Nanana’s Buried Treasure #10 – With everyone pulling in the same direction, the Adventure Club is able to make short work of the treasure chamber in Southred Mall. But that’s not what this episode is really about. This is about Hīyo finally getting some of what’s coming to him. It’s about Yū giving up on the helpless damsel act, and Tensai showing that her genius extends to the baser arts such as combat, and Isshin demonstrating that having deeper respect for and understanding of Nanana’s game than Hīyo ever had is the way to victory.
No two ways about it, that was a heck of a lot of fun. Well, except that last moment. Hīyo, being a proper hissable villain, has another trick up his sleeve.
Now that it’s clear Yun really was trapped in the chamber and probably suffered a serious injury, it’s even more likely that the treasure there has some kind of healing powers. Jūgo’s collapsed lung is going to put a serious strain on his ability to keep his promise about not using the treasure. If someone else used it to heal him, would that count? Can it even be used that way?
JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Stardust Crusaders #11 – Yes, you heard correctly– the man with two right hands is named J. Geil. The translator has chosen to rename him “Centerfold” after the J. Geils Band’s biggest hit, which, according to the Internet, hit the charts in 1981, which means that given the youthful demographics of current English-language anime fandom, the reference will appreciated by almost exactly nobody.
Then again, this show is probably getting a slightly older audience, and maybe Crunchyroll’s translator is just following the manga translation.
Joseph and Jōtarō are back at the end to say that Avdol is really, truly dead, although the viewer is given no visual corroboration of the story. In action-adventure terms, this merely places Avdol in a Schrödinger’s-cat-like state where he is neither truly alive nor dead until further plot developments give us a direct look. Or, if you like, this places the viewers who really liked him in denial.
Mushishi #9 – A typical episode of Mushishi: some bucolic countryside scenes, some gentle wisdom, and some body horror. Just to make it clear, Hōichi’s mother never started producing more milk. It was the mushi changing her blood to provide nourishment to its new host.
Rather than the usual accidental encounter between human and mushi, this week’s story is about a specifically evolved parasitism. It seems to be rather self-limiting– wouldn’t a better evolutionary strategy be one that allows multiple offspring to be infected? Perhaps it normally latches onto species with a shorter reproductive cycle or which usually has multiple births.
You can see Hōichi’s point of view in not immediately getting rid of the parasite, seeing that he does have a bunch of kids to feed. But in time– maybe as the kids get old enough to help, or maybe just as he gets wiser with age– it seems he makes a better decision.
Brynhildr in the Darkness #11 – Brynhildr is two shows. One is the story of Ryōta and the witches struggling desperately against time and the inhuman actions of the lab and its possibly-alien allies. It’s dark, smart, and relentlessly engaging. The other is a bunch of idiot harem-comedy hijinks. And the problem now is that the wall separating them is cracking and the stupid is starting to leak into the first show.
Consider that someone fresh out of the lab has dropped in on our crew, and no one has yet thought to ask what she might know about where the lab is. Or that having gotten confirmation that Neko really is his old friend, and thus another prompt to think about the dam incident and its connection to aliens, Ryōta still doesn’t think of that as a clue. Then there’s the business about protease, where neither the geek with the photographic memory nor his genius scientist uncle brings up the fact that protease inhibitors are an actual well-known entire class of drugs.
Thankfully Valkyria is here to present them with a potentially fatal challenge, which should knock the idiocy back for a while. I hope.
