Recap

Freed from imprisonment in the base, Hana and Teppei must try and adapt to life outside. The gang are joined by Commander Nishikubo’s estranged daughter Akari, and Daichi is baited into taking on a second Killtgang attack.

Zigg’s Thoughts

This episode didn’t do much for my perception of the show, and what’s really disappointing is after starting so strong with coherent plotting and character interaction, it’s those very things that seem to be slipping away. In a classic symptom of BONES shows, Captain Earth now seems more interesting in dumping a lot of new plot on us rather than letting us know why we should care about the plot we already have.

To me the most disappointing manifestation of this was in the opening part of the episode. There’s so much interesting story to be told with Teppei, Hana and Daichi reuniting after so long, and learning what each of them has become. Likewise, there’s a compelling narrative to be mined out of Teepei and Hana finally being free after so long as basically prisoners. Is there resentment there? Psychological damage? Nope, instead we all just move into one big happy house for some tired comedy hijinks. It’s such a huge waste of potential story, and the change in circumstances is so jarring it’s actually obvious. It feels like there should have been another episode or two to get us into this situation. As it is everyone seems buddy buddy straight off.

I’m not a huge fan of Akari either. I get you have to have a more energetic character contrast these quiet rubes, but there’s a right and a wrong way to do that. Akari displays all the traits of the otaku-bait geek girl designed to sell hug pillows. The know-it-all attitude, the nerdy references, the boob jealousy – they’re tired and pandering clichés that do little to endear me to her. She reminds me a lot of Elena Peoples, and anybody who followed my Eureka Seven AO coverage will know how much of a slam that is. Still, there could be an interesting dynamic between the four if they can straighten out some of the problems, so let’s not lose hope just yet.

Really the best part of this episode was the ending. Baiting Daichi into taking up the fight is asshole villain writing 101, but no less effective for that, and it enables Teppei coming in to make the save. It’s a cool if brief visual sequence, a nice twist and an interesting setup for some cool short-term plot lines. Let’s hope that the show can actually commit to them this time.

Random Observations

• That laser powered coffee cup communicator is one of the coolest things I’ve seen in quite some time.
• The baddie’s computer making creepy remarks about how he could ‘have’ his secretary is supremely unnerving. I’ll give it a pass since that’s presumably what they’re going for, but was it really necessary?

Gee’s Thoughts

Captain Earth continues the fine Bones tradition of being a Bones mecha anime that really doesn’t make much sense, but is still visually exciting enough to keep watching. Daichi, Teppei, Hana, and the newly introduced hacker genius Akari are now living under the same roof at Daichi’s uncle’s place. This has all kinds of potential for stupid anime hijinks, which I sincerely hope Captain Earth will avoid, but I’m not going to get my hopes up. Additionally, Salty Dog continues to be the scum of the Earth as asshole glasses guy conspires to purposely sabotage Daichi in hopes of pushing his shadowy agenda. Overall, while the idea of Daichi piloting a faulty machine isn’t particularly exciting, Bones manages to keep things visually engaging as Captain Earth continues to be one of the nicest looking anime airing this season. That said, being saved by Teppei in a newly introduced robot is pretty contrived and certainly not putting the best foot forward. Additionally, looking pretty alone isn’t going to keep me in it for the long run. I worry that Captain Earth is never going to capitalize on the technobabble it alludes to or craft a more interesting story than the one we’re currently getting. Eureka 7 was an amazing tale about growing up and facing the realities of the world besides the one you love. Star Driver was a campy romp rife with crazy robots and even crazier characters. Even after three episodes, I’m still not sure what Captain Earth is trying to be, but I hope it shows us soon.

Marlin’s Thoughts

I wish I could have liked this episode all the way through. I love the robot fights, I like most of the characters. However, there are just a lot of things I have problems with. First off, the new girl was absolutely annoying. Even taking her magic genius powers out of the equation, she talks like she came from 2chan or something and also does that annoying thing where flat characters constantly have to talk about the stacked girl’s boobs. That said, I don’t think it’s incredibly farfetched to see Teppei piloting his own mech. Considering we hadn’t even been told why he and Hana are actually important, it’s nice to see an actual demonstration of their powers. Hana’s whole “singing to summon robots” thing seems a bit too close to being an episode of Star Driver for my tastes. This also makes the second episode where Daichi needs to be saved or assisted to win a mecha battle. I get that his character development these episodes is mostly in interacting with the designer children, but it’d be nice to see him actually grow as a competent pilot as well. I’m hoping now that he’s been shown up that he’ll step up his game. I would also like them to actually start telling us stuff instead of spouting words in our face. I’ll settle for the former, but hearing all this technobabble with no context is starting to get real annoying.