©タカヒロ・竹村洋平/集英社・魔防隊広報部
As this season of Soldier in Chains comes to a close, it’s clearer than ever that the series is unlikely to top it as a pretty good action-sex comedy and could achieve more so if it were given more freedom to escape its proverbial shackles. For an anime about a literal sex slave transformed into giant fighting monsters based on whatever monster-slaying motherfucker is riding him at the time, it’s hard to overlook how tame this product is, especially its second half. It wasn’t terrible, but “War, Naon, Recite” was another episode that left me wanting more when the credits rolled.
I’m not just talking about fan service either (although the supply has been surprisingly weak lately). Rather, the biggest disappointment of the week for me was that I could care less about the big showdown between Yuuki’s new humanoid Shuuki friends and the girls of Squadron 7. The reveal of the experiments The torture the Humanoid girls go through makes their situation that much more sympathetic, and the show tries its best to make us like Coco, Naon, and Aoba as much as we like Squadron 7. I couldn’t muster up the emotional investment when Kyouka and crew arrived to take down Yuuki’s captors.
Part of this may have to do with the fact that the Chained Soldier is finally starting to pay off with its vague and rather generic world-building. I never had much reason to think too hard about the ground rules of Peaches, Mato, Shuuki, and all the other mainstays of Chained Soldier’s storytelling because the movie never seemed to care. much. The entire premise of the series mainly acts as an excuse to put Yuuki in a series of situations where he helps the girls fight a bunch of monsters and is then suffocated by his chest and/or suit. their genitals. It’s a lot harder to ignore how lacking in substance the film’s setting and themes are when we’re suddenly supposed to sympathize with humanoid Shuuki enough to question Yuuki’s loyalties and notice the tension in the conflict between his woman (and yes). , I included his sister in that description).
I feel compelled to note that this week’s “bonus” is perhaps the least sexy piece of fan service Chained Soldier has ever delivered. While I will admit that the joke about Tenka getting in on the action just because she’s crazy about Yuuki was funny, it wasn’t enough to distract me from the awkwardly filmed and animated finger-sucking payoff about and half-heartedly. I’m sorry, but we live in a post-Chainsaw-Man-Episode-5 World. That show featured a finger sucking scene that was quite possibly one of the sexiest moments in anime history. You’re all going to have to step up your game.
However, despite my complaints, I want to emphasize that my impression of this episode is not that it was bad; I knew Chained Soldier could do more than just the watchable time killer that it is. At the very least, the episode is guaranteed to leave a better impression at the end, as the action pretty much picks up when Humanoid Shuuki brings out their pet to sabotage Team 7. Hopefully the show can add up to it all. even the battles by turning the Horny Nonsense Dial up to 11 at least one or two more times before the season ends.
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Chained Soldier is now streaming on HIDIVE.
James is a writer with many thoughts and feelings about anime and other pop culture, which you can also find on Twitter his blog and his podcast.