My favorite line from anime ever as my readers are well aware.
This episode rivals Valvrave for the most stupid mecha cliches you can possibly pack into one episode, except it isn’t nearly as funny. We get the “You’re you, you.” which no doubt resolves all of Hina’s internal struggles regarding her identity.
Oh, and then of course there’s the “You aren’t my real daughter” moment.
And the father (introduced only last episode of course!) on his death bed telling a sobbing Hina to leave him to die.
Next Aoba is given a gun, and he of course complains that he’s only a kid in high school. I’m not sure why high is italicized. Regardless, I guess Aoba doesn’t realize he’s been shooting guns and killing people in a mecha for the first ten episodes. But once he holds the gun in his own two hands, it doesn’t feel like he’s playing a video game anymore, and he’s not old enough to pull the trigger.
Soon enough, Aoba finds Hina sobbing by the vending machine (the place where all anime girls go to cry) and tells her that she’s her. Very helpful. And that she should desert and join the other country’s army for some reason.
As evidence, Aoba points out that they accepted him, and he’s from 70 years ago. One may wish to point out to Aoba that this is slightly different since he didn’t kill loads of their soldiers and wouldn’t be asked to kill his friends on the opposing side. Oh well, Aoba is an idiot. His only power is that he can reach an instantaneous simultaneous orgasm with just about anyone, anywhere.
But anyway, Hina and Bison-kun steal Aoba’s toys. Bison-kun is pissed at Aoba because he talked to Hina and he’s jealous and wants to kill Aoba.
But Aoba doesn’t want to shoot the stolen mecha down. Because Hina’s on them. And she didn’t do anything wrong except attack their base, kill loads of his fellow soldiers, and steal his robot. Besides, she’s thinking about her FEELINGS right now. Don’t these people have any consideration?
Dio secretly thinks Aoba’s a moron, but Dio knows Aoba’s great in the cockpit when they Couple, so he goes along with Aoba’s plan to follow the enemy soldiers and ask them to please come back and join the other army. But the Coupling feels so raw in the old cockpit that they BUDDYCUM™ too soon. Hina and Bison-kun can’t join in, and they escape with the cool new mecha.
I’m not too worried though, since Bison-kun can’t Couple like Aoba can, they won’t be much of a threat.
yeah, I can’t see any sense in the plot. To be honest, I don’t know if they’re going to finish it or prolong the inevitable.
Aoba and Dio never finish BUDDYCUMming
This anime turns out to be one season only, so they have to wrap it up within two next episode. Seeing how things went, there are only a few possibilities on how they can do it. Hina will betray her own country and goes to Aoba to have nice coupling with him. Remember how Aoba can mate with anybody? Yeah, right. She wants him even though they are only being together once. I call it the power of Deserted Island™.
Whoa what seriously?!! I hope it gets a second season later like Valvrave did… I cannot see them wrapping everything up in two episodes at all. They haven’t even gotten to time travelling yet!
I know Hina does want to BUDDYCUM with him though.
“You can’t kill her, she’s hot! Find some faceless, non-curvy enemies to shoot, nobody cares about them!”
PLEASE GUYS! CAN’T YOU SEE THOSE CURVES?!!!
Dio: KILL HER. NOW! YOUR BODY IS MINE, AOBA!
Aoba’s high school comment and his confusion over why Hina won’t just up and defect also really highlight flaws that are all over the place in mecha anime. The heroes bravely venture into battle… while riding inside sealed mechs that are usually far more advanced than the machines of the faceless soldiers they slaughter. The only time the life of the enemy ever matters is if said enemy is a hot girl the protagonist has a crush on or a childhood friend or some other nonsense. Aoba fine with getting conscripted into the military when he gets to screw around on a battleship and make out with Dio, but once Aoba’s out of his super advanced mech and faced with having to fight for real, he’s suddenly invoking his supposed immunity as a minor. And for a genre that is always spouting pithy anti-war messages, mecha anime hardly ever seem to have any real understanding of why people fight wars in the first place. Characters are always being convinced to turn on their country and blow away the people who were their comrades five minutes ago.
These kind of tropes don’t usually get to me when I watch this stuff, but this time it sort of pissed me off.
Exactly. These same things actually get to me much more in shows like Gundam 00 which take them completely seriously. Buddy Complex feels sort of like Valvrave to me in that it is so transparently stupid that it approaches parody and it can’t really get me angry. But Gundam 00, where these terrorists rule over the Earth using their superior technology, making war to “end” war, all the while belittling people who do fight wars out of strong convictions and their homeland, really really pisses me off. It is insulting to humanity. Saying that it would be easy to get along if everyone were smart and hated war like Japanese teenagers. Fuck that shit.
because of Aoba’s meddling and naivety. The enemy were successful in stealing the luxon and the bradyon. Now they modify them to connect the dots. It would be better if Watase aoba didn’t exist in the first place. Just kill him at the final episode so I can laugh at his naïve death.