The last time we saw Ikoma, he was out of his mind, and was pinning down Ayame. Now, in this fourth episode of Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress, Flowing Blood, we are treated once more with another episode full with action, after last week's rather peaceful one. So, spoiler alert as usual, intentional or otherwise.
No big surprise when Kurusu appears once more to knock Ikoma off, and now once more kabanes are on their tail.
One interesting part was that Ayame relented her master key to the the anti-kabane men in the Koutetsujou quite willingly. I suppose this could have made for a better political conflict, but perhaps that was the best a woman could do back in those days.
And with the anti-kabanes in control, Ikoma's friends were also confined to the back.
Once more, this could have evolved into a more bitter political story with the anti-kabane sentiment, but from where the story shall go, it seems that they won't press on that for too long, for this may just be a usual action-oriented story. It seems that Takumi and friends were just sent there to give Ikoma's gun (and glasses), and a rather tickling scene when Mumei was still asking for blood.
As expected, just before the anti-kabane people succeeded in decoupling the last car where Ikoma and the others were at, they were surprised by the kabane. The interesting thing? Those seemingly mindless zombies leaped from above the tunnel entrance.
And one of them was carrying a pair of swords. Now that's new.
And thus, the action starts from here on out. After the cars were barricaded, the soldiers engaged. Here, for the first time, we see Ayame bring out her bow and arrow: an interesting steam contraption.
Let's just pause for a second here, just why did the soldier that committed suicide blast a hole on the side of the car? The last time the little explosives pack was used, there were just enough sparks to destroy the heart.
Anyway, Kurusu was apparently amazing with a katana, with those leaps and slashes.
And then, the sword kabane appeared. Apparently, even Kurusu could not penetrate the iron frame of the kabane, and in the confusion, got stabbed by the stomach.
Well, to be fair, this one fight was a little bit choppy. For example, when Kurusu tried to slash sword against skull, the transition and lack of reaction made it a little bit strange.
However, the scene going at the same time was perfect:
Yes, they used the scene from the preview. What was even better, though, was that in addition, there were even more kabane being defeated above the train.
This sequence just did it right. No more comments needed.
With Kurusu out of the picture, Ayame braved herself to get into the top of the train to meet Ikoma.
And here, the most symbolic scene so far, the blood contract, the real start of the humans and kabaneri working together. And with her blood, Ikoma defeated the kabane, no problem.
Thus, the conclusion was all to predictable. As Ayame vowed to supply blood to the kabaneri in exchange for helping them, the others joined in as well. Here, I think that the anti-kabane overthrow at the beginning was actually unneeded except for giving a gun to Ikoma. They will continue to live in peace after all, and no one should overrule the blood contract. At least I think so.
The ending was relaxed, unlike the other episodes. Finally, they could work together--for whatever is to come next episode.
And beautiful art.
Speaking of art, there was another form of art on display: the ending song. They played the second stanza of ninelie. It was also beautiful. Again, no comment needed.
No comments:
Post a Comment