Koukaku no Pandora: Ghost Urn – 10

You may meow use lethal force…

The action heats up when Clarion faces off against a powerful enemy, and Nene….cleans Takumi’s house? Really? Is that what she did? Let’s see…

We Can Play This Game…

Well that sucked! Wonder what’s on Grimgar this week?

Oh no! Clarion is down and out! What are we gonna do? Let’s cut away to to other characters shall we? Yes, lets, I’ll bring the cake, you bring the tea! Which is pretty much where the shows direction goes all things considered; a smart move, and I’ll discuss that that one a bit later on in the post. But for now, let’s follow the progress. Last time we learned that Clarion was going to follow all her instructions to the hilt, which included instructing Nene to not get involved, as the ultimate form of protection, perhaps leaving her out of the “dirty business” that sometimes makes up keeping the peace.  How good is she, Nene, at listening to this?

He’s Mr. Cat for a Face!

…pretty good up to a point. But a little bit of play time with Amy (where her cat companion is stuck on her mind), and a chance meeting with Altman (where all she can talk about is Clarion) and some thinking time on her own(plus a bit of plot assurance, and technical insurance from little Buer) prove to change her mind to challenge Clarion after all.

I thought it was interesting that Altman’s problems and her’s paralleled each other. With both of them getting involved in the action, it will prove troubling for the people they care about greatly, and for both it means stepping out of a large shadow and on their own, risking and risking what they perceive to be a status quo relationship.

For Nene, this is a singular action, with her being perhaps a little ignorant of all the ramifications. She doesn’t know exactly what she has to do, only that she must, as all anime characters must, “move forward”. For Altman, this involves his fellow officers and subordinates, who have also grown tired of being fairly powerless in the face of the Imperial Armies’ presence, and are rather champing at their bits to get the order to act.

The romantic subtext is fine, but even then it’s best to be equals

But for both Nene and Altman it involves informed consent. Altman won’t order them to step out of the technical line, but will take volunteers. This leave us with Nene needing to inform Clarion that she isn’t entirely incapable, either with her cyborg defender or without.

Which makes what Nene felt about her own cyborg body that much more hard on her; she feels she’s been given more than she’s earned. This doesn’t mean that she still should get help from Clarion, but she shouldn’t count out her own merits to her “cat prince” so soon and so quick. If we only knew a bit more about Altman, other than that he’s “just doing what feels natural” I could balance him out a bit as well.

FK YA Kickass LOLi

I really have enjoyed how they’ve directed these past two episodes. This weeks give us a “catch-up cold open” from last week; the moment before one on one combat broke out. But instead of continuing it, they cut to the other action, with the implication that Clarion was not able to defeat the mini-boss. Heck, they played us that card twice. One on hand that’s a good way to underscore the action and it’s consequences; the uncertainty is there once the fight commences.

But on the other, it could be to much coverage, leading to a reveal that doesn’t balance the scale. Which side the conclusion falls on is for next time. But the twist with silly Bunny-san was silly. It exactly the type of thing Clarion couldn’t prepare for, and yeah, it worked to pull her out of her game state, thus giving that fight the wrinkle it needed. Still it was a forced bit of writing and I feel a bit put off by it (in as much as Vli__ and her weird ass exposition). With the android mini-boss it was fine, as we didn’t know if he was alive and thus under Clarion’s orders not to use lethal force.

What’s underneath?

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There were quite a few little moments I loved with made the episode stick out. I enjoyed the “tennis match” inside Takumi’s mind as she’s being constantly reminded that her and Clarion’s association in the current endeavor is temporary no matter how much she cheers her on (for obvious reasons) and also feels at odds because of “the puppet'” mistress and that they really are competitors. I also liked how she tried her best to shield Nene from any complications, even though I think that is misguided. It shows she’s on uneven ground and that Uzal, even though “passed on” is more crazy prepared than any of them.

Stupid Stupid Bunny!

We’re probably going to see the fallout of all these odd alliances over the next two (three?) episodes. I hope they can build a bit more into the body of the story. The layer of flesh is alright, and the muscles flex rather well, but it really feels like were missing some sinewy bits here and and there. It has a nice backbone, but needs a touch more structure to make it complete. They’ve done good with a partial picture, but now it’s time to pull out and show a larger world. The yuri antics are fine, too.