Summary:

Heading straight for the enemy capital, the Dai-Gurren arrives at the ocean, and all the guys get excited at the thought of the girls wearing bathing suits. This causes Yoko to beat them all up for being lecherous, and she cites how their top priority is to head for the capital, so they don’t have time to play around. Leeron, however, points out that they have to cross over this ocean to get to their goal, and since the Dai-Gurren is made for use over land, he needs time to put the water equipment onto it. This mean that they do indeed have time to play, and the guys can’t wait to see Yoko and Nia in their swimsuits. Yoko’s amount of skin exposure disappoints them, but they soon go crazy for Nia. What gets Yoko even more pissed off is how Nia is superior to her in every beach game, from volleyball to suikawari (watermelon splitting) to making sand castles to seeing who can hold their breath the longest underwater. It also doesn’t help that when Nia brings Yoko a bowl of crab during the barbecue, Yoko accidentally drops it and gets laughed at by the guys.

Leeron meanwhile finishes installing the equipment of the Dai-Gurren, so it’s time for them to head across the ocean. Although everything seems to proceed perfectly at first, they soon come under torpedo attack from Adiane’s Dai-Gunkai. The Dai-Gurren attempts to return fire, but it doesn’t score any direct hits with either its cannons or depth charges. Kittan wants to head out in his Gunmen, but he quickly finds that it’s not suited for underwater combat when water starts pouring into the cockpit. The Gurren Lagann can still fight because its repair abilities allow it to self-seal, but it is unable to do much against Adiane’s Sayrune which is clearly superior underwater. Under Viral’s command, the Dai-Gunkai then clips the Dai-Gurren’s feet and starts dragging it underwater. Simon and Rossiu are unable to help because they have their hands full with Adiane, and so the other guys panic when water starts pouring into the bridge. To their surprise, it is Nia who tells them to calm down – she feels that it’ll be okay because she trusts in Simon to come through for them.

With his friends going under, Simon finally becomes determined enough to put on his goggles and fully powers up the Gurren Lagann. He transforms its arms into drills to free it from the Sayrune’s grasp and then creates a huge drill on is head to allow it to propel its way back towards the surface, speeding upward faster than the Sayrune can catch it. The force of the Gurren Lagann hitting the Dai-Gurren is enough to send it back above the water, but the battle still isn’t over because the Sayrune leaps out of the water and plunges its arm into the bridge of the Dai-Gurren to pull out Nia. Yoko, however, isn’t about to stand down just because Nia has been taken hostage and prepares to fire straight at the girl. Yoko’s first bullet manages to miss Nia’s head, though it goes through much of her hair. The next shot rips through even more of Nia’s hair, but this time it also hits the Sayrune’s shoulder, causing the Gunmen to drop Nia, entering her into a free fall. Fortunately, old man Coco once again saves her by catching her.

With it no longer holding a hostage, the Sayrune gets blasted to smithereens by the Dai-Gurren’s main cannons. Viral tries to come help with the Dai-Gunkai, but Simon doesn’t let him by using the Gurren Lagann to drill straight through the submarine Gunmen. Both the Sayrune and Dai-Gunkai start to blow up in a glorious fashion, but although Viral manages to survive, Adiane does not. Her last words are an apology to Thymilph. The subsequent explosion rivaling a nuclear blast creates a huge wave that the Dai-Gurren rides to the other side of the ocean with everyone cheering the victory. In the aftermath, Nia approaches Yoko with a request: to trim and even out her now-tattered hair. As she cuts, Yoko asks Nia why she closed her eyes when Yoko was about to fire at her in the earlier battle. Nia’s response is that Yoko is a rifle expert, so she trusted her. Yoko eventually finishes cutting Nia’s hair to a shorter style that both girls are happy with.

Preview:

RIP, Nia’s long hair. Of course, that was only a small part of this episode since, aside from the battle, it was mainly about Yoko’s relationship with Nia. I’m actually glad that Yoko got more screen time because I was afraid that she was going to take a backseat to Simon and Nia for at least the rest of this arc. Granted, it was Simon who became a support character instead in all of the scenes this week except for the one where he powers up the Gurren Lagann, but he runs little risk of getting minimalized since he’s the main character. Anyway, I liked Nia’s long hair better, but this short hair’s not as bad as, say, Eureka’s hair from Eureka Seven. Once again though, it was the old man Coco who saved her, and I continue to question his role.
Also, RIP, Adiane. She was no match for a determined Simon and underestimated Yoko, but at least she got a really nice eye-catch this episode. Viral, however, survived again. He’s outlived two generals now and I see little reason to kill him off anytime soon since they haven’t already. At this rate, he’s going to live longer than the Helix King and and maybe become the final boss. For now though, it looks like Cytomander is next, and his domain appears to be the air. We’ll see if he can provide Simon with a challenge since Simon currently only appears to need that determination and fighting spirit to win.

45 Comments

  1. downloading the raw! this episode looks freaking awesome~
    But… They do that to Nia’s hair?! What have you done Yoko!?

    “they wont kill yoko off, she’s the only female member of the crew that actually does something =___= ”

    cough cough.. who knows, they killed Kamina to have simon replace him. No reason not to do it again to have Nia replace her!

    Quina
  2. Nia doesn’t do much except spout plot themes and look cute. Unless she manages to do something, she’s just kind of dead weight. I accept that Nia was a catalyst for Simon to get over Kamina’s death but after that, there’s no real reason for her to remain after this arc except for the moe factor, the ‘We must have a goody-good girl!’ thing in anime, and maybe Simon’s prevailing love interest. Which, after seeing Gainax’s track record, seems kind of improbable but who knows?

    Even if Yoko is dethroned from main heroine by Nia, what’s Nia going to do? Unless she pulls off a deux ex machina.

    Is this episode just mainly about a Nia vs Yoko + Viral and Adiane comeback all rolled into one? Sounds great.

    Ciel
  3. “Next to die list: Yoko.”
    -she’s stupid, no good for the show after kamina died, she’s only there to balance out kamina and be kamina love interest, since kamina died, so she’s no longer needed. yoko in the mean time play a major role in simons recovery and character developments..

    “But… They do that to Nia’s hair?! What have you done Yoko!?”
    -wont know if it was yoko or not.. but still, wtf yoko are u jealous of Nia to even get her killed?

    “they killed Kamina to have simon replace him”
    -wtf? get your fact strait!

    “Isn’t the prevailing theory that Nia dies at the end of this arc?”
    -maybe… hope not.. but it might…

    “I want Rossiu to die. *whistles innocently*”
    -no he wont, the person 2nd in-charge to simon from ep1 looks a lot like rossiu.. so he lives.

    anono
  4. >> Nia’s no fighter (it’s kind of hard imagine her wielding a gun, or piloting anything.)

    hoho wait a few episodes and you will see.
    Nia beat the crap out of Yoko in every beach game they played which pretty much mean she is a lot stronger physicallly. (I don’t know how the hell is that possible). Let she have her gun, she will learn how to snipe better than Yoko in no time.

    Hellrider
  5. lol, edit..
    i mean Nia, “in the mean time play a major role in simons recovery and character developments..”

    “after Yoko shot straight at her to free her from Adiane’s grasp”
    well, didnt get to read that..so meh, but yoko with less hair looks equally the same, cute!

    anono
  6. Oh, and forgot to add; I don’t necessarily want to see Nia die, since having main characters kick the bucket left and right isn’t all that fun (or it might, depends.) Maybe she’ll prove her worth as an ambassador between human and beastmen for the final arc?

    @Hellrider
    Orrr it could be the fact that they need to kick Yoko down so that way the episode climax is set as Yoko having to save Nia, whom she isn’t exactly liking all that well? Isn’t ‘Cute Girl has Uber Powers’ kind of a prevalent thing when it comes to competition? Especially when the girl happens to remain innocent and peppy through the whole thing?

    @anono
    Doesn’t that look more like a human Boota…? But who knows.

    Ciel
  7. @Ciel
    lol, boota turns into beastman? just the thought of that makes an awsome arc for the show..

    anyone here thinks that the 4 legendary beastmens is gonna turn out like the japanese 4 guardian (turtle, tiger, dragon, phoenix)? since we get an armadillo, the rest might be a cat, snake, eagle..? who knows..

    anono
  8. – A lot of sexual reference in this episode. The private parts of every men on board start hurting when Dai-gurren’s lower observation part was hit by torbidoes.

    – Leron’s butt hurts when Simon drills Dai-gurren up from water at its butt.

    – Swimsuits for the fan service. Nia completely overshadowed Yoko for some reasons…

    – Yoko first thought that she is better than Nia physically.. but Nia proves her otherwise… Nia beats Yoko in every beach games. Yoko gets really fustrated…

    – Simon’s screen time reduce dramaticly. He is there only for the action now since he had a huge development last episode.

    – Aldene is dead. damit…

    – Jii-san again.. who the hell is he? He can fly!? whats up with that glasses on his neck. cough cough.. Simon from the future!?

    – Yoko was in a bad mood almost all episode long…

    – Nia’s belief in Simon and Yoko is really out there… she really belief in them. wth… I can understand Simon a bit, but Yoko!? because of this Yoko weaken to Nia by the end of the episode.

    – Nia’s hair!!!!

    – Nia’s hair!!!!

    Next episode:
    well.. next week we will have Nia’s cooking. By the sound of it, she will becomes some housewife type character waiting for Simon to return……. Please don’t end with just that Gainax… I want buster machine.

    quina
  9. All this Nia attention is getting anoying, really this is supposed to be super hotblooded manliness, not goody goody moeblob diabeaties time.

    Yoko=Superior, what with her actually doing things that don’t involve getting captured.

    King7th
  10. quina: I had the same thought about Coco’s goggles, but upon closer inspection, they’re quite different. Still, his appearances these past two episodes have been quite mysterious indeed.

  11. A short-haired Nia is fine too

    btw: I still think old man Coco has something to do with Simon. Knowing Gainax, probably some time-fucking would be involved, and he would be Simon, a lot of years later or something. Way too suspicious that he keeps saving Nia when she shows faith in Simon saving her and stuff.

    Ravage
  12. @Guy
    Simon and Nia romanace are really background currently…
    You can notice in this episode that Nia and Simon stick together almost all the time.

    Last episode double pilot Simon-Nia is pretty much as far as simon’s age should go for now -_-

    quina
  13. AM I THE ONLY ONE IN THE ANIME WORLD THAT LIKED EUREKA’S POST-ACCPERIANCE II/PRE-ACCPERIANCE III SHORT HAIR?! THAT HAIR (more with the positive change in Eureka’s personallity) WAS THE REASON I GOT INTO EUREKA SEVEN. THAT HAIR WAS THE REASON I STARTED READING D.GRAY-MAN BECAUSE OF LENALEE’S SHORT HAIR. (breaths in/out) Off my rant, still hearing it from a source I was hoping it was going to be that short, but it’s still cool. Loving the series one gar-filled episode at a time (Wonders if Yoko will go yandere…).

    Akumaten
  14. If Nia were to become a fighter and they changed her clothes I think this hair style could suit her more, but that seems unlikely.

    Too bad Yoko is so cranky these last eps, I miss how she used to act when Kamina was around.

    LifeCarrier

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