Takuto’s range of challengers only continue to increase with this episode.
What They Say:
Star Driver takes place on the fictional Southern Cross Isle. One night, a boy named Takuto washes up on shore swimming from the mainland. He later enrolls in Southern Cross High School as a freshmen and makes new friends. However, beneath the school is a group of mysterious giants called Cybodies, which can be controlled by humans in an alternate dimension known as Zero Time. Takuto, The “Galactic Pretty Boy” , finds himself dragged into opposition with the “Glittering Crux Brigade”. Glittering Star Cruciform Group), a mysterious group that intends to take possession of the island’s Cybodies for their own purposes as well as break the seals of the island’s four Shrine Maidens, whose powers prevent the Cybodies from functioning outside of Zero Time.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Takuto’s life on the Southern Cross Island continues to be one that’s a challenge, especially sa we see at the start here that he’s really bad off since coming there as he apparently gave his monthly allowance to the fish. Luckily, others in the school will help him out with a meal here and there but they’re also suggesting that he might want to get a part time job. Or rather, Watanabe is suggesting that he come to her house to clean her pool. Those that hear about it get pretty excited and manage to make their way into the excursion since Watanabe’s house is action a very big luxury cruise liner that she herself owns called Thunder Girl. It makes the wealth issue pretty apparent from the start but we also get a look at her amusing relationship with her wealthy French pervert of a husband who can’t speak a lick of Japanese, hence his not being there while she teaches.
A lot of the episode, more than just the first half in fact, focuses on these kinds of interactions once on the ship since there’s fun little quirks to deal with that Watanabe has there. There’s also a mock fight of sorts with the brooms between Takashi and Takuto, but it lacks seriousness to it as Takashi doesn’t treat him like a real opponent. Which is unfortunate since there is some issues to be had there and if the two cut loose it’d be pretty interesting. There’s some real room to maneuver with Takashi at this point as we see how he’s being tweaked and manipulated about the potential to become the new Kiraboshi.
Which, of course, leads to another of the galactic scale battles that happens. With the way they’re executed, I’m hard pressed to give it much grief if we’re getting one each episode because it goes so big, so epic and full of wonderful design and animation that it leaves me grinning. Even if it doesn’t make all that much sense either to a degree. There’s some neat twists to how this particular battle works out with the Star Swords and the types that are used, including the introduction of a dual sword in fact, and all of it feels just as amazing as it did in the previous episode as well. It’s just so… empty of meaning at this point.
In Summary:
Considering the run that Star Driver had when it premiered, I’m definitely in this for awhile to ese where it goes, but at this point it’s having a really hard time holding my attention when it comes to the story. It’s a beautiful show in a lot of ways and I like the designs for the characters but it’s the big epic moments that are holding my attention right now. This episode rolls through what seems to be a pattern of dealing with a particular character and shuffling them up to the big time for a bit so there aren’t any real surprises here, but it’s got a good sense of style to it along with some humor and a few nuggets of interesting info, especially when it comes to Watanabe. Beyond that, it’s feeling a bit empty overall.
Grade: B-
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.
