We've still been watching Escaflowne via Netflix, I just haven't got around to writing it up. We're through episode 20 of 26 now, and I'm rather at loose ends at the moment, so this seems like a good time to do a quick roundup. [Belated warning: No spoilers, please, or I'll have to kill you with my brain.]
Okay, the treatment of fate and its influence is annoying me. We're apparently supposed to believe Van's dead mother (she is dead, right?) when she says that Hitomi's anxiety is causing bad things to happen via her readings, but to me that just came out of nowhere, and I see no in-series reason to believe it. We've been offered no reasons why this makes sense.
Similarly, in episode 20, Hitomi blames herself for the attack on the wedding, because she tried to change fate: but she saw bad things happening and then they happened! What's to blame her for?
Possibly this ties into my chant of "more giant robots, less teenage angst!" So you can imagine how happy I am with the Van-Hitomi-Allen triangle taking on major plot significance. Gack.
Back to fate: unless this is a translation issue, it appears that the "power of Atlantis" is both an individual's will and the big power source that the King of Freid turned over to the Empire (for some reason I also didn't understand. I would've liked to see more of him, because he seemed like an interesting character, especially in his—honorable? loving?—insistence that Chid is his son, when it's obvious to anyone with eyes that biologically speaking, he's not.). Possibly I should just not think about this.
Character roundup:
- Van: still my favorite, though the romance thing bores me. I wonder if this whole "I and my giant robot are one" thing is going to come to a further plot point, or if the mind-control was it.
- Hitomi: her brief freakout about not wanting to be involved was at least brief (back after the doppelganger guy, maybe? I forget.). The current freakout isn't her fault, it's the plot making her be stupid. Still, less teenage angst, please.
- Allen: still gets up my nose.
- Millerna: not terribly interesting, though sucking it up and making a good marriage for the country is better than I expected of her.
- Dryden: I have no idea. Seriously. He is an obnoxious sarcastic arrogant stoner who gives up an entire fleet without blinking to save the life of someone he's never met before.
- Folken: I'm still waiting for him to become interesting.
- Folken's cat-women: ick ick ick. The abasement, the freaky quasi-incestuous moment, just ick.
- Dilandau: see Folken, but without the ick. Went crazy a few episodes back, I think, and hasn't been seen since?
- Emperor Dornkirk: why is he in the big snail-like thing?
But hey, I got an icon out of episode 20!