Ao no Exorcist: Shimane Illuminati-hen – 12 (Fin) – See No Evil

After all that battling and a tense meeting in Mephisto’s office, everyone’s head is spinning about Shima being a spy and a double agent. Rin thinks everyone still trusts Shima, but Bon only said that to save his ass from execution, while Konekomaru doesn’t have a clear answer. Shiemi thinks it would be nice if Shima could return to class with them like nothing ever happened, but even she has her doubts, and doesn’t like how that uncertainty feels.

As for Yukio, he’s setting up to be the next person to have split loyalties. Always the loyal soldier for Mephisto and True Cross (despite never really being able to trust him), Shima bringing up Lucifer calls to mind something we didn’t see back at the lab: Lucifer actually met with Yukio and asked him to join Illuminati. He told him he’s weak, but he can help him unlock his power. This weighs on Yukio throughout the episode.

During an early morning run, Shima and Bon happen to run into each other, and have something of a heart to heart. Shima isn’t lying about one thing: he’s pretty much true neutral, as he told Yukio. That means he can warn Yukio and not want Bon or Konekomaru or Izumo to get too badly hurt, but it also means he’s having a blast being a spy for both sides. Bon, who has always been like a brother to him, admits he still has “zero trust” in Shima, but still wishes him good luck, for at least he’s decided what he wants to do.

With Shura recovered, Mephisto sends everyone to a spa and waterpark for some much-needed R&R, and even Yukio can’t escape it. But he also pulls a prank on them, unleashing the Three Wise Monkeys to stir up some mischief. Yukio, Bon, and Konekomaru notice Shima acting strange and unusually serious and focuses, but it turns out he’s contemplating which girl to go down the water slide: Izumo, Shiemi, or Shura.

Rin, who also falls under the spell of the monkeys, declares that he wants to go down the slide with someone too, but that person can only be Shiemi, thus revealing who he has true feelings for once and for all. Unfortunately, Shiemi doesn’t hear it, as she and Izumo and Shura are already at the top of the slide stairs. Shima and Rin duke it out, collapsing the steps and nearly re-injuring the girls, but Bon uses a charm to cancel out the effect of the monkey and Rin and Shima return to normal so Shura can wreck their shit.

So, the spa trip wasn’t as relaxing as Mephisto had hoped it would be. Rin shows he’s not mentally still in elementary school by telling Yukio that he knows something must be on his mind, and that he can talk about it to him if he likes. But Yukio puts on a fake smile and just says he’s tired; it only exacerbates his inferiority complex to open up to his dumb little brother.

Yukio thinks he’s too weak and wants to get stronger, which means he could easily fall into the hands of Lucifer and the Illuminati. But that’s a story for another arc, which it seems will be coming far sooner than previous arcs. That must be why the series felt comfortable with these last two episodes serving as little more than an extended epilogue to Izumo’s story, and a sneak peak of what’s to come.

Ao no Exorcist: Shimane Illuminati-hen – 11 – His Precious Pieces

Shima’s brother Juuzou tells Bon and the others that Renzou has been a double agent all this time. Even before he started at True Cross Academy, Pheles wanted him to accept a recruitment invitation from the Illuminati. Due to his black flames (second only to Rin’s blue ones in power), he’s an enticing target for recruitment, and Renzou also just has a gift for duplicity and spycraft, and a desire to prove himself his way.

That’s how Shima now finds himself aboard the Illuminati’s gigantic flying aircraft carrier, with the chimer-ified Gedouiin prostrating himself before Lucifer, and Lucifer doing all of us a solid and eliminating Gedouiin once and for all. The fact he was wearing a toupee all along really adds icing to the cake. Lucifer’s Number Two, the lady I don’t believe has even been named yet, orders Shima back to True Cross to gather intel.

That’s how Shima finds himself back in Yukio’s class with his buds, including a Rin who is wearing a pink wig and trying to pose as Shima so his absence won’t be felt. Bon gives him a hug, then a brutal headbutt; Izumo uses “Expel Scumbag”, and even Konekomaru can’t help but give him a smack for worrying them so much. And for making them think he betrayed them.

Everyone is suddenly summoned to Pheles’ office so Lewin Light (AKA Lightning) can question Shima and gauge his trustworthiness. Most of the rest of the episode unfolds in this office, with everyone sitting around, which is not all that interesting or dynamic, but the air is cleared about a great many things.

Most importantly, when pressed about the timing of Shima becoming a double agent and everything that’s happened since then, Pheles admits it: everything they’ve gone through these past three arcs has been, in effect, a series of trials to toughen them up for the battle against Lucifer. Rin can bear his fangs and flames all he likes, but Pheles isn’t the enemy. As for Shima, his friends vouch for him, which is all Lightning needs for now (i.e., no torture).

After the meeting, Yukio walks away from Shima to attend to some things, and Shima says he knows Yukio has spoken to “the Commander”, AKA Lord Lucifer. Yukio’s unhinged reaction seems to suggest that he too is an Illuminati spy. But with only one episode left, that seems like a tale for a part two. Here’s hoping it arrives before 2030!

Classroom of the Elite – 07

As soon as it was clear this was not only a pool episode, but an underlying operation by the guys to peep on the girls in their changing room (immediately), I sat back and settled in for what I imagined would be a pleasant but lightweight episode, “7” stamp in my hand, ready to strike.

But hidden among all the usual pool episode fanservice cliches and peeping scheme antics, this episode turned out to be something I didn’t know it was until the end, and felt silly for not realizing it. At the same time, it ever-so-gently nudged a character towards a slightly more normal human high school life.

If this episode were a sandwich, the insides would be pretty monotonous, while the bread, particularly the bottom slice, would be where the true action is. Yet the middle part—let’s call it egg salad for the purposes of this metaphor—was nevertheless crucial in setting up the twist at the end.

Clues are everywhere as to what kind of phone conversation went on between Horikita and Ayanokouji that led to her joining him, the three bad apples (including Sudo), Ichinose, Kushida, and Sakura at a lovely Summer day at the pool, rather than her usual day composed solely of study, eating, and sleeping.

‘Leisure” and “friends” are a waste of time and energy for Horikita, so what is she doing here? Nah. Merely humoring Ayano and the others? Worried he and Kushida (or Sakura, or Ichinose) will get too close if she’s not there? Nope.

Once the ridiculously overwrought and over-dramatic peeping scheme is in dire jeopardy, and Ayano asks Horikita to climb the highest diving board and deliver a stirring speech that gets the nod from her Class D colleagues but rankles the other classes, it should be clear she’s not in on the peeping scheme either…and neither is Ayanokouji.

Rather, Ayano, AKA Argos-4, served as a double agent, knowing the other guys would go through with the scheme even if he protested or failed to participate; better to let them think he’s on their side and let them fail all on their own. But the consequences of failure would spread to all of Class D, so Ayano appealed to Horikita’s pride and desire to reach Class A, and help him neutralize one more obstacle to that goal.

She does, swiping all of the SD cards from the cameras set up in the changing room, and thus while the guys’ scheme failed, Ayano’s succeeds. Getting to see Horikita in a bikini, and having her hang out with people who would be her friends if she just let them, is pretty much just a bonus for Ayano. He dunks Horikita, but when reaching out to pull her out, she pulls him in with her…as “payback” (Sakura also tries and fails—quite hilariously—to join in the fun).

Back home and in her usual routine, Horikita gets a text from Ayano: a photo of him and her with the others at the pool; a memory of a fun time. Horikita collapses on the bed, maintaining that being alone is “easier”, but does she truly want everything to be easy? Doesn’t a challenge make one’s results more satisfying?

Classroom of the Elite let its hair down a little this week, but it deserves kudos for taking the tired pool episode and peeping scheme premises and adapting them to the specific thrust of the show: Horikita and Ayano keeping Class D above water as part of the greater goal to get promoted to Class A. It also allowed Horikita to loosen up ever so slightly, while perpetuating the complex relationship between her and the still very mysterious Ayano. A win on all fronts.

Attack on Titan – 34

While I’m all for hanging out in the branches of giant trees on a gorgeous sunny afternoon, I was hoping for a little more substance. Instead, it’s a time-marking episode, with Reiner and Bertholdt waiting for a sunset that never comes while Ymir and Eren poke and prod them with questions, none of which are actually answered except one: they’re ultimately headed for the traitor’s hometown.

Just as Mikasa has to keep calm and watch her pace so as not to break the rescue party formation, Eren has to keep calm and not do anything stupid by transforming back into a titan before he’s healed and in the middle of enemy territory. But while his eyes bulge and his teeth grind, Eren’s struggle is pretty moot: Reiner says he and Ymir are too weak to transform anyway.

Then Reiner goes off, talking as if he wasn’t the armored titan, but just another soldier in the scouts who should probably get a reward, if not a promotion, for all his good work. Ymir surmises, and is probably correct, that after spending so long pretending to be a regular human soldier, he no longer knows who he is, or at least forgets sometimes.

However, he’s lucid enough to know he can flip Ymir if he can convince her it’s in her best interest, or more importantly, in Christa, AKA Historia’s. Ymir is at least willing to listen, adding another slice to Eren’s shit sandwich. But as the sun sets, their limbs start to regenerate, and the smoke flares in the distance indicate the scouts are further along in their pursuit than Bertholdt calculated.

I was expecting a quiet episode in the trees, but rather disappointed in the lack of answers, especially when it comes to the Beast Titan. Eren also seems to know, and accepts, less than we do, and it’s always frustrating to wait for a character to catch up to you.