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「父親」 (Chichioya)
“Father”
Ah Plunderer, truly the gift which keeps on giving. From time travel to magical aliens engaging in mob rule, we’ve now reached the point where the evil antagonist who wasn’t so evil is, in fact, actually evil. ‘Tis a strange twist of fate when Schmerman is proven to be the progenitor of all evil, but frankly I think we all knew it was coming.
Besides Licht actually kicking the bucket (even if we all know he’s not permanently dead), the main surprise definitely had to be Jail getting beaten to a pulp by daddy dearest. Or, you know, Jail technically being a stand-in for Alan’s murdered son and daughter, but that’s a family conversation for another week. I’m frankly not too stunned Alan overcame Jail right now considering Alan’s Ace status and the uncertainty surrounding how the ownership over the Original Ballots will play out, however I highly doubt Jail is going to be left Numberless for too long. When Jail has more or less become the rival sidekick for Licht and is now serving as his “rational” side (insert speech about conviction here), there needs to be someway to ensure those iron fists to face leave their intended mark.
As for Doan and Schmerman though, things are a little less certain. While Doan’s opinions are a pretty easy read—i.e. believer in power only being given to those who’ve proven their worth—Schmerman for all his changes still leaves some things up in the air. It’s easy to guess that preserving Alcia is front and centre for example (it’s important for Doan as well), but it’s hard to believe a simple preservation of the status quo is all that our bespectacled blondie is aiming for. When you’re producing pills seemingly capable of turning the average man (or woman) into superhuman killing machines and demanding full control over the Original Ballots, there’s something else going on behind the scenes, especially when some other key players (e.g. Firenda) haven’t been seen for a while. Not that the truth is going to be easily discerned (if at all) before season’s end mind you, but I imagine a twist or two will help keep things moving along.
It’s only a question of how big a shakeup they wind up causing.
Preview
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Unfortunately, Nana doesn’t have enough Counts to prevent their meeting with Doan and the Special Services Unit. And IMO, I might be wrong, but Jail’s fight with his dad seems the 2nd best animation fight quality I’ve ever seen so far.
His fights with Licht could’ve been better and gives us a good adrenaline vibe in our minds. So yeah, the only saving grace for this series’s season is the plot progression and reveals especially when Jail’s dad’s backstory reveals the reason why he agreed on Alcia’s creation.
Nevertheless, there’s a plot hole in plain sight in 2nd half. Oh Hina, Hina. I feel bad for her having an irresponsible mother. And when I mean irresponsible, it means keeping your daughter in the dark that she suffers from being taken advantage of. Cue the worst premiere episode of this series…😐🙅
As much as I appreciate Tsukina’s sacrifice (maybe, just a speculation, her Count represents the truths she must tell and not lie otherwise…) and determination in stealing that Original Ballot,
she had 10 whole years to tell her daughter the truth about everything. Unless this involves the OFFENSIVE SHOUNEN TROPE – “I keep this secret so that I can protect you from harm.”
Somehow SSU somehow force her to lie about the OB’s whereabouts so she can hand it to them. And she lied so many times that it went to zer0…of course the manga is on-going and we are to believe she’s officially dead because how can you survive falling from the Abyss’s sky in a wounded and powerless state?
I doubt Tsukina is an Ace even if we are to be proved she’s 300+ years old. Even if she’s one, she’ll likely have non-combatant powers like Nana’s. Again this is just a mere prediction of mine so that I can hold my brain together for logic behind these unanswered plot holes…
So moral of story: Tell your child every secret you’ve the day before you die, especially when it comes to an OB that’ll make some people angry about it.
For the forgettable villain, he’s delighted to have found it. For Doan, he’s angry because he believes they’re trying to make another Dinosaur Era Extinction reenactment. Makes sense and more adrenaline rush in making that deadly cliffhanger. 👍
Overall this episode is half-good-half-bad in terms of plot reveals and progression that I always wonder if the author has no idea how to make use of Hina or Tsukina or both. In fact, it seems unbelievable that première episode has Hina believe in anything. This episode features her not knowing how any SSU people react to her MacGuffin…which completely throws off all the character development she has so far…☹️
Prove me wrong if she is still redeemable in terms of CD and intelligence besides on the first day of Waste War and Licht’s first kills.
Not sure the animation was the best, but the artwork definitely improved for that fight which let the impact of each punch be felt. This is unfortunately just one of those shows where visual aspirations exceed the animation budget 😛
What is ‘OB’, ‘SSU’ and ‘XD’?
OB = Original Ballot
SSU = Special Services Unit
CD = Character Development
*My own abbreviation vocabulary depending on the series’s terms/names
Right. CD, not XD. I know what is the meaning of XD. XD 😛
Thanks. 😉
I still don’t get Schmerman’s method. I understand the logic, but what he did practically made him lose 33% of his combat assets. Tokikaze was willing to kill, but never did. Licht kept on kill stealing from him. While Sonohara never did want to kill anybody. Considering what has been said, her first kill was after Tokikaze’s death. That’s two out of six combatants lost early on just for some test. Sure he still ended up with five, but he could’ve had more quicker with another strategy.
Doan’s a bully with a heart isn’t he? He tries his best to keep unwilling combatants out. 😛
Was kind enough to put Rihito out of his misery too. Wonder why he’s looking for Sonohara though? He didn’t raise his count by making her submit to him everyday did he?
Pretty sure he’s looking for Sonohara because whatever was controlling her has worn off and Schmerman wants his tool back to being a tool, instead of rebelling like Licht. I also get a kick out of Doan’s mentality, in some sense he’s meritocratic which you’d never guess upon his first appearance XD
Alan has some inhuman willpower not to shoot the murderer of his children. For a moment I thought that the murderer’s child was actually Jail. That would have been a nice guilt trip..
As for Hina and the comments of last week’s episodes, my guess is that she isn’t that old and lived a normal life until her mother got dragged to the “real world”. Which also means that her father would have been alive all this time. I don’t think that what we saw of him in the flashback being slashed by Licht confirmed that he was dead, so yeah…
Speaking of Licht, forget boring Hina and concentrate on Nana, geez.
The truth of Hina’s age is a bit simpler than that, although we definitely won’t get to it by end of season. If you’re really curious see below:
Show Spoiler ▼
Is dead? I don’t remember that scene. ^^U That happens when you don’t have time and skim through a series.
love the chest of Nana
Kinda dropped this. IDK now the gonna throw away all the char development of Shurman during the 300 year flashback: he was FIERCELY attached to the kids liken wtf ESPECIALLY when they weren’t looking. now the writers are gonna throw that away? Sounds like they wrote themselves into a corner and couldn’t figure out how to fix it.
Unless it really is the sourced author’s doing but we almost forget that Schumermann is over 300 years old so anything could’ve happen in between that timeline and that may have involved some mind intervention possibly from Firenda which won’t make sense if the said author doesn’t reveal she’s alive and not dead.
The only character development that suddenly got thrown off the rails is Hina’s. After all being kidnapped and knowing the military wants the OB in premiere episode, viewers think she’ll remember her mistake/lesson…but unfortunately, she didn’t. This episode has revert her into the typical ignorant hero’s love interest. You would think she was too busy on how to save Licht’s should when she SHOULD REMEMBER HOW TO SURVIVE WITHOUT GETTING CAUGHT with her MacGuffin.
Of course I should be disappointed with Lynn and Pele that doesn’t affect the plot’s progression except be there to assist current hero Jail. Nothing more, nothing less. But Hina is kind of rubbing viewers, even the blind ones (non-manga readers), with her forgetfulness unless she becomes another victim of being an “accidental trouble-making damsel” of the offensive shounen trope lists. Or the author is throwing darts on which character development needs to be scrapped off the chart.
For now, I’ve to tolerate her for who knows how long I can last… I know I’ve to accept her for the sake of a shounen-ish story that’s loads of potential of its speculative fiction and moral dilemmas it presents in this second arc.
So my honest verdict is that this anime series isn’t worthy to be Best Anime of 2020. But at least… I hope it WON’T BE NOMINATED FOR WORST ANIME of 2020 for it really presents itself as an 8-in-1 shows that has made me use my critical thinking skills for first time ever in my opinion.
Could I ask what you mean by ‘ has made me use my critical thinking skills for first time ever in my opinion’?
My critical thinking skills = Observing for plot consistency and plot holes
Of course makjang dramas are the actual ones that got me use my brain the whole time watching it. Well of course other anime series I skim through My Logic Dictionary, but this series is the very first show to make me wonder and come up with 3 or 4 theories in fitting my own logic to the plot holes seen here.
I know anyone reading this reason might think I’m acting like Marple/Sherlock, but I’m not. I just want to solve like that at my own will. That’s all.
If that’s the case, I don’t think we can call television as “Idiot Box” anymore because any drama/anime series I watch makes me use brain power lolz…
Hopefully this is the best explanation I can write, answering your question. Anyways, I’ll keep loving Plunderer in some ways no matter how crazier it gets from here on. ☺️
I think that this is the first series that I left three times and came back three times. ^^U
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