Garo Honoo no Kokuin ep13

Garo Honoo no Kokuin 

It’s a new year and with it Garo continues. Lets first talk about the new opening theme. While Garo’s opening has always been one of its weakest components, every opening theme sort of fits together. With most anime or live action shows, each opening theme of a season can be wildly different. But for Garo, no matter the season, each opening theme seems to be written for the franchise as a whole, and not just for that particular season, lyrics not permitting. I don’t mean this as a negative critic either, I like how all the opening themes seem to work together. This new opening, at first, didn’t seem to fit this theme. But as the song went on, I could see it as another good addition to the franchise. I think I prefer the first opening theme of the anime so far, but we will have to wait and see. 

                The show proper starts about where we left it a few weeks ago. Leon is awoken on the side of a river by a simple farming girl after his failed suicide attempt at the end of the last episode. German is being cared for by the woman he ran by naked twice before. Alfonso has taken up his role as prince again, and by day he rebuilds his kingdom and night he slays Horrors as Garo. While Alfonso’s and German’s stories are touched upon, mainly that Alfonso is now living this double life to protect his people and Alfonso helps where he can, the episode mainly focused on Leon. Leon is now living on this small farmstead with a girl his age, two grandparents, the girl’s mother, and their dog. At first Leon is his usually mopey self, passively looking at the world around him, and trying to figure out why he is still alive. But lowly he learns about this family, and starts to help. He digs an irrigation canal with them, he eats with them, and he even smiles. Leon is acting like a real person for once. 

                The core of this episode is Leon kind of letting it all go. At the beginning of this episode, and the end of the last one, Leon was at his lowest, suicidal even. He was a broken man who had lost all that he cared for. He lost his chance for revenge. He lost his Armor, the only thing that he had inherited from his mother. He was shamed and defeated at his strongest, by someone who had been a Makai Knight for a shorter period of time. But now Leon doesn’t have to worry about all this. He has to worry about this nice family, like whether or not their harvest will come in good or their irrigation system will work well. The question is how far he will take this. Will Leon ignore all that he has seen, all the monsters and heroes that he has seen, all the magic and evil that he has witnessed, for this idyllic farm life? Or will he stay long enough to get back on the horse and go out and fight again? Leon is at a cross roads and I am honestly interested in seeing which direction he will take. Hopefully this little weekly blog will work better this year than it did the last. So until next week, have fun watching.