Asakomi

Yay!! More Basilisk! I was beginning to wonder if any more episodes would ever get subbed. But now I have two more to satisfy my ninja cravings :D.

We learn more about Tenzen’s plan - to annihilate the Iga and marry Oboro, all while making Gennosuke watch. He attempts to attack Hyouma, and Hyouma tries to convinces him not to, but as we all know Tenzen isn’t exactly the most rational or good man in the world. Seems the Kouga really do want to simply go to Sunpu and find out the truth, and hopefully put an end to the rivalry between the clans once and for all.

Oh oh oh and we learn the secret to Hyouma’s ninja art! So awesome! And Tenzen is dead, but who knows for how long. Everyone who doesn’t believe that Tenzen is dead - raise your hand!

I was very very sad to hear Gennosuke order his group to kill the next hawk they see, as well as the hawker, even if the hawker is Oboro. I don’t want to believe he’s actually ok with her being killed. No no no, don’t want to believe it at all.

Oboro’s bathscene… ugh.. It made me sick to my stomach as I watched her remember Tenzen’s violation of her, and ask Akigenu to scrub harder. But how hard will she have to scrub before she feels clean again? A physical cleaning will not be enough to cleanse the emotional dirt on her soul.

I end with a question… did Tenzen abandon Koshiro in the wilderness, or did they merely become separated because he can’t see and now Tenzen is dead and he doesn’t know it yet? Maybe episode 18 will shed some light on the situation, but that will have to wait until tomorrow.

Sooo Yamata suddenly thinks Honoka is cute. Blah.. “We should become a couple, ” he says, which of course makes Honoka ecstatic. But he’s settling for her just cuz he thinks he can’t get Suzuka. What a chump. CHUMP! It may work out for him, but he’s not being fair to Honoka.

But I can’t hate him because I don’t think he’s intentionally trying to be a player or anything. I think he’s just confused and naive and doesn’t realize how much he could hurt Honoka in the end if he’s just using her in the interim till he figures out a way to get Suzuka. If he knew the consequences, I wonder if he would still choose to go out with Honoka. Is he trying to make himself like her just because he knows she likes him? If Suzuka gets a grip and confesses her feelings to him, will he drop Honoka like a sack of potatos? I guess we’ll see. All I know is that right now I feel really sad for Honoka.

And while this is all going on we see Suzuka’s walls come down a little bit as she invites him to go shopping, and even when he says no for the first time and she ends up going with Miki, still she doesn’t let that bother her too much as she browses shirts that would look good on Yamato. Poor Miki is conflicted over whether or not to tell Suzuka the big news, but she decides it’s better to hurt Suzuka sooner rather than later and spills the beans.

The fact that Suzuka reacts later by being nice and saying that she’s glad for him, (even if it was laced with a joke about her thinking he’d never get a girlfriend) all while wearing this bittersweet smile on her face, made it all the more apparent, to me anyway, that this news pains her greatly.

I love the Miki/Hattori team! THEY should get together, haha. They both have incredible insights into what’s going on around them with their friends, and they obviously have brains in their heads. They’d be an unstoppable duo. Unstoppable at what, I’m not sure, but watch out!

Next episode should be interesting, with Suzuka and Yamato stranded together. Can’t wait!

It’s funny that Gates talks about balance since he’s so FREAKING INSANE and uh, off balance. That’s all I have to say about that.

Sousuke has definitely hit the breaking point. Everything has fallen apart around him and now we will see if he chooses to pick up the pieces and carry on, or give up. “Die? That’s a good idea too,” he says in the beginning, and at this point it seems that he is choosing the latter option.

He meets up with a prostitute who looks like Chidori. At first it doesn’t look like he’s going to go with her until she yells at him, much like the real Chidori would. He might have chosen to go with her because he thought being around someone who looks like her might make him feel better, but as memories of Chidori flash through his mind he only becomes more agitated. I wasn’t surprised that he ended up pushing the prostitute away and not going through with it, but the scene was very well done nonetheless.

Two more episodes to go! Argh, only two!

I took a screencap of Lunar’s new little intro screen just because I think it’s really pretty.

Anyway, on to the episode. Yamato dances around Suzuka and tries to get her to like him, while Honoka dances around Yamato trying to get him to like her. Hattori is in the background making astute observations and giving really good advice to all parties. And in the end Yamato feels like he’ll never be able to catch up to Suzuka so he kind of settles for Honoka by taking her hand. Ugh. Not a good reason to choose a girl my dear. I could be judging him prematurely though…but we’ll see.

Can I just say that Honoka’s outfit when she visited Yamato at the track at night was GORGEOUS. I want that top! I want that skirt! And those shoes and knee socks! She looked stunning.

As far as Honoka is concerned, I think her character is developing quite nicely. When she was first introduced it looked like she was going to be one of those girls who pines from a distance but never does anything about it. But in the past couple of episodes especially we’ve seen her swallow her fear and just go for it, though she knows full well she is risking rejection. I thought when she put her hand on Yamato’s she was being quite brave, but I also think it was totally sweet and came more from a perspective of wanting to encourage him than wanting to prove her feelings for him. Of course that changed when she saw Suzuka. I can’t believe she had the guts to kiss him!

On a side note, it’s too bad the animators make her face look so funny somtimes ^_^v

Ok, this was the episode for awesome outfits, because Suzuka’s rocked too! I’d want hers as well but I refuse to wear horizontal stripes, they make me look shorter than I already am. That girl is totally going to lose to Honoka if she doesn’t own up to her own feelings. Maybe part of the problem is that she doesn’t realize she has competition at all, so she doesn’t feel the urgency to fight for what she wants.

This time around we learn more about the Lambda Driver. It must have been hard for Sousuke to hear his comrades indirectly criticizing his ability to activate it and reminding him of this failure in that regard in Nanking.

It’s weird to see Sousuke having a conversation with the Arbalest like it’s a person, weirder still that it seems to be able to actually learn things like a person. And it has instincts? That’s simultaneously creepy and wicked cool. But these supposed human-like qualities seem to only increase Sousuke’s hatred for the Arbalest.

Oh, and Mao’s story about how her father tried to marry her off but she snuck away on the day of the wedding to join the marines to piss him off was great! And very Mao-like. Heh.

Now Mao telling Sousuke off for being distracted by thoughts of Chidori was quite powerful, though I don’t think she was 100% on the mark. He was brooding the whole episode, but over the Arbalest in addition to Chidori.

He couldn’t protect Chidori, and he can’t seem to activate the Lambda Driver when he needs to. It all boils down to feeling like a failure, which leads to the questions of, “What am I good at? What am I good for? What do I want to be good at? Where is my life going and what am I living for?” These are powerful questions, and if one goes on a journey to truly find the answers internal and external chaos inevitably ensues.

It’s risky and crazy and hard, but true growth will never happen if you don’t take the chance. I commend Sousuke for questioning himself, and I respect him even more for his blunt honesty in the words, “I can’t take it anymore.” It never helps to try and pretend you’re ok when you’re not.

Yup, so at the time of finishing this post it’s just after 3:00 a.m. and I can’t sleep. Insomnia causes me to have many so-called deep throughts. Heh.