(Toward Tomorrow) |
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| Original Release Date: 03/29/10 | Chapters Included: 556-558 | Review Date: 03/29/10 |
| Summary | ||
| The youkai inside the jewel tell Inuyasha that Kagome is destined to give in to the darkness and make a wish on the jewel, which will cause her and Naraku to become the new souls battling within it for eternity. Inuyasha shouts to Kagome and she hears him, and trusts him to save her without having to wish. Inuyasha arrives, and Kagome makes the one correct wish to make the Shikon no Tama disappear forever... which turned out to be "I wish for the Shikon no Tama to disappear forever." Afterwards, Kagome was so happy to be home, the well said, "Fine, you can stay here then" and closed up. Everyone went on with their lives, Kagome graduating high school, Miroku and Sango having a bunch of kids, Shippou going back to train at the inn and whatnot. Then Kagome decides that she doesn't want to go to college and instead goes back to the well, which has conveniently opened back up. She bids her mother farewell and returns to Inuyasha, and they all lived happily ever after. Srsly. | ||
| Review | ||
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The end! For real this time! Unless they decide to make a fifth movie, which is not entirely out of the realm of possibility, but I could do without pointless filler. Unless it's Inu-papa related. And not in the manner of, "Here's yet ANOTHER random youkai that he couldn't be bothered to put down for good and left his kids to clean up after him."
Anyway, teh final episodeeee! No opening credits this time around, just got right into... recap. And then a different title screen than normal. The episode itself was, from what I could tell, entirely new music, and thankfully quite a bit better than the new pieces we got last week. They were all still re-hashes of old themes, but hey, new is new. The anime added a number of things, but they were all quite welcome additions. First and foremost, Kouga got to be in the epilogue, when he got totally forgotten about in the manga. Although his ending had him marrying Ayame, an anime filler character, so I guess I wouldn't consider it a "happy" ending for him, but... at least he got to do something. Sesshoumaru also got a line, when he didn't originally. That line being "Shut up or I'll kill you", so it wasn't exactly a worthwhile line, but... he still "Hmph"ed. That actually made me laugh when for the time being that really WAS the extent of his dialogue. Let's see, was there anything else the anime added...? Anything at all? I'm sure I'm missing something. Oh, yeah, Inuyasha and Kagome kissed. Anyway, moving on... Haha, okay, yeah, I was actually pretty pleased that the anime added the kiss, since we manga readers were DENIED all the way until the end. The wasn't where I had initially expected one to be added, but this way actually makes more sense. The kiss came when Inuyasha finally rescued Kagome from the darkness rather than when she returned three years later, and I accept that their mindsets in the former occasion were probably much more, "OMG holy crap I needed to see you totally three days ago, gimme some sugar ommnommnomm". But even though the kiss was a very welcome addition, it surprisingly doesn't get my Best Moment. That goes to the one other thing the anime added: The result of the Shikon no Tama's destruction. In the manga, it was just, "Disappear forever, Shikon no Tama!", the jewel shatters, and Inuyasha and Kagome are like "yeyz". But the anime added a scene of Midoriko finally sheathing her sword and heading into the light, the youkai disappearing, and Naraku reawakening momentarily to express his gratitude at finally being at peace. Actually brought a tear to me eye. Next week we have... Wagnaria, which is taking Inuyasha's timeslot and whose ad for some reason still ran at the end of the Viz copy of the episode, along with an ad for the Kanketsu-hen DVD's. In fact, the whole ending was kind of weird, since they played the opening theme and opening credits over the epilogue, and then after the break immediately ran the end credits and theme over a montage of clips from the series. Seems like they could have... used that minute and a half for something more relevant but, meh. It's over now. Go outside, nothing more to see here. |
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(Unreaching Feelings) |
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| Original Release Date: 03/22/10 | Chapters Included: 550-556 | Review Date: 03/22/10 |
| Summary | ||
| Inuyasha repeats that everyone's here, making Kouga feel really unloved. Everyone hacks away at Naraku without really doing much damage, and Naraku finally absorbs the jewel and transforms. His body begins falling apart and raining down destruction on Kaede's village below. Everyone escapes the floating spiderball, giving Kagome her chance to shoot. She fires and pierces the jewel, causing Naraku's body to be purified away. He appears over the Bone-Eater's Well and states that the wish he made on the jewel will be granted upon his death, and with that, he is purified away. At that time, a Meidou opens behind Kagome and sucks her in. The Bone-Eater's Well vanishes in both time periods. Inuyasha makes his own Meidou to follow after her. Kagome wakes up in high school, living a normal life. She has no memory of her previous exploits, but also doesn't remember ever making it to high school. The one thing she finally notices off is that Goshinboku doesn't have the mark left by Inuyasha, and the illusion is broken. She's been floating inside darkness the entire time while the Shikon no Tama deceived her. The jewel beckons her to make a wish on it to return to that peaceful life, otherwise she'll be trapped forever. | ||
| Review | ||
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This definitely went better than the last few episodes, though the animators were still lazy and reused a few scenes a number of times. Sesshoumaru still "Hmph"ed way too much, and Miroku was still sucking up shouki left and right, despite the fact that it should still be poisoning him regardless of how imminent his Kazaana's destruction is.
We got two new BGM tracks in this episode, one when Naraku died and one when Inuyasha confronted the youkai inside the jewel. Both were rather unmemorable, so hopefully the seven other new tracks that we'll get next week make up for that. It's not that the pacing of this episode was bad, I just question the writers' decision to break the episodes up as they did. Naraku's death was downright anticlimactic since it happened even before the commercial break. It seems like a better choice would have been to have the episode end when Kagome gets sucked into the Meidou. But with the entire last half dedicated to her illusionary high school life, Naraku barely had time to put up a fight. I also question the writers' thoughts on giving the Shikon no Tama an entirely original voice. It seems like it should have been voiced by Onigumo or Magatsuhi or to really drive home the point, Kikyou. I guess they were going for a more soothing voice than those to make it seem like something you'd really want to sell your soul to. I also don't understand how this whole Meidou thing even works. It's supposed to be the "Path to the Underworld", but really it seems to be the "path to whatever dark and scary place is convenient". When Sesshoumaru first went through it, he ended up on a path. When Sesshoumaru and Inuyasha went through it, they ended up in a black hole and started fading away. Now Inuyasha and Kagome ended up inside the Shikon no Tama. Maybe next time it'll take everyone to Disney World. Best Moment: Yeah, Naraku's dead! Finally! This season managed to do something that the first one never could! Even if it did take 193 episodes to do it! ... Seriously, it took Goku less time to kill Freeza. So now that Naraku's out of the way, we've just got to deal with the jewel. Strangely, all of the dialogue in the episode preview was from the epilogue, but all of the visuals were from the battle preceding it. There's only a chapter and a half worth of battle material left to animate, so that'll likely encompass the pre-commercial spot, leaving the entire post-commercial spot for the epilogue, which will be a nice pace. Will the anime add anything of their own? Like... a kiss? Or names for Sango and Miroku's kids? Or most importantly... give Sesshoumaru some lines that do not consist solely of "Hmph"? |
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(Naraku: An Empty Wish) |
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| Original Release Date: 03/15/10 | Chapters Included: 545-549 | Review Date: 03/15/10 |
| Summary | ||
| Sango shows up and Hiraikotsus Naraku, but her boomerang comes back covered in shouki and poisons her. She falls and Miroku discovers his inner lemming and goes after her. Meanwhile, Sesshoumaru decides he's given everyone enough time and starts breaking things. Kagome and Inuyasha go into self-help booklet mode but Naraku absorbs the jewel anyway and transforms. Inuyasha Meidou Zangetsuhas him a few times figuring if he does it enough it'll work eventually, and sure enough, one time it comes out different and actually does some damage. Byakuya appears and fakes Kagome out, so Inuyasha kills him. Everyone gathers, and Inuyasha proudly announces that they aren't missing anyone. Except Kouga. And Kikyou. But they don't count. | ||
| Review | ||
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Well, that was a bit better than last week. The visuals were nice in some places and it flowed well, but there were still a number of jarring moments.
Like... Jinenji retcon! Whaaaaaaaat? "Gee, it's a good thing I have this shouki antidote that I got from Jinenji that I have never mentioned until now." What the hell, what was even the POINT of that? Of all the ridiculous things going on, the writers picked Sango and Miroku's unexplainable recovery from miasma poisoning as something that needed an even MORE unlikely explanation to explain away? Did these pellets appear in some filler episode years ago that I'm just forgetting about, because this seems way, WAY too stupid a thing to just suddenly throw in at this point. This episode also had its share of really stupid lines. They were stupid in the original, too, so it's not like they were badly-translated, there's just no way to translate them accurately and not make them sound dumb. "I'm going to sever your spider web-like tentacles!" Not to mention almost every single one of Sesshoumaru's lines either started with or comprised solely of "Hmph", including his first two which were spaced all of five seconds from each other, making him sound like he had hiccups. "Hmph.... hmph.... hmph...." Best Moment: Er, there really wasn't anything that stood out to me. Jaken came back and did some Sesshoumaru fangirling and got a boot to the head in thanks, and Jaken always makes things better. So, Jaken. Jaken is always the best part of any episode. Unless he randomly pulls out some anti-shouki pellets, too. Next week, Naraku finally bites the big one. But wait! We still have two episodes left, how can that be? Yeah, gotta face off with the jewel after that, which is apparently voiced by Tuxedo Mask (I almost thought it was Byakuya doing the next episode narration until I remembered reading that the Shikon no Tama was going to be voiced by Furuya Tohru). Plus, next week we'll finally start getting some new BGM. Better late than never. |
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(Naraku: Trap of Light) |
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| Original Release Date: 03/08/10 | Chapters Included: 539-544 | Review Date: 03/08/10 |
| Summary | ||
| Kagome gets her powers back, which turns Inuyasha back to normal and gives Naraku the hiccups. The light returns to the Shikon no Tama, so Naraku decides to use it to lure Miroku and Sango into a sense of false hope and trick them into using their last resorts. He tries to trick Sango into attacking an illusion of him and sacrificing Rin in the process, and trick Miroku into opening his Kazaana for the last (and it's always the last) time. Inuyasha stops Miroku and Kagome shoots Naraku as Sango throws Hiraikotsu, so the illusory Naraku disappears and drops Rin before it can hit. Sesshoumaru shows up and Sango tells him it's okay to kill her for what she tried to do, but not until after Naraku is dead. Everyone makes their way to Naraku, and Inuyasha tries to Meidou Zangetsuha him but misses. Byakuya sucks up the Meidou Zangetsuha with his own sword, and Naraku starts releasing deadly shouki. | ||
| Review | ||
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I suppose this episode indicates that Toba + Sakuma = lolwtf. Though episode 17 wasn't too bad, so maybe they didn't start drinking together before making an episode until later, but holy hell, this one was right along the lines of 21 in terms of "wut". First off, right at the beginning when Naraku starts vibrating... that was an... interesting interpretation of the "shaking". It almost seemed like the Naraku spiderball had turned into a basketball and was being dribbled or something, if the accompanying sound-effect was any indication.
Then there was the scene of Shippou, Jaken, and Kohaku getting separated, and it was done with tentacles simply coming down and going "yoink.... yoink..." and then everyone just riding them away. Finally, there was Byakuya... throwing... sparkly confetti? Haha, what? Seriously, what? And then Naraku catches one and tries to sound all threatening while holding a piece of glam. "The light will kill them all... and even the shiny silver confetti will experience my wrath, mwahahaha *burns*." One thing that threw me about this episode, and the manga version as well when it came out, was that Sesshoumaru actually referred to Kagome by name. He's... never done that for any of Inuyasha's party members. They're undeserving of names to him (though given how often they shout them at each other, he HAS to know them). So hearing Narita Ken say "Kagome" was just... weeeeeird. This episode once again made me want to beat Miroku over the head with his own staff, and Naraku and Byakuya hit it spot on. Miroku and Sango were being exceedingly selfish in this episode. Miroku totally ignoring Sango's feelings and running off to die alone and pretending that it's "for her sake" when she'd explicitly stated the opposite, and then Sango getting ready to kill Rin along with Naraku. Though in Sango's case, it's at least understandable. She was indeed weighing human lives against one another, and when the choice comes between saving your fiance or some random kid, no one blames you for chosing the fiance. Best Moment: Uh... well, Byakuya was in it and kind of did stuff, even though he got his arm blown off, and that scene was at least depicted pretty nicely. Byakuya's such a nice incarnation, it's too bad that in the next episode he'll have to die really stupidly. Even though today's episode pointed out that Byakuya and Naraku are connected and if Naraku dies so does Byakuya, even if that wasn't the case, there's no real need to kill Byakuya off, since if Naraku died he'd just be like, "Oh well, I guess I'll go do something else now." He's just not much of a threat when acting on his own. His entire attitude is "I'm just doing this because Naraku told me to and I don't really care one way or the other." Hopefully this episode marks the end of Sakuma crap. We're getting down to the finale, and the preview for next week looked pretty promising. We'll get Byakuya's stupid death, Naraku's stupid wish, and Inuyasha's stupid spontaneous sword upgrade. But I'm with stupid. |
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(Naraku: Trap of Darkness) |
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| Original Release Date: 03/01/10 | Chapters Included: 534-539 | Review Date: 03/01/10 |
| Summary | ||
| Miroku and Sango wander around and are greeted by a vision of Miroku's father being devoured by his own Kazaana. This freaks Sango out and makes her even more paranoid about Miroku's fate. Elsewhere, Kagome wakes up to find Sesshoumaru swatting away youkai. He wonders if Inuyasha attacked her, and she insists Inuyasha was just trying to push her to safety. Sesshoumaru wanders off so she follows. Miroku and Sango keep fighting tentacles, and Miroku is forced to use his Kazaana on them. Miroku realizes he's at his limit for the millionth time, but this times it's for real, honest, so he leaves Sango so that she doesn't get sucked in. Rin stumbles upon the still youkai-fied Inuyasha, but Inuyasha attacks Magatsuhi instead. Sesshoumaru and Kagome find them but Rin gets sucked away and Inuyasha and Sesshoumaru fight. Inuyasha returns to his senses once he realizes that Kagome is okay and forces Magatsuhi out of his body, allowing Sesshoumaru to kill him once and for all. | ||
| Review | ||
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Well that was definitely scores better than last week's episode in terms of pacing and writing. Tobe has some funky character designs, but at least the animation's nice. He decided to bring back the partial youkai transformation we saw in the last episode of the original series despite it not appearing here in the manga, but I didn't mind.
The episode did end in a funky spot, though, one page from the end of 539. So, what, Kagome's powers are just going to go "poof" in the first five seconds of the next episode? I don't see why they couldn't have spent that five seconds at the end of this episode to include it. It was a mostly faithful adaptation, though the Sesshoumaru/Kagome scenes were tweaked a bit. A few lines were added about her wondering if she should bring up Inuyasha in his presence, but then utterly cut a lengthy conversation where Kagome filled him in on what the Shikon no Tama wanted and that she knew he was capable of saving Inuyasha without hurting him. Which... kind of bothered me, actually. Not the lack of Sess/Kag interaction, but the fact that the anime decided that Sesshoumaru still absolutely hates Inuyasha's guts and wants him dead, despite all that's already happened. Gone is the scene of Sesshoumaru commanding Kagome to take Tessaiga to Inuyasha. Added is a scene where Sesshoumaru declares that he never considered Inuyasha his brother. Added is a scene where Sesshoumaru makes to switch to Bakusaiga to fight Inuyasha. Seriously, anime writers. He's over himself. He friggin' let Kagome hang off his fluff, he's not all "rawr kill" anymore. Which is really going to come back and bite them in the ass in the next episode where the manga simply left it to the readers to understand that he's not going to kill Sango because the readers understand that he's not like that anymore. Best Moment: Oh Shippou and Jaken, I love you. Their presence in the final battle is utterly worthless aside from providing transportation out of Naraku's body, but I still love their interactions. "Hey, I'm just a kid, I shouldn't be going in there! Waaaaah!" Next week is... mostly a whole bunch of Miroku and Sango being stupid and angsty and everyone else having to slap them to their senses. And Sesshoumaru chucking Hiraikotsu at Sango. Oh pleasepleaseplease leave that in. |
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(Into Naraku's Body) |
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| Original Release Date: 02/22/10 | Chapters Included: 530-534 | Review Date: 02/22/10 |
| Summary | ||
| Naraku recaps the beginning of the series with all those Kikyou flashbacks we saw ten billion times in the first season, then uses the jewel to transform himself into a giant spider. Deciding that now would be a great time to ditch everyone, Kagome goes home to graduate middle school, then returns. Everyone minus Shippou, Kohaku, and Jaken go off to face Naraku, and he opens his body to beckon them inside. Sesshoumaru goes in first to go find Rin, and the others follow. They are immediately greeted by countless Naraku dopplegangers attacking them, and the group ends up separated into their standard pairings. However, the toxic atmosphere forces Inuyasha into his youkai state, and he attacks Kagome. | ||
| Review | ||
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... The fluck was that? Was this episode written by a schitzophrenic monkey throwing darts at manga panels and saying, "Ooh ooh, that's my storyboard"? Come on, this episode had the same staff as the epic episode 13, except for Sakuma on animation, but I can't pick on him for effing up the script and pacing, just the ugly art and lethargic movements.
Come on, this episode only covered four and a half chapters, proceeded in a linear fashion, contained almost no anime-original material, and yet it seemed almost as rushed and disjointed as the first five episodes of this series. There is no need for the characters to be talking like the Micro Machines dude anymore! Especially during the more dramatic scenes like Inuyasha telling Shippou to stay behind. But this episode did have, um... giant CG Naraku spider thing! Maybe they blew their whole budget on that and paid the writers in bananas. Not that... giant CG Naraku spider thing really did all that much. But the Best Moment: OMGWTF, was that actually... new background music playing once Naraku finished his series 1 flashback? Or was it just some really funky sound-effect mix? Either way, it was frikkin' creepy sounding and kinda awesome. Next week, prepare for the Sess/Kag fangirls to cream their panties. Series 1 veteran Tobe Atsuo is at the animation directing helm this time around, and while his art style is a bit on the ugly side, he does do good action. Let's just hope the writers have gotten over their hangover by then. |
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(When the Shikon no Tama is Complete) |
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| Original Release Date: 02/15/10 | Chapters Included: 525-529 | Review Date: 02/15/10 |
| Summary | ||
| Naraku reaches down tentacles to catch Kohaku, but Inuyasha and Sango slice them away. Magatsuhi attempts to re-capture him, but at that moment Sesshoumaru appears and cuts Magatsuhi down with Tenseiga. Magatsuhi warns that it's not over yet, and Sango informs Sesshoumaru that Miroku and Rin were affected by Magatsuhi's toxins, so Sesshoumaru flies off. However, as soon as he's gone, Naraku appears and captures Kagome, holding her hostage in exchange for Kohaku's shard. Kohaku agrees to hand himself over, but as he's captured, he uses one of Kagome's arrows to pierce Naraku's shoulder and purify the jewel inside him. Naraku lets go and appears to have retreated, but just as everyone is congratulating each other, one of Naraku's leftover tentacles snipes Kohaku from behind and takes his shard. Meanwhile, Miroku has gotten better, as has Rin, apparently, but she's actually posessed by what was left of Magatsuhi, and is taken away. Naraku leaves with the completed jewel, saying that Kikyou's light is gone, but it turns out that's because the light stayed inside Kohaku to sustain his life, so he could still live without the shard. Kikyou used her light to save Kohaku rather than defeat Naraku, so now Kagome and the others are left to defeat him themselves. | ||
| Review | ||
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For an episode that only covered a little over four chapters, there really wasn't that much added this time around. Sesshoumaru's dealing with Magatsuhi was very slightly extended, and the jewel immediately shattering again once Naraku completed it was kind of a psych-out moment, but beyond that I didn't notice any additions. Okay, so there was the extra explanation about Meioujuu considering the anime condensed what was originally a 5-chapter arc into about 10 seconds.
The animation of the fight scene at the beginning was very nicely-done, handled by the same animation team that did the Shishinki battle back in episode 13 (easily the best-executed fight in the anime so far). However, the animation aside from that was hit-and-miss. Sesshoumaru just looked silly while he was flying, and he was waaay off-model in the profile shot of him flying at the end of the episode. Part of it might have been due to the fact that the direction just wasn't particularly great this time around. Rather than Toba, who handled episode 13, this time around it was Yoshida, who did such riveting episodes as 5, 9, and 14. Specifically, when Sesshoumaru spontaneously appeared on the scene and sliced up Magatsuhi, the choice of using a long-shot there was... odd... considering the manga had a full-page close-up, implying a pan. And when Sesshoumaru switched hands to draw Bakusaiga, the manga framing had THAT as a long shot, like we were zooming in on him from the tentacles' perspective as he was drawing his second sword, but the anime decided to do THAT as a close-up, causing the trade-over to pretty much happen off the bottom of the screen. I was also a big bugged with how Kohaku's sniping was depicted. Yeah, it was very subtle and out-of-nowhere in the manga, too, but it just... felt different. In the anime, it's like, "Lalala, we're talking, oh wait was that just Kohaku's shard flying out of his neck? Huh." It reminded me of everyone's unconcerned "Huh, Kagome just collapsed for no apparent reason" reactions from episode 18. Okay, though, even though Kohaku's "death" looked sillier than it should have, I'm going to give the Best Moment to his resurrection and everyone's reactions leading up to it. Since while everyone was initially kinda "Huh..." about it, thankfully they managed to pull the right emotions out after thinking about it for a while, and it was enough to at least make the end of the episode pretty powerful. It was pretty much the group's first big "F*ck you!" to Naraku, in that Kohaku lost his shard but still survived, so let them gloat. Next week, the final battle begins, and we've got 6 episodes to get through the remaining 3 volumes of manga. You hear that, Kubo Tite? 3 volumes is plenty long for a final battle for a 500+ chapter series. Take notes. |
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(Kohaku's Shard) |
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| Original Release Date: 02/08/10 | Chapters Included: 392, 521-525 | Review Date: 02/08/10 |
| Summary | ||
| Kagome finishes her exams and prepares a feast to celebrate. However, Inuyasha ends up destroying the kitchen. While they're messing around in the modern era, Miroku and Sango are paid a visit by a bunch of youkai. Miroku sucks them up, but the youkai were just a diversion so that Magatsuhi could posess Kohaku (Sesshoumaru was off chasing a decoy). Miroku sucks up a bit of Magatsuhi and is heavily poisoned, while Kohaku injures Sango and flees. Inuyasha and Kagome return and go after Kohaku. Sango kisses the unconscious Miroku goodbye, then follows. Everyone yells at Kohaku to snap out of it, but his corrupted shard has been forcing him to relive killing his father over and over. Suddenly a Shinidamachuu appears in Kohaku's dream and guides him towards light, where Sango asks him to save everyone. Kohaku wakes up and is determined to force Magatsuhi out. | ||
| Review | ||
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That was... random. Since the last episode ended in the modern era, I guess the anime decided they wanted to milk all the modern-era chapters they skipped while they had the chance and incorporated 392 into the beginning of the episode, though changed its context. Gotta love a series where you can pull material from almost 150 chapters away and not have it seem out of place.
The remainder of the episode covered 521-525 pretty faithfully except for one completely nonsensical cut. In the manga, Naraku intercepted Kohaku and tried to take his shard. Kagome could tell Naraku was there because she could sense the point of light left by Kikyou in his Shikon no Tama. Then when Naraku reached down a tentacle to take Kohaku's shard, rather than purifying Naraku, Kikyou's point of light transferred from Naraku's jewel into Kohaku, which is what then gave Kohaku the power to purge Magatsuhi from his body. And, I mean, the anime represented this transfer quite nicely by having a Shinidamachuu appear in Kohaku's mind, but as to where it came from... who knows?! It just magically appeared, and the point of light in Naraku's jewel will later just magically be gone because it's in Kohaku now somehow. I also question where they decided to end the episode. Chapter 525 ends with Sesshoumaru appearing and cutting Magatsuhi away from Kohaku, something that happens, like five pages from where the episode stopped. So next week Sesshoumaru is going to have a less-than-dramatic entrance since he'll show up about two minutes in to save everyone temporarily, before rushing off again to go save Rin because she got knocked out and the guy has the attention span of a fidgety puppy and the punctuality of an overturned bus. Best Moment this week is a toss-up. For one thing, I really liked the scene where Shippou confronts Sango about leaving while injured. Just seeing Shippou act seriously for once adds to the whole weight of the scene, and I think Kumiko and Houko did a stellar job with it. The other contender would be the totally-not-serious scene of Byakuya twitching in disbelief as Sesshoumaru pwns all his cannon fodder in one hit. Next week is the continuation and resolution of the Kohaku's Shard story, and from there on out will be the final battle. I expect all the episodes from now on to end on cliffhangers like this one instead of with some kind of resolution like most of them up until now, since the episodic section of the series is now over (well, if next week's episode concludes at the end of chapter 529, that's sort of a "resolution"). |
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(An Important Event in Life) |
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| Original Release Date: 02/01/10 | Chapters Included: 494, 512, 519-520 | Review Date: 02/01/10 |
| Summary | ||
| Kagome has a nightmare about not passing her entrance exams and wakes up in Kaede's hut. Kohaku is still unconscious, and when Kagome tries to purify his shard, she finds that she can't. Magatsuhi has further sealed her spiritual powers. Outside, Toutousai finishes a sheath for Bakusaiga, and Sesshoumaru immediately leaves in pursuit of Magatsuhi, leaving Jaken, Rin, and Kohaku behind. Figuring she's pretty useless as she is, Kagome returns home to study for her exams, but finds that her family has left on vacation without her, due to never knowing when she'll come back. Kagome gets lonely and is actually grateful when Inuyasha comes to bother her as usual. The two chat and almost kiss, but Kagome's family returns. Not wanting any more interruptions, Kagome tells Inuyasha to leave her alone for ten days and then heads out to take her exams. Inuyasha chases her to the train where she loses her bag. Inuyasha tracks it down by the scent, but it turns out her exam ticket wasn't in her bag to begin with, and her mother catches up to her to deliver it. | ||
| Review | ||
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This episode was sort of "all the modern-era chapters condensed into a single episode". It still mostly worked considering they all dealt with the same topic of Kagome's impending exams and needing to choose which world she wanted to end up in. The only real glaring incontinuity, which the anime version tried to drop a line or two to address, was the fact that Kagome and Inuyasha were really cuddly before the commercial break, but then she was suddenly distant towards him again afterwards. This was due to jumping straight from chapter 494 to 520, so originally a lot went on in the meantime.
We were also treated to a few voice cameos in this episode, at least in the sense of regular cast members voicing incidental characters. The men who comment on Inuyasha's "cosplay" are voiced by Sesshoumaru and Naraku, and the stationmaster over the intercom yelling at Kagome to get off the tracks is voiced by Jaken. Aside from the beginning dealing with Kohaku and Kagome's sealed powers, most of the episode was devoted to comedy, as a sort of "calm before the storm" before we delve into the precursors of the final battle in the next episode. With 38 chapters and 8 episodes to go, the pacing from here on out should be pretty steady and no longer episodic, as every event hereafter flows one right into another. Best Moment: The almost-kiss, duh. By combining two previously separate bedside discussions, the anime certainly built up to it a lot better. Darn it all for always getting interrupted right when things get good, though. The ending changed yet again this week, to "Tooi Michi no Saki de" by Takekawa Ai. Visually and musically I like it waaaay better than "Diamond", but I think "With You" is still my favorite ending overall. I'm a sucker for the pinwheels. But the new ending has Byakuya and Bakusaiga, so... tough call. Next week, Kohaku gets posessed, because that's what he does best. Due to the pacing, my guess is that the whole Kohaku's shard thing is going to be spread over two episodes considering it runs from chapters 521-529 and there's no longer any reason to rush to squeeze that much into one episode. And for those of you who felt cheated out of a kiss scene this week should be vindicated next week. Provided you like Miroku/Sango. Which I don't. |
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(The Evil Will of Magatsuhi) |
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| Original Release Date: 01/25/10 | Chapters Included: 512-518 | Review Date: 01/25/10 |
| Summary | ||
| Kagome worries about her sealed powers, figuring that Kikyou must have done it. However, Kaede informs her that Kikyou left all her power to Kagome, therefore the only possibility is that the Shikon no Tama itself is sealing her power out of fear. Taking this opportunity, Naraku allows the evil in the Shikon no Tama, Magatsuhi, to manifest itself using his body. Magatsuhi makes a beeline for Sesshoumaru's group where he immediately goes after Kohaku. He instantly corrupts Kohaku's shard, and Sesshoumaru tries to fight him off, but without an offensive weapon and only one arm, he can't put up much of a fight. Inuyasha comes to his rescue, and when Kagome tries to purify Kohaku, Magatsuhi knocks her unconscious. Sesshoumaru refuses to be helped and transforms into his true form to fight Magatsuhi off. When that also proves ineffective, he gathers everyone out of harm's way before going after Magatsuhi himself again, however this time he aims for a spiritual presence he senses controlling the physical body, and cuts it with Tenseiga. This actually works, but Magatsuhi immediately counters by impaling Sesshoumaru through the chest and crushing him. However, Sesshoumaru bursts free, energy glowing from his missing left arm, and attacks. His left arm has been restored, with a new weapon of his own along with it: Bakusaiga. Magatsuhi retreats, and Kagome wakes up. | ||
| Review | ||
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Phew... I mean, I still had my nits with how this episode was pulled off, but it wasn't nearly as bad as I was dreading from the previews. It still had its stupidly-directed moments, though, the hilight of them being when Magatsuhi knocks Kagome unconscious with his Stare of Death, she falls over, and everyone around her just reacts like, "Huh... Kagome just collapsed. ... Huh."
Another part that kind of bothered me was the anime really playing up the goofiness of Jaken and Rin mourning over Sesshoumaru's supposed death. It was so hammed-up that it was impossible to take seriously and left no one with any doubt that he was going to be okay, while the manga actually played it up more like he was really in trouble here. True, in both cases he recovered stupidly quickly, but the anime pretty much let you know it was coming. I included chapter 512 in the chapter list up top solely because some information that was originally dropped in 512 was included here, though the actual content of 512 itself was skipped as it was a modern-day chapter. The anime explanation of Bakusaiga's origin was... still pretty much a cop-out like the manga was, though the anime added one line that at least made an attempt to clear up why he got Bakusaiga now and not in episode 15. Miroku observed that Sesshoumaru was risking himself to protect them, which would be a great new development that would merit him levelling up, provided that observation wasn't immediately nullified by Rin's response: "He's always been nice." Sooo, nothing new under the sun other than Sesshoumaru taking way more damage than he ever has in the past. And then the explanation of where it came from was still apparently "You've had it stuffed up your ass this entire time and that's why you've been such a jerk until now. Doesn't it feel good to have that pulled out?" And thus all was solved by a convenient gladius ex recto. Though, okay, I'll admit, Bakusaiga was animated pretty nicely, and the animation of the scene was surpisingly intense for a Sakuma episode. The episode's first half proceeded as dully as a Sakuma-animated episode usually does, but the second half really did pick up. The part with Sesshoumaru getting his arm impaled was a bit blandly-handled, and in the manga he took a punch to the gut which the anime cut, but I did like that Magatsuhi showed up and just totally ignored Sesshoumaru and went right after Kohaku, to which Sesshoumaru was like, "WTF." Best Moment: Most of my Best Moments end up being original stuff the anime did since everything that happened in the manga is hard to impress me because I already know it's coming and already have an idea in my mind of how it should go. So the Best Moment this week goes to Jaken frying Shippou's tail with his staff after Shippou mocks him for his hammed-up mourning of Sesshoumaru's death. At least the anime added in a bit of Jaken/Shippou banter since all the rest of it up until now has been cut due to their respective battles being utterly glossed over. Next week, it looks like they're combining most of the modern-day episodes into one, considering they've skipped almost all of them up until now. Kagome will take her exams, and judging by the preview... omg do they kiss?!?!?! Haha, I'm glad they found a way to slip that scene into the anime despite it originally coming from chapter 494 and having nothing to do with the exams, so I wonder how they'll work it in. |
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(Hitomiko's Barrier) |
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| Original Release Date: 01/18/10 | Chapters Included: 507-511 | Review Date: 01/18/10 |
| Summary | ||
| The miko Hitomiko recalls a time 15 years ago when Naraku approached her as a child and tried to kill her, but was unable to because of her barrier. Now, thanks to the power of the Shikon no Tama, Naraku is able to kill her with his spiderwebs and take over her body. Inuyasha's group follows those webs to her shrine and she abducts Kagome. Inside, Kagome is given the choice of being killed, or consigning Hitomiko to Hell and therefore defiling her own heart. Hitomiko tells Kagome that she doesn't have the necessary spiritual power to save her, and is angered the Kagome would even think that she can. Kagome then remembers the "Kagome, Kagome" game she played as a child and how she could always guess who was hiding behind her, and uses that power to shoot an arrow through Hitomiko and strike Naraku who was pulling her strings from behind. Hitomiko is saved, but she tells Kagome that her true spiritual power is still sealed... | ||
| Review | ||
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Oh man... Sugimoto really came through on this episode, because the animation and direction were absolutely fantastic. And despite it covering five chapters worth of material without cutting much of anything, there was a ton of anime-original material in this episode as well. And it was all pulled of very nicely without feeling forced or rushed.
The anime version decided to read its own meaning into Kagome's name in this episode, by constantly referencing the children's game "Kagome, Kagome", a game where children encircle another child and the one in the middle has to guess who's behind them. There was also a scene of Kagome's mother explaining a sign she saw in Kagome's chest when she was born and named her for that symbol, thereby essentially making it so the Shikon no Tama inside her gave her her name. Inuyasha and the remainder of the cast were barely in the episode at all, aside from ineffectively whacking away at Hitomiko's barrier from the outside while Kagome handled everything herself. This was nicely refreshing in that even though she was sort of the damsel in distress in this episode, she didn't need the hero to come save her and managed to work everything out on her own. Which brings me to the Best Moment and a damn good change the anime made to the manga. In the manga, Kagome grasps Hitomiko's severed hand and says she'll save her, and Hitomiko regains her senses enough to bid Kagome to shoot and just believe in herself, and Kagome's new Naraku-seeking arrow is simply randomly born of that. In the anime version, Kagome figures everything out on her own by remembering that in the "Kagome, Kagome" game she could always sense who was behind her, and used that idea to come up with the "shoot the person behind her" technique all by herself. Not only was it more admirable on Kagome's part, it actually made way more sense than the original. Bravo. Next week... sigh... Sakuma. Oh, Sakuma. You and your lackluster animation direction already look to make the next episode's battle frightfully stale, despite it being my favorite fight in the series (aside from the stupid ending). Please please please don't suck as bad as the preview makes it look. |
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(Legitimate Heir) |
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| Original Release Date: 01/11/10 | Chapters Included: 499-504 | Review Date: 01/11/10 |
| Summary | ||
| Sesshoumaru shows up with his newly-acquired mirror shard which he obtained in a flashback. Inuyasha tries to attack him, but Tenseiga absorbs all of Tessaiga's powers. Byakuya transports them away where their morality pets won't be a bother. The two fight, Sesshoumaru wanting Inuyasha to prove he is the rightful heir to Tessaiga. Inuyasha transforms into his youkai form and starts taking his attacks back, so Sesshoumaru Meidou Zangetsuhas him to Hell. He then discards Tenseiga into the Meidou as well, deciding that if he can kick the butt of the person who's supposed to inherit Tessaiga that easily, it's not worth it. While in the Meidou, Inuyasha uses the Dragon-Scaled Tessaiga to cut his own youketsu, creating an infinite feedback loop that breaks the Meidou. Not happy with this, Naraku posesses Tenseiga through the mirror shard on it and attacks Inuyasha. Sesshoumaru intervenes and ends up breaking Tenseiga over Tessaiga, giving it the Meidou Zangetsuha power. Before they disappear into Hell, Inuyasha sees light from Tenseiga and uses his new Meidou power to cut themselves out. Sesshoumaru leaves and Toutousai comments that he's one step away from getting a weapon of his own that's not an heirloom to fight over. | ||
| Review | ||
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So, Sesshoumaru just randomly showed up with the mirror shard at the beginning of this week's episode, and it was silly. True, he flashed back to the acquisition later, but I just wanted to comment on my prediction at the end of the last episode's review.
But, yeah, this week was Black Tessaiga, with the introductory part with Toutousai and some random hanging out and chatting between Inuyasha's and Sesshoumaru's groups chopped out for time. Strangely, a lot of the BGM was also changed. I can understand changing it at the beginning where stuff was cut out, but there were quite a few other scenes where something completely different was played (or in the case of the opening battle, nothing at all). The scene where Tenseiga broke was the worst offender here, where it simply broke in the middle of normal battle music instead of the event having any kind of musical hilight. In the original version, Sesshoumaru's theme played over the fight and ended right as the sword broke, so the event was hilighted by the sudden silence. Here, it was just an uninterrupted drone of music. Even weirder, some of the dialogue was re-dubbed or even completely changed. Again, some of it was understandable if it straddled some kind of cut and context needed to be restored, but changing Jaken's line of "Sesshoumaru-sama, hayaku o-modori kudasai" ("Sesshoumaru, please come back quickly") to "Washi wa kaeru ka?" ("Am I a frog?") is just... why? Other than the latter line is ever so slightly shorter and thus cut maybe one second from the scene. And they freakin' cut Jaken's fangirl squeal immediately after that when Sesshoumaru comes back. Then there's the whole issue of, no matter which version of this you're looking at, whether it be the manga, "Black Tessaiga", or "Legitimate Heir", this story just makes no friggin' sense. Tessaiga gets its powers stolen for the eleventy billionth time, and Inuyasha turns into his youkai form because "Tessaiga, which lost its youkai power, is seeking mine." That his sword leeching off his youkai power would cause him to go more youkai seems counterintuitive. Then he cuts his own youketsu which I assume created an infinite feedback loop which is why it grew bigger, but honestly, it's never explained, even though Sesshoumaru looks at it like, "Ah, that's the proof I was looking for." Proof of what? That unbridled recursion makes things explode? And then, of course, there's the foreshadowing at the end about Sesshoumaru being "one step" away from getting his own weapon. That "one step" being getting impaled or something, because that part also never made any sense. Even Inuyasha, in a line altered from the manga, commented that he's ended up taking everything that their father left for Sesshoumaru and that's totally unfair. And, you know, that is totally unfair. While I have my own ideas that I'm using in fanfiction to explain this stuff away without Inu-papa coming across as a total dick, canonically, there is nothing to support it other than nothing to the contrary has ever been stated. Which as far as evidence goes is pretty much worthless. And after all that ranting, time for the Best Moment. I'm gonna have to go with the final fight between Inuyasha and Sesshoumaru in the Meidou. It was animated quite nicely and there was a real sense of desperation in Sesshoumaru's actions. Now if only they'd used the right music for it... Next week is the Hitomiko story, and for once even the episode preview looks impressive. Sugimoto is back in the animation direction position next week, and her episodes have been solid so far. She may be the Ikeda of this series, though her stuff still falls just a hair short of Ikeda's old glory. The next episode centers around Kagome, so she'll really have to prove her stuff to make that worth watching. :P |
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(Naraku's Pursuit) |
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| Original Release Date: 01/04/10 | Chapters Included: 495-499 | Review Date: 01/04/10 |
| Summary | ||
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Byakuya shows up at the Meidou battleground to see what happened. Elsewhere, Kohaku, Rin and Jaken are hanging out alone as Sesshoumaru has gone off in a huff to see Toutousai about his sword. He tells Toutousai that he believes that now that he's mastered Meidou Zangetsuha, the next step would be for Tenseiga to be reabsorbed by Tessaiga and for Inuyasha to inherit that technique as well. Much to his disgust, Toutousai confirms this, but warns him to think about the bigger picture. Sesshoumaru breaks some stuff and leaves, obviously unable to do that at this point. Back on the Kohaku side of things, Naraku shows up for his shard, but when he tries to take it, the pure point of light in his Shikon no Tama purifies Kohaku's shard, making him unable to touch it. Naraku continues to attack, trying to cut off Kohaku's head so that he can capture him without touching the shard, but Sango shows up to stop him. Naraku tries manipulating Kohaku again, but Sango throws her Hiraikotsu at him. Surprisingly, Hiraikotsu actually damages him, thanks to Yakurou Dokusen's treatment, and Naraku retreats. The group berates Kohaku for always trying to do everything himself when it's obvious he can't handle Naraku alone. Meanwhile, Naraku tells Byakuya to go make use of Sesshoumaru while he's out of commission. |
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| Review | ||
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Man, after the epicness of last week, this week's episode was... really boring. I mean, it's Sakuma, and he could probably make a sex scene boring, so it comes as no surprise, but... still a disappointment.
First off, the action was not animated well at all. Naraku touches Kohaku's shard, and then he just starts glowing, and is like, "Huh, I am glowing" and lets Kohaku get away temporarily. He wasn't writhing in pain or surprise or even looking particularly shocked like he did in the manga (and Jaken didn't fry him), he just sort of stood there and glowed while looking at his hand like he was on LSD and thinking, "Duuuuuuude, I have fingers..." The problem with this episode is the same problem with most Sakuma episodes (though in his defense, Sakuma is just the one who controls character models and actions, the blame also falls on Furuta, the director, who did this, episode 5, and episode 9). And that being that the episode is presented in a "this happened, then this happened, then this" sort of manner without any real expression to its presentation. When you read the manga, you sort of have to invent the "in-between" actions in your mind since you only get a few frames depicting a few key poses in the action. When animating, the animators fill those in for you, so you're forced to see it as they envision it. And when it comes to Sakuma episodes, it's like "KEYFRAME lsdfkuhalksuh KEYFRAME skdfhlaeiuhliu KEYFRAME". So, gonna be hard to pick out a Best Moment since the episode was pretty "meh", but I'll have to give it to upgraded Hiraikotsu pummeling Naraku to pieces. Because he had that coming. Then the anime added a couple shots of everyone else getting a shot at him, too, before he tucks his tail betwen his legs and runs off whimpering. Speaking of the anime adding stuff, they did a lot of that this week. True, mostly with flashbacks to previous episodes, but this episode had them in spades. Almost as if it was saying, "This episode is really boring, hey, remember this other, better episode? Yeah, those were good times." One of the weirder additions was Naraku giving the mirror shard to Byakuya and telling him to go give it to Sesshoumaru. Unless they plan on cutting the corresponding handing-over scene in the next episode, that just seems pointlessly redundant. But if they do cut that scene, it's just going to open with Sesshoumaru showing up and going "o hai there I have mirror shard that they said they'd give to me but you never actually saw it." Which means, yes, judging by the preview, next week is Black Tessaiga, likely with some portions removed due to it being about six minutes too long for a standard TV slot. They could probably cut pretty much everything prior to the title screen since it was all already covered in this and the previous episode, except for the aforementioned handing-off-of-the-mirror-shard scene, since Sesshoumaru just randomly showing up with it at the beginning of next week's episode would be silly. |
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(Completed Meidou) |
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| Original Release Date: 12/26/09 | Chapters Included: 488-493 | Review Date: 12/28/09 |
| Summary | ||
| Sesshoumaru is approached by a boy who tells him to follow him to learn the secret of what Tenseiga lacks. He is led to the lair of the youkai Shishinki, who fought Sesshoumaru's father in the past. Shishinki was the original user of Meidou Zangetsuha, but Sesshoumaru's father stole the technique from him when he defeated him. Inuyasha arrives, and Shishinki reveals that Tenseiga is actually merely a piece of Tessaiga, cast off the original sword to house the techinique that their father realized he didn't want. Enraged, Sesshoumaru attacks Shishinki, who fights back with his own Meidou Zangetsuha. However, when Inuyasha steps in, Tessaiga and Tenseiga resonate, allowing Sesshoumaru to use his own completed Meidou Zangetsuha to defeat Shishinki. Sesshoumaru leaves in a huff, realizing what his father must have had planned beyond that... | ||
| Review | ||
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Thaaaaaank you, anime, for not disappointing me with this episode. The preview made me kind of apprehensive that this episode was going to lose a lot of its impact, but holy hell this episode delivered. Going through the credits, it looks like we have director Toba Akira to thank for the quality episodes, as he's been the one to direct this one along with 2 and 8. Though given that he's gotten 2, 8, and 13 so far, his appearing every 5-6 episodes doesn't make it very likely that he'll be set to helm episode 17 when Magatsuhi shows up, but I can still hope.
Anyway, why was this episode good? For one thing, the animation was fantasic, thanks to animation directors Maezawa Hiromi and Tachibana Kayo. Plus, more importantly, unlike episode 9 where the director decided to play down Sesshoumaru's outward emotions to a stupid degree, this episode had him very upset and quite expressive. Narita Ken certainly seemed to go for it, too, since he played a good amount of rage into the voice, including even having his voice crack at one point ("I thought I told you to stay out of this!" Oh man, you can just feel the pissed-off-ness in his voice, it's awesome). I also think this is the first time that Kanketsu-hen has used clips from the original series in a flashback. Though, oddly, the shot of Sesshoumaru trying to take Tessaiga and being zapped away was new, but the clips of him losing his arm to Inuyasha and getting blasted by the Kaze no Kizu were taken directly from the original series, albeit cleaned up and widescreen-formatted. Best Moment: Just the fact in general that Sesshoumaru was actually emotive in this episode. Yeah, all the emotions were "pissed off", but it was still nice to see him have some actual expression on his face and in his voice. The animation was good, the directing was good, the whole episode itself just turned out really well without any one real glaring moment of awesome. Next week is... well, next week is a break, actually. And of all things, House is playing in Inuyasha's timeslot, so if you wanna catch Hugh Laurie dubbed over in Japanese, that's what you'll get if you try watching Inuyasha live next weekend. The week after that, though, is kind of a mish-mash of everything that needs to happen before the Black Tessaiga showdown in episode 15. Though, part of the preview for 14 included scenes that were covered by Black Tessaiga, albeit animated differently. Then again, Black Tessaiga just used the Toutousai conversation as a quick flashback, and the quick shot of Shishinki from Black Tessaiga also didn't appear in today's episode. So who knows. And where the hell DID that eyeless boy from the beginning go, anyway? |
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(Sango's Feelings, Miroku's Resolve) |
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| Original Release Date: 12/19/09 | Chapters Included: 482-488 | Review Date: 12/20/09 |
| Summary | ||
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Kagome and a human Inuyasha are headed to meet up with Miroku and Sango, who are currently fighting a bone-stealing youkai. The youkai crushes Hiraikotsu, so Miroku continuously tries to use his Kazaana until he passes out. Sango then spreads youdoku, a corrosive poison, on Hiraikotsu and throws it at the youkai, dissolving both it and her weapon. Myouga appears and tells them to go visit Yakurou Dokusen if they want Hiraikotsu repaired. Yakurou Dokusen takes Hiraikotsu and puts it in a vat of sake, then tells Sango to jump into an adjoining jar and placate the youkai within. Meanwhile, Miroku takes the old man aside about his shouki wounds, and Yakurou Dokusen gives him something which is both a medicine and a poison. It won't heal his wounds, but it will make him able to continue to fight by numbing their pain. Inside the jar, Sango finds that the youkai there are those which comprise Hiraikotsu, and they're not very happy about being dissolved and discarded for Miroku's sake. Sango refuses to agree to never again discard Hiraikotsu for Miroku's safety, and the youkai attack her. Back outside, Miroku agrees to take the poison/medicine so that he can continue to protect Sango despite his wounds. By doing so, his will is transferred to the youkai through the sake, and they reform into a new Hiraikotsu. |
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| Review | ||
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Compared to last week, the pacing this week was awful. Chapter 481, which originally introduced the bone-snatching youkai, was skipped entirely in favor of simply starting the episode mid-battle. So, much like Sesshoumaru losing Toukijin in episode 2, Hiraikotsu's destruction left little impact since all the build-up to it was cut. Sesshoumaru was just suddenly in a battle and his sword broke. Sango was just suddenly in a battle and Hiraikotsu melted. And because its loss and reforging were condensed into a single episode, it made the loss even less profound, since she got it back right away.
Inuyasha himself didn't really do much in the episode, since he was human for the first part (though he still got to jump in at the last minute and Kongousouha everything away), and drunk for the second part. Which was amusing in and of itself, though. They cut the scene of Shippou getting drunk, though. I never liked the Miroku/Sango pairing to begin with, and this episode just made it grate on me all the more. Sango wants to get Hiraikotsu back so that she can protect Miroku so that he won't have to use his Kazaana so much. This was the understood reason of them going there in the first place and the reason Sango's going through her trials. But while she's gone, Miroku decides to stomp all over her gesture and drags Yakurou Dokusen aside and goes for a potion that won't actually heal him in any way, it just makes him unperterbed by the consequences of his actions until they kill him. And he does this because he doesn't want Sango risking her life for him (and he didn't like the idea of being protect by a woman, the sexist a-hole), and that this was his choice. You know, screw you, this was Sango's choice, too. I know this was supposed to be a setup for tragedy, but it's not a tragedy when they walk into it willingly. It's just being retarded. And then there's the whole fact that Miroku is doing all this behind her back because, essentially, he doesn't trust her judgement. And people wonder why I hate them as a couple. Straying aside from that, Best Moment goes to Yakurou Dokusen quickly flipping Kagome's skirt to keep her from eavesdropping on Miroku's venture into idiocy. The guy actually sexually harrasses most of the cast, from flipping Kagome's skirt to feeling up Sango's butt to licking Miroku. Next week is the Shishinki fight, which should hopefully be better-paced since there's only five or so chapters to cover. And hopefully they don't decide to mute Sesshoumaru's emotions way down again like they did for the Meidou story, or it'll lose most of its impact. |
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(Kanna's Gravestone) |
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| Original Release Date: 12/12/09 | Chapters Included: 476-480 | Review Date: 12/13/09 |
| Summary | ||
| Kanna uses her mirror monster's red Tessaiga to break through the barrier Inuyasha's group was hiding behind and draw them out. Due to Tessaiga losing its powers, Inuyasha transforms into his youkai form upon being injured, though is somehow able to maintain control over it. He attacks the mirror monster, but it regenerates. Instead, any damage inflicted on the monster is transferred to Kanna instead. Byakuya watches as she contines to get chipped away until Inuyasha destroys the mirror Tessaiga and regains his powers. Disarmed (literally), Inuyasha and Kagome bid Kanna to leave, but Naraku forces her to self-destruct. A fragment of the mirror hits Kagome in the eye and Kanna's final words pass to her: "The light will destroy Naraku". | ||
| Review | ||
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There was some very nice pacing in today's episode, along with some spectacular animation as well. The battle was nice without being over too quickly, but wasn't pointlessly drawn out.
Back when I read this in the manga, it was this arc that made me think that Byakuya was eventually going to switch sides, too, or at least start to get more development now that he was the only minion left. Alas, this episode is really the deepest we ever get into Byakuya's head. The guy has a lot of potential as a character but it just seems so wasted, especially given his eventual anticlimactic afterthought of a death. Tessaiga's powers also seem to be completely random. The mirror Tessaiga absorbs all of Tessaiga's powers except, conveniently, its barrier. However, I seem to remember that it's that very barrier that keeps Inuyasha's youkai power in check, so the fact that he suddenly lost control of it makes no sense. Maybe it's a different barrier. It's not like the sword isn't already completely tricked out. Best Moment: Kanna goes kablooie. Kagome tells Kanna that they won't fight her anymore and that she's free, and while Kanna reflects on that and Kagura, Naraku crushes her heart and forces her to explode. Next week, we'll get weapon angst from Sango and Miroku, then the week after that, epic weapon angst from Sesshoumaru, then Inuyasha AND Sesshoumaru weapon angst, then Kagome weapon angst, then even more Sesshoumaru weapon angst... just in case anyone forgot that this series revolves around the weapons. Even Shippou admitted it in this episode: "I'm not afraid of you, I'm afraid of Tessaiga!" |
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(A Grief-Stained Flower) |
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| Original Release Date: 12/05/09 | Chapters Included: 471-476 | Review Date: 12/05/09 |
| Summary | ||
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Kanna comes upon the field of flowers where Kagura died and retrieves her fan, noting that she has become the wind and attained freedom, but Kanna has become nothing. Elsewhere, Inuyasha's group comes upon a town surrounded by flowers. They stay there, but during the night the villagers are all drawn to the flowers and cry tears of blood. Miroku dispells the flowers, but some of the villagers have turned into soil. The culprit is a youkai called Kaou who feeds on grieving hearts. Miroku gives Kagome a rosary to protect her and she and Inuyasha pursue Kaou. Inuyasha is captured by Kaou and is forced to watch a dream of Kikyou while Kagome tries to release him. Inuyasha hears Kagome's voice and is able to break free, while Kagome uses the rosary to break the barrier. However, losing the rosary means Kaou can probe Kagome's heart and discovers that she is also suffering. Angered at having her feelings revealed, Kagome blows up Kaou's manor with her arrow and Inuyasha finishes him off. Kanna lays Kagura's fan to rest in a lake, then enters the lake herself to summon a creature from her mirror. Inuyasha's group arrives, and Kanna's mirror monster clones Tessaiga, including stealing all its powers. Inuyasha's group is forced to retreat. |
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| Review | ||
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This episode was a lot more lethargically paced, though the addition of the beginning of the Kanna fight at the end threw the pacing off quite a bit. There was a lot of anime-original material here which didn't surprise me too much considering the main story only had three chapters to work from.
The main story in the episode itself, though, was as "meh" as I remember it in the manga. While the whole Kaou thing was supposed to be Inuyasha's "coming to terms with Kikyou's death" story, it didn't really seem to believably do any of that. It just messed with everyone's feelings, and they're just randomly all okay after that. Kagome especially was just ridiculous in this episode. After Kaou probes her heart, she freakin' blows up his manor with a sacred arrow. Seriously. WTF. And when all is said and done and Inuyasha apologizes to her for not considering her feelings and how she's been so strong, she gets pissed off at him for not wording his apology exactly the way she wanted it. Holy crap, sit girl. The guy just lost his girlfriend and you have the gall to bitch at him for not feeling bad enough for you? Ugh, I just remember this storyline making me want to punch Kagome in the face. And with that all said and done, two seconds later it's all forgotten and they go off on another rumor of a youkai who just conveniently happens to have a connection to Naraku. Inuyasha gets his powers stolen, again. Seems like the guy should be used to it by now, since it seems like practically every villain he goes up against manages to use his own abilities against it, and yet he's surprised every time. Best Moment: The couple of new scenes depicting Kanna paying her regards to Kagura were a nice touch, which will help foreshadow Kanna's own impending death in the next episode and make it not quite so random. Because, seriously, the only reason she's showing up now is that Takahashi was like, "Oh yeah, Naraku still has one other minion that I haven't shown in, like, ever. I'd better do something with her." Today also premiered the new ending theme, "Diamond", which was a montage of snow-covered scenes despite the fact that it's never winter in the Inuyasha universe (or, rather, it's only winter in the modern era, while the Sengoku era seems to have been hit with some premature global warming). Though I've still never quite figured out the Japanese fashion logic of a scarf, heavy coat, and bare legs. Best clip in the ending was definitely of Jaken, Rin, and Kohaku building a snowman, though. Sorry, Kohaku, you're a Sesshoumaru minion now and are therefore obligated to do stupidly cute things despite it being OOC. |
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(Sesshoumaru in Hell) |
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| Original Release Date: 11/28/09 | Chapters Included: 466-471 | Review Date: 11/28/09 |
| Summary | ||
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Sesshoumaru seems to be looking for something while Kohaku angsts about not being able to see Kikyou before she died. Suddenly, a flying dog appears in the air and Sesshoumaru transforms to intercept it. The dog turns out to be his mother. Elsewhere, Ginta and Hakkaku have shown up and Kouga decides to leave with them since he feels he'll be a burden without his shards. He tries to pester Inuyasha, but Inuyasha is still too zoned out on Kikyou to care. Kagome and Kouga hug and say farewell before Kouga leaves for good. Sesshoumaru and club go to Sesshoumaru's mother's castle in the sky, and he demands to know what she knows about Meidou Zangetsuha. His mother reveals the Meidou-seki left to her by his father, and summons a Hellhound which is unaffected by Meidou Zangetsuha. The Hellhound swallows Kohaku and Rin and escapes into the Meidou, where Sesshoumaru follows. In Hell, Sesshoumaru uses Tenseiga's healing blade on the Hellhound and is able to cut it. Kohaku wakes up but Rin is still unconscious, so Kohaku carries her. The group is attacked by more denizens of Hell and Sesshoumaru fights them off while trying to keep Kohaku and Rin safe. However, once it seems like the coast is clear, Kohaku realizes that Rin isn't breathing. Sesshoumaru draws Tenseiga, but can't see the pallbearers of the afterlife and therefore can't revive her. Suddenly, the darkness of Hell expands and sucks Rin into it, where Sesshoumaru and Kohaku follow. Sesshoumaru's mother uses her Meidou-seki to offer Sesshoumaru a way out, but he opts to follow after Rin. They arrive at the lair of the Master of Hell, which tries to suck them in. The Master offers Rin to a pile of corpses, but Sesshoumaru kills it with his healing blade. But even this fails to revive Rin. Distraught, he drops Tenseiga, and the mountain of corpses reach out for it. He uses Tenseiga to purify them all, and this widens his Meidou enough to cut out of it from the inside. Back in the real world, Sesshoumaru's mother reveals that Tenseiga can only call a life back once, and that he had to go through this in order to learn to show compassion for life. But not wanting her son to be sad, she uses her Meidou-seki to call Rin's soul back from Hell and revive her. As they leave, Sesshoumaru's mother notes that Kohaku, who was called back by a Shikon shard, is also unable to be revived by Tenseiga. Back on the ground, Kagome mulls over Kikyou's final request that she protect Kohaku's light, and the group heads off to keep Kohaku's shard safe. |
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| Review | ||
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This episode was thankfully pulled off a lot better than I was expecting. After episode 8, there were some high standards to live up to, and while this episode didn't quite make it that high, it was still more than I was expecting from the staff involved. The animation wasn't near as sucky as I was fearing, as there were actually some pretty nicely animated scenes.
My biggest gripe right off the bat was Sessmom's voice. Holy crap, woman, lay off the weed, she sounded downright stoned for the first half of the episode. Strangely, she progressively pulled out of it as the episode went on until she actually sounded like a self-aware person by her lecture to Sesshoumaru at the end. I guess the drugs wore off. This episode was also the first one so far to have any kind of recap, as Kikyou's death was replayed at the beginning to segue into the universal angst that the episode opened with. For the most part, though, everything was played totally straight from the manga. The bits from chapter 466 were shuffled around a bit, but I actually thought they worked better where they were positioned than where they originally came, since things went right from Kohaku angsting about Kikyou to everyone else angsting about Kikyou until Inuyasha smells Sesshoumaru from the sky, to the main bulk of the episode ending with the quip about Kohaku's shard, then back to Inuyasha's group talking about Kohaku's shard. The only real deletion I noticed was Sesshoumaru's lecture to Kohaku that his arm is only meant to hold a sword, after he catches him from falling. However, in place of that, the anime version added a quite effective concept of the Master of Hell's lair drawing people into it, and offering corpses to a void that Kohaku and Sesshoumaru had to fight to keep from being pulled into.
So, I'll put that as my Best Moment: Kohaku loses his footing and gets sucked towards the void, and Sesshoumaru nonchalantly throws out his Strangely, despite having a lot of dialogue and plenty of opportunity, Jaken didn't seem to have any ad-libs in this episode. Next week is the Kaou storyline to whip Inuyasha out of angst-mode, and my guess it'll be fairly lethargic given that the original manga story was only, like, three chapters long. Hopefully they'll add some stuff to make it more interesting, since the original version was pretty dull. |
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(Among the Shining Stars) |
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| Original Release Date: 11/21/09 | Chapters Included: 459-465 | Review Date: 11/21/09 |
| Summary | ||
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Inuyasha catches Kagome after she falls, but while he's away, the others all get captured by Naraku. Naraku takes Kikyou for himself while Kouga goes to fight him. Kikyou notices that Kouga's shards are being purified by Midoriko's will, and if Naraku takes them in, he'll be purified. Naraku tries and recieves a purifying shock, then crushes Kikyou with his tentacles and says he'll kill her before Inuyasha can get there. Inuyasha arrives anyway, but his sword doesn't have any effect. Kagome intends to shoot an arrow with her new bow, but she only has one, and Kikyou bids her to wait. Inuyasha tries cutting Naraku's youketsu, and it opens his body, revealing the Shikon no Tama. Naraku drops Kikyou as Kouga goes for the jewel, but Kagome notices the jewel has disappeared. Kouga is captured, but Kagome sees that Naraku has hidden the jewel in Kikyou's discarded body. Kagome shoots Kikyou with her purifying arrow, which Kikyou rebounds with her own holy power and the purified jewel and shoots it back at Naraku. Naraku fights against the purification, and Inuyasha uses the opportunity to release Kouga, but not before his shards are taken. Naraku defeats Kikyou's purification and laughs triumphantly and leaves as Kikyou is drained of her strength. She tells Kagome that it's now up to her to protect Kohaku's final shard. Elsewhere, Kohaku attempts to go to Kikyou, but Rin and Jaken hold him back as Sesshoumaru says he's already too late. Kaede watches the sunset, and is greeted by a phantom of Kikyou who has come to comfort her. Meanwhile, Kagome laments her inability to save Kikyou's life, but Kikyou reassures her that she's saved her soul. Miroku, Sango, and Kouga also reflect on how they were saved by Kikyou's power but were unable to do anything. Inuyasha takes Kikyou off alone, and Kikyou tells him that she's finally become an ordinary woman. She is happy that Inuyasha will cry for her, and the two of them share a kiss before Kikyou disappears, her soul carried away by Shinidamachuu and leaving everyone with the message that she'll always watch over them. |
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| Review | ||
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And that's the end of Kikyou. Her death was handled with a lot more care than Kagura's was, I think (though I'm not saying that Kagura's death was horribly handled, I just think they put even more thought into this one given the time they had).
The choice of music was definitely nice, too. Using the instrumental version of "Dearest" was a good way to make her death kind of bittersweet in a way, in that she died, but she was released of her pain and could watch over everyone. Though it's still too bad that there's been no original music written for this series aside from the intro and ending songs. Naraku seemed especially maniacal in this episode, since the animators chose to give him some darn creepy expressions, including maniacal laughter after he defeats Kikyou's purification power. And they still kept the infamous Kikyou Chest Rocket. Best Moment: That's gonna have to go with the little scene the anime added between Kikyou and Kaede. Kikyou's spirit goes to visit her sister, and Kaede takes the form of her child self and begs Kikyou not to leave, while Kikyou comforts her. My only gripe with the scene is that Kaede addresses Kikyou as "Ane-ue" when she's always used "Onee-sama" in the past. Next week... zomg Sessmom and Sesshoumaru's Adventures in Hell! I hope they pull it off as well as they did today's episode, but with Sakuma at the helm... eh, that's gonna be iffy. |
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(The Mausoleum at Mount Azusa) |
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| Original Release Date: 11/14/09 | Chapters Included: 448, 452-458 | Review Date: 11/14/09 |
| Summary | ||
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Kikyou helps to purify Miroku's shouki wounds, but warns them if he exerts himself and they reach his heart, he'll die. Kikyou and Kohaku leave together. Naraku returns to Mount Hakurei to retrieve his human mind, wishing to use its emotions to defeat Kikyou. Kikyou is attacked by spiderweb from the sky but blocks it with a barrier. However, when Naraku drags innocent bystanders in by the web, she has to act and is caught herself. Inuyasha's group happens by and finds Kikyou tainted by the spiderweb in a small shrine. Both Inuyasha and Kagome are caught by it as well. Meanwhile, Kohaku is hiding behind a barrier to protect his shard now that Kikyou has been tainted, but thanks to Kikyou losing power, Byakuya discovers him. Byakuya assaults Kohaku with poisonous snakes to taint his shard, but Sesshoumaru appears to drive Byakuya away. Kagome is told that the only way to help Kikyou is to shoot her wound with a sacred arrow to purify it, but since Kagome has also been tainted, the bowstring breaks as soon as she touches it. She is told to get a replacement at the mausoleum on Mount Azusa, but can only succeed if she honestly wants to save Kikyou. At the mausoleum, Kagome is separated from the others and runs into the spirit of the mountain, who bears the face of Kikyou. She receives the new bow without much fuss, but on her way back, she encounters an illusion of Kikyou telling Inuyasha to abandon Kagome because Kagome hates her and doesn't really want to save her, so will never succeed. Kagome falls through the ground and clings to a cliff, the bow weighing her down, as Kikyou appears on the cliff above. She taunts Kagome and tells her to stop being so jealous and try to break her bond with Inuyasha, and Kagome finally gets fed up with having to play second-fiddle and yells at her that they both have spent important time with Inuyasha that neither can take away from each other, so there's no reason to be afraid of what Kikyou had with him. The bow gets lighter and the illusion of Kikyou that Kagome's heart had constructed disappears, and she is severed from Naraku's spiderweb. However, at that time she falls from the cliff... |
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| Review | ||
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Another very straight-shot episode, aside from deleting the short Yama-arashi side-story. Kouga has now more or less joined Inuyasha's party, and he and Shippou get to play running commentary on the ever-present love triangle.
What confused me the first time when I read the manga about Naraku's heart made more sense here now that I re-watched it in Japanese. What Naraku re-absorbed from the baby was his "shinzou", or physical heart, while what he went to get back from Mount Hakurei was his "kokoro", or emotional heart. I always liked Kagome's outburst at the end in the manga, since it almost seemed directly pointed at the Kikyou-haters, and I think Satsuki pulled it off really well (almost sounded like she wanted to get this rant off her chest, too). Kagome confronts superbitch!Kikyou that her mind has invented, and one actually faced with her, realizes that, "Holy crap, the real Kikyou is nothing like this!" But it still doesn't stop her from saying, "Look, I've always had to back down being told, 'oh, they have a past together, leave them alone, what they have is more important than you,' but screw that, I've spent time with him too and have seen him do things you never did, so that has to count for something!" And that would have gotten the Best Moment if it weren't for Jaken. Oh, Jaken, I love you. After Jaken gets bitten by a snake, Chou-san ad-libs a very plaintive, "Sesshoumaru-sama... help me... it hurts..." Next week, Kikyou bites the big one and Kouga loses his shards for good, causing him to essentially be written out of the story from here on out. |
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(Mouryoumaru's End) |
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| Original Release Date: 11/07/09 | Chapters Included: 439-448 | Review Date: 11/07/09 |
| Summary | ||
| Naraku absorbs a youkai tree called Youmeiju and flies off with it. Kouga confronts Kikyou who wishes to take his Shikon shards before Naraku kills him for them, but Kouga brushes her off to pursue Mouryoumaru instead. Naraku and Mouryoumaru meet and begin to fight, and Mouryoumaru appears to absorb Naraku. Mouryoumaru then goes after Kouga for his shards and manages to capture him, but then Naraku appears inside with the infant and uses Youmeiju's power to break the infant's barrier and re-absorb him and take over Mouryoumaru's body. Kouga escapes thanks to the one-time protection from the Yourouzoku ancestors and Miroku attempts to suck Naraku into his Kazaana, but he is heavily poisoned and Naraku escapes. | ||
| Review | ||
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Wow, for once, this episode wasn't a mish-mash of chapters but actually proceeded totally linearly. Because of this, the pacing was waaaay better than in previous episodes due to only one battle occuring at once. The speed-talking that's plagued the series so far was still present, however, but it's a small complaint now that we've finally had a non-disjointed episode.
My only complaint about something that was handled way too fast was the ancestors' protection of Kouga. There's just some light, a kind of wimpy howl, and he pops out of Naraku. The way it was depicted in the manga made it seem like it was a scene that should have been lingered on for at least a few seconds for dramatic effect, but animated it was just like "boing" and he's out. This episode also nicely illustrated the pointlessness of all the upgrades we've had to suffer through until now. Inuyasha's all, "Yeah, I'll Tessaiga DS him! Oh, wait, he doesn't have a Youketsu because the Fuyouheki hides his youki!" Which is pretty much the case for every single upgrade Inuyasha has gotten until now. He gets to use it once, and then Naraku finds a way around it and it gets rendered useless. Best Moment: Ooh, shiney sparkly Naraku who is once again pantsless. It was neat watching him shed Mouryoumaru's skin and pop out all jewel-encrusted. Next week Kohaku joins Sesshoumaru's group, rendering his depiction with Kikyou in the opening relevant for all of one episode. From there we begin the Mount Azusa arc, and given that there really isn't much else to draw from at this point, hopefully the series will continue in this linear fashion from here on out. |
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(Yourei Taisei's Trials) |
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| Original Release Date: 10/31/09 | Chapters Included: 401, 409, 416-422, 425-431, 438 | Review Date: 10/31/09 |
| Summary | ||
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Kohaku approaches Kikyou and asks her to use his shard for her own purposes. Elsewhere, Kouga decides to leave Ginta and Hakkaku with Kai and Shinta to pursue Naraku on his own, since his shards have gotten the entirety of the Yourouzoku in trouble. Elsewhere, Mouryoumaru approaches two fused youkai, Kinka and Ginka, who are battling each other for control of the body. He wants their strong bonding powers to fuse his armor together to make it even more impenetrable. He succeeds in killing and absorbing them while Byakuya watches on. Suddenly Sesshoumaru appears and attacks Byakuya because he has Naraku's scent. Sesshoumaru then attacks Mouryoumaru with Meidou Zangetsuha, but Byakuya interferes to allow Mouryoumaru to escape. Elsewhere, Inuyasha talks to Toutousai about Tessaiga's recent upgrade, and Toutousai tells him to visit Yourei Taisei to learn to handle it. When the group arrives at Yourei Taisei's place, he says he was attacked by a youkai who stole his guts. Tessaiga is sealed with chains and Inuyasha is sent to track down the youkai and learn to find its youketsu. He eventually defeats the youkai by learning to sense and destroy youketsu, thus allowing him to use Dragon-scaled Tessaiga safely. |
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| Review | ||
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While the first part of the episode was utter WTF-ery, the second half was pretty straightforward. Kikyou and Kohaku are finally together as they're depicted in the opening, but at this rate, their togetherness is going to last all of two episodes before Kohaku joins Sesshoumaru's group instead.
The Kinka-Ginka thing was entirely rewritten, though. Now Inuyasha's group isn't even there for it at all, which thankfully means no "Flame Tessaiga" that only ever got used once, but the purpose of the glue powers was also never fully revealed even in the manga, and with Mouryoumaru dying in the next episode, it seems mostly pointless. For the most part, the Kinka-Ginka scene was added merely as a way to get Sesshoumaru and Byakuya to meet. This is where 401 comes in, since most of the dialogue surrounding their meeting was pulled from there, though the circumstances were completely different. Sesshoumaru got to show off his shiny new attack a few more times, and then got shooed away. The last half of the episode went through the Yourei Taisei arc in a pretty linear fashion, though was quite sped up as usual. The whole "youketsu" thing was never fully explained, but then again, the manga never really explained it either. It was just a whole "cut here and youkai dies" thing with no real explanation as to why or how it worked. Best Moment: Well, at least Sesshoumaru and Byakuya finally met and could exchange a little bit of bantering. Too bad most of their amusing conversations either have been or will be skipped over. But the characteristic "WTF, you're trying to kill me right off the bat?!" sentiment is still there. From the preview, the next episode looks almost to be a straight-shot of chapters 439-448 or so. Though with as quickly as this series is bouncing through things, the "Naraku/Mouryoumaru/Inuyasha defeats a youkai and gains its power" routine that has happened every episode so far is becoming painfully apparent. Thankfully it stops after this one, and thankfully that stupid Nikosen story appears to have been skipped entirely, so we're at least spared one. |
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(Dragon-Scaled Tessaiga) |
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| Original Release Date: 10/24/09 | Chapters Included: 386-391, 407-408, 432-436 | Review Date: 10/24/09 |
| Summary | ||
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Sesshoumaru is testing his new Meidou Zangetsuha, hoping to perfect it to its circular shape but can still only manage a crescent. Inuyasha goes to ask Toutousai about Dakki, and he disassembles it revealing it to be forged from a Ryuujin's scale. The Dakki Inuyasha fought was a prototype, and the real Dakki is elsewhere. Inuyasha wants Tessaiga to absorb Dakki's power so that he can absorb youki from his enemies, but Toutousai warns him that if he loses to Dakki, then Tessaiga will lose all its power forever. Meanwhile, some wolves are attacked and all but two children are killed. A new face shows up and offers the older child, Kai, a shikon shard and asks him to steal Kouga's shards in return for his little brother's safety. Kai attacks Kouga, and Kouga follows him to where his brother is being held. Inuyasha locates the original creator of Dakki, Toushuu, who has just completed the real thing. The Ryuujin shows up and demands it, but Inuyasha defeats him. Toushuu absorbs the Ryuujin's power into Dakki and then faces off with Inuyasha to absorb Tessaiga's power as well. Tessaiga is nearly destroyed, but Inuyasha defeats Toushuu and gains the power of dragon scales. Kouga and Kai follow a moth carrying Kai's brother, but the moth is absorbed by Mouryoumaru. Inuyasha's group arrives on the scene, and both Inuyasha and Kouga fight Mouryoumaru, however Mouryoumaru steals Inuyasha's Kongousouha power and traps Kouga with it. Inuyasha tries out his new ability, but Tessaiga overheats from absorbing too much youki and blows him back. Mouryoumaru still takes damage from the combined attack, though, and escapes. The group meets Naraku's newest detachment: Mugen no Byakuya. |
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| Review | ||
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This week was another "more things going on at once than you can keep track of" episode. And it ended up fusing and reworking multiple battles again much like episode 2 did.
I included 407-408 in the chapter list simply as a "kinda", since it's only the ideas that were presented in those chapters that made it here, not the fight itself. Those chapters were originally Sesshoumaru and Inuyasha vs. Mouryoumaru, but here it's Kouga and Inuyasha vs. Mouryoumaru, which indeed happened in 436 as well, but the events of 407-408 are partially played out by Kouga, too. Mouryoumaru getting Kongousouha was ridiculous in this episode. Inuyasha just shot him with it, it stuck in his shell, and he was just like, "Haha, got your attack now." It was as anticlimactic as him getting the armored shell in the first place. The Toushuu fight was thankfully abridged, because there was no reason it needed to be five chapters in the original. The anime battle may have only taken a few minutes, but I really don't think much of anything was lost. It wasn't a particularly memorable arc for me. Best Momen: OMG Byakuya, finally! His voice sounds a lot better than it did in Black Tessaiga, even though the credits still list him as being voiced by the same guy, Madono Mitsuaki. Maybe he had a cold when doing Black Tessaiga or something, because he doesn't sound nearly as nasally anymore, and almost does manage an Ishida Akira sort of feel, who was who I was originally hoping to voice him. Next week we get... holy crap lolwut? Kinka-Ginka, Yourei Taisei, AND Sesshoumaru vs. Mouryoumaru? ... Wait, back up. Sesshoumaru NEVER fought Mouryoumaru with Meidou Zangetsuha in the manga. WTF is that fight supposed to be? And why include Kinka-Ginka at all, nothing even remotely important comes of that fight other than Mouryoumaru and Inuyasha each acquiring an ability that they never use again. |
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(Meidou Zangetsuha) |
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| Original Release Date: 10/17/09 | Chapters Included: 383-385, 409-411, 505-506, 512 | Review Date: 10/17/09 |
| Summary | ||
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Toutousai pays a visit to Sesshoumaru stating that Tenseiga was reacting to a change in his heart, and that the time had come to reforge Tenseiga into a weapon. Back in the modern world, Kagome is applying to high school and studying for her entrance exams. Her grandfather tells her that the legend of the Shikon no Tama includes making the right wish on it, but he doesn't know what that wish is. Back on the trail, Inuyasha's group comes across an inn inhabited by kitsune who are undergoing their own exam, except for testing their prowess at deceiving people. Shippou pranks the group until he increases his score to his satisfaction, then runs away where he runs into a girl called Mujina. Mujina has a sword called Dakki that can absorb the youkai power of another's weapon, and Shippou, smelling "old man" on her, thinks she's out to avenge her slain father. Inuyasha easily defeats her, though, revealing her to be an old badger in disguise, much to Shippou's disappoinment. Dakki is destroyed and Tessaiga's power is returned, but Inuyasha is still uneasy about the existence of a sword like that. Back on Sesshoumaru's end, Toutousai presents him with the new and improved Tenseiga, and Sesshoumaru proceeds to attack an oni with it. The new attack creates a rift in the air that sucks its opponent's body into Hell: Meidou Zangetsuha. |
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| Review | ||
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Well, this episode certainly pulled material from a wide variety of chapters, some over 100 chapters apart. I guess in order to cram everything "exam" and "Shippou" into one episode, though the chapter where Kagome actually takes her exams is still farther into the future.
The main problem with this episode is that it is first and foremost supposed to be a "humor" episode, and humor is all dependent on timing. And with something as rushed as this series is, there's a lot of missed chances at comedic timing here. Things just happen way too quickly to be funny. Meanwhile, Sesshoumaru's off in his own little world being his usual "Sesshoumaru on the Cliff by the Sea" self, saying "Haha, I'm doing something important while you guys are all dicking around." Too bad Sesshoumaru isn't likely to appear again until his mother shows up, but at the rate the series is progressing, that'll probably be, like, episode 9. Unless they somehow stick the Numawatari thing in somewhere. The writers managed to sneak the Sango assgrab into this episode, but, as with everything else, it was rushed and so the comedic timing got thrown off too much for it to be funny. Strangely, the funniest thing I noticed in the episode wasn't intentional, but that one of the members of the kitsune trio who hangs out with Shippou originally had a swastika design on his kimono, but the anime changed it to a criss-cross box. The Nazi kitsune is no more (yes, I know the symbol had other meaning before it became more commonly associated with something else). Best Moment: The speediness of the anime actually made Sesshoumaru's first test of Meidou Zangetsuha more hillarious than it should have been. It made him seem like, "omg yey, I finally get to kill something, OOH OOH, ONI! *slice*" Though seeing how it's animated in its crescent-form was nice to see since I've only seen it in its full-circle form in the Black Tessaiga OAV (which I'm assuming will eventually be condensed down and used as episode 12-ish). Next week is the introduction of Tessaiga DS, the first in the long line of pointless Tessaiga upgrades, though all further ones minus Black Tessaiga the anime appears to be thankfully cutting out. Since the Dakki fight only spans 6 chapters (which in the original series would have been two episodes, but at this pace is only a half), I wonder what else they're going to be inserting. NTV's broadcast doesn't include the episode previews for some reason, so it's hard to say. The episode summary talks about Kouga rescuing a wolf kid from a poisonous moth, which sounds kinda like the Kai story, except that involved Byakuya, who still hasn't made his appearance yet (he's in the intro, so he's gotta show up sometime). EDIT after seeing Viz's version with the episode preview intact: Yey, Byakuya next week! And... Sesshoumaru? What are you doing here? Unless I'm forgetting something, I honestly don't remember him showing up again before the Hell arc aside from the Numawatari thing and the sneeze joke in the Kinka-Ginka battle. But I guess he needs to meet Byakuya somehow, since he already knew who he was in Black Tessaiga and the Meioujuu battle was cut. |
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(Kagura's Wind) |
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| Original Release Date: 10/10/09 | Chapters Included: 366, 370-377, 380-382, 403-407 | Review Date: 10/10/09 |
| Summary | ||
| Sango takes Kohaku back to the taijiya village to pay respect to the graves. Inuyasha and the others enter Midoriko's cave and notice a light in Midoriko's chest. Inuyasha recognizes the scent and stays behind until the light becomes a shinidamachuu and flies away with Midoriko's soul. There, Inuyasha meets Kikyou who absorbs Midoriko's soul for the purpose of influencing the Shikon no Tama and destroying Naraku. Kohaku's shard is also influenced and he leaves with Kikyou. Elsewhere, Kouga enters the grave of the Yourouzoku to get a new weapon, Goraishi, but is stopped by a stone guardian. The guardian attacks him and Kouga is unable to defeat it until he says that he doesn't need Goraishi if he has to sacrifice his companions for it, since his entire purpose is revenge for his fallen companions. He is bestowed with Goraishi and defeats the guardian with it. Kagura has a run-in with Naraku, who offers to return her heart. He does so, but also immediately stabs her with his tentacles and pumps her full of shouki, telling her to enjoy her newfound "freedom" while it lasts. Meanwhile, Sesshoumaru discovers the cave where Mouryoumaru is hiding and blows him out of it. Mouryoumaru has gained a new armored shell by devouring the youkai Meioujuu which Toukijin can't cut, and every time Sesshoumaru blasts him, Mouryoumaru merely absorbs his power. Mouryoumaru catches Sesshoumaru, but at that time Sesshoumaru catches Kagura's scent on the wind, and Mouryoumaru mocks her impending death. Sesshoumaru uses Souryuuha on Mouryoumaru which fills him with so much energy he begins to break apart, but Toukijin breaks in the process as well. Mouryoumaru escapes and Sesshoumaru immediately leaves in the direction of the scent. Sesshoumaru arrives to find Kagura fading away and makes to use Tenseiga on her, but realizes that even Tenseiga can't save her. Kagura is okay with this and says that she's glad she could at least see him in her final moments, before disintegrating into wind. |
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| Review | ||
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And here we go again combining four or five originally unrelated plotlines into one for the sake of speeding through a good dozen chapters in a single episode. However, this time around it didn't seem quite as schitzophrenic as episode 1, despite things being covered just as quickly.
The whole thing still runs like an animated "manga digest" rather than an actual interpretation of the series, since it simply bounces unceremoniously from one plot point to the next in a "this happened, then this happened, then this happened" fashion rather than actually telling a story. It almost feels like the writers are simply blowing through all the "setup" chapters to get everyone their new powers as quickly as possible so that they can spend more time on the final 50 chapters once all is said and done. The Kikyou part and Kouga part were done in a pretty straightforward manner and were simply truncated versions of their original stories, but still got the point across (though in a much more bland fashion since we weren't given enough time to really take it in before hopping to the next scene). Sesshoumaru's fight on the other hand.... eh heh... Sesshoumaru's fight was actually the fusion of two separate battles in the manga, one from 366 and one from 403. I had a hard time deciding which manga chapters to include since while it was technically a manga-inspired battle, because it fused the events of two fights into one the battle itself was technically anime-original. And since the battle was anime-original kinda-sorta... the writers just COULDN'T RESIST it, could they? FFFFFUUUUUUUU Souryuuha. At least Toukijin is broken now and we will hopefully never have to see that stupid thing again. Though I was wondering just how all this was going to work out considering Toukijin originally broke AFTER Kagura died when Mouryoumaru mocked her memory. Now it breaks before she dies when he mocks her impending death. Also... no squished persimmon Sesshoumaru, nuuuu! In the original manga battle, when Sesshoumaru gets caught by Mouryoumaru, he's completely enveloped by tentacles except for his fluff poofing out the side, which looks really silly and Jaken laments that Sesshoumaru has been squashed like a ripe persimmon. But now Sesshoumaru just gets temporarily caught. He doesn't even get impaled, either. Come on, anime, rough the guy up a bit once in a while. Although now Jaken and Rin are the peanut gallery instead of Jaken and Shippou, so we also lost the scene where Shippou jumps up and yells that Sesshoumaru is a moron. Now we just have Rin hoping he'll be okay and Jaken assuring her that he has things thought through very well (hurr hurr). The deal with Meioujuu actually cracked me up. What was originally a multi-chapter battle where Meioujuu steals Inuyasha's Kongousouha, and then Mouryoumaru captures and absorbs them both, was turned into a scene that basically went like, "Oh, hey, Meioujuu, I'm gonna eat you now. *slurp* Mmm, armor." Best Moment: Despite all the whining about things being changed, I still got choked up a bit at Kagura's death scene, even though, yeah, still too fast. Though I did also like that the anime inserted shots of Kagura throughout the episode desperately struggling to continue on despite her body giving out on her, before she finally collapses in the field and Sesshoumaru finds her. Next week, Sesshoumaru's getting his shiny new upgrade and Shippou gets to cause hijinks that originally came 100 chapters later in the manga. So... when exactly is Byakuya showing up? |
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(Naraku's Heart) |
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| Original Release Date: 10/03/09 | Chapters Included: 359-361, 367-373, 375, 392, 411 | Review Date: 10/03/09 |
| Summary | ||
| Hakudoushi tells Kagura that if she wants her freedom to release Goryoumaru from his imprisonment. Elsewhere, Kagome is working on a test at school when Inuyasha comes to pick her up, breaking her concentration. They return to the Feudal Era only to be attacked by Hakudoushi, who steals Kagome's shard Elsewhere-er, Kohaku fights a mountain dog posessed by a Hitoukon. Kagura shows up and defeats the youkai for him, then attacks Kohaku for his Shikon shard. Meanwhile, Kouga finds Mouryoumaru and fights him until he's blown apart by Kikyou. Kagura lets Kohaku escape as Inuyasha's group comes to the scene, as does Hakudoushi. Kagura tells Inuyasha's group that Naraku's heart is in the baby, who is inside Mouryoumaru. Hakudoushi says he intends to usurp Naraku, so Naraku removes Hakudoushi's barrier, allowing Hakudoushi to be sucked up by Miroku. Mouryoumaru comes after Kohaku for his shard, but Sango intervenes. She realizes Kohaku has regained his memoires and the group convinces him to come with them. |
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| Review | ||
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Weeeeelcome back Inuyasha anime! It's been five years! How's things been?
The new opening, "Kimi ga Inai Mirai" is... I dunno, I don't think particularly up to par with some of the old openings. It flashes through all the characters and attacks, yeah, but not a whole lot really "happens" in it, though it does foreshadow the final battle in the series. The episode opens without any recap or introduction and gets right to Naraku talking to Kanna. It's like the series is basically acting like the five-year break since the last episode didn't happen and we are totally freshly up-to-date with what's been going on (though the fact that the series has been available online both in Japan and the US for a while now may contribute to that). It starts there and the pacing, well... "breakneck" might even be too slow a word to describe how quickly and choppily it covers new points. Scenes bounce from one to the next with just enough dialogue to describe what's going on before moving on. It's like episode 165 on steroids in terms of pacing. The new "Chapters Included" statistic above doesn't necessarily mean that the entirety of those chapters was covered, but that something in this episode was pulled from each of the chapters listed, in some cases merely a single scene, and they also do not necessarily appear in chronological order (for instance, the modern-day scenes at the opening of the episode come from 411). A lot of the material was anime-original solely for the purpose of stringing together a lot of unrelated chapters into a much more condensed version. Hakudoushi didn't originally steal the shard, Mouryoumaru did it himself in a battle that was skipped entirely. The Kouga vs. Mouryoumaru fight also seemed to be completely original, given that they cut Kouga from the fight vs. Mouryoumaru he originally appeared in, but now the series needed to give a reason for Kouga to know who Mouryoumaru was. Best Moment: Blink and you missed it. But I have to say that the one scene in the episode where Sesshoumaru's party showed up was memorable, because it was anime original, and it was hillarious. Jaken sneezes because Inuyasha is talking about him, and he begins giving a lecture while Rin sings in the distance, "Jaken-sama, Jaken-sama, we're leaving you behind~" The ending credits, on the other hand, I think is right up there with some of the better ones. The entire cast is represented along with some really nice dramatic shots. The song is of a rather different style than previous Inuyasha fare, more along the lines of something you'd hear in more modern productions. After this cram-fest of an episode, though, which I hope was done merely as scene-setting and re-introduction of all the characters, hopefully the rest of the series will settle down to a more reasonable pacing. |
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