Yup, this really is a calm-before-the-storm-episode. The pieces are set in the right spot for the finale, and the characters mourn about the things that happened in the previous episode. Finally, the parents of the different children decide to take away their glasses, because it’s now really clear that these things are dangerous. With Kanna and 4423, the details were vague, and most people just assumed that they just died, but it seems that Isako’s case went all over the news, and it’s finally become clear that the cyber-world isn’t something for children to play with.

A lot of time is also spent on Yasako, mourning about the loss of Densuke, and I loved the details put into it. Like everyone else, Yasako is really starting to doubt whether the cyber-world is real, and blames the fact that she can’t cry for Densuke on the fact that he’s just a bunch of codes, while in fact she still can’t accept that he’s gone. I think that that’s because she was surrounded by Isako and Haraken, who both lost someone important to them. For the past few episodes, we’ve seen how Yasako tried to help both of them recover from their troubles, though I think that she never really imagined how it must feel to lose a loved one. That’s what she finds out in this episode.

And ZOMG, I totally forgot about Mayumi! This series is very sneaky in that, mentioning things early in the series that only turn out important near the end of the series. Densuke being kidnapped, Yasako’s grandfather’s room and others are examples of this too, and it really took me a while to realize that Yasako actually DID have some problems in her previous school. According to Wao, she got into a fight with Mayumi. Yasako believes that Mayumi was the one who started bullying her, while it was in fact Yasako who started the bullying.

Another thing I loved about this episode, despite how quiet it was when compared to the other episodes of this series, was how I could relate to so many things. Okay, I may never have seen the death of a loved one, but I can understand Yasako in trying to relate to people who did experience it, because I’ve been doing that very often with different anime-series. It also felt really nostalgic when the parents started confiscating the glasses of their children. The story about Mayumi and the bullying also brought back memories. I think everyone has done some thing in their pasts that they aren’t quite proud of…

And with this episode, some of the final left in this series are answered: why did some survive, and what is Takano after? This episode explains about operation #34, where basically the entire village is killed before they have the time to become paranoid. The reason why Keiichi wasn’t killed in the third arc was because nobody knew where he went, and he was only discovered afterwards by some non-Yamainu. If I had to guess, then he was killed immediately afterwards by the same woman who killed Satoko in the first arc of the second season, because their symptoms would develop in time anyway, making them claw their own throats. The reason Rena was the only one who managed to survive was because she was the only one who managed to get cured by Keiichi, so there was no need to kill her. It’s a shame Rika doesn’t remember this, as it would have been a key to keep surviving.

Then, the reason Takano does everything is finally revealed: to put the blame on the bastards who turned down the work of her grandfather. There’s probably more to this, since she kept yelling about being t=a god-like person, but I’d like her to have such a simple goal. It makes much more sense than becoming the next Oyashiro-sama.

I really wonder how this series plans to end… I mean, with this, there are just five episodes left. Higurashi has been building up for quite a while now, but it has to make up for this with some pretty amazing climaxes. How can they turn this into something more than just “Takano dies and everyone lives happily ever after”? Will the creators really be able to trump the highlights of the first season in the end? Overall, I’d say the two seasons are about the same quality right now. The first season had a better feel, was more intriguing and had better climaxes, but the second season has been much more consistent and it managed to avoid the flaws in the script of the first one, but on the other hand, it’s just too slow at times…

Really, writing a review for this series is going to be incredibly tricky…

Whoa… seriously…. I expected this series to take the same path as Les Miserables and Perrine, where the first season would be used to quietly introduce the different characters and settings, especially since Perrine has been a rather quiet series while Perrine and her mother have been travelling through Easter Europe.

And then Sara comes, and already delivers such a powerful episode, so early in the series, where Sara has to say goodbye to her father. She really is something different from your usual spoiled child, and the bond between her and her father is huge. This probably is due to the loss of her mother, which made a major impact on the two of them.

The majority of the episode is filled with Sara, trying to find Emily. It becomes even clearer that she’s got a lot of imagination, and sortof lives in her own world. And because she’s so innocent, she probably also gets her way. It’d be interesting to see in the future episodes when she doesn’t. The head of the school she’s in already suspects that she’ll cause huge amounts of troubles when that happens, though she looks more like someone who hides her sadness, like this episode showed how both Ralph and Sara refused to cry in front of each other. One thing’s for sure, though: the people in the school are going to have to get used to Sara’s strange personality.

Ow bugger. Saiunkoku Monogatari kept getting more interesting with every single episode progressing, and now the creators have to tease us with a recap-episode. Basically, the important moments for Suou and Shuei of the past six episodes are recapped, suggesting what some of the commenters have indeed been hinting at, that the two of them will play a major role in the upcoming arc. There is a bit of new material here and there, but that’s mostly quirky dialogues between Seiran, Ryuuki and Kouyuu. I did appreciate the few serious scenes amongst them, though.

2007 has really been a bad year for the Mahou-Shoujo genre. I’m not really going to expect Shugo Chara to become better than Sasami Mahou Shoujo-club of last year. This episode also showed that the creators are going to settle for the story of the manga with fillers now and then to fill the time of a 26-episode-series, despite how I hoped for them to just go with their own version of the story.

Still, this episode wasn’t that bad. It had no bad egg of the week, and finally put someone other than Amu in the spotlights. The result is a silly adventure where Ami and the Shugo Charas go on a treasure-hunt. Quite fun and random. The other characters also go through a bit of development, and we meet three new bad guys: the one who’s behind everything and tries to look evil behind his “Easter”-desk, a red-haired woman and the yellow-haired girl we’ve been seeing in the OP.

It’s indeed like expected: Amu has Embryo. Otherwise, there’d be no way to explain why she has three Shugo Charas and can transform, while the others can’t. It’d be great if the creators showed why Amu of all possible people has it. I’m still not sure whether she’s going to be a good main character for this series, though. On one side, her case is interesting, about the facade she puts up in front of others, and she’s got a nice sense of humour. On the other hand, her whining against the Batsu-Charas for the past few episodes grew more obnoxious with every episode.

I may have chosen the wrong shows to blog this season with Shugo Chara and Suteki Tantei Labyrinth. It’s ironic, at the start of the season, I tried my best to predict which series would turn out the most interesting, and I somehow ended up choosing these two above Mokke, which is getting better and better with every episode. It’s going to be a nice experiment, though. I wonder whether both series will be able to turn out excellent in their second halves. It’s not like these two series aren’t fun; actually, they’re quite enjoyable, but I just can’t see them become among the best series of the season.