天下制覇

Okay.

Impressions:

That was… uh… anticlimactic? The fight didn’t even begin until 8.5 minutes into the episode, and was over less than 2 minutes later. Perhaps any time spent trying to build up this character for the last two months could have been better spent. Heck, the transformations may have been longer than it. And yes, they did have to include a flashback. My brain certainly retched a little when the first thing emblazoned on the screen was "NOW BEGINNING FLASHBACK." I think it may have been longer than the fight too. Certainly felt that way. I guess my point is that I’m not exactly feeling like they know what they’re doing here with the pacing and I highly doubt that they do either. There was also a distinct lack of self-awareness there considering Ryuko’s ‘humbling’ fight a month or so ago was against pretty much the exact same thing, except instead of science eyes that predict her every move, it was magic eyes that predict her every move. I guess the magic makes all the difference.

So about 14ish minutes into the episode, we move on to the other fight… for about 2 minutes of mostly posing before it’s time for her obligatory time padding flashback. I guess once it dragged itself back to reality it was briefly okay, but the ass pull at the end of the episode left a pretty sour taste in my mouth. So did the whole "I’ll just blow up the arena and win by default," but "by the way, I’m also a jetpack" was the kind of thing I expect from something like Aqua Teen Hungerforce. At the very least, if you’re going to pull a whopper like that straight from the anus, don’t preface it with a minute or two of trying to build up the tension just to rewrite your rules on the spot.

Next Episode:

Uh, who?