Summary:

After having shot Alicia in the back, Faldio tosses aside his gun and takes her to the medical tent. Word soon reaches Welkin and Squad 7 about Alicia mysteriously getting shot, and although Welkin’s initial reaction is to want to go to her side, he realizes that he has to lead his squad into battle. He thus decides that they have to stop the Empire and protect Alicia. Over in the command tent, Damon is getting desperate in the face of the enemy advance, and he even tries to make a plea to Cordelia since he had heard that she has Valkyrur blood in her. Faldio interrupts the meeting to declare that their side has the power of the Valkyria, and since time is of the essence, he pretends to take Cordelia hostage so that he can get her lance and shield.

By the time the two of them make their way to the medical tent, they discover that Alicia has already healed herself, but she’s still unconscious. Faldio explains to Cordelia that when the body of someone with Valkyrur blood is endangered, they start to awaken as a Valkyria. He then surprises her by revealing that Alicia is descended from the Valkyrur, and he starts a visible reaction in Alicia by bringing Cordelia’s shield near her. Alicia, however, does not regain consciousness, and no matter how hard Faldio begs, she doesn’t open her eyes. It’s not until Welkin comes over the nearby radio to report Squad 7’s retreat in the face of Selvaria’s power that Alicia opens her eyes. Realizing what Alicia is responding to, Faldio begs her to save Welkin, and she proceeds to get up and power up.

Alicia then calmly heads to the battle front near Welkin and Squad 7, and everyone is surprised to see her glowing as a Valkyria. When the Imperial forces try to shoot her, she easily blocks their shots and counterattacks with her lance blast, destroying several tanks. She then faces off against Selvaria, and Selvaria finds herself unable to even touch Alicia. Shortly before she gets knocked down, Selvaria has a flashback of a young Alicia, and she’s briefly in shock afterward. Maximilian gets uneasy from seeing all this and has the Batomys fire at Alicia, but the shell has no effect, and she responds by charging at the tank. Selvaria isn’t able to stop her from destroying it, and although Maximilian survives, Jaeger decides to order a retreat. In the aftermath, Alicia returns to normal and faints into Welkin’s arms, with him still shocked about who she really is.

Preview

Well it makes sense now why Faldio shot Alicia, though I still wonder if he had to do it in such a dramatic way. Regardless, it led to the desired result of Alicia awakening as a Valkyrur. I would say that Alicia was really cool when she went into overpowered mode and completely owned Selvaria, but there’s something quite unsettling about how dead her eyes looked and how she wasn’t in control of herself. Perhaps that’s part of the reason she was more powerful than Selvaria? Selvaria obviously had control over herself, and maybe that meant that she wasn’t tapping into her full potential.

In any case, it was still a fun fight to watch, and I mainly wish that it had been better animated and longer. Actually, the animation quality of that fight scene was better than the rest of the episode, but when the overall quality is off from the norm (there were a few scenes that looked downright bad), it comes out looking only a bit better than average. I assume this won’t be the last time the two meet in battle though, especially since Selvaria seemed to flashback to young Alicia, so there should be at least one more chance for A-1 Pictures to dazzle us with a good fight. Next week’s episode, however, looks to be more about the immediate aftermath of this battle and about the revelation of Alicia’s Valkyrur blood. I worry that that idiot Damon is going to try to use Alicia for his own gain, and I’ll be quite annoyed if he does.

Oh and I almost forgot: they really scared me into thinking they were killing Largo off. I’m glad he made it out alive though.

42 Comments

  1. indeed… maybe I should pick this up again as well ):3…

    hopefully I won’t have to endure the HORRIBLE tactics I saw in episode 1 and the ridiculously bad aim of the trained soldiers… missing the… militia… girl…

    (no offense to girls btw :3, but it is a fact that female’s normally have 8x the more chance to blow out there knees under the same stress conditions as a male O_O!)

    PS (how that related to the terrible aiming of those soldiers from ep 1, I don’t know, but it’s a fun fact :3

    Putang
  2. Putang: Unfortunately, that’s a law of anime:
    #16 – Law of Inverse Accuracy
    The accuracy of a ‘Good Guy’ when operating any form of fire-arm increases as the difficulty of the shot increases. The accuracy of the ‘Bad Guys’ when operating fire-arms decreases when the difficulty of the shot decreases. (Also known as the Storm trooper Effect) Example: A ‘Good Guy’ in a drunken stupor being held upside down from a moving vehicle will always hit, and several battalions of ‘Bad Guys’ firing on a ‘Good Guy’ standing alone in the middle of an open field will always miss.

    😀

  3. “Well it makes sense now why Faldio shot Alicia.”
    Are you high? Let’s say I think your some alien race, but yet I have a 50/50 chance of killing you. So you wouldn’t mind me shooting you in the back just to see if MY hunch was right? Only a Faldio fanboy would save grace his messiah into thinking it’s ok to shoot her in the back. geesh

    Marcus Bigguns
  4. >I worry that that idiot Damon is going to try to use Alicia for his own gain, and I’ll be quite annoyed if he does.

    Even if he tries, I doubt he’ll be able to order her around, if what I suspect is true – she’ll only respond to Welkin (in fact I bet Damon will get his butt smacked big time in the process, if not get himself killed).

    Sailor Enlil
  5. Dude… I was laughing my @$$ off at Faldio. He was just a-class retarded compared to the awesomeness that was “F— you all! I’m saving the world!” before going totally AWOL and taking down ———–. Faldio, Faldio. What has A1 Pictures done to you.

    Alicia is only half-blood Valkyrur- hence, the brown hair.

    And don’t worry about Damon. He’ll get his dues from Sylveria herself.

    NUKE!

    Zero
  6. Its amazing how Faldio lost everything important to him just like that. He lost his entire squad and Alicia, and probably a punishment (if they’re even going to) for shooting Alicia and kidnapping the princess. Also, I’m glad they didn’t kill off Largo because Isara and Lamar were said enough.

    Siege
  7. All these “every superior/boss(damon) in the good guys camp = idiots while opposite for the bad guys”, stupid aiming, dodging skills and especially those dragon ball super sayen style overpoweredness is actually turning me away from this anime. WTF is with this ridiculous Alicia blowing up a tank and blocking a shot from a tank?

    Nightshifter
  8. I don’t think Damon will be sing Alicia. He’s a stuck up noble(?) and thinks nothing of the Militia. And Marcus has a point, but the valkyrian bloodline will only activate when you’re on the verge of death. Love how Alicia totally pawned Selvaria in the game. Can’t wait for the subs!!!

    Miko86
  9. Story-like, Selvaria couldn’t do anything against Alicia because Alicia is a pure-blood Valkyrur (at least in the game, but it seems that the series will handle that differently) Don’t bicker about how overpower Alicia has become, because in the game she’s the only one that could take Selvaria (not even the 7th Squad could handle her)

    One thing that the series has made to have the upper hand against the game is the individual characterization of the main cast, something that the VG lacks.

    SeedStriker
  10. Well, at least they kept this part pretty much the same, except for the taking the valkyria weapons from the queen.
    It’s too late to follow the game plot now tho. I’m guessing that the “Valkyries Final flame” will be the last thing from the game they use. Poor selvaria…

    @SeedStriker: There was no indication that Selvaria wasn’t a pureblood either, we only know that she was experimented on and used as a lab rat until maximilian took her under his wing. It’s possible that she was defeated simply because Alicia was unconscious at the time, sort of like how the Guyver is much more powerful when the unit is moving by itself and not by the user.
    The new one in the sequel is an artificial one tho.

  11. Overpowering…that’s only a taste of what she can do. I stuck it out until now & considering all the bs garbage episodes we had, it can’t get any worse than it was. I just hope they keep the way Faldio dies in the game the same; it would suit him much better since he’s at rock bottom now. It’s Welkin’s turn now. Atleast he’ll try to live through this shit more-so than Faldio.

    Its true that none of the characters in the game had personalities worth mentioning. Welkin was a thoughtful super-dude, Faldio was a gong-ho ass-tard, & Alicia was a goofy thoughtful chick in normal mode & a super-uber bitch in Valkyrur mode. In the anime Welkin basically turned in a typical enclosed jap guy, Faldio lost his gong-ho & gained more ass-tard, & Alicia powered up her goofy part into something that can’t do shit right. The entertainment value is just about the same for both. Its kinda sad that it finally had to turn into a typical supergirl anime, but that’s much better than Welkin beating his own ass for 18 episodes.

    Megas
  12. I don’t know Megas, I kind of liked them in the game. I liked how capable Welkin was and that he was an everyday kind of guy with a bit of genius in him, like his father. I liked that Faldio redeemed himself at the end. I liked the more mature/motherly Alicia who never lost that touch of the baker from a small town. When Alicia turned into the Valkyrur it was just so foreign. I liked that they didn’t need to use her to win the game/war.

    Nvenya
  13. I wish the animators hadn’t spoiled this in the opening. Can’t be helped, because otherwise whatever exciting stuff they showed it would have been monotonous. Well, as the central heroine that was to be expected though. I don’t know how the original game story went, but this episode was impressive. Though the story was basically about the main character starting to show a latent power, it wasn’t a hey-it’s-an-ass-whooping-from-our-side kind of bright, exciting thing, but instead an even more depressing turn of events for some reason. The background music saw to that, I think.

    I do wish this anime were more realistic in terms of tactics and other military stuff. (In fact I wish the anime wasn’t a fantasy in the first place.) But since that can’t be helped, I’m fine with how they at least tried to show wars as something depressing. Episodes 10, 14, 17, especially. (Man… I’m actually mourning a fictional character’s death..) My interest in this series is hyped up because it looks like it’s time for a dark, depressing anime supergirl to begin. Hopefully, anyway.

    Starshade
  14. Omni,

    Everyone knows the reason good guys can shoot straight and bad guys cannot is because Bad guys spend their training budgets on fancy uniforms.

    That and buying lots of ammunition, which bad guys shoot off at a furious rate.

    Masiro
  15. I thought the fact that Faldio had to mention Welkin to Alicia to get her to wake up was a nice touch, kinda sweet actually. Selvaria having a flashback of Alicia as a child is another change I’m liking; I originally thought they would turn out to be siblings or something like that anyways, so if they are then. \o/

    Honestly, I was surprised that Damon didn’t try to use Alicia, or at least call down a million scientists to observe her or something like that. I guess there just wasn’t enough time to do that.

    aether
  16. Marcus Bigguns: There has to be some level of suspension of disbelief. Regardless, I was just referring to how they actually explained it instead of not giving any reason at all for it.

    aether: That could still happen next episode.

  17. Omni, how is that law working in Black Lagoon where everyone is bad? And remeber Balalaika’s snipers vs evil children… Pure pwnage.
    That aside I think another law should be added: “everything is more powerful when glowing”.
    I wonder about possible blood relation between Selvaria and Alicia.
    Damon should die. And thats ’nuff about him.
    If they killed off Largo it would be going overboard.

    ewok
  18. At least the lose ends have been tied a bit. The fight scene was pretty well done and hopefully they will address how Alicia got so much more powerful thn Selveria. I do find it a bit weak how Faldio essentially lost his mind (stress/grief) yet was able to implement his plan. I guess disperation would better describe his mental state.

    Finally. Glad Welkin showed some strengh of character. Didn’t just run after Alicia and leave his command. Hope they return to the relationship next episode. Not sure they can progress the story much more from the battles.

    Irie
  19. Given that the series is quite close to the end, I’ll just say that the animators aren’t really following the game storyline, and to be honest, it isn’t exactly a good thing. At this point, it seems impossible for the last few missions of the game (some of which were actually epic) to be animated in such a short amount of time.

    My guess is from here on out: Show Spoiler ▼

    Regardless, this is an interesting alternate telling of VC. Unfortunately, it has more faults than the game.

    Meister874
  20. I also thought Largo was dead. I mean, they already killed off two of my favorite characters (Isara and Lamar) before they can even have a relationship, so what’s to stop them from doing the same to Largo?

    Apparently, Faldio was a lot weaker than I expected. He was desperate. And even if you know someone is going to survive being shot and awaken at full power, it’s not a good reason for shooting the one you love. As long as there is even a 1% risk to her, you won’t do it. It’s different, however, if there is an unbreakable bond of trust between the two.

    I learned that from Luminous Arc 2, Fatima’s route.

    magnumslinger
  21. Man that fight scene is straight from the game itself, except that Selvaria gets knocked out from that hit. The game scene is much better then the anime scene.
    To those that say the OP spoiled it, it really didn’t if you where following the story. You could already tell she is a Valkyrur when she opened that door in ep 7, it was a big hint there.

    winters
  22. Am I the only one who thinks the main characters are just downright boring in this series, and the sub-cast (faldio, and especially the ‘evil’ characters) are way more interesting and fun to watch?

    Especially Welking and Alicia are just downright uninteresting to watch :/

    Jazzle

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