First Impressions / Valkyria Chronicles

OP2 Sequence

OP2: 「カナシミレンサ」 (Kanashimi Rensa) by MARIA
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Summary:

At roughly the same time, Welkin’s group and Zaka’s group launch their attacks on their respective targets. Zaka’s group is liberating the concentration camp, but Zaka himself initially has trouble communicating with Rosie using hand signals. Regardless, they are able to kill the guards and free everyone. Rosie finds the conditions the Darcsen had to live under atrocious, and Zaka uses it to emphasize to her how much his people suffered. Their group then moves on to their next target, the train tracks, and they lay some explosives. Welkin’s group meanwhile attracts the attention of the Imperials, so Gregor sends out the tanks. Unbeknownst to the Imperials, Isara and Lamar have stolen one of the tanks, and they use it to destroy the others tanks threatening Welkin’s group. With this helping them, Welkin has his men move forward, but what they don’t realize until almost too late is that there’s a survivor of one of the destroyed tanks. That soldier targets Alicia, and Faldio tackles her out of harm’s way just in time to save her. Despite shooting the enemy soldier afterward, Welkin can only watch in silence as Faldio helps up an embarrassed Alicia.

When Gregor finds out that Squad 7 is behind this attack, he orders the Equus out. The train soon falls into the trap set by Zaka and Rosie, but the explosives don’t completely destroy it. Since the main cannon is still operational, Gregor decides on a little gambit: he addresses Squad 7 directly using the train’s speakers and orders them to withdraw. If they don’t, then he’ll fire the cannon towards the escaping Darcsen people. Welkin is conflicted about what to do, and his inability to make a decision prompts Faldio to take control and order an attack. Gregor responds by firing the cannon as promised, and it wipes out many of the Darcsen. Rosie is so pissed off that she charges at the train, and Zaka has to save her before she gets killed. Fortunately for the two of them, the train’s smaller guns don’t get to shoot a second time at them because the turret gets destroyed by a tank shell from Isara and Lamar. Their stolen tank then fires another shot, and this leads to the destruction of the train. In his final moments, Gregor yells for Squad 7 not to forget that it was they who sacrificed innocent people. With the battle now over, Rosie grieves for all the dead and remembers what happened to her own parents.

ED2 Sequence

ED2: 「ひとつの願い」 (Hitotsu no Negai) by 井上ひかり (Inoue Hikari)
Watch the ED2! Mirror 1, Mirror 2, Streaming ▼

Well I’ve already commented on the spoilers in the OP, but I will say that it’s at least entirely action-oriented, which might bode well for the rest of the series. What doesn’t bode well is that it also shows overpowered Selvaria vs. (I assume) overpowered Alicia, and that makes me think we’re headed towards battles of Gundam-esque proportions. As for the music, both the new songs are decent, but not great, and I still like Asu he no Kizuna better than the new OP. The new ED at least is a slow song this time around and is more fitting for whatever sad ends we see (like the one this episode).

Preview

Despite my unhappiness with what’s shown in the new opening sequence, I still enjoyed this episode quite a bit. Like past weeks, the emphasis continues to be on the brutality of war and of the Empire, and that clearly had an effect on Rosie since she appears to have mostly gotten over her hatred for the Darcsen (though the preview seems to indicate that there’ll be more on that next week). Speaking of which, I noticed that before Gregor could be killed off, they had to make him a little extra evil by having him make a threat to kill all those people and then go through with it. It makes me wonder what they’re going to do if/when Jaeger or Maximilian or Selvaria has to die since those three have been portrayed as much more sympathetic characters than Gregor and villains in other series. I guess they could make them more evil like they did with Gregor, or they could give their deaths a more tragic spin.

The other thing that was interesting about this episode was how they portrayed Welkin to be powerless, first when he couldn’t do anything after Faldio saved Alicia and then when it was decision time for Gregor’s ultimatum. He’s usually a pretty strong male lead, so I’m not used to seeing him like this, but maybe it’s due to the castrating effects of Faldio’s declaration from a couple of episodes ago. If that is the case, then Welkin probably won’t get back to normal until something progresses in his relationship with Alicia. As a side note, I was amused that one of the people who came out of this episode looking cool was Lamar since he and Isara basically saved everyone. Maybe there’s hope for him yet. The preview seems to dash that hope though since it shows him getting angry/flustered with Isara again. Regardless, next episode looks to be a more fun and lighthearted than these past few weeks have been.

39 Comments

  5. hahaha…. poor welkin. he needs to make a move on alicia. he’s too much of a dork. well, let’s just see what happens in the next episodes.

    still cant get over the WxA in the last scene of the op. so sweet! :3

    Layla-san
    Reply

  8. i was really shocked to learn that gregor died then i noticed that it as ep 14 already… with the remaining eps, i’ll be expecting a lot more deaths though it would surely suck if no major good side character dies.

    i guess welkin is the kind of leader that makes good decisions as long as there is a bond of trust between his comrades. thinking back on previous episodes, his trust to his comrades enabled him to perform well like in episodes 5 and 12 but when the bond of trust crumbled, he mixes his military work with his personal one making him seriously f*ck up. despite his brilliance, he is quite naive when it comes to sacrifice

    baka~
    Reply

  10. While the new op shows more action and the animation is top notch (kudos for Yasuomi Umetsu), Omni is right in that Asu e no Kizuna is a better song. At least the ed is more fitting for a series like this.

    The events of the Darcsen Concentration Camp are simmilar in the game, but had an even stronger impact as Isara, Zaka and Rosie start searching for survivors among the rubble. Here, the center of all has been Rosie and her (now diminishing) hated over the Darcsens, an issue that she’ll come to terms in a heartwrenching moment later.

    And while Welkin hesitated to make the decision to sacrifice civilians, that’s somewhat normal in a situation like that, specially with people like him. I wonder if he was the overall mission commander, because if that’s so, Faldio will have to pay the price for overstepping his authority.

    SeedStriker
    Reply

  11. Man, that opening totally spoiled it!! We aren’t supposed to even find out until quite a few chapters after the “Train Incident” at the Darcsen Camp. And from the looks of the preview they changed one aspect of the story considerably. I really wonder if i should be happy, or sad at that change. Kudos though, on showing Rosie’s past, always wondered what that was like, that is one aspect i like about the Anime that i like.

    sushibot12
    Reply

  17. quote:
    so basically faldio is responsible for the death of dozens of civilians. great commanding there man.
    end quote
    sorry, but he saved all the soldiers in the main army under fire from the train. no easy decisions in the war…
    as for Gregor,may he burn in hell!!!
    Next on the line in the triumvirate – a rather misleading name since Selvaria is a woman – is Selvaria or Jaeger? I suppose Selvaria is stronger physically with all the Valkyria powers at al, but Jaeger seems more cunning tactician.

    ewok
    Reply

  23. You can never trust the openings too much. They tend to show stuff that won’t happen in the anime especially in the first season. Looks like Welkin was hit deeply when Faldio got that close to Alicia. From the looks of the preview for the next episode at the very end it seems like Alicia is going to knock some sense into Welkin again.

    roger
    Reply

  25. Also it seems Faldio realized Welkin’s slump at a critical moment was because of him and he in turn took command and made a stupid decision sacreficing the innocent people.

    roger
    Reply

  27. Gregor would of done that but there was a 50 50 chance if he was delayed which is most likely what Welkin would of done if he wasn’t in a slump. Remeber the bombs under the bridge. Welkin would of immediately realized all the bombs aren’t blown seeing the bridge and would of arranged for someone to trigger the bombs while he is delaying Greggor.

    roger
    Reply

  31. Once I discovered that Selvaria was on the Imperial side in the game, it wasn’t long till I started to suspect Alicia.

    However, I wonder how they plan to show the three big surprises for me:

    WARNING 3 EXTREME MEGA SPOILERS, ALL NON GAME COMPLETERS DO NOT CLICK

    Show Spoiler ▼

    FX102
    Reply

  34. I think this is a quite decent episode. Especially the tragedy of Darcsen and its effects on Rosie are wonderful!

    For the opening, well at least it had more Selvenia. I hope this is a good sign for episodes full of her as well. I love the confrontation between Alicia and Selvenia too so can’t wait to see them in the anime. Is there anyone who reads the manga of Valkyria Chronicles?

    I want to ask some people a question: Why is Faldio/Alicia/Welkin triangle so bad? I don’t want to sound like a feminist but I gotta say this: when it’s a triangle of girl/boy/girl it’s all good but when it’s a boy/girl/boy triangle, everybody seems to hate the other boy and the girl’s interactions with him. Well, I’m not into romance that much as well, I’m watching this for its unique atmosphere and characters such as Selvenia.

    For the Seiyuu of this serie, it’s like a dream for me. Marina Inoue, Fukuyama Jun, Ohtsuka Akio are three of my all-time favorites. Especially Marina Inoue, since she was the voice actor of Kasahara Iku from Toshokan Sensou as well <33.

    Btw, Omni, I sent you an e-mail with “Anime” as its subject. I always tell people before mailing them so that they would feel safe while opening them.

    Phantom
    Reply

  35. Well, for someone who has not played the game (I know, I’m missing out, but I can’t afford a PS3 just yet), that opening really spoiled it. When Alicia opened a door at that darcsen temple on one of the earlier episodes, it was kind of suspected, but now… Well, so much for ruining that surprise.

    I want the old opening back please. Much better song, and nicer overall.

    Kal
    Reply

  37. Valkyria chronicles is PS3 only.

    And I didn’t really like how the anime portrayed Gregor. In the Game he was shown to be ruthless but honourable and not plain evil like in the anime.
    In fact, when Alicia and Welkin helped out the Imperial soldier on the mountains Show Spoiler ▼

    gundamjehutykai
    Reply

  38. @Anon

    If I could afford a $500+ PS3 (and a PS2 b/c one at that) I’d have bought this game in a heartbeat. For the moment I can’t justify such an expensive purchase for the only RPG on the system that really interests me. I’m sure others here have similar opinions. So for the time being the anime is a poor man’s (or in my case woman’s) substitute.

    So far I like this series, although it drags a little in places. This episode was one of the better ones so far, and I love the new OP sequence. I had a feeling Alicia had similar powers to Selvaria.

    —
    http://www.theicecave.org/damage_control/

    silver_huskey
    Reply

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