It’s almost time to go back to the old school but it’s not what the gang is expecting.
What They Say:
The Ishiyama gang hears rumors that Ishiyama’s school building is almost done being rebuilt, but when they go to check it out, they find it’s turned into Akumano Academy! Plus, who is this old man that’s come in search of Oga?!
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
It’s hard to believe it’s been so long since the gang last dealt with their old school, Ishiyama, since they’ve been at the new academy temporarily and gone through a fair number of adventures and side stories there, especially the bigger one with Lord En and the time spent with the Knights and their goofiness. In the end though, both of those larger events don’t feel like they had any serious long lasting impact as the smaller episodes with the split stories tend to register a bit more. With it having been so long since the school was destroyed, it’s close to completion in being rebuilt now and that’s going to set a whole series of other events back into motion. In some ways, it’s really surprising that these guys haven’t completely destroyed the new school yet and turned it to ruin like the other one was. Or that it’s seemingly in excellent condition considering the time spent there.
Amusingly, as things start to move on the lower levels of the cast, there’s some upper levels that looks like it could add a lot of fun as the old men that own and run the name schools in the area all have a history together with a lot of disputes just bubbling under the surface. And they have plenty of skill to back it up as well that would prove difficult for the young punks to deal with. And there’s an amusing twist with the man that’s gotten Ishiyama back on track as he’s actually Behemoth. Though what may annoy the students most from the old Ishiyama school is that it’s being renamed to the Akumano Academy and is partially designed to be a school for Lord En to utilize since there’s a lot he needs to learn.
With the school designed to bring in those from Behemoth’s side, we get the various Pillar folks that serve under him coming to classes now in order to get an education about what the human world is like before they destroy it, which leads to a comically good scene with one of the new teachers who can’t grasp what’s up with these “high school students” he’s been assigned. When Kanzaki and his group of associates makes their way onto the campus, it’s got the dreaded music playing but it’s played against such a great looking exterior and the brightly colored students that you can’t help but to love the disparity between it. It almost turns into part of a horror movie where a group of kids ends up going further and further into a very bad place where they have no clue what will be around the corner.
In Summary:
While a lot of people didn’t enjoy the double story episodes that populated the series recently, they were ones that I felt were a lot of fun, especially after the Lord En arc felt like it dragged on way too much on top of the Holy Knights story which fizzled for me. With this episode, it’s getting into something progressive again with the larger storyline by having the gang get ready to return to their newly rebuilt school only to have it become a training ground for Behemoth’s subordinates who will use its knowledge to destroy the human realm. It’s fairly relaxed overall but it has some very fun moments and builds up to where things can go with a mixture of action and fun that really did dominate the first season or two of the series.
Grade: B
Readers Rating: [ratings]
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.
