© 青崎有吾・講談社/鳥籠使い一行
This episode is a good reminder that “main character” is not synonymous with “good guy.” After witnessing the terrible chaos that followed Aya’s investigation, it’s tempting to conclude that both villages might have been better off if her cage had never appeared on her doorstep. Surname. She and Tsugaru also didn’t seem too worried about the bloodshed going on around them. Tsugaru even added to the body count. However, it makes sense when you consider their motives. Solving this mystery is a means to an end; Their real goal is to stop Moriarty from finding the werewolf village himself and using their blood to fuel his insane lust for power. A few (or a few) corpses along the way doesn’t affect their ambitions one way or another.
It’s also important to remember that both Aya and Tsugaru are inhumane, and they’ve approached all of their targets. cases of severe separation. This is especially understandable to Aya, who has been here for centuries upon centuries. You might expect Tsugaru to be more sympathetic, and perhaps he is, but he also strikes me as a guy who’s always been a weirdo outcast. While these qualities don’t make these characters more likable in the traditional heroic sense, it does make them more interesting personalities with more interesting relationships between them and their fellow humans. other. For example, I liked their brief interaction with Victor. It’s friendly, ruthless and alluring at the same time. They are enemies of a common enemy, and you can feel the mutual respect and malice mixed together into a fun, quirky concoction. I hope their correspondence will continue in future installments.
Last week’s focus on Shizuku makes even more sense in light of these current events. Unlike Aya and Tsugaru, and unlike her cold expression might suggest, Shizuku is actually sympathetic and genuinely cares about the girls who saved her. She takes measures to avoid causing further trouble for Kaya and Vera, and she goes on her own during the end credits to find Kaya and save her from the massacre (and from Carmilla). Thus, Shizuku also anchors the other members of the trio of Cage Users into the foundation of humanity. Aya may not have any scruples about either group of villagers, but she cares enough about Shizuku to let her follow her conscience. Or Aya is just smart enough to know that she can’t stop Shizuku from stumbling across a bunch of other naked women.
Meanwhile, the attack inside Wolphinhel shows that humans have greatly exaggerated the indestructibility of werewolves. That’s hardly surprising; Short-sighted rhetoric always creates all kinds of distortions about outsiders. Wolphinhel’s isolation doesn’t do any good either. Despite their powerful warriors, their highly ritualistic and secluded society puts its more vulnerable members at risk of attack. They value physical strength over solidarity and support. But the people in Heulendorf also made this mistake. Abandonment of Louise is the cause of this entire tragedy. If her parents loved her as much as Rosa loved Jutte, these murders would never have happened. The varying degrees of collective and individual culpability on both sides, as well as the varying sources of third-party intervention, make it nearly impossible to translate this conflict into simple moral terms. Like many battles in history, this battle was a combination of bad decisions on all sides.
Speaking of murders, I won’t be too hard on myself for not foreseeing the existence of a secret underground tunnel several miles long that conveniently connects both villages. I also love that Aya explains its existence in the most annoyingly realistic way, like it’s the most obvious solution in the world. That’s why she’s the brains of this operation. It’s not just by default. That said, this pretty much confirms that Jutte was impersonating Louise. Rosa showed Jutte the entrance before she died in the fire, Jutte escaped to Wolphinhel and impersonated Nora, then about a year and a half ago she kidnapped Louise and kept her in the tunnel while she lived a life that doubles (technically triples) both villages. While I still don’t understand what the other double murders were about, I’m pretty confident that Jutte ultimately killed Louise and used her body to fake his own death. So the tomb that Vera just opened is empty, while Jutte/Nora is still alive and there will probably be an explanation next week.
This was the first time I was slightly disappointed with the pacing and structure of the story however. The second half of the episode dragged on a bit despite all the chaos going on. I liked the transformation of the London arc into a free-for-all melee, so this could be a case of diminishing returns for a similar development. However, the plotting here is sloppier as Royce’s agents accidentally stumble into the tunnel, after which they round up the villagers completely off-screen. Once we get into the action, it’s messy and over-the-top in a good way — Kyle knows how to work that sequence — but there’s also a tonal dissonance with the righteous horror of the ongoing genocide take place. I don’t think that discomfort is necessarily an unintended effect. If it ties this into next week’s resolution, the immortal murder farce could certainly still land.
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The zombie murder farce is now streaming on Crunchyroll.
Steve is on Twitter while it lasted. He’s just trying to move forward in life. You can also see him chatting about trash and treasure on This Week in Anime.