To Aru Majutsu no Index III – 08 – Unfinished Sentences

As a battered Touma recovers in hospital, Itsuwa is briefly overcome by regret for being beaten by Acqua so easily, failing so completely in her mission, and yet still being thanked by her charge. Tatemiya snaps her out of it by rattling her cage, and as the rest of Amakusa sharpens their blades for a rematch, Itsuwa regathers her fire and commitment to beat Acqua to a pulp.

If only it were that easy. While Itsuwa talks big and she and Amakusa have a deep bag of tricks including Saint Breakout, specifically designed to deal with saints, all of it is for naught, as Acqua isn’t just a saint, but the Right Hand of God, possessed with the angel Gabriel and master of both human and angelic spells.

Even Breakout isn’t enough to so much as singe his collar, and Itsuwa ends up taking a fall off the dome of the underground district and has her turtleneck burned off, leaving only her crop tank. The rest of Amakusa can’t do any better. With only them between Touma and Acqua, the situation is most dire.

Acqua is about to finish Itsuwa off, but someone shows up he must give his full attention: Kanzaki Kaori herself, there not just to bail out her former sect, but to protect Touma. Miss Half-Cutoffs exchanges words with Acqua, but as much as he’s said this episode, he’s really not interested in talk when it comes to Kanzaki. He wants to see what she can do against him. And so they begin.

Meanwhile, Touma wakes up to find Index dozing by his bedside, but as far as he’s concerned there’s a battle to return to, so he gets up and gets going. I really don’t know what else he can do considering how easily he was taken down by Acqua’s saintly powers, but who knows…when there’s a saint in your corner—even a non-Right Hand one—anything is possible.

Iroduku: The World in Colors – 09 – Shou Breaks the Logjam

Ah, Photography Club: where there are always plenty of photos of the members looking at one another to determine who likes who. Shou can see how good Hitomi and Yuito look together, while Asagi can tell Shou likes Hitomi. Neither of them are particularly happy about that! If only Shou would look Asagi’s way…and neither Hitomi or Yuito existed…

In high school, time moves a lot slower than adult years, making it feel like you have all the time in the world. But Shou, a senior, is out of time, and can’t afford to wallow in indecision. So he offers to take Hitomi on a picture-taking trip around town, just the two of them.

It’s not overtly a “date”, but it’s a big enough deal that Shou feels it only right to inform Yuito of the plans, which of course imply other plans. Yuito, whose mother worries is too aloof like his dad, isn’t one to suddenly ask a girl out. But he takes the “not relevant/doesn’t matter” route with Shou’s pursuit of Hitomi. HE AIN’T MAD, FOLKS.

The trip goes very swimmingly, if platonically by necessity—Hitomi is not under any illusions she’s on anything other than a photo-taking trip with her senpai—though Shou certainly seems to be enjoying the fact that it very well could be a date.

Chigusa and Kurumi (who seem to be spending the day together like NBD, bless ’em) spot the two, but also shrug it off as not a date. Shou and Hitomi even climb to the highest vantage point in the area at sunset and exchange flattering compliments of each others’ personalities.

It’s not until Hitomi turns to walk home that Shou confesses and asks if she’ll go out with him; fortunately the train doesn’t prevent her from hearing him. Unfortunately she’s so shocked and startled from the confession she bolts away, and spends the rest of the night and the next day in a haze.

At first she tells Kohaku nothing, but between skipping meals, putting her shoes in the locker wrong, and running away again when Shou says good morning, Kohaku can tell there’s definitely something off.

Hitomi finally comes clean, by hypothetically asking Kohaku if there’s anyone she likes or if she’s ever been confessed to. She asks these questions in earshot of the whole class—a high school violation if ever there was one—but when they’re alone Kohaku tells her that ultimately the choice is hers to make, based on her feelings for the ‘rhetorical guy.’ For Kohaku’s part, she’d rather be rejected then not given an answer, even if it hurts.

Asagi can tell Shou is being uncharacteristically gloomy as they look at the pictures he took of places they’d been to countless times. When Asagi asks Hitomi if she’s coming to club, Hitomi has the same questions for Asagi she had for Kohaku, and Asagi spots the photo on Hitomi’s camera of the same place Shou was.

The gig thus well and truly up, Hitomi says she doesn’t “deserve” either to be liked or to like someone, something Asagi characteristically rejects. She urges Hitomi to do something lest “that person” get hurt, then storms off to club.

To Hitomi’s credit, she doesn’t let this uncertainty linger, nor allow Shou to suffer longer than this episode. On the roof she formally rejects him, stating there’s someone else (even if she’s unsure of the true nature of those feelings).

It’s clear to Shou about whom she’s talking: Yuito, who joins Shou on the roof and witnesses him shouting at the top of his lungs in a kind of release. Both the confession and the scream amaze Yuito; both are things he can’t imagine doing himself.

Later, Hitomi tracks Asagi back down, but before she can say anything, Asagi tells her that the person she liked (past tense) was Shou, the person Hitomi just rejected. Then she runs off and crumples into a little ball on a playground. What a fine mess we have here!

Bloom Into You – 09 – Ready, Set, Yuu

Sports Day has arrived, and the StuCo is so busy Yuu and Nanami hardly see each other, to say nothing of anything more. Just as Yuu is thinking about this as she’s leaving the storage shed, Nanami appears and the two go into the shed.

Yuu lets Nanami kiss her, but when Yuu pulls her off, Nanami agrees to behave until Sports Day is over, whereupon Yuu promises to give her a “reward” of her choosing: instead of Nanami initiating, Yuu will kiss her.

The Sports Day unfolds as one would expect: Yuu does her class relay, demonstrating she’s fast for a short kid, owing to her long-standing friendship with the far taller Akari. Yuu then gets to talk with Maki for the first time in a while, still adamant she has no feelings for Nanami despite his suspicions. She tells him she can’t fall in love with anybody, which in theory would make the two of them the same…but Maki doesn’t buy it.

There’s every reason to put stock in his doubt, considering how he’s basically carved out a life of observing relationships from afar rather than participating directly. As such, Maki has seen a lot of faces of both lonely and content people, and Yuu’s face looks lonely…too lonely for someone incapable of falling for someone.

Meanwhile, in a continuation of last week’s thread, Sayaka greets Hakozaki-sensei’s live-in girlfriend, who shows up to secretly watch her run in the teacher’s relay. When it’s time for the StuCo to do a relay against the basketball team, Yuu sees how much Nanami really wants to win, as well as her and the basketball captain Serizawa exchanging trash talk.

Yuu does her best, and manages to keep pace with the far more athletic Akari running beside her. She hands off to Sayaka smoothly, and Sayaka does the same with Nanami. As Yuu watches Nanami run with everything she’s got, everything else in her world fades into the light and it’s just the two of them. Perhaps a rare instance of her actually feeling that “special feeling” she claims she’s unable to feel?

The ballers win in the end, but it was close, and despite having to deal with Serizawa’s gloating, Nanami is happy her StuCo worked so hard. Then, with Sports Day in the books, Nanami and Yuu retire to the storage shed once more. Yuu is nervous, as she didn’t think Nanami meant immediately after Sports Day was over, and when Nanami waits for Yuu to come to her with her lips, Yuu feels like she’s crossing a boundary she shouldn’t, because she doesn’t like Nanami.

She tells Nanami to go instead, and she does, including putting her tongue in Yuu’s mouth for the first time. We haven’t seen the telltale blushing on Yuu’s face until that happens, because when Nanami pauses and asks if she should stop, Yuu tells her it actually feels good.

So Nanami keeps French kissing Yuu, as Yuu thinks about all of the positive physical and behavioral qualities Yuu finds comfort in. She considers them all “normal” and not something to be considered “special.” But as Maki would tell her, someone as incapable of love—and as comfortable with same—as Yuu claims simply wouldn’t be going around looking lonely or making out with someone.

That being said, just because Yuu seems to be on the road to falling for Nanami (if she hasn’t already), unless she’s actually aware she’s on that road and acknowledges it once and for all, her vacillating is doomed to continue.

That she’s still trying to explain/excuse her rapidly escalating romantic entanglement with Nanami after nine episodes suggests the series just might end without Yuu ever coming to believe she’s in love with her. Fortunately, four episodes is plenty of time to resolve this one way or another, and whatever the outcome, it’s been a wonderful ride.

Zombieland Saga – 09 – True Guts

Aw, HELL yeah! Saki is probably my favorite idol in Zombieland Saga, so I’ve been awaiting the telling of her backstory with great anticipation. That telling finally comes this week which opens with her and her right-hand woman Kirishima Reiko having just finished conquering another rival bike gang way back in 1997.

Fast-forward to the present, and Tatsumi deploys Franchouchou to a public park to practice the Kashima dance with some old folks. Since the elderly make up the vast majority of Saga’s population, gaining them as one of their fanbases is key. And as the idols discover, the fogies have quite the moves once they switch on the cassette tape.

Their dancing actually attracts the attention of one Kirishima Maria, who along with her two henchgirls, wears the same long red coats as Saki and Reiko back in the day. It would seem Saki’s bike gang Dorami is still alive and well, but in a kind stunted, pee-wee state (even Lily critiques Maria’s ride, a pink scooter, as lame).

Against Sakura and Lily, who don’t want any trouble, Maria and her goons believe they have the upper hand…until Tae bites one of Maria’s buns. Then Saki shows up, and all it takes is a glare and grunt to scare Maria off. After all, Saki’s the genuine article and they’re just wannabe poseurs.

Maria almost gets herself in some real trouble with Dorami’s perennial nemesis Korosuke, and Saki jumps out of Tatsumi’s van just in time to break up the fight, though predictably Maria is furious that Saki interfered in her business. The leader of Korosuke also promises this isn’t over and will be settled “soon.”

Maria’s eyes remind Saki of Reiko’s, and that connection is confirmed when Maria comes home. Reiko is no longer in the game, having gotten married and had Maria as part of wanting to live a “normal life”, something Saki never knew anything about, and never got to experience.

Saki died riding her bike off a mountain road while playing a game of chicken with Korosuke’s then-leader. She won the game, since she never hit the brakes, but paid for it with her life, and Reiko lost her best friend.

When Reiko discovers Maria has snuck out of the house to answer a fresh challenge from Korosuke (which involves an identical game of chicken) she dusts off her steed and hits the road to stop it. She doesn’t care how embarrassed her daughter gets; she’s not going to let her end up like Saki.

Saki also heads out to intervene (hilariously all she has is a bicycle, so she’s a little late), and ends up reuniting with Reiko, but when she recognizes her as Saki, she pretends not to know who she’s talking about.

Saki appoints herself “Captain for a Day” and assumes the Korosuke challenge, sparing Maria from participating. And since she’s already dead, she can replicate the fiery crash that made her a legend. When she emerges unharmed from the flaming wreckage, Reiko slugs her, showing a side Maria had never seen. Turns out she has guts after all…and always did.

Only she wasn’t a legend; not really. All the dangerous stuff Dorami and Korosue are doing is nothing more than cheating death, and it’s only a matter of time before Death decides to settle the score. Instead, Saki invites Maria, Korosuke, and the old folks to a concert where she and the rest of Franchouchou put on a dynamic biker gang-themed show.

Bunny Girl Senpai – 09 – Two Friendless Sisters

When the second school term begins in September, Sakuta just can’t wait to see Mai. Due to the dating ban and her busy schedule he’s seen neither hide nor tail of her, and that trend continues when she fails to show up to school.

When he finally does happen upon her on a random street, there’s something…off about her. She claims to not know who Sakuta is. Then a short blonde girl appears, telling him she’s the real Mai, and that she and her half-sister Toyohama Nodoka have swapped bodies.

This happened quite suddenly after Nodoka ran away from home and her domineering mother (she and Mai have the same dad) and spent the night at Mai’s impressive, self-bought condo. When they woke up, they were switched.

This is clearly adolescence syndrome, but while the cause becomes clear enough—Nodoka has a lot of built-up resentment for her “perfect” big sis—the means to undo the swap remain elusive, short of propelling Nodoka to the top of the idol charts (something most likely beyond Sakuta’s abilities).

So the two carry on in each others’ lives, trying not to draw to much attention. The fact that Mai’s schedule is comparatively paltry compared to Nodoka’s not only speaks to how hard Nodoka’s mom is pushing her to succeed, but Mai’s desire to have as much time to hang out with Sakuta as possible during the second term.

Despite not having a perfect big sister, Sakuta diagnoses Nodoka’s issues pretty easily, leading to Nodoka confronting Mai and telling her things she’s kept inside, hoping honesty might be a step towards undoing the swap. Instead, Mai shoots her negative emotions regarding Nodoka right back at her.

While it’s not immediately clear from the montage of Mai and Nodoka’s days as one another is just how much easier Mai is able to slip into her little sister’s life, doing the necessary singing, dancing, and training required of a rising idol and purporting herself well.

Nodoka does alright with the photo shoots and interviews—things she’s done before—but when it comes time to film a commercial and memorize lines when a camera is rolling and an entire crew is surrounding her…it’s too much. She hyperventilates and the shoot has to be cancelled. When Sakuta reports the incident, Mai is surprised; she figured Nodoka would have been able to get a good take from that particular director.

Being somewhat out of his element with regards to younger siblings, Sakuta gets some insight from the most unlikely of sources: Kunimi’s girlfriend, Kumisato, who like Nodoka, has a hardworking, overachieving, brilliant, perfect big sister (I assume she’s pretty too).

Kumisato neither likes nor hates her, because it’s nothing that simple. What she can say is that she’s always annoyed by her mom’s constant urging that she take her sister as an example and study more.

Being a middle child myself, I can state that there was always the push-pull of wanting to set a good example for my little sis while not falling too far behind my big bro (who is much more academically inclined than me…not to mention more historically and politically informed. I can paint way better though!) But my siblings and I aren’t competing in the same field, so we never really competed the way Mai and Nodoka seem to be.

More importantly, we had parents who pushed us to be the best individuals we could be; we weren’t used as pawns in a proxy war between our mothers (for one thing, we all had the same mother, but still). I have no doubt a part of Nodoka is proud of her half-sis, and a part of Mai is happy to have a younger sister to inspire and support. But their folks have not made it easy for them to interact with each other on their own terms.

Body-swap episodes seem to be a dime a dozen these days, but I’ll admit to being a big fan of them when they’re well-executed, as this one is. It’s nice to hear Seto Asami switch up her voice style to match the Nodoka in Mai’s body, not to mention Uchida Maaya’s more upright measure as Mai in Nodoka’s body. The fact they are swapped, and the novelty therein, is secondary to why the swap occurred, as well as how to undo it, which, as with the other solutions to adolescence syndrome outbreaks, will require character growth to achieve.

But my main gripe with this arc is that I found it hard to garner as much enthusiasm as I did for the previous ones. Perhaps that’s due in part to the brisk, sudden manner in which Nodoka is introduced, and the fact the only time we saw her in her own body was in that brief TV interview with her idol group. Futaba, who interacted plenty with Sakuta prior to her own arc, is thus proving a tough act to follow for Nodoka, who entered this episode a virtual unknown.

Golden Kamuy – 20 – Inkarmat Holmes

Ah, the seaside. Warm breeze, giant sunfish, sea otter meat, and…swarms of locusts?! Golden Kamuy brings a lot of people together, but then immediately splits them apart, both with the swarm, and with sudden clashing stories about who is dangerous and who is (still) working for Tsurumi.

When Sugimoto, Shiraishi, Ogata and Tanigaki seek refuge in a building and proceed to cook the sea otter stew, they all start to get very horny and see sexier versions of each other (including the latecomer Kiroranke), resulting in a ridiculous sumo orgy. There’s more serious activity afoot outside, as a highly suspicious Asirpa demands Inkarmat tell her how she knows her father.

According to Inkarmat, Nopperabo they’re seeking isn’t her father at all. Her father is a man named Wilk, whom Inkarmat befriended and even fell for (though he only regarded her as a child). Wilk, Inkarmat tells her, was murdered by his best friend…Kiroranke.

That night, just as the others are coming down from the sea otter, Inkarmat mounts Tanigaki and disrobes. While there are any number of reasons she decided to sleep with him (including genuine attraction, which is definitely there) she later attributes the lay with the sea otter’s legendary aphrodisiac effects.

Once everyone is reassembled on the beach, Asirpa immediately confronts Kiroranke with what Inkarmat just told her. When Kiroranke plays innocent, Inkarmat produces evidence in the form of fingerprint matching.

Then Ogata draws his rifle on her, accusing her of working for Tsurumi, but she says she was only using Tsurumi. Tanigaki puts himself between Inkarmat and Ogata’s gun, and Ogata accuses him of letting himself be seduced.

It’s a big mess, with multiple people suspecting each other of murder, or conspiracy, or some such foul play. This week Sugimoto not only gets the horny sumo orgy started, but also plays the role of peacemaker (after all, no one is pointing any fingers at him for anything).

He tells everyone that their mission remains the same: go to Abashiri and meet with Nopperabo for answers. He half-jokingly warns that whoever “makes their move”, resulting in another member of the group suddenly meeting their maker, will share the fate of their victim. Call it Mutually Assured Justice.

Tsurumi’s intel network is formidable, and he is informed the moment the reunited group is headed to the prison. He even has a mole there, posing as a greenhorn noob. His superior officer is ordered by the warden to “feed him to the pigs” when his duplicity is uncovered, but the young lad make quick work of the two inmates who ambush him. Looks like our friends are heading straight into a hornet’s nest. What else is new?

As for the post-credits sequence in which a wagon is robbed in the night by a crack shot with a pistol…not enough info to form an opinion one way or another, except to assume the able gunman in question will probably cross paths with either Tsurumi, Hijikata, or Sugimoto & Co.

TenSura – 09 – Adult in the Room

With Shizu absorbed, the adventurers gone, and the village on autopilot, Rimuru explores his new human-mimicking ability, and learns that his default form has no gender.

He can make it any age and as masculine or feminine as he likes, but steers clear of the latter (looks too much like Shizu) and maintains the default form, continuing his practice of looking deceptively twee.

While practicing some of the new abilities he got from Shizu, Ranga reports in: the hunting party is under attack by a group of six ogres. These ogres (or oni) don’t match Mikami’s idea of the hulking, ugly brutes, but one thing’s for sure, they’re confident in their abilities.

Their red leader believes Rimuru is responsible for the destruction of their village and intends to get revenge. Rimuru leaves only the pink mage to Ranga and quickly dispatches three of the remaining five.

But the white ogre knows the skills he’s using and where he got them, and can even slip past magical sense. The red one also has a fire attack, which is obviously useless against the immune slime.

Rimuru decides to remove the aura-concealing mask and show them his true power by breaking out one his newest abilities, Black Flame. Red is impressed and scared, but as the leader of his people he’s not going to back down just because the cause is hopeless. It takes Pinky, who also happens to be his sister, to be the voice of reason among the ogres.

Everyone stands down and they work through the misunderstanding. Both sides’ people are healed up and Rimuru invites his new horned friends back to the village for a feast (which he’ll now be able to taste in human form). And now I know who all those horned folks in the OP and ED are!

As for what their story is, that will have to wait for next week. Until then, I welcome the introduction of six more very cool-looking characters.

SSSS.Gridman – 08 – Stealing a Kaiju March

When Neon Genesis shows up at Yuuta, Rikka and Shou’s school—with outside shoes—and risks being reported or escorted away, you know something big is brewing. Akane has dusted off the first kaiju she built to defeat Gridman and souped it up into a kind of mega-mecha-kaiju.

She’s also not shy about her role in the kaiju-making. Assuming Yuuta has caught Rikka and Shou up, she tells them upfront that she designed her latest kaiju especially to attack the school’s cultural festival. If they don’t like it, well, they’re just going to have to try and stop her…if they can.

How to proceed creates a rift in the “Gridman Alliance”, which I only put in quotes because in the midst of said rift Rikka calls into question whether it’s an alliance at all, since only Shou has been insisting that’s what they are. Shou thinks they need to fight at all costs, but Rikka is far more hesitant—Akane is her friend; she doesn’t want to fight her friend.

When Shou accuses her of letting her emotions rule, Rikka wordlessly stalks away, and Shou knows he’s stepped in it. At school, Yuuta and Shou again try to get through to Akane, asking if she’ll have the battle somewhere else where their classmates won’t get hurt. But Akane hates the festival, and suspects the two of them wouldn’t mind if it were interrupted by a cool kaiju battle. There’s nothing left to say; she ain’t budging from her plans.

Back at the junk store an extremely hungry, one-eyed Anti shows up looking for Rikka…then passes out. Rikka’s mom feeds him and he goes on his way without incident.

In one of the more unsettling scenes of the entire show, Rikka is alone on a bus with Akane, hoping to change her mind about attacking. But Akane hugs her from behind, lauding her for being such “a good girl,” and assuring her no matter what she does, Rikka will never hate her, because she’s been “set up from the start” to like Akane like everyone else in the city.

Akane is convinced she is a god and there’s no one to prove otherwise, even though I wonder how far she’d get without Alexis’ help. Rikka leaves the bus, no doubt creeped out at the prospect of having been born programmed to be Akane’s friend.

She meets with Yuuta and reveals another reason she’s so upset about the whole situation: she feels she hasn’t contributed anything to the Gridman Alliance. All she feels she’s done is be related to the people who own the junk store and computer. But Yuuta tells her she’s wrong: she has contributed vital moral support throughout this whole ordeal.

Yuuta draws courage and strength knowing she and Shou are cheering him and Gridman on. Sadly, when Yuuta tries to use the opportunity to say more about how he feels personally towards her, she interrupts by saying she’ll apologize to Shou tomorrow, saying it would be folly to think Shou would apologize first.

Her mention of “going first” illuminates a light bulb in Yuuta’s head, and suddenly he has the right plan for the festival: Gridman will invade the school first, forcing an evacuation before Akane can mobilize her kaiju. He also has Gridman summoned at only half-size in order to allow all the Neon Genesis to sortie at once and combine to form Full Combo Gridman, who is of a size with Akane’s mega-mecha-kaiju.

The ensuing battle takes place outside of the school, leaving the festival untouched, which Akane is very upset about, in addition to being outmaneuvered when Gridman appeared first, the opposite of how it’s always gone.

More frustratingly for her, even her new upgraded kaiju isn’t much of a match for the Combo Gridman, who pulls of its head, launches it into the stratosphere, tosses it down to the earth, then cleaves it with a gold-plated finishing move.

In the midst of the battle both Rikka and Shou are by the computer, watching and cheering Yuuta on as usual, and that’s how they get over their previous rift. After all, they all tried their best to dissuade Akane and she simply wouldn’t listen. Friend or not, her attack had to be stopped lest more people die.

After the battle the three participate in their class’ “reverse gender cosplay cafe”, resulting in Maid Shou apologizing to Sea Captain Rikka while a pleased Schoolgirl Yuuta looks on.

As for Akane, who was so sure that this time she’d win and that she couldn’t lose, stays home, lying on the floor of her filthy house, in the dark…a fallen god. Maybe she’s just done with this…one can only endure so many defeats until it’s just not fun anymore.

Alexis isn’t mean or anything, but he’s very firm in his belief that she can “do better” than this. However she feels here and now, Alexis isn’t done with her, and intends to keep relying on her inimitable “talents.” More and more it’s looking like it’s ultimately not the city that must be saved from Akane’s kaiju, but Akane who needs to be saved from Alexis.

Sword Art Online: Alicization – 08 – Blooming in Foreign Soil

After a quick pep talk from Liena telling him not to remember that Volo’s power comes from his vaunted family line as well as the power of his imagination, and to keep his promise to her to show her everything he’s got, Kirito engages in his real-swords duel with the First Seat.

Volo also gives it everything he has, but Kirito remembers he has a family too; not just in Eugeo and Liena but in all his friends IRL. He also draws from the power of the Gigas Cedar his sword is made with, and successfully blocks Volo’s strike.

The faculty member ends the fight in a draw, but Volo is satisfied Kirito has been sufficiently chastened for staining his uniform. It’s good to see Volo has a good head on his shoulders and wasn’t going to take things too far. Liena is elated at Kirito’s feat, as are the rest of the assembled students.

After celebrating at Liena’s quarters, Kirito meets the two highborn bullies who didn’t like the result of Kirito’s fight with Volo, and come to deliver a message in the form of the snipped-off bud of the flowers Kirito had been growing in the garden. As I thought, the jerks just couldn’t lay off the garden…

Kirito had come to feel he had a lot in common with the flowers that don’t usually bloom in such a climate; he too is a stranger in a strange land, far from the family that knew, loved, and supported him. Sure, there’s Eugeo and Liena, but it’s not the same.

Then, suddenly, a voice comes out of the air, urging him to ask for the other flowers in the garden to aid him in restoring his plant. They answer the call and send some of their life energy to the ruined planter, resurrecting the buds.

Liena, having both learned from and been inspired by Kirito’s previous fight with Volo, manages to dig deep and defeat him to graduate as First Seat, and thanks to Kirito learning something new about the world he’s in, he has a bouquet of flowers from her homeland waiting for her.

Liena, Volo, and the other elites graduate, and Kirito and Eugeo become Elite Deciples themselves, complete with cute Novice Trainee pages in Tiese and Ronie. Eugeo may tell the latter that Kirito will be nothing but trouble, but the other side of the deal is she gets to be the first artificial fluctlight trained in his unique Aincrad Style.

Meanwhile, Kirito and Eugeo, after going at it like an old married couple, keep their eyes on the prize: Alice’s most likely whereabouts, the grand white tower in the center of the city. Swordcraft Academy may be fun, but it’s only a stepping stone.

Goblin Slayer – 08 – Good as New, but Still Scared to Death

Goblin Slayer is Resurrected by a miracle that requires him to share a bed with a virgin—in this case, the Priestess. While he’s out, he remembers his harsh but fair master who taught him how to slay goblins, breaking him down then putting him back together into someone who won’t freeze and do nothing, but act when action is needed…even if it kills you.

Or, in GS’ case, almost kills him. The miracle works, and we get our first look at a maskless, armor-less Slayer, although his eyes remain obscure both in flashback and present. The Sword Maiden pays him a visit (I imagine it’s her bed he and Priestess are in), but she couldn’t be the virgin the miracle needed, thanks to the Goblins.

She confides in him how even though she defeated the Demon Lord, she remains scared to death, and in need of people to help her overcome that fear. We’ll learn that that constant fear is something GS shares.

Dwarf, Elf, and Lizard reunite with GS and Priestess and they go into town for their first meal since GS went down; a meal they promised to have together. GS and Priestess then split off and head to the shops. Priestess could easily replace her damaged chainmail, but for her its sentimental value vis-a-vis GS outweighs the difficulty of repairing it. GS also acquires new weapons, since he lost them all in the ruins.

They share a sunset by the sea with a new invention called “ice creme” and after being chided earlier for being so taciturn with the Priestess, he actually opens up about that fear he once had to just take one step forward, lest the ground swallow him up. He’s still “scared to death” just like the Sword Maiden, and not amount of noble feats will change that.

What changed was what they do with that fear, and how they keep living in spite of it. In both cases, neither would still be alive were it not for a little help from their friends. Back at the farm the cow girl assures her father that despite having been gone a long time, the GS will be back.

Resurrection apparently doesn’t require much recovery time, since GS is back in action in the ruins with the rest of the party, after acquiring a mystery burlap sack from the Black Mage. Their next big foe is not a goblin, but a “creature of Chaos”: a giant eyeball with tendrils coming out of it, each tipped with more eyeballs. Whenever something enters the room where it resides it blasts it with a stone-melting energy beam.

GS knows he can’t just rush in and stab or blugeon the thing to death, so he formulates a game plan that requires the cooperation and coordination of everyone in the party. The Elf rushes in to distract the Eyeball, allowing the Dwarf to slip in and hit it with some sleep-inducing fire wine. Once GS empties the burlap sack—full of ultra-fine flour—into the room, creating a huge cloud of the stuff, the Elf shoots an arrow into the side of the eye, and then everyone retreats from the room, behind the Priestess’ Protection.

The Lizard sends a Dragontooth Warrior in, which the Eye instinctively targets and fires its beam—igniting the flour like coal dust in a mine. The resulting explosion kills the creature, without the GS using fire, water, or poison. That leaves the adventurers standing before the thing it seemed to be guarding: some kind of magic mirror.

I was a bit surprised so little time was spent without GS in the picture—the Priestess wasn’t even awake during that time—but considering the name of the show perhaps I shouldn’t have been. Not to mention this is a world of fantasy and magic in which death isn’t always irreversible. It was also good to learn a bit more about our boy, and for him to actually open up to the Priestess, who has certainly earned the right to know more, having saved him and all.

Iroduku: The World in Colors – 08 – The Color of Spinning Wheels

From the day her magical ability awoke in her when she was a little girl, Kohaku has been devoted to one goal: using magic to make people happy. You may recall that this goal has already been mentioned a few times in previous episodes. But is it folly—not to mention hubris—to believe you and you alone can make everyone happy?

Magic is all about balance: for everything taken, something must be given. Doesn’t it stand to reason, then, that there will be times when the same conditions that make Person A happy will render Person B the opposite? This episode is framed as Kohaku-centric, and doesn’t so much explore whether Kohaku should do something, but rather whether she can.

Now that everyone knows that Hitomi can’t see color, Kohaku has begun to believe that the condition is a kind of magic Hitomi cast on herself. And if a spell can be cast, it can be undone. Her resulting “experimentation” on Hitomi and Yuito is somewhat ham-fisted, and definitely insensitive of two very shy people who are simply going at their own glacial pace.

I don’t wish to pile of Kohaku her, since she first showed up she’s surpassed my expectations as a character. but I’m afraid the time I’ve feared has come, when the force of her personality, not to mention her magical power, conspire to almost completely eclipse Hitomi.

Despite not getting a clear answer on whether Hitomi will ever even want to return to her time (and let’s face it, Hitomi isn’t the best at clear answers), Kohaku works tirelessly to familiarize and master time magic, starting with restoring a wilted rose to a bud, in hopes of being ready to send Hitomi back when she’s ready to go back.

After a photo session, Asagi’s camera suddenly craps out, and Kohaku quickly casts a time spell on it, restoring it to working order. My first reaction to this was “wait, if you turned back time aren’t some or all the pictures she took now gone?”, but be it rose or camera, I couldn’t help but feel like she was messing with powers she shouldn’t be.

That fear is confirmed when the rose and camera die again shortly after her spells, which obviously doesn’t bode well for any other living subject of her magic. For the first time, we see a Kohaku who isn’t sure at all about what she should do and not sure how to to it.

Kohaku’s own grandmother, the voice of reason, tells her that her future self must have withheld the knowledge of how to send Hitomi back for a reason. If she’s meant to have that knowledge, it will come to her in time; she mustn’t unnaturally rush things, as when she tried to literally bring Hitomi and Yuito closer together.

But while Kohaku is rushing to give Hitomi an exit plan, Hitomi is perfectly content where she is, and wants to stay. In other words, Kohaku not using magic will make Hitomi happy, at least right now. So where does that leave Kohaku and her central goal? On indefinite standby, I imagine.

Bloom Into You – 08 – A Friend and a Senpai

Yagate Kimi ni Naru is the finest school romance I’ve watched since Tsuki ga Kirei back in the Spring of last year, and I’ve known that for some weeks now. Both shows are wonderful to look at, but more importantly they feature some wonderfully fleshed-out characters and relationships, and the more I learn about both, the deeper I sink into the show.

It would have been so easy and expected for someone like Sayaka to launch a transparent full-scale war against Yuu once she determined she was a potential threat to her relationship with Touko. Not only did YKN not take that route, but continued to develop Sayaka as someone just as confused, frustrated, and yet still mostly happy as Yuu.

Watching Sayaka take “revenge” on her former senpai who so coldly dumped her was a thing of absolute beauty, and a perfect way to start the episode in which her and Yuu’s rivalry is laid bare (well, more bare). And how perfect was it that Touko swiftly delivered “payback” in the form of continuing to hold Sayaka’s hand?

Yuu gets the feeling that she and Sayaka have some things to talk about, and that the present chill is affecting their relay baton exchange game, so after school she invites Sayaka to join her for a repast of McDonalds. Sayaka almost immediately calls Yuu out for her “olive branch”, which could harm Sayaka’s image simply by dint of Yuu being her junior.

Yuu holds her own, saying she wouldn’t put it so “dramatically.” Still, the two come to a sort of mutual respect once they learn that neither is the person they expected: Sayaka isn’t so easygoing, and Yuu isn’t so timid and respectful. Both appreciate their directness with each other.

That directness breaks down when neither comes right out and says what they both insinuate by mincing words. Instead, Sayaka says she likes Touko very much “as a close friend” while Yuu likes her “as a senpai” … because what other possible way would they like her??? (Gee, I wonder.)

This first segment of the episode is called “Intersection,” which is fitting in many ways. First, Sayaka and Yuu find common ground and gain a bit more understanding of what makes one another tick, leading to them eventually getting the baton hand-off right.

But an intersection isn’t just a meeting, but a splitting into different directions. In the interests of being as open with Sayaka as possible regarding Touko, she expresses her hope that after the stage play Touko will be more open and “like herself”, dropping the Ms. Perfect act. Such a prospect frightens both of them, since they’re not sure what the hell they’d do in such an instance.

Would Sayaka finally confess her feelings? Would Yuu be left in the lurch? Neither has any idea what such a future holds? Regardless, I love every minute Yuu and Sayaka share the screen, especially now that they’ve reached a measure of détente.

The second segment deals with another common school romance trope: the Rainy Day Umbrella Share. It starts with Yuu Being Yuu, which is to say being super-kind to those she cares about, even if it means getting wet. When the guy Akari likes forgets his umbrella, she nudges her in the guy’s direction, though the two were going to walk home together. Akari is deeply grateful for the gesture, and off she goes with the guy, the two already looking like a couple.

This leaves Yuu stranded at school, as the only available loaner umbrella is useless. She calls her sister, but when Rei’s boyfriend answers, she says never mind; she doesn’t want to interrupt their date. She’s also hesitant to call Touko, not just because she doesn’t want to give her the wrong idea or just because she doesn’t want to burden her. There’s a number of factors that drive her hesitation; another reflection of her character that Rei has down to a T in a brief scene with her boyfriend.

When she says Yuu is great at getting on with things once she’s dipped her toe into the water, so to speak; it’s that initial hesitation that’s her problem. Now knowing pretty clearly how much Yuu’s friend Touko likes her sister, Rei expresses her hope Yuu will find the person she needs to give her those oh-so-important nudges—much like the one Yuu gave Akari so an opportunity wouldn’t be missed.

Much to Yuu’s surprise, Touko actually called her while she was on the phone with Rei, and shows up with an umbrella just when Yuu was about to call her. They walk together with Touko holding the umbrella, but once Yuu sees that Touko’s shoulder is getting soaked she insists on taking it; they compromise by holding it together.

When they take a rest under an awning, Yuu proceeds to dry Touko off with a towel, in a very warm and delicate scene. Yuu’s “pampering” makes Touko happy, but she’s worried she’s taking advantage of Yuu’s kindness and that resentment will build up in Yuu and curdle into hatred.

It’s a perfectly plausible scenario from Touko’s perspective, since she still believes Yuu when she says her feelings are still just one-sided. Of course, that certainly doesn’t seem to be the case, as Yuu betrays when she blushingly tells Touko how happy she was to be rescued by her and her umbrella.

Yuu quickly corrects by saying she “meant nothing weird” about it, and Touko thinks to herself “that’s more the Yuu I know.” But that’s the whole point: she doesn’t know the Whole Yuu…nor the Whole Sayaka. Both girls have acknowledged and accepted each others’ existences. Now comes the hard part: acknowledging and expressing Touko is much more to them than the words “friend” or “senpai” alone can express.

P.S. The piece of music that plays during particularly dramatic scenes reminds me of Uematsu’s “A Secret Sleeping in the Deep Sea,” one of my all-time favorite video game audio tracks. 

Zombieland Saga – 08 – An Unexpected Father-Daughter Reunion

It’s a Lily episode! By which I mean, it’s a Gou Masao episode, since we learn that’s her birth name. And it’s just as much a Gou Takeo episode, Takeo being Lily’s father. That makes this the first episode of ZLS that is at least partially told from the POV of a person who survived one of the members of Franchouchou.

At first the show plays around with the idea this immense mountain of a man could simply be a creep, but I never bought into that angle. Instead I see his fatherly determination to confirm whether “Number 6” is really his Masao. That enthusiasm earns him a rolling sobat from Saki, protecting her girls. But Lily later reveals to Sakura that the giant was indeed her father.

Lily explains the vast size differential by saying she took after her mother, who died when she was very young. Her father raised her on his own, and when she noticed how much he loved TV, she signed up for auditions, got cast in one thing after another, and never looked back.

However, Masao AKA Lily put so much stock in her tininess and cuteness that the day she found a hair on her leg she refused to go out and perform, and when she found a whisker on her face, she basically died of mental shock.

From Takeo’s POV, he was a bad father, pushing Masao too far. When he saw her smile appear posthumously on TV, he picked up the set and threw it at the wall, and ceased to watch any TV ever again.

Lily and her dad’s next meeting is a lot more cordial as both apologize, but Lily doesn’t betray who she really is, and her dad doesn’t pry, convinced No.6 just looks like his daughter—besides, from where he’s standing, there’s no way she could just come back to life. His daughter is gone; he doesn’t want to cause some girl undue stress or harm just for resembling her.

While Saki is the leader of Franchouchou, she’s always erred on the side of mocking Lily, both for her tiny stature and later for her butch real name and ridiculously vain way of dying. But Sakura has shown she’s much better with Lily, and in Sakura Lily finds the shoulder she needs to cry in after putting on a brave face for her dad.

Sakura and the other girls put their heads together and get clearance from Tatsumi to hold a free public show and invite Lily’s dad, who almost doesn’t attend, but changes his mind at the last second. He’s then treated to a concert in which the other idols provide backup vocals and moves and Lily is in the spotlight.

She sings a song with lyrics that, while perhaps a bit too on-the-nose and even kinda sappy, nevertheless successfully delivers her feelings to her father, even if he still doesn’t realize she’s really his daughter. The next time he’s at work, he doesn’t go out for lunch while his co-workers watch TV, which of course features that chicken commercial in which Lily appears.