Wait – what??
Longtime readers of the site know I hate to bury the headline, but once I start talking about the last 30 seconds of this episode there’ll be no point in talking about anything else. So for the sake of discussion, we’ll cover the leading 22 minutes first – and it’s not as though those were either uneventful or uninteresting. Though if I was hoping (and I was) this would be the week that would finally convince me I was pot committed with Angolmois: Genkou Kassen-ki, we didn’t quite make it there.
It was another interesting amalgam of historical accuracy, anime cliche and pure fantasy this go-around for Angolmois. We see growing signs of the potential problems the diversity of the Mongol forces cause, and the opportunity they provide the defenders. Indeed this was sometimes an issue for the Mongols in their tougher campaigns, though as a society that has always leaned on ethnic homogeneity as a strength Japanese historical fiction loves to stress this point. On the other hand, it is nice to see some actual personalities among the Mongols – and a diversity of them at that.
We also saw the end of Yajirou, who was flying more death flags than the scoreboard at the zombie Olympics. With all the talking he was doing about how he’d seen the light, not to mention getting praise from Jinzaburou and proving his prowess with a bow, it was only a question of when and how this ep would take him out, not if. Turned out it was the introduction of a “gun” that did it – and indeed, this is about as primitive as anything that could be called a gun could ever be. As its Mongol field commander notes, it’s really more a toy than a real weapon at this stage of its development, but it does still have the power to kill in the unlikely event it actually hits something.
Onitakemaru’s ruse to use plunder as a means to distract the invaders seems quite unnaturally prescient, given that the arrival of a second Mongol force in the mountains makes it particularly effective. I actually would have preferred to see the series just use confusion in the darkness on narrow mountain paths as a means to express why the two forces slowed each other down – the whole plunder thing was too convenient to be believable. But again, the core idea here – in this day and age the two Mongol armies (different nationalities to boot) would have had little means of communicating with each other, and confusion would have been a serious issue for them to deal with.
But really, it all comes down to that weird and surreal moment with Emperor Antoku(!) shows up at the end and Ishida Akira starts talking. I actually knew he was joining the cast but I certainly never connected him with Antoku, the child emperor who died when his mother jumped overboard with him after the Taira lost to the Minamoto in the Genpei War. I guess… somehow he survived, was pulled from the sea and ended up on Tsushima – where he would now be something like 96 years old?
The Toibarai were already a bit far-fetched for my tastes, but if they really existed on the terms expressed in Angolmois, I guess it makes sense that they would still consider Antoku the legitimate emperor, and the Kamakura Shogunate usurpers. I’ll without judgment here until we see where Angolmois plans to go with this strange development, but if nothing else it’s intriguing for its sheer outlandishness.
Matti
August 16, 2018 at 7:10 amDon’t think I’ll be perservering with this series any longer. May revisit it in future, as it seems like the type of show that’s better marathoned in one or two sittings, not that I have any confidence in finding the time to actually do that. Can’t remember the last time I dropped every single series in a season. Strangely, I’m feeling more relief than disappointment.
Bad Mington
August 17, 2018 at 9:32 amIndeed, that mikado-on-the-mountaintop thing certainly wasn’t expected.
And now for something completely different aka sorry for the rest of this being off topic.
Since you’re well-known as a fan of sports anime, have you watched Hanebado at all? I believe it got no mention in your season preview, so I don’t know if it slipped by you or you didn’t like it enough. If it’s the former, it’s about a “retired” young badmington prodigy getting pulled back into the sport at her high school club, after having abandoned it due to a traumatic experience with her mother (a 10-time national champion in the sport). I was half expecting it to be a CGDCT of some sort, or a mostly fan service show (cf Harukana Receive), but it has shown itself to be a largely bona fide sports anime (with a heathy dose on interpersonal drama on the side), and a pretty good-looking one at that (I mean the animation; not that the girls aren’t pretty, too 🙂 ). I’m not sure focusing the opening episode on an (at that point) a rather unsympathetic-appearing supporting character was the best way to lead into the series, but it does get better from there.
Guardian Enzo
August 17, 2018 at 9:43 pmThe first ep indeed didn’t impress me, and I dropped it based on the fact that I didn’t see much in the rather artificially forced tone or characters to make me expect an improvement. Sounds like you did see one, though.
Bad Mington
August 18, 2018 at 3:00 amI did indeed. It’s no Haikyuu, but definitely watchable. The fact that it deals with a less often covered discipline.is also a plus. The forced tone you mention is not prevalent throughout, or maybe you just get used to it, not sure 🙂 It stopped being an annoyance for me, in any case. I think maybe they felt they needed to “push” everything because the cast is female and girls are expected to have constant drama.
The real lead, btw, is an interesting specimen, someone who absolutely loved and lived the sport, and then was absolutely crushed psychologically by a rather peculiar move by her superstar mother. So her comeback is a complicated affair to say the least, as her mother’s seen and unseen influence keeps rattling her in various ways. The supporting cast has also gotten some pretty good development.
elianthos80
September 6, 2018 at 3:25 am– Important things first: Weekly Tsushima Cats Spotting at the 20:43 mark!
– Death scene per se was good ( Transience And Meaning Of Life Last Thoughts lite included. Check) but I wasn’t particularly invested in that character yet/it came too soon so it was less effective than it would have been for me…
– Almost Kiss The Sleeper. Again?! Hime, please. Just stick to your own Transience And Meaning Of Life Thoughts with the fireflies and keep those arrows coming 8D. Also because you have a Mongols’ army general on your tracks now apparently. Uh-oh.
– Sooo…never mind that a wild surprise!Emperor appeared. The surprise!running grandpa managed to outpace our valiant hero and switch dress at Houdini’s speed to strike a dignified group pose on top of that mountain with no shortage of breath and without breaking a sweat. Ooooook. Spill out your health secrets jiji :,).