Another week and another anime dropped: Gundam AGE has become quite boring. BUT, this week we had three great episodes with Fate/Zero, Last Exile, and UN-GO.
Chihayafuru, Episode 8
This episode continued the trend of explaining bits and crumbles about the karuta rules. The game is complex and not just about fast reflexes. Although those help. It is also the introduction episode for the last club member: Porky. OK, his name isn’t Porky, but Nishida. He’s the fat kid that lost to Arata in the early episode. He joined the tennis club after that to try to forget about karuta, because he lost and it had become all about winning for him.
UN-GO, Episode 7
Oook. Our poor Detective, Shinjurou, has been a bit brain addled by the novelist. I can see why they added that to the script, though. It simply represents the fact that the story is inspired by true novels from the ’50s. But still, I’m not sure what the writers for the show took, but it must have been good stuff.
So, the last war was before the time of the grandfather of Shinjurou. Why does he have “flashbacks” of it in a few places, and why do the settings have so many destroyed buildings? You’d think that, after 60+ years, they would have been rebuilt?
So many interesting “hints” in this episode, despite the confusing story and lack of Inga as well. It looks like everybody got a tracking chip except for Shinjurou.
Gundam AGE, Episode 7
I’m dropping this. The episodes are getting more boring each week.
Fate/Zero, Episode 9
Lancer’s back-story. Poor guy, falling in love with the fiance of your king is always a bad idea. Although, I’m really freaking out with Archie having that flashback, and so is he. Poor Archie also lost his magical power and I don’t like his wife one bit. She’s totally “evil,” ready to cut her husband’s arm to take the command spells. Luckily for him, Lancer doesn’t approve of the change of master. Knights and their oats. Saying she’s doing it to save her husband convinced Lancer to accept the change, though. She’s so going to cause that group death.
Also, more Rider and Velvet! Velvet actually shows that he’s not an idiot because he came up with a method to find where Caster might be hiding. Rider showed us that he’s not an idiot, either, once it was time to protect his master from Assassins. But why did Assassins show up and attack Velvet? Doing that just to see Rider’s most powerful attack was quite clumsy of them.
Last Exile, Episode 7:
This episode is probably the start of the real plot. First, it opens with Ades Intelligence department head going into a place full of dead Guild people, but he probably didn’t kill them because their faces are covered and there is no sign of blood or wounds on them. He then looks above and sees Starfishes and an Abiter (Guild combat ship) that says, “White Legacy.” Looks like Luscinia and Ades just got new toys and that the “Guild” is probably long dead in the Ades Federation, replaced by “cultists.” The one in the first season was quite “cult”-oriented as well. We also get a speech by Sara about last episode purge and she breaks down after it. The poor kid, hopefully nothing bad happens to her, although, it looks like Vasant likes her, so she will protect her when she backstabs all the others.
In the meantime, on the Silvius, we learn a bit more about the geopolitics around the Grand Lake. Tatiana seems well-accomplished in the politics of Earth, and she’s mentoring Millia about that and a little bit on warfare. I didn’t really expect that. Well, I expected Tatiana to like Millia, they have a few things in common (sick fathers, nobles, family lost everything, etc.), but I didn’t expect Tatiana to teach her and help her to become a better leader. While Tatiana is teaching Millia, Alister learned how to make better tea from Teddy.
Despite all the other things, this episode was actually about Fam deciding to steal eight ships all at once to impress Tatiana. She actually only needed one to finish her contract, but Fam is still so childish that she hasn’t realized that doing stupid things isn’t how you impress Tatiana. But Fam isn’t the only one with the idea, and she encounters her Sky Pirates along the way. Long story short, the whole thing was a trap. Gisey saved most of the pirates and Fam ended up being tailed on her way back to the Silvius. This episode also highlighted that Fam hasn’t had any character development for four episodes, while Giselle and Millia have had a ton. Fam is still very much a child.
We also get a bit of exposition for another country around the Grand Lake: Glacies. It appears to be covered in ice and snow. They also have unusual rocket-propelled ships and attack anything that cross their borders. The four unknown characters in the opening sequence are probably from this country, the ship in the background match what we see in this episode. The Silvius moved closer to that country border as well, so they should appear really soon. Along with Vincent, who is apparently trying to “negotiate” with them. Tatiana doesn’t seem impressed by his “negotiation skills.”
Next episode: Silvius against the First Fleet and General Sadri is the most experienced of all the Ades General. The fight seems to be ~65 ships against one. Oh, and there was foreshadowing for this to happen in Millia and Tatiana’s conversation. Millia asked Tatiana how did one ship destroy an entire fleet and Tatiana kind of skirted the question by saying war is more about resources. So, I guess we will find out next episode what kind of resources the Silvius got.