The Emperor Gaz’s plan revealed.
What They Say:
Episode #9: “The Throne that Invites War”
The Review
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
I sincerely wasn’t expecting the black Chaika to unceremoniously toss the saboteur siblings and their dragoon out on their butts. Black Chaika demands they hand over the remains if they want to get their Chaika back. Red Chaika had just decided to hand over her remains to white Chaika only to find that they’ve been taken from her companion by force.
Vivi, Matheus, and Gillette manage to sneak out of the castle and get to the rendezvous with a very surprised Zita and Leo, who discover their boss lives, although there is less of him than there used to be. They manage to get back on their vehicle and report back to the Agency about the tournament. The dangers of all out war breaking out draw even closer now that Hartgen’s plan has been revealed. Gillette sneaks back in by simply walking back into the castle, since the guards have no idea that he’s turned against them.
Toru and Akari have no real choice but to bring Black Chaika the remains, especially with useless Frederica once again down for the count. They return with all the remains they’ve gathered and bring them ibto the throne room, and finally meet the Black Chaika face to face. Our Chaika begs Toru to not hand over the remains, but they want her freed. When they don’t let any of them go Toru almost springs into action but Gillette stops him. Apparently no one on black Chaika’s team noticed Gillette regained his memories when he was defeated.
Black Chaika starts an incantation which Hartgen thinks is going to make him the next emperor, but then Black Chaika reveals her plan. No one was expecting what she was up to, or how she was going to carry out the master plan, and the reactions from the crowd watching are priceless. I’m certain my expression matched that of Toru and company.
Finally we learn of Emperor Gaz’s ultimate plan, and that he was playing the ultimate Xanatos gambit the entire time. We discover what his goal was, the roles the Chaika played in it, hints as to who and what our Chaika was and why she might have been different from the others. It’s entirely overwhelming, I can excuse our cast for standing there dumbstruck. The final question remaining is, what the hell any of them can do in the face of a being so overpowered as to make them all look like ants?
In Summary:
It all comes down to this. With the next episode being the finale, I’m unsure as to what, if anything, the cast can do to stop war from engulfing the planet once more. What can three saboteurs, a few wizards, several rogue creations, a knight, and an almost entirely useless dragoon do against a sorcerer so powerful he remade himself as a god? I’m also concerned that the finale won’t be nearly enough for those of us wishing for a completely to satisfying ending. Without knowing how the light novels go I don’t know if this matches up with them or if it will in the future. Will this be an anime only ending next episode? I am sure of one thing though, I can’t see how anyone is going to be able to stop Gaz.
Episode Grade: A –
Streamed by: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment: 27” iMac running OS 10.9.5, via Safari 7.0.6, FIOS 15/5 Mbps connection. Your milage may vary.
“The ultimate Xanatos gambit?” That was clearly gambit roulette. A Xanatos gambit is when someone sets up a situation with many seemingly completely different possible outcomes so that every one of those outcomes are favorable to himself in some way (so even the “failures” of the plan are still actually successes, just in different ways). Gambit roulette (which originally was called Xanatos roulette, but many have been campaigning for it to be renamed for years, as it is not required for it to be an attempt at a Xanatos gambit specifically for it to be one, to the point where they have now succeeded in getting at least some of the internet to call it “gambit roulette” instead, but changes to things that have been in place for a while is hard, especially on the ‘net) is when someone makes a plan that completely depends on unlikely things to happen that he himself has no actual control over nor any ability to predict with any reliability for it to work (and generally only have the one favorable outcome), usually resulting from an inadequate author attempting to write in either a Xanatos gambit or some other form of complex master plan and not being capable of actually pulling it off, often by getting overzealous and throwing way too many complications in, possibly combined with massive amounts of retcon.
There was nothing in this plan to suggest it was the former.
This is what I get for trying to use words.