In / Spectre – 23 – The Merciless Protector of Order

Kotoko’s Columbo-style “One More Thing” involves the remainder of her interrogation of Fubuki, the yoko with whom President Otonashi contracted to murder Sumi. At the end of their chat, Kotoko deduces that Fubuki didn’t actually kill Sumi. He was about to, but someone beat him to it. He kept this secret from Otonashi so that he’d hold up his end of the bargain.

Fubuki also transformed into Sumi to scream out that the killer was a man in black in order to obscure the true killer: Kaoruko. She was able to fake the time she broke her leg after all, and made it look like a burglary. She now points out that Koya knew about Kaoruko’s role in the murder before this meeting, which is why Kaoruko wasn’t present, and yet Koya was willing to let his father-in-law take the fall.

When Koya scoffs and reminds Kotoko that Sumi screamed that a man attacked her. Kotoko can’t mention that a yoko actually screamed that, but it’s just as plausible that Sumi was protecting her daughter and the Otonashi brand. As Koya gets more agitated, Kotoko gets him to slip up and confirm Kaoruko wasn’t able to confirm Sumi’s death—a combination of her inexperience with murder and the gloves she wore that wouldn’t have been able to detect a pulse or faint breath.

As all of this unfolds, Rion realizes Kotoko guided her to the wrong answer in order to corner Koya and Kaoruko. Now that she has achieved this, awakened the truth, and protected the order of things, Kotoko starts to take her leave. But then Koya pulls a gun, and when Kurou approaches him, he shoots him in the head then aims for Kotoko’s. He can believe his family won’t tell a soul, but doesn’t trust her or Kurou.

As you’d expect, Kotoko doesn’t flinch for a moment. The following exchange is a standout of this arc:

Koya: Now there’s no turning back for me. You and that boy were wrong.

Kotoko: I am correct, and you can still turn back.

When the resurrected Kurou comes from behind and disarms him, Koya, like the others, is somewhat shocked. Kurou’s half-assed period drama explanation doesn’t hold water, and Kotoko saying they’re “people who live in a daydream” for which normal laws and reality don’t apply, isn’t any more reassuring.

Some time passes, and Rion narrates the aftermath of Kotoko’s awakening of a long dormant truth. An always guilt-ridden Kaoruko tried to take her own life, but failed, and Koya remains steadfastly by her side. Her father and Susumu have become closer, something she deems to be a saving grace.

Her grandfather the president’s health took a turn for the worse, as he deals with both his cancer and wrestles with his own guilt and doubt over whether it was the right thing to even approach Kotoko. She and Kurou actually visit him at his bedside, where he admits he’s always both believed in and been fascinated by the supernatural. That’s how he came into contact with the person who referred him to Kotoko and Kurou: none other than Sakuragawa Rikka, who told him they’d be able solve his problem.

This new kernel of information irks Kotoko, who wonders if Rikka was merely trying to bully her. Kurou thinks it could be Rikka wanted Kotoko to get all tangled up in this case to distract her from whatever Rikka was planning. He also believes Rikka wanted him to see Kotoko at work, and in particular how jealously and mercilessly she would protect order by revealing a truth, no matter the cost to her audience.

Kurou silently recalls Rikka telling him he still hasn’t realized how “terrifying” Kotoko is, and as he remembers this, Kotoko falls asleep beside him, looking like the very picture of an innocent angel. Whether this case was meant to be a diversion for Kotoko or not, it is true that Kurou learned more about his girlfriend. But I don’t think it hurt his opinion of her like Rikka probably wanted.

Quite the contrary: it’s surely better for one’s partner to be terrifyingly just than boringly corrupt!

In / Spectre – 22 – Squirrel Lion

During a brief recess when Goichi’s heirs get some air, Kurou lies down, but doesn’t get to rest long as a frisky Kotoko pounces on him with the full force of her 90-ish pounds (which is to say, not much). It’s another fun reminder of how close they’ve become, and it’s also a prime opportunity for Kotoko to confer with Kurou on her progress baiting the heirs into admitting their murder plans, which adequately prepares them for the false solution she’s prepared.

Of the three “contestants”, she believes Rion will be the first one to come upon that conclusion, as early as that night, and that proves to be exactly the case. While Susumu and Koya were successfully baited, the genuinely innocent Rion was also given everything she needed to craft a solution. A phone call with her dad is the catalyst that helps Rion organize and connect the clues swimming in her mind.

Missing from the meeting’s revelations is the true nature of Otonashi Sumi’s motivations. She wasn’t simply a tyrant bent on success at any cost, but was herself a puppet of her father Denjiro’s machinations. Denjirou laid out an intricately detailed plan, Sumi carried it out, and it resulted in the company’s success. Under that kind of pressure, it was virtually impossible for Sumi to disobey Denjirou even after he passed, even if she knew his plans were fracturing her family and eventually even the company.

That’s when Rion remembers how Kotoko phrased it—success sometimes harms people and leads them to their own destruction—and eureka, she has the solution: Sumi committed suicide. Trapped between her family’s happiness and the success of her company on one side an Denjiro’s orders on the other, Sumi took herself out of the equation.

Rion even surmises that Sumi made it look like a murder knowing her family had alibis to avoid harming the brand or their reputations. Kotoko looks happy with Rion’s answer—not necessarily because it’s the correct one, but because it’s the one she wanted Rion to come upon. Kotoko even softens the tension between them by saying her name is cute and brave, like a squirrel and a lion.

I like how that led to Susumu saying if Rion were a boy she’d be named Reo, since his big bro loved lions. It’s enough to suggest that amends between the brothers is possible. When the time comes to deliver the group’s answer to Goichi, Rion is the one to present it. Not only does Goichi accept it, and accept the even distribution of the inheritance, but laments that he didn’t do something like this sooner.

To do so would have saved his children undue guilt. While Susumu, Koya, and Kaoruko feel they’ve sinned, Goichi points out that there’s a very wide space between wishing to kill someone—and even holding a knife to someone’s neck—and actually going through with it. In doing his part to manipulate Sumi into commiting suicide, he believes himself the sole culprit in her death, and plans to pay for it by foregoing medication and dying a painful miserable death.

In this way, Goichi hopes to powerfully impress upon his heirs the lesson that one should never expect success as a result of murdering someone. The cost may have came late for him, but it will come all the same. That would wrap things up, except that Kotoko isn’t done. She rejects Rion’s theory of suicide, and provides valid reasons why.

The most important of these reasons is simply that making a suicide look like a murder carried far too much unnecessary risk and complexity. Engineering an accidental death, on the other hand, would have precluded the need for any alibis and prevented any police investigation.

Also, Goichi can claim he’ll pay for his crime, but the fact his family was protected by this solution means he doesn’t regret the choice he made or the success it led to. No, Otonahi Sumi didn’t commit suicide, she was murdered, and next week Kotoko will reveal the identity of the true killer. The question is, will that really be the fox ayakashi, or still someone else?

In / Spectre – 21 – Clearing the Air

Of the three Otonashi family members gathered, Rion (voiced by Iwami Manaka) is the only one whose thoughts we’re privy to. She rightfully wonders just what the hell she’s gotten into, and also realizes she’s underdressed for the occasion. Kotoko breaks the ice with another vulgar remark involving her an Kurou, before leaving the three to decide on an a singular narrative for how the president murdered Sumi, and a mutually agreed-upon order of inheritance.

It takes Susumu, Kouya, and Rion less than three minutes to come to an agreement, which is so fast that Kotoko wonders if it’s an agreement that they came upon in advance. She then reiterates that both the president, his sons, his daughter, and her fiance all had cause to murder her, but since everyone had solid alibis and no further evidence, her death was deemed a random burglary and murder.

Rion picks up on the semi-accusatory tone as Kotoko describes the ways Sumi’s children’s alibis were all too convenient, timely, and fortunate—even her daughter Kaoruko breaking her leg. Kotoko further prods her by calling the theorizing entertaining. Rion speaks up for her older relatives, telling Kotoko she’s completely devoid of taste. In this moment I felt bad for Rion, because I knew Kotoko was so many steps ahead.

Kotoko makes clear that the president was adamant that “the crime get the proper punishment”. This is the opportunity for everyone assembled to come clean, and Susumu is the first to avail himself of that opportunity. To Rion’s shock, both he and her father Ryouma plotted to kill their mother, but someone simply beat them to it, while they were still planning. While Rion points out that her uncle and dad hated each other, they also both standed to gain from Sumi’s death, so they collaborated on a murder plot while remaining at odds about everything else.

Susumu even posits that his brother sent Rion to the meeting in his place so she’d learn of the crime, as a way of atonement. Before Rion can catch her breath, Kotoko gently prods Kouya, who also confesses that he and Kaoruko also plotted to murder Sumi so they could get married. The plan involved Kaoruko pretending to break her leg for the alibi, only to break it for real before she could do the deed.

Now that “the sins of the successors” have come to light, Susumu believes they’re all done there. But Kotoko doesn’t care about their past sins. She’s there to hear them give their explanation for how the president managed to murder Sumi before any of them could. She assumed that all the secrets flying around would disorient Rion, so thought it best to take care of all of those first, and then give everyone a chance to arrive upon a satisfying answer.

In effect, Kotoko proves that she is not someone to be trifled with, as she played everyone in the room like a fiddle. Everyone except Rion, the sole innocent, to whom Kotoko helped reveal her family’s dark secrets. Rion seems like an otherwise easygoing person who didn’t mind being ranked last in the inheritance. Will that change now that she knows the truth?

In / Spectre – 20 – Paranormal Succession

Kotoko’s next case is brought to her by her parents, and the client is Otonashi Goichi, the president of a successful international hotel and hospitality chain. He ascended due to the murder by stabbing of his wife Sumi, who was detrimentally controlling the lives of their three children and about to drive the company off a fiscal cliff. The timing of her death was no accident; Goichi comes right out and informs Kotoko that he is the culprit. Kotoko’s reaction is classic Kotoko: cheerfully sardonic!

While Goichi didn’t wield the blade that killed Sumi, it was Goichi, who had cloistered himself in a mountain villa, who turned to the supernatural to solve his company and childrens’ problems. Specifically, a fox ayakashi known as a yoko came before him and offered to kill Sumi for him if he agreed to acquire and develop the next mountain over, where the yoko’s rivals lived. Within ten days, Sumi was slain by an unknown assailant, and Goichi was president.

He held up his end of the bargain, and not only did he back the company off a cliff, he shored up its finances to ensure long-term survival and success. Similarly, with the influence of their controlling mother removed, Goichi’s two sons and daughter could pursue their own life goals. His first son became a successful chef; his daughter married the man she loved (who was also successful); and his younger son became the heir apparent to the company.

Goichi waited for the consequences for turning to supernatural means to kill his wife to arrive, but the never came until recently, when he has been diagnosed with cancer and given about a year to live. Before he dies, he wants his children to know—and believe—that he was the one responsible for their mother’s death, and that what he did isn’t something that should be repeated lest they invite the wrath of the universe upon them. That’s where Kotoko comes in.

After meeting with the mountain yoko Fubuki, captured by his rivals, Kotoko works out a deal: he’ll tell her everything there is to know about his arrangement with Goichi, and she’ll use her stature in to ensure the severity of his punishment for his crimes is lessoned. From there, Goichi gave Kotoko free rein to create whatever plausible lie or web of lies is necessary to get his kids on board with the idea that he killed their mom.

After Kotoko completes her preliminary investigations, she brings Kurou up to speed, and Kurou is characteristically reluctant to be roped into this, even if he knows full well that’s what Kotoko is going to do. Over several rounds of a crane game to win a pack of naughty pens packed with fantastically adorable reactions, Kotoko lays out the basics of the plan.

It’s the classic In/Spectre move of spicing up what is otherwise a scene of exposition by having Kotoko/Kurou engage in something interesting. There’s a fair amount of suspense in whether they’ll nab the pens or not, and when they finally do, it’s because Kotoko is mad that Kurou tells her there’s nothing sexy about her…not even her paisley underwear. Rude!

When Goichi’s second son Susumu, the daughter of his first son Rion, and the husband of his daughter, Koya, are invited to a meeting with Goichi, Kotoko, and Kurou, they are tasked with coming up with their own explanations for how Goichi killed Sumi.

Kotoko, assisted by Kurou, will judge their explanations, give them a chance to amend them over the two-day-period, and will be the one who decides who has the best one based on truth and order. The winner will receive precedence in Goichi’s inheritance, so there is no small incentive for them to take this seriously.

While largely a table-setting episode, the GF/BF interactions between Kotoko and Kurou and the supernatural Succession-esque tale of corporate intrigue make it a table for a meal I’m looking forward to tucking into, especially once we get to know the three contestants.

In / Spectre – 16 – Honeymoon Period

Kotoko tells Masayuki and Yuki-onna that she knows precisely who the culprit is, and furthermore, that the police aren’t really seriously suspecting him at the moment, which explains why they haven’t been hounding him of late.

The reason? Evidence indicates that the victim Mahiru didn’t have any of her effects taken, and there’s every indication that she and the murderer had time to converse. In that time, she would have surely warned the murderer about the formal accusation she’d written up beforehand.

After all, Mahiru wasn’t trying to be killed, and would do everything she could to avoid that outcome. And if Masayuki killed Mahiru, he would have taken steps to obscure her identity and/or the location of her body. And the cops already all but ruled Masayuki out as a serious suspect after he was wishy-washy about his alibi, and unprepared to defend himself from the facts they’d collected thus far.

As for why it looked like Mahiru was trying to write Masayuki’s name on her hand? That was written by the true murderer after killing her. Before Kotoko says the name of the murder—Iizuka Nagisa—the name already pops up in Masayuki’s name as the only possible culprit.

Iizuka was the only one who sided with him when he was forced out of his company. She loved him, and murdered Mahiru and framed Masayuki so that he’d have no choice but to go to her for support. Sure enough, as Kotoko discuss this, Iizuka calls Masayuki, but he doesn’t answer.

Kotoko reveals that she didn’t deduce this from the mere facts of the case as they stand, but from the eyewitness ghosts who were at the scene of the crime when it occurred. They identified a woman that matched Iizuka’s description. If that’s “cheating”, Masayuki can hardly complain, as the information Kotoko gathered from the ghosts categorically clears his name.

With Masayuki’s name sure to be cleared and only a matter of time before Mahiru is arrested, Kotoko gives him and Yuki-onna her blessing—as long as they use protection! Kurou shows up shortly thereafter, terrifying Yuki-onna (as he tends to do). Kotoko then tells Masayuki and Yuki-onna to get lost and bone already, since they’re now in “the optimal mood.” Yuki-onna  scoops Masayuki up and flies them back home.

While riding a flying yokai home, Kotoko and Kurou talk about the case a bit more. Kotoko explains further how Mahiru had overplayed her hand. She wanted a suspected Masayuki in the palm of her hand, but ultimately didn’t go any further lest the consequences of framing him cause him distress. The two conclude that Masayuki has and may well continue to have horrible luck with women.

Even Yuki-onna, who has been good to and for him thus far, is still a thoroughly volatile yokai who could one day freeze him to death for a slight real or imagined. Kurou likens Masayuki’s plight with his own, not just where his ex and Rikka are concerned but with Kotoko. Kotoko is not amused by this remark!

In / Spectre – 15 – So Generous, It’s Creepy

This episode was an emotional roller coaster! It begins by rewinding from Yuki-onna’s request to Kotoko to the police detectives questioning Masayuki. Their reasons for suspecting him of murdering his ex-wife are numerous: Mahiru left a note accusing him should she die suspiciously; the beginning of his name scrawled on her hand; and camera footage of Masayuki with a woman that looks just like her.

The police have reasonable cause to suspect, but not arrest Masayuki, and his failure to definitively state he had no alibi doesn’t help his case. But what choice does he have? He can’t tell the police he was having tempura and drinks with a yuki-onna on the night of Mahiru’s murder. Why, they’d think he was nuts…even though it’s the truth! Days pass and the police don’t bother Masayuki again, but it’s still looknig bad.

Then Yuki-onna, who was present in rabbit form for the entire talk with the police, asks him if she looks like his ex-wife, and he admits that she does, so it was Yuki-onna in the camera photo. Hers was the face of the one person in his life who didn’t betray him, but he admits he felt bad for marrying for whom he was otherwise unsuited.

Masayuki decides he’ll head out and try to find the real culprit, but Yuki-onna tells him to wait, and when he keeps going with a full head of steam,. she freezes him in his tracks—literally! 

Yuki-onna correctly diagnoses this as Masayuki being impatient and restless and wanting to prove his innocence at any cost, but with no leads and nothing to go on, the best move is to stay put, eat some food, get some rest. Then she remembers that her Ladyship, the Goddess of Wisdom, is just the person to solve this case, so she reaches out to her.

Yuki-onna flies Masayuki deep into the mountains to a cave where Kotoko is waiting. Rather than her going right into the particulars of the case, Masayuki gets a better taste of who Kotoko is, namely someone still quintessentially human despite her status as a goddess to supernatural beings near and far. That’s because Kotoko is upset that Kurou blew her off and she had to get cold pork cutlet from the local konbini.

I was so happy to see my favorite goddess of wisdom meeting my new favorite human-yokai couple, about to dish out the solution to their problems. But that’s where the roller coaster starts hurtling down to the earth, as Kotoko points out that not only does Yuki-onna’s wishy-washy sense of human time make her a poor alibi, but Masayuki might have capitalized on that poor sense to manipulate her into trusting him implicitly.

With Yuki-onna’s unwavering trust, Masayuki could kill his ex-wife one night, have tempura with Yuki-onna, and say they were doing the latter on the night of the murder, thus making him look innocent in her eyes and persecuted by the police. He could even convince her to kill the business partners who betrayed him.

Kotoko is so precise (as always) in laying out this theory that it even had me questioning if Masayuki really did have such a diabolical plot in motion, and had pulled the wool over Yuki-onna’s eyes with food, drink, and companionship. But you know who didn’t suspect Masayuki, even after hearing all this? Yuki-onna herself. She prostrates herself, says Masayuki has a truly kind heart, and demands that her Ladyship reconsider her stance.

Kotoko responds to Yuki-onna’s display by making it clear she’s all too aware that Masayuki isn’t the culprit, and that everything she uttered about otherwise was a lie. Among the reasons she trusts Masayuki? He’s been refusing Yuki-onna’s sexual advances! If he’d wanted to gain her trust quickly, he’d have swept her off her feet.

While Kotoko’s theory of Masayuki being a yokai-manipulating criminal mastermind was harsh and at times cruel, it was still crucial for her to say what she said, so she could enlighten Masayuki to the fact that Yuki-onna trusted him so much, she was even willing to defy her goddess for his sake.

By underscoring the courage Yuki-onna demonstrated for him, Kotoko hopes Masayuki will make the effort to regain some of his own courage. Even if this criminal investigation is all tied up with a neat bow and he gets off scot-free (as he should), Kotoko suspects that won’t be the end of Masayuki’s troubles.

A new start is in order. Masayuki owns up to being terrified of interacting with people—that lack of interaction is why he doesn’t have a human alibi—and tenderly gathers Yuki-onna’s cold white hand into his to thank her for going to bat for him. As for the true culprit of his ex-wife’s murder? Naturally, Kotoko already knows that too!

Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury – 12 – School’s Out for Winter

As the Dawn of Fold attack continues, the Dads are on the move. Vim Jeturk decides to pilot his Sol Dilanza rather than be Shaddiq’s puppet any longer. Delling finds Miorine, but true-to-character, his first words aren’t “Thank God you’re alright” but “What are you wearing?” since she’s not in an evac suit.

Poor Suletta is still shut off from the rest of the plant by the emergency bulkheads, but Sophie spots her, and shoots around her area to try to goad her into running off to the Aerial. When Dominicus tries to subdue her with Antidote, Sophie goes up to Permet Level Four … nearly killing herself in the process.

Like the bloody epilogue that got Witch from Mercury off to such a stirring start, this season one finale really accentuates the essential frailty of human beings. Delling is seriously wounded by a piece of errant shrapnel, while using his body to shield his daughter. For all his abuse and neglect, when the chips were down, he chose her over everything else.

When Norea spots GUND-Arm’s spaceship—with Earth House still on board—she takes aim and prepares to destroy it as part of the mission to keep anyone from escaping. She only stays her hand when Nika flashes the correct code with a signal light. Nika saves everyone on that ship, including herself, but Martin sees her signaling to the enemy. The gig is up.

When Guel overhears that a Gundam from Asticassia is on Plant Quetta, he pilots a mobile suit and heads out, determined to move forward “after Suletta”. But in the heat of his first real space battle, he almost loses it. He’s able to do what is necessary to survive—i.e. kill someone—but the one he ends up killing is his own father, Vim.

Suletta manages to crawl her way through the plant and make it to Hangar 78 where Aerial is—just as Lady Prospera knew she would. Mercury gets there first, and is about to be discovered by Dawn when Prospera arrives and kills them all. Mercury is shocked, but her mother lays out the calculus. All she did was move forward and gain two by killing others to save her.

There’s a beautiful, heartbreaking shot of Prospera and Suletta on opposite sides of a doorway, splattered blood between them. It can’t be any clearer: this is where moving forward means you can’t go back. Suletta, so easily manipulated by her mother and their credo, steps onto that blood and crosses the threshold.

When Sophie arrives to play, Suletta is already in Aerial’s cockpit and deflects her attacks with her Bits, then fires up her rockets and shoves Sophie the hell out of the hangar, scolding her for behaving in such a crass manner. That said, it’s my assumption Sophie may never have had a mother to scold her.

Suletta doesn’t know it, but as she scuffles with Sophie and then Norea, she’s buying time for the authorities to arrive with reinforcements. Once an entire patrol fleet enters the area, Naji gives the signal to retreat. While she complains, even Sophie doesn’t disobey, and hopes to see her “Big Sister” again. I’m sure she will.

Shaddiq gets word that the Dawn’s operation failed, and he doesn’t really react, wearing the same serene smile as usual. While I’m sure he’s been careful in trying to keep distance between himself and Earthian terrorists, the fact he doesn’t have Aerial and Delling isn’t confirmed dead will surely come back on him in some manner.

But there’s is nothing, and I mean absolutely nothing more shocking and upsetting than the final scene of the season, in which Miorine is cornered by one straggling member of Dawn while pushing her injured father on a makeshift gurney. Before he can kill Delling, Suletta blasts through the bulkhead and smashes him with Aerial’s hand, turning him into a fine paste of blood and guts just inches from where Miorine stands.

Suletta hops out of the cockpit with her usual chipper demeanor, and even jokes about being such a klutz when she slips on the blood and guts. She reaches out her hand—which again, is covered in blood and guts of a man she just killed—to her bride. Miorine is quite rightly absolutely aghast and terrified at the Suletta before her. “How can you smile right now,” she asks, before declaring her groom a “murderer”.

All season Witch from Mercury had been lulling us into a false sense of security by showing us duel after bloodless duel at space high school. Well, graduation has come early for Guel, Nika, Miorine, and Suletta, in a cruel blast of twisted metal and a spray of blood. Nothing will be the same going forward for any of them. In other words, it’s Gundam being Gundam.

To be fair to Suletta, I’m not sure what else she could have done in that moment when it was either the shooter or Miorine. But now Suletta’s innocence is gone forever, Miorine will never look at her the same way again, and she isn’t even aware. For all she gained by following her mother’s motto to the letter, we’ve yet to see what she’ll lose. That will be revealed in season two this coming Spring.

The Eminence in Shadow – 10 – Advent of Chaos

Eminence in Shadow? More like boxtease in shadow. Left and right girls are trying to get Cid to notice them or hang out with him, but he ain’t interested. He’s too lost in the pretend game he thinks he’s playing in this world. And the next stage of that game calls for a trip to the Sacred Lands and their capital, Lindwurm.

So Epsilon can augment her figure with slime, and Beta can write all the aspirational doujinshi she likes, and the two can compare their busts at Shadow Garden HQ, but Cid/Shadow could not care less. They’re not women to him so much as valued, loyal underlings.

That certainly extends to his non-Shadow Garden women in his life as well. Claire clearly wanted to have a fun summer day with her brother, but he hit from her. Alexia, who is also headed to Lindwurm, stops by Gamma’s modern department store and is introduced to thongs, and subjects her big sis a wall slam to prove her commitment to wearing one to win him back.

Then there’s Rose, who we learn found Cid alive and well in a flashback to the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attack. Since he gave her her life, she’s decided to return his feelings and give him her heart. He runs into her at the train station and from that point on she’s constantly clinging to him. Cid doesn’t want thongs or drill tails. He just wants some space and some intrigue!

Just as he hid from Claire, he hides from Rose’s attempt to sleep with him (he believes she’s trying to convert him to her religion) and two days later they arrive in Lindwurm. There, they have a sightseeing date, where he learns from Rose that the demon Diabolos lost his left arm to the Great Hero Olivier in the Sanctuary, a place just outside the capital.

He also learns that Rose is a huge fan of Natsume-senpai, a famous and popular author. One glance at Natsume’s novels, and Cid knows it’s someone blatantly plagiarizing works from his world (including Eminence in Shadow—nice fourth wall break, that). He’s disappointed to learn the author is Beta, with whom he’d shared those stories in hope she’d be inspired to, ya know, right something original.

A few episodes ago we saw how playful and flirty Alpha could be (and how utterly unaffected Cid was), but here she’s all business, investigating the gruesome assassination of Archbishop Drake. Shadow Garden is already well into the case when their leader arrives.

He ends up intercepting the assassin in an alley and parries his sword strike with a little wooden ice cream spoon (Cid seems to be channeling Riddick here). Then the assassin is swiftly dispatched by Epsilon the Accurate. She and Shadow exchange a few words, Epsilon’s fake boobs bouncing emphatically the whole time. But Cid has no time for boobs…there’s adventure afoot!

The Eminence in Shadow – 09 – Doing What They Must

It doesn’t take long for Sherry to tune the control unit, and she opens a hidden passage in a bookshelf to use the secret tunnels to get to where the artifact is so she can shut it down. She’s doing all of this for her father Ruslan, who took her in when her mother was brutally murdered.

She thanks Cid for all his help, and they go their separate ways. Once she reaches the balcony of the auditorium she finds out how bad things have gotten: the invaders are now simply picking off students for sport from above. Sherry wastes no time deactivating the anti-magic field, and when she does, Rose is ready.

Within seconds of getting her magic back, she slices the nearest invader to ribbons with a flourish of her drill-like ojou ringlets, and encourages everyone else to rise up and attack their captors; after all, they outnumber them. She tries to reach their armored boss man, whom even she isn’t sure she can defeat, but is soon surrounded and running low on magic.

Still, she fights on, confident others will fight if she dies, and eager to live up to the love Cid felt for her that led him to die for her. Things look dire until Shadow himself crashes through the ceiling and dispatches everyone around her. He’s not alone: his army of Shadows are with him, and mop up the invaders.

But the boss slips away, then hikes up the pressure of the oil lamps school-wide, causing an massive inferno. While I don’t hear a single cough from the ensuing smoke and flames, nor does anyone seem to be getting burnt by said flames … eh, whatever, maybe they’re special isekai flames.

The invader boss proceeds to start burning everything in Ruslan’s office, but Cid is there waiting for him, and knows who the boss is: Ruslan himself. Once he’d reached the absolute highest summit of swordsmanship, he became ill, and sought out a radical cure.

That’s how he ended up meeting Sherry’s mother. When she warned against using the artifact, Ruslan murdered her in a elaborate, grisly way, and while Sherry was present for that, it’s been established that she’s not very observant, and so never knew her adoptive father killed her mother.

Ruslan never gets into why he took the academy hostage, or why he set the academy on fire, but never mind, now that Cid’s there he’s not going to accomplish anything else. There’s a fun little fakeout when Cid lets Ruslan slash him right out the office window to his apparent death, only to reappear Batman-style in his Shadow form.

Ruslan fuses with the artifact in order to augment his power—as one does—but as you’d suspect, fighting him is still child’s play to Mr. Atomic, who doesn’t really have to break a sweat parrying his opponents’ lightning-fast fusillade of attacks.

When Cid has had enough, he ends Ruslan’s life in the exact same grisly way he ended Sherry’s mom’s … and just like that traumatic event, Sherry arrives just in time to witness a parent’s demise. Shadow departs as she screams out in anguish, not having the heart to tell her who Ruslan is and why he deserved this end. Knowing how much her dad meant to her, she most likely wouldn’t have believed him anyway.

While Ruslan was as two-dimensionally eeeevil as villains come (why else hire Oostsuka Houchuu to voice him?), he was never anything but a loving, supportive father to Sherry, and I was devastated watching her experience a repeat of her mother’s death. No one should have to face that. And now she’s an orphan again.

At the same time, I don’t blame Cid, because he did what he had to do. Even though Ruslan promised him that he arranged things so the real Shadow Garden would be framed for this entire terrorist attack, he shrugs that off. He never claimed he and his garden were walking the path of righteousness, but nor do they walk the path of evil.

Instead, they walk their own path. This comes as news to Alpha, who thought they were being righteous, but accepts Cid’s interpretation without hesitation, as does the rest of the organization. If Shadow is now the number one most hated and wanted fugitive in the kingdom, so be it—they’ll continue to do what they must.

As for poor Sherry, she and Cid share a muted farewell scene where she regrets not getting to know him better before heading abroad to a prestigious research institute. Before they part, perhaps forever, Cid asks her what she thinks she needs to do. A kaleidoscope of emotions fall over Sherry’s face as she’s momentarily unable to hide her emotions with a sad smile.

But she won’t tell Cid; it’s a secret. Does she, unlike so many others, know Cid and Shadow are the same person, and thus Cid is the one who killed her father? If that’s the case, is she going abroad in order to plan her revenge against him, or simply to start the next phase of her life as a researcher? It’s pretty ambiguous, and I like that.

Akiba Maid War – 01 (First Impressions) – Welcome Home, Master

We begin in Akihabara 1985, with a Mercedes Großer pulling up to a cafe. A maid gets out, opens the back door and a second, older maid gets out. A third maid approaches this older maid, and after a moment or two of acting nervous, she pulls out a gun and empties a clip into the older maid before fleeing. The older maid’s kohai shoots a look that promises vengeance.

Fourteen years later, in 1999, Wahira Nagomi has arrived in Akiba and is excited to start living her lifelong dream of being a cute café maid. When she arrives at the Oinky Doink Cafe just before opening, she’s initially greeted cheerfully like a customer, but when Yumechi learns she’s the new girl, the act drops immediately. No matter; Nagomi is just happy to be here.

Turns out she’s one of two new girls, the other being Mannen Ranko, who at 35 years old is clearly the maid with revenge in her eyes in the flashback. She and Nagomi join a team composed of the affable Tenchou, the two-faced Yumechi, and the ganguro Shiipon. There’s also a panda, despite the maid being pig-themed.

The rookies don’t get off to the strongest start. Ranko has all the lines and moves down, but delivers them in an uninspiring deadpan. Nagomi goes too far in the other direction, her ultra-enthusiasm and wordplay only overwhelming one of her masters. She’s also on the clumsy side, squirting omurice ketchup and drinks all over the place.

After closing, a suspicious-looking man arrives who treats Tenchou like someone who owes his bosses a lot of cash (which she does). As a compromise, Tenchou asks Nagomi to go on a little errand to a maid cafe owned by their parent company’s competitor. When Ranko offers to accompany her, I immediately felt better.

That opening scene in 1985 was ever in the back of my mind as the standard maid café stuff unfolded throughout the day, and I knew that Nagomi at least was totally unaware of the other side of Akiba café maiding. Ranko, on the other hand, knows the score. After ramen on Tenchou’s dime, Ranko gets a “doggy bag” and then leads the way to the space bunny-themed Wuv-Wuv Moonbeam.

After gaining access, they walk in on what is either an initiation of a new employee or a punishment for poor service: a girl being forced to cut off one of her pigtails. Their leader approaches Nagomi, immediately intimidating her. Nagomi presents her with the letter, which the lead bunny maid reads, then asks another maid to read it out loud. It’s an insult and a provocation.

After Nagomi gets smacked and slapped around a little, Ranko shoots through the paper bag from the ramen shop, putting a bullet right in the middle of the lead maid’s forehead. One, two, three blood fountains spurt out, landing conveniently on the paper apron a shocked Nagomi forgot to remove. From here…things get a little nutso.

The Wuv-Wuv maids, who suddenly number in the dozens are all mowed down and oblierated in a bloody ballet out in the streets of Akiba. The comically over-the-top bloodshed takes place while Yumechi is performing a J-pop concert for some rapt masters.

As someone who has never witnessed such violence, never mind committed it herself, Nogami is understandably no longer enthusiastic about being a maid in Akiba, and would just like to go home now if that’s all right, thanks!

When she and Ranko return to the Oinky-Doink,  Tenchou, Shiioin and Yumechi are amazed they’re still in one piece (Tenchou was already writing up want ads for new maids right after they left). Nagomi probably wants to scream after the horrifying sights she witnessed, but remains eerily calm and neutral, no doubt still numb from the experience.

In the room that’s been set up for her new live-in job, Nogami changes and then quickly packs up to get out of here while she’s still breathing, but that’s when she gets another surprise: Ranko is not only her new co-worker, but her roommate as well. She can’t go home. She already is home.

Will Nogami be able to maintain her sanity and innocence in this kooky scenario, or will her mature senpai train her to become as deadly as she is cute? I have no idea, but I can’t help but salute this show’s audacity and commitment to its bit, and will definitely keep watching to see where this goes!

DanMachi IV – 08 – Elfhunt

Bell joins Bors’ party as they descend to the 27th floor, and proves his Level 4 mettle by making quick work of both a lead merman and laser-shooting foes. He learns that some of the party members actually understand why Ryuu is going after those who caused the destruction of the rest of her familia…but the 80 million in bounty is far more pressing to all of them.

When he gets a chance, Bell breaks from the party to find the source of the singing everyone hears. He knows it’s Marie, who is extremely spooked when he encounters her. Something is down here that shouldn’t be, and it’s powerful enough to make huge holes in the Dungeon walls that don’t quickly heal.

Marie also helps lead Bell to Ryuu’s location, and their encounter is pretty cut-and-dried: Ryuu doesn’t want someone like Bell, a gentle soul from a gentler part of her life, to be anywhere near this place. Bell wants her side of the story but she has no time for him, and flies off.

Meanwhile on the 25th floor the rest of Bell’s party waits, which Cassie believes is the key to keeping everyone alive. That said, Turk, the werewolf who pinned the Rivira murder on Ryuu, insists on searching the floor for Ryuu. Some of the hunting party stay put per Bors’ orders, but Bell’s party decides to follow Turk’s, if only to keep an eye on him, as Bell asked.

Bell reunites with Bors’ party just as they end up afoul of Ryuu, who is targeting the last survivor of the Familia that contributed to the destruction of hers. Letting him survive simply isn’t an option to her. She makes quick work neutralizing everyone who comes after her, but Ryuu keeps up the chase, until it’s just him, Ryuu, and her prey.

For the first time, Ryuu raises her wooden sword, warning Bell that she won’t hesitate to cut him—even him—down to get to her target. Bell, who did not come to capture Ryuu or collect a bounty, simply wants everyone to get along and be happy. But it would seem he’s out of his element here. How can he hope to quell Ryuu’s murderous rage when he’s never experienced the trauma of losing his entire Familia?

Can he say he’d remain the kind-hearted live-and-let-live Bell Cranel if that fate befell him, as it does in Cassandra’s premonition? But with that giant evil snake slithering around, it’s looking more and more like Ryuu isn’t the cause of that particular “banquet of tragedy.”

DanMachi IV – 07 – Cassandra Tries to Explain It All

Cassandra has another horrible premonition of doom: all the members of their party dead, Bell struggling, and Ryuu Lion looming like an angel of death. She awakes (partially nude, which is neither here nor there) to Daphne announcing that an adventurer has been murdered.

A witness of uncertain trustworthiness claims the Gale Wind Ryuu Lion did the deed. That’s enough for Bors to arrange a posse to hunt her down and bring her to justice.

Before Bell can say too much about his past dealings with Ryuu, Aisha escorts him somewhere where they and the rest of his party can talk in private. They agree to join the party with the purpose of getting to Ryuu first and getting to the bottom of things before needless blood is spilled.

Cassandra, having seen what happens when the party goes back down into the lower floors, doesn’t like this course of action one bit, but her method of trying to dissuade the rest of the party—simply telling them to stay behind—doesn’t fly. Even if he believes Cassandra, Bell trusts Ryuu and wants to help her. When Cassandra collapses from frustration, Daphne offers to stay behind with her.

Cassie says she’s coming with them after all, and resolves to find a way to save everyone on the way. Lili gets a letter to Hestia explaining the situation, and we learn from Miach that Cassandra indeed has an extraordinary gift of foresight. The hunting party is large and unwieldy, but when a herd of mammoths attacks, they’re dealt with rather swiftly.

As the party heads deeper into the Dungeon, Cassandra takes Welf aside and asks him a favor. We catch a glimpse of Ryuu running at full speed in the vicinity of the Great Falls with hate in her eyes. Then everyone starts feeling tremors that seem to be coming from the 27th floor, where Cassandra’s awful premonition took place.

Clearly recalling Aisha dying in that dream, she manages to keep her from joining the other adventurers down there, though Cassandra’s manner of convincing her involves exaggerating the difficulty inherent in carrying Haruhime. Instead, Bell goes down below, which is acceptable to Cassandra as he didn’t die in her dream.

That said, he did look very much the worse for wear, and all the talk of Ryuu being a superior Level 4 means he likely won’t have an easy go of it down there. Seeing things that even the gods don’t know will happen is clearly a terrible burden for Cassandra, not least because most people don’t want to believe their fates are predetermined.

Here’s hoping whatever she saw is only one possible dream, and that the steps she’s taken will help ensure a better outcome. Of course, a lot will depend on what Ryuu’s whole deal is.

Engage Kiss – 08 – The [REDACTED] is Already Dead

Engage Kiss does not care one single whit about your tonal or genre whiplash. After last week’s poisonous members and tentacle mech suits, we get what amounts to a hard-boiled detective procedural, and the results are…mixed.

While I appreciated the episode’s dedication to showing its work, that work is rarely glamorous. The monotony of what amounts to scene after scene of exposition as Detective Mikami, Miles, and Shuu try to piece things together is at least punctuated by the usual Kisara-Ayano sniping.

Last week’s MVP Sharon is tied to a chair behind bars this week, unable to unleash her full horny/trashy/sacred/profane shtick, but still wields power as someone who remembers crucial information Shuu forgot thanks to Kisara.

It’s pretty significant that Shuu thought Kisara would let him keep certain important memories, but Sharon says that it doesn’t work that way and he’s actually lost a lot more than he knows, and she’s not lying just for spite. All she offers “for free” about the identity of the big bad is an arsonist analogy.

Before Shuu can interpret the scant info Sharon gave him, Mikami has a eureka moment that seems primed to blow this case wide open…just as the trench-coated “Informant X” who’s been feeding Shuu shows up.

Mikami leaves a voicemail for Shuu, and during the recording he is confronted by someone and a gunshot rings out. By the time Shuu and Kisara arrive in the station lot, Mikami is dead, and Informant X tries to slink away. Shuu and Kisara show what a good pair they make by cornering and unmasking the guy…who turns out to be Mikhail.

I gotta say, that’s a pretty cheeky revelation—to dangle this oji-san like high school character who feels like he’s from another anime as the delusional third child in the family pecking order, only to reveal that he’s the mysterious General Director of Bayron City Police, from whom everyone gets their orders.

With his cover blown, Mikhail takes Shuu and Kisara down to his secret surveillance information center deep under the city hall, where he has over three million cameras going 24/7/365, (even on his sisters while they shower and sleep, an observation Shuu is quick to make and condemn).

The other fake-out in play is that Mikhail didn’t murder Mikami, and the camera footage proves it. The person who did is the one for whom Mikhail is merely a puppet, the second human agent who is coordinating the creation and destruction of demonically possessed.

Mikhail’s sudden major player turn takes a backseat to the emotional fallout from Mikami’s sudden murder, and it’s a good reminder of how good the show can be at occasionally taking the goofy/horny elements down a notch and letting these people be humans.

This culminates in Mikami’s funeral, always a solemn affair, followed by Shuu being picked up by his foster father and old pal Miles, who can’t believe Mikami is gone. When Miles talks about Mikami as the rare natural police who was also softhearted and guillible, Shuu drops the hammer: he knows Miles murdered Mikami.

Sure enough, a tattoo on Miles’ arm glows. While I’m hardly enthused by the only brother in the cast being the big bad, his villainous turn isn’t altogether unearned. Like us, Shuu’s had a huge blind spot for the guy, in his case due to the events and conversations he’s forgotten because his contract with Kisara takes away much more than he thought.

Shuu’s been trying to piece together a mystery when his own memory has been crumbling behind him in real time. Now he’s lost a true ally in Mikami and another main ally has turned out to be false. It’s safe to say things are going to get worse before they get better for Shuu.