Well that was a messy episode. At least if you are a nameless character it was. After killing off Keita last week the body count just skyrocketed with this encounter. While it makes sense tactically, can’t say I like the idea of sacrificing all those people just to find out what the enemy is capable of. I mean how many people were they going to sacrifice before finally the enemy made it to Hibiki’s final line of defense?

It’s also a pretty questionable decision since we didn’t see anyone else who can use electricity. If you are trying to test to see what the enemy can do, wouldn’t you want to use a weaker version of what your last hope is? It wouldn’t help them much to find out that it’s immune to lightning until it’s the final showdown. One tip for Yamato is not making yourself look like a villain. Makes people more than willing to side with anyone who doesn’t appear to be pure evil.

Wouldn’t you follow this guy to your death?

The stakes are certainly high, but I still don’t agree with the strategy. There are a lot of enemies left and he just sacrificed a very large percentage of his forces. This kind of strategy didn’t exactly work out well for Russia in WW1. You can’t just throw bodies at a problem and hope it solves itself. Yes, if they don’t win these battles there is going to be a terrible result, but they are using human lives here. At the very least they should use a strategy that will result in the fewest casualties.

Also treating people like pawns isn’t going to foster any loyalty either. Only so many people are going to follow the orders of “please stand there while everyone in front of you dies.” While it might be some sort of strategy, not sure I support it. This could be a classic case of motivating people to fight, by making you someone to hate. Regardless of the intentions, it’s working for me. I want to throw this guy up as a meat shield and see how he likes it. There are just too many questions and mysteries surrounding this guy. Yamato has too many ties to characters who seem likely to cause trouble.

Glad to see that despite the injuries Hinako appears to still be alive. While she did get hurt trying to protect Hibiki, she probably is still better off than if he didn’t show up. The way things were going she was likely to get slaughtered and left for dead anyways. At least this way she appears only to be seriously injured and not dead.

Once again my condolences for Daichi. Seems like he was left to wonder around with his weak demons and try to help anyone he could find that was still alive. Sadly, it was not yet his moment to step up and accomplish something. So far he seems to be regulated to comic relief. A guy who cares about his friends, but right now just doesn’t have the power to back that up. Still, probably the most normal of the characters dragged into this. A situation that dangerous would of course make you tell your friends to get the heck out of there.

That conversation with Alcor was certainly interesting. Just who the heck is this guy and what side is he on? Feels almost like a third party, but was chatting with that enemy from the last episode…So was he not actually with the Septentrions? It’s kind of tough to figure out who is actually siding with who if they are siding with anyone at all. Did seem rather intrigued by Hibiki’s decisions and his thoughts about why he is taking action.

It feels like Hibiki is going to continue driving himself into a corner. The more power he has the more he feels like he needs to use that power. He’s pushing himself hard and every death or injury adds to his stress. Because he has power he feels like he should be able to protect those around him and accomplish things. Right now he’s battling against his instincts to run and stay safe and I’m not sure how far he can go. There is a lot he isn’t aware of and I’m a bit worried he’s going to crack under the stress. He’s going to need the support of Nitta and Daichi in order to survive this.

Either way, Merak was one heck of a difficult enemy to deal with. The pure firepower of that thing was pretty insane. It could take a lot of hits and could dish back a lot of damage in return. It was particularly devastating against the grunts in this episode. A lot of weak opponents might be able to do something against certain enemies, but this one seemed especially capable of attacking multiple enemies at the same time. There wasn’t any apparent personality behind Marek, just pure devastation and destruction.

Props to Nitta for stepping up in this episode. She obviously has felt the need to do that for a while now. After all she’s lost this was the chance for her to take action. Seems similar to Hibiki in feeling like she has to do something. That she can’t just cry and be worried about her family. I do think it’s a good quality to want to support your friends and not just be the one person to sit by and do nothing. It does line up with that conversation with Alcor though. Hibiki taking action and fighting has spurred on others like Nitta who might have just sat back and not gotten involved. Taking action doesn’t just affect you, it influences those around you to act or not to act. Kikuri-hime was pretty effective in that fight. It didn’t finish the job, but at least it did a whole lot more than the grunts did. Though it was a lot of stress on her, I think Nitta did a good job out there.

One enemy down, but it seems like things are only going to get more complicated. I’m surprised anyone would pick a fight with JPs right now. While I can understand this Ronaldo character not trusting or liking Yamato, is this really the right time to be doing this? There are a lot of lives in jeopardy if they don’t manage to win these battles. I’m just not sure that now is a good time for whatever he is planning. What I am curious about is if Hibiki went with him willingly or not. He has reasons to doubt and dislike Yamato so anything is possible, but I’d be surprised if he’d just walk off and leave his friends behind like that.

So overall a pretty good episode. It was all focused on this battle and showed how dangerous this threat is. So many lives were lost in such a short amount of time. Also clear that despite having a lot of power Hibiki isn’t going to be able to so easily handle every threat coming his way. Though he did power through at the very end there. Looks like things are going to get messier with this Rinaldo character taking action. I don’t expect things to calm down any time soon as the series continues to quickly move along.
Score: A