Twelve Kingdoms – 34/35/36 – Throwback Thursday

This is the home stretch for Twelve Kingdoms people! The final 12 episodes, the final cour, and we begin with open rebellion. All of our leads have found each other, swords have been drawn and bullets fired. So without further ado, lets dive into this weeks three episodes!

So starting off… whew that shit got dark. I knew it could, we saw in the first cour where Twelve Kingdom’s was willing to go. But it’s been awhile since then, things have been… not necessarily positive, but not dark. It wasn’t until Shoukou’s introduction a few episodes back that this started to change. But now? Armed revolution, children (more children) murdered in the street, shot? I’m not complaining of course, Twelve Kingdom’s has ramped this up very naturally, narratively and visually. Early on, most of our scenes took place in the day. But as the story has progressed, as we have gone to war and people have died? They took place further and further in the day. Shifting the whole color palette of the show to lead into this. I hadn’t even thought about how dark it was getting right up until the gunshot, that’s how well it worked.

That out of the way, lets talk war. More specifically, lets talk about our three girls involved, starting with Nakajima. This week gave me a lot of what I wanted from the time skip in the first cour. Remember that? When Twelve Kingdoms completely skipped over the reclamation of her throne? Well this time we get to actually see her fighting for her people, leading troops, etc. It wasn’t as involved as I would like, no real hard decisions or anything yet. But there’s plenty of conflict left to go and I’m happy just to see her in the setting. I also liked her insistence that Shoukou be taken alive in this war, most likely so she can pass judgement on him as Queen. She knows what she can and can’t do as the Queen, so hiding as a commoner and using that to give herself more options is nice.

In fact, Nakajima’s story as a whole through this arc was rather satisfying. Her discontent with how she has ruled and her court, going out to learn what her peoples lives are like, commiserating with them and then joining them in revolution. It’s both literally and symbolically a revolution against the old government of the nation, of the court. In a way it’s the real war, where casting down the false queen was not. Though that might be me just waxing poetical for a bit. Anyways, Twelve Kingdoms did a good job here and even managed to mitigate the worst part of the arc: Pacing. By adding in Shoukei and Suzu, it gave us something to watch/do between Nakajima’s revelations. Both keeping us engaged while also allowing her time so her progression doesn’t feel rushed. I say this a lot, but only because its true, well done!

Speaking of Shoukei and Suzu, they finally met up! With this our entire cast/core group has met each other, one way or another. I thought their meeting was a really wholesome scene personally. I like how they slowly progressed from why they were here, to talking about the rebellions, to their own personal experiences. Shoukei using her time in Hou to understand Nakajima’s position and communicating that to Suzu, Suzu explaining her plot to kill Nakajima, mirroring Shoukei’s original plan. All the while they both bond over their shared loses, Shoukei her father and Suzu, Seishuu. It was a really good moment of narrative crossroads, where their two journeys overlap and the similarities come out, but their own personal experiences change it slightly. Letting them both understand and learn from each other. It makes following their story the last 10+ episodes that much more worth it.

Getting back to the actual rebellions, this was a clever way for Twelve Kingdoms to tie those together two. Its natural for these to characters to talk and connect based on their experiences and ages. So using that to also inform the two separate rebellions of each others existence, putting them in contact with each other? It was a very natural way of connecting the two conflicts and merging them into one, larger conflict. I expect Shoukei’s group to actually end up helping Suzu/Nakajima’s in some way. Whether it be rising up themselves as a distraction, or using the opportunity to go after the provincial governor himself. Either way, Twelve Kingdoms is doing some good stuff here. Please give me more in the… 9 episodes we have left.

And now, before we get to the specific episode overviews, I want to talk about a few side plots/issues. Plot wise, Asano! He also finally see’s Nakajima again and it was… interesting. Asano has missed most of Nakajima’s character growth, so it makes sense that he would still view her as she was. Desperate for people’s approval, to go home, unsure of herself. This gap in experiences, in time, turned their meeting from one of old friends to distant strangers. With Asano trying to force his own ideals and goals onto her, trying to get her to come home with him, that Shoukou was right etc. I’m curious how Nakajima is going to handle Asano to be frank. He shot a kid, and she knows it. Is she letting him go near the end of the episode? Or giving him a chance to redeem himself? We will see.

On the “issues” point though, I have one question: How the hell did Nakajima get from the safehouse back to the city that fast? What happened to all the men? Did she abandon them and ride her youma back to help the second assault? Or did she pull off something crazy with her youma to take down the attacking army? I’m really hoping there is some kind of answer here, because her arrival came out of nowhere and was really confusing. I figure Twelve Kingdoms will give us one, it’s pretty good about those sorts of things. I just wasn’t expecting to see her show up at the second assault is all. If you all know, or I missed something, please let me know below!

With that we come to the episodic part, starting with episode 34! The two big events of this episode were Shoukei joining a rebellion and Enho being kidnapped. For the first, I wasn’t expecting this. Shoukei didn’t seem like the type, mostly because of her soft upbringing. But her introduction to it was good and she seems more focused on day to day work than actual battle. Doing chores she used to rage against without batting an eye, and admonishing the men for being like she used to. Its another small moment of showing us her growth. Meanwhile on Enho’s side, this was basically the catalyst to the whole revolution. Stealing away a wise man, killing the girl and setting Nakajima onto the rebellion. As far as inciting incidents go, it was good, and Twelve Kingdoms set it up well with all the secret meetings.

Next we come to episode 35, the round table of leads! The most important event here was clearly Shoukei and Suzu’s meeting, and it was more wholesome than I expected. I originally thought when they met they would both still be a bit… bitchy? And it would be through their own interactions they grew. But seeing them grow first, and then comfort each other with this newfound growth? Doing and saying things they never would have when we, the viewer, first met them? It was rather heart warming to see how far they had both come. Beyond that, this was mostly setup. Getting Nakajima involved in the rebellion, teaching us who Enho really was, that sort of thing. Necessary, but not particularly exciting.

Finally episode 36, rawr action! We already talked about the war, Asano, and how I don’t understand how she got back to the city. So instead I want to talk a bit about the court scenes we saw this week. Once again, we see them not only ignoring orders but actively undermining them. Faking sickness, making up excuses they can’t send troops, etc. It becomes more and more clear that the Chousai was the true villain of the cour all along, actively working against Nakajima. The only truly new thing to come out of this was that we got a glimpse of hope. That not all court officials are bad, as one questions the orders. Only going a long with them because, well… he is horribly out ranked. Hopefully that means good things for the rebellion and I am really looking forward to what Twelve Kingdoms pulls off here.

So all in all, how was Twelve Kingdoms this week? To be frank, I am running out of ways to say “It was good”. The narrative is great, the characters compelling and the world intriguing. The worst part of the show are its visuals. But even then it’s only the animation. The backdrops are well built up, they feel like actual locations and are consistent with the wider world, and the colors blend well. Twelve Kingdom’s doesn’t necessarily need to be a well animated show to work, which is good because its not. So long as it can nail these upcoming episodes? We should be good to go.

Oh, before you go I wanted to remind everyone: If you have a show you want to see covered in Throwback Thursday, let me know below! I’ll add it to the list and when the next poll comes around, everyone can vote on it!