(The Bond of Two - Use the Shikon Shard) |
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| Original Release Date: 09/13/04 | Review Date: 09/13/04 |
| Summary | |
| After hearing that Gakusanjin has been killed, Inuyasha's group finds some youkai-slaying children. However, the children are untrained and are only powerful because of jars that shoot light. They follow the children back to their temple and meet Goryoumaru, a man with a youkai attached to his arm that shoots light like the jars. Kagura feels that the temple is connected to Naraku's baby, so attacks, but Goryoumaru shoots her through the chest. This convinces Inuyasha's group that Goryoumaru is not Naraku's ally, so they leave.
Meanwhile, Kagura is found by Sesshoumaru. She gives him the youki crystal used for tracking Fuyouheki and informs him of the location of Naraku's heart, then leaves. Hakudoushi intercepts her, and they return to the temple to kill Goryoumaru. Led by Kagura, Inuyasha's group follow the retreating Hakudoushi and the baby to a giant stone ogre. Inside, they find Naraku. Naraku brings the ogre to life and Inuyasha realizes that even Kongousouha can't pierce its stomach. He takes Kagome's Shikon shard in order to power up Tessaiga, but once out of Kagome's hands and in the polluted aura of the ogre, the shard becomes corrupted and turns Inuyasha into his full youkai form. Kagome rushes out to hold onto him, thus purifying the shard and brining Inuyasha back to his senses. He fires off an enhanced Kongousouha and breaks out of the ogre. |
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| Review | |
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Thaaaaat's it, everyone! The end of the series! And, I must say, the pacing was much better than last week's episode. All good, all good.
Now, the thing I was most wanting to see in this episode was Goryoumaru, simply because I wanted to see what sort of anime character design they'd give him, not to mention his voice. They went the deep voice route with him, and he came across quite nicely as an ambiguously good/bad guy. And the Gyouja... dear god, the Gyouja were CUTE! "We're gonna laser you! Waaaah, we're gonna run hom and tell Goryoumaru on you!" There was this added thing about Kagome's shoes that I really didn't understand. One of her shoes had a rip in it, and it fell off a couple of times, but at the end, she gets a new pair of shoes. Maybe it's supposed to be symbolic of "well, the old journey is all old and busted, so now it's time for a journey of new hotness!" The seiyuu commentary at the end was fairly ambiguous of any sort of animated sequel, but that was expected. "Thanks for watching, read the manga, watch the movie, yadda yadda..." There was also no "Inuyasha's Jar" segment on this episode (though the obvious contents of the well would have been Inuyasha and Kagome). Oh yeah. Best Moment. Obviously, the purified Inu firing off a Kongousouha with Kagome holding him up. I mean, duh. I was kinda miffed that there weren't very many good shots of pure Inu's face, but oh well. It was still a very nicely-animated segment. At the end, Kagome collapses, and then it's Inuyasha's turn to hold her up. Awww. The other scene I really wanted to see was the Kagura/Sesshoumaru encounter, which was handled... okay. The earlier scene of Kagura approaching Sesshoumaru and giving him the youki crystal was cut and instead infused into this scene. Because of this, Kagura seeking out Sesshoumaru when she was in trouble seemed a bit random, since the earlier scene of her confiding in him was merged into this one. At least they kept the scene of Rin and Jaken getting swept away. Last week's episode cut just about all the humor scenes to save on time. The end credits played "My Will" and played a character montage of Sesshoumaru, Kikyou, Naraku, Hakudoushi and Mouryoumaru (PUT ON SOME PANTS!!!), and.... KOUGA?! Ha ha, he got a cameo in the end credits. Poor wolf got written out of the series. At the end, everyone was running off into the sunset, basically saying, "And the journey goes on, and we'll follow Naraku until we kill him! THE END!!!" I'm actually pretty satisfied with the ending, aside from one scene that they could have done without: Sesshoumaru standing over Goryoumaru's empty grave. Everything else sort of had some closure, but that one scene just suddenly left a loose end that didn't particularly need to be there. And Rin wasn't hanging off Sesshoumaru's fluffy, to boot. :P Anyway, that is all. If there's more, there's more. If not, the manga reviews will still continue until that part's over. Until then... thanks for watching! |
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(The Greatest Clue to Defeating Naraku) |
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| Original Release Date: 09/06/04 | Review Date: 09/06/04 |
| Summary | |
| Inuyasha's group learns that Naraku stole Fuyouheki, a stone that can conceal his youki. They get some youki crystals from the mountain youkai, Gakusanjin, in order to track him. Meanwhile, Naraku tests out Fuyouheki by sneaking up on Kikyou. Affirmed that it works, he gives Fuyouheki to the baby. Elsewhere, Hakudoushi creates the soulless youkai Mouryoumaru out of spare parts and sics him on Inuyasha. | |
| Review | |
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Holy pacing change! Unlike the usual canon episode, which tends to contain no more than three chapters worth of material, this one crammed in EIGHT friggin' chapters. And you could tell, too, considering we had, like, three kinda unrelated things all happen within the span of 20 minutes.
The episode ran a lot like a recap episode, aside from the fact that it was all new material. They'd dwell on a topic just long enough for us to understand it, then move on to something else. Therefore, the pace of the episode was REALLY rushed, and there was a LOT of stuff cut. Most notably Kouga. That's right, there was no Kouga to be found in this episode, even though this is where he was supposed to return. Because of this, the fight with Mouryoumaru took no more than two minutes, since Kouga was no longer there to get in the way of anything. Notably, the scene where Kohaku reveals to Kagura that he has his memories back was also cut. Best Moment: ... Uh, they skimmed over everything so quickly, it's kinda hard to pick. But it was cool to see Mouryoumaru in action, in all his pantsless glory. I guess he doesn't obtain his "part" until he gets a soul. *cough* The Naraku vs. Kikyou thing didn't look as neat as it does in the opening credits, and I still think that it went by too fast. It was just like *poof* there's Naraku. Yeah, I know that's how it happened originally, but I was expecting a little more "looming" first. Oh well. And next week... is the end! In which they're cramming 11 chapters into two episodes! That's five and a half chapters per episode, which isn't quite as bad as this week, but then again, this week cut out a lot. If they rush the Kagura boobies or the youkai Inu thing, I will be one unhappy puppy. |
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(The Strongest Enemy - Parasitic Pupa Shippou) |
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| Original Release Date: 08/30/04 | Review Date: 08/30/04 |
| Summary | |
| A parasite that possessed a kitsune god now latches onto Shippou, causing him to make a mess of the town. After numerous attempts to subdue him are unsuccessful, Inuyasha finally slices the bug off Shippou. They follow it and find many more of its kind, leading them to wonder where they all came from and if they have anything to do with Naraku. | |
| Review | |
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So, at the beginning of today's episode we get a recap of going to the grave and getting Kongousouha, followed by the subsequent ratting adventure. And then Naraku steals Fuyouheki and is toting it around feeling way too proud of himself at the end of the episode. "Ha ha, I swiped an orby thing off a pedestal. FEAR ME!"
Best Moment: I don't care if this was reused from the manga best moments. Propeller-head Inuyasha rules! Coupled with Kappei's sound effect of "Nyrrrr..." while floating away, it was just awesome. ^_^ Actually, this episode had a lot of characters making strange sound-effects. Except the "Ah!" I don't recall hearing Miroku make the "Ah!" sound when Shippou ate him. I was sad. There was an added scene at the beginning where, in order to trap the kitsune god, Inuyasha ties Shippou to a tree, claiming that the kitsune will come save its baby. Sure enough, the god shows up, but then trys to EAT Shippou. XD The weird thing about this episode was that, even though it was a Sakuma episode, only about half of it actually looked like his artwork. There were some parts that looked downright Nakanishi-ish. But, Sakuma has a history of inconsistancy, so it's always hard to tell what you're going to get from him. I still think that one of the other directors would have played of the slapstick of this episode better. For the most part, it seemed done "by the book", and while it was animated okay, it wasn't particularly memorable. Next week... I have no idea what's going on. There's at least five chapters worth of stuff depicted in the preview alone, and I wasn't expecting Mouryoumaru to show up in the anime at ALL, but no, there he is, in all his pantsless glory. He's an easy enough character to skip if they want to get to chapter 355 for the ending, but he becomes such a major plot point later, it seems silly to keep him if they're not going to do anything with him. It also looks like they wrote Kouga out of the fight, though. XD |
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(Kohaku, Sango, and Kirara and the Secret Flower Garden) |
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| Original Release Date: 08/23/04 | Review Date: 08/23/04 |
| Summary | |
| Kohaku goes back to the taijiya village and finds Kirara getting attacked by youkai. They team up and kick youkai butt, and Kohaku decides it's okay to spill his guts to the cat. Sango comes looking for Kirara, so Kohaku runs away. | |
| Review | |
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In this episode... absolutely nothing happened. But you know what? That's okay! Because it's Ikeda, and all the not-happening stuff was still a lot more awesome than the series is on average. Really, Kyoto Animation needs some serious lovin' for the episodes that they put out, because they are DEFINITELY the hilight of the series. It's too bad that this is their final episode. I'll miss their work.
Best Moment: The missed encounter. Sango goes running, calling out for Kohaku, while Kohaku hides behind a tree. He desperately restrains himself from reaching out to his sister, and ends up breaking down into tears. It's like... dang. Really, this episode was just one emotional roller-coaster ride. For the first half, we're treated to a bunch of flashbacks of Sango and Kohaku as UBER adoreable little kids, doing all sorts of fun, happy stuff. And then it seems like Kohaku has a serious older sister complex, as he brings her a bouquet of flowers from his secret garden. In the present, Kohaku takes Kirara to his secret place, and wishes that he could show it to his sister. After Sango comes looking for him and he escapes, Kirara takes her there in his stead. Man, I'm having a horrible time putting this episode into words, since there was so little actual action in it. It's just something you have to see to appreciate. At the end, Hakudoushi made a cameo, but didn't talk. And it seriously weirded me out, since this is the first he's appeared in the anime since... yeah... happened in the manga. Next week, however, is the psycho Shippou episode, which I hope Sakuma can give fair treatment. He did okay with 162, but... |
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(Together Forever with Sesshoumaru-sama) |
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| Original Release Date: 08/09/04 | Review Date: 08/09/04 |
| Summary | |
| Rin is abducted by a youkai, Ongokuki, who spirits children away with flute music. Monks, led by Ungai, come and rescue Rin and the other kidnapped children, but Sesshoumaru appears to take Rin back. The monks attack him, forcing him into a rage, but Sesshoumaru manages to wipe out the monks without actually killing them. Given the choice to return to the human village or stay with Sesshoumaru, Rin naturally choses Sesshoumaru without question. | |
| Review | |
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Aww, ish teh CYUUUUUTE! XD Well, I guess. But, the question that a lot of fans had been bringing up was brought up in this episode: How can Rin stay with Sesshoumaru if he will vastly outlive her? Rin doesn't really seem to care, though.
Best Moment: "Huh?" XDDD Man, that was adoreable. At the very end of the episode, Rin asks that Sesshoumaru not forget her when she dies. Sesshoumaru's reaction is a vaguely taken-aback, "Huh?" It wasn't anything showy or exagerrated, it was just a subtle change in his expression that was just like, "Wha...?" Not to mention that scene is the first time in a LONG time that there's been any sort of dialogue between Sesshoumaru and Rin that wasn't along the lines of "Let's go." It was just one line, but... ah, I'm happy. ^_^ Also, this episode brought up that Rin is more wary of people than she is of youkai, because humans killed her family, but a youkai saved her. It seems like everyone, from Rin to Kagome to Miroku, got lectured about hanging out with youkai in this episode. Even though this was a Sakuma episode, the animation was not too shabby at all, which was a refreshing surprise. Some of the fight scenes between Sesshoumaru and the monks were downright awesome, though I admit it looked kinda silly seeing the troupe of monks running in circles around Sesshoumaru and pelting him with sticky notes of doom. Oh yeah. Inuyasha was human in this episode. I don't know why the writers figured he needed to be, but he was. And he was just wandering around in the open in his human form, to boot! He's just lost all wariness about his weak points, I guess. I can't really give an opinion on the next episode preview, because it was quite possibly the shortest preview ever. o_O It was like, "Sango was born in the taijiya village! See you next time!", and I was like, "Uh... okay". It looks like it's mostly flashback. And Sango skipping is scary. |
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(The Monk Miroku's Past Mistake) |
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| Original Release Date: 08/02/04 | Review Date: 08/02/04 |
| Summary | |
| The group goes to a village assaulted by earthquakes, only to find a girl, Shima, who claims that she was betrothed to Miroku two years ago. The master of the lake, who had been causing the earthquakes, comes to take Shima as his bride, forcing Miroku to protect her, which in turn makes Sango jealous. However, when the lake monster threatens Sango, Miroku goes all-out to protect her, and an uneasy trust is restored. | |
| Review | |
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Well, hello manga filler from way farther ahead in the story. Granted, since it was more or less stand-alone, moving this story earlier really had no effect on the continuity of the story, aside from one minor detail that the anime glazed over: At the beginning of the manga chapter, Miroku was upset because he'd gotten the youki crystal stolen by Mouryoumaru, but in the anime, he was just generally upset (since, of course, they haven't met Mouryoumaru yet in this timeline).
Best Moment: Man, since this spans three chapters and I had Best Moments for each of them, that kills three moments right there that I can't use. ... Um... ... Well, this episode was certainly filled with a LOT of visual gags. Like Nushi-sama blowing kisses at Shima, and having the little hearts shatter when they hit Miroku, who was standing in front of her. And it seemed like every other line cut to Sango going, "DOH!" I kind of have a gripe with how the anime handled the battle at the end. Originally, it all happened in the lake, but now Miroku sucks up all the water in the lake in order to fight Nushi-sama. This kinda kills the amusing scene at the end of the chapter with Miroku paddling around after Sango. Now he's just walking after her, stepping on Nushi-sama occasionally. Now, the preview for the next episode... Uh. It's Sess/Rin filler, I'll give you that, and it's Sakuma, which doesn't usually excite me, but... whoa. It's Sesshoumaru vs. the Monk Brigade, apparently, and somehow they have to get through it without killing anyone. And Kagome reading that episode title just cracked me up. Next week will be even worse, with Inuyasha reading it. XD |
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(The Violent, Two-Timing Boy who Invites Happiness) |
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| Original Release Date: 07/26/04 | Review Date: 07/26/04 |
| Summary | |
| Kagome goes back home to work off Inuyasha thinking about Kikyou. Her mother gives her a second-hand bike, which Inuyasha proceeds to break. Kagome goes to school and gripes about this to her friends, who decide they want to meet him. In an attempt to reimburse for the bike, Inuyasha attempts making diamonds with Kongousouha, but can't get it to work, so settles for working part-time for Jii-chan. He pops in on Kagomes friends while they're sitting in her room (he's wearing a bandana to hide his ears) and they decide he's pretty cool. In the end, Kagome decides she doesn't need the bike after all. | |
| Review | |
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It sure seemed like the break for the anime was longer than a week. But, it's finally back, and the anime has now caught up to my manga reviews. And therefore, since this was the first chapter I really got in-depth with and remembered clearly... wow, it was almost completely the same in the anime.
Best Moment: Inuyasha vs. the bike. Inuyasha 0, bike 1. Kagome's mom gives him some onigiri, which he proceeds to scarf down and then goes after the bike with a vengeance (all while battle music is playing in the background). He finally does a Sankon Tessou on that sucker, and the bike is a threat no more. There's an added part about Inuyasha wanting to use Kongousouha to make diamonds, but he ends up blowing away half the hilltop and almost hits a plane. And is anyone else wondering why Souta was carrying around a diamond ring in the first place? The anime writers also caught themselves, considering Kagome's friends technically first met Inuyasha back in episode 128, so they made sure to make note of that. But, man, some of the line delivery was just priceless. "Haa-huuu?" Next week is more manga filler that originally came way later in the storyline, but was likely moved to have all the filler in one spot instead of interrupting the flow of the story. It has giant floaty Sango head of doom. |
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(Kohaku's Determination and Sango's Heart) |
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| Original Release Date: 07/12/04 | Review Date: 07/12/04 |
| Summary | |
| Hakudoushi whips out some slugs that eat the mayose tree and send the rats into a frenzy. Meanwhile, Sango beats on Kohaku, but the rats, angry at being deprived of their tree, go smother them. Inuyasha arrives on the scene and turns the zushi into toothpicks, while Kohaku escapes again, reluctantly. | |
| Review | |
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Hooooly recap. I guess because they were only covering two chapters with this episode, they needed to fill up the rest with something, but dang... Took up, like, a quarter of the episode.
But, man, Kohaku needs hugs. I can't give him hugs, but I can give him the Best Moment. He's just all like, "Aaah, I wanna tell her, I wanna tell her! ... CRAP! Saimyoushou! And Hakudoushi!" And even though this was a Sakuma episode, the animation didn't suck as much as it often does when under his direction. Although Hakudoushi suddenly looked like he was 20. Maybe it's because they only had to animate about 12 minutes worth of new stuff instead of the usual 20. :P Well, next week is another Conan-induced break, and then the week after that is manga-based filler. And it's also where my anime reviews catch up to my manga reviews. o_O Have I really been doing this that long? I'm gonna have to figure out a way to not re-use Best Moments... |
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(Stampede of Countless Youkai Rats) |
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| Original Release Date: 07/05/04 | Review Date: 07/05/04 |
| Summary | |
| Naraku's not too happy that Kikyou's arrow hurt his little boy, so sends Hakudoushi out to go make a mess. And lure out Kikyou. So, Hakudoushi figures that releasing a crapload of man-eating rats should do the trick. Meanwhile, Kohaku, who has his own will back, doesn't think that's a very nice thing to do, but also doesn't want to say anything to give himself away. Kikyou, on the other hand, plays pied piper and sends the rats into orbit via a mayose tree. Sango figures that she should stop the source of the rats, and who does she find there? Kohaku, you've been a bad boy. Maybe. | |
| Review | |
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I know I've said time and time again how much I love Ikeda and Kyoto Animation's animation, so I won't get into that here.
... Yes I will. ::bowgrovelworship:: Oh, happy moving pictures! Man, it was just like... la. I actually had to watch the episode twice before writing this review, because I got so caught up in the pictures that I was ignoring the dialogue. ^_^* And the thing is, I can't really point out anything that was particularly awe-inducing, other than it was Ikedamation, which always leaves me going "Ooooooooh". I mean, content-wise, it wasn't a terribly exciting episode, but it just LOOKED so good. Best Moment: Hakudoushi the little bastard. Just about everything he did today just reeked of, "Check me out, I'm evil!" Not to mention he was floating around naked for a while. And we got to watch him get dressed. I just liked the way he was lazily hanging out on the cliff watching the rats and going "Ha ha!" at the silly little people below. And... someone kick Kagome. WTF is she so pissed off about? Must be her time of the month or something, since she just nails Inuyasha with "Osuwari" after "Osuwari" with no real reason. Maybe she's just irate that there was no resolution in the previous episode about how they got out of the grave, other than "go through the gate", even though a dozen episodes earlier, there was a whole episode dedicated to how they COULDN'T go through the gate. But poor Kohaku, though. Next week's gonna get angsty again. |
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(Pierce Through Naraku, Kongousouha) |
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| Original Release Date: 06/21/04 | Review Date: 06/21/04 |
| Summary | |
| Housenki instructs Inuyasha to cut him to take his youkai powers, but Inuyasha is unable to do so and ends up getting showered in diamond shards instead. Meanwhile, Sesshoumaru is ineffectively hacking away at Naraku and releasing shouki to poison everyone. Therefore, Inuyasha gives up on gaining new power in favor of protecting everyone from the shouki, but it turns out his kind heart allowed him to inherit the new power anyway, and he lays the smackdown on Naraku with his new diamond attack, Kongousouha. Inuyasha, Sesshoumaru, and Kagome each get their turn at smiting Naraku, but he STILL manages to get away, sans jewel shard, though. | |
| Review | |
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Whee! It's new attack time! Unfortunately, the anime just re-used all the Kongousouha footage from the opening when Inuyasha finally fired it off, but at least there was the addition of Kappei screaming "KONGOU.... SOOOOUUUU HAAAAAA!!!!", which made up for it. At least the sequence of the sword actually turning diamond was new, and looked pretty darn cool.
Best Moment: The pwnage of Naraku. Okay, they didn't actually beat him, but they came DARN close. While Naraku does tend to emote more than Sesshoumaru in general, it was still pretty cool seeing the look of utter "OMGWTF!!!1" on his face. And then when he got back to his house and his kids, there was the general air of "Holy crap, we almost got screwed! Hakudoushi, SPEAK TO MEEEE!!" I'll bet Kagura and Kohaku were silently going "Woo-hoo!" to themselves. I should mention Jaken, too, since he's a cute little bugger, and he was certainly extra cute today. He spent most of the episode screaming incoherently at the shouki, but he did get to hang out with Shippou and root for Kagome. The poor guy. Hanging out with Sesshoumaru is certainly hazardous to his health. And through all that, no, we were still never explicitly shown how the heck they got back to the world of the living, other than the vague mention of "the gate will be closing soon, so you should follow Sesshoumaru". With the big deal they made about not being able to get back a couple episodes ago, they really should have made it something a tad more complex than that. Because that means the only reason Sesshoumaru was beckoned to come back to the grave at ALL was so that he could provide Inuyasha's way out. Nah, Dad's not playing favorites here... |
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(Decisive Battle in Front of the Grave! Sesshoumaru vs Inuyasha) |
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| Original Release Date: 06/14/04 | Review Date: 06/14/04 |
| Summary | |
| Sesshoumaru does some gate guard pwnage and is able to freely pass through the gateway to the boundary world. Back at the grave, Naraku has stolen Housenki's shard, and it turns out nothing can get through his barrier, including the kitchen sink (Bakuryuuha). But then Sesshoumaru comes flying to the rescue. | |
| Review | |
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Jeez, talk about a horridly misleading episode title. Not only was there no "Sesshoumaru vs Inuyasha", there wasn't much of a "Decisive Battle" going on, either. Unless you count Inuyasha: "I'm gonna throw everything I have at you! YAH YAH YAH YAH YAH!" Naraku: "Yeah, whatever. ::takes shard::" as "decisive". Naraku decidedly got the shard. For the moment. Woo hoo. Best Moment: Well, it was exactly like the manga. And the animation was so "ho hum" it was almost like watching the manga panel-by-panel in color. But I did kinda like the effect of the pulsing sound of Tenseiga overlayed on the guards running in slow-mo. I have no idea why, other than it was probably the only effect in the episode that stood out as being more impressive than watching the episode frame-by-frame, in black-and-white, and on mute (aka, just reading it). At least Sesshoumaru's theme music was appropriately tossed in when the gate opened. Even so, this episode went by really fast. Probably because they ended up cramming in three manga chapters plus the recap and random flashbacks. And both Inuyasha and Sesshoumaru yelling at their swords. I really don't have much more to say about the episode, other than I really liked this part in the manga, but it's kinda "meh" in the anime. Hopefully next week will be better, with the introduction of Kongousouha. |
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(The Oni that Guards the Shikon Shard) |
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| Original Release Date: 06/07/04 | Review Date: 06/07/04 |
| Summary | |
| Inuyasha and company follow Naraku down the river of blood flowing from Tekkei's beheaded body, which leads to the next world. Once there, they are attacked by Housenki, who is guarding Inuyasha's father's remains... and the Shikon shard! | |
| Review | |
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This is one of those episodes that contains a lot of stuff I remember very vividly from the manga. ... And it's kind of one of those "Hm, that's not the way I pictured it" sorts of episodes. First off, Tekkei's blood was purple and had the consistancy of water, which I guess they had to do considering the series's timeslot (7:00pm), and therefore have certain content guidelines. The faces in the blood weren't as creepy as they were in the manga, either.
The anime also added this weird thing where the black pearl in Inuyasha's eye kept making him zone out and flash back to his childhood. Um... yay? Maybe there was a reason for this that I didn't catch during the initial watch-through, but I can't really think of what it would be. ^_^* Best Moment: Through all that, though, Housenki stole the show. They don't call him "Daiyoukai" for nothing! He just went a-smiting everything, and then became DARK HOUSENKI and did more smiting. Plus he had a really nifty voice. Inu-papa had an awesome voice as well (in the movie; he's not in the episode :P), so I guess it comes standard with being a daiyoukai (and I guess it IS "daiyoukai" and not "taiyoukai", as Myouga actually used the word in the episode, and it sure sounded like "dai" to me). So, the episode ended with Inuyasha being knocked into the bottomless pit of misty death, but we know that no one is ever dead when they fall off a cliff (Toukajin being an exception), so he'll be back next week... to get his butt kicked by Sesshoumaru, apparently, even though neither the episode preview on Yomiuri's site nor the preview at the end of this episode depicted anything non-canon (which is what an Inu/Sess fight at this point would be). I'm kinda wary of next week's episode, anyway, since even though Sunrise doesn't have the director's list updated on their site yet, I'm almost positive 156 is being done by Sakuma, because the art and animation in the preview is... horrid. -_- |
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(The Youkai that Links the Next World) |
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| Original Release Date: 05/31/04 | Review Date: 05/31/04 |
| Summary | |
| Inuyasha meets with Kikyou and she gives him an arrow covered in soil from Onigumo's cave. The group then heads to the birds' nest, but finds that Naraku has already been eaten by Abi-hime's mother, Tekkei. Or not, as Naraku proceeds to burst out of Tekkei's head and smite Abi. Time to open the path to the next world! | |
| Review | |
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Sigh... as I thought, this episode didn't hold a candle to the intensity of last week's. The artwork was almost painful at times, with a few scattered still shots that were at least passable. The fact that a clip from the end of 153 began the episode didn't help mask the stark difference in visual quality between the two directors.
However, the flaming hell-hen was okay, at least. This episode is really all we get to see of her, so I guess they tried to make sure she didn't suck. She really does look like a chicken... She's a chicken, I tell you! A giant chicken! Best Moment: Bye bye, birdie! Abi's death was kind of anticlimactic, but that's how it was in the manga as well. First she got her arm dissolved, then she got impaled on Naraku's tentacles, and then she was gone. It was nice while it lasted, but all new villains beyond Kanna don't live to see more than a handful of episodes (I guess Hakudoushi is an exception). Today was also the start of season 6, with the new opening "Angelus" by Shimatani Hitomi. It was very... Latin. Like Mambo/Salsa/Conga dance-party fun-happiness. The intro was a nice montage of teaser clips, though, and given its content, season 6 will extend at least to manga chapter 355. Kanna and the baby were strangely absent, however, and Hakudoushi only got one quick shot superimposed over the Mayose tree. Plus we got our first look at the anime version of Kongousouha, which will be appearing in three weeks. Look forward to it! |
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