What They Say:
Formation of Special Fire Force Company 8 / The Mightiest Hikeshi
The Review
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
One of Fire Force strongest aspects is its theme of building a family and community uniting for a common goal. This episode is divided into two parts and they each focus on a specific family or community. It creates a strong motif for each of the families to be united and to still be unified as they face difficult challenges. These families have had their structure and emotional ties defined well.
The first half of this episode dives into why Special Fire Force Company 8 was created and how Obi and Hinawa meet up. I enjoy seeing Hinawa’s growth even though it is slowly moving. He starts off in the army with some of the same qualities he has in the present but more emotionless and cynical person. His friend, Tojo, ends up transforming into an Inferno and he begs Hinawa to kill him before he fully becomes one but Hinawa ends up freezing with fear and regret and unable to kill him. Even though Hinawa doesn’t believe in religion, Hinawa didn’t want to shoot his friend because his gun wasn’t baptized. He would later ask for Tojo baptized gun and defies orders to help Obi put an Inferno to rest.
Obi does cause Hinawa to change his ways but it is disappointing that his backstory hasn’t been touched upon yet. He plays such an upright leader and is able to convince Shinra and Hinawa of the righteous path they should take. Obi also shows disgust towards Company 3 method of awarding points based on the difficulty of killing Infernos which would lead him to create Company 8. Obi is a rare leader who does the best for everyone else and seems to have no wrongdoings. I would want to know more about what led him to become the person that he is.
In the second half of the episode, Company 7 is introduced as well as their leader, Benimaru, who was seen last episode. Benimaru was seen as the guy who does whatever he wants, but he has the complete trust of the people living in his area. An old lady gives him daifuku but he insults but she still insists on giving it to him and a man, Kantaro invites him out for drinks. Kantaro ends up turning into an Inferno and Benimaru puts him to rest.
I do admire how Benimaru put his friend to rest. He involved the whole town in a festival and destroyed several buildings to honor him. He put his hand through his friend’s body and looked at him right in the eye as he was dying. Usually, when an inferno dies it has become rather similar and lacking of emotion but this episode finally brought back some much-needed emotion that hasn’t been seen since episode 1 similar to when Shinra killed the Inferno and brought relief to the family.
One aspect that I found weird about Benimaru is that he has a right eye with circle-shaped pupil and his left eye has an X shaped pupil. The episode gives some explanation as to why this is but it doesn’t go far enough. He is classified as a compound fire user who uses both second generation and third generation powers but i am wondering why this eye pupil is unique to just him. Shouldn’t all fire users have either an X or circle shaped pupil depending on their generation?
A neat fact of this episode is that it serves as a history lesson of the Edo period of Japan. The term “matoi” is a “flag” that people would carry up to their roofs to notify firefighters of the direction of where a fire is located.
Summary:
I enjoyed this episode because it keeps riding upon the emotional track that was set up last episode. There are two different families that are shown here and how their bonds are carefully tight knitted. Some people fear death but this episode shows that as people are facing death, they wish to go out at the hands of the people they trust and this happens to be the family that they have created.
Grade: A
Streamed by: Crunchyroll and Funimation
