Okay. The mysteries behind the flying airship were revealed in this episode. I did not expect that at all. I really thought that it was just a small side-story, and that Aria’s adventure was mainly used as a way to spend the time for Gauche to wake up, just like the previous episode. And here this episode comes and it suddenly ties a ton of stuff together.
I mean, good mystery is about two parts: asking questions and revealing them. Series that are perhaps good at the former may not be as good as the latter, and vice versa. Letter Bee though… it’s awesome at both. This episode yet again was excellent, and the amount of depth that was just behind that airship really surprised me.
This episode also laid more and more links between Lag and that Artificial sun. Especially that eye… not only was it a major surprise for that sun to have… an eye (even though we already knew that it was made out of hearts), but am I the only one who is reminded to that dream Lag had in the lighthouse episode? Nichi’s shadow was drawn in the exact same style there. Also, my memory is rather blurry on this one, but remind me again: did Lag first meet Gauche before, or after that airship crashed?
I also never really noticed that there were quite a few people with eye wounds in this series. At the same time, that does make me wonder about the nature of that guy who couldn’t become a spirit: his scars were exactly the same as the one we saw from that human experiment. Could all of that be linked to Lag’s strange connection to that sun as well?
Either way, this episode was also really heart-warming at the end. Perhaps it was a bit forced to suddenly have Sylvette coming, but it worked really well.
Rating: *** (Awesome)
OP: I like the song, but indeed: why is it a clip show?
ED: Perhaps not the best song, but again it’s based on a great visual concept. It’s great to look at, apart from that annoying placement of the next episode preview, perhaps.
Lag met Gauche after the airship accident, aka the day of flicker (which was also the day that both Sylvette and Lag were born actually).
Lag met Gauche after the airship crashed. Lag was born on the Day of Flicker, ie the day when the airship crashed. there must be some kind of connection between Lag and the artificial sun. the reason why his mother was taken away is still unknown.
I wonder if Lag saying ‘okaa-san’ while he was dreaming and the artificial sun also saying ‘okaa-san’ during the flashback is related? And could Lag have the spirit amber eye because he lost his eye on the day he was born due to looking at the artificial sun? Or maybe the real Lag is in the sun and the Letter Bee Lag is an clone powered by spirit amber? This episode answered quite a few questions but raised some more, which is pretty fun to speculate about =D
It surprised me as well how the plot tied in several aspects of the story thus far. It’s been focused on adventure and drama that the mystery was like a minor topic, but now I can sense something else unfolding…
Lag and Gauche met after the day of the flicker (which is when the airship crashed) and day of the flicker is Lag’s birthday apparently, which makes it even more suspicious… I have this theory (not much to support in anime or manga so it’s not really a spoiler) that Lag is the physical manifestation of all the stolen heart from all the people, which kind of means, the collective heart of all the people is a huge crybaby 😛
They are getting kinda close to finishing the manga material though, especially if you consider that they skipped some content (maybe they will get through it later?).
The events of this episode got up to chapter 38 and manga has 47 chapters so far, and the anime is really not fooling around and covering manga material at a pretty quick pace (which is good of course).