No sea changes for me after the third episode. I still see this series as solidly right down the middle. Nothing too exciting but quite watchable, and though the animation is hit-and-miss it has a very distinctive look that’s well above DEEN’s normal standards.
Onyx makes a pretty good baddie for so early in the series. He’s full of power and quite the smooth talker to boot. His goal is to force Rose to be his bride – either by force (knocking her unconscious and kidnapping her) deception (telling her that all humans hate dragons, including Ryuuji) or threat (he’ll kill Ryuuji unless she forgets about him). Rose is not easily convinced but certainly an innocent, and she seems ready to accede to Onyx’s wishes. But there’s more to the story – and Ryuuji – than we’ve seen so far.
Being the “Level 10 Breaker” that he is, Ryuuji is the only one who can unlock the power all the Type S Precious (Gollum, Gollum) his parents left for him, including a short sword that responds to his power and has indeterminate but kickass powers. He, Eriko and Dr. Tokura head off to the still under-construction high-rise Onyx is using as his hideout. There, as if in a thumb of the nose to his many critics, Ryuuji not only proves himself to be a badass in combat but also declares his love for Rose. Despite having to deal with Onyx’ dragon form and getting sliced by a scale, good triumphs over evil as Rose and Ryuuji combine their power through magical runes on their hands and she heals his wound with dragon’s breath. It can do that, you know.
Lots happened there, that’s for sure. Ryuuji has pretty much gone the full cycle from total wimp to GAR and declared his love all in the space of three episodes. Not only that but Onyx had the definite feel of a head boss, but we’ve still got most of the series to go so clearly, there’s much development to come. As mentioned, it’s quite watchable but hardly breaking any new ground. Rose is arguably the weak point of the series so far – as interesting as it is to see KugiRie in a deredere role for a change, Rose is awfully one-note so far – Ryuuji, Erika and Dr. Tokura are far more interesting. But then, with love declared so early-on perhaps we’ll get some focus on the odd relationship of Ryuuji with his parents, which seems potentially much more interesting than the romance with Rose. Next week, the trend of rushing things along continues as we get the beach episode out of the way in only the 4th episode….
