome. Kaede alone was already more than worth the wait, but this episode delivers and makes both Kotetsu’s brother and mother a delight to watch as well. It was all wonderfully down to earth. Even the thunder storm doesn’t matter. Yes it was very coincidental, but the things it accomplished more than made up for it.

By far the best was Kotetsu’s development though. This guy got a ton of depth with this episode. This episode really showed how he still sees his daughter as a 6-year-old kid, due to the lack of time they spent together, and seeing his mother and brother lecture him about it was also an excellent touch. Finally showing his dead wife only made things complete.
Rating: *** (Awesome)

Holy crap, what a plot twist! Compared to the light-hearted episodes of the last two weeks, this episode was really dark. It didn’t just reveal Lunatic’s background, it also put a completely new spin to this series.

There have been plenty of hints so far that the city of Sternbild is corrupt and closely linked to Ouroboros, but there is one thing that always stood solid as the epitome of goodness: Mr. Legend. That’s exactly what he was though: a legend. His history was written so that he really stands out as a heroic figure, completely masking his flaws. It’s also not like he turned out to be some sort of Ouroboros Mastermind, and during his glory days he probably did some amazing things. He was the one who popularized the hero business after all, and inspired countless of people. Sure he was probably influenced by corporate strategies, but even then he himself had a huge influence there.

And then his powers declined, he started drinking and beat his own wife and son so badly that his son (aka Lunatic) ended up killing him.

What’s more: this episode also rocked because of the huge contrast between Kotetsu and Barnaby. I mean, they already were opposites and all, but right now, Barnaby is going though his glory days, while Kotetsu is about to leave them with the loss of his powers. Tiger in a way is very similar to Mr. Legend, his great example, so I’m really not sure what the creators have in store for him. Like I said before, it would really be interesting if he really were to lose his powers. At this point there have been no hints whatsoever to power upgrades, so it would be a bit of a shame if something like that ended up solving his problems.
Rating: *** (Awesome)

Here it is: the long-awaited Sky-High episode. And it was worth the wait! It’s finally time to really get to know him.

And again, this episode somehow did it while also delivering a bunch of really nice twists to the plot. Skyhigh here actually gets to show why he used to be the king of heroes: he’s far from as active as the Dragon Kid for example, but his powers are by far the strongest out of all of the heroes out there. It’s really interesting how, while he’s an interesting character, most of his awesome points have just been hinted towards and that makes for a really interesting character, especially since this episode focuses on his flaws. And builds some romance around him. That also really was awesome.

I’m not sure whether this was intentional or not, but that robot actually has this really similar voice as Dorothy from the Big O. It’s really bizarre, especially considering their parts and personalities in both series are totally different, but they do speak with this similar tone. She also was animated really well, by the way.

Also, if this were a shounen series, then Tiger is about to get a huge power up. In this series however, where his powers are anything but conventional aside from the fact that he’s really strong, anything can happen. I’d actually really want to see Tiger lose his powers for real, without the creators pulling some Deus ex Machna as an excuse to make him stronger.
Rating: *** (Awesome)

This was a really silly episode, but I absolutely loved it. The humour was exactly what this series needed after the previous arc, but most importantly: timeskip!

this episode was a riot to watch, but on top of that it contained a ton of character development because we skipped 10 months forward. Bison, Blue Rose, Tiger, Barnaby: they all changed, and it was awesome. The trust between the main duo is finally complete and got the chance to mature a bit, Bison changed to the resident loser and especially Blue Rose’s crush on Tiger gave an interesting twist to her character. Usually it’s nothing special when a girl falls in love with the main character and all, but Tiger & Bunny has never been a romantic comedy: it was immediately established that Kotetsu had a dead wife and a daughter and so far the creators never hinted at Blue Rose liking him so far: this was no love at first sight like you see at nearly every series, but instead it’s only something that grew over the course of the past episodes. As character development it fits great into this series.

Also, the comedy. The villain f this episode was hilarious, but especially the way in which he turned out to be that stand-in for Barnaby that was once used had me in stitched. Because of that the chase at the end of the episode was a really entertaining one, and Tiger’s powers getting wonky made it even better. His powers are changing, and yet this series has never shown anything like this before (the closest I guess was Jake getting two powers). There has to be a catch beyond simply “his powers are evolving”.
Rating: *** (Awesome)