DanMachi IV – 20 – Her Justice

A week of absolutely sterling anime continues with this, the long-awaited (and feared) definitive depiction of the demise of Astrea Familia and Ryuu’s subsequent fall from grace. Jura and Rudra Familia, working under Evilus, did indeed set a trap for Astrea, but it didn’t work. However, detonating all of those bombs awakened the Juggernaut, which turned even a dream team like Astrea into mincemeat with sickening speed and efficiency.

It’s a tough, horrific watch, as it should be. And even if we haven’t spent nearly as much time with the various members of Astrea, all I needed to do was imagine if it were members of Hestia instead dropping one by one to understand the weight being placed on Ryuu by Alise to “live enough for everyone”. Alise trusts Ryuu to always “do the right thing”. Alise, Kaguya, and Lyra die, but they go out fighting in a literal blaze of glory.

The weight proves too much for Ryuu, and she is soon consumed with anger and hatred. She leaves the goddess Astrea (though is able to keep her blessing) and transforms into an angel of death, tearing through every Rudra Familia and Evilus stronghold, hideout and hovel and leaving no one alive in her path, like a merciless calamitous gale wind.

Once her twisted form of justice is finally complete when she finds, corners, and stabs the shit out of Jura (whom she only learns much later survived), Ryuu feels like an empty husk, hollowed out by all the hatred and murder. But when she collapses, it happens to be near the tavern where one Syr Flover works, and that’s all that’s needed to know that the gods aren’t done with Ryuu quite yet.

She’d go on to not only work with Syr and the other ladies at the tavern, but to swoop in and save the lives of Bell, Hestia, Welf, Lili, and everyone else, more times than Bell can count. She may have thought she was simply continuing her quest of vengeance, but to Bell, it meant she was his hero, plain and simple. He came back for her at the Coliseum because it’s what she’d do for him, and he won’t leave her behind because his justice is making it home alive with her.

Bell admits he didn’t know the “old Ryuu”, and that she may have made many a mistake in her past. All that matters to him is how many times he and his Familia would be dust without her. Without Ryuu even realizing it, the justice of her Familia lived on, and continues to live on.

When a Barbarian busts through the wall and Bell looks like he’s knocked out and about to be eaten, Ryuu desperately cries out his name, only for him to kill the monster and reveal he was playing possum, causing her to blush profusely.

The two eventually make it to a spring beneath the Coliseum, and they might just be the first two adventurers to make it there. When Bell collapses from exhaustion into the water, Ryuu gets in with him, cradles him, and heals him. Let those waters cleanse Ryuu of the hate, grief, regret and anguish she allowed to define her for so long, as well as the notion that she doesn’t deserve to live, or to love.

What happened to Astrea Familia was a abject tragedy. But it wasn’t her fault, and it was a blessing that she survived, because it meant she was alive to rescue Bell & Co. all those times. Now that they finally have a place to rest and heal, and the Xenos contingent aren’t far above them, it’s looking like both Bell and Ryuu are going to make it out of this. They won’t be the same  people they were when they first fell down there…but that’s not a bad thing.

Saving 80,000 Gold in Another World – 08 – The Messenger of Lightning

Thanks to word of mouth from the three maids, shampoo sales are booming for Mitsuha. One day a gorgeous doll-like girl aristocratic air makes a large purchase of shampoo, plushies, and other products. She thanks Mitsuha and promises to return, but Mitsuha is concerned such a well-to-do young lady has no security detail.

Sure enough, Mitsuha spots a suspicious-looking man following the girl, then grabbing her and forcing her into an alley with three others. Mitsuha puts and end to their human trafficking plot by trying out a nickname “Messenger of Lightning” and demonstrating the power of a pistol-style stun gun…and just plain-ol’ gun gun. The baddies try to flee, but are surrounded by guards in full plate armor: royal guards.

The cutie isn’t just an aristocrat, she’s the Royal Princess Sabine, and suddenly Mitsuha has the gratitude of the entire royal family. She uses this opportunity to present both the king and his chancellor Sahr with reading glasses, which are far better than the crude lenses they’ve had to use since their vision became impaired. Mitsuha assures the king she can procure whatever he wants…except women, of course.

As the king has Sahr look more into Mitsuha’s whole deal, a third party visits Mitsuha’s store: President Nelson Adler of the Adler Trading Company. Immediately condescending to Mitsuha and throwing his weight around, he not only offers to take the store off her hands, but to take her and Sabine in, with some uncomfortable subtext to that offer.

Mitsuha asks him to return the next day, and has Sabine deliver an invite to Sahr, her new “business partner”. Sahr arrives, Mitsuha explains the hostile takeover and kidnapping attempts by Adler, and Sahr throws the book at him, warning him that any interference in Mitsuha’s shop, and Adler will be the one personally punished.

So now Mitsuha has the double-edged sword of a legit royal warrant and the fast friendship of a very cute but very spoiled princess in Sabine, who has quickly become addicted to Japanese DVDs Mitsuha has to live-dub in the isekai language. All she needs now is an actual sign for her shop—a breathtaking oversight on her part to this point!

In / Spectre – 14 – Youkai Alibi

In/Spectre can really spin a good yarn. This week we meet Muroi Masayuki, who is pushed off a mountain by his best friend. As he lays contemplating his imminent death, a spunky yuki-onna (Yuuki Aoi) pays him a visit. She’s not there to kill him, though she does think long and hard about it when he knocks her looks!

Yuki-onna subverts Masayuki’s idea of her kind by building an conjuring an igloo around him so he’ll last the night, then flying him down the mountain in a princess carry, all for half of the cash he’s carrying. Once back in town, he’s able to walk in on his former friend lying about what happened and finger him for attempted murder.

Eleven years pass, and Masayuki moves back to the town by the mountain where he met the Yuki-onna. As luck would have it, he doesn’t need to search far for her, as she’s enjoying soft serve in human form. When he tells her about the time he met a yuki-onna she’s initially furious he broke his vow of silence, but he’s sure she’s the same person, so he technically isn’t.

Masayuki is coming off a divorce from a woman who cheated on him and tried to kill him, as well as the hostile takeover of his company by another former friend. Understandably distrustful of future human interactions, he sought her out. Yuki-onna is eminently interested in human food and drink (and cars!), so he agrees to buy her booze and cook for her at his bachelor pad.

An adorable, mutually beneficial friendship ensues. The connection to the In/Spectre we know finally comes when Yuki-onna speaks glowingly about her lady and Goddess of Wisdom, Kotoko. Yuki-onna cleared befriending Masayuki with Kotoko, and even got approval for sexual relations with him should things go that way (as long as they use protection!)

The good vibes suddenly sour when detectives come to Masayuki’s door to inform him that his ex-wife has been murdered, but that’s where Kotoko comes in. Yuki-onna reports that she knows for a fact Masayuki wasn’t the culprit because she was with him at the time of the murder. The problem is she can’t go to the cops and Masayuki can’t say the source of his alibi is a yokai.

It looks to be a fascinating case, and one that has a lot more resonance now that I’ve come to know and become quite fond both Yuki-onna and Masayuki. They make a surpassingly cute and charming couple whose playful banter and cozy chemistry rivals Kotoko and Kurou, and if anyone can get this out of this legal dilemma, it’s the Goddess of Wisdom.

Giant Beasts of Ars – 02 – Covenant of Convenience

With no time to waste, the Paladin Jirou performs the Covenant Ritual that allows him to become a vessel for the Cleric Kuumi’s godlike power. He wields that power in the form of an expandable spear, which he plunges into the eye of the beast to kill it, saving the town from devastation. After the battle, Kuumi returns to her normal state, and Jirou passes out.

The next morning the Imperial commander inspects the pier where Kuumi accidentally dusted some soldiers with her miasma. He deems the prototype successful and orders his underlings to leave no stone unturned in their search for her (or as he calls her, “it”). Clearly, this isn’t someone in whose clutches you want Kumi to be.

Jirou comes to inside Myaa’s airship, waking up from a dream from the past when his former cleric, whom he loved, died in battle. When he overhears Myaa talking about marriage to Kuumi, he makes it clear he only formed a covenant with her because there was no other choice in the matter. But as it was Kuumi’s first time, she’s rightfully confused.

When Kuumi won’t elaborate on why the Empire is after her, Jirou peaces out, not wanting to get involved. But he leaves his spear behind, so Myaa knows they’ll meet again. Once again, she and Kuumi show horrible judgment by walking around town in broad daylight and then having a meal at the tavern, where they’re quickly spotted by Imperial guards. When miasma starts emanating from Kuumi and she kills a guard, Myaa surrenders and the two are taken away.

Because Jirou’s spear is drawn to him like Mjolnir is to Thor, he soon locates them aboard the commander’s hovercraft. Because he’s a former elite Paladin, he has no trouble getting aboard the ship and neutralizing any hostiles. And because it would simply be rude to take his spear and leave the girls behind, he breaks them out of their cell.

He tells Myaa to ready his airship while he and Kuumi merge once more so he can disable the pursuing hovercraft. I wish we had gotten to see more of his ship, but after they get away the ending of the episode is very rushed and awkwardly edited, suddenly sapping the escape of energy and urgency. The animation in general did not impress this week, but I’m still sufficiently intrigued by this world and premise to keep watching for at least one more week.

Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War – 12 – Tears of the Sun

After finishing the first of this week’s two-episode finale, I maintain that an entire arc devoted to how Ichigo’s parents met and fell in love would have been just fine with me. And indeed, the two-part flashback feels a bit rushed at times. But I’m still grateful for what we got, which is nothing less than the most beautiful and heartrending story Bleach has ever told.

Due to the fact no one has harmed and minimal damage done, Isshin is not punished by Old Man Yama for his unsanctioned excursion to the World of the Living. However, Isshin lies when he says there was “nothing else of note” to report … like, say, he discovered that some Quincy were still alive.

Both he and Masaki don’t want to be done with one another, but Masaki is feeling the ill effects of being bitten by that weird hollow, and even bumps into none other than Urahara Kisuke when she momentarily faints.

Masaki comes home and is read the riot act by Ryuuken’s mother, who found out from Katagiri that she got in a hollow battle and was injured, all to save a hated soul reaper. Ryuu first rushes to Katagiri to castigate her for snitching, but Katagiri only did what thought she needed to to prevent the tainting of the Ishida bloodline.

Indeed, if it wasn’t for Katagiri informing Mrs. Ishida, Masaki may have well collapsed somewhere other than the entrance to the house, and it would be too late by the time someone found her. Because as a result of being bitten by the hollow, she’s undergoing the process of hollowification.

Ryuuken carries her out and flies through the sky, unsure where to go or what to do. A giant hollow sneaks up from behind, but is bisected by a returning Isshin. Ryuu exchanges some harsh words, but ultimately, the two men want the same thing: to save Masaki. Unfortunately, neither of them know quite how the hell to do that.

But Urahara does, and he introduces himself to both Isshin and Ryuuken as the only person who can save Masaki. He was banned from Soul Society for the very research he’ll draw upon to do so, warning that while he can save Masaki’s life, she’ll never be the same again. Meanwhile, Masaki is lost deep within her mind, descending into the mouth of a giant hollow.

Urahara describes what must be done to save Masaki—bind her now half Quincy, half Hollow soul with that of a half-Soul Reaper, half- human. Isshin is full Soul Reaper, but if he uses a special gigai developed by Urahara, he can become half-human, but will have to say goodbye to his life in Soul Society forever.

Both Urahara and Ryuu are amazed how quickly Isshin says he’ll do it, but I’m not. This is Ichigo’s dad we’re talking about, and even if Masaki isn’t his family yet, he can’t deny the two of them already shared a sense of justice and altruism that transcends their opposing factions.

He also admits that he’s not sure he really wants to throw his current life away, but he also knows that his future self will laugh at him or worse if he refused to save the person who saved him. The procedure commences, visualized by Isshin saving Masaki and getsuga tenshou-ing the giant mind hollow to hell. Masaki comes to giggling, wanting to know Isshin’s name.

Ryuuken heads home in the rain, knowing that while his potential future bride Masaki did not outright reject him, in a way fate and the universe did. He regrets not stepping in sooner before Masaki was injured, which turned out to be the beginning of the end of her being a suitable wife. Now her soul is literally bound to that of his historical mortal enemy of the Quincy.

Back home, Katagiri is waiting for him in the rain, and he tells her to inform his mother that he is no longer worthy or able to protect the Quincy anymore. But Katagiri, who met Ryuu when she was a small girl and has grown not just to dutifully serve him, but love and care for him, tells him that’s not true. She sheds tears that mingle with the rain; I’m sure she’d long hoped to be his wife one day, but probably not like this.

Isshin starts to wrap up the tale of his wife to Ichigo, their son, by saying she left the Ishida family when she graduated high school and would visit him as a college student when he opened up his medical clinic. He told her he’d been banished, but always assumed she immediately saw through the lie. The two soon fell in love, became inseparable, and she had Ichigo.

Again, I wish we could have watched more episodes of Isshin and Masaki getting to know each other both before the attack that would bind their souls and afterwards when he began his human life. The two are such compelling, rootable characters. Isshin is absolutely right that Masaki radiates light and warmth like the sun.

But there’s also a romantic quality to just how goshdarned fast everything happened to these young people, how they rolled with the punches, and came out of it living different but probably better lives than the ones they would have led had they never met. A life neither in the Quincy or Soul Reaper way, but in the middle way.

But that too had its cost, as Isshin wraps up this epic tale to Ichigo. The day Masaki died protecting a 9-year-old Ichigo, she shouldn’t have died. She was still part Quincy, and her Blut Vene should have been able to not only defend against Grand Fisher, but defeat him easily.

But she didn’t, and died instead, because her powers failed her. Rather, they were taken, by the awakening King of the Quincy, Yhwach. Uryuu’s mother Katagiri met the same fate, becoming frail and dying too soon as, like Masaki’s, she was deemed unworthy of keeping her powers by Yhwach.

That Yhwach is the father of all Quincy, and his blood runs through all their veins, means he was Masaki’s progenitor, and thus Ichigo’s as well. There may be no ecaping that. And like her mother, he inherited the part of her soul that had become Hollowified.

As if Ichigo needed any further motivation to defeat the guy, he can add “ultimately responsible for his mom’s death” to the list. When an uncharacteristically docile Ikumi stops by to give him his Soul Reaper talisman, Ichigo takes it, thanks her, then tells his father he’s headed off.

Now that he knows more about who he is and where he came from, there’s much work to be done … I just wish he’d at least said hi to his sisters!

To Your Eternity – S2 10 – Eko From the Beyond

Fushi has been hard at work training on the beached galleon, but is running into problems replicating something so big and complex. He’s able to summon forth each and every part of the ship, but not the ship in its entirety. The Beholder advises him to develop better “awareness” that the objects he creates “belong to him.”

Prince Bon and Kahaku are also hard at work, defeating Nokkers and warning the crown princess of Renril that a Nokker attack is coming. While the masked, obscured princess refuses to abandon the castle or town, she does agree to an alliance. Taking a break from training, Fushi discovers a town.

There he finds new fruits and vegetables at the market, and pays for them with money. He then finds poor and starving people and gives them the food he bought, but when he tries to give money to a woman and her kid he’s met with resentment and suspicion. The woman won’t let him “control” them with his money.

Fushi then senses intense pain coming from a filthy girl with big eyes who is trapped in a cage in a circus tent. He breaks her and her little brother out in the middle of the night and rides back to his galleon base, but on the way the boy dies and he buries him.

Back aboard the ship, Fushi ensures the girl doesn’t meet the same fate, as he feeds her, shows her his menagerie, sews her a dress, bathes her, and cuts her hair. Since the only word she says is “-eko” in response to the presence of a cat (neko), Fushi decides to address her as “Eko.” She stays aboard while he continues his training.

When she senses her falling after trying to plug a leak, he transforms into her brother, and is able to communicate with her through her clay pot, which is apparently a particular ability of her people. This experience helps him to better understand the Beholder’s advice, and he rejects the idea that he “controls” anyone or anything.

Rather, he has to look at things as having always been a part of him. Everything he sees or has ever seen is not merely a collection of possessions, but his very existence itself. He surrounds the ship with an elaborate tangle of vines from his body, and from his spot below deck is able to achieve a number of tasks remotely.

After a while without any contact, Kahaku and Bon decide to return to the beach to check on Fushi, and find that he’s essentially created his own little mini-world. His face covered and body constrained by vines, Fushi confirms that everything within a 3km radius of him…is him. 

He’s also able to teleport, after a fashion, by creating an ambulatory copy of himself through the network of vines. He prepares tea and pastries for his friends and introduces them to Eko, whose people Kahaku is aware of. Fushi communicates with her again as her brother, and learns she has no home to return to, so she’ll be accompanying him on their mission to protect Renril. She seems fine with that!

Bon heads to Uralis to try to find “Immortal allies” that will help them, while Fushi, Eko, Kahaku and Horse head to the beautiful and imposing palace city of Renril, where they’ll likely meet with the crown princess and some of her trusted officers.

Considering her prominent presence in the ED, I was looking forward to Eko’s introduction, and was not disappointed. She rivals March and Rynn for cutest character in TyE, and I feel both we and Fushi have only just scratched the surface of her clay pot abilities.

Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War – 11 – Meet the Parents

I gave up on Bleach twelve or thirteen seasons or so into its run because it kept stalling on anime-only filler arcs, most of which were hot garbage and almost never masked the fact that they were meant to stall for time while the source material developed. Now that Bleach is back, it feels fresh, and something new happens in every episode.

Take this episode, one that finally begins to explore Ichigo’s parents’ past in detail. From the moment Isshin showed up at Ichigo’s boss Ikumi’s place in his shinigami garb and told his son the time has finally come to talk about this stuff, I was riveted. my only beef with Ichigo’s return is that we don’t get to see any Karin or Yuzu.

In the not-too-distant past, Shiba Isshin was the captain of the 10th Squad, with a short-haired Matsumoto as his lieutenant and Hitsugaya as his third seat (and heir apparent to the captaincy). Toshio delivers a report on soul eater deaths during patrols in Naruki City in the human world. Those deaths are part of hollowification experiments being run by Aizen, Ichimaru and Kaname, who are in the early stages of planning their takeover.

Kurosaki Masaki is a kind, capable, and somewhat lonely young woman. She’s lonely because she is the last surviving member of her Quincy clan, and has been taken in by the Ishidas. Uryuu’s father Ryuuken’s mom is not that crazy about this, no doubt being obsessed with maintaining a pure a bloodline as possible, while Ryuuken himself is a lot nicer to Masaki (probably because he sees himself one day marrying her).

Tying in Aizen & Co.’s slow-burn scheme with the origin story of how Masaki and Isshin met is a brilliant bit of retroactive continuity. Isshin comes to Naruki to investigate the source of the deaths, and meets Aizen & Co.’s eldritch abomination: a hollow whose hole has been filled, adn who fights like a soul reaper…a powerful one. Aizen even slashes Isshin in the back to give him a handicap.

As a Quincy, Masaki is extremely attuned to spiritual pressure, and knows something is wrong when she senses Isshin and the Hollow fighting. But she’s also an empathetic and caring person with a strong belief in noblesse oblige. When she starts to run towards the trouble, Ryuuken tries to stop her, saying the lower-level Quincy can put themselves in danger.

But Masaki tells Ryuuken something I could easily hear Ichigo saying: it’s one thing to stay safe so one has a future. But if she stands by while someone dies, she won’t be able to forgive her future self. She runs into town under the pelting rain and finds a soul reaper locked in mortal combat with a strange hollow, Isshin’s fire-based zanpakuto lighting up the night.

To his warm flames, Masaki adds her icy Quincy arrows in order to save Isshin’s life. When the hollow charges her, she disarms and allows it to bit her shoulder, which allows her to kill it from point-blank range. So not only is Masaki a Quincy, but comparable in skill and power to a Gotei 13 Captain, and even possesses a sense of style to her fighting.

When the hollow prepares to self destruct, Isshin sees Masaki is in trouble and uses his body and spiritual pressure to shield her. On the ground, battered and bloody, Isshin thanks Masaki for saving her. She in turn thanks him for saving her, and he laughs, saying that must make them even.

When Isshin asks her who she is, Masaki considers how a soul reaper would react to learning that she’s a Quincy. Perhaps since he just saved her, Masaki isn’t in the mood to lie or deflect, and comes right out and tells him she’s a quincy. Isshin’s reaction of casual amusement is definitely not what she expected, and it puts a big Kurosaki smile on her face.

So there you have it: a shinigami captain and the last surviving member of a Quincy clan have a meet cute, all thanks to the series’ big bad’s machinations. Forget flashbacks; I could honestly watch an entire separate season of Bleach centered on these two (and the ensuing love triangle with Ryuuken). You can plainly see how Ichigo became such an honorable and upstanding young scamp from watching these two.

Golden Kamuy – 40 – His Mother’s Eyebrows

If you told me we’d be getting a Lt. Koito origin story this week, I would have been dubious, but, well, here we are, and while it’s completely divorced from the present day story and our core couple of Sugimoto and Asirpa, it’s still a ton of fun, blending geopolitical history, family strife, and the usual Kamuy zaniness.

At fourteen, Koito Otonoshin is an aimless, willful 14-year-old, a spoiled rich kid whose father has basically washed his hands of him. But when he runs a man down with his mini-motorcycle, he gets more than he bargained with, as that man turns out to be Lt. Tsurumi, in full possession of all of his skin.

Tsurumi can tell young Koito has skill and potential, but needs direction. He also learns—or rather already knew—that Koito has a complex about his 13-years-older brother who died valiantly in battle. Basically, he wishes he was the son to die. Tsurumi tells Koito he’ll enjoy his move to Hakodate, and that if they meet again, it will mean the heavens want them to be friends.

Two years later, Koito is still a rich little shit put-putting around town, but is suddenly kidnapped by Russians. Tsurumi arrives as a representative of the army to deal with the hostage situation, meeting with the grizzled Captain Koito and his wife. Finding his son will involve using the telephone exchange to trace the kidnapper’s call—the town only has 50 or so non-public phones, but that’s still too many to go door-to-door.

On one of many hunches, Tsurumi and Koito stake out the abandoned Russian embassy and await a phone call. But Captain Koito makes clear that if the Russians want him to dismantle his fleet in exchange for his son’s life, that’s not going to happen. Yet when the kidnappers call and put the captain’s son on, Koito is already prepared to die, tells his father to forget he was born, and starts fighting with his captives over the phone.

Papa Koito may be stern and honorable, but he’s not heartless, and his son’s gesture propels him to go after his son once the location of the phone—an abandoned fort six klicks away—is found. The horses are too scared of the steep hills, so Koito races off on his son’s motorcycle, with Tsurumi catching up with his Terminator speed and hopping on.

A thrilling little chase ensues, with one of the kidnappers pursuing the motorcycle. Tsurumi helps them get around corners by leaning to the side, surprising a couple of local townswomen and giving them a wink. He then swings around so he’s facing the captain and shoots and kills their pursuer.

However, Captain Koito ends up crashing the bike into a trolley and sending them both flying, losing just enough clothing to look like they’re members of a queer bike gang. They arrive at the old fort, the Captain distracts the kidnappers by striking a rock star pose, but he’s knocked out, and his son is tied up to a post again.

Koito hears gunshots behind the closed door and fears the worst, but when the door opens it’s not his captors, but Lt. Tsurumi, in all his sexy masculine glory. Koito’s dad comes to, and the three enjoy a good laugh while Tsurumi’s underlings—a younger Kikuta, Tsukishima, and Ogata—deal with the bodies of the dead kidnappers.

Clearly smitten with the always-charming Lt. Tsurumi, and also finally possessed of a sense of duty to both father and country, Koito takes the army officer test and passes, and even though his father is a naval man, he’s proud of his son whether he fights on land or sea. Tsurumi takes him under his wing, and Koito and Ogata exchange glares, the start of their long and colorful history together.

Left ambiguous is whether Tsurumi planned all of this: meeting the young Koito in Kagoshima to get the measure of him, arranging the kidnapping, facilitating a reconciliation between him and his dad, and eventually claiming him as one of his loyal 7th division officers. Or was it simply fate that brought them together?

The Eminence in Shadow – 02 – Toiling in Obscurity

Kagenou Minoru is hit by Truck-kun, then resurrects as Cid, the infant son of a noble family, while maintaining all the intelligence and awareness of his 18-year-old self. When his parents are puzzled that he doesn’t cry, Cid simply fakes it. As the second-born, he plays second fiddle to his supremely talented sister Claire, but that’s the way he likes it.

In the day he’s content to be “Background Character A”, but at night, in the shadows, he practices his magic on the bandits and baddies of this world as a vigilante. He’s partial to using magical slime to create weapons and even disguises, and is a one-boy wrecking crew; even seasoned warriors can’t last more than a minute before being eviscerated.

While inspecting the bandits’ loot Cid hears sounds coming from a wagon and assumes it’s a slave, but it’s…well, it’s basically Mitty. He experiments thoroughly and exhaustively on the amorphous blob of overloaded magic, until one day he’s finally able to purify and stabilize it, resulting in the coalescence of a beautiful blonde elf girl.

Assuming she’s a tabula rasa he decides to try out his Eminence-in-Shadow act for the first time, ad-libbing tall tales about her origin as one of the original heroes and the identity of a great foe, the Cult of Diabolos. The girl buys it all, and in exchange for having saved her life, agrees to join Cid in his quest. He names her Alpha, and Shadow Garden is born.

Three years later, to Claire’s eyes Cid hasn’t improved as a dark knight at all, but she still spars with him—and beats him—every day. There’s a neat little moment when Cid sees all of the movements that would defeat Claire, but instead he takes her strike and ends up in the drink. Claire then touches her neck, where he had placed his blade for the tiniest fraction of a moment. I wonder if any part of her wonders if her little brother is holding back?

The day she’s supposed to start attending Midgar Academy for Dark Knights, Claire is kidnapped. Cid’s mom lashes out at his dad demanding to know what the plan is, but Cid and Shadow Garden—now seven Greek letters strong—is already on it. They’ve narrowed down the hideouts where Claire was taken, and a rescue op commences with all due haste.

Claire is the captive of a Viscount Grease, but isn’t that worried about it. Indeed, she breaks her magic bonds when Grease even mentions the possibility of harming her dear little brother. Just as the bandits in her home village were no match whatsoever for Cid’s magic, the seven members of Shadow Garden make quick work of Grease’s small fry. Grease himself has to take a strength-enhancing drug in order to keep up with Alpha.

But Alpha isn’t going all out; she doesn’t want to kill Grease, she wants him to talk. When he goes to ground, she’s not concerned, because he ends up right in Cid’s clutches. Grease takes more drugs, and tries to intimidate Cid with his talk of “the depths of true darkness”, but Cid just vows to dig deeper still.

There’s actually a measure of pathos in Grease’s depiction as we see how his own daughter suffered from a curse similar to Alpha’s before Cid saved her. But at the end of the day, Grease is no more than another bandit to Cid, who ends “playtime”, powers up, and kills Grease with a flashy coup-de-grace.

Cid doesn’t let Claire know who saved her, but simply withdraws from the Viscount’s castle, enabling her to escape on her own. It only takes her a day to recover from the ordeal, and then she’s off to academy, her little brother happily waiving goodbye. Cid himself is still two years away from Midgar, but he intends to make full use of those years honing his skills and sharpening the seven-pointed sword that is Shadow Garden.

But Alpha & Co. apparently have other plans, and suddenly tell Cid that it’s time to leave him. My first guess would be that they’re going off to hone their skills independently, possibly to make themselves more “worthy” of Cid’s leadership, but we’ll have to wait until next week to test that theory. Until then, for the first time in this new world, Cid is genuinely flummoxed.

The Eminence in Shadow – 01 (First Impressions) – Bringing a Crowbar to a Gun Fight

After being kidnapped by a stalker, Nishino Akane is chaffeured to school and back, and maintains an eager-to-please mask for both her teachers and peers. There’s just one kid at school who doesn’t remember her name or look her way: Kagenou. That kinda pisses her off. Kagenou doesn’t seem to care.

One night Akane must walk home when her chaffeur doesn’t answer, and she’s swiftly kidnapped again by a pair of bad dudes bent on holding her for random. One of them isn’t even above assaulting her, but thankfully for Akane, Kagenou saw her be abducted, and has come to rescue her. Before he does he removes several extremely heavy weights he’d been wearing all day like they were nothing.

He smashes through the warehouse skylight and announces himself as the “Stylish Ruffian Slayer”, dispatching the gangster-style baddie with ease, then going to town on an ex-military connoisseur of violence. While fighting him, Kagenou goes into great detail about how great crowbars are as a weapon, then demonstrates it by whaling on the guy before untying Akane and vanishing.

Akane realizes that Kagenou, like her, was also wearing a mask around others. She never gets a chance to confirm if he was her savior, however, as he falls victim to Truck-kun and gets—you guessed it—reincarnated in another world full of magic and fantasy.

While in his old world and life there was only so much building muscle and martial arts training could achieve, but here he’s shed those limits, determined not to be the Hero or the Villain of the world, but rather the mastermind behind the scenes controlling everything—the titular Eminence in Shadow, flanked by seven female assassins.

This week is a succinct if somewhat tonally ambiguous prologue for the “fantasy action comedy” to come. Some isekai start with the lad already having been in the new world for a while, others spend several episodes getting him there. I daresay including a scene of attempted sexual assault probably isn’t a great idea if you’re trying to be tongue-in-cheek.

That said, next week we’re surely in for something completely different, as Kagenou’s chuuni tendencies are now perfectly at home in the new world he inhabits. So I’d say it’s worth at least one more look.

DanMachi IV – 05 – Gong of Ice and Fire

Without Bell, the party finds itself well and truly against the wall, to the point both Lili and Aisha decide it’s time to bring out their fox in the hole, Haruhime. Thanks to her study of the grimoires, she’s now able to summon five tails from a fox spirit that bestow Level Boost on Welf, Daphne, Aisha, Ouka, and Mikoto. Suddenly, fighting back the monsters is easier.

But there are so many, and even when they’ve slaughtered them all, the Moss Huge eats all the crystals they dropped and becomes even stronger. I don’t know if it knew the party had someone like Haruhime, but it was counting on using their power and effort to increase its own.

The last couple episodes have really built up the fact that this is a smug, ugly brute of a monster whom I simply could not wait to see ethered by Bell.  But before that happens his party has to endure more setbacks. It takes a huge bite out of Aisha’s shoulder with its toothed trunk.

Aisha then proceeds to demonstrate just how tough she is by continuing to try to fight off the Huge, since she’s the only one who can, even with vines growing out of her gaping wound. Meanwhile, her and everyone else’s level boost fades as the monsters continue to swarm around her.

It’s at this point the injured party they found can’t sit around and do nothing anymore. They decide as a group to make their last stand here, to give Hestia Familia a chance to escape and spread the vital news of the Moss Huge. And Lili knows that a Strategist must sometimes be coldhearted and underhanded.

But she doesn’t leave the injured allies behind. She can’t, and still live with herself or look Bell in the eye. She uses her lightning blade to push back the monsters and save those who were about to give their lives for her. And just then, Haruhime’s fox ears hear a tolling bell, signifying that they just managed to hold out long enough for the one-man cavalry.

Everyone finds cover so Bell can unleash a Firebolt that blasts the Moss Huge clean out of and about a hundred meters below the cavern they’re in. There, in a much larger space, Bell, demonstrates how being on these Lower Floors have helped his mana and physique synchronize better. In short, he’s figured shit out.

As a result, he’s able to observe his opponent rationally, and revels in the fact that it’s neither as fast as the Iguazu nor nearly as strong as Minotaur. The rest of the party is relegated to the grandstands, but that’s fine; at this point both they and we the viewers have earned the right to sit back and enjoy this decisive battle.

DanMachi brings out all its most epic and bombastic battle music for this one. When all of Bell’s melee attacks amount to nothing due to Moss’ ridiculous regenerative abilities, he takes off the kid gloves, imbues his black dagger with Firebolt and awakens its runes, naming the attack “Argo Vesta” after an alternate name of his goddess.

This finally does the trick, and if I have any complaint about the Moss Huge’s demise, it’s that it doesn’t suffer nearly as much or as long as it made so many others suffer. For a being of such obvious intelligence to use it purely to hurt and kill and make itself stronger…it was a bad dude and I won’t miss it!

With the defeat of the Moss Huge, the parasitic vines growing in Chigusa and everyone else vanish, restoring them back to normal. Marie, not interested in meeting his friends, thanks Bell, says she loves him, then waves goodbye. I was hoping for more Marie Time!

But that’s okay, there’s no shortage of allies and hugs waiting for Bell after his impressive feat. But the members of Hestia Familia and their colleagues must understand that their role wasn’t simply to await rescue. Everything they did bought them and Bell crucial minutes he needed to get to where they were.

Everyone contributed, from Cassandra’s well-timed heals to Haruhime’s clutch five-fold boost. And conducting it all was Liliruca, who like Bell learned a lot from being down here. For her, that meant learning that a Strategist doesn’t have to be coldhearted or underhanded, and sometimes luck will reward them.

Spy x Family – 11 – A Dog Will Bring Peace

The agency expects Anya to earn eight Stella in four months, but it’s becoming apparent to Loid (thanks to Anya’s test scores) that academics might not be the way. Fortunately, there are other ways to earn Stella. Unfortunately, Anya is also not great at those other ways either.

Loid thinks her drawing of a moo cow is a cheetah or a panda; Anya plays the violin like a cello and breaks all the strings; she can’t hit a tennis ball she tosses in the air (I felt seen). There’s also volunteer work, but no sooner do Loid and Anya show up eager to work that the kindly head nurse loses her cool and tells them to clear out.

It’s important to Loid/Twilight that Anya earn these stars without any undue “outside assistance”, but with even a volunteer Stella feeling as far away as an actual star, he may have to ask his agency for that assistance in order to get Desmond in a room. Then Anya hears a boy’s thoughts: he’s fallen into the pool and he can’t move his legs.

Without any regard for her secret, Anya tells her dad that there’s a boy drowning in the pool, before taking advantage of Loid’s confusion to walk it back and come up with a (slightly) more plausible reason for racing to the pool. She dives in and swims with all her might, but soon tires out. Loid, having seen where Anya went, jumps in and pulls both her and the boy out.

Loid is too proud of his daughter to think too much about how she knew what she knew. There’s also the matter of Anya literally putting her life on the line to save a little boy’s life. It’s an act of heroism that earns her a Stella, the first in her class and the fastest ever to earn one at Eden.

While Anya’s legend grows among her peers, Loid and Handler meet in disguises that make them unrecognizable. Handler asks if any agency resources could be used to help quicken Anya’s rise to Imperial Scholar, but again Loid declines. He doesn’t want to put anyone else at risk. If Anya won one Stella on her own, she can win another. That may not be Twilight’s cold logic and practicality, but Loid Forger’s pride, trust, and love.

The dangers of Anya rising to far too fast are evident at her return to normal classes. While she earns the esteem of some classmates, rumors start to swirl about the legitimacy of her Stella. But when Damian is asked by a couple of girls to add his two cents, they get more than they bargained for: he scolds them for besmirching Eden’s good name with such spurious accusations.

He’d never admit he was standing up for Anya, but he is standing up for truth and justice, which make him good and cool. When Becky brings up Anya’s new opportunity to ask her parents for a reward, Anya tables her desire for a large amount of peanuts and decides that the right way to befriend Damian is by getting a dog.

When she makes the request at home, Loid is open to the idea for its security benefits, while Yor can’t help but imagine the ways dogs big and small might kill Anya if given the chance. All the while, we get a little closing sequence of what I presume to be the Forger’s future dog, currently in a cruel, dark kennel where experiments are being run on the dogs

Summertime Render – 09 – A Tale of Two Ushios

The video on Ushio’s unlocked phone shows both the original Ushio and her Shadow delivering a joint message to Shinpei. The original assures him her Shadow isn’t evil like the others, but an ally, then proceeds to tell the story of how she ended up dying, and why that’s not the end of her story, because ultimately she is her Shadow and her Shadow is her.

It started with Shiori telling Ushio about seeing her own Shadow and asking her for help, since no one else will listen to her. Then, while Ushio and Mio were cleaning up the beach, there was a flash from above and just like that there was a second Ushio, who runs away before she can learn anything more.

Ushio comes home for a bath to find the other Ushio is already in the tub; she went home because it’s her home, same as Ushio’s. Once she determines that this other Ushio isn’t a threat, the two join forces to seek out Shiori’s Shadow on Mt. Takanosu, the locaiton of Sou’s family’s old clinic, believed by most of the island to now be haunted. It is haunted, but not by ghosts…by a monster.

A Shadow in its black goo form copies Ushio’s copy and tries to kill her, but Shadow Ushio figures out on accident that the copy’s weakness is not its body, but its shadow, and that she can use her own body—like her hair—as a weapon to slice through that Shadow. She can also repair her physical body, and tells Ushio that the instinct to kill her original “fills her brain”, even though she has no intention of doing so.

The two Ushios return to the beach to record a message for Shinpei, and after the present-day Shadow Ushio watches it with Shinpei and Sou, she suddenly regains her memories and knowledge of her power. She uses that power and her phone to “transport” the three of them into a recording of the tragic events of July 21st on the private beach where original Ushio breathed her last.

Original Ushio had Shadow Ushio turn into a seashell necklace and wore her, so that when Shiori was washed out to sea, not one but two Ushios were there to rescue her. However, under those waves Shadow Shiori kills her original and drowns the original Ushio—the one Sou was unable to revive and ended up being cremated.

Struck by her original’s sacrifice for both Shiori’s sake and her own, Shadow Ushio vowed to help Shinpei wipe out the Shadows when he returned to the island. As Sou and Shinpei weep over what they witnessed, Shadow Shiori suddenly grabs Shin’s arm and transforms into Haine, who promises he won’t escape her next time.

Shadow Ushio switches of the recording so she, Shin and Sou are back in the present, but Shin now has a sinister black mark on his arm where Haine touched him, proving that it wasn’t just part of the recording, and that Haine is apparently capable of transcending time and space like he can.

That adds an extra layer of difficulty and dread to Shinpei’s task, but the recordings he and Sou watched proved one thing: Shadow Ushio is indeed their ally, and they need all the allies they can get against an increasingly menacing enemy.