Did not see this one coming. Send me some links to the doujinshis guys.

This show is great. Not only for the battle sequences, but also for the motivations behind the characters. Although I was disappointed that the torturer was killed off last week, the new archvillain is even more compelling.

The guy who died last week was just plain stupid, following a moral code blindly without the slightest hint of self-awareness. The main villain now, on the other hand, knows exactly what he’s doing. He’s a traitor to the royalty and he’s proud of it.

I can’t help but sympathize with his motivation in trying to make the royal family atone for their crimes. Sadly, he’s going to make them pay by doing the exact same thing he accuses the royal family of in the first place. What makes him a compelling villain is that he’s aware of this contradiction. He knows what he’s doing is wrong but chooses to do it anyway. Maybe this could have been how Celestial Being turned out if they possessed some minimal amount of self-awareness.

This episode also turns things around by telling us a bit more about the situation of the Martian commoners. If I had to eat chlorella and krill every day, I’d want to invade Earth too.

I feel like this episode’s developments fit in quite well with the Imperial Japan parallels we’ve discussed before. A nation that looks with scorn upon the rest of the world.

Only through invading Earth can its great cause be maintained. I find this rather insightful. Its “great cause.” While it’s certainly applicable to Japan before the second world war, I see the same thing happening in America as well. We had to invade Afghanistan to maintain our “great cause”, then Iraq, then Libya, and Pakistan, and… now the great cause at the moment appears to be stopping ISIS.

But what I like about this villain is that he doesn’t think what he’s doing is right. He does think the royal family and the nobility on Vers are wrong— and he’s right about that. But what he’s doing isn’t justice, it’s just vengeance.

Further Thoughts

Gamers, so scary.

I liked what they did with the Lieutenant here. After his flashback I feel much more sympathetic towards him. Before I was just annoyed at how useless he is. Now I’m shipping him with the Captain even harder.

See guys, he isn’t emotionless! Look at the joy on his face! It’s what I’ve been saying all along!

Wonder what he’s going to do next week now that the Princess is dead.

Hahaha like she’s actually dead from that. Although you never know… if they actually just killed her off after that it could be amazing.