Who needs Blue Angel in disguise when we get an ANGRY!Angel! Man, when she’s in a bad mood, you don’t wanna mess with her. Also her pissed-off attitude is freaking glorious!
Aoi/Blue Angel was absolutely triggered this episode. She tried to heed her brother’s warnings, but it was really getting under her skin when everyone started commenting on her absence. Then Ema comes along to help her out by giving her that push she needed!
Now last week, I said I like to see Aoi find the motivation on her own. Although we didn’t get this, no undercover, just straight-up angry!angel, I wasn’t disappointed because I appreciate the big-sister dynamic Ema has with Aoi. It is exactly what she needs. Someone opposite of Akira, someone to push her, knowing what she is capable of. Heck even Ema is kicking herself for getting too involved with Aoi. It does make me wonder if perhaps she has a story of her own of a lost sibling, or something of the sort. She slips right into the annoying big-sister role seamlessly. Props to her for getting under Aoi’s skin! Gotta love her!
But Aoi’s emotions ended up getting the better of her when she throws herself head first into a Hanoi Knight Elite, Baira. She is extremely confident with her Trickstar Deck, to the point it is her pride, but Baira shuts her up real fast when she makes a snide comment how it’s too popular now, and because of that, she came prepared with a counter strategy… With a creepy as f— Virus Deck no less.
Now let’s just take a moment to appreciate the enemies adapting and challenging the protagonists in a new way. This is fantastic for everyone, because this creates a more threatening villain, it gives them more presence, raises the stakes, and at the same time enables the protagonist to grow and adapt to the new challenges they face. I am especially pleased to see this happening early on. Although I will confess, while this was happening, I did have my doubts – and thought, “Damnit, if Blue Angel loses here, Imma be PISSED!”
But thankfully, I don’t think we have to to worry too much about that. Especially when the preview is talking about Blue Angel creating miracle plays and such. This duel will be focusing on Blue Angel’s growth as a duelist, and to contribute forging her new purpose in Link VRAINS. As Ghost Girl pointed out, Blue Angel’s alias was created in order for her brother to appreciate her, and now since she knows he loves her, the “Blue Angel” doesn’t need to exist anymore. 
Furthermore, Aoi said today she doesn’t fight for others, but for herself. However as someone who has suffered from the virus, Aoi has a lot of feelings and emotions when it comes to the cases of Another, especially when she is facing off its creator. As soon as she realized who she was dealing with, Aoi wasn’t thinking about herself anymore, but others. So I expect this duel will shape her into fighting to protect others from experiencing to the same pain she had to go through when she was trapped in the darkness.
There is another thing I wanted to point out and that is how easily Aoi can flip the switch of her idol personality – it’s almost scary. When Blue Angel is performing and the cameras are rolling, she is right in character. I am curious to see just how much of her anger will seep out of her, or will she keep it bottled up to maintain her confident and unwavering image (despite having a couple of freak out moments).
But like I said, Angry!Angel, is the best angel, ahahahaha!
In the meantime, Kusanagi and Yuusaku are continuing to investigate, and they managed to find Baira in a security camera observing one of the Anothers’ case. Now this i could be crucial timing because Blue Angel keeping Baira busy right now. That means her body is non-responsive at this time. Should they decide to act on it, this would provide Kusanagi and Yuusaku a window of time to investigate in the real world, hopefully without being caught.
Ah, that reminds me of something I mentioned last week: I wondered about how all the villains would be carrying the cure, and in this week, Faust and Baira addressed exactly that. But if Blue Angel beats Baira, does that mean she obtains the cure for all cases, or just one? We know that Baira in particular isn’t too fond of the whole purpose of the virus, and feels bad that Blue Angel was their first test subject for its development, so she will probably hand her over the cure for at least one case… Unless she decides that for the greater good of protecting Revolver, she won’t give in and set the conditions to only Playmaker being allow to gain it as a prize. (Now that would be quite interesting wouldn’t it?). Either way, I do like seeing the antagonists with grey morals as oppose to black and white mindset we often see.
And this leads me to the next subject: A Rift within the Hanoi Knights Organization!
Things just got interesting when we learn that there is actually a rift within the Hanoi Knights organization right now – in the most unexpected way possible. Faust and Baira are one of the higher-ups who knows what’s going on. We learned how Revolver is someone who is very dear to them, and because he is the leader of the Hanoi Knights, Dr. Kogami’s crime will be pinned onto him. But it’s not just an crime, it’s supposed to be a historical one! Dear god…
So what do they want to do? They want to stop him by beating him to the punch. This means they need to acquire Ignis and find the Cyverse World first to prevent to delay Dr. Kogami’s grand scheme. In order to do this, they are the ones who are using Anothers to bait Playmaker out.
This is pretty crazy, because I never expected something like this to happen so soon. It also goes to make you wonder if Revolver is really okay with shouldering that burden of his father’s crime (since the man is supposed to be dead). Is it just doing this because of certain circumstances that drove him into that direction, or is he being used? There is much to learn about Revolver’s relationship and circumstances with his father, and how Dr. Kogami had died in the first place.
As for Sol Technologies, after the embarrassing and sound defeat, they will likely try to stay off the radar for now, until they come up with a more effective way to redeem themselves in the public eye. They are absolutely being ROASTED! (Ai of course is having a field-day over this!)
Finally, it’s about time we see the media be addressed to stop filming in Link VRAINS. Frog-Dude (Yamamato) got orders from the higher ups to end it because it’s inciting idiots to get involved in Link VRAINS – LIKE THOSE STUPID LITTLE KIDS CHEERING FOR BLUE ANGEL. LIKE WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING IN LINK VRAINS. GET THE HELL OUT!
But of course as soon as Blue Angel appears, they are like, “SCREW IT! WE GOTTA FILM IT!” Honestly, I really do hope they just end the Link VRAINS coverage because it does need to stop at some point for the sake of safety in the public. It’s also encouraging the hooligans because it glorifies their victories, and they know they are being covered. I have little doubts now that they will actually stop it. But if they do, I will give mad props to the writing team for paying attention to that detail.
This week the new ED Theme came out! I love the track quite a bit, especially the lyrics and the artistic details such as the Vengeance graffiti! Something worth noting though, is how Ai’s is Yuusaku’s shadow. This could be interpreted as Ai is also looking for vengeance after what Revolver and the Hanoi Knights have done to his friends- especially since we haven’t exactly seen Ai’s darker and more serious side… except for the hints of ‘evil Ai’ kinky acts. Afterall, For most part, he acts like a sassy little shit.
Fun Fact: Kusanagi can’t cook anything else other than hotdogs and fries! DEAR GOD, SOMEONE SAVE YUUSAKU, THIS ISN’T A HEALTHY DIET!!!!!!!!!
So the teddy bear is indeed another one of Go’s disguises, BOO! (BTW, where’s that one throwaway dude you saved?)
Wow, to think Ghost Girl is the one who fired up Aoi’s spirit and Blue Angel’s return to take on Baira (whose deck has the emphasis around viruses, sasuga Kaiba) certainly didn’t disappoint (as long as they don’t bring up the Trickstar’s measly but annoying looping Burning effects too often) and she returned to the main stage not only because she’s pissed at the audience doubting her recent inactivity, but now she’s taking the battle to the Knights of Hanoi because she’s once a victim of the Another virus, meaning that she’s officially tied to the main plot with her own conscience. (Back off and watch, Akira.)
With Dr.Genome being such a lame one-episode wonder (although it largely helped that Go wasn’t even a likable “entertainer” to begin with) I certainly hope that Baira will last longer on the scene because Blue Angel will definitely swoop for the win next episode & it’s still hard to grasp at the true colors of the Knights of Hanoi. Speaking of which, WHERE. IS. SPECTER? His significance to the Knights, much less the show itself, is virtually non-existent!
Oh, and the new ending is fine, although I still preferred the 1st ending. (Just wish they put more effort on the visuals, though…)
Wow, I never expected to see Blue Angel in a foul mood before. Seems like she’s somewhat dropped her cheerful idol persona to go all out on Baira. It’s actually refreshing in a way because I feel kinda like that when I play my Trickstar deck against other duelists, although with less aggression. Glad this episode really focused more on Aoi and with Yusaku taking more of a side role. That’s exactly what we need right now with her. It looks like parts of Aoi’s alter-ego as Blue Angel are beginning to slip out as she was actually openly angry and expressed her opinion actively rather than her usual passiveness. I’m also really glad Emma takes on a big-sister role to encourage Aoi to decide things for herself instead of having Akira or anyone else to decide for her. I do agree with Emma though. Aoi needs to find her true identity. This is going to be a great mini-arc for part 2 of Aoi’s character development.
I’m quite glad that this episode actually got to focus a lot more on the female characters introduced so far. It shows that Emma actually does show some care to people other than herself and Akira, even if she did question herself later about the reason she gave advice to Aoi. Plus I was really surprised that Faust and Baira have history with Revolver. It seems like Baira has some sense of morality despite being a Knight of Hanoi because of how she felt guilty for turning people into Anothers as the creator of the Another virus. She did display a little bit of pity for Blue Angel because of how Blue Angel was infected with a prototype of the Another virus and came back to Link VRAINS and could possibly become infected again with an updated version. Baira does care for Revolver a lot and does seem to be somewhat uncomfortable with Dr. Kogami’s plan. That means Revolver isn’t the only one who feels somewhat upset about the plan.
Compared to last week’s episode, this one was a whole lot better. The ending is actually pretty good too. The music is definitely a good contrast compared to Believe in Magic. Can’t wait for next week’s episode with a new Trickstar monster I saw in the preview.
P.S. I’m also in the process of gathering cards to make an Altergeist deck. I’ve created a deck recipe already.
And yes, you’re right about hot dogs and fries being an unhealthy diet. I can’t believe Yusaku can stay so skinny even when eating hot dogs. Metabolism can’t be that fast. Seriously, I think Yusaku needs to learn how to cook and not just eat junk food.
The bear thing was kinda obvious especially with the hat on top a big giveaway. XD
I’m liking the new characters and the developments with most. Especially working with more of Aoi/Blue Angel’s character.
Surprised that “kings temple was used even more surprised that Vyra’s deck was based on the whole healer/burn deck based on her being a nurse in ep8 but of course that could have been a ruse.
Speaking of Vyra’s she’s pretty interesting as well
Regarding the new ED Katsumi Ono did storyboard/directing which easyily shows with the “Synchro” written in graffiti on the left as the ed starts. The again, it’s not surprised that Ono hammers more in with his love of Synchro. It annoys me to no end especially with all his known favoritism
The new ending was kind of meh with the lyrics. But the imagery is really cool! I think its hinted that Ai and Yusaku are going to become super attached or at least have a better partnership. Not like Yugi and Atem or Astral and Yuma. Both basically carbon copies of one another with the latter partnership kind of more annoying and kind of unsure when it actually became a partnership that involved respect…
Yes! I wondered about Yusaku’s diet as well! I mean, I expected Kusanagi to reply to Ai’s question by saying ‘Of course i can make other stuff! I can make some onigiri for us.” but no, corn dogs (i cant remember the other thing) and fries… you could argue fries are made from potato so they’re somewhat healthy. But if he’s cooking them from a packet then i dont believe this cook.
Baira’s design btw is so cool! It really is a great design and isn’t drawn ultra sexy. That’s a problem they had in the past with some female characters. They didn’t know how to give an interesting design without maing them sexualised. Asuka and even Aki comes into mind as examples.
I will flip a fricking table if Aoi loses. I had the same doubts as well, especially considering Yugioh’s track record for female characters being too passive and their decks weak for the most part compared to the males. The one after Aki was Anna from Zexal who was prettyy much my favourite girl from because how crazy she was just trying to kill Yuma by trying to blow him up with a bazooka!! XD
Then we had the amazing bracelet girls from Arc-V who started out great but slowly got degraded to plain damsels…
Hopefully Vrains wont go down this path with Aoi. Let’s hope all her damselness was used up at the beginning when she was in a coma and she starts to kick some ass!
Angry Angel is best! I like how she didn’t just become a passive individual. She doesn’t like being under her brother’s thumb. I’m glad Eva pushed her to do what she wants rather than what her brother wants.
I swear if Brother Akira grounds Aoi when she wins and returns I will jump into the series and SLAP HIM!! He really pisses me off. Unless he lets go a little i will not stop hating him!
Well, stopping media coverage is one thing but Sol tech did not do anything else to stop idiots to entering Link Vrains such as putting some kind of password to enter and can only be acquired by hacking the system.
When Aoi gets character development in the next episode. She is definitely pulling a Link 3 monster because it wouldn’t make sense for her to have a link 4 monster when she dosen’t have a link 3 monster.
I don’t think Sol Technology was the higher up the frog was referring to, most likely their own seniors in the media industry. What is more shocking his how Sol technology isn’t being roasted for not at least putting up the server for maintenance to prevent more idiots from logging in.