Date A Live III Episode 9 – Tengu City, Five Years Ago

Well, that’s one hell of a cliffhanger…

I was iffy about involving time travel in this and it looks like my suspicion paid off. So Shidou went back in time to stop Origami and failed. I wasn’t expecting to see her parents disintegrated in front of us, my god not on the lord’s day please, but that’s a different story. Then Kurumi in the current time gets told by Shidou from that current times future that there is still a way to save Origami. And that way is to see past Kurumi, who happens to be nearby, and send Shidou back in time again to stop Origami / Phantom for good. Obviously, I don’t want to nitpick this too much because it’s supposed to be a lighthearted harem, but this is just… a minefield. A minefield that they really shouldn’t have stepped in. For example, if the past and future iterations all still exist, then ‘Shidou sent in the past twice’ should have seen ‘Shidou sent in the past once’ when he saw young Origami. Because he was just there. There’s a lot of small stuff like that that just pointlessly contradict and take a little bit away from the show. Not to mention it’s just generally confusing.

Putting all that aside, it may not be her real face, but at least we get to put any face to Phantom. I was wondering who the girl was in the OP. I had forgotten (or was it never explained?) that Phantom was the one who handed out the crystals that gave the powers of a Spirit. Of course, the ‘I can’t show you my body yet’ and the surprised face she had when she saw Shidou make me insanely curious as to who she actually is. I doubt the anime will get to that though. Shidou’s joke about not knowing anyone who censored their whole body actually got me good. I love his banter with Kurumi. More so than a villain, as Kurumi stated, she just seems to be unpredictable and chaotic. Handing out crystals left and right. From the way she talked to Shidou it looks like she is/their relationship is the reason he can seal Spirits and use their powers. And I guess she’ll eventually be coming back to nab him, for good. Can’t wait to not see that animated probably. I don’t know if I’m really invested enough to go read/play the source material though.

I forgot Shidou’s main plan of action is always to ‘talk it out’. It’s definitely an interesting approach when the people you’re dealing with are super-powered girls that tend to be a bit on the crazy side. First with Origami, then with Phantom. Then that always fails and he resorts to action which is then always followed up by another talk. A tried and true harem protagonist wombo combo classic. Jokes aside, that ending really messed with me. I feel like there may have been a few extra options to explore. You know, besides either a talk afterwards or sacrificing yourself to save them. There might be a solution in between those. Couldn’t he just keep trying with Kurumi anyway? I don’t remember if they said there was a limit to how many times she could use it. It sounded like the only reason current Kurumi didn’t do it again was because they were separated by time and space. Hence finding the past Kurumi. Maybe my memory is just shitty though.

My sadness for Origami continues for yet another episode. I admit I was briefly tricked into thinking she might be fine, but then I remembered she just watched her parents get disintegrated and I am actually kind of glad a pep talk from Shidou didn’t sway her. That would’ve looked even worse probably. So the reason she’s so emotionless in the series is because she is entrusting them to Shidou until she can get revenge. Well, she pretends to be emotionless at least. We’ve seen her express happiness, jealousy, and love on occasion. Being as that I have no idea what is coming next in the show, I’m genuinely curious how this will be resolved and what/where/when Shidou is now. The preview shows Kurumi, so there’s that. Hopefully we’re done with time travel?

Speaking of, I’ve held off talking about this for the whole post… TWO KURUMIS! Everything really does have a silver lining. She’s like that friend that you talk to when shit goes down and she’s already on-board with whatever it is you want to do. Probably not the healthiest of relationships, but sometimes necessary.