「太刀の媛巫女」 (Tachi no Hime Miko)
“Princess Maiden of the Long Sword”

This episode should’ve been pretty clear in its intention: Campione! will stubbornly stick to the formulaic approach it has maintained throughout summer season for its final arc. It’s a bit of a disappointment, coupled with the fact that of the setup episodes we’ve seen thus far, this one was a bit of a dullard. Most of the episode is spent plodding around with the girls: Liliana fully integrates herself into Godou’s harem, Erica and Godou goes on a date, and final girl Seishuin Ena (Saito Yuka) is finally introduced into the story. Not the most terribly interesting, exciting or even least bit entertainingly comical episode of the lot, and I’ll put this somewhere close to the Mariya episode in execution, which, if my endless rants about haven’t been made clear was the single episode I disliked the most. Oh shoot, there I go again with the rant.

For a moment, Campione! actually tries to insert some kind of complexity, but does so like the awkward beast it is when it tries to step out of its bounds. Here, we see something not commonly addressed in a romcom, how emotionally disconnected a romcom protagonist actually is. Godou’s denial of the attraction the girls share for him is, realistically speaking, a cruel display, and the anime tries to play on this, giving us a moment of introspection where he, at least in his gut, seems to understand the emotional impact of his actions upon seeing Liliana and Mariya dismayed by his neutral response to Ena’s questions about their relationships. Another interesting idea in a series full of potential, but sadly underplayed with the anime never directly tackling the subject head-on, instead choosing the let the two girls wallow in their emo before wrapping everything up with a self-asserted conclusion that not only feels forced in its entirety, but render the entire debacle slightly pointless. It’s disappointing that something this interesting is only being brought up now, yet is being written out as a passing notion.

That also pretty much sums up my feelings for an episode that felt like it should’ve come sooner. Judging from the writing, Ena’s entrance feels like it is supposed to bring into question the harem dynamic, maybe even Godou’s own feelings about it, but with only some 2 episodes left, I don’t see how this can be played out meaningfully this late in the show, not when there’s a whole other plot thread opening up about the underworld. It’s possible, no doubt, but with the way the series handled subtlety and general emotional depth here and before, I’m not holding out any hope. Not to mention, the whole deal with Athena and the mysterious dark figure she’s fighting with feels far too tacked on at this point, with seemingly little connect to what the episode is going for. For the light novel readers in the know, it seems all the more certain that the anime intends to go with a halfway original ending by tying up this loose Athena plot thread, and while I’d personally prefer to see a proper conclusion to everything raised in the series up until now, I can only question how well the writers will be able to integrate this seemingly separate story into the overarching plot.

Full-length images: 01, 05, 25, 26, 30.

End Card

14 Comments

  1. So Goudou’s harem is complete. Series, thankfully is almost complete, too. Trying to be serious about girls feelings feels… forced? Especially as they pretty much forget about it soon. Goudou being immune to girls charms is so out of place, too!

    ewok40k
  2. The thing with Athena is anime original but hopefully, it turns out decent. The build-up for it was presented and everything “can” be tied up well. How well it’s tied up is another matter however. And as for the relationship matters, Godou does address it in a way fitting for a King later on but sadly, I don’t think we’ll be seeing it. I want to be wrong though and they actually address it.

    Just for fun, a recap of what we already know from the previous episodes just to see if we can predict how it’ll wrap up. (Put in a spoiler because some might get angry)
    Show Spoiler ▼

    Whookie
      1. It’s highly possible for it to be a tweaking of the later LN events and I was kinda alluding to it based on the stuff in the spoiler. What’s anime original is her involvement at this point of the story so we can’t really predict how it’ll mesh together. Will it be decent or tacked on?

        Like what Asobi said, Athena fighting that mystery figure feels disconnected from the rest of the events and will continue to be disconnected unless they do it well. On the bright side, at least we’ll get some semblance of closure.

        Whookie
  3. Loving the 4th wife Ena! Straightforward and aggressive! Erica’s strongest rival finally appeared! Glad that this episode focused on a lot of aspects, Gudou’s cute imouto Shizuka, Gudou’s relationship with Erica and their date, Lili and Yuri’s finally acknowledging that the guy is dense and that they gotta tell it out loud to the guy, Ena’s appearance and strife between his other girls, and hell even that cute Athena’s sudden entrance looking for the guy.

    Gotta love this series!

    Ryner
  4. I’ve just read half of the LN and god… This series has a lot of potential. Sadly, this is another LN who got a poor anime adaptation.

    And Godou is just a lucky bastard to have so many beautiful girls looking for him. lol

    Higure
    1. Yeah, they really hiked up the pace in the anime to speed through the harem. They didnt go whole hog at doing a lot of original stories, but they change enough to not be very faithful. Sadly, with all these hyperdrive pace, it still wont gets to the most interesting volume which has the Godous face the Monkey King

      wicked
  5. All I know is Main character like Godou or any other spineless wimp in other anime are freaking gay or ED, you got girls that are plainly falling head over heels for you and you refuse them and act like they are friends, truly Main character like him don’t deserve any of them at all, they never appreciate something until is lost so what we need is Maria and Liliana to get involve in some sort of disaster and they fell into a coma or worst then maybe he will start to regret he should have treasure them while he had the chance and now is lost forever.
    Godou really need to be taught that kind of lesson and start cherish them.

    Mike

Leave a Reply to Ryner Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *