Kappas and sharks and bears – oh my!
What They Say:
“Stand, Hisui”
Princess Hisui and Arcadios are on their way to Fairy Tail when they fortuitously run into Natsu, Lucy, and Yukino. Princess Hisui has created something to send the wayward Celestial Spirits home by force, but the mother and son duo of Pisces appears to snatch it. And, like the other Celestial Spirits, this is a new, darker version of their previous selves. For example, the mother Pisces now has much bigger jaws…
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
We finally found what caused the Celestial Spirits to go mad! As a result of the Eclipse plan, there have been weather anomalies throughout the country. It’s so far reaching that it’s affecting the Celestial Spirit world too and…well…that’s it. It’s an influx of magical energy that they just couldn’t stand.
I don’t know if I want to buy this—or if I’d just be more ok with it if it wasn’t in filler—but it seems like a super dumb reason for something like this to happen. The impact that an arc like this can have is huge repercussions later on, just like when the zanpakutou went wild in Bleach. As it is, the arc isn’t even addressing the fact that it’s hurting the Celestial Spirit mages to attack their own spirits. Lucy seemed extremely hesitant to do so, but when push comes to shove, she did it anyway. And then Yukino seemed to have no reservations at all (perhaps a result of their different upbringing?). Natsu is Natsu, so I’m more ok with him wanting to challenge the strongest spirits.
Aside from that, we don’t get much of a sense of stakes in the arc. Immediately, we’re introduced to a set of keys that can force open and closed the Celestial Spirit gates. No work has to be done by the characters to snap them out of their release. I want a moment—and this could still happen—where Lucy or Yukino is beaten silly only for the Spirit to finally awaken and realize what they’ve done. It’ll be the first step to awakening them instead of just having a convenient thing to close gates and literally avoid conflict.
Not only that, but the entire fight in the episode is pointless given that Arcadois had a fake set of keys that Pisces stole. Why even have this? Where are the stakes in the episode anymore when the episode didn’t need to happen at all. Let Pisces leave and then reveal this and 22 minutes is suddenly five minutes. I guess that’s the reason though. As Team Rocket says, “We have to fill 20 minutes.”
In Summary:
Despite my misgivings about the episode’s point, I liked the content quite a bit. It’s fight scenes were dumb, but fun and it allowed the never talked about silver keys to have some spotlight. I don’t know why two Celestial Spirit mages have all 12 keys of the zodiac (are there literally no other Celestial Spirit mages then?), but it reminds us that other keys exist. Plus the weird mom and son combination of Pisces was a little charming.
Grade: C
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Equipment: PS3, LG 47LB5800 47” 1080p LED TV, LG NB3530A Sound Bar
