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「希望」 (Kibou)
“Hope”
Coming into this third week, one of the biggest things for me was seeing if Coppelion was going to continue the skipping and rushed development we saw in the second episode. Luckily, it seems like it was only for that portion—at least, that’s what I hope—and the third episode ends up righting the ship somewhat. It doesn’t quite make up for the shortfalls of last week and the development is far from ideal (partially as a result of last week), but if it stays like this the rest of the way, I’d gladly continue watching.
With that said, what we get this week is essentially a quick resolution in terms of the “delivery man” responsible for supplying the remaining people living within Tokyo. As it turns out, it’s the same man who caused the incident in the first place in Tristar Industries scientist Denjiro Shiba, and things actually turn out far more positive in terms of his meeting with our main characters than expected. Of course, considering the back story—Denjiro’s essentially doing this because he feels guilty at this point—it makes sense, but it’s still quite surprising how well things end up here, and it’s not without a bit of irony that the man who was on the cutting edge of scientific innovation now speaks of science as a kind of curse instead.
But as they say, if something gets resolved too easily, there’s probably something else coming. And we get that literally moments after the aforementioned encounter—in the form of the sudden appearance of a B-2 Spirit Bomber piloted by unknown assailants. Strange decisions to land and try and capture the grandma aside, the appearance of these unknowns suddenly make things very darn interesting, and there ain’t nothing like seeing Ibara wielding a Type 91 surface to air missile to get one excited for the next episode.
Suffice to say, it’s also interesting to note the revelation that new, higher level contamination “zones” are suddenly popping up. And while they’re probably caused by the “goods drop off” from the bomber, it makes you wonder what the purpose of that is. At the very least, it seems like they’re intentionally doing this to try and keep people out of the area, and I gotta say, if they possess weapons such as the B-2, one can only wonder what else they have up their sleeves. On the bright side, it seems like our heroines also have some tricks up their sleeves too—each of them seem to have some kind of genetically enhanced ability—and they might just need every bit of that and then some in the future.
Overall though, it’s a decent episode to say the least. Some of the more emotional scenes could use a bit of work in terms of how they’re delivered—especially considering how last week’s episode didn’t do well in this regard—but I can at least get behind some of the struggles our heroines have. After all, they essentially wouldn’t have been born if this accident never happened, but at the same time, it’s not like the fact they were born is all fun and games either. And well, the experience so far has been somewhat flawed to be sure, but there are things to like—including the continuously gorgeous backdrops from GoHands—and that’s good enough for me. Here’s looking forward to some surface-to-air missile awesomeness next week!
Author’s Note: As usual, please refrain from spoilers past this point in the manga. If you must, please use spoiler tags.
Preview
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The rushed feeling came from the fact that the first two eps are the first 10 chapters of the manga. The manga does a better job actually explaining stuff because here they just skim through it. Its weird, why only 12 eps when there’s enough volumes to do 24 eps (even if they do somehow continue with 5 chapters an episode…which I hope they don’t (average for most shows is 3 chapters an ep if the chapters are 16-18 pages long)
It feels to me like maybe there isn’t enough background to form much of an opinion of the events unfolding.
It’s hard to articulate, but I feel like it’s too close to reality in some ways, while being too different in others. Chernobyl, I understand. Radiation-proof teenagers with a military officer vice-principal, that’s a little weird. Then there’s a spider walker in the OP. Please tell me someone else is confused about the spider walker in the OP.
Am I weird for feeling lost here?
A small quib: a B-2 flying that low is stretching it for rationality. Those things cost an entire small nation to build.
Another thing is going to be explaining who owns it. The US are the sole possessors of B2s, going to be a stretch saying they would magically hand one over to another state, let alone (what i’m assuming they are) mercenary force. Cannot forget to mention their construction is classified. When you build a 1.8 billion dollar plane you certainly don’t want the competition finding out how to counter it.
It may be worth reminding folks that this series is set in 2036. The B-2’s stealth technology may not be the most advanced thing on the block anymore, and some of them may indeed have ended up in non-US-government hands over the intervening 23 years.
Of course, if that is the case, the mere fact that there were a limited number of the things made should make it much simpler for someone with the right connections to use process of elimination to figure out which one this is, and who it belongs to.
good Point, in 2036. perhaps the B2 Bombers are outclassed or outdated with other ones. So this ones could be just “very old used” Bombers buy on Black Market
A (cheaper) Chinese copy, perhaps? By 2036 entirely possible…
just “EMP” a B2 Plane and the Pilot lose control. Because only with the help of the Board Computer, this thing can Fly in the Sky in Controllable way of course. This Baby is “fly by Wire”. Most of the Top Notch Planes has these Weak point. They reliable to much on Wires and Computer-systems. And to protect them against such attack, they gain to much Weight
@Germanguy
Assuming you even know where the B2 is to EMP it, and on top of that firing a nuclear missile to do so, which would make you the pariah of the international community. Finally, the EMP would not only affect the B2, but the entire area it is in, and if it is on foreign soil, it could be construed as an act of war against both the nation who owns the B2 and the nation it is flying over (Barring the fact that launching an ICBM is pretty much the same thing).
of course, i know how a EMP burst is made. And to Hit a Moving Object in the Sky is nearly Impossible, but why we have Computers to calculate and 2038 Update radars? 🙂 hey, it is Anime world
Or just invent a Powerful Jammed device, that kill their Systems…
dont forget, we talk abut 2038 in a Anime world…
Imagine is a powerful Tool
And dont forget, the US Military today, has more then Just a Stealth B2 Bomber. They have Fighters as well… Just remember “Nighthawk” was is called i think
Here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Air_Force
the F22A. But i bet in 2036 they have better Airplanes then the F35A. or a Plane faster then B1B
This is just Wikipedia Wisdom. There is no Secret behind this
There’s also the idea that they can take down the B-2 Spirit using a Type 91 Kai “Hand Arrow” (that looks very much like the US FIM-92 Stinger). I’d be surprised that if the Hand Arrow can even fire considering these weapons have shelf lives ranging from 4-5 years; these have been in storage in the nuclear wasteland for 20. The B-2 stealth tech was also designed to throw off their targeting systems, so this won’t end pretty.
One thing is noticeable: the plot-driven stupidity of flying B-2 low so it can be targetted by MANPADS at all…
20 years is not a lot of time. The F-15, still one of the world’s best fighter planes, was built 40 years ago.
An EMP is a wide area-of-effect weapon. You do not need to hit an aircraft with an ICBM. Furthermore, your “Imagine” of calculating where to fire the ICBM (Barring the fact that no nuclear-capable country would ever do this) is incorrect, because you’d need to first know where the B-2 is. The B-2 is primarily a high-altitude strategic bomber. Even with advanced radar, you need to know the B-2 is there or is coming, and then actively ping radar to find it. The point of the B-2 is to fly high and stealthy, and hit you before you know it’s there. And before you say, it would be costly and idiotic to constantly run a radar picket around an entire country.
Furthermore, even if you assume the use of passive radar, considering the entire area is irradiated, it’d still be impossible to find and track the B-2, because passive radar are small-scale and small-range, and you need a large number of individual platforms spread across an area to work as a whole system.
Also on the matter of stealth, for one, while the Nighthawk has the F identifier for Fighter, it is a bomber. Second, the B-2 is specifically pointed out because it has THE greatest stealth capabilities of all current modern aircraft. Third, the B-1B is not the fastest plane in the world. It is merely America’s fastest bomber. Fourth, the F-35 is hardly the end-all-be-all of aircraft. It is a jack of all trades and master of none.
I may not know everything there is about the military, but given my enjoyment of all things military and that the vast majority of my friends are in the armed forces, I think I generally know what I’m talking about. I find it rather demeaning to see you talking down to me as if you think I’m ignorant.
ANIMAX ASIA
Fun times in the ghost town of Tokyo with Ibara & friends!Join us next time as we go B-2 hunting! – is probably what Aoi is thinking.
Still waiting to see some reasons on what’s someone like her doing on such a mission.
they pretty much gave the answer in every episode, they’re genetically altered to withstand the radiation -_-. If you’re talking about asking her to chase down the fighter jet, one) they can easily maneuver themselves without the gear on, two) they were trained in their “school” to do this kind of stuff, kind of the whole point of them being created.
I get the point that they are able to live w/o any extra equipment in that environment, but MGMaster has a point IMO in terms of how Aoi compares to the other two girls. Evidently she doesn’t have any “special power” nor does she seem competent at anything other than carrying a large duffle bag or eating large quantities of food. I fail to see how the latter provides any benefit to the mission, and the former minimally so. JMO, but I would expect her to be more useful than what we’ve seen so far.
^That’s what I meant.Aoi is like a character taken from a different type of show that was just thrown in here.It’s like she received no training at all.What the heck did they even do,have her lead a normal life?I don’t see someone creating a genetically enhanced human being for that.She also mentioned how she’d like to have a special ability like the others have at some point during this episode.However,that’s a reason why a part me tends(more like wants) to believe that there’s something up with her that we’ll find out later.And by something up I don’t mean her getting kidnapped or dying or whatever just to for the sake of a dramatic impact but some reason as to why their higher-ups chose her for this mission despite clearly not being trained for it.
Main character is so loose-lipped
exactly as Zephyer said – a decent episode. it’s kinda relief after the omits and the rush (only a bit) in the 2nd episode. and the good thing is that the scenario this time hasn’t over yet, so it gives time to build things a bit more, we don’t see rushy pace.
looks like Ibara gonna try bring that B-2 down with the anti-aircraft gun she have. gonna be awesome. the animation is so masterwork. great indeed.
p.s
so funny! we want Aoi to have special powers too!
She has specials powers: the ability to lighten up the mood
I’ll refer to that as “the ability to be useless and annoying”.I feel that she’s ruining the mood the show is trying to set more than anything.
Aoi has a special power… That would be her voice. ^^
You referring to her ability to cry and whine with said voice?
Dropping this, btw. I might check out the final 2 eps to see how it all wraps up, but don’t really have the patience to follow the whole plot.
Just as Zephyr and others have commented, IMO – a better episode if not a good/great one. Personally, one improvement is that I found Aoi much more likeable/less annoying than in previous episodes.
I haven’t read the source material, but not surprised at all to read that the pacing is Formula 1 fast. I can’t shake the feeling that here and there “something” was cut. The “delivery man” mystery connected well enough with earlier episodes, but the B2 Bomber felt “out of nowhere.” Yeah, I know it’s stealth, but stealth =/= silent nor invisible to the “naked eye”. A bit of stretch for me to believe that nobody – especially those still living in the area hadn’t noticed it before (and not as a “giant crow”). Meh, whatever, still curious enough to want to know where this all leads.
*sigh* I guess I’ll have a 4 or 5 (6???) EP rule for this show. It’s just good enough to keep from dropping it.
I can only guess a few things…
1.) They mostly flew at night where, of course, a pitch-black aircraft would be extremely difficult to see with the naked eye. (And I doubt they flew THAT low for any extended time, so noise shouldn’t have been too huge a factor.)
2.) They only just reached this section of the city, where the survivors were.
3.) Any other survivors who may have seen them anywhere else are no longer there to spread the news (given how those men were trying to forcefully take Grandma Ayame with them after she saw them).
…what concerns me is the goods they “dropped off”. Given how shadowy they’re trying to be, I doubt it’s anything helpful like supplies, but possibly things that are causing the much higher contamination in various areas of the city, possibly to keep people out in order to hide whatever other secrets they may have, or it may be stuff relating to the secret itself.
I hope it’s not another growing “big, bad America” scenario though.
quote: I hope it’s not another growing “big, bad America” scenario though.
Same here, though choice of such unique and specifically US owned plane makes this scenario very probable. OTOH the plane is about THE only way someone could get over “the zone” without being intercepted by SDF fighter planes… so they chose one standard boring plot device (big bad US) over jarring plothole (someone flying unintruded over Japan).
Do we really know that Denjiro Shiba caused the meltdown or whatever it was? All I caught was that he designed the plant in which it happened. No doubt he’d feel guilty anyhow if it involved a faulty design, but for all we know from the anime it could have been a case of sabotage or terrorism rather than bad industrial design.
You’re right. I think, what he truly regrets is building the nuclear plant in Tokyo despite the opposition to the project. I believe he thinks if he had asked to built it in another place, they would have done it, and not so many people good have died or lost their homes.
Remember the Inventors of the Atomic Bomb? At First it was cutting Technology for them, but after use they saw what they created. They have some kind of curse, too
First you can not see, the Dark Results. Because you just wanna reach the “Goal”. But after you see your Baby in Action, you begin to fear the Dark Side of your Inventions
Or bring into Mind, that a H Bomb is more Fearful then Atomic Bomb. They Fear the Chain Reaction Machinery thins thing can produce.
i just remember you some sort of “Planet of Apes” spin off, where they praise a H Bomb as God…
want some Names? oppenheimer, this Russia A-Bom Creator (forgotten name) and so on
1. Oppenheimer is German-American
2. Oppenheimer is American, not Russian.
i know, but i forgot the name of the Russian Atomic Bomb Dad… (i saw an TV Documentation of Atom Bombs). He even could build a stronger then the US, but to prevent a world wide contamination, he made it weaker
and the US Hydro Bomb made a really big Hole in a Island, where still today is no Life on the ground