Teamwork makes the snipers work
What They Say:
Osamu Mikumo is a member of Border, an organization designed to protect Mikado City the from alien invaders knows as Neighbors. One day a mysterious new student named Yuma Kuga transfers to his school and turns out to be a humanoid neighbor himself. The two are supposed to be natural enemies, but could there be more to neighbors than Osamu has bargained for…
The Review:
Content (warning as portions of this review may contain spoilers):
So I’ve found myself asking this almost every week for a while now but it really feels like World Trigger should be an FPS. The way it continually handles itself as far as that kind of action goes really lends itself to that and it’s kind of weird seeing it played out in anime form. Of course it works for the most part so it’s hard to complain and that’s once again the primary focus of these episodes as this arc gets closer towards the end.
Before quite getting to that stuff though, things open up with the continuation of the previous Osamu focus (as well as a nearly 5 minute long recap in the first of these two episodes) which is always appreciated. He witnesses Chika get turned into a Trion cube and feels it’s his fault for trying to take advantage of her abilities. However he remembers how much the others have helped him out and it inspires him to do his best to get her safely back to HQ while the Rabits pursue him. He gets a bit of a chance to show off as he actually puts up a decent fight for awhile, but before long he’s cornered and finds himself saved by Replica. Replica manages to help Osamu escape by taking out a few of the Rabits with one of his own, but warns him that whether or not the future Jin saw involving Osamu’s death depends on if he can get back to the base safe fly or not.
From there on though, the focus shifts to some of the ongoing fights and they’re a lot of fun. As I’ve said a couple of times before, World Trigger’s fights really stand out in that group tactics matter a lot more than mano-a-mano shonen brawls and there’s no better example than the conclusion to the Enedora fight. He catches on to the training room ploy the agents have been using and manages to successful mask his weakpoints making him difficult to take down. Shinoda arrives on the scene in time to halt him and for a while it looks he’ll be able solo Enedora by overpowering him in typical shonen fashion, but Enedora’s clever usage of his Trigger turns the tables and severely injures him instead. What actually ends up saving the day here is one of the minor agents distracting Enedora with a seemingly failed stealth attack while the others mark his weakpoints and take him out with a genuine stealth move. World Trigger’s overusage of minor characters has been a gripe for me since it’s hard to keep track of or care about them but this is one instance where it really manages to work and it highlights the show as a one where the Shone Jump mantra of teamwork actually means something.
This continues into the other major fight of these episodes as Izumi continues to battle against Hyrein and figuring out the weakness of his Trigger in that it’s only effective against Trion. Rather than trying to just damage the environment around him to to destroy his Trion body, he instead does it clear open a shot for the snipers in the vicinity so they can chip away at him. It’s a nice little tactic, though it’s rather quickly negated when another one of the Afrokrator soldiers named Mira manages to lure the snipers out of their positions. It does manage to buy Osamu a little more time to make it to the base though, so it works out pretty effectively although the clock is still ticking.
Of course it’s worth nothing that if the heroes actually emphasize teamwork the villains obviously don’t. Shortly after the Enedora fight wraps up and he tries to make an exit, Mira instead decides to kill him for his failure (and in a somewhat comically censored fashion compared to the manga) and takes his Black Trigger. She notes that his Trigger was starting to have adverse side effects on his mental state which more or less made him useless to them since they could find a better user, which provides a slightly interesting contrast to how Shinoda valued the individual abilities of his subordinates. It’s a nice way to highlight those differences without getting too upfront about it and it again helps that group efforts are a thing that actually matters here. Looking forward to seeing more of that as this arc gets closer to wrapping up.
In Summary:
World Trigger delivers on another set of battle heavy episodes, and both putting a fair amount of emphasis on the importance of teamwork while actually demonstrating it. It’s the little thing that makes the series stand out a bit from the usual shonen mold as those are generally more in favor of straightforward fights and occasionally less interesting as a result. With things chugging along nicely, hopefully the show can continue along that path without any major bumps in the road.
Grade: B+
Streamed By: Crunchyroll, Hulu
