Aldnoah 8, Nozaki-kun 7-8, Akame 8

The torture never stops.

Not sure what was going on at the end of Aldnoah Zero 8. Mainly, why did Saazbaum capture Slaine rather than kill him? Does he believe Slaine knows where the Princess is? How could he assume that? Another thing that confused me: how did Cruhteo fall into the hands of Cruhteo? If they spotted him among the wreckage they ought to know that the humans had their hands on a battleship … well, maybe not. It was the cheap-ass human-made mecha and Slaine’s ship that polished off Femieanne last episode, not the battleship. Still, it all doesn’t hang together. Also, why can’t they tell that the Deucalion has been revived? It all adds up to an enemy that has its head up its ass, something Rayet sums up nicely in the best speech of the episode. And we get to see Slaine tortured–a lot. Could have handled that better, unless there’s a torture-oriented fanservice I haven’t seen before. What else? Inaho states his indifference to the princess and makes another contrast between her altruistic motives and the real world. Oh, Cruhteo does his face turn, but a little too late …

Mikoto tries some new poses.

Catching up with Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun is a pleasure, though the show is beginning to show signs of fatigue. In the first story of episode 7, Nozaki has some rare free time so Sakura takes him to a shopping mall. Basically, it boils down to this: every time Sakura (or onlookers) think Nozaki’s about to do something romantic, it turns out to be work-oriented, and then Sakura reacts. They look at woman’s clothing and he just wants to study them. Same with the movie they watch, and the figurines they look at. It gets a little better when Nozaki innocently takes things too far and tries on the schoolgirl uniform himself, and spotting Mikoto looking at the figurines was good for a laugh. The second half isn’t great. Mikoto agrees to model for the art club and stresses out before, during, and after. Though the art club pose requests were amusing.

Explaining this would take forever.

As for episode 8, I think I’m losing track of the various character intentions, or they’re expressing them in such weird ways that I lose track. Kashima decides that Hori wants to be a princess and does her best to make his wish come true, which he considers more harassment. But when she carries him to the nurse’s office something changes, for a second. Now I have no idea what he’s thinking, and I’ve never been able to figure out Kashima. I don’t mean that in a bad way. It’s always entertaining to see where their non-relationship will go next. Also, that whole sequence flowed nicely from the first half, when he’s spotted with one of Nozaki’s shoujo manga, and where we learn that Hori is about the only one on the staff who can draw backgrounds. I like the little hints they give us about putting together a manga, though it makes me wonder: does Nozaki actually pay these talented people?

Sorry to see you go, bro.

Akame ga Kill 8, while sad for me because I liked Bulat, went over in an over-predictable fashion. Bulat and Liver kept pulling out bigger final moves (well, Liver did. Bulat just withstood it all) until they were both half-dead. And then Liver sort of cheated by using poison. Really, this was up to then an honorable battle between two adversaries who had been friends, etc etc, so I was sort of let down. And I was amused by how Tatsumi and his opponent would stop their own battle to gape at what the other two were doing. At one point I thought they were going to place bets. And I wondered what everyone else on the boat were thinking about the craziness going on on deck. Apart from flashbacks we only see these four people this episode. And while I was dubious about Tatsumi handling Bulat’s imperial arms, they made a good case for him doing so. Sadly, we lose this pack of villains only to introduce another crazed killer next time. I’m getting a little tired of that.