Summary:

Since Kiyama Harumi is an expert on matters of the brain, Kuroko and Mikoto try to question her on the Level Upper. Saten and Uiharu join them, and Saten decides not to reveal the Level Upper she discovered after Kuroko mentions what’s been happening to the other users. It continues to bother her though, and she leaves the other girls behind to think about what to do. Mikoto follows her, so Saten tries to play it off as nothing, and in the process she drops a charm that her mother gave her. This leads to her reminiscing about her family and reminds her of the weight of the expectations on her since she’s a Level 0. The next day, Saten is still debating what to do with the Level Upper when she overhears some thugs roughing up a guy who is trying to buy a copy of the Level Upper from them. Against her better judgment, Saten steps in to try to stop them, but she’s powerless against the thugs. Fortunately for her, Kuroko happens to come across them and is able to take out two of the guys with relative ease.

The third thug, however, proves to be a much bigger challenge, and Kuroko finds it surprisingly hard to hit him with any of her teleport attacks. She gets injured in the process and has to flee up an abandoned building while trying to figure out a plan. Kuroko eventually realizes that the guy’s power is to distort the light around him, thereby throwing her off. To counter this, she decides to teleport the nearby window panes into the building’s support columns, cutting them in half. This causes the building to crumble, voiding the thug’s advantage and making him fear for his life. Kuroko saves him though and teleports both of them out at the last second. She then gets him to tell her about the Level Upper, so he reveals that it’s just a piece of music. Saten meanwhile has left the scene, and she’s even more conflicted about what to do with the Level Upper now that Kuroko has shown her what someone with an ability is capable of. By chance, she runs into a group of friends, and when they start talking about the rumor of the Level Upper, Saten reveals that she has a copy.

Preview

Despite the lack of Touma for a second week in a row, I actually really liked this episode. It had a nice balance of humor, action, and character development, and there was some great production quality backing it up (the animation, the piano pieces during the Saten scenes). Actually the Touma scene that should have been here wasn’t as important a scene as the one that wasn’t in last week’s episode, so it’s even less of a big deal, though I do worry about his role moving forward in the series.

But my point is that what was in this episode was quite good. Aside from the fairly intense Kuroko battle (my only complaint about the episode was that the thug surrendered a lot more readily than I thought he would), they’ve also really dialed up the emotional conflict inside of Saten, making her into more than just another side/support character. It makes me start to wonder about the possibilities for her character, and since this is around the point I stopped reading the manga, I’m very curious to see if she actually uses the Level Upper and what her ability turns out to be if she does.

40 Comments

  1. Next arc is the one with the mikoto’s clone and the accelerator experiment. Though Touma will only appear at the end of it, and I suppose To Aru Kagaku no Railgun will end at the end of the Accelerator Arc. I haven’t read the novel so I’d assume the focus will be shifter to Accelerator after he got his brain damaged.

    Ayle
  2. Saten is SO gonna use that level upper now that she feels so useless. By comparing herself to Kuroko in being the same grade level yet so different, she will probably take this chance to make a change. The fact that she let her friends know she had LU could mean she was scared of using it alone.

    pierce
  3. Kuroko getting kicked through a glass window was the best part of this episode, particularly the way in which it was animated. I actually laughed out loud. No reason why that thug should have surrendered so readily. And finally, needs more Touma, no need to cut the little of Touma there is.

    So Very Odd
  4. SPOILER: Maybe ^_^
    Show Spoiler ▼

    Animeniac
  5. The thing is with Touma…is that the writers (like America sitcom) made him a complete and utter moron. In the first series, I found myself screaming at the screen, “USE YOUR BLEEPING RIGHT HAND ALREADY YOU MORON! IT’S WORKED AGAINST EVERYTHING UP TO NOW! START USING THAT DAMN HEAD OF YOURS AND…etc etc…” at the end of each arc.

    Even if he was in this ep, I’m sure he’d just get the crap beaten out of him until the last five minutes where he realizes, like every other instances involving magic/abilities he’d face prior, that his Imagine Breaker cancels out his enemy’s magic/abilities.

    Remy
  6. https://randomc.net/image/To%20Aru%20Kagaku%20no%20Railgun/To%20Aru%20Kagaku%20no%20Railgun%20-%2009%20-%20Large%2006.jpg

    LOL at Uiharu’s reaction after getting her skirt lifted up by Saten-san as usual.

    Another lol at Kuroko reprimanding Harumi for her blatant indecency, since she happens to be the least qualified to tell others that, considering her own track record with Biribiri. XD

    It’s quite hard to comment on Saten’s dilemma when I already know what’s about to happen, all that I’ll say is here’s hoping people will cut her some slack in the events that will follow.

    (BTW, anyone seen the latest poster?
    http://www.sankakucomplex.com/2009/11/28/mikoto-kuroko-yuri-swimsuit-chaos/

    Saten turns out to be most well-endowed of the four girls, so what’s there not to like about her? 🙂 )

    Kinny Riddle
  7. It was a nice episode indeed, although I think the Kuroko-battle was somewhat better in the manga. Since they left out Touma again, this time with an obvious connection to the Index-story I guess they won’t link together Index and Railgun at all. Probably it’s better this way.

    Jurkasz
  8. It’s good to see that our yuri raep vixen can deal a good fight!!! I couldn’t believe my eyes, she has a new dimension now.
    As for Saten
    1. Love her clothes!
    2. Her bikini poster is my wallpaper.
    3. She’s about to surpass Biribiri in my list.
    4. I can relate to her strugle of the lever upper. Geesh I have wished to have super powers every now and then. Frankly sometimes to kill off people that screw me off. So I’m glad I’ll never have the chance she has now; because I go to the darkside for sure.

    Nice ep.

    Island esper
  9. @Remy: I’m not sure what scene you would be talking about, because What I saw was Touma using his Imagine Breaker whenever he could, except just Mikoto on the bridge in the Accelerator arc. (and he didn’t use it on purpose) If you mean against Accelerator……the Imagine Breaker doesn’t stop normal steel beams, normal railroad tracks, or normal explosions.

    Shinji103
  10. @bobara: Chapter 6+7, and chapter 8.

    @SomeKindaNick: You know that Railgun is going to be ~24 episodes, right? And unless they spend about 10 episodes entirely on fillers, they’re going to be done with the Level-Upper arc real soon here (around episode 12 maybe), which leaves the whole second half of the anime.

    Shinji103
  11. @ Martin – Or enemies!!

    Even though the episode felt a little slower they definitely spent their time wisely. I like that the supporting characters got a little more development than they did in the manga.

    In any case it does kinda suck that Touma vs/x Misaka moments are being taken out. Alot of the enjoyment of the series was seeing the overlap from Index and making it feel like the 2 story lines did have some significant correlation between the two.

    Schwegburt
  12. @Shinji: Though continuity in abilities aren’t constant, save when writers chooses to use them, I can only note speculations. And you’re right, on naturally occurring occurrences, Imagine Breaker is useless. However, when occurrences are brought upon by unnatural events or means (IE by abilities or magic), it’s been shown that these oddities and their immediate effects can be countered by Touma’s right hand of doom.

    IE, Accelerator was able to accelerate and increase the force he sent via rail. If I had the Imagine Breaker, I’d simply TOUCH the rails. It’s shown that Imagine Breaker not only cancels out abilities, but the effects created by that abilities IE velocity and speed of an object. Take the Giant Concrete Golem or the Fire Golem. Even if Imagine Breaker (IB) were able to cancel their existences, the force of their attacks should not have been canceled, but yet they were.

    In one of the latest ep, IB had been show to be able to shield Touma and the girls from the heat and force of an explosion that was literally in front of him. I’ll buy that the trick may not have worked in the dust explosion, since it was a full area effect. But the rails (with the exceptions of the rail that were falling from above), Accelerator’s accelerated jump kick, and even the ‘Accelerated Spirit Bomb,’ all, in theory, could’ve been canceled by IB. Same goes for Misaka’s little iron dust vibro-blade/whip. IB not only canceled it out, but also the ‘saw blade’ effect that the iron dust were causing.

    Not to say that IB makes it’s owner invincible, just that Touma seems to make the realization that he has IB after he’s gotten his ass thoroughly handed to him, he re-re-discovers his IB’s capabilities by accident and decides to use it to his advantage.

    It’s like watching Superman realize he’s got all his super abilities time and time again. It’s just damn frustrating.

    Remy
  13. @RyougaZell: No, the Index stioryline has already started, or at least i the manga version it has. In the manga, the Index story started back in episode where Mikoto was doing her cute act with those thugs in the family restaurant. That was the bridge scene in the beginning of episode 1 of Index. Then this episode is the next day after that (or would be if the Touma scene hadn’t been taken out), where Mikoto runs into Touma again and Touma mentions having met Index earlier in the day, i.e. the scene where she shock-stomps the ground and causs those machines to go into alert mode and they run away, at the end of episode 1 of Index. But now that you mention it, the fact that they were in classes back in the early episode of Railgun is another one of those changes fromt he manga version, because they [i]are[/i] supposed to be on vacation already, at least int he manga.

    @Remy: But the rails aren’t supernatural, nor brought to existence by anything supernatural like the explosion in episode 7. They’re just being knocked around by Accelerator’s ability. Besides, trying to touch a metal object flying at you at superspeed…..if Imagine Breaker doesnt work on it, or he misses or reacts too slowly, he’d kinda be dead. ^^; Not the kind of chance most would like to take. ^^; And his ability certainly wouldn’t work on the rail /before/ Accelerator……accelerated it, so he /would/ have to wait until it’s flying at him at body-shattering speeds.

    Shinji103
  14. Man they cut off Touma’s appearance again?! Come on! The guy hardly appears in the manga and in this series, but how could they even cut off his limited appearances? Dam this sucks, especially since this episode would’ve been a lot better had Misaka detected Touma using her hair (not kidding lol, like an antenna of some sort that reacts to Touma’s presence) and she met up with him. This also shows the transition to the Index side of the story, because at this point Touma doesn’t remember when Misaka first met him, and he is also looking for a church, which Misaka helped him where it is. Dam, I was looking forward to these few and rare Misaka and Touma moments. This was the last appearance so far with the manga.

    X
  15. @Shinji103:
    Yes. Index already started in the ‘manga’. Yet this version is not following the manga. Since classes have not ended in railgun, it would be weird to have them have a scene from Index which takes place in vacation. Thus is ain’t the same version anymore.

    The scenes are going to happen eventualy, just not in the same order. The very same as we saw the pool cleaning scene and Kuroko’s past early. Heck, we even got introduced to Saten way early. Its obvious the series is not following the manga anymore.

    Touma’s scenes will probably happen between the bridge of the Level upper arc and the next one.

    RyougaZell
  16. I guess since they re-arranged Index that Railgun is getting somewhat re-arranged as well, so Touma just doesn’t show up sometimes when he is supposed to… which is too bad. His scenes in Railgun are awesome.

    Which is too bad. I thought the series was good but then I read the manga and it just kind of flowed better.

    I think the series is only 12 episodes – they can just get rid of Touma since the Level Upper arc is more or less self-contained. They’ll probably end after that arc and not get into the “Sisters” from Index.

    K.K.
  17. @Remy: I’m still not sure what you’re talking about. As far as I’ve seen, he uses Imagine Breaker whenever he can. He even tried it against Kanzaki and ended up getting his arm sliced up for it since she doesn’t actually use magic in her attacks like he thought.

    @Ryouga Zell: I know, that’s what I’m talking about. JC Staff is rearraning Railgun so much that the whole chornology is different now. But if they really are going to animate the SISTERs arc of Railgun, then they’ll /have/ to have Touma, which means they’ll have to have the Index corrolation scenes they skipped. So my point is why did they skip them in the first place if they need them? *shrug*

    Shinji103

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