Haha! That was an awesome episode. I can’t believe how good Night Head Genesis turned out. It had a few bumps in the middle, but right now, the episodes have been getting better and better. This definitely was one of the best episodes of Night Head Genesis yet.
The episode has a fast pacing. So many things happened at once, but the great thing is that this episode develops so many different side-characters of this anime. Especially the ones who were introduced in the previous episode. The episode already starts out great with the video-tape. Futami Yoshiki’s case did seem a bit boring when I saw him at the end of the previous episode, but now he starting to tell about himself and his own history, he suddenly turns very interesting. It seems that he has two kinds of powers: to see things at places, miles away from him and to enter the internet itself, sort of like Serial Experiments Lain. He then got caught up in these powers, though Natsuko, the girl from the previous episode, changed this, and turned into his only support. Great scene. 🙂
Then, Asano-kun comes, and the episode takes a strange twist when he invites them to the Ark-company. Another new character is introduced there, Okuhara Akiko’s assistant. He seems to have the power to cancel all other psychic powers, making him very reliable. He seems to chain the Upheaval to total destruction. Here, Naoya once again displays how much he’s grown when he actually tries to prove the guy wrong. This is something he wouldn’t be able to do at the beginning of this anime.
Overall, it was a very interesting conversation, full of thought-provoking elements and references. But what followed really was awesome as we first see Naoto really get serious with his powers. 🙂 The three antagonists from the Mikuriya-arc play a strange role in this, serving only to be killed off by him. Boy, he looked scary when he did that. Great fight, and it actually gave a lot of answers. Later, the scenes only turn even more awesome when Shoko appears. She’s getting more lost in her powers, and now she even won’t be able to return to the temporary dimensions she creates. I don’t know what it is, but she’s turning more awesome every time she appears on the screen.
The episode closes with another very interesting confirmation. The reason why Ark exterminated the persons they did is because of Okuhara Akiko’s predictions. She saw that they could form a thread, so she ordered their extermination. Surprisingly, Hirose Reiko also possessed psychic powers. That’s probably why she reacted so strongly when touched by Naoya. Great to see how pieces of the puzzle are slowly being solved. 🙂
Seriously, if the rest of the anime turns out as good as this episode, we’re really in for some awesome finale. One detail I also loved was the balloon. We see it several times in the episode, one time when it’s been stuck on a pole, and during later scenes, we actually see it float upwards in the background. Love the symbolism.
