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「大支柱崩落(パージ)」 (Dai shichuu houraku (Paaji))
“Purge”
Takaii apologizes in advance boys and girls, he’s a little swamped with work, so you’ll just have to put up with my ramblings on Clockwork Planet’s second episode. Admit it, you enjoy them. Well, at least that’s the fantasy I’m sticking with.
Back on topic though, Clockwork continues apace. Compared to last week’s very light novel opening, little has actually changed this time around. The infamous ubiquitous light novel tropes remain at the forefront, the story still is frustratingly vague, and the characters are cookie cutter enough to give gingerbread molds a run for their money. Eh, that’s a little too harsh. The first hints of plot—the actual plot—are popping up, as RyuZU’s age and the talk of global stagnation suggest a threat not unlike that of The Corroding Empire, while we also have the political machinations between the military and guild throwing a wrench into things. Given Naoto already knows of the issue (thanks to those ridiculous ears), it’s certain he will join up with Marie eventually, and such circumstance already looks to be in store. The only real question is what the problem is exactly, and how it must be solved.
Character-wise this episode also had some improvements. Yeah Marie remains a cheeky tsundere, but Halter at least keeps in her check, and there’s the potential for an intriguing backstory. The true star of the show though is RyuZU who without a doubt currently makes the show for me. Her blatantly snobbish personality is on the right side of funny, and oh boy does she never fail to drop the comedy bombs. Pretty sure I haven’t spit in laughter at a transfer student scene in a long time, but damn does this girl know how to bust a gut with things like RyuZU YourSlave. It’s a personality that would get Marx rolling in his grave, and it might be enough to reform Naoto out of his hopeless origins. The dweeb already is reveling in his fetish(es) after all, won’t take much to push him into half decent territory. Well, one can hope.
While better than the opener, there’s no denying Clockwork still has some work ahead of it. Introducing Marie to Naoto next week should hopefully draw—if only slightly—the story away from its light novel trappings, while further revelations concerning the story (i.e. RyuZU and her role) should fill in some of the annoying blanks present. There is potential here, but Clockwork must act on it and not remain transfixed on its current setup. Give me a story to match RyuZU’s delicious personality and I’ll forgive Naoto for his vanilla transgressions. Definitely not making a blogging call on this one yet, but if Clockwork offers the goods next week, I might just be tempted sticking with it.
Preview
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You know, i wonder where the “Ghost in the Shell” are hiding. If RyuZU is an Automata, what are then inside her Brain section? All Gears too? No, somewhere there must be at last an AI or KI Center, for talking, moving, and seems like emotions, too
So RyuZU is perhaps something alike 2B, and perhaps these two (Game and Anime here) are helping each other out
I short: i wonder how these gears inside RyuZU can be the living spark. But then it would poison the anime here
.. or to get more mysterious
Her entire Body is like Erza’s Magic from Fairy Tail. When he open her Chest to fix the gears, and an Dimension Gate connects the Human Body under the skin with her Clockwork Clone somewhere inside the Planet
But, this is heavy Stuff. But could work in this Universe
(This was an Brain Strom of mine)
Like the Neck of the late anime “Duhalan” Monster Girl
This is the first episode not 2nd
I don’t know what makes you think that but this is definitely the 2nd episode
bruh this is definitely the second episode LUL
I might forget a lot of things, but I always double check the episode count 😛
Holy fuck. Out of the massive potential that lies within the metallic and industrial steampunk aesthetics found within and the many sci-fi based ideas that one could use to develop an interesting narrative based off those ingredients they decided to go with this? Are you fucking kidding me? Goddamn… Yeah, GG author, GG.
Man, this makes me quite salty that Ar NoSurge has absolutely no anime adaptation planned… The difference is frickin stark despite having some questionably overdone elements itself.
C’est la fuckin vie~~~
The Problem with the entire Ar Tonelico and others Gaming series, is that it plays on a Big Tower. So no change of location. Well this helps to save background art Budget, but every time the same “soup” for the eyes becomes boring. And i dunno, they would had only the fights for animation…
Even Deep Space Nine, in the end created many episodes outside the Station (for explanation)
Yes, apparently a VERY, VEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRYYYYY BIG tower. That in itself is a massive challenge. Even Ar NoSurge takes place in a planetary-sized space station. (If you really think about in terms of actual scale, that’s bigger than what most fantasy worlds even go out of their way to depict) What I think is that in the games due to hardware and other limitations the actual sizes of everything are extremely scaled down to not cause much system, budgetary or manpower strain.
A passive medium like an animated serial can definitely much more accurately depict the sheer scale of the world found within the games. The only thing is that the staff must really think and imagine how to greatly expand upon and rearrange the various scenarios accordingly based upon the increase in scale. Plus those games were extremely lean on gameplay so battles within an animated version can be kept to an absolute minimum.
RyuZU and Kiriha…decisions, decisions…
Eh… I don’t know here. Was kind of borderline with Ep. 01, and Ep. 02 didn’t really help matters. Maybe in some ways better than EP. 01, but also reinforced some things I didn’t like about Ep. 01. Yeah, the tropes sure remain (though not like that only happens in LNs), and that’s not helping matters. Just feels quite by the numbers too often, and execution isn’t good enough to offset.
My impression of the main cast remains largely the same though for me RyuZU is coming off too much as a discount Horizon. I get that some like her, but she’s perhaps OK for me. Also, uh, how do automatons blush exactly? Yeah, yeah, “moe”, but still… Speaking of Blushy McBlush (Naoto), yeah, still not working for me and Ep. 02 just reinforced that. Still like Marie, but I guess I didn’t pick up in Ep. 01 just how great she is at combat, sharpshooting, etc. on top of being genius Meister at like what? Age 13? NOT wanting damsel in distress, but would help IMO if she wasn’t quite as Mary Sue as she appears.
Halter still is probably my favorite, but uh, we need some backstory here – something, because I can’t buy that dude is human given what he does, and if he’s an automaton, he seems super advanced. Looks completely human (doesn’t even have RyuZU’s gear… hair ornament, or is that just part of her body?). So how rare are automatons? Is he a cyborg instead? Honestly, could use a little more world-building/setup details. Maybe cut some of the SOL early on?
I did get a chuckle out of RyuZU’s class intro (her name didn’t do anything for me), but that was it. Comedy and really SOL in general isn’t working for me. :/ Frankly, it was a bit jarring how it went from “Must save 20 million!” complete with battles & countdown to fluffy YMMV SOL.
The Military and I guess XYZ family (forgot name) working to discredit Marie’s family is OK as a plot line, but going THIS far? Really? No one at the top brass has an issue with killing off 20 million + destroy a big city? Just overall it’s a bit hard to buy into the military purging the entire city and have no negative repercussions, but whatever. Still, the military does seem kind of stupid. Just damage the controls on Floor 15 rather than turn the switches to “off”. Not plot friendly, but much more effective & logical. Gonna purge it all anyway no matter what – right?
A bigger problem is the in medias res opening. Ep. 01 started with Sprocket Calendar February 8, 1016 while Ep. 02 starts with Sprocket Calendar January 12th, 1016. OK, well we know for certain all 4 of the main cast will survive. Not only that, I will be very surprised if Kyoto isn’t saved as well given how Marie is quite willing to “go down with the ship”. In short, all of this is robbed of tension. Now of course one might say, this all as expected anyway. Hard to believe the show will kill off the main cast and ML & RyuZU won’t save the day when it’s been setting up for that. Fair enough, but skipping spoilerific in medias res opening would at least help a little with maintaining suspension of disbelief. Make easier on the audience, not harder.
I don’t hate the show, and there are bits that still interest me, but definitely issues as well. Very on the fence here and I doubt Ep. 03 will change that.
perhaps to add more drama, the repair the defect gear they need an part from RyuZU’s Body.
Kinda ironic that in a show where the world has stagnated, the development of the plot seems to be the same. Episode 3 really needs to sell what the show is about. If I want blandness with no progression, I’ll just keep watching Sagrada Reset.
You should really stay away from pitching The Corroding Empire, which has been pulled for being a ripoff of The Collapsing Empire, by John Scalzi. Best not to encourage plagiarism.
Ignoring the sh*tstorm surrounding it (and trust me, I’m well aware having read both), I used the book as an example because that story’s premise better fits Clockwork so far than The Collapsing Empire. Probably other examples I could have used, but it was the first one that came to mind.