What They Say
After arriving at the Ministry of Welfare’s Nona Tower, Makishima and Choe Gu-Song seek out the source of the large power consumption. In the meantime, Kogami, Akane and Kagari arrive at the Tower and try to stop them.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Internet rumor says that Urobuchi claimed a feeling of deep satisfaction after writing a masterpiece, and the director responded “Do you mean episode 16?” So it was with a great deal of anticipation that I waited for this episode, especially through episode 15 which was a big tease. I am not patient, so once spoilers were posted to the internet, I read them, not knowing if they were accurate or not. It turned out that they were, but even knowing everything that was going to happen, episode 16 was tense and riveting. It’s going to be a hard act to beat.
The episode begins in the lobby of the Welfare and Public Safety Ministry’s Nona tower, with all the patrol drones having been dispatched by Makishima’s henchmen. Shinya asks Shion to hack the security cameras to give the heroes some idea of what might be waiting for them inside. Shion’s reluctant, but Akane takes full responsibility for the hacking, a decision I’m certain will come back to bite her in the rear. Shinya then calls Ginoza to report in, and echoing the commands of his supervisor, Kasei, he demands that Makishima be brought in alive. There’s no time to wait for Ginoza and the others to arrive, so Akane, Shinya, and Kagari decide to split up.
Shion reports that the intruders have split into two groups of four. Makishima is headed to the roof, and the other four appear to be headed to the boiler room. Shinya tells Tsunemori to join his pursuit of Makishima upstairs, and Kagari will take downstairs alone. He seems to know how bad of an idea this is, but volunteers nonetheless. Once Akane and Shinya are alone on the elevator, Kogami reveals he thinks Makishima is a decoy and that the party downstairs are headed to the group’s true goal. Kogami’s obsession with revenge seems to be getting the best of him.
There are a lot of fantastic scenes here. Akane ends up wearing a helmet to shield her “healthy” cymatic scan so the intruders can’t pick up on it. Downstairs, Choe tries to seduce Kagari to the anti-Sybil side, reminding him of all of the indignities he’s suffered in his life. We know very little about Kagari, but he impressively refuses to join in with Makishima. He’s indifferent to the suffering of people who treated him poorly, and hates the Sybil system, he says, but he’s not about to join a group that uses evil tactics, no matter how much he agrees with their end goal.
The showdown between Kogami and Makishima is somewhat of an anticlimax, with Kogami being roundly beaten until Akane delivers the finishing blow. Shinya tells Akane to kill Makishima as he’s out cold, but Lawful Good Akane, despite her fury, takes him in alive. The explosive end we might have expected instead happens downstairs, with Sybil’s true identity being something so horrific it would cause riots, according to Choe. He phone-records what he sees, but it’s doubtful if the message will get out, as Kagari and Choe are ambushed by a robotic Kasei. She somehow is able to override the Sybil system’s restrictions on the Dominator, killing Choe, and targeting Kagari, who grimly smiles at the approaching green light. Does he die? We don’t know for certain.
It all works fantastically well, but I can’t give it a perfect score because I’m uncertain about the new direction this brings to the show. When PSYCHO-PASS started, I didn’t know if it was a new Madoka, or a new Ghost in the Shell, or a new Minority Report. It seemed to decide on the form of a pulpy sci-fi CSI with some social criticism, but the revelations about Sybil might change this. If the people in PSYCHO-PASS are complicit in this new social order, choosing security over freedom, it works in a way to comment on the shortcomings of our own criminal justice system. But if Sybil is imposed from the outside by robots, or aliens, or shoggoths, I can’t help but wonder if this dilutes the point I thought PSYCHO-PASS was trying to make? Sybil is evil because of its results, not because it runs on unicorn blood and orphans’ tears. Will the big reveal muddy the message, or was I misreading the series’ intent all along? Only the future can tell.
In Summary
While whether this episode is a “masterpiece” really depends on where the show goes from here, it’s nevertheless fantastic. Kagari and Akane are given a chance to truly shine with some incredibly memorable moments. But with the Makishima vs. Kogami plot seemingly wrapped up, where does the show go from here? Is this the show’s high point before it descends into a fun but dumb and schlocky They Live-like ending sequence? Or does Urobuchi have even more tricks up his sleeve? We’ll find out next week.
Grade: A
Streamed By: Funimation
Review Equipment: Sony VAIO 17″ HD screen
