Fang fetish ++;

Yet another episode of “LOL, training”, but the introduction of Elize as a fourth member and her mock battle with Ichijo kept it interesting enough that I can’t say anything bad. It all depends on what happens next, if the arrival of Elize means it’s back to square one in terms of the sonic diver squad’s training, then I sense an incoming truck of fail. But if she is quickly and seamlessly assimilated into the team and they’re deployed to the Kouryu on schedule, I’ll be quite content with the new loli recruit.

Episode Rating: 8.5/10

Despite the news that the girls have only a week left until they are transferred to their mobile base aboard the Kouryu, things are going quite well for the sonic diver squad. The real life combat experience seems to have helped a great deal as their training exercises are going much more smoothly and falling into more than acceptable success ranges. The girls themselves are becoming well adjusted to working together, their formations becoming more fluid and their competence as a team at a high. But what fun would it be if things continued to go so smoothly, and what better way to add some tension than to add a new member to the sky girls…

Enter Elise von Dietrich, at te age of 15, she’s the youngest of the sonic diver pilots. She makes quite the entrance as she suddenly flies into one of the girls’ live training exercises, unannounced to the girls and the control team. Typical of Lt. Hizuki, he suggests letting the situation play itself out, as it’ll be an interesting way for the girls to acquaint themselves with Elize. Ichijo takes command and orders Karen to plot Elize’s predicted flight path and uses it to send Otoha to intercept and corner Elize. The newcomer admits defeat, but is unimpressed that it took all three of them to stop her, she excuses herself and flies off.

The aftermath of Elize’s introduction falls into Captain Togo’s lap as he’s bombarded with questions from the girls and the task of prepping the new equipment that came with Elize. The latter of which he dumps on to the maintenance crew, who has to spend the better part of the night setting up Elize’s sonic diver, which conveniently comes with its own spread booth, explaining how Elize was able to launch on her own earlier.

Meanwhile, the pilot is elsewhere causing problems of her own. In the cafeteria, Takumi treats the girls to some coffee as an apology for what happened during training, but Ichijo says it’s no problem, that if Elize doesn’t want to listen to them, they’ll just have to force her to. As if on cue, Elize appears behind Ichijo and starts to belittle her skills as a leader, refusing to listen to listen to her unless she proves herself stronger. Ichijo calmly stands up and suggests that they have a mock battle in the simulator, one on one, to see who’s the better pilot.

Just as the maintenance crew finish prepping Elize’s sonic diver, she shows up with Ichijo who demands its data be inputted into the simulator. Elize runs off to ready her nanoskin and motion slit while Takumi runs around trying to find Togo and explain the situation. He finds him just in time to hear Nanae report that the spread booths and simulator have been activated.

The showdown turns out to be quite evenly matched, both Elize and Ichijo unable to land a hit with conventional dogfight tactics. Otoha, Karen and the maintenance crew look on, quite impressed with the show, until Togo shows up and gives them a lecture. But not wanting to deal with the trouble, he lets the fight continue, ordering Otoha to send the two to his office for punishment afterwards.

The fight ends with Ichijo’s experience edging out Elize’s natural skill. With a sudden mode change while dodging, Ichijo uses the sun as a screen and pins Elize down not unlike the technique that was used against her by the mystery sonic diver pilot way back in the first episode.

Afterwards, Elize says that she only lost because she just arrived and isn’t in top form yet, swearing to win the next time and childishly running away.

Thoughts

Interesting episode, to say the least. I find myself liking Elize already, everything from her spunky attitude to her fang to her odd usagi mimi headband. I usually hate the types of characters that are all full of themselves and barge in like they own the place, but something about Elize makes me like her. Maybe it’s because she sorta reminds me of Becky. Oh, and being the only true DFC among the Sky Girls doesn’t hurt either :3

Aside from the new character introduction, this episode didn’t really do much in terms of moving the plot forward. We already knew about the attack on the West Europe Base and Elize’s escape. The only new information we get is that Elize’s sonic diver was supposed to be a mass production unit, which I’m guessing means better universal syncing, as opposed to Raijin, Reijin and Fuujin, who are very particular about their pilots. But unfortunately, the base was attacked before the plant could be put to use, and Elize’s sonic diver ultimately ended up as another one of a kind.

As i said before, whether Elize’s introduction turns out to be a good thing or a bad thing hinges on what happens next. We’re almost halfway through the series, so I sincerely hope that Elize doesn’t bring another wave of training episodes about, I’d probably drop the series if that were the case.

The preview for next episode looks like it’s more filler, with the girls leaving the test facility and boarding the Kouryu, Karen’s only wish is to see her brother once more before they leave. But that implies that they are actually leaving! So at the very least next episode should signal the beginning of the end for all the administrative stuff, meaning we’ll get to see the girls in action against live WORMs sooner rather than later. But I wouldn’t be surprised if it took a couple filler episodes of adjusting to life on the Kouryu before we get to that point.

Basically, I’m hoping for the best, but preparing for the worst.

You know the drill, obligatory Ichijo fanservice.

~ Shirukii ~