We got nearly a full episode of mecha combat so time for those CGI animators to show us what they can do. Now I gave this series a lot of grief last episode over CGI, so it’s only fitting to commend the CGI this episode as that was some excellent mecha CGI. not quite seamless enough to not be recognised as CGI but the movement of the mechs made it very easy to forgive that. Three quarters of the episode was pretty much mecha combat and it didn’t feel janky while also conveying the weight of these mechs. 2D mecha would still be preferred obviously but as an alternative I am fine with this as well. I loved the scene were the behemoth jammed the barrel of it’s cannon into a mecha, swung the mech upward and shot it in midair. Admittedly it was supposed to be a rather grim death scene but I saw that and immediately thought “Damn that was cool.” Speaking of which we did have some death scenes, though none of characters that were all that well known.
Seems they may have gotten more attention in the novels but right here and now all I scene was background character cannon fodder. Though one of which was Speck, who was the soldier that was joking about mutiny one episode back. Now sacrificing his life to give Kurtz a shot at taking down a behemoth. Again it does feel a bit trite but I find myself willing to forgive it. Another argument I have heard is in why Kurtz pretty much watched Speck die without doing anything and only after it finished killing him. But someone brought up that he couldn’t get a clear shot because the composite armour was all he could see and once the mech turned it’s head, he had a clear shot at the exposed head. Makes sense as firing beforehand would cause him to lose the surprise factor, which when fighting Behemoths is integral to taking them down. One detail I really love is that upon Kurtz taking out the main control of the behemoth, the mech was crushed under its own weight. Ultimately black technology is what keeps these robots bipedal and if you take that out then the robot quite literally destroys itself.
Other than that we got a really nice scene with Sousuke and Chidori where in the do a thing that a majority of couples need to do in anime. Actually communicate with each other. You could call it an anticlimactic resolution to their individual problems but it certainly is good to see characters actually deal with their problems instead of letting them bottle up their emotions until the appropriate climatic moment for maximum dramatic effect. Like episode 14 of a certain show about Darlings. The fact of the matter is that these two have been through a lot so actually seeing them talk things out is excellent development for them. Chidori admits to being both in love and scared of Sousuke with Sousuke admitting the same thing about her. You would think it would take an entire episode for Chidori to push Sousuke to rescue her classmates over protecting her and yet Sousuke cuts that right off by stating that he wants to protect Chidori and the school life that she cares for. Admittedly in the novel there was a bit more Angst with Chidori suddenly talking furious technobabble to explain the situation being hopeless and the manga goes even further than that. So I actually prefer how it was handled in the anime, less dramatic, more sensible. Cause those things are precious to him too. Actually makes me wish I could have given the entire series a rewatch up until this point cause this really does feel like a development the series has been building towards for a long time.
