Garo: Honoo no Kokuin ep 7-8-9

Garo: Honoo no Kokuin 

It is coming to the end of the semester for me, so writing these weekly posts are getting a bit harder. Mostly because they are being interrupted with real work and everything. So at least this week’s post will be about the past three episodes. There is a decent amount to go over, so let’s just jump in. 

Episode 7 is about Leon, and really sets up where his journey for the rest of the show will be going. After being defeated by a new evil, a black Makai Knight, (bringing the count of real Knights up to 4 and only one main Makai Priest) he comes under a case of amnesia and believes he is the brother to a young girl in a town where the church every so often takes the children away to paradise. And by paradise I of course mean slavery. But the real brother comes back as a Horror, and Leon must slaughter him. The crushing defeat and then easy win sets up Leon’s next character arc. Leon has been defeated before, but usually it was his own naivety or the flaw in his armor that caused it. This time though he was just out right crushed by a superior opponent. Leon must now face his own weakness and overcome it. Personally, I feel that his greatest weakness is his combined naivety and overconfidence. The show likes to focus on his anger, and how he is seeking revenge, and those are weaknesses for a Makai Knight to have. It was explored better in the first series even. But Leon isn’t just a copy and paste of Kouga, the hero of the first Garo series. Leon is a child basically. And because of that he sees things almost selfishly. He sees his father sleeping around and acts superior for condemning it, when really his is just nervous around girls. He tries to act cool and aloof, but always ends up helping the people around him and caring a bit too deeply. Leon needs to, as a person, grow up and accept who he is, and that acceptance will lead him to being a better knight. Hopefully this will be expressed by the cracks in Leon’s armor healing. Of course that is only my interpretation of the character. I feel like the show is going more for the anger and revenge aspect a bit more, and his whole naivety thing is more for comedic relief. 

Mind you, it is funny comedic relief.

Episode 8 is interesting for three main reasons. The first is that it takes place at the same time as episode 7. Both the starting and end points are exactly the same, and even goes to explain the bizarre ending to episode 7. The second is that it is the first episode to focus solely on German, Leon’s father and wielder of the Zoro armor. We have never had an episode focus on him, and that is a shame because he is one of my favorite characters in the show. He brings this lightness that is needed for Garo, to counter act the inherent darkness of the world within the show. The third is that it’s a comedy. Garo as a franchise rarely does straight up comedic episodes, but when they do they tend to hit more than miss. While I wouldn’t want a whole series of Garo comedy, the random little bits really help to alleviate from the tension that can build up in a show like this. The episode proper is about German’s dick getting him into trouble, and ending up literally stripped of everything but is blades and the Horror detecting bell they use. Also, lighters are so much better then bells, they just look cooler. The episode is him mostly running around naked, hitting on women, being chased by military police, or the equivalent for the time period, and killing a horror real quick. All without pants! The real purpose of the episode was to explore German’s backstory a bit. He used to be a team with a Makai Priest, who was the woman who was burned at the stake in the first episode and is Leon’s mother, and another Knight who is now the evil Black Knight. They were all friendly, but the Black Knight, who was usually the most straight-edge of the group, was also the one hiding the deepest darkness. German thought his partner had sacrificed himself to save him and Leon’s mother, but is obviously still alive. I actually look forward to this being explained. German’s episode has to be one of my favorites so far. It explores the character just enough to keep him interesting, but not so far as to give everything away too early. That and seeing him run around naked was honestly hilarious. It was a good reprieve before the story needs to become serious again. 

The best thing to tell your son, in the middle of the street.

Epsidoe 9, like the two before it, starts off following only one of the main characters, but quickly brings the story back to Leon. Alfonso, the son of the king and the cousin of Leon, and Rafael, owner of the Gaia armor, have been training, mostly preparing Alfonso to become a Knight. The relationship between these two have been really interesting. You get a sense of teacher and student between these two, more so then Leon and German. Alfonso and Rafael seem more like a father and son pair then the main two even. It is time for Alfonso to prove himself, so he must go out and fight an incredibly strong and old Horror, and if he lives, he will be able to don the armor and become a Knight. He bumps into Leon, who is on a similar journey to become strong. I actually really liked the short interactions between these two. It really highlights how they are walking down two very similar paths, but each starting from very different start points. I especially like how they are both naive and terrible liars. I like to think that that just a trait of their family now. Once they actually reached the Horror though, the episode really picked up. The design of the Horror this week was amazing. It was dark and massive, a tombstone being carried by hundreds of corpses, with two large grim reapers in front to protect the nightmarish demon inside. Again, the anime is showing just how much more it can do against the limitations of live action, especially in terms of monster design. While the monster was great, the real star was Rafael. Two people cannot share the same armor, there can only be one wielder. Rafael relinquishing control of the Gaia armor to Alfonso was inspired. His death was brutal, but it acts as a good passing of the torch moment, especially when Alfonso is able to pick up his masters sword, something only a few episodes ago he wasn’t able to do. It is disappointing to see Rafael go so early though. I would have preferred for the due to stay together longer, and have more stories of Rafael training the young prince. I would have liked to see their relationship grow and change, and at the end of it Alfonso would be able to call Rafael a father, and then the armor could be passed down. As it is now, it is good, but I feel they could have let it go a bit longer and let us see those two develop a bit more. Hell, I would have loved the whole show to be about them. Sure, that means sacrificing German, but that is a sacrifice I am willing to make.

I take that back, keep this man in this show. He is amazing.

A lot has happened in the past few episodes. From gratuitous nudity on the part of German, to the addition of two new Makai Knights, one with new armor even. The show is keeping the quality high, and I am excited to see more interactions between Leon and Alfonso in the upcoming episodes. But until then, have fun watching. 

A new Gaia raises from the ashes of the old.