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「私にできること」 (Watashi ni Dekiru Koto)
“To Do What I Can”
Episode at a Glance:
While under attack by the Neuroi that appeared, the naval fleet wonders why it’s toying with them. Below deck, Yoshika is shuddering in fear, so Mio gives her an intercom to communicate with her in emergencies, and tells her not to go outside. Intending to fight, Mio, equipped with her Striker Unit, leads a squadron of regular aircraft into battle. While Mio’s busy searching for the Neuroi’s core, Yoshika goes above deck and contacts her saying she wishes to help in some way. Hearing this, Mio is concerned about Yoshika’s safety, but gets motivated by her courage in this situation, and cuts off one of the Neuroi’s wings.
Using her right eye (Glam Sight?), she locates the Neuroi’s core, while Yoshika tries to heal an injured personnel. After being told she’s just in the way, Yoshika still insists on helping, so she gets sent off to get more bandages. Meanwhile, all the fighter planes have been shot down, leaving Mio to fight the Neuroi alone. Yoshika on the other hand is frightened while retrieving bandages and feels she can’t do anything in this situation, when an attack on the ship knocks her down. Reminded of how her father once told her she’d become a great magician like her mother and grandmother, Yoshika equips a nearby Striker Unit and takes to the sky to protect everyone.
With the fleet about to abandon ship, they notice Yoshika (and her relationship to Dr. Miyafuji), who can’t quite control her flying yet, but is able to produce an enormous magical shield. Insisting that she use the gun she brought herself, Mio explains their plan of attack. After a missed chance due to Yoshika’s exhaustion, Mio diverts the Neuroi’s attention again, allowing Yoshika to close in for an attack. While able to reveal the core, Yoshika can’t follow up on her attack, but Strike Witch reinforcements from Britannia are able to deliver the killing blow. During this time, Mio catches a passed out Yoshika, which draws the jealous attention of Perrine. Once awake, Mio praises the rookie Strike Witch on a job well done.
At Britannia, Yoshika is taken to the remains of the address where the letter came from, a former research facility of her father’s, and thanks Mio for bringing her here. Explaining that she used to live here with her father, the two reminisce about Yoshika’s father and visit his gravestone, which has writing on it that encourages one to use their power to protect people. Reading this, Yoshika is brought to her knees in tears, while Mio looks on. Before they leave, Yoshika asks Mio to let her join the Strike Witches, so that she can grant her father’s wish of protecting many people. Mio gladly agrees and introduces Yoshika to the rest of The 501st Joint Fighter Wing as its newest member.
Next Episode:
「一人じゃないから」 (Hitori Janai Kara)
“Lonely No More”
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Impressions:
Well, this series has drawn quite a lot of attention it seems, but not for the right reasons in my opinion. After going through five pages of comments last time, I will first and foremost say that if you feel so strongly that this series is so-called “lolicon” (regardless of what your definition of that word is in an anime context) and don’t wish to watch it for that reason, that’s your prerogative. Not everyone is going to agree on the issue, but I respect people’s decisions, regardless of whether or not I agree with the train of thought behind that decision. If people can be a little more open-minded about such things though, then all the better. Now with that said, the number of underwear/spandex shorts shots this week reduced drastically, and to me, was already a mere afterthought, so I don’t see any point in bringing it up anymore in my coverage. I just hope that that’s not all people care to comment about, especially if they don’t watch the show and are drawing that conclusion from the screenshots alone.
As for the actual episode, there was a fair amount of exciting action with the entire twenty minutes or so devoted to the battle with the Neuroi, which by the way, seems to regenerate just like WORMs. A noticeable difference compared to Sky Girls though is that the fleet doesn’t rely on the Strike Witches alone, as they’re supported by squadrons of regular fighter planes. Plot-wise, it was pretty apparent that this would be the episode where Yoshika changes her outlook on the war and joins the Strike Witches, but I was curious to see what would motivate her to do so. Without a doubt, it would entail her father’s involvement with the development of the Striker Unit, but that determination in her eyes (especially when she was told several times that she’s just a bother), is a character trait that definitely helped in her decision. Because of this and her earnest nature, Yoshika is also a easily likable heroine (at least to me). I felt kind of sorry for her as she cried her eyes out after reading the motto her father swore by until the very end, but hopefully that will just make her stronger over time. 「よしよし芳佳ちゃん。 元気出せ！」 (There there, Yoshika-chan. Cheer up!)
Next time, Yoshika gets some actual training along with the rest the Strike Witches. Hopefully we’ll see more of Perrine‘s jealousy too as that’s always amusing to watch.
Cast:
– Miyafuji Yoshika (宮藤 芳佳) / Fukuen Misato (福圓 美里)
– Sakamoto Mio (坂本 美緒) / Chiba Saeko (千葉 紗子)
– Perrine-H. Clostermann (ぺリーヌ・クロステルマン) / Sawashiro Miyuki (沢城 みゆき)
– Francesca Lucchini (フランチェスカ・ルッキーニ) / Saitou Chiwa (斎藤 千和)
– Gertrud Barkhorn (ゲルトルート・バルクホルン) / Sonozaki Mie (園崎 未恵)
– Professor Miyafuji (宮藤博士) & Narration (ナレーション) / Gouda Hodzumi (郷田 ほづみ)
– Captain (艦長) / Mugihito (麦人)
– Vice-captain (副長) / Hori Yukitoshi (堀 之紀)
– Communications officer (通信兵) / Takahashi Kenji (高橋 研二)
– Injured soldier (負傷兵) / Nakanishi Hideki (中西 英樹)
– Medic (衛生兵) / Iijima Hajime (飯島 肇)
– Pilot (パイロット) / Miyashita Eiji (宮下 栄治)
– Pilot (パイロット) / Koizumi Yutaka (小泉 豊)
FTP!!!!!!!!
There are subs!
@linmingru:
Yeah, it’s almost like a sin isn’t it? I had this post ready and waiting for screenshots, so I decided to just use the subbed one for now. Should a better raw come out, I’ll consider recapping everything without subtitles.
When I saw this:
http://img.muri.se:8080/STRIKE%20WITCHES/STRIKE%20WITCHES%20-%2002%20-%2010.jpg
I say: what is this? Geass? Sharingan? Man, nowadays “Eye Skills” are quite popular.
This episode was definitely awesome.
I’m not absolutely positive whether it was Yoshika or someone else who fired the finishing shots, but I think it was Yoshika herself who did it.
AGear2Ax, there was also something like that in “Venus versus Virus”.
Perrine’s double-take was excellent. It reminded me of some oldschool Tex Avery stuff, lol.
@AGear2Ax:
I made reference to the Glam Sight from Rental Magica, simply because it has the ability to see through magical spells.
I guess the Sharingan would apply too though.
Subs on screencaps!?!? BLASPHEMY!!!
This was a solid episode. Everything that happened could be seen a mile away, but it was still good enough to keep me watching.
I still can’t stand Mio’s annoying fake laugh, i really hope she doesn’t laugh in every episode. I’m almost wondering if Miyafuji’s dad is really dead. After that stunt with the Druaga ending, I can’t put anything past GONZO anymore =_=.
@frubam:
lol, I love Chiba Saeko’s fake laugh though.
Also may i ask where you are watching your version of Strike Witches? I’ve watching the ones on youtube, but quality obviously isn’t as good as you show in the screencaps. I didn’t see a version of it on bittorrent.com either(which is where i got the good Druaga subs).
@frubam, thats the BOST version
@Steven Den Beste, it looked/sounded like a heavy shot came from the neuroi’s side while yoshika was behind it
i kinda lul’d at the usual overconfident villan dicking around and getting owned for it in the end
@Steven Den Beste and Divine
I forgot those anime shows, but, the point is the same, there are more “Eye Skills” nowadays for main roles.
Huh? I don’t see the subs. Divine probably changed the screencaps already.
Anyway, this type of episode is much more to my liking. Less saving cats in trees and stuff.
Si quieren ver lolicon bueno busquen hentai, si no mejor abúrranse con esta jalada. Mala trama y fancervise chafón. Que descepción.
See, had it started like this I would have been less angry the entire time watching it. Still throws me off that Sakamoto sounds 30 and looks 13… maybe this falls under they “All of you look and sound alike” category.
What did they say the time was, Mio was working with her father 5 years before that? Is there like an age list somewhere for the characters?
@Hister:
Doujinshi, mi amigo. Hubieren muy pornografia de esta anime en el futuro….invierno Comiket, eh?
Nice episode overall. 🙂
I hope anti loli KKK will be glad to know fanservice has been toned down a lot.
The chars still have only half uniform, but that’s cause the series’ peculiar Chara Design.
i want to watch this series but it hurts my brain.
TOTALLY agreed Divine. If you do not like fanservice anime, STAY AWAY. For the rest of us who either tolerate or even love it, it’s all the better for us.
I need to see this episode..
the eye skill!!!XD when I read the word “britannia” I thought its Code Geass in girlish form! XD Thats all due to the influence of Clamp! (They like to make something with eyes very often…just not to spoiler…^^’)
At least in 2 episodes, we’ve seen the main chara fly, some cool battle scenes, and none of those “Delta-lock!!!!!”, “MV-Sword!!!!!”, and the dreaded “Quadro-lock!!!!!”. Instead, we get some really nice camera pannings, and even a little bit of strategic air-borne fighting. Plus, at least the worms…uh…. neuro-whatever ain’t slow, and pack one helluva laser weapon.
well, to me, Strike Witches contains most (if not all) of the things that I love from Sky girls… of course, except Ayako Kawasumi.
Not only Gaess eyes but the jubei/eyepatch thing seems to be the rage as well. I was thinking, won’t the squadrons be more of a liability since the neuroi has the potential to absorb them?
Nice job on the screencaps, Divine.
@42-42-564
heh, I actually liked those sentai style ATTACK MOVE declarations in Sky Girls. Really, I’m loving both this show and Sky Girls. Though this show seems to just move faster and worries less about the real life military utilizations like Sky Girls did.
It’s too bad this episode dont have that much close-up butt… maybe thats the reason there’s not much comment anymore for this series
@Setsuke
maybe loli hater learnt not to follow shows they don’t like? Guess I’m off on a tangent, I consider this episode quite enjoyable once you look past the exterior of the show and enjoy the deeper aspect of the show.
I’ll have to say the music and the timing of it are well done, If Strike witches has more moments like these I would find it more enjoyable than Sky girls. Side note, Mio Sakamoto is quite different from her OVA counterpart. I love the caring side of Mio more than his strict side shown in the OVA, she could easily be my favourite if that’s her ongoing trait in the series
Some hint on why Strike Witches are depicted the way they are: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mecha_Musume
PS: They are personification of military devices, airplanes in this peculiar anime.
http://img.muri.se:8080/STRIKE%20WITCHES/STRIKE%20WITCHES%20-%2002%20-%2010.jpg
OMFG! that girls has geass! >__< loli with geass = we’re all doomed.
Hister y Anonymous, si van a trollear sólo por puro gusto, entonces vayanse al carajo!!
And for all to understand that: Hister and Anonymous, if you’r gonna troll just because, then GTFO!!
There’s not much loli in this series (only Lucchini and the Brittish one are underage), and since we got here the dogfight sequences that should’ve been on Sky Girls, I’m on.
WTF
LoLis with power and geass
http://img.muri.se:8080/STRIKE%20WITCHES/STRIKE%20WITCHES%20-%2002%20-%20Large%2010.jpg
nice
The origin of Strike Witches: http://www.konami.jp/th/menu/index_mecha.html
I’ve come to the conclusion after a few years of debate with “those who overuse the word loli to dismiss or hate” that they’re basically just advertising their own basket of neuroses. They’re the types who see “pedo” everywhere they look because it haunts the insides of their own skull. Rather equivalent to the most ardent homophobes and their behavior in response to their own inner signals.
Sorry, but I’ve the most innocuous or simply cute things being labeled “loli” to the point I wonder about their response to the kid’s underwear advertisements for department stores.
Other than suggesting they STFU and get counseling, its unlikely you’ll be able to discuss anything coherently with them.
Other than Strike Witches having the bad luck of following Sky Girls (even that short OVA came first) — it looks like a mildly entertaining bit of action and “days in the lives of people in war” with interesting references to history and militaryware.
The japanese love anthropomorphizing EVERYTHING … (probably some Shinto threads in that love) … so just more of that.
BINGO! It’s exactly this:
>The japanese love anthropomorphizing EVERYTHING …
Japanese people are animists, so they tend to bind a soul to inanimate objects. Everything has its own soul or god. A stone, an animal a feeling too. These are called Youkais and we have plenty of anime regarding them. Should i mention Wolf and spice, Shigofumi or even the hated kanokon, to name the last ones.
Youkais are often related to animal presences, so here it come nekomimi and inumimi on Strike Wiches.
Infact, regarding the subject of Strike Witches, it started when Humikane created the serie Mecha Musume, a set of pictures regarding military devices anthropomorphization.
Gashapon sets of Mecha Musume are being sold from years by now. I even own one! I bought one years ago cause it was nice, without any clue of what it really was.
Sky Girls, on the other hand represent a similar subject: Gundam Girls, that is personification of a Mobile Suit or combining it with a girl.
We can consider Mecha Musume like the old culture meeting the new modern aesthetics, some “new youkais of modern ages”.
I started researching this morning for answers about this particular chara design. I started a similar discussion on an Italian board and a friend of mine pointed out that link on wikipedia i promptly posted it here.
If only i did it a couple of days ago maybe some fanwars could have been avoided.
Ken, Sakamoto isn’t a loli. She’s 19 and has a rather nice figure. She also has the rank of Major (shousa).
@SeedStriker:
Technically, the only ones who are of majority age are Sakamoto (19), Wilcke (18), and Barkhorn (18). The rest all range from 12-16, with Lucchini being the youngest (12).
BTW, pictures are out of the Strike Witches trading figures vol 2, to be released in November. It completes the entire cast.
“majority” age depends on where you’re standing. “18” is no more a given standard than “21”, “15”, “16”, or “14” (all true in various industrialized countries including the US and Canada). This is also a fantasy world this story takes place in, so customs may not match your neighborhood.
I’d like to add that age is just a number. I measure loli-ness by the way the characters look and behave, despite arbitrarily assigned ages. It’s like interpreting the letter of the rule vs. the spirit of the rule. To each his own.
Again, I’d like to comment how much of a step up this episode was from the first one. Even discounting obvious fanservice levels, the action, character development, and plot took great strides forward. It gives me hope for the future.
This episode was a definite improvement. It was a very formulaic episode, in that I predicted pretty much everything that happened ahead of time, but despite that I wasn’t bored. They were able to present the formula in a way that I actually enjoyed. If they can keep that sort of thing up throughout the rest of the series, I may even forgive Strike Witches for the OVA.
uhhh i think its horrible that the neuroi alien laser ships cant even take out huge slow moving boats. Yes there is a fleet of ships, but I mean come on they can fire dozens of laser beams at a time. Then they only fire 1 shot at a time at the big flat 25 knots carrier and miss most of the time. It really makes everyone and everything else uninteresting. ive got other things i want to complain about in this show but ill continue to watch and hope it gets less irritating.
@marinelzen:
I think the first line of my summary should address that concern.
“While under attack by the Neuroi that appeared, the naval fleet wonders why it’s toying with them.”
So basically, even the captains are wondering why the Neuroi don’t just finish them off when they’re sitting ducks most of the time.
I’m actually liking this series. Not because it is loli or pantyshot filled (Military and Civilian Norms must be gone by now)but mainly because it makes me remember another mecha show. Gunparade March. Now, you can say its not the same, except that enigmatic aliens are attacking the Earth and changing the landscape.
I like it because its a change. I kinda gave up on Code Geass and other shows because they were the same. Now, you can make the argument that Strike Witches is the same to other shows, but the overall premise of the thing. The fact that 20 and under girls (according to their bios on wiki) are witches, recruited by the alternate-world League of Nations (Turtledove would most likely laugh if he saw this) to use specially designed magic-technology units that equip to their legs allowing them to fly and use weapons that are normally crew served weapons in order to combat the aliens.
If that isn’t over the top and different, give me another series that’ll entertain my inactive mind. I’m out of college right now, and I’m saving any massive thinking for my STAT 250 course. This is just the good mix of loli-ish fanservice, mecha musume action (why, oh why is Leopard 2A6-tan not there? Damn timeline! T^T)and hopeful character development that’s believable and well done.
Now, bring on Episode 3. I’d also like to know how the girl with the Boys AT Rifle can absorb the recoil and such.
@Hitster:
If you are going to use Spanish in an English speaking blog, at least learn to speak/write it properly.
I don’t care that it has loli elements to it, or that it had tons of fan service in the first episode. My problem is why do you need all that junk? I would have liked it more if it would just be a show about girls who have amazing abilities without the creators thinking “oh, people like 100 panty shots an ep, let’s throw them in randomly!”
Also, if you don’t see the loli in this, you’re fooling yourself. The min character is obviously young, and we’re looking ar her ass. The ages of the other characters could be argued about.
Why do they only wear pantsu only? not even shorts. I don’t get it.
@Yotaru Vegeta
I think someone needs to read Divines summary again. “loli” by what do you mean? lol, if you’re trying to say there are loli in this series than that’s nothing strange since a majority of anime have younger characters in them. But if you perceived this series as a loli bait fanservice anime than maybe you have an argument as I don’t think anyone was disillusion coming into this series not expecting loli characters but whether or not your enjoy this fanservice is another matter.
“I would have liked it more if it would just be a show about girls who have amazing abilities without the creators thinking “oh, people like 100 panty shots an ep, let’s throw them in randomly!”
I wouldn’t call it random as clearly it is intentional, the free-market concept seems to be an unknown concept to some on the internet, if there are demands for this type of fetish and people are willing to pay for it, so why not include it in. Hypothetically speaking anime is a product, while some people view it as ‘free entertainment’ they forget to realise people are make a living from anime DVD sales and not by the amount of people watching it freely. In essence it’s easy to please a crowd, something like the anime community but clearly not all fans are going to reward quality show, while the fanservice doesn’t affect in any way I understand there are some people who enjoy these kinds of things so just let it be or don’t watch if it bothers you.
Here’s a question do you think more people would purchase DVD’s if strikes witches had no fanservice? Objectively speaking there isn’t a clear answer until we can see sale figures but I’m more incline to believe it does sell more with it included. Don’t underestimate the power of fetish ^^, BTW I’m just glad people have stopped talking about the no pants normality it was getting incredibly ridiculous with the amount of debates over it.
@Novax:
Why do they only wear pantsu only? not even shorts. I don’t get it.
I explained in my previous post that that is a peculiar character design. the concept is called “Mecha Musume” (“Mechanical Daugther”).
The Strike Witches are personifications of WWII airplanes, so they have mechanical legs. Other mechanichal girls have mechanical arms, helmets or some other equipment resembling the veichle they are the personification of.
If strike witches dressed long skirt or trousers it could be impossible to expose their mechanical legs in the first place. Just read the wiki link i posted before. There are good infos there
As a WWII buff, I was really amazed by the detail they put into it so I can’t wait for more