Here I thought the show would go back to the plot but an episode like this was a bad idea. A very bad idea. I have trouble writing this review because of the lack of things to talk about. This episode was completely unnecessary because all it did was repeat things we already knew. People in London are racist, that’s not anything new (the use of the word “Oriental” drove me crazy, but only because it was used accurately to the derogative terms of the time). Chise thinks London is strange, she loves her country and her culture, she’s a little homesick, we know. Maybe this episode was to further show us Chise’s character, but all it did was give us information that was already established about her, so I felt like we didn’t learn anything new.
In the first half of the episode, Chise writes a letter to her older sister in Japan. She writes about her day in school and her classes, how she stands out, the food isn’t as good as Japanese food, she doesn’t get the customs, and she also writes about Ange and the others, their skills, and their missions. We are also reminded of Chise’s mission of spying on the spies for Lord Horikawa to choose a side for Japan to ally with. Chise currently feels useless as she does so little on their missions, but she wants to feel useful for once and she can do that by helping her country of Japan grow and be recognized around the world. So she has a lot of pressure on her little shoulders.
The thing is that we know all of this. I already had a good grasp of Chise’s character, and after watching this episode, it hasn’t changed because we didn’t learn anything new about her. This episode served sort of as a recap, even though that’s completely unnecessary, but also showing Chise’s struggles. Honestly, I thought this episode was pointless.
This anime is strange because it goes from great to okay to eh back to back. It has a rocky flow to it and at this point, I’m just worried as to what’s going to happen in the last three episodes that’ll “end” the series.
Order of Cases covered so far, if you’re interested in watching them chronologically:
Ep 1 – Case 13
Ep 2 – Case 1
Ep 3 – Case 2
Ep 4 – Case 9
Ep 5 – Case 7
Ep 6 – Case 18
Ep 7 – Case 16
Ep 8 – Case 20
Ep 9 – Case 11
Ep 10 – Case 22
I think this ep also serves to display the social discriminations against foreigners and commoners of Princess’ universe further, especially when you account for the class and wealth gaps illustrated in the last episode.