Medaka’s first opponent clues her in on what’s in store for her future in going against the 13th Party.
What They Say:
Medaka’s first opponent even catches her off guard with his abnormality. Medaka will have to push her body to the limit and speak with her fist to make it to the next floor.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
With Medaka and her group making their way to deal with the Flask Project group, she’s ended up with pretty much the entire student council around her as they stand with her. The previous episode started to set things up and then thrust us right into the action by having them come across Takachiho Shigusa, a man that looks like something of a lean boxer who claims to be the 13th Party’s strongest man. He’s wiry and fast but also pretty strong, even if he claims to be a researcher at heart. Medaka takes a few hits quickly but also starts to mess with him a fair bit, first with the way she grabs his data chain and then by stating that if he’s the strongest, she’ll be able to handle future opponents pretty well. Her cocky nature is always welcome.
With the way that Medaka operates, she does a pretty good job of breaking down what it is his capabilities are and how he uses it, something that he doesn’t have any problems essentially admitting to. It’s amusing to see him so confident and proud of it since it just confirms things for her and provides others with solutions on how to truly defeat him. Zenkichi’s potential for being the real strategist of the gorup continues to go up, but a lot of it still comes down to the physical exercise here that must take place for Medaka. Seeing her attacks here are pretty fun to watch since she uses the whole clone maneuver that lets her really go at him, but there’s always limits to things and we have to see that there are real challenges to be had here with the 13th Party.
The fight dominates the episode and works quite well as it progresses, showing us how Medaka is handling going against him as he shifts and adjusts and we see the damage to the hallway they’re in to make it clear that things are getting dealt with here. Medaka knows how to push his buttons quickly and it’s good to see that the rest of the team is smartly analyzing things as well. There’s a good mix to events here even if the episode is kept relatively straightforward in what it’s achieving by showing us some of what the team will be up against. What helps is that the whole thing is essentially kept to one episode and that goes a long way towards mitigating and heavy problems I might have with it.
In Summary:
Unfortunately, Takachiho isn’t all that engaging of an opponent and even when we do get that bit of very tiny back story towards the end, it’s nothing to really make us connect with him. He’s all reflex and action with a nod towards overall plot progression that doesn’t impact things that much. For Medaka and her group, we see the way they’ll operate together and progress in that fashion while doing whatever they need to, within reason as you know Medaka won’t want to compromise herself. With it taking place in just one part of a long hallway, we get a pretty good fight overall and a look at the lower end of the scale of what they’ll be dealing with, so it’s instructive in that matter. It just doesn’t resonate in a big way and is more of a placeholder and minor introduction to what’s to come.
Grade: C+
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.
