Short Synopsis: Luka (or what’s left of him) makes his re-entrance in this series.
Highlights: Mostly build-up, but an episode well-spent with lots of eye-candy.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10
Well.. so this week I decided to not watch the low quality raws from horribleraws (since these also mess with the video-resolution, which just doesn’t do justice to this series’ sense of visuals). This wasn’t the best timing for that decision, because it seems like the raw providers went on strike this week, explaining why this entry is so horribly late. Ah well, at least it’s not like Porfy no Nagai Tabi: it’s been TWO bloody WEEKS and still no episode 34.

In any case, like predicted, this episode started the final arc of this series. It’s of course mostly building-up, but it was an episode well-used, with especially Luka gaining some more depth. The woman he ran into was cute: she lost her boyfriend, and therefore picked him up for emotional support. There were some things I didn’t like, though. In the end, Luka found 044 due to a coincidence (this woman turns out to be a maid at the hotel 044 is staying at), and he may have been a bit too similar to a gorilla in this episode. Especially the red glowy eyes were a bit too much.

This was probably the lightest episode of the entire series (I was really surprised to see these characters in broad daylight ^^;), but at the same time, this finally allowed 044 to relax a bit, resulting into a touching scene where she was finally able to cry her eyes out and let the stress of all that happened to her go.

Okay, there are two episodes left. I think that the creators just need to focus on creating a solid final episode, centred on the action and style of the previous episodes. There’s no need for any fancy plot twists, and I can see this series actually finishing off with a satisfying climax, if the creators just do what they’re good at, there shouldn’t be any problems.

Short Synopsis: That scientist isn’t willing to give up that easily, and prepares for a second attempt to zap Tokyo, while keeping Chiko and the others out of his way.
Highlights: Excellent aftermath, apart from that climax perhaps.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10
Really, this series has a strange idea of the concept of hiatus: it stops, right after the climax, only to show an aftermath instead of starting a new and fresh arc. I must say that a lot of spring-series share these themes of fooling the viewer: Kaiba first advertised itself as a tragic love-story, Real Drive first seemed a Ghost in the Shell-clone, while it was actually a strange combination with slice of life and science fiction, Himitsu ~ The Revelation at first seemed to be a series about its stories, while the characters turned out to be its main focus instead. But the king of these games obviously is Nijuu Mensou no Musume, where you can absolutely not predict what path it’ll be heading into for the next arc. And of course its very misleading ED also counts.

In any case, I’m glad to see that the previous arc merely served as build-up for the final arc of this series. In a way, this episode was more intriguing than all the four episodes of the previous arc combined. The creators seemed to have gone for the thriller-approach to end this series, and there’s a lot of potential. What I especially liked about this episode was how every member of the cast seems to have his or her own agenda and troubles. A lot was going on in this episode and it was a lot of fun to see how everyone reacted to that beam of light in the previous episode. The angry mob also was perhaps a bit clichéd, but it did portray the anxiety of the general public, right after the war, and their fears for more casualties perfectly.

But please. Did the creators really have to end the episode with that flying airship? It’s not the fact that it’s an airship that bugs me, but out of all the possible ways that the creators could have introduced it, they went with a Deus ex Machina, and a pretty blatant one at that: you know the scenario, the hero is cornered and at the last possible moment a saviour comes from out of nowhere. I mean, the creators could have at least shown Ken as he arrived at the airship, and as he took off, he suddenly saw Chiko jumping around on the roofs.

Short Synopsis: Senkawa and Nakasugi go on a date and Natsumi and Muroto go after some rumours about Syamalan.
Highlights: Yet another episode that delivers.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8,5/10
And here I thought that this would be a simple intermezzo, where the series takes a small break, and takes its time to introduce the next arc. Instead, the creators managed to turn this episode into both an intermezzo and an episode that yet again pushes the plot forward. Especially the mysteries around Syamalan continue to tighten as this series goes on.

I must say that I like this series more and more with every episode, and it’s really one of those examples of a series that starts off rather weak, and only picks up later in the story. In fact, I see the entire first season as just one big introduction for the second season. My guess is that this first season takes care of everything around Syamalan (consider him as a sort of mid-boss), so that the second season can focus on Capella, and the guy with shades and his boss.

I’m really curious to how the creators planned to end the first season. It’s probably just going to be an average climax, where Syamalan gets stopped, but I can’t help but think how both Noein and Escaflowne’s thirteenth episode were absolutely amazing. I wonder whether the director has the same in mind for Birdy the Mighty, or would he rather provide a solid introduction for the second season instead?