Samurai Flamenco Episode 14: Yet Another Twist!

IT’S ANOTHER BIG ONE

Hazama uses his appearance on TV to let the nation know about From Beyond’s all-out attack, and right after that influential Japanese like politicians, people in the press etc get calls from From Beyond to tell them that From Beyond will launch it’s all-out attack the next day! Despite the public going berserk with the news at first, a calm Hazama later pleads with the public to calm down (which surprisingly works). Meanwhile Goto passes the Mari baton on to the MMM girls, although Mari isn’t too happy about it.

During the attack as the Flamengers are almost overpowered we see Red Axe make his return, along with all his ‘friends’ – actual superheroes from all that super sentai stuff airing on TV! Harakiri Sunshine and the rest are all real! (or something) and they’re here to help save the day. However, as the episode draws to a close, the Flamengers receive a call in the middle of battle, requesting that Hazama meet a certain member…

Lemme just say that I CALLED IT! I CALLED IT MOFOS! It was clear from last week that we were going to get something huge this week (how huge no one can tell, especially after the Gorilla incident) but W O W. WHAT WAS THAT? But before that though, this week was a pretty interesting one even without the plot twists. The most interesting thing for me this week (aside from the twists) was in fact Mari meeting the MMM girls again. At this point I must say that Mari really isn’t a nice person at all. She’s selfish, conceited, forceful and takes things for granted – there really isn’t much to like about her other than her looks and musical talent. To see Moe, who forces Mari to really realize just how much of a scum of a person she is hurts, should not be a nice feeling of course, but she really didn’t need to treat someone who got tortured for her sake like that.

She’s also clearly thrown away all heroic (or ball-stomping) ideals she once had, even after listening to Hazama’s public message…it’s almost safe to say we won’t see a comeback from her unless she gets a slap to bring her back to her senses. And speaking of Hazama’s public message, boy did that work out well. Way better than I expected. I thought the people filming the video would have egged him or something.

We also see the return of the annoying reporter dude who’s been chasing after Ishihara for forever, I’m surprised he got off the hook too. I suspect he’ll be part of the resolution of Mari’s personal issues, but that probably wouldn’t be happening anytime soon since we’ve got that HUGE PLOT TWIST TO DEAL WITH. Like seriously, what the hell was that whole thing? Why is there another Hazama voiced by Akira Ishida?! Why is he the last member of From Beyond?! Is he a big boss in the organisation (since he was the only one that didn’t make the call to the public)?! IS HE REALLY HAZAMA’S TWIN BROTHER? WHAAAAAAT? I can only say that this was a curveball I did not expect at all. Going by the format of the ‘arcs’ the series has been airing I genuinely expected this episode to deal with real consequences of the Flamengers and their heroics, what it would mean for the setting they were in. But this is taking the series in a whole new direction. I suspect Hazama’s going to end up following his brother to From beyond’s lair, where he’s going to get a request to JOIN THE DARK SIDE (don’t laugh at my predictions ok this is a pretty campy show sometimes it could happen!), whether he says yes or no (there ain’t no way Hazama’s giving in UNLESS there is a new, not yet revealed revelation about his parents/granddad) I’m almost certain Goto and the Flamenco girls will come and save the day.

Well, almost. Since you can never expect things to go according to plan in this manic series. Like seriously, I haven’t seen a series pull so many HUGE plot twists in recent memory (Geass/Valvrave don’t count). Looking forward to next week, and sorry for the mess of a post…I’m having trouble getting my thoughts reorganized after watching this episode.