Five days after its airing, I finally got around to doing this post. Unsurprisingly, this episode concluded the Sovereignty/Shiraho arc. As expected, there was a battle in the first half to resolve Sovereignty's conflict, though it went differently from what I thought it would. The latter half was pretty much putting the finishing touches on the arc, as well as hinting towards the next arc.
Yeah! Fear's crazy faces make their return. I just love how she looks completely opposite from her normal moe self. Shiraho said something about Fear not caring about humans after all, which may have caused the viewer to doubt whether or not Fear is actually in control of herself. Indeed, it turned out she was. Their idea was to lure out Sovereignty by using Shiraho as bait. After making him (I'll just refer to Sovereignty as a guy from now on, since there are less guys on the show and just makes it easier) reveal all his Killing Organs, all that was left to do was to destroy them.
I thought that the arc was solved rather elegantly. Based on the previous episodes, I automatically assumed that they were going to try to lift his curse, but they simply just removed the harmful aspects of it. It was actually a pretty intense scene with some tremendous voice acting by Chiwa Saito. And the running theme throughout the episode was love. Erasing Sovereignty's curse also meant that erasing their love for each other. As long as the Killing Organs were removed, just your regular gender changing moeblob.
The latter half of the episode was really looking more at Shiraho's character. Same voice actress aside, I feel that Shiraho's character is eerily similar to Senjougahara. She has comparable mannerisms and possesses the same type of tsundere qualities in that lashes out verbally, yet not in a malevolent way. Though not as a student, Sovereignty is conveniently placed at school. Thus, it is likely that they will both be recurring characters.
You're probably tired of me repeating the same thing over and over, but Silver Link has really got it going artistically. The above and below screenshots are prime examples. Another good one was when Chiwa Saito was voicing that emotional plea with the blue cracking pieces. Something that was pleasantly surprising is the background music during the casual scenes in the school setting. It was just really upbeat, and I think that it fit perfectly with resolution of the arc, with the students that got energy drained recovering quicker because their crushes visited them and all.
I think I said this on the previous post, but Fear is really growing as a character. There are two instances that I want to point to. First, when the group was talking about how to solve the problem in the beginning of the episode. When Shiraho said she didn't want the curse lifted, Fear apologized for not understanding the human emotion of love. Near the end, she feels like she's beginning to understand what it is. I hope to see more of this in later episodes. So, sports festival next week, eh? And a new character, too? I'm game.
-Bern
