Series that start out great and fall apart are hardly unicorns in anime. Samurai Flamenco, Ousama Ranking – the list is quite long in fact. But if not unicorns they are snowflakes – each one falls apart in its own unique way. The one Chi Chikyuu is putting me in mind of is Fumetsu no Anata e. Something that starts out narratively tight as a drum and then goes ass over teakettle, remaining interesting but losing all structural integrity. Big timeskips and things getting weird and disjointed, like a totally different series.

Yeah, everything about Orb is just a hot mess right now. The timeline, for starters, which is seriously all over the map with stuff like naturalism, the Protestant Reformation, and Guttenberg’s movable type all sharing the stage. Then we have that speech Draka makes to Schmidt before they get into the carriage (does it seem like half this series is dimly lit carriage rides?) – that was unintentionally hilarious, one of the most contextually outlandish things I’ve seen in a nominally serious anime in a long time.

Draka is generally a very silly and unbelievable character, who stands out like a sort thumb. The only question is whether she or the ludicrous popinjay Schmidt is sillier, really. By dint of demeanor it may be a draw, as both are equally absurd (though quite opposite). His ideas (naturalism, more or less) are probably less implausible in situ than hers (which are effectively rationalism merged with Adam Smith capitalism). But both go well beyond any plausible suspension of disbelief.

But then, that debate they had in the carriage – out of time and place as it was – certainly qualified as interesting. Fascinating, even (and hilarious – when Schmidt said “in other words” when using Draka’s exact words). That seems to be Orb now – 20 minutes of absurdity spiked briefly with really well-written intellectual exploration. Which, sadly, still makes it better than 90% of the anime we get in a season like this one. Again, what she’s espousing here is basically rationalism – which will eventually become a staple of the Enlightenment, though not quite in the way Draka espouses it. Schmidt’s naturalism is certainly a long-standing philosophy with its roots in ancient Greece, but it was almost unknown at the time Orb is set (though it’s growing increasingly hard to guess just when that is).

While Draka and Schmidt fundamentally disagree about existence, they do have a shared disdain for the Catholic orthodoxy and a desire to see it brought to its knees. And after she burns the (what I assume to be Oczy’s) book, they have no choice but to bring her along since Frei hasn’t memorized it. As for Uncle he got what was coming to him in the melee when the Heretic Liberation Squad (ROFL) ambushed Antoni’s men. It’s also interesting that Antoni was very much open to the idea that Draka might be useful – that her way of thinking might offer some insight on where the Church was obviously missing the mark at the cost of their control over the masses.

In addition to all the other randomness happening here, there’s one very straightforward thing which makes no sense – why did Schmidt and his men step out of the carriage to bathe in the sunrise, and then arrive at their hideout in the dead of night? Was an entire day supposed to have passed (if so, it was communicated pretty badly)? Jolenta being the leader is not a huge surprise – perhaps she’ll have dragged her father (likely disgraced) along somewhere. There’s a definite trainwreck curiosity to see where Orb goes from here, but it terms of character and story it’s pretty much a shambles at this point.