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Nov 13 2011

Categories: ben-to, episodic review, fate/zero
Tagged: ben-to, fate/zero

7 Comments »

“It feels good to have the entire world mapped across my chest!”

Gosh, can Iskandar become even more awesome? He discovers wrestling and Amazon Prime and Shirt Woot? If he doesn’t win the Holy Grail War, I hope he at least beats Macho Man Randy Savage in Wrestlemania… uh… 12? Which Wrestlemania would occur in this time period?

(If it’s the late 80s, early 90s, Iskandar’s shorts would fit in easily. Especially if he were in the NBA.)

Between Fate/zero, Ben-to, and Nichijou, rasslin’ is definitely making a comeback in anime. I want to see a ladder match between Mio, Iskandar, and Monarch. It would be awesome. Especially if Iskandar muscles out of his shirt and goes, “Whatcha gonna do when my Noble Phantasm runs over you?!”

The beat down in Ben-to was excellent. It had a palatable built-up. It had an unlikable villain, especially when Monarch jumped Ice Witch a la Caster using the little kid shields. It had honor and justice succeeding over villainy and plotting. It had some great trash talking, “You’re not even a dog. You’re just a brown rat.” Like somehow a brown rat is worse than a black rat or white rat or Kyubey. And it had the fight with Ice Witch soldiering on in her torn (!!) tights, The Main Character providing just enough support, and Beauty by the Lake keeping the dogs at bay. I enjoyed it.

(I felt like David Production left something on the table for this one. If only we had less Shaga melonpan fanservice and more Ice Witch delicious thigh meat fanservice. With torn tights, I felt like it was a missed opportunity. This is what separates the Shafts from the David Productions… Shaft would have given us a close-in zoom of Ice Witch’s delicious thigh meat.)

“How do you like this terrible spectacle?”

Speaking of leaving something on the table… Saber… tentacles… sigh.

I thought this was the proper ending too, since it was exactly like the end of Rocky III with Rocky and Apollo trading hard rights to start their match… then cut to the credits. You just don’t know who would have won that one. I felt like this episode should have ended here since knowing Satou won kinda… well… meh ending. I also feel bad for Shaga… she’s always a bridesmaid, never a bride. She’s like those drivers in Initial D where are supposed to be great, but they never could beat Takumi or really anyone else.

Don’t really know why Emiya is fighting still, but you know you can root for him. I liked his, “I’ll kill everyone to get Ilya” line. I would still like a better answer for why he wants the Holy Grail beyond making a better world, but you’d think Irisviel wouldn’t allow otherwise. More importantly, Emiya is fighting the war it should be fought: all out, leave nothing back. He doesn’t give a rat’s ass about the rules (rightfully so since Tousaka-papa and Kirei are also flaunting them), he fights with every fucking weapon possible (except maybe some RPGs and tactical air strikes), and he shows that he is still human.

Why does he remind me of so much of Kafka from Final Fantasy VI? More importantly, I am just relieved that Caster’s mana source isn’t little boys. No, seriously, I was relieved.

(Do I make a joke about little boys, mana, and the church? Or a Penn State joke? Too soon?)

Archibald and his magic ball… with how the last scene set up, you know Emiya has some sort of special bullet in that pistol. Unfortunately, all he needed to do was devise a trap with VX gas. As awesome as Archibald’s ball might be in stopping bullets, the dude still needs to breathe. Emiya just needs a few drops of VX gas, force Archibald into his ball, and then wait it out. He would either suffocate or breathe in the gas.

(If Emiya can smuggle in so many weapons and explosives– dude took down a building with no fear of being caught, he can get his hands on some chemical weapons. Dude also has a small, thin laptop that looks more like something from 2004 than from 1994.)

(I still do not understand how Japan has so many terrorists that are blowing up buildings. I almost checked out of Future Diary because rewatching Minene’s story… well… she’s supposedly a bad-ass terrorist trained in the Middle East and wears loli dresses. What? I just shake my head at that one.)

Don’t get why Saber doesn’t like Emiya’s plans. So what if he just uses Saber as a distraction? Caster will go down anyway. I believe all of this is caused by Fate/Stay Night… if I had to Fate/zero, I would just retcon it so we don’t have to deal with the two conversation requirement between Emiya and Saber. I would just say, “Hey, Shirou sent back a D-Mail to Emiya’s 2004 Thinkpad and changed the world lines. We can have as much conversations and bonking between Emiya and Saber as needed!”

(Steins;Gate and Penguindrum are probably at the forefront of shows using technology correctly. I liked how they realized on Steins;Gate that people didn’t have SMS in 1994. Also liked how Tabuki sent Kanba a “Find My iPhone” tracking request. See, anime, you don’t need to be afraid of technology. Though I still don’t understand how the Takakura family, despite being so poor, can afford two iPhones for Kanba and Shouma?)

Lancer definitely wants to lance Saber. Though I am hoping for a Lord of the Rings rip-off moment between Lancer and Saber in seeing how many tentacles they can slay… until Iskandar arrives and pwns all. More importantly, who doesn’t have the hots for Saber? Archer and Lancer both dig her. Caster as well. Berserker probably.

(Current doujinshi rankings? 1, Irisviel x Saber. 2, Iskandar x Waver. 3, Saber x Lancer. 4, Irisviel x Maiya (I dunno, something hawt about waifu x mistress). 5, Emiya x Saber x Irisviel.)

The Brunette is to Ben-to what Wilson is to Home Improvement.

tl;dr

1. I see more motivation for winning over half-priced supermarket bentos than I do for a magically Holy Grail.

2. Need more delicious thigh meat. Need more Saber tentacles.

3. Iskander gets pants when he beats an enemy Servant.