SoulTaker

Uh, well that was a lot to take in at once. It reminds of the very recent first episode of Kill la Kill in how it was super energetic and pretty rushed, but still coherent enough and entertaining throughout.

So we have the resurrected Kyosuke, her dead mother and the mystery of the latter's death and attempt to kill her son (probably related to him being the "strongest mutant"); Maya and the Flickers, beings with split personalities, two people in one; the Kirihara group which is trying to hunt down the flickers; the psycho doc and pink loli from Hospital (really original naming skills by the way) who seem to have clashing motives with them; and Shiro aka Toothache who for now appears to be on his own and follow his own agenda, but is famous enough that psycho doc knows of him. There is a lot of stuff here and it's actually pretty intriguing - it merely needs to come together within the next few episodes at a slightly more relaxed pace.

Genre-wise, it plays out more as a dark hero story than a horror, but that's fine too.

The animation definitely has Shinbo's seal: colorful, flashy, disorienting, with quick scenery shots, psychedelic backgrounds, close-ups and weird, spinning angles (Pink Loli is a massive Hachikuji look-alike too). I liked it and how it helped to set the mood, plus the action was nice. I wish my video files were of a higher quality because these scenes were worth it.

Not much to judge the characters on, so far. The MC Kyosuke seems kind of boring, but he's as confused and knows as little from all this as us viewers, so I'll give him time. Shiro seems pretty cool, and Maya is kind of messed up.

Long story short: neat presentation, sweet production values, unsteady setting left to decide on later.
Thumbs up for this start. :thumbsup:

We start with some weird but typical horror imagery and we see a scene play out where Kyousuke’s mother stabs him while crying that she’s sorry. However, this is all really stylized since none of the positions make sense. If she’s lying on an altar then how could she stab him at the angle? And stabbing him would probably knock him back so how did he fall on the dagger? Also, if he did fall then how did he end up going out the window? Well, just the opening but hopefully this is just stylized and not sloppy continuity.

Ugh, that fanservice shot. That’s such an unnatural position she’s lying in all so her stripped panties are show; seems that’s not a recent habit for Shinbo. Well I can say this does have pretty striking visual style. As Kyousuke and Maya are having their conversation I like the shifting background and how she goes into silhouette. I like the look of the visual effect of her black form against the shift background. Annd then the colors go all weird, Kyousuke cries blood and she uses some kind of medicine gun on. Yup, this is definitely Shinbo at work. Especially here in this scene, it wouldn’t be out of place in one of his later SHAFT shows.

So yeah, not much is made clear in that conversation. She doesn’t seem to be dodging his questions though; if anything she seemed rather open. It’s just that she announces he was buried alive and she sensed that he was alive like it’s all a very natural everyday occurrence. How she found him or why she dug him up remains a mystery.

Erm, okay these stylized visuals kind of make it hard to tell what the hell is going on. I thought the fight at the graveyard was a dream. So did Kyousuke leave get attacked in the graveyard, then comeback to find the apartment torn up and Maya gone? I guess that’s what I’ll assume for now. Also, apparently Maya is his little sister?

Ah okay, we get some answers here as to why she knew he was alive in the grave, but I’m still a bit confused about what Maya is. I understand she’s whatever a flicker is, but is she or isn’t she his sister? I guess she could just be a small piece of his sister, or some remnant if his sister died, he did just say only his mother was left. Maybe that’s why she talks about not being whole in her diary. Either way it seems that flickers want to find a way to be whole as they put it, but I don’t really have enough to theorize about it.

So this is taking place in the future and now Kyousuke has a fuckin’ lightsaber.

So yeah, usually I kind of write stuff down as I’m watching but the second half of this episode was purely action, but it wasn’t particularly good action. It had some energy to it, but it was really shaky and hard to tell exactly what was happening at times. The direction in these scenes felt very amateur.

Anyway, Kyousuke and Shiro break into Kirihara’s lab to take back the Flicker Maya. Kirihara is an organization that’s capturing flickers to experiment on for some reason. Kyousuke is fatally wounded again and which is when the show turns into a cheap X-men knock off. Mutants with super powers fight it out, Kyousuke turns a generic looking demon everyone whistles impressed saying he’s the strongest mutant and there’s a lot of poorly staged action before some cheesy super sentai music starts playing while Kyousuke kicks Nightcrawler’s ass (Yes I know the doc’s power wasn’t teleportation, sue me) and then the episode just sort of ended.

“Hey, here is a machine gun. Go stand out in the open and fire at the heavily armed gunships.” Something tells me these guys aren’t very good at strategy.

At least this episode starts a little slower and it’s easier to tell what is going on. So the Kirihara group and the hospital guys are separate groups. Last episode I just thought the weird doctor had went crazy. Anyway, seem these groups are interesting in experimenting on the Flickers. I’m still not clear on exactly what a Flicker is though.

All those sharks and he gets swallowed by a huge whale…of course. Did the doctor make the wale beach itself or was that just a coincidence. Why even involve the whale? That just seems really roundabout and pointless. So Kyousuke gets blown up and then swim suit girl and doc could have fished him out. The whale thing just strikes me as random and weird.

The subs I have for this show are just weird. They keep fucking up the names of the characters. He keeps saying Misaki but the subs show Maya. Anyway, looks like Kyousuke found his way out of the wale, and now he’s had some visions of Maya, before finding Shiro again. I don’t really like the way these things are shown, because there’s no clear idea what’s real and what’s not. It’s not really so much abstract as intentionally confusing. How did he find Shiro again? The two have just met, and how did Shiro get off the island facility?

It’s weird to me the way he refers to his sister as Misaki-san. I get that she’s not really his sister but a flicker, which seems to be some kind of pale copy of a person with some kind of powers. The organizations are interested in Kyousuke and Maya because they have that psychic connection. At least that part is starting to become a bit clearer. However, for a show tagged as horror, it’s not really building any kind of atmosphere. It’s trying to be weird and the artwork makes everything look a bit deformed, but the presentation comes off as more intentionally obtuse than anything.

And now we’re back to action scenes. The fights are very stylized but don’t have much substance to them. Kyousuke is pretty dumb for just attacking head on like this, he’s really an annoying protagonist. All I get from him is obsessive love for his sister. It’s the most basic of characterization and not even all that well done.
Oooh, good a random guy saved him during the fight. Hopefully we’ll find out something about him rather than just have him disappear after saving Kyousuke for some reason. Well now the alcohol doc killed the scientist lady. You know, this isn’t so hard to understand as there’s nothing really complicated going on. This is just an example of show with a simple plot trying to make it look more complicated than it is. The weird presentation doesn’t add much to what is going on. I really hate how characters just pop in and out seemingly at random intervals.

Anyway, looks like Maya is dead and now Kyousuke gets to go all demon monster and fight a giant mech in an underwhelming battle. I get it if you can animate a nice fight just make it all stylized. Yeesh, this show is tiring to watch. There it is again, the doc that found the whale and the loli are watching the fight and now announce they are enemies before leaving. Oookay, I’m supposed to care about that?
So Maya is dead, but there are other Flickers out there. They keep focusing heavily on Kyousuke’s cross in this episode that’s some pretty heavy handed symbolism there. So he’s going to dedicate himself to saving flickers by becoming the monster. I get it, he’s like Jesus if Jesus turned into a demon and had super powered battles.

Shiro is pretty clearly manipulating Kyousuke for his own ends. He wants to destroy the Kirihara group and he’s using the boy’s anger over the death of Maya and to a lesser extent his mother.

Okay, at least we’re getting some explanation now. Runa is Kyousuke’s real sister but the flickers are all fragments of her soul. They’re not fragments of random people but all fragments of one person. Maya looked nothing like Runa and she sure didn’t address Kyousuke like a brother, unlike Runa. The hospital group is backed by the Kirihara group are after Maya and the flickers for research purposes. Maya wasn’t a very good subject which is why they just killed and dissected her. Strangely Kyousuke is really cold toward Runa. I guess he’s shocked by his situation and what he’s learned so far. Also, he does indeed want to know both why his mother was killed and why she tried to kill him.

Heh, Runa is a Flicker and like Shiro she’s trying to manipulate Kyousuke into destroying the Kirihara group using his guilt over his mother’s death. I guess it makes sense with the flickers being hunted down to be studied. However, the Kirihara group has its own problems. They’re not too good at actually catching flicker and haven’t gotten much useful data from them. It looks like Kyousuke has gotten himself stuck in this larger conflict and he doesn’t know what to do about it.

Erm, he’s stopping a care with his bare hands and yet, he’s only as strong as a normal boy? Bullshit. This entire attack struck me as pretty half assed. It seems like the Kirihara group sucks at this whole capture the flicker thing as they just gave up and left.

This episode is actually a pretty big improvement over the first two. First of all this flicker has some personality unlike Maya and now we’re finally getting to learn the character motivations. Kyousuke was cold to her because he knew she wasn’t really his sister. Kyousuke is in a weird place here. He can choose to fight to defend the fragments of his sister’s soul and avenge his mother. However, his own mother tried to kill him and the flickers are trying to manipulate him for their own safety. It’s a pretty simple story, but when it’s presented more straightforward I can start to get into it a little. I really dunno where Shiro fits into all of this at the moment but his motives will hopefully be revealed eventually.

I still laugh at that lightsaber Kyousuke uses. At least this flicker can fight and defend itself. It doesn’t want to be just a victim. Annnd now we see the result of all the cross symbolism from the last episode. Kyousuke will sacrifice himself to save the flickers. He sees them all as his sister. However, he needs something else to transform. Both times it has happened he’s been in a desperate situation or angry over something. I wish they’d shown us that he couldn’t get into the Kirihara Group HQ, instead last episode just ended with him beating the Samurai Gundam with this episode starting back at the church.
Pffffftthahahaha, the car is a fucking transformer. Man that looks so damn silly. But looks like Kyousuke found his resolve and is able to transform because he now has a purpose. It’s a simple motivation and not really all that interesting though. Crosses, crosses everywhere, a burning church, the symbolism is fucking everywhere. It couldn’t get any more heavy handed. His mother killed him for the sake of saving the poor flickers. I get it Jesus metaphor!

Buuuuuuullllshit. So now she’s leaving because she thinks she’s strong enough on her own after spending five minutes with Kyousuke. This is so damn stupid, yes, she lied to him, but he’s found his resolve so now she’s leaving. Give me a fucking break, I hope this isn’t going to turn into monster of the week/protect a different flicker of the week pattern. They’re all about the flickers but now it’s more dangerous to Kyousuke. This is stupid.

The Kirihara group probably can’t catch flickers because they keep changing their mind about what they want to do. Now they’re after Kyousuke and fuck the flicker. I get that they could use him to find flickers but considering how they hunted this episode they seem like a really half assed organization.

Gods, this opening is pure cheese. You’re right this is a dark hero story. The opening reminds me of an older style of anime. Actually this whole show reminds me a lot Devilman, but that show wasn’t into the symbolism like this show is and was a tad boring. Soultaker on reflection is starting to grow on me a bit. Didn’t like it so much at first but on reflection, I think it’s decent if not great.

So I’m guessing this is another Flicker. Once again we are getting some pretty heavy symbolism with the lingering shot of the butterfly caught in the spider’s web. The butterfly is the flicker and the spider’s web is plotting of the Kirihara organization. These poor flickers are caught in a conflict they never asked for. Further we see the spider closing in on the trapped butterfly which has a pretty obvious meaning.

The Flicker’s name is Sayaka and accident at the start of the episode wasn’t part of her dream. It seems she was really saved by Kyousuke. She feels guilt over whatever happened. Kyousuke wonders about the reason his sister is being targeted but it seems Shiro doesn’t know or isn’t telling what he knows. His motivations remain a mystery at this point. I guess the sister is some kind of mutant and her power has something to do with creating the flickers. I’m not sure what that power would be but it’ll be interesting to find out.

I really liked that show at the hospital as they show the distorted shadows over the various bottles. This show is indeed full of different kinds of monsters. However, Kyousuke has proven to be the strongest and the toughest even if he retains more of humanity than the monsters he fights even if they are more human looking than his transformation.

Haha, silly fanservice shot with Komugi. For the moment she seems to just be observing although she does take the time to state the obvious of Kyousuke giving his life to protect the flickers as if all the crosses in the earlier episodes didn’t make that obvious. Now the question is to trust her or not. She says she quit the hospital and wants to help out but I find that pretty suspect. I do like her dialogue; love that burns away all sense of justice or righteousness is a pretty good line to describe Kyousuke. She does explain a lot that’s already obvious but her dialogue is still pretty nicely done. And it seems she has some kind of hypnotism power.

Again that hospital song made me laugh even if it was a bit eerie with the deformed students looking on. I think it was meant to be a bit creepy and it sort of works but the song is so silly it made me laugh.

Funny that Shiro questions why Kyousuke trusts Komugi when there’s really not much reason to trust Shiro. He’s made it obvious that he’s trying to manipulate Kyousuke to destroy the hospital and Kirihara group while leaving his motives unclear.

We get the cross again but this time with Christ actually nailed to the cross. However, the cross is turned sideways and maybe this will represent Kyousuke’s failure to protect Sayaka or maybe the music guy is going to make Kyousuke question what he is doing. Meanwhile it looks like Komugi has been knocked out and Sayaka is being chased by the man in flames from her dream. This is all probably connected to the music guy. I like that kind of power it’s interesting. He uses the guilt people feel to attack then or at least stun them so he can make the kill. Sayaka’s boyfriend probably died in the crash from the start of the episode and Sayaka is full of guilt over it.

So music guy is actually a bat mutant that can use sound waves to hypnotize people. It looks like we’re going to an aerial battle here as Kyousuke once again states his resolve to protect the flickers while. He bears the guilt of Maya’s death and uses it as his motivation. The image he saw of the flicker on the cross represents that guilt. So it seems the cross imagery is being used in more ways than one.

“This is your curtain call” that was a pretty cheesy one liner there Kyousuke. That was quick and brutal with the tearing open of the bat’s jaw. However, looks like the girl still isn’t safe as we see the spider is still alive in its web. I was going to ask how saving her from one attack would leave her safe but Komugi says Sayaka probably wasn’t reported. She’s a convenient exposition machine combined with fanservice. However, looks like Sayaka isn’t safe just yet.

Shiro is sure a manipulative bastard, now he’s working Komugi to get her to help destroy the searcher. Interesting they are assaulting the Kirihara group directly like this but I guess they have to because that searcher will make it impossible to protect the flickers. Meanwhile we get to see a different side of the hospital group. They do have normal patients that they care for but it seems they are being manipulated by the Kirihara group taking their funding in exchange for researching the flickers.

Kyousuke is protecting yet another flicker and now is in the Kirihara territory. Once again we see the cross motif as Richard makes his challenge to Kyousuke. We know from last episode that Kyousuke has found his resolve as he was able to break out of the hypnotism.

Interesting so Kyousuke and his sister were created through the hospital but they lost control of them at some point. It’s interesting that Richard doesn’t way Kyousuke to die just yet. It probably just means he wants to capture him to experiment on. The same goes for Runa, but no one knows where she is yet. The mutant at the beginning was probably talking about Kyousuke and Runa when he said kill them all before he died. The mutants were all part of the hospital’s experiments.

Uh oh, It looks like Richard can transform too. His form looks pretty badass and Soulcrusher is a pretty cool name, he’s not someone to fuck around with. Ouch, looks like Richard is going to be a tough opponent as he seems to know how to use his mutation to the strongest effect.

Finally, Shiro actually let something slip, he has a personal connection the Kirihara group through his sister. I dunno if I find Komugi annoying or not. Sometimes I think she’s a bit cute and funny, but she really does talk too much even if her talks usually do have more meaning than a normal fanservice character.

Shiro comes face to face with his sister and there it is again another cross. I wonder who’s sacrifice this one represents. Yui is standing right before a large red cross. Maybe it represents the siblings wanting to sacrifice each other for their own ambitions.

Here we go, Richard is going to force Kyousuke to see the truth. Apparently this is another power the mutants have or at least Richard can use. The opening eyeballs representing Kyousuke being forced to see the truth. Wow, okay, so the hospital was unwittingly administering the virus to its patients only the higher ups and Kyousuke’s real mother knew. Richard isn’t just cruelly experimenting on the flickers but trying to find a cure for the virus killing people. The mathematical equations during the flashback are another interesting bit of symbolism. A lot of the symbolism so far is religious, but the equations represent something different, the more logical scientific approach of the hospital. Kyousuke’s family the Toukisakas are responsible for all of this suffering and all to create the perfect mutant in Runa.

Hahaha, Kyousuke I am your father. Suddenly this went all Star Wars on me, but I like we have finally gotten some backstory here and even a hint for finding run. Kyousuke has to find his true mother if he wants to get his sister back. Wait where the hell are they? It looks like they’re up in some space station but how the hell did Kyousuke get up there?

Anyway this was a good episode. We go a lot of backstory, plus the first opponent that Kyousuke couldn’t just curb stomp with his lightning breaker. Also, Shiro and Komugi actually get to do something rather than sitting around watching Kyousuke do his thing. The plot has turned out more interesting than I initially thought.

There's not much to say in general. There are some nuances to plot progression here and there but the focus of this episode was pretty much the action. Also, I liked this one less than the first. Meh.

Shiro leaves Kyosuke behind to escape from the massive explosion in some kind of emergency jet. That new Doc character (who I guess is from Hospital too as he's with pink loli) saves him by... having a whale eat him up... okay? I guess he must be able to manipulate other living creatures, otherwise that's too random.

Then Shiro and Kyosuke meet up again (as for your question on how they met up, the place was probably that famous restaurant that Shiro was talking to Kyosuke about earlier in the island facility, so he figured Shiro'd be there). Afterwards Kyosuke heads for that random Japanese-themed amusement park with killer samurai cosplayers, shurikens and shit.

ZetsubouKaiji said:

Kyousuke is pretty dumb for just attacking head on like this, he’s really an annoying protagonist. All I get from him is obsessive love for his sister. It’s the most basic of characterization and not even all that well done.

Click to expand...

Kyosuke is my main gripe with the show right now. In the first episode he was simply boring (which I considered due to his disorientation, akin to the viewer's), but no, he's just boring in general as a character, and now they really overdid it with the Maya thing. Alright, in the first episode it made sense for him to feel in debt and go save the person who saved his life, but now he's so adamant and sensitive about it that it feels way heavy-handed. The fact she saved his life aside, they're complete strangers as far as Kyosuke is concerned (he doesn't even remember having a sister, if he ever did that is... this bit is too weird right now), and their screentime/interactions together were really scarce, so I don't buy that he's so involved in saving her like she's the most important thing in the world.

I guess that since we get to know they're connected mentally, together with the fact he's all alone now bar for her, that somehow justifies his actions, but still, really overdone. Particularly since the show really was expecting me to feel sad at Maya's death, even though she barely had any time to establish herself as a character to care for.


I want to think this couple episodes were an extended introduction to the world, the action, the setting and the basic elements that form the show, and that it'll begin to explain itself and unravel its mysteries in an interesting manner. This episode, other than some insight on how Kyosuke and Maya the Flicker were connected, adds nothing to the first's information and was basically action, melodrama, new random character appearances, and that's about it.

Oh, and the female doc died - whatever, since she was another silly villain like the psycho doc from Hospital in ep 1. All that "hurr durr Flickers are not humans hurr durr countless sacrifices are allowed hurr durr for science" was pretty painful to wade through. Here's hoping the next few villains popping up will be more fleshed out and interesting. I'm also wondering if the doc with the alcohol bottle who helped Shiro out was whale doc... hard to say, but I'm guessing yes.

ZetsubouKaiji said:

The subs I have for this show are just weird. They keep fucking up the names of the characters. He keeps saying Misaki but the subs show Maya.

Click to expand...

Yeah. I suppose they are official, localized subs for the show and they figured in English it was more natural for Kyosuke to call people by their first name instead of their last (Shiro and not Mibu, Maya and not Misaki...). If you ask me that's all cool and fancy in a dub, but with subs it's just plain silly as you're constantly hearing him say something the subtitles are not showing. Eh...

Some confusing action and Kyosuke's alleged sister shows up at last.

So the Kirihara Group is actually after Runa and their hunting down Flickers is just a handy means to get to her... I'm not sure about the logic behind those actions - first I'd have to know what a Flicker exactly is and what worth there is in experimenting on/dissecting them... I'm guessing they're mentally linked to Runa much as Maya was linked to Kyosuke?

Oh thank GOD they made it clear that Doc is from Hospital and Vice President is from Kirihara. Since that's where I placed each of them but their making deals with one another was making me doubt my assumptions. So these two organizations who fight on the surface have business behind the curtains... Hm. Not sure what of make of it just yet.

Runa seems quite a bit different now than when she was fighting those... whoever they were. I don't know if she can be trusted. Anyhow, she starts revealing a bit about the Flickers and how they're fragments of her soul. Apparently they are made from individual emotions of Runa, so Maya capitalized on some feelings and aspects of her personality different from those she's showing Kyosuke now--

Oh. Never mind, she is a Flicker too. Got to agree that she's more interesting than Maya so far. And if she's not lying about Kirihara at least now we seem to know they were the ones who killed Kyosuke's mother. Since they showed the robots in a quick flashback scene and all I doubt she's lying about what she saw, but still I'd expect a twist about the culprit being someone else, somewhere down the line. And just dropping this here but we still don't know what's exactly the deal with Shiro.

Now just when I thought this episode would be a calmer one... gunshots everywhere! I wish the action scenes were more momentous and not so sporadic and quick and irrelevant that they end up as mere anechdotes to carry the plot along.

Pink Loli needs to implode. That is all. She's annoying, random and kills the mood. And fuck that "normal girl" nonsense, I've heard that one too many times for comfort.


Kyosuke continues being boring, his dialogue and motivations are as basic as it gets for a shonen protagonist. I just hope the plot goes somewhere interesting with the murder mystery and the Flickers storyline, because I can't really count on this MC to provide the entertainment.

I thought Asuka would join the group, but in the end hers might have been a one-time appearance. She was quite more interesting than Kyosuke overall so that's a shame. I guess the ones who have more of my attention right now are Shiro and Kirihara's Vice President, the former for his mystery factor and the latter for being in a position of power and seemingly being ahead of everyone's game.

This episode shed a bit of light on what might really be happening behind the scenes and gave some more characterization to Flickers in general, but it wasn't really that relevant. Oh, and Pink Loli just resigned from Hospital so she might be joining the MC group soon enough... Ehhh.

The fuck was all that all about. I thought it weird that they were up in space last episode, but I kinda just ignored it because the plot was moving along. Now the anime is giving me some pretentious sounding dialogue that doesn’t help with my understanding because it’s hard to tell what’s metaphor and what’s real with this anime. Well, I guess this episode will go on to explain, but shit that was a dumb way to start the episode. And seriously, did I miss something? How the fuck did Kyousuke get up there? And don’t tell me he flew because that’s retarded.

Anyway, even if I don’t know how Kyousuke got up there, I know how he’s getting back down, falling head first after taking a beating from Darth Vader his father. He’ll of course survive, but I wonder if he’ll be captured by the Kirihara’s on the ground. Since Shiro and Komugi are captured as well it’ll be a way to get them all back together. Also, what about the flicker that he was helping on the space station? She got grabbed and that’s the last we saw of her. And then Kyousuke says he hopes she escaped safely? She on the fucking space station, where the fuck would she go?

Wow, these scenes are very stylized and disorienting. So I guess Megumi and this Zabo guy found Kyousuke and bandaged him up. He’s looking pretty good for someone that fell all the way back to Earth even taking into account that he’s a mutant. I wonder if these are some kind of vision he’s having from the way the perspective on all these shots are screwed up. Everything is being shown at weird angles and then the fanservice shots of Megumi. Once again we’re seeing that Shinbo style. I’m a little disappointed that Megumi did the whole, you can’t trust what hospital tells you, calling into doubt everything that we learned last episode to only minute later go, yeah it’s true I learned it from hospital guy Zabo. If the anime wants us to question the truth this wasn’t the way to go about it. Although it seems her entire purpose to try and make Kyousuke question himself. She calls into question his faith in god, his love for his sister and the flickers. Maybe she’s trying to set a trap for Kyousuke. She gets rather aggressive with her questions as she uses him as a model and her drawing of him makes him look a bit monstrous.

Well, I was pretty much expecting Megumi’s betrayal here and it’s revealed that Flickers are actually just clones of Runa to be used as decoys to keep Kirhara from catching her. Them being clones doesn’t make a ton of sense since they all have different personalities of looks. However, this does make me wonder if the flickers are like the homunculi in FMA: Brotherhood. Like each one represents a different aspect of Runa. In this case Megumi represents anger or maybe cunning and deception. Whereas the flicker in episode 3 represented the will to live and the flicker from episode 4 represented guilt or having a conscious. Maybe I am reading too much into this because the flicker from episode 5 didn’t get any screen time for a chance to read her personality and Maya the first flicker was just a victim. After finishing the episode it seems that Megumi represents betrayal and deception, maybe. It’s probably me reading too much into it because this episode actually felt mostly like a waste of time.

Once again we get the cross motif representing sacrifice as Megumi talks this time with bloody nails imbedded in them. You could probably make a pretty drinking game out of spotting crosses in this anime. The idea of sacrifice is pretty big in this anime, flickers sacrificed to protect Runa, Kyousuke sacrificing himself to protect the flickers even the brother sister conflict with Shiro and Yui had a giant red cross involved. Damn anime, did you really need to last show the image of the Last Supper? I freaking get it Kyousuke is Jesus and as you helpfully pointed out that would make Megumi Judas, but thanks for the close up of Judas in case I was too brain damaged to get what you were going for. There’s interesting imagery and then it’s having it shoved down your throat.

Talk about heavy fucking handed, this entire episode was to reinforce Kyousuke’s belief that humans exist because they believe in each other. After all of Megumi’s attempts to make him question himself and question his ability to believe, Kyousuke is able to stick to his guns. In concept this isn’t so bad, but to have it explained to be by two or three different characters wasn’t necessary and a bit annoying. Also, all the mumbo jumbo in the beginning meant they were still in space in a castle that Zabo built because he can do that. God, writing that makes it sound even more silly. Well anyway now they fight while Zabo goes on about how this is a true fight and you know what I don’t give a shit about Zabo or anything he has to say.

More interesting is the man in bandages. He’s popped up a couple of times before, just in the background. This is the first time we get to hear him speak as he explains to Megumi the lesson of this episode. Apparently he wants to protect the flickers. I thought he was with the hospital group, but maybe he’s another one that quit as he’s almost certainly a mutant.

Yeesh, this episode felt like a waste of time. There was a shitton of pointless fanservice and most of the dialogue and symbolism was heavy handed as fuck, which Is especially bad when the message was so simple and didn’t need an entire episode to convey. The only useful things we learn are the flickers were created to protect run and the Shiro/Kogumi team were able to destroy the flicker tracker. The rest of it was pretty meh, Megumi was there for cheesecake shots and Zabo was a pretty boring battle hungry archetype with a sense of honor. We learn nothing else about it and I don’t see why anyone watching this would care about that last fight.

You probably enjoyed this one more than I did. Probably because I generally don't like Pink Loli aka Komugi, whose addition to the main cast was the only thing that stopped #4 from being the episodic "flicker-of-the-week". I think it's not so much her lightening up the mood with her silly love and antics as the way she goes about it... plus it doesn't help that Kyosuke is of a boring one-track mind so the interactions don't mesh well there.

Actually, my favorite bit of the episode might have been Shiro stealing the strawberry with an uncaring face. Both him and Komugi are pretty similar in that, as you say, Shiro's motives and allegiance are not cut-clear either, so if any kind of interaction here with Komugi is going to work for me it'll probably be those two clashing over becoming some sort of right hand for Kyosuke while doubting the other's trustworthiness.

ZetsubouKaiji said:

I really liked that show at the hospital as they show the distorted shadows over the various bottles. This show is indeed full of different kinds of monsters.

Click to expand...

Heh, those reminded me (especially the ones in the walls) of Nightmare Before Christmas' Oogie Boogie.


Nice touch. I mean, everything that makes me think of my favorite childhood movie gets a plus in my book.

---
On the new Flicker's story, there's not much to it: accident happens, boyfriend asks for help, she can't help and is overriden with guilt thereafter. I did like how it came into play through her nightmarish imagery and the Hospital guy's powers. Still, I'll forget about the plotline itself soon I'm afraid.


The fight had its good and bad points. I too enjoyed the bit with the bat's jaw being torn apart. The cheesy 'curtain' line, though... God I was wondering when he'd walk away with a smoke while a stock western tune plays in the background. Also, this Lightning Breaker is getting sort of old - I'm the kind who thinks a "superhero" should have more than one finishing move.



Oh well, I'm criticizing it a lot but my overall impression of the show is that it's decent as well. The mystery stands, I fancy the animation style (it got less confusing to follow too) and I guess the characters, while nothing special, are serviceable to what in the end is just a corny hero tale with a dark edge.

space.

I'm glad that they're now getting around to explaining a lot of things at once. Such as the mutants' origins, Kyosuke's true family, Hospital's goals, Shiro's ties with Kirihara, etc.

It's just a shame that the exposition is very simplistic and uninspired, though. Uh, so, we guys from Hospital were living in peace when shit happened - that's all you need to know about us up 'till then. Someone was injecting patients with this Beta Pacillon virus because why not. I tried to look into it but... *cue 3-second flashback of him turning into a mutant*. People died, it was horrible. Your true mother experimented on herself because ambition and shit so now we're going to take revenge upon her sinless offspring. How could she betray ME, her husband?! Also I'm your father. I state it clearly just in case the narrative wasn't obvious enough about it.

I guess I'd have rather they cut down on the action scenes (really, when I said the Lightning Breaker was getting old I didn't mean you should make it "Double", guys...) and made Doc's version of the facts more extensive and involving. But other than that it was a nice episode, at least this is taking shape in setting, backstory and character interrelations - and it's good enough at it despite my earlier stab.

I guess Doc is no final boss material after this encounter. I wonder what his true intentions were in that fight: actually testing Kyosuke or just letting him live with a excuse for his outraged subordinates?

The biggest mysteries left right now are probably: a) what Kirihara is actually trying to achieve with the Flickers, or rather with Runa; and b) what Runa is actually like, if she's still around. I'm particularly interested in the latter because according to what Doc says she's the real guilty one they're after, whereas Kyouske is just as guilty simply because of their being family.


No idea about them being in space. After finishing the episode I thought they were in that bit of the Earth that was kind of shining orange, but your comments made me go "nope... space".

Fucking stop telling me how I’m supposed to feeling. Komugi is an absolutely worthless character. If the meeting between Kyousuke and his mother was really sad then let them show me it’s sad through their interaction rather than cutting to Komugi saying awww, sooo sad.

Wait, wait, wait now flickers aren’t clones? They’re Runa’s defense mechanism? What the fuck am I supposed to be believe here? This seems a more likely scenario but seriously anime, stop it. I don’t even know when to believe you anymore. Anyway after a laughable action scene with some overly sexualized nurses, Kyousuke suddenly believes everything Tsubaki tells him despite it running contrary to what his father said. Not that he needed to take Vincent’s words at face value, but dude, apparently didn’t learn anything from the betrayal last episode. Kyousuke seems be willing to believe anything a woman tells him whether it’s Komugi, Megumi or now Tsubaki.

Good job, Shiro, you just go ahead and question that zombie nurse that clearly can’t talk.

Ooof course, she’s yet another flicker because god forbid if we go an episode without one of those. I don’t even get this one. I thought flickers were reflections of Runa, but this one had the memories of Kyousuke’s mother which makes no damn sense. Right, she was able to create a Flicker with her mother’s memories, because she had a desire for a loving mother…waaaat? I mean I get how she could create one with the appearance of her mother but not with her memories since all Flickers are supposed to be a part of Runa and up until now all had her memories. So once again, can we trust the bare minimum we learned this episode? Also, what was Richard’s point in helping Kyousuke? And then he just left. None of this makes sense. This episode seems like another waste of time.

So the only thing we really got out of this episode was that Kirihara is trying to make some kind of monster, thing from collecting the flickers and Runa. Everything else was filler waste.

But from what I got, I see that we share the same problem with this series, and that is: blending serious story with too much random occurrences that just don't fit with the tone it's trying to achieve. If it was Gainax-like anime, then it would fit, but this time, however, having an attack of bizarre looking nurses after that "dramatic" scene just doesn't feel right in any way. After few episodes it was really hard to take this show seriously, and the way they implemented symbolism barely fitted with the things that were going on... it just looked like a mess.