天下制覇

 

Mmmmmmm business suits…

Impressions:

Hooray! Arguably a start to going back to being a show about slaying monsters and lighting things on fire. Okay, so Yuji had to punch a baby, and none of the action scenes were more than maybe 30-40 seconds at a time, but it’s a start. This is the kind of show I want to watch. If the rest of Margery’s flashback is more of the same, then hell, spend as many episodes on it as you want.

Don’t get me wrong, this is still more or less what Prism Ark’s action looks like on an off week, so Shana’s still got a ways to go before it wins itself back into my good graces, but this was a good start. The second half of the episode dragged on a bit. I find it hard to care about a naive kid when we know that this little story is going to end with everybody on fire and a tentacled monstrosity bisecting people at the head. I don’t even think that I caught the names of a single one of the flashback characters either. There’s the whiny kid and his dagger, the bartender and his watch, and the Crimson Denizen that has a parking meter for a head. I think somebody was drunk at the character design session for this episode. Was the clown from the first couple episodes too scary and they needed to scale it back to something meter maids conquer? Oh well. I suppose if I saw a parking meter in a trenchcoat and a fedora, walking around, I’d at least begin to doubt my sanity, if not make a break for the hills.

All in all, I was pleased with this episode. It wasn’t great, but it was certainly leaps and bounds closer to what I’d hope from Shana. The near total lack of Shana and Yuji may have had something to do with this as well. The main problem was that the second half of the episode dragged and dragged and dragged. When your endgame is “tentacles everywhere, everybody dies,” it’s probably best to fill the time between that with something aside from melancholy teenagers and world weary barmen. Personally, I’d have been a fan of an 80s fashion montage of Margery picking her new suit, but I suppose that I can’t always get what I want. 

Oh boy! Recycled footage! Okay, only that first shot is recycled. This time, the Silver tears into the villagers like the hellspawn that it is. Margery tries to stop it, but it turns towards her, full of eyes and miasma.

Magery wakes up from her nightmare on the bar and puts on her glasses. She wonders aloud what’s wrong with her and downs another drink.

Wilhelmina continues to spar against Yuji, forming the original Rinne that attacked him with her ribbons while Shana and Sato watch. Yuji runs in fear, but turns and attacks it, taking its punch with his own and blasting it away.

Wilhelmina says that he passes with a smile. Sato walks off, annoyed with something. Yuji and the Flame Hazes discuss his ever growing power and his progress. Essentially the same things they’ve said after every single other training session this season. They’re a little concerned, but things are still in hand for now and his training will be stepped up to making Barriers soon.

Back at the apartment, Wilhelmina pours over books looking for something. She finds it and is shocked… Pheles.

The next morning, Shana wakes up to Wilhelmina all packed up and ready to head out. At the Sato house, Margery is drunk as usual. Sato storms in and wants to have a word with her. He wants to be trained. She shrugs him off as usual, but he wants the power to fight with her and to go with her. He wants to become like her.

Margery turns serious and says that’s fine. She’ll tell him the story of the world that made her.

A man with a parking meter for a head stands on a bridge. A barrier forms around him and young Margery flies up. She immediately attacks, tearing the bridge to pieces. The Denizen retreats but doesn’t counterattack. He introduces himself and says that he already knows Marco and Margery Daw. Margery presses the attack and surrounds him with energy before blowing it up.

She thinks that it’s over, but a huge serpent erupts from the water and attacks. More heads come out, revealing it to be a hydra. It shrugs off Margery’s shots and slams her against a wall. After she falls, the hydra reverts to Sidonay. The Parking Meter man thanks him for helping out.

Margery is still conscious, but can’t move at all. The Parking Meter man wanders away to give a horrible speech about our the world is there for him and leaves things to Sidonay to clean up, though he just wanders off as well.

Marco appears near Margery as she finally gets up.

Her dress is totalled, so she strips and prepares to create new clothes. Through the barrier, a boy comes running up to her. She turns in surprise, giving him the full front view of her splendor.

Later, the kid explains that he’s a Flame Haze too. His partner is the dagger at his side. He wants to help Margery, but she wants nothing to do with a little wet-behind-the-ears punk like him. Even Marco gets in on taunting the dagger. He keeps begging and going on about Flames Hazes helping eachother and it gets tiresome quickly for Margery and myself. Margery thinks that he’s quite a strange Flame Haze, but agrees to hang out with him for now.

Over at the bar, Margery shoots the breeze with a Flame Haze bartender. They don’t talk about anything particularly interesting. Most of it is about the kid and that the bartender doesn’t really have any clue what was going on with the Denizens or the like. Margery doesn’t express any particularly insightful thoughts  either, she just needs to cut all the Denizens up.

Later, Margery does the rounds with the kid staring at her ass. She remembers what Parking Meter-head said and drifts off while the doofus tries to hand her a drink. The two take refuge in a park for a little while. The two talk about how unforgiveable the Denizens are, yada yada stealing families, so on so forth. The kid apparently really hates the Denizens and his dagger needs to remind him that Flame Haze need to keep the balance.

After his little outburst, he tells Margery about how he came to America on a big boat that was attacked by a kraken. Everybody was taken from him by that Denizen. He was powerless to save anybody. Now though, he has power and he will save people. Margery sighs and yells at his dagger. It says that it understands.

Margery makes a decision and yells at the brat that he’s forbidden from following her anymore. This is a direct order and not to be disobeyed. He tries to reach for her as she strides away, but she grabs his hand and throws him to the ground.

Parking Meter Head makes another generic speech at night while in the Empire State Building.

Margery angrily wanders around the city, repeating the boy’s wishes and hopes as naive dreams.

Parking Meter Head removes his hat and bows to the people in the lobbey. He raises his hands in triumph. Margery casts her barrier and moves in.