Garo Honoo no Kokuin eps 21-22

Garo Honoo no Kokuin

These past two episodes have been heavy on the action. That’s not to say that nothing about plot happened, but with the amount of action to plot in these past two there isn’t exactly a lot to talk about. Lets takes a look at episodes 21 and 22 of Garo Honoo no Kokuin.

Episode 21 starts with German being confronted by our band of scoobies. He tells them that the whole plan, the reason he is protecting Mendoza, is that Mendoza plans on opening a portal to Makai, the place Horrors are made, and unleashing a shit ton of Horrors on the world, using the city and its inhabitants as the sacrifice. The remaining Knights and Priests would then kill Mendoza and all the Horrors, considerably lessoning the amount of Horrors in existence, for a short time at least. This is a bad plan to start with, and one that I don’t think many Knights would agree to, given their code to protect the innocent. But it is a very Garo series villain plan. There have been attempts to do something like this in past seasons or movies, and it is an interesting moral dilemma for the heroes of the series. But good and common sense usually win out. The episode also has an amazing fight between German and Leon. Peppered though are flashbacks to Leon’s childhood, showing German as a mixed parent at best but obviously wanting the best for his son as a father and a Makai Knight. At the end we learn of Mendoza’s real plan, which is to revive an ancient Horror of legend. If the original plan is a good Garo plot, then this is the standard Garo finally plot. I swear every season has this as it’s finally. It’s not bad, it’s just expected at this point. Almost traditional. I fully expect the final battle to take place hundreds of miles above the town while falling the entire way. 

Epsidoe 22 is German turning his back on Mendoza which was apparently the plan the entire time. He fights a ton of basic Horrors and is badly injured. With the villains the loyal servant has a transformation of her own, turning into an armored demon of sorts. She looks pretty cool minus the large spikes coming out of her nipple regions. It just looks ridiculous and doesn’t work in modern day character design. On our heroes’ front, the strangest thing happened. Mendoza set a trap for them that sent them to a fake dimension. That isn’t the weird part. The weird part is that the dimension looked exactly like the modern day. Like it was a major city. And the characters didn’t notice or act like it was a big thing at all. Why would they through that in? There is no point in having it be a sky scraper city in a series that obviously takes place in the past. Unless there saying something crazy like the show takes place in the far distant future where everything went circular and we returned to the middle ages, but that’s just crazy. Outside of the set up for the final fights coming up in the next two weeks, there wasn’t much this episode outside of shear mindfuckery. 

We are quickly coming to an end to our little Garo animation and the finally is shaping up to be a great fight, but I’m not sure if anything else will be done. But until next week, keep on watching.

Garo Honoo no Kokuin ep 10-11-12

Garo Honoo no Kokuin

So I’ve been a little late with these this past few weeks. It’s been finals, and holidays, the 12 days posts, and just a lot of interruptions which led to me having to again do all three episodes in one go. Let’s not wait any longer, and take a look at the past three episodes of Garo Honoo no Kokuin.

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. 

Garo Honoo no Kokuin ep 6

Garo Honoo no Kokuin 

This week, we learned a piece of the villain’s plan, how bad ass a father can be, and that Leon is a virgin. Obviously the last piece of information was the most important. In actuality Leon is shaping up to be an interesting character. On the outset he looks like he is a cool, calm warrior type. He cares about honor and working towards his ultimate goal. Distractions of drink, money, and flesh mean nothing to him. But that is only the most visible layer. In actuality he is still young, an adult by the standards of the time period of the show, but he is still a boy, and not only because he is a virgin. I mentioned before that he is naïve as a Makai Knight, but that naivety seems to stretch further than that. While he acts calm and cool, his emotions are always surprisingly just about to boil over. He is basically just a normal teen. But this gives me hope for his growth. Yes he is an emotional youngling right now, but by the end of the show? Who knows?

Ignore the shitty play button and animewow in the corner. I needed to make screen shots fast, alright!

                On the episode itself, I want to say that is was very standard. That isn’t a bad thing, standard Garo is still getter then most things on television. While the plot of the week was just ok, I have to admit I really like the villains plans. The idea of inducing the darkness that is required to be first consumed by a Horror, and then forcing the Horror into the person is an evil yet effective plan to build an army of the damned very quickly. While they don’t get a lot of screen time this season, I am really digging the villains this season. My only complaint is in the next episode it seems to be introducing another Makai Knight. This brings the totally up to four, and this one will actually be evil. I believe the most Makai Knights we have gotten before was in season two, but I am not counting the final battle with all the Knights, I mean just named ones. And they were working off of ones from the previous season. This season alone we have gotten three brand new Knights. I feel like we might be getting too many. But on the other hand, that is a benefit of animation over live action. It costs less to draw a new suit then to manufacture one and do the CG for it. 

This is a good plan. I am happy to be a part of it!

Garo Honoo no Kokuin ep 5

Garo Honoo no Kokuin

The new episode of Garo really focuses on a topic that I haven’t talked about much in these weekly logs, and that was the Prince. The story seems to be having two separate story-lines that at some point will meet up and then both groups will go after the final boss. The Prince’s story is the Shakespearean tale of a disposed prince who will go out, raise an army, and come back home taking the throne and saving the day. He is teaming up with the Purple Knight, who we now know is the Knight of Defense Gaia. For now at least the Prince will be training under the Knight to gain the skills and powers to defeat the Horrors. I really like this, because it creates a good mirror for Leon, especially since Leon and the Prince are cousins. I am reminded of the mirror storyline from Gekiranger, which turned out really great, though that had the added benefit of the mirroring being much deeper, it involving the main character and the main villain. I hope this dual storytelling works out, as it will be something new for the Garo franchise to do and it can make for a really great story.

The Prince and his Knight

The other big thing I wanted to talk about from this episode was the idea that armors are passed down through bloodlines. This is interesting, to say the least. Before, armors weren’t necessarily passed down via blood. While the Garo armor itself is passed down this way for the most part, it was never confirmed Ryoga, who is the main character of Garo: The One Who Shines in the Darkness, is in any way related to the previous Garo, Kouga, though to be fair it isn’t said he isn’t related. The third season takes place so far in the future that Ryoga’s ancestry might be forgotten. And even if the Garo armor is passes down, we have seen other armors that are not. The Zero armor is passed down to adopted son Rei in the original series. So that makes the whole idea of blood lines in this kind of questionable. I think it is more like it is common to pass down one armor to another through a family, but it isn’t 100% necessary. And I think that means that the Prince will take up the Gaia armor before the series is over. 

This dude is seriously cool.

The anime is still going strong and has yet to, in my opinion, make a misstep. I think my only big complaint so far is that the shows focus on the overall story might eventually impede the more standalone episodes, but that has yet to be shown. So until next week, have fun watching.