“We can’t be certain of anything any more” -Ao Fukai

Summary: With Generation Bleu left in an uncertain limbo after the events from week, Team Pied Piper prepares to launch before the Allied Forces attack. Ao takes the Nirvash to recover the Quartz Gun from the basement. The Americans attack but before they can do any real damage, a huge explosion from inside headquarters rips the building apart, exposing a mountain of Quartz with Ao and the Nirvash right in the think of it. Ao grabs the Quartz Gun after declaring that he’s no longer afraid of it, at which point it absorbs all the left over Quartz (? either that or it magically makes it all vanish into thin air). Ao goes eye to eye with the Allied Forces but is stopped by Team Harlequin, who managed to escape the deadly explosion in space and (pretend?) to switch sides.

Team Pied Piper high tails it out of there, but they miss out on some action when Truth emerges from the wreckage with a new top-secret IFO/mecha/thing (code name: Cannon) that he has combined with. He jets off to do god knows what. Team Pied Piper is faced with the problem of having no where to land safely, when the Japanese unexpectedly announce that because of a contract negotiated between Christophe, the Secret, and themselves, they’re willing to provide support for the team.

Impression:  “We can’t be certain of anything any more” pretty much summarizes how I feel about this episode. Coming off of episode 19, I was totally ready for a big fight between the Americans and what is left of Generation Bleu in a final ramp up to the ultimate face off between Ao and Truth (who clearly wasn’t destroyed in the explosion caused by Christophe). With only 4 more episodes to go, it seemed like a good time to start wrapping things up. So this episode just seemed…like a copout? It seems very late in the game to continue to raise questions instead of starting to answer some. First and formost in my mind after this episode is: What was up with that one solider with the crazy eyes who was claiming to be able to see Trapar? It was such a short clip, and hardly touched on at all but it seemed like a very important moment. Is it a side effect of people starting to get sick from the Scub Corals? I’m honestly curious to see where they go with that.

*See Final Thought*

And then Truth fusing with that new super-powerful Mecha? He’s starting to remind me of a boss in a video game that you have to face multiple times through out the game, and then at the end he’s like “JK, this is my real final form! MWAHAHAHAHA!” I can’t think of a specific example (maybe Ganon from Legend of Zelda?), but you all know what I’m talking about right? At this point, I’m pretty sure he’s indestructible. The Mecha, Cannon/IFO-0/Archetype whatever you want to call it, is a big mystery too. I chuckled a little at how weird Truth looked attached to it like a mechanical IFO centaur. We definently see theEnd in that pile of Quartz right before it get’s blown up (much to the dismay of everyone everywhere). How did it get to this world? and When? and if it exploded in the past…then wouldn’t it not exist in the future…? Elena deffecting to the Allied forces was the most unexpected part of the episode. What up with that? and the mask?

Pretty sure that by all rights that ship should not have survived that blast.

This episode also featured the return of Team Harlequin. No wonder they glossed over their “deaths” last episode. That should have been a major clue that they weren’t going to actually be dead. If there is one thing that I flipping hate, it’s when they kill off a character (or characters) and then bring them back. Especially when they bring them back one episode later. Again, I wasn’t the biggest Team Harlequin fan, but still, mass explosion with hundreds of dead (some of them kids) for no real reason other that Truth being an asshole is sad. So when they come back the next episode, totally unscathed, it makes my emotions feel used and dirty. And my emotions, those few that I have, don’t really like feeling like cheap $20 prostitutes. Anyway, I went back and looked at that explosion scene again, and there must have been a miracle because that explosion was massive and it totally got their ship. Unless they have warp speed, there’s just no way they could have escaped that without a scratch.

sigh I’ve decided to stop thinking so hard about all the details because I don’t really want my head to explode. From now on I’m just going to let it wash over me and roll with it. I’ve got my fingers crossed that this show doesn’t turn out like Lost or The X-files; promising answers and then not delivering. For all the problems that I have with this show, I’m still excited to see where all of this is leading. There were some good parts to this episode; like Fleur breaking down and morning for her dad (gosh, that makes me sound like horrible person). I also liked that Ao seems to finally be getting control of his feelings towards the Quartz Gun, although he still can’t seem to bring himself to use it.

Next episode looks like hologram!Eureka will be back, and I’m hoping we’ll get some answers about…anything really. Anybody have any new theories after this episode? My new theory is that the whole show is all the delusions of an autistic kid playing with a snow globe (give yourself a gold star if you get that reference).

Final Though: So, who do you think this guy is going to be? Some people seem to be leaning towards Dominic (why and how would he have traveled through time? It seems like only Eureka (and Eleana who got taken with her) has mastered that art, so I’m saying Dominic is out), others are saying Renton (not likely) but if there’s one thing I’ve learned from this show, it’s that you can never be too sure of anything. Personally I think it might be some kind of ancestor of Renton. He strikes me as the type who might finally sit Ao (and us, the viewers) down and explain some stuff.

I think this is the first time I can remember where the animation just looked…bad. That CGI thing is not working in your favor (and looks soooo out of place).

This Post Has 7 Comments

  1. Vantage

    If you’re referencing both Zelda and facing the same boss multiple times, then the king of content reuse, Skyward Sword has to be the perfect example. Both Ghirahim and the Imprisoned, three times. Especially the latter – it was bad enough with arms, then it just had to grow a tail, wings and a halo. Fun xD

  2. Tenderfoot

    The Imprisoned! Yes! That is a perfect example. I hated that thing with the fire of a thousand suns. By the third time I had to fight it (when you have to shoot at it with the cannon for the first time) I was like “Yeah, I’m so done with this.” and that was about where I quit.

  3. Wanderer

    I’m suspecting they are going to remove that ship in the blu-ray version to show it wasn’t destroyed. Either that or they explained the ship being damaged but wasn’t fatal. (probably fixed a bit by BBB before they appeared)

    Personally though, I’m kinda tired of things keep on going kaboom in space. Seriously, unless its related to power and explosives, getting hit by objects in space is not gonna cause booms or dust debris. You’ll see walls getting penetrated or impacts, but unless those so called debris are mini-explosives, they shouldn’t detonate like that upon contact

    The thing with the adults, I’m suspecting its the increased influence of the scub corals. It could have been that kids, with weaker immune system than the adults, are easier to invade for the corals. However, now that even the adults are being influenced with overexposure? (either that or the US army did something to them to increase coral influence?)

    As for the mysterious man, not sure, but it is most likely not Renton since I’m suspecting the mysterious person in the OP is Renton, so the appearances doesn’t match.

    Btw, who thinks Noah Helmet is a win?

    1. Tenderfoot

      Noah Helmet is a total win. They should really work on getting an official one into production (or a winter hat, that would be almost even better), because I would buy that. Because if there’s one thing that’s been solid for me since the beginning of the show, it would be Noah.

  4. Bystanding

    Between the whole 22 episodes rumour (which the official TV listings seem to verify, actually – they’re listing Episode 22 as the ‘final’ episode of AO), and some of the shoddy animation popping up here and there in the recent episodes, AO may well be having some Gainax problems with its endgame funding. I’m seriously hoping it either gets the full 24 episode run (maybe a 23-24 omnibus a la Code Geass) or a continuation of some sort (which they might need, given the complexity of the series development – though if it’s to end up like DTB2 I’d rather it just not happen altogether). In my dreams, I see a full 50 episode run of two series but dreams are nice like that.

    This episode took trolling to a new level though :I I’ve been waiting to see if Devilfish and theEND pop up for around twenty episodes now – first I see a gleam of silver, only to find that it’s Harlequin, and then I see theEND only to find that it’s obliterated. Blegh. I’m really finding it hard to believe that they’re not going to do anything with it – either Kanon is somehow related to it (probably, hopefully not) or they’ll bring it back properly later (mmm…)

    As for why Elena decides to go over to the Allied Forces, that’s not too difficult; since the materialisation of the Quartz Gun, her eyes have been on that, and if Ao’s not going to fire it she’s probably intending to take it by force and do it herself. Still think she’s Anemone’s daughter by the hair, though the way the whole Anemone-Dominic thing got like two seconds of air-time in theEND being destroyed in this entire series seems to imply that the director doesn’t really care for it.

    No idea who the guy sitting there is. Hair looks like Dominic, people want it to be Renton, or it might be Truth pretending to be someone else again. Which might be a problem, since transforming back into his giant-mech fusion form inside a room will take half the house with him. It won’t be Renton, because Bones are being arses about that.

    My biggest worry is pretty simple; I can see many different directions this series could end in, but I can’t see how they can manage it in four episodes without botching it (let alone two). I’m really hoping that this sudden (and not verified as of today) reduction to 22 episodes isn’t because of scheduling problems and budget issues and is because they’ve managed to secure an extension of some kind at a later date, but that’s probably a pipe dream.

    1. Tenderfoot

      Good to see that I’m not alone in the boat of worrying about how this show is going to end. In an ideal world, there would be a second season, but yeah, I don’t really see it happening either. But we can dream right? Everything I’m reading is still pointing to 24 episodes, and that’s still what I’m hoping for, even if two of them aren’t aired but released on the Blue-ray disc instead. I’ve also read that there’ll be an OVA but don’t quote me on that. I’m crossing my fingers that they’ll prove me wrong and pull off great ending (I’d even take a marginally okay ending, just as long as there aren’t too many things left hanging.)

      I feel like, because it’s been so long since I watched the original series, I’m the only person who doesn’t really care about theEnd essentially being a giant exploding red herring (I’m a baaad fan, I know). I think it’ll probably end up being related to Kanon in some way, but this show throws a mean curve ball so I’m not going to say I’m willing to take bets on it. As to Elena, some how I get the feeling that her defecting to the Allied Forces is just a ruse to maybe gather information for Generation Bleu to use? My latest theory on Mystery Guy is that it could be a younger Johansen, who traveled through time like Eureka. Or maybe someone related to him who can explain some more about his book? I have so many questions…regardless of how good/bad the show is, I still can’t wait for next week :3

      1. Bystanding

        The OVA’s slightly different, it’s a Blu-ray bundle with a single slightly extended comic-relief episode set fairly early in the series 😛 As far as the episodes are concerned, this is what worries me:
        http://cal.syoboi.jp/tid/2471/time
        This seems to list ep. 22 as the last one, don’t know where that comes from. I really hope they don’t have to cram the last two onto the Blu-ray; again, a two episode bundled-together thing like Code Geass would be entirely fine. But yeah, like you, at the end of the day all I want is an ending that does justice to a series that was really a lot better than what I expected at the beginning of it all.

        wrrryyyyy theEND has two massive laser cannons
        In all honesty, my real issue with that decision is the fact that by the end of the first series, it became more than a killing machine and something more akin to Type Zero in that its archetype had a bit of a personality. It just seemed a bit too brutal to kill it off like that. As for Kanon, well, aside from the horrendous aesthetics it just seemed like a bit of a pointless decision unless they have something planned for theEND later on, since using the latter would have been a lot more canonically interesting and fan-satiating.
        Eh, I’m not sure. I don’t think Elena was ever as attached to Generation Bleu as the others; to her, what happens in this reality is irrelevant insofar as what she wants is to return to hers. That might change over time, but I don’t see how the current direction she’s developing in can really bode well for GBleu.

        Possibly, though that’s a bit of a cheap plot mechanic for explaining the story 😛 I think another point we might want to consider is – who died? That incense isn’t up for no reason, and Eureka disappeared a long time ago. Given that I can’t think of anybody who died recently inside any of the Okinawan/Japanese households (unless Nakamura dies during the next episode) and we don’t know who this person is, this might actually be an Acperience sequence.

        As for that final point, I can’t argue with that >.< (especially with my other two weekly anime on Tokyo MX ending this week)

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