In Fans’ Own Words: Week Ending December 7th, 2013

I Couldn’t Become a Hero, So I Reluctantly Decided to Get a Job (Yushibu) Episode 10 | TFP Review

EmperorBrandon: Yeah, looks like Fino awakening to her full powers theory is probably going to play out in this final arc, courtesy of the “Bloodstone” Raid is going to give her. Lam tried to get Fino to focus on her true heartfelt goals, but it seems like there may be some wavering on her part now that she’s learned Raul really wanted to be a hero. The wait for next week is going to be tough… Quite curious to see how things go down with Airi, as it’s implied the villains have her as a big part of the plan.

Hitsugi Amachi: It’s going to be interesting, but I hope that they will show Raul and Airi being true heroes, in the real sense of the word. It’s not about being able to swing a sword well or being more powerful than others. I hope that the two of them will do the right thing in the end. So, I’m hoping that the plans of Raid, Blaze, and the Amada Boss all go down in flames.

I do fear that the Bloodstone will do something bad to Fino, perhaps turning her into a fiendish demon who suddenly starts destroying everything, and then Raul will have to stop her without killing her (since that would be a massive downer ending for a comedy if she died. I don’t expect that to happen at all).

bctaris: So one big reason for Amada as the force behind all of this (if menacing company president in half-shot looking ominously down at the street wasn’t obvious) is simply because they made/make a lot of money on the Hero industry. Duh.

But one small problem with execution: distracted throughout by this mild subplot of not letting others know who Fino is, I somehow never realized that Raul had never revealed that he was a Hero to Fino. Didn’t feel like that was ever even made an issue, like that he would need to hide it from her. So the Big Dramatic Moment of Fino learning it here felt flat or forced. But it could just be me.

Sensuifu: I didn’t see anything wrong with Fino’s realization that Raul was a hero. I thought it was pretty much established that there was no effort or setup on Fino’s part for asking about him personally all this time. Rather, it was Fino who was openly telling who she was, albeit recklessly until Raul inquired her more seriously about it. Also, Raul had that introspective moment when he and Fino went shopping, which kind of alluded to him not disclosing any of his Hero identity to her. I was under the impression Raul wasn’t the only one to know who Fino really is. Though, some of the other characters know of Fino’s identity too; Lam does incidentally.

Why Raul didn’t disclose that truth to Fino was likely due to how he felt about himself and his developing relationship with her- the exact opposite of what he stood for. He probably didn’t want to harm the good he saw in Fino because of the situation he was in…failing to become the Hero he wanted to be and yet, sees no reason to fulfill his shattered dreams since the Hero program was cancelled and acknowledges that Fino escaped to the human world to deny becoming the next demon lord.

Hitsugi Amachi: I didn’t have a problem either with the reveal. Looking back over the past, Fino and Raul never really had much in the way of personal conversation about him. Fino is completely open about her past, but Raul was always only talking about work with Fino. So, it’s really not much of a surprise that Fino never realized that Raul had been a Hero candidate. We also saw occasions where Raul wanted to conceal his past from Fino, because they had developed such a good working relationship at that point and he didn’t want to ruin it by telling her “oh, by the way, before I took this job, I trained really hard to kill your dad.” We also saw how he tried to suppress Fino revealing to Airi that she’s the Demon King’s daughter when she first visited the store. It’s clear that he wants to keep the past from invading the present. Once Raul accepted Fino as a junior co-worker, he’s done his best to shelter her from her past and the baggage it carries.

bctaris: I’ll stress that I don’t have any problem with the idea of the reveal, nor the concept of him keeping it a secret. It’s a decent plot point. I just didn’t fee like it had been established quite as concretely as it could have. (Or, again, I just wasn’t paying enough attention. )

sonic: Or maybe your attention was diverted to some other, um, assets the show had on display at the time…

I think they briefly touched on Raul’s reservation to tell Fino of his former hero status at some point, but I cannot remember when, if ever, they overtly did.

Well, the plot moving forward seems to be as I thought before. Fino has chosen to create a peaceful world rather than one of war between demons and humans; a decision born from remembering defending her poor mother from the Demon Lord’s wrath. She’s being taken against her will to become the new Demon Lord with the Bloodstone as a likely catalyst to that end. My guess is Raul will have to don his hero gear once more and take down those would be hero friends of his to save her and become a real hero in the process; so he will both be the hero he always dreamed of and get to work with Fino at her store in the netherworld when the drama ends.