Cross my heart, hope to die-
stick a needle in my eye.
Summary:
Yukimura returns to the castle, and everyone is winding down from a hard journey. A supposedly quiet night is shattered by people sneaking into each other`s rooms; Saizou wants to find out what Yukimura is up to by collecting 10 powerful fighters; Anastasia wants the secret-keeping eye that Rokuro is charged with protecting at all costs.
Impressions:
This was about Anastasia’s breasts alliances.
No kidding.
Drama, drama, drama! Anastasia is a SPY!?! She’s actually not that interested in working with Yukimura…only stealing the secrets. Now that everyone know each other, it’s hard to take down a member of the team when they go renegade, and that hesitation is what took down the team. Sasuke hesitated and got a blast of Anastasia’s ice breath. Rokuro, on the other hand…
…was faithful secret-keeper until the end. Just when Anastasia tries to extract the eye from Rokuro, he rams the needle in so that he loses the eye. UGHHHHH. D: Rokuro was so powerful in a fight, how can he be taken out so easily? This inconsistency irked me, and since Rokuro is usually the one protecting Yukimura, I was surprised that Saizo got so close to him.
The other reigning theme was the lack of “family” for the characters; Isanami only has a surrogate brother that only sometimes understands her, Benmaru is an orphan, Anastasia is a ninja with a broken past. How does this group even band together, when they’re all so different? I guess that’s their strength, and their weakness. No wonder they’re fighting all the time. Isanami’s headpiece is explained this episode, so it’s going to become important in the next 3 episodes. The despair she feels triggers the destruction. The origin of the darkness, or other side is pretty sad, and it was sealed to protect/control its power. The Sanada Braves all have “elements” that they’re associated with, and together, they can harness the darkness.
The darkness isn’t necessarily Isanami’s fault, though. She goes through the same trials as everyone else, but she’s not battle-ready, which is why she can’t deal very well. Anastasia was her friend, and being betrayed like that, after being so raw from everything changing so fast around her, it takes a lot to get through that. The darkness is eating away at her rather than the things around her, which is new. The way that other people treat her will help turn the tide for their side. I just felt this was a really strong episode, drawing on how you feel for each character to understand their motivations. The one big draw is that every a character is unique; not like some school life anime with a blob of girls. They all have a past, a history, a mission- and that’s what sustains them, sustains me watching it. And it works, to some degree. I’m not saying Brave 10 is a good anime, on the grand scale of things, but it has it’s value points and strengths. Even with the terrible character designs for historical figures like Date Masamune (his image is forever ruined in my mind “OTZ).
Will Isanami be a goddess of destruction? Or just an ordinary girl with a lot of power, is used properly? I actually want to see the first one, actually…if only for a little while- because I know the Sanada Braves will pull through together, no matter what.
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