Momokuri – 09 + 10

After an exhaustive search for the perfect swimsuit (driving Norika half-insane), Kuri joins Momo and the rest of their circles of friends for BBQ. And that’s really all this episode is: a nice, pleasant, relaxing slice-of-life BBQ.

Sure, it draws more attention to one of the other couples, which is non-romantic in nature and between cousins, with the guy somewhat worried about the girl being too close for too long. Ya know, ’cause their respective parents are siblings, and all.

Moving along, the one person who probably relaxes the least (other than Momo) is Rio, who came in part to try to make some kind of tangible progress on the Momo front. Alas, as much as she stares into his soul, Momo considers her naught but a friend, if he considers her at all.

Kuri brings her A-game to the BBQ, and even though it’s too cold to swim, Kuri wants to see Momo’s skin so bad she gets it into her head to show him hers, lifting up her skirt to reveal her red swimsuit.

Momo has nothing but compliments for said suit, but makes it clear the compliments he’s making are directed at the suit and not anything else. Bold “reveals” aside, these two can still awfully timid around one another, suggesting the next steps in their courtship won’t come quickly or easily.

91 Days – 04

This week documents the adventures of Nero and Avilio on their road trip, with dwindling funds and a hitman on their tail. After the action, intrigue, and tragedy of the first three episodes, this…was a bit of a drag.

A road trip is an opportunity to spice things up, but the manner in which 91Days does this is scattershot and disjointed in nature. The guys have a little fun doing tricks for kids, but it’s too obviously a means to show Avilio the innocence he’s lost.

Meanwhile, the lumbering Mexican hitman is about as one-dimensional as you can get; more a walking plot device to be defeated than a character. Fango, while evil, was a lot more interesting than this guy.

After managing a smile while around the kids, later in the night Avilio continues practicing his murder face while Nero remenices on his first job with the family, which was the night Avilio’s family was killed. Nero was the one who shot at Avilio as he ran. He realizes there were “three”, but I thought he already knew this.

The episode kinda goes off the rails when the hitman making his move is played for laughs for some reason, complete with a slapsticky kick in the nuts, and failing to kill him by hitting him with the car (which is totaled by the impact).

Sure, the hitman is good at tracking, but never seems to apply his superhuman strength when he needs to. That, and the goofy comic tone to his pursuit near the end, really kills the tension.

He tracks them to a barn late in the night, but once more, “Big Mexico” can’t get the job done. Nero empties a clip into him to no avail, but his well-thrown knife to the back gets the job done…only he gets right back up a few seconds later (only to be blown away by a shotgun-wielding Alex Trebek).

This wasn’t a total loss; Nero had some more adventures with Avilio, making their bond that much closer for when Avilio decides to make his move…but other than that, this was a pretty uneven episode.

There was a bad omen in the beginning, when a waitress’ eyes were pale blue one second and deep green the next. Unlike Nero with his juggling skills, a ball or two was dropped here.

Alderamin on the Sky – 04

This episode of Alderamin provided great bang for the buck, not only giving us a highly satisfying mock battle where Ikuta can flex his keen military mind and Yatori can flash her considerable skills in combat (albeit on the wrong side), but it also inserts a fresh plot against the princess by skilled knights loyal to the late Gen. Rikan.

That once more places our core of protagonists between training and war, and neither Yatori nor Ikuta flinch when the time comes to flip the switch to “playing for keeps.”

But first, Ikuta easily outwits an overconfident and intellectually outclassed opponent, just as we thought he would. It wouldn’t be any fun if his chess moves proved incorrect and a clearly semi-villainous character were to prevail, even temporarily, eh? In fact, had Sarihaslag not had Yatori on his side, he would have “died” much sooner than he did.

Ikuta steers the mock battle exactly how he likes, exerting as little effort as possible and making his off-balance opponent fret and sweat (I like how he let Torway do the honors of taking out his bro). Like farming and digging wells, his strategies are borne out of laziness; the human desire to make life easier.

You’d think Suya would still be opposed to this kind of philosophy, but she looks as dazzled as the rest of Ikuta’s men, who surprise him by chanting his name. But he doesn’t think he did anything special. Just Ikuta being Ikuta.

Because the mock battle was so entertaining and yet still fairly lighthearted, the episode wisely decided to follow Ikuta’s victory up with a serious situation, as Chamille, hearing false reports that Ikuta was injured, ends up surrounded by rogue knights who want to exact their vengeance upon her for what happened to their beloved leader.

Yatori is Johnny-on-the-spot, but these are seasoned warriors led by someone who looks just as badass as her, if not moreso. Indeed, he quickly demonstrates how tough he is by driving his bare hand through Yatori’s sword and pinning her to the ground.

That’s when Torway fires a shot at the rogue captain’s head, and things get crazy.

The moment Yatori’s movement is freed by the shot, she kills the captain, then explodes into a furious killing frenzy, ending the entire group of renegades with the vicious grace of some kind of wild cat. It’s Alderamin’s best combat sequence to date, beautifully staged and animated for maximum breathless effect.

When it’s all over, all the traitors are lying dead in pools of their own blood, which also covers both Yatori and Chamille, who is fine, but stunned by what she just witnessed. Yatori too can neither move nor let go of her swords, as if unable to switch off her berserk mode.

That’s where her “left hand”, Ikuta comes in, saying just the words and touching her in just the way that calms her down and brings her back into the world, as no one else can. This is clearly not the first time this has happened; Ikuta has been supporting Yatori since they were very young. If anyone wondered why she puts up with this twerp, here it is.

When Chamille sees Ikuta with Yatori, she seems in awe of the bond they share, not to mention jealous. And when Ikuta starts teasing her for drenched in blood (probably not the best idea considering she’s twelve), she starts to bawl like the kid she is and lets him have it.

Ikuta may be annoyingly good at a lot of things, but he has enough flaws and nuances to balance him out and bring out his humanity. And his chemistry with Yatori, and the dialogue, combat and direction in general are all marvelous. If it weren’t obvious already, Alderamin is a sure keeper for me.