Summary:

With the Imperial attack, Welkin and Squad 7 have to abandon their plans to go help Alicia and fight instead. Despite their casualties, Welkin does his best to rally the group, even after learning of the large explosion at Ghirlandaio. What they’re unprepared for is Maximilian’s Marmota pulling out the central tower of the castle and letting it fall onto the ship. It turns out that the tower had a huge lance inside of it, and that lance now sits on top of the Marmota. This is all according to Maximilian’s plan, and he knows that this lance was used in the past by the Valkyrur to defeat the Darcsen. He also knows that the Valkyrur hadn’t been saviors and had instead subjugated the Darcsen and had rewritten history. To test this weapon now, he fires at a nearby mountain and completely blows it away. Even after seeing this though, Welkin refuses to give up and continues to believe that Alicia is still alive, so Squad 7 keeps fighting.

Onboard the Marmota, Jaeger starts to questions Maximilian’s motives and finds out that Maximilian had been after this weapon all along. It all stems from how Maximilian lost his mother when their train exploded, and to get back at his father and brother, he wants to become something greater than the Emperor – he wants to be the Valkyria King. He now orders the weapon to be fired on the castle, but right as it’s about to do so, Alicia appears and fires a blast at the tip of the giant lance. This dispels the weapon temporarily, but Alicia is exhausted afterward, and the Marmota begins shelling her with conventional weaponry. When Maximilian fires the giant lance again, Alicia is able to block this shot and counterattack, but she faints soon after. Seeing this, Maximilian orders her to be captured, and when Jaeger questions what he plans to do with her, Maximilian just warns him not to interfere. Jaeger, however, decides that he can’t support Maximilian anymore, and since Maximilian refuses to let him just walk away, he shoots Jaeger.

Back outside, Welkin is too late to save Alicia from the Imperial soldiers, and he nearly gets sniped, but he’s saved thanks to Faldio who has arrived as back-up. Welkin and Squad 7 then charge towards the Marmota to go save Alicia.

Preview

After all of the backstory this episode, I’ve finally now realized just how much Maximilian really is like Lelouch. Both are princes who despise their fathers and siblings after losing their mothers, both aspire for the throne and beyond, both have witches who support them, and both are voiced by Fukuyama Jun. I know this probably isn’t a new revelation for those of you who have played the game, but for me who hasn’t, watching this episode finally allowed me to understand the depth of the similarities. It’s almost too much to be a coincidence, and I have to think that the writers were inspired or at least influenced by CODE GEASS. It’s a shame though that they gave Maximilian all of this backstory that made him a tragic but relatable character, and then had him be a dick and kill Jaeger. Now I can’t do anything but hate him since I really liked Jaeger’s character and had wanted him to survive the series (even though I knew deep down that it wasn’t likely to happen).

As for the rest of the episode, it was nice to hear more about the history of the Darcsen and the Valkyrur, but I wish they had explained how a Darcsen like Cordelia came to be disguised as a Valkyria-descended ruler. I also questioned a lot of what happened with Alicia. I can believe that she survived Selvaria’s blast, but how the heck did she get from Ghirlandaio all the way to Randgriz? According to the map of Gallia from a few episodes ago, there’s well over 200 kilometers between the two, and I highly doubt she ran the entire distance in such a short amount of time. The other thing I didn’t understand is why she didn’t just aim for the giant lance’s support structure. If she blew that up, then Maximilian has no functional weapon anymore, and it’s over. Instead, she’s now the one who needs to get saved, and it’s up to Welkin, Squad 7, and Faldio to do it – I guess maybe they felt the need for Welkin to be more of a hero at the end. And where the heck did Faldio come from anyway? In any case, I hope they’ll have time to do everything and wrap up all the loose ends in the finale, but I get the vague feeling that things might be rushed.

36 Comments

  1. Too bad for Jaeger. That’s one more thing the game does better: He survives! The game does tell why Cordelia is disguised as a Valkyria. Not going to spoil it here since they may bring it up on the next ep. Can’t wait for the subs. 🙂

    Miko86
  2. All the setup for the final engagement is completely changed in comparison from the game, at least that’s good news because is something new and not a copy pasta from the game, but still, I wanted to see a showdown between Jaeger’s Lupus and Welkin’s Edelweiss. As others had already written, the game tells all about the Randgriz house and its role in the Valkyrur-Darksen war. As for why Alicia didn’t shoot the structure, the first blast was to neutralize the giant cannon, while in the the second, she didn’t have a clear view of the main structre while blocking the shot, that’s why she aim for the nearest radiator.

    And for the comparison between “mad” Max and Pfailouche, even if Geass was 2 years earlier, the concept for Senjou no Valkyria (which were originally for the defunct Sega Dreamcast just like Thunder Force VI) were way before that, since it’s made by the Skies of Arcadia’s team. The fact that Fukuyama voiced both sociopaths is just coincidence.

    SeedStriker
  3. Anime’s entirely different from the game. Squad 7 didn’t battle the Batomys like in the game. Most of them were on standby while the awesome threesome are trapped in the Barious Valkyrur temple. Completely different.

    razgriz
  4. Maximillan isn’t that similar to Le-douche in the game. They altered his character slightly for the anime, but at least he got off better than some of the other characters.
    He doesn’t hate his father in the game but his mother was of “lower class” which meant that he was always treated poorly compared to his siblings.
    In the game, he doesn’t really care for the throne, but wants to establish a powerbase around himself so he’s more easily protected from the numerous assassination attempts from his siblings to remove his right of succession to the throne (even though he’s quite low down)

    But the thing which annoys me the most at the moment is how everything is dependent on Alicia and her Valkyrur powers. In the game, they went to great lengths to show that they whouldn’t rely on such powers and need to win with their own strength. Maximilians obsession with the same power was what eventually led to his downfall…
    Not long to go, then I can just forget about this show. Looking forward to that…

  5. I stopped knowing wtf was going on after ep 20. But from the preview it looks like they’re gonna speed the hell out of this mess to give us some kind of silly ending – too bad they already fucked the anime up so much that I really don’t care anymore. Bah, just end it plz.

    Megas
  6. What the hell? My comment ended up screwed up…

    Anyway, what I said was if people wanted to see Welkin actually DO SOMETHING+Alicia NOT being the damsel in a sweet an epic scene (since it doesn’t look like it will be in the anime) I refer you to this scene from the game: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pnDwxZjOEYQ

    @Omni: The Darcen/Valkyria thing with Cordelia is much better explained in the game since she’s the one who gave the explanation to Max but since they changed the basis of their meeting that kinda became improbable.

    Acerbus
  7. @Acerbus: Yeah, they fucked it up that badly. But when that scene happened, I couldn’t help but think that the damn tank was getting away – & now in the anime they gave it uber power that could take down Alicia.

    Whatever, I really think I’m wasting my time with this anime – I don’t even think the script writers even played the game. If you’re going to animate a game, don’t make the main guy a gayass for half the series & the main girl a twit that can’t think for herself. Look at Tales of the Abyss. The game & anime were exactly the same & it was way more interesting than this junk even if you knew what was going to happen because of it.

    Butchering an OK game into a shitty anime is just wrong.

    Megas
  8. Wow, they killed off Jaeger. That’s rather pathetic how they killed him off, too. I liked that Jaeger lived in the game and his exit from the battlefield after that tough fight with Welkin and Squad 7.

    Maxmillian’s character and story are changed for the worse. No explanation given as to why the Randgriz rule Gallia in the Valkyria’s stead and Alicia has become a damsel-in-distress instead of fighting alongside the squad…

    Looks like they just wanted to save the confession for last. So much for Welkins’ Power of Love potential on the battlefield. Not surprising since they butchered his Calm Heart potential, as well.

    Nellie
  9. It’s getting so dumb with the ability of a dozen or so militia people taking on a whole tank full of trained regular soldiers and still coming out with minimal losses. Apparently only the good guys have grenades and RPGs at their disposal. The enemy shoot at them with machine guns blindly ONLY when the good guys hide behind covers but switch to single shot rifles with horrible aim when they’re out in the open field. People standing on top of high platforms that has perfect view of the field cannot hit anyone running at them while the other side can run, shoot, and hit them at the same time. Apparently a sniper with a scope perched on a stable surface gets one-shotted by a guy with a regular rifle in one hand and driving a jeep on a bumpy ground with the other and still has perfect aim. I’ve read the Rule of Anime, it’s hilarious, but this is way too blatant and taking it too far. At least in Gundam they have the excuse of having overpowered machines and literally “superhuman” characters to explain the difference in skills/power. This is just sad…

    …Sorry, rant over. I’m just pissed at the series too much now, but I gotta finish what I’ve started.

    Chen^2
  10. Faldio is such a bad ass in the anime. Seriously? Sniping people while driving a jeep over rough terrain?

    I wouldn’t really say Lelouche and Maxamilian are the same. Lelouche, more or less, had good reasons for what he was doing, while so far, Maxamillian is just on some hate driven power trip.

    Stei
  11. I’m not interested in anything other than apparently seeing Isara again, though it’d be a flashback.

    Oh, and in Jaeger. I was impressed by him in the game and wanted him to be a likable character. I hope he still lives.

    Starshade
  12. Hey Omni, I know you’ve been busy with the servers crashing and all, but just wondering when the Fall Season Preview is going to be out, especially since the season has already started…

    Also didn’t know where to put this, srry :<

    Stormflux
  13. now that u mentioned lelouch being similar to maximilian, i can no longer see maximilian as a villian. We arent sure whether Jaeger is dead, most likely yes. But that situation wud be like Lelouch pointing a gun at suzaku (after all Jaeger is a high rank soldier, and maximilian is just a posh boy wif “ambition”), for all we know Jaeger probably took the gun and killed maximilian. As for why alician didnt destroy the big lance instead, im thinking its probably because the big lance is made of the same material as her little lance and shield, so she know it wont be easily destroyed wif her already weakened power.

    brianleung8912
  14. Heh Chen^2 I agree completely. It’s ridicolous plot convenient for all characters to ”dodge” all bullets. Then again since when have you taken a war series where female soldiers(and kids) runs with skirts seriously? xD And this anime is meant for the masses, not the gaming fans, therefore a medicore anime.

    semtex
  15. I agree Maximillian is a lot like Le Louche .. except Maxy is a huge D-bag … that episode when Jaguer, Silvaria, and Karl go to rescue him I liked how it was showing feelings and unity in both sides .. or so it led us to believe ..

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