Gachiakuta’s first cour wraps with a somewhat non-“finale” episode, but nevertheless a lynchpin one. There are no huge cliffhangers here, no major character deaths or scene changes. But it’s a bit of a coming-out party for a hugely important character, and one that starts to unravel the mystery surrounding Rudo. It’s more of a table-setting cour break than a meal in itself, but that’s certainly not a bad way to go. Especially as we’re still very much in the appetizer stage at this point anyway.

The character I’m referring to is Tamsy, of whom we’ve only seen glimpses so far. He’s a major, major player in Gachiakuta and in the “tip of the iceberg” sense, we start to see why here. As things are at a bit of an impasse with Amo – only he and Zanka are unaffected by her mind control – Tamsy moves to take control of the situation in no uncertain terms. We get our first look at his Vital Instrument, “Tokushin”. It’s a distaff – a spindle used to wind cord or thread. And when Tamsy unleashes his “Net” ability, Rudo – along with Delmon, Riyo, And Follo – are wound up in thick rope and unable to escape.

Simply put, Tamsy is a serious badass – even if this were all he could do (which it’s obviously not, this is battle shounen) he’d be a force to be reckoned with. These are some powerful folks (well, three of them) he’s bound here, and they’re quite unable to escape. But that doesn’t stop them trying, and Amo shows no qualms about having them tear themselves to bits struggling to break free. So Tamsy unleashes another powerful attack – “Unspool”. He basically turns Tokushin into a giant drill, which blasts through several levels of Amo’s house and thoroughly beats the crap out of the bound quartet.

Tamsy knows that thanks to Remlin’s spell, they can heal themselves. But still – damn, that’s stone cold, and Zanka (who manages to be both very clever and rather simple) is aghast. Of course that one get out of jail free card applies to Enjin too, and he’s also a serious badass – just in a totally different way than Tamsy. He’s been healed and attentive to the situation for a while now, even as Tomme pretends to treat his wounds as part of the ruse. He relieves the girl of one of her smelly boots, which turns the tables in this showdown in decisive fashion.

Meanwhile back at the ranch, Corvus finds Semiu staring at a photo of Rudo (who we now know is “about” 15  – though that may just be their guess). As we know Semiu’s Jinki is her glasses, and her ability to see the “true essence” of a person. Corvus realizes that she’s seen something disturbing she hasn’t told him of, and presses her on it. Semiu talks of something inside Rudo – something dark and dangerous she eventually comes round to calling a curse. That’s still relatively vague, but it seems to be something Rudo is aware of himself – though perhaps not on those terms.

As if (well, literally) on cue, we see evidence of that when Amo’s ability is neutralized by the loss of her boot. There’s still a major problem here – just what do the Cleaners do with her? But Rudo, his senses returned, slowly walks up to her and delivers a ferocious right hook. He then proceeds to start pounding the crap out of Amo until Gris restrains him. One of the things he chastises the boy for is the fact that Amo is a girl – to which he replies, “So what?”. And oddly, that’s sort of refreshingly sensible for a battle shounen. She’s put the lives of he and his colleagues in serious jeopardy for what appear to be entirely selfish reasons – what does her gender have to do with it?

Of course there are other reasons why what Rudo is doing is bad, as Enjin gently points out to him. Not least that she’s already defeated, but also that they came here to get info from her. Which Tomme finally does, of a sort, catching flies with honey rather than vinegar – talk of an “angel” that moves between the Ground and the Sphere. Enjin shows his importance to Rudo here, taking him aside and showing him the error of his ways without letting it cause Rudo to give up on himself. Enjin may say he’s bad with kids, but with this one he’s assumed something very much like a father’s role – and Heaven knows, Rudo desperately needs a male role model like Enjin in his life.