As his showdown with Medaka continues, Unzen lures her back indoors and unleashes a volley of balls containing strings that create a net that stops her in her tracks. She counters by moving the school the strings are attached to, bringing down the entire building to wrest herself free. With no more offense or defense, Unzen admits she’s stronger, but she hasn’t won, because he won’t be reformed, and derides her trying to coexist with humans. Her final blow is stopped by Kikaijima, Akune and Zenkichi, who hold her back. She reverts to normal Medaka and apologizes to Unzen, then heads to the hospital.
Unzen wasn’t the most interesting adversary in this series, despite his strength and staying power. He tends to introspect and over-analyze during battles too much, shonen-style, which kind of slows said battle to a crawl. But he does make some good points this week as he increasingly realizes if he can’t beat Medaka, he’ll at least question her very humanity and existence with his dying breath. After all, what is Medaka? As this episode demonstrated, clearly neither a saint nor a pacifist. But he does see a weakness in her, and it’s the need to not only love other humans, but to be loved by them too.
Unzen dismisses her as an inhuman monster; a lonely soul who represses her true, godlike self so humans won’t fear and shun her. Unzen, meanwhile, is just another human; if Medaka kills him, she’ll be killing the very thing she loves. So it’s very fitting that Medaka’s friends refuse to abandon her and prove Unzen wrong; she isn’t alone. She has friends who love her as much as she loves them, and there’s no human alive she won’t try to befriend. Unzen can scorn her all he likes, but he can’t touch her spirit. And clearly, judging from how he treats his underlings in the aftermath, he doesn’t hate all humans.
Rating: 7 (Very Good)
RABUJOI - An Anime Blog 