Oh no. Well I suppose this was coming with all the news of this series troubles but it is disheartening to see it come to worst case scenario with the quality of this episode. This is the episode that announces without a doubt that this team is at the breaking point. Characters go off model several times, the animation get to levels of absurd with Sousuke running an obstacle course and his animation missing frames, audio errors like Sousuke kicking away a canister for it to make no noise whatsoever from the sound of the sergeants pockets being patted despite his hand currently lighting a cigar. Tessa eating a sandwich without even opening her mouth. Boy of boy, I don’t know if this episode was outsourced or what but you can just see the tremendous drop in quality. I don’t blame the animation team as it does feel like they were going above and beyond for this series and that finally broke them. I previously wished for a second cour but at this rate I should consider it lucky if we get to the end of this cour with respectable quality. Well after this episode there will be a three week break until the next one so I hope that would remedy some of the problems with production.
Despite this the story still holds up as we have Sousuke manage to fend off an attacker, Tessa dealing with insomnia and guilt of over the the stress and guilt of the situation and Chidori finding out Sousuke is still searching for her and finding herself wishing to disappear due to the trouble she’s causing others. Not to mention Kalinin revealing that he was a traitor to Mythril and a Amalgam spy. If this last revela felt a bit out of nowhere that would be because it was supposed to be revealed at the end of the Dancing very Merry Christmas volume which was skipped over by this adaption. So indeed the reveal here feels rather abrupt due to the fact that the audience should already know about it at this point but I kinda wish they gave the reveal a bit more gravitas. He wasn’t a major character but he did play an important role in the series, not to mention being a mentor for Sousuke so him being a traitor is sort of a big deal. Still they set him up well as a villain here what with him shooting a man and telling him that he will die in 30 minutes if not given first aid. Remarkably cold that upon being refused he just left him there to bleed out, not even asking him to reconsider.
It is rather funny that the fanservice moments of this episode were downplayed by the situation what with Tessa stripping down to rest only to be unable to eat, sleep and being racked with guilt all the while lying to her officers and pretending she’s fine. She’s still a teenager after all so no doubt this hits her hard and when Kalinin’s betrayal is revealed to her that’s gonna be devastating. Chidoris situation by contrast isn’t quite as dire and her scene felt a little more gratuitous with her jumping into a pool and swimming lengths in her underwear. Which gave her motivation because…hmm…I don’t quite remember her being on the swim team. I guess cause it reminded her of swimming class at school or that she just felt she needed to do something? Truth be told I don’t quite grasp the logic but whatever it was got her pumped to do something at least. I just hope her little angst moments are few and far between. Other than that we got some good comedy with Sousuke’s old sergeant who was drilling in a personal philosophy of being a soldier into him only fr Sousuke to literally get knocked out and the sergeant goes “Well I guess that happens” Also saying shit in Japanese is fine yet saying fucking in English needs to be beeped out? These censors need some fucking guts. Well we won’t be getting the next episodes for another three weeks so it will be quite the wait till I can close this one off. I am still waiting on SHaft to get those final Fate/Extra episodes out as well come to think of it. Hopefully they don’t all hit during a bad time.
