Nothing inspires Haru like video chat with a bikini clad Kuroyuki.
What They Say:
Haruyuki receives a call from Kuroyukihime, who is away on a school trip. Touched by her kind words, Haruyuki vows to settle the score with Dusk Taker on his own.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
With the way the series has unfolded, we’re in that kind of awkward patch right now where Haru’s growth is key and we’re getting it, but it’s not exactly engaging. We know he’ll grow, we know the cast will grow a bit more with those that help him and we get some nice call backs to earlier characters. Things are on a set path but the larger picture feels weakened because of it in that you’re not sure, well, what the point of things are outside of Haru’s own growth. He is a fun character to watch though since he’s not like most others and that leaves him with some good quirks to take advantage of and some serious issues with how he views himself that he’s trying to conquer.
Part of my frustration with the show in the last few episodes has been that there’s been very little Kuroyuki. With her out of the picture, she does finally make a return visit here, showing us that she’s on a school trip to Okinawa. It’s a rough virtual mail to Haru though as she does it while wearing her tiny bikini while on the beach. That’s bad enough, but he feels even worse when he sees the scar from the accident from when they were together, but she shows him how she wears it as a badge of honor of sorts and that it shouldn’t worry him. It’s good to see that she understands his concerns and allays them as best as she can from there while also checking in on him in general as the trip goes on. A little bit of dialogue can go a long way towards easing the pressures he faces during a normal school day.
All of this does give him the incentive he needs to go after dusk Taker on his own, which happens to work out well when the situation turns in that direction. The kid has been pushing and prodding all along and that just makes Haru want to go after him all the more. So when Taku and Haru get into a fight with Nomi in the virtual world, it goes bad fast for Taku and pushes Haru into an awkward position. Though the reasons for the fight are basic and obvious, there’s some good fun to how it unfolds when it gets down to just Haru and Nomi sa Taku recovers. Nomi’s picked up some neat abilities since he can fly now, but it’s also the kind of thing that really does push Haru to be more than he has been and to really strive for the sky, to crave it in a way that he never realized.
In Summary:
Accel World brings to fruition some of the recent events that have happened with Haru and his wings and puts it all right into a match against Nomi. That goes about as one would expect and is well played but has that overall predictability factor to it that lessens it overall. Visually, it’s striking and engaging though and that helps, though there’s fare more pauses for dialogue and dramatic stances than I care for. I rather liked that we got some time with Haru at school and got to see that side of things a bit more as well as getting a visit from Kuroyuki to help brighten his mood a bit, something that’s been desperately needed. The show hits some good notes here though it’s still just a cog in the works rather than a significant move forward.
Grade: B
Streamed By: Viz Media
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.
