Welcome everyone, to another week of Kaina and the Great Snow Sea! This is a slow week all thing considered, which is weird when you realize it’s also the week of their great escape. Still slow doesn’t mean bad, just that it was nice and relaxing. So without further ado, lets dive into the episode! And apologies for the delay, I had some computer troubles this week.
Getting into the episode, this week was a bit of a disappointment for me. As far as escapes go, it was barely an escape at all. Resolved almost immediately, they used a small raft already made by those they had befriended. While it was sweet seeing them come to an understanding and inspire the downtrodden, it wasn’t the most engaging way to leave Valghia. It becomes even more disappointing when you see what they give us after that: Recaps. A bunch of recaps. Well I say a bunch, it was more like 5 minutes. But 5 minutes of recaps in a 22 minute episode is still a sizeable chunk. Regardless of specifics, it simply wasn’t the most exciting way to spend the episode for me.
Now to be fair to Kaina, these recaps did serve a few secondary purposes. They informed Yaona about their journey down the tree and how this isn’t the first time they’ve done something like this and, more importantly, it reinforced Kaina and Ririha’s relationship. Gave them a few small moments to remember the trip, connect, a little bit of holding hands. A sweet moment of quiet and romance between all the war and life threatening situations. That was nice! I just don’t think we needed 5 minutes of recap to achieve that. Take that time and spend it more on the escape, or even on them just having a heart to heart while Yaona is asleep. Anything would have been more impactful I feel.
Luckily for Kaina there were a few other small moments on the raft. The snow whale was cool, giving us that “Majesty of Nature” moment that Fire Hunter failed at. Just a fleeting shot in the night before it moved on. There was also that funny bit where Yaona almost fell off the boat, which for me at least happened immediately after I thought “Damn, that’s a small boat”. I also liked Kaina getting to show off his navigational skills, managing to get them home. I’m a bit confused as to how the raft functioned/moved at all, but that’s not terribly important in the grand scheme of things I feel.
Moving on, we made it back to Atland! This was fine I guess. Kaina getting the reception of a hero was nice, I enjoy his growing prestige for going out and actually accomplishing shit vs just being from the Canopy. Really shows how Kaina is building up this narrative of the 2nd coming of the Sage. The only weird bit in all of this to me was the massage/”Reward” joke Kaina had going on. Felt weird, and a bit out of place. Same with Ririha’s towel drop, Kaina just isn’t the kind of show where that sort of thing fits tonally. There was enough romantic/sexual tension between the two just in being in the same room in towels/getting a massage. We didn’t need a nipple-less boob towel drop to sell that and honestly, Polygon’s models aren’t good enough for it anyways.
What I did like though was how the tapestry I mentioned before came back into it. I said those looked like words and that it was going to be important! And here we are, Kaina and Ririha using the tapestries, along with the Sign Master’s teachings, to convince the King to look for the Giant Canopy Tree. Why would he listen to some old pieces of cloth? I don’t know! Maybe he’s just big on traditions and national history, Ririha did mention a bit how he cares for that sort of stuff. Seems a bit weird for such a no-nonsense guy, but Kaina needs some way to get them off on a new journey was this upcoming battle is over. This is as good as any I suppose.
So yeah, all in all not a particularly strong episode of Kaina. It had a few moments I enjoyed, but just as many that brought it down for me. Hopefully moving into this big battle, *Kaina will be able to give us a satisfying finale for the season. Or as satisfying as it can get with the knowledge there is an upcoming movie for the series as well, telling us it won’t truly be over. Maybe that cage the Valghian’s are dragging behind them will be something cool, some big predator they caught that’s native to the canopy for Kaina to beat. Or Amelothee will turn on the Admiral, taking over Valghia and uniting everyone. I dunno! I just want it to be fun.
