NieR: Automata Ver 1.1a – 03 – This Cannot Continue

Lily brings 2B and 9S to their ad hoc base, and does not get into why she shoots so many intent looks in 2B’s direction. Could Lily have known a former version of this 2B? Did she know 2A, since she recognized her as “Number Two”? We also meet Jackass, who really wants to take the YoRHa androids apart to “collect data”, but is content to drive them to their recon site.

The truck ride, and really all establishing shots in NieR succeed in creating a vast sense of both scale and desolation, especially when we see the half-buried ruins of our familiar civilization (Saturday is apparently post-apocalypse day for me—not that I’m complaining). The grandeur is enhanced with the score, with themes perfectly suited to the base, desert, and the orbiting YoRHa base.

When they encounter Machine Lifeforms wearing tribal masks and markings, 2B and 9S get to work trashing them. But when 9S hacks the biggest bot, he gets a lot more than he bargained for. These MLs are among those that have absorbed knowledge from the library of humanity of yore, and he ends up in the middle of a Mesopotamian-style  ritual.

With this group of bots defeated, 2B, 9S and Jackass trudge on into the ruined city, where all communications to YoRHa HQ are being jammed by an unknown power source. They keep exploring, and locate a group of android corpses, including the missing YoRHa liaison. That the corpses aren’t totally destroyed but in various states of dismantlement bodes ill for our two androids.

2B and 9S fall though quicksand and into a yawning undergeround complex. They come upon a circle of yellow-eyed, non-hostile MLs both reciting and emulating various human emotions and activities, including copulation and childrearing. All of this makes 9S particularly uneasy, since this is not the way the enemy should be acting. But then things get even weirder when one comment from a red-eyed ML—“this cannot continue”—sends the yellows into a frenzy.

The MLs climb columns made of the fossilized bodies of their dead, and huddle together in to the super-brain thingy teased last week. The mass opens and out pours an approximation of an android that quickly grows skin and stands up, part Terminator, part Sephiroth. 2B and 9S’ first instinct is to kill it ASAP, even though he is not immediately hostile to them.

While they successfully break his energy shield and impale him with their blades, a second, unharmed ML android emerges from the lifeless body, good as new, and this one is a lot more aggressive. 9S is just able to grab 2B and leap out of the way of the android’s devastating main weapon. The resulting cave-in apparently crushes the android, but as we saw that’s not going to be enough to do it in.

We learn from Commander White up in space that she didn’t send 2B and 9S to assist the resistance, but to use the resistance as a shield and decoy in order to facilitate their real mission, which has now borne fruit. Not only do they know what became of the liaison, but they’ve uncovered a potentially game-changing development in their once-primitive foe.

The Fire Hunter – 02 – Precious Goods

Maiden Train Arc

Touko’s adventure starts out rough, with her vomiting and passing out, no doubt due to the fact she’s never been on a moving vehicle. When she wakes she’s greeted by two kindly women, Hotaru and Benio, who are also getting a ride on the collection truck, to be married off.

Hotaru and Benio are resigned to their fate, which is the result of their villages believing sending them away will lift curses. But a third bride-to-be, Kaho, is manifestly not resigned and not taking it in stride. A shot of her right next to a window makes it obvious: if she finds an opportunity, she’s going to run for it. The forest may be full of fiends (and various ruined artifacts from before this world’s fall), but not an unwanted husband.

Unlike the brides who are confined to their car, Touko is given a brief tour of the truck and given toilet-cleaning duty. It’s hard work and it stinks, but Benio would prefer work to being cooped up and twiddling her thumbs. The episode is full of vividly-rendered postcard memories to accentuate certain scenes. When Touko is back in the brides’ car for lunch, Benio shows a growling Kanata who’s boss by basically asserting that she wont put up with his continued hostility.

That night, Kaho comes to Touko’s bed, telling her she’s talking and groaning in her sleep, but also to give her something he dropped. It turns out to be a spirit stone with her adoptive sister Rin’s name carved into it. Touko’s happy reaction to his indicates it was Rin’s intention, despite her harsh words, to send Touko off with a good-luck talisman, and the mask she wore was indeed to conceal her sad face.

Lightning in a Bottle

Nighttime is a good segue back to the Capital, where Koushi walks past unhoused orphans huddled together in the rain. Koushi may be apprehensive about his future with his mother dead and his father away, but this little shot is a good reminder that he is a lot better off than most.

Koushi makes his way to the ornate mansion of Yuoshichi, who knew his father, Haijuu—Haijuu, of course, being the fire hunter who was killed saving Touko’s life. Yuoshichi feels firmly indebted to Haijuu, and following the death of Koushi’s mother has decided to welcome both him and his little sister into his home, not as a servant or factory worker, but as members of his family.

Yuoshichi would rather Koushi focus on his studies, and begin research on the skyfire his father had collected over the years. The moment Yuoshichi mentions that the current government is on its last legs and that skyfire can be used as both a fuel and an explosive, I knew his intentions vis-a-vis Koushi weren’t entirely altruistic. When the winds change, he wants to be ready, and Koushi is key to that.

Runaway Bride

When the collection truck stops for “fuel”, the fire hunter onboard conscripts Kanata to work beside his own good boy, Izumo the hound. He doesn’t bother asking Touko for permission, and Kanata tentatively follows. When Hotaru reports that Kaho has gone missing and must have left the truck, Touko also exits to go look for her.

She finds Kaho in the clutches of a black beast that the fire hunter and dogs are in the midst of hunting. It’s a chaotic and frought scene of multiple perspectives all captured on the screen at once in the battle’s climax.

In the end, Kaho and Touko are fine, as are the dogs, and the truck has ample fiendfire from the slain beast. But Sakuroku tells Touko that her leaving the truck is unacceptable. He summarily decrees that he can no longer keep her on the truck, and will be dumping her off at the next village along with one of the brides (though which one isn’t revealed).

If Sakuroku doesn’t change his mind (and something about him tells me he won’t), it looks like Touko’s journey to the capital—and rendezvous with the son of the fire hunter who saved her—will be delayed. There’s also the possibility the village won’t accept her, or try to betroth her to someone.

In any case, this episode did a lot of heavy lifting showing how despite the apocalypse that has left the world in this state, humanity’s innate bad habits of using one another as currency and tools have not abated.

Urusei Yatsura – 14 – Pinch Hitter

Another week, another new Urusei Yatsura character. This time it’s Mizunokouji Tobimaro, AKA Ton-chan, a childhood friend of Mendou and Ryouko. Once defeated by Mendou in baseball, he went to the mountains for training, only to return just as uncoordinated and accident-prone as ever.

What makes Ton interesting is that unlike the other guys, he has absolutely no interest in girls, only in beating Mendou. One could even take it a step further and call his obsession with Mendou a crush. But it’s Ryouko who has always loved Ton, whose fear and hatred of women may be due to him being the recipient of her elaborate and often violent pranks over the years.

A ridiculous ballgame ensues in which Ton is complete rubbish but Ryouko deploys her ninja manservants to manipulate the baseball (i.e. hold it and run with it like they’re invisible). Despite Ton being on his team Ataru intervenes, resulting in a duel. But Ton is determined for a rematch with Mendou.

He hadn’t counted on Ryouko encasing Mendou in cement from the neck down, which means she is the one walking the octopi on the bridge when he tosses his challenge letter to her. Only it doesn’t look or read like a challenge letter, but a love letter.

Mendou, who is as firmly against a Ton-Ryouko union as Ton himself, forbids Ryouko from leaving the family compound. But she’s not only able to escape in her litter, but rope Ataru into assisting her with keeping Mendou away from her plans to see Ton at the athletic center. As usual, Ryouko’s methods for communication show no regard for other people’s peace or property.

As Ataru gloms onto Ryouko, Lum follows and electricutes and chastises him for straying yet again, especially since Ryouko has no real interest in him beyond him keeping Mendou at bay. Mendou, meanwhile, reveals he’d disguised himself as one of her manservants in order to come between her and Ryouko.

Ton’s one-on-one challenge with Mendou ends up being a five-way fracas between him, Ataru, Lum, Mendou, and Ryouko. Ton takes the lion’s share of the punishment, demonstrating that he’d actually make a perfect match for Ryouko and her violent pranks since he is able to take a great deal of physical punishment.

Mendou eventually even concedes the battle and allows him to date Ryouko, even though that’s the last thing he wants. It’s an episode packed with manic chaos and slapstick, with the only one you could call satisfied in the end being Ryouko. Which is all that matters to her!