I know, I know, I’m late for another post again. And yes, it’s still Endwalker. But… I just finished the MSQ and it was one of the best pieces of media I’ve experienced in a long time so I regret nothing! I’m sorry that the Escaflowne posts had to suffer while my game of the year came out but such is life. My questionable priorities aside, lets dive into this weeks The Vision of Escaflowne.
I have a lot of positive things to say about Escaflowne this week, I quite enjoyed it. So to save my reputation I thought it best to start off with something negative: The production. I’m afraid to say that we’re starting to see some cracks in Escaflowne. In these two episodes the colors seemed muted often, as if they had lost a lot of their vibrancy. This may be due primarily to the night scenes but it was noticeable. Additionally the layering seemed to have a lot of issues. There were multiple scenes where I could clearly make out what parts of the image were layered from different cels. And then there’s the falling animation! Escaflowne must really like it because they’ve reused the same sequence… 4 times now? I don’t even mean with edits, just the same raw scene! Are these deal breakers? Of course not. They’re simply noticeable.
Moving on to the actual episodes lets start with episode 9, “Memories of a Feather”. Remember last week when I said it was time to stop asking questions and start answering them instead? Well Escaflowne kind of does both this week. For every new question it asked another one got answered. From why Van has wings and is special to Draconians and Atlantis. To be honest half of this episode was basically a lore dump, that’s how much information was inside it. It was a dump presented through a characters backstory though and so actually wasn’t bad. At first I thought it was a vision, that Hitomi was able to see the past now to! But luckily Escaflowne walked that back and it was just Van telling her the story of it all instead. As for the content of that story, well, we have a lot to talk about.
Draconians, Atlantis, Dornkirk, oh my! The long and short of this flashback is that Atlantis exists, its filled with a winged people called Draconians who are considered “demons” and its probably special or technologically advanced in some way. So much so that I think it’s a safe bet that Atlantis is what Dornkirk is after. It definitely feels ominous enough to fit the bill, and who better to protect it than the prophesied prince Van, right? So yeah, all this of this makes sense and fits and Escaflowne answered some of my questions. My only issue with the flashback actually has nothing to do with the infodump and more the romance. I wish Van’s parents had just… fallen in love normally instead of some special prophecy. I don’t think it was really necessary and anytime “fate” enters the equation I think it just muddies the waters.
Moving on we come to the second half of the episode, AKA coincidence central. What do I mean by that? Well to explain lets take a look at what happens shall we? Hitomi, Merle and Van get ambushed by the Zaibach leading to a fight in the river where they can’t use their invisibility. Makes sense, good tactical thinking by Van, I like that he’s adapting to the situation. Then Allen appears to back them up when Van starts to lose, alright sure, he escaped to search them out and help them. Sadly this still isn’t enough and Allen is critically wounded. They are just barely saved by a passing Fried merchant ship. And who just so happens to be on this ship? Princess Millerna! Who is also the only remotely qualified doctor on the ship owing to her medical passion! Seeing the issue yet?
Any one or two of these I’d accept. You need a certain amount of coincidences to make these kinds of world spanning stories happen. It’s how you get certain characters to bump into each other and interact, to become reoccurring. That’s fine! But it starts to become to much when so many coincidences happen one after another in such close proximity to each other. Not only does it stretch believability in the story but it makes the world feel small. For so many characters who were separated by distance and circumstance just an episode ago to be reunited so suddenly with so little effort on their part… it reduces the size of Escaflowne’s world when this happens. Compare it to another fantasy-like epic I’ve covered before, Twelve Kingdoms, and how it handled multiple characters across vast swathes of space. That’s an example of how to do it right I feel.
Next up is episode 10, “The Blue-Eyed Prince”! This one tells us more about Allen and Millerna, introduces us to the nation of Fried (Fantasy… India? China? I dunno) and shows us a terrifying new monster. All in all I would say it was a good time! Seeing a new nation, its architecture and culture, is helping to enlarge Escaflowne’s world after last episode reduced it. On top of that the ruler of Fried ties back into Allen and Millerna’s story to boot! I love how both Chid and Allen have a clear love for Marlene, Millerna’s older sister, and how that informs both of their characters. Chid’s great respect for Allen, Allen’s loyalty to Fried because he cares more for Marlene and her son than he does his own honor. His story is really coming together.
The only concern I really have about Fried is just how quickly everyone believed that Allen was a traitor. I know, I know, Zongi the Doppleganger was acting as Plaktu, a trusted government official. They have no reason to doubt him. But why would they take the word of a Zaibach soldier, one who conveniently escaped right after I might add, without a second of investigation? This seems like a really extreme reaction for people that are basically family, especially when Allen is clearly injured. My hope is that they figure this out and it was simply a “We need to end on a cliffhanger” kind of thing. That would be totally fine, these kind of things take time and it’s not like he’s shackled or anything.
Speaking of Zongi though, this dude is creepy. Escaflowne really went hard on his presentation. I love, once again, the stark lighting he gets anytime he’s in his Doppelganger shape. It really brings out his angular features and drives home how scary this guy is supposed to be. Combine that with him sucking out peoples souls to take on their form and his casual murder and I think Escaflowne has a winner for “Temporary Arc Villain”. It makes me wonder how Van and Hitomi are going to beat him. They have the whole “See the invisible” stuff, and I like that Van is growing and learning from Hitomi, but I don’t see how that will help them identify him in the first place. I suppose we will have to wait and see. Whatever the case though I’m looking forward to more Zongi.
So yeah all in all these were some fun episodes of Escaflowne. Zongi is cool, Fried is interesting and I enjoy what it’s doing with Allen and Van. They aren’t without their issues though sadly. The production is showing some cracks and it feel like Escaflowne’s story is starting to suffer for its scope. At times its like Escaflowne is trying to do something beyond the authors abilities. Like it’s shooting for the stars but can’t back it up. I thought this might have been due to how it was being adapted. But when I went to check I realized Escaflowne was an original! There’s no excuse about “Not made for a TV format” or anything, its entirely on Shouji Kawamori. Hopefully what we have seen here is the extent of it and everything else remains strong. I can deal with a few to many coincidences.
