Guilty Crown – 03

Gai- “Yes, I would like twenty large pizzas and a diet coke. I gotta watch my figure…”

I hope at the end of this show that the Guilty Crown is a real crown. Not just any crown, but a solid gold bitching-ass crown that turns Shu into a pimp. Yep, I should totally be an anime director!…Or not. Let’s see what the actual directors came up with this week.

So after missing episodes one and two, I finally get to join Fosh for Guilty Crown! It’s been pretty good so far, but now Inori is going to school with Shu. School=School Scenes=Slice of life. Slice of life is pretty iffy with me, so we’ll see how this goes.

You have made it to the third episode! Congratulations you can get a cookie or in case of this series a giant mecha! You just have to wait until those actually exsist… Anyway Twitter was exploding with some mixed reactions on this third episode, and the series in general most hate it or enjoy it. What about you? Still having fun? This week I’m joined by OC and Kara for a fun tag review. Plot this week follows Inori joining Shu at school and moving in with him. Before anything can happen between them, they are quickly summoned to help Gai and the Undertakers on a special mission. Their mission is to find a witness named Sugar at his school who saw the recent events with the Undertakers and Inori along with Shu. This Sugar person is also selling a drug called Norma Gene, so Shu uses his void power on a few random students until he finds him and figures out his true identity.

Shu- “Sigh… again no new twitter followers… I want friends too!”

Starting out on a random moment, Shu sits up stunned and shocked that Inori is joining him at school, but really he tries to ignore the fact that she is around. However, a few students recognize her right off as the idol girl from Egoist, well she has PINK hair! Can’t you tell that is main character material right there? Inori seems to fit in quite well with the rest of the students because she is really freaking quiet. After school ends, Inori starts staying at Shu’s place; I can also smell the fan rage over this whole scene. And of course we have Inori getting dressed without a care in the world even if Shu saw her or not, or killer robot who’s the tsundere of this series for now.

Students- “Dude, she has pink hair!!”                                Inori-“….I will murder everyone in this school.”

Robot- “I will rip your face off if you peek at Inori again!”                Shu-“Damn… what got up your USB…?”

Meanwhile in plot developing land, we join the GHQ as they discuss Norma Gene and Major Sengai. This drug also has a connection to the Apocalypse virus vaccine. Major Sengai is a crazy dude; not as messed up as Daryl but he really loves science. He just loves to kick back and hang around your house, just don’t give him rope… Back at Shu’s amazing house. Damn does it ever look cool, Inori gets a message from Gai and the two of them head out to meet up with him after they bump into Yahiro a friend of Shu’s from school.

Major Sengai- “Oh look at this a cute kitten video… And now I have to kill someone…”

Gai- “Dude, stop giving me that creepy smile.”                 Shu- “Sorry! I got lost staring at your awesome hair….”

The mission that Gai sends Shu on requires him to find someone with a code name Sugar. This witness saw the recent events between the GHQ and Undertakers along with what Shu and Inori did together. Gai reveals he has a power too, the ability to see people’s “void” and sends Shu out to find them at his school. What takes place is a hilarious adventure as Shu uses his power on random students! He even grabs some chick’s boob. Yes, Shu is cursed; his hand is magnetized right for breasts. After countless failures, he finds Yahiro who happens to be Sugar! DUN DUN DUNNNN! Well he pulls out a weapon from Yahiro and Inori draws a gun to shoot him but Shu pulls the friendship-is-power card and stops her from killing his friend. Yahiro agrees to keep his mouth shut about Inori and Shu’s involvement with the Undertakers. The episode comes to an end while everyone is on a train together and Yahiro pushes Shu out after a short stop, and he stands right in front of the GHQ along with Major Sengai. I bet Shu really hates his friendship with Yahiro right about now…

Shu’s failed impression of Touma’s Imagine Breaker aka the breast breaker!

Yes, Shu’s void power swings both ways! Watch out boys!

Shu- “So what the hell kind of a weapon is this? Looks like Yahiro plays a lot of halo.”

Inori- “Damn, you have a better looking gun! Wanna trade?”            Shu- “HELL NO! THIS IS AWESOME!”

Yahiro-“Sorry dude, you are off my friends list.”              Shu-“Oh NOT COOL BRO! SO NOT COOL!“

Major Sengai-“Ooooooh! A new science project to play with.”               Shu-“….help…..”

Extra Crown fun

Shu needs an episode of MTV cribs! Like seriously, nice place.

Yahiro- “Dude, I thought we were watching Sekai-ichi together?”          Shu- “Not right now, I changed my preferences.”

This shot is all for you, fangirls of Gai! Enjoy.

Inori- “This is funny because you are dying slowly.”                   Shu-“I….hate…you….so….much.”

FOREVER ALONE.jpeg

End Thoughts

Guilty Crown is still keeping up the same status quo as always – typical plot and wondrous execution. This episode scarcely diverged from your typical school life rom-com anime, which was a little disappointing to say the least. You can check off accidental boob grab, girl moving in with the boy, girl stripping in front of the boy, and even girl becoming incomprehensibly attached to the boy on the list of generic plot points. It is beyond me why this girl is so fond of a man who consistently thrusts his arm into her chest. She may have no memory of it all, but she should be able to put two and two together since she works for Gai. Hopefully there is some explanation about that. Perhaps something to do with why she has no friends or how she acts like she’s a hop-skip away from falling into a coma?

One thing they cleared up is Gai’s special ability: scoping out other people’s Voids. It would have been nice if he had told them beforehand that he knew Daryl’s Void was (conveniently) a device that reflects projectiles. I had just assumed it was a crappy plothole, but now it’s been filled. Gai’s power should work perfectly in tandem with Shu, but I can’t see the two working together all buddy-buddy at all. Shu is just going to have to trust what Gai says and shove his hand into people when Gai says go. …Wow, that doesn’t sound wrong at all. Anyways, Gai is a rather shady character for someone that’s supposed to be leading a rebellion for the good of the people. I guess the reason people are so split on whether Undertaker is good or bad is because of his brash methods. To me, both sides seem like they’re just destroying everything and I wouldn’t want to side with either of them. I don’t blame Yahiro for haphazardly joining the “bad” guys.

Yahiro being the one with the shear Void was painfully obvious. Once again, this show isn’t the best at the subtle art of storytelling. One thing I did really like was how Yahiro turned on Shu at the end of the episode. Slightly unexpected, and an important lesson in how the world is not a safe, friendly place for you to let down your guard. At this rate, Shu is going to remain a spineless, anti-social wimp who is unable to trust anyone. I don’t mind him being a bit on the overly sensitive side, but his characterization has been getting less and less consistent. Okay, we get that he’s sensitive, there is no need to give us a scene of him moping over being called a ‘baka.’ Seriously? Can you imagine if Inori was a tsundere? He’d be called baka so much I think his poor little heart would stop. Don’t go out of your way to prove to me what personality he has and how he’s growing, just tell the story naturally. Oh well, at least he has a personality. That gives him a one up over Inori.

Okay, so that wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. Hell, I didn’t even mind that there were no awesome mecha scenes. Sure they had the whole crowd the new person thing going on (and it was even worse thanks to Inori being an idol), but at least there wasn’t a big deal about Shu hanging out with her. Normally there’d be some annoying fan club out for blood if some unknown guy started hanging out with the popular new girl. The slice of life part wasn’t that bad either (though I had to cringe during the groping part). Silly shounen protagonists and not looking where their hands are.

I don’t think they could have chosen a more obvious person to end up being Sugar (though watching Shu go around groping people was kind of hilarious). He leant Shu a video about shears for one thing and he even said straight out that it was good that Shu never joined the Undertakers. Though I’m glad that Shu actually figured it out for himself as opposed to being surprised when it was revealed. I can’t say that I like Shu being so hesitant, but at least he has a brain (as further proven when he figured out Gai’s power). I’m also interested in how Shu’s relationship with his mother will turn out. Parents in anime are rare and aren’t really around that often. Shu’s already on his way to joining the side opposing where his mother works so I hope they play on that relationship later on.

There was a lack of that insane blonde guy from last episode, but THAT SUIT. Gai should wear those more often. Though his face was RIGHT ON THE NEWS and now he’s walking around in public? I’m not entirely sure if that’s a good idea. That news thing totally reminded me of Code Geass though. I can see why some people are comparing this anime to that, but Guilty Crown still has some pretty unique things to it. Like pulling out a refrigerator from some guy’s chest! I can safely say that I have never seen that before now. Anyways, looking forward to the next couple episodes since it looks like Inori will actually get a personality thanks to her inner heart being shaped like a sword. Or at least she’ll get an episode dedicated to her past or something like that. However, for now I guess Shu needs to deal with the government arresting him (why wasn’t Inori pushed off the train as well? She’s waaay more involved than he is. Hell, he hasn’t even officially joined the Undertakers yet).

Whoa this episode! I know a few people did not like how predictable it was and I would agree with them. I saw the whole thing with Inori moving in with Shu from a mile away! After all she is the mysterious transfer student. I was going to make an Evangelion comment here because it’s a lot like Asuka after she moves in with Shinji but Inori isn’t super aggressive like Asuka. Inori is very short and to the point even when asking for food, she is a really starting to be robotic maybe she is a machine!? But at least she had more lines this time. Sadly Inori will still be a boring character for me, I don’t think we will see any real “emotions” from her unless she snaps and goes all yandare on us! She did make the comment about protecting Shu…

Another new character introduction! With Major Sengai who appears to be a hired hand to deal with certain things. I feel bad for Shu because he might be in for a world of pain! However I think Gai will pull a random plan out of thin air and rescue him in a fantastic way involving mecha and fan service, of course. It was nice to see more of the GHQ side of things even if it was like five short minutes? But hey more insane characters! Well Major Sengai doesn’t appear to be insane or anything special but we might find out more about him next week.

And now for the laugh out loud moment! The whole section with Shu running up to the random students at school and trying out his void power on them, I wasn’t expecting to laugh but I did and that void refrigerator? Ahahah that was amazing! And I can’t forget Shu grabbing the chest of that random chick; you are so terrible at using that power… And last! Learning about the mysterious Sugar, who was actually Shu’s friend? They didn’t do a great job hiding that well; after he showed up at the house like that I was like it’s YOU! And sure enough he was evil. But damn that ending scene was pure WTF as he pushed Shu off the train. I guess you have bad luck with friends huh, Shu? Oh and something new I discovered in Shu’s room, you see a shot of a duck on fridge right? And then we get a shot of a girl holding a clipboard with the same duck! I think she might be either Shu’s mother or a friend of his family.

Preview

Inori- “Help…I have fallen and got stuck in a weird pose.”

More fun next week! What will happen to Shu and will Inori ever get off that train? Find out next week!