Junketsu no Maria delivered a brutal, exciting, and character building episode this week. Philosophically speaking, It may’ve be about people paying for their sins but the structural ramifications for each character are so immediate, it hardly seems worth digging for deeper meaning.
Still, the sin/payment structure is as good a hook as any to frame a synopsis so bear with me…
Sin & punish: Carrying over from last week, the French have relied on their (partial) control of Maria to shape this week’s battle in their favor. It goes well until Maria shows up off-script and, even though they have the English on the run (and Maria is blown out of the sky), the battle goes to crap and they are forced to retreat.
Their sin is arrogance in assuming they had control and their punishment is death and defeat.
Similarly, the mercenaries move out of position because their greed isn’t being sated by the grunts they are fighting but, when the English counter attack (after Maria is blown out of the sky) their employer ends up losing.
Their sin is greed, and their punishment is death and not getting payed because they lost the battle.
…which brings us to Galif, who proposed leaving their assigned position in the first place, and who’s boss holds financially responsible for the loss. As a micro-aside, the merc boss calls him a Moor, which may just be an insult but would be hella interesting as a side detail for his character.
Context aside, Galif then slits his boss’ throat, in front of the merc-camp-hoochie, and gets his arm blown off by a cannon ball before any resolution can come of it. The scene is exquisitely violent and matter of fact.
His sin is wrath and his punishment is brutal pain and near death.
Meanwhile, Joseph chooses not to kill a lowly english footman only to have that man instantly butchered in front of him. Joseph’s sin is a minor defiance against God through his assumption that saving a man is better than God’s salvation, and his punishment is minor in that he just has to see the man murdered in front of him — to see how powerless he is before ‘God’s will’ …or the people who act in his name.
That leaves Ezekiel and Maria,who are both prideful and not obedient. For this Ezekiel is forced to become Michael’s spear and slash Maria from the sky. Fortunately, Ezekiel retains enough self-will not to kill Maria in the process.
Like Joseph, Maria is also forced to see her efforts amount to nothing. Even before her spearing, the English use the truce time to retaliate against the French — even though Maria was providing them safe cover to retreat. Though I suppose they chose correctly’ish, in that they won the day and chased the French from the field…
The ramifications are pretty obvious: lot of people died, Galif shows a total lack of morality that I didn’t suspect and Joseph/Maria/Ezekiel become closer when they realize each other’s feelings. Even the Witches become closer to Maria, as they help her off the field and to recover at Edmura’s house.
Oh and Ann’s Grandmother dies off camera.
Blood and guts and a solid medieval battle, followed by the wounded hanging around and gabbing while they recover (or don’t). It was a good rise and fall for an episode, visually gripping, and maybe meant something symbolically too.
Scrape that all into a bucket and I call it a 9. How about you?
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Excellent episode indeed. There are just so many interesting things that are happening and it looks like this is about to turn towards the darker side of things.
So, it seems that while Ezekiel does have some free will, she can still be commanded by Michael at his own discretion. That would definitely be an important turn for her character (on an interesting side note, they actually pronounce Michael’s name as Mika-el, which is the Hebrew/archaic pronunciation, and not as Mihairu, which is the common Japanese pronunciation of the name, gotta give props to that). Also, it seems that the whole deal with Maria’s virginity is really about to play a big role in the plot, what with Galfa and Bernard finally agreeing to connive on something.
And I really like how this people’s will vs. God’s will thread is playing out. There is this certain subversiveness to it, where “God’s will” actually brings in only death and destruction, and the supposed omniscient church in heavens does nothing to stop it, but instead punish those people who try to defy it in order to save others.
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