Too many Servants spoils a battle?
What They Say:
It is the road to zero-the beginning.
Craving for the power of the Holy Grail that enables to do a miracle, seven wizards (Masters) summoned seven heroic spirits (Servants), and make them performing a battle royal— that is, never ends to fight until there left only one winner— Another Duel over the Holy Grail.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
The arrival of Rider in the midst of the fight between Lancer and Saber was definitely a great little moment at the end of the previous episode since he’s got a whole sense of humor and style about him. And he did it by landing in the middle of two of the more serious Servants that exist who were just getting into their fight pretty well. Even worse is that Waver is feeling kind of embarrassed about the whole thing with how Rider acts, especially when you have someone like Saber reiterate that she was the King of Britain and won’t work as a Servant for some other Servant. It’s all quick and simple hits we get right from the start here that are good character identifiers, especially the look of mild exasperation on Lancer’s face.
As much as Rider complicates things by arriving in the middle of this and attempting to upstage them all by talking about global conquest, what really throws things off balance is the arrival of a new Master in hiding who summons forth his terrifying Servant, the Berserker, after the Assassin jumps into the fray. The use of so many Servants here at once is chaotic and is throwing off the Masters as well since it goes against form and good planning by having so many together, which should lead to a rather quick ending for many of them based on knowledge of how these things work. What started as a simple one on one match with the intent of using it as a distraction to eliminate a Master has turned into a full fledged sizable battle where even Waver can’t determine just how powerful the Berserker is.
Similar to the previous episode, the action is quite intense here as everyone goes at it in different stages. The animation is fantastic and I adore the coloring of it all as it has a real vibrancy that puts most every other series to shame. Also like the previous episode, the action is short, intense and unfulfilled as you have Lancer frustrated by the fact that his fight with Saber has been interrupted with no results to be had yet between them. There are some great moments to be had here between this cast, and the way that they have in essence felt each other out about where things stand, but it’s also kind of empty in a way because of that lack of real resolution. We get so many of them here but it all falls away surprisingly quickly. The cute moments work though, especially when it comes to Rider, but there’s just a feeling of it all being very, very anti-climactic here.
In Summary:
In terms of getting to know the cast of the series better, at least with the Servant side of it, this episode does some really good things in having so many people there. We get a handle on how they fight, the way they’re all very strong personalities and just how difficult it will be when they really do get down to fighting the good fight. The stakes are definitely upped here and it’s easy to find a character to rally behind, even if we are essentially given only one to really feel is a good guy. But there’s enough meat to the other characters so far, and plenty of potential, to make each of them accessible and really build a fanbase around and that’s an exciting thing that you want to see more of. While I felt a little let down that they didn’t go all out here, what we did get was exciting, especially with Berserker, and it has me wanting to see them really capitalize on it all soon with another battle with some real consequence.
Grade: B+
Readers Rating: [ratings]
Streamed By: Nico Nico
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.
