To Aru Kagaku no Railgun S – 05

MISAKA 9982, Misaka Mikoto

Misaka meets her clone MISAKA 9982 and helps her rescue a cat from a tree. MISAKA won’t tell her classified info, so Misaka decides to tail her. On the way they have ice cream and fight over the frog badge. MISAKA then tells her she’s “going to the experiment” and bids farewell. Misaka hacks the net and finds out that 20,000 of her clones are being sacrificed in hopes of causing a Level 6 Shift. The Level 5 boy chosen for the shift meets MISAKA in an alley and they fight, ending up in a train yard where he thwarts her trap, rips off her leg, and drops a rail car on her. Misaka arrives too late to save MISAKA, and attacks the boy.

MISAKA 9982’s good deed (saving a baby in a car from heat stroke) has an unintended consequence – a kitten stuck in a tree. Like that kitten, MISAKA’s in new territory and in need of a helping hand, and this incident shows her that her “onee-sama” is a decent, compassionate sort who helps the weak. It’s also a great introduction to MISAKA, who has a totally different personality from the original, but then few sisters are alike, and sometimes they resent each other for it. MISAKA is a lost puppy, not a terminator. She throws Misaka off her rhythm, but also forms a strong bond.

But it turns out Misaka has bumped into her clone on the eve of her mission, the 9,982nd of 20,000 intended to turn one very sadistic kid into the first Level 6. After all the lighthearted comedy and sisterly exploits, Misaka is crushed upon learning these new facts, and takes it upon herself to save the kitten in the tree. Only she’s too late. The episode twists the knife here. Just when we thought MISAKA got the upper hand (when her bomb went off we pumped our fists) she’s viciously maimed and then killed; disposed of like nothing. That vibrant, clever, perceptive girl is gone in one crunch of a rail car. It spurs the original Railgun to rush headlong into danger once more, to avenge her sister.

9_superior
Rating: 9 (Superior)

Stray Observations:

  • We forgot how much we love how MISAKAs talk. So eccentric, yet so precise and easy to understand.
  • The whole ice cream interlude was kinda random, but still sweet.
  • Even Misaka’s clone questions her tastes. Ha!
  • We know the kid as Accelerator, of course. In this series, he doesn’t seem to need a crutch, though even if he did, he’s hardly a sympathetic character thus far. So far he’s just a snake, doing what comes naturally when a live mouse is dropped in his tank. (Argh, that’s another animal metaphor…sorry about that!)
  • After a second viewing, we’ve upped the rating to a 9.