Witch Craft Works Episode 11
EmperorBrandon: Weekend sure ended up being quite the epic villain, leaving us on another cliffhanger. Given how quickly other “antagonists” were dispatched and dealt with before, I didn’t expect the battle against her and her cohorts would last until the end of the series. Hirano Aya is certainly fittingly over the top with this one.
bctaris: Okay, okay. Chronorie is definitely a Tower Witch. It was never perfectly clear (or I simply forgot–wasn’t there a scene of her meeting Kazane near the beginning of the show when she shows up in town?). But, she also wasn’t in this episode, making her end game all the more curious. But more stuff is also sort of explained, at least with the science teacher, Mikage.
Hitsugi Amachi: The ED has actually been a useful cheat sheet here, since the Tower Witches are all included in one panning moment, while the Workshop Witches have their own separate panning shot. I noted that Mikage was in the Workshop panning shot from his first appearance, so it was slightly confusing what his role was until now, but it was clear that he would be on the “good” side by the end. Chronoire was always in the Tower shot.
bctaris: It’s still fun without getting too serious. Kudos to that. From a plot perspective it’s an interesting deliberate mess, demonstrating all the shifting alliances and motives of both Tower and Workshop witches. Certainly no black and white; it’s hard to tell if there’s even a good vs. evil going on (though one side–of one side?–protecting civilians, and one side of another trying to kill them seems clear cut, but even that is a means to some other end). Really, that’s more depth than most anime straight ahead dramas get away with Though this one’s slightly insane, so that may be why.
Hitsugi Amachi: It is complicated, isn’t it? Not all of the Tower Witches are pure evil (some, like Chronoire and Medusa are clearly just magical power hungry, but are not malicious; Weekend and friends are callous and malicious, which makes them more obviously evil). And we’ve seen that the Workshop Witches, while generally good, are not exactly bright, shining examples of heroism (many of them are willing to use rather disreputable means to achieve their ends, even if the ends are positive).
While I’ve really not been a fan of the entire Weekend arc, since I think the deliberate harm that she and her confederates engage in was out of character for the show so far, which was much more comic in its “villainy,” it is the general insanity that keeps the show from crossing the line into becoming annoying for me. There is still humor here.
Sly05: Tower witch seems to be a loose designation for any witch that isn’t a member of a workshop so the label encompasses witches with a wide range of goals that range from simple self interest to committing outright harm to human society. Unlike the Workshop witches, Tower witches don’t seem to have much in the way of group cohesion as a whole so they are not necessarily allied with one another. As we saw from Chronoire’s rounding up all the tower witches in the city, she doesn’t seem like she has much to do with Weekend and has her own (presently obscure) goals.
bctaris: And speaking of that: is Tanpopo being set up as the hero here?
Hitsugi Amachi: You know, I would love it if at the end of the show, it turned out to be that Tanpopo is the hero who saves the day. No changing sides, no becoming a Workshop Witch and joining the side of “Good,” but just simply because she gets pissed off at being left behind and having to face off against Weekend and crew. “You ruined my perfect plan to just hang out and sing karaoke! For that, you’re finished!” Said before blasting Weekend and friends into submission.
One can hope.
