What They Say:
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The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Now that the volleyball match is over and all the tension from that bit of ranking and playing going on, Gon and his group have gotten the card they needed, made copies and moved on. But there is also the problem of Bomber out there that’s intent on getting the card himself, which has a few threats being laid down as well. There’s been a fair bit of fun going on with this part of things, background as it was for the last few episodes, but this episode shifts gears a bit itself as it brings the Phantom Troupe back into play and has Hisoka hooking back up with them for a mission to be dealt with. What he gets to do with them is meet Kalluto, his replacement in the group. Which, amusingly, he finds pretty tasty looking.
While this mission is set up and we see some things going on with Bomber and his plans, the show also goes back to some of the basics here as we see Gon going through his training routine more, which almost vexes Killua a little as he and Bisky look on. The first half has a lot of this kind of small movement and setup material going on as Bomber is getting his things in order, eliminating people and taking cards as he builds up his catalog of items, while others are watching on to see what he’s doing to gain some intelligence on him. We also get a touch more on Hisoka’s interactions with the Phantom Troupe and it’s very fun to see the way he’s excited at the prospect of being chased to the ends of the earth by one of them, since he does love a challenge even though he knows he’s the superior one here.
Thankfully, the training phase that Bisky is putting Gon through doesn’t get a ton of detailed time overall, where it takes up the entire episode. Here, it’s a part of the story as it goes on and it’s glossed over in a decent way so thta we see progress is being made without having to watch every iota of it. But for the most part, as the episode goes on, it’s all about the setup more than anything else as the various teams that are working on Greed Island that will be part of this final arc of the story get their placement set into the motion. There’s not a lot of meaty material here and with some of these supporting arcs, which will play more importantly as it goes on, it’s simply not that engaging.
In Summary:
When your most engaging moments are in the first couple of minutes of the episode, name the time spent between Hisoka and the Phantom Troupe, you know you have a weak episode. There’s some nice if small moments here with what Bisky is doing to get Gon trained up to where he needs to be now, but the rest of the episode is just subplot material moving forward slowly and in a rather uninteresting was simply because the characters themselves aren’t all that interesting. This is the kind of episode where it feels like you could watch the first couple of minutes and skip the rest unless you’re a diehard fan needing every minute of the characters.
Grade: C+
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Sony KDS-R70XBR2 70″ LCoS 1080P HDTV, Dell 10.1 Netbook via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.
