The Eminence in Shadow episode 25

Rating: A-

It’s now official: Gamma is an absolute terror on the battlefield, and not necessarily for any good reason. My sympathies go nearly as much to the two unfortunates escorting/assisting her as to the Clover members trying to infiltrate Mitsuoghi. From the reactions of the former to being assigned as her support, they had to have some idea of what they were getting into.

A confident, powerful character who proves to be spectacularly incompetent in battle is a time-tested and time-worn gag in anime, but this series, naturally, is not content to aim for such a low standard. The result is one of the funniest pairs of sequences yet in this series. Seeing the normally-elegant, composed, and brilliant Gamma acting like a giddy schoolgirl at her first opportunity to fight in (presumably) a long time is fun in itself, but that just sets the stage for her keen perceptiveness and overwhelming magic power being used with absolutely no skill or restraint. And oh yeah, let’s not forget a skull capable of warping a weapon which hit her in the head. But the sharpest jokes actually come before that, in the opening scene where Gamma volunteers to deal with the intruders. I loved how everyone paused, then tried to ignore her as they considered the absurdity of her request. Nu also gets in a couple of good reactions, too, both during this and in response to learning Gamma’s apparent true age, as well as later reaction shots to Gamma’s wanton destruction.

But that’s just the purely fun part first third or so. The rest of the episode deals with furthering the counterfeiting scheme “John Smith” and the nine-tailed fox came up with last episode, how everyone in power is starting to become aware of it, and what could be done about it. That the counterfeits are actually higher-quality than the original is also an amusing twist, but one of the big questions left lingering is whether or not Shadow Garden’s elite will eventually figure out that the counterfeiting mastermind is actually Shadow. Rose, at least, has actually met Shadow in person but did not recognize him in his John Smith disguise, so making that connection may not be so simple, especially since John Smith was far less ruthless than Shadow ever is.

Another interesting aspect of the episode is what’s revealed about Gettan. We still don’t see him fully, but he is clearly a therianthrope with a big, bushy tail suspiciously similar to Delta’s. The nine-tailed fox seems to remember him as the one who slaughtered her village, but Gettan also seems to be remembering Cid in his young bandit-hunting guise at the one who defeated him – and, notably, both flashbacks are to devastated villages in a snow-covered setting. Undoubtedly there’s a connection, but that is ancillary enough to what Cid is scheming that I wouldn’t be surprised if we don’t ever get the full story. This series is one of the biggest deliberate teases ever in anime, after all.

Iris and Alexia also get a brief scene to remind us that they aren’t just casually sitting around, including a nice transition shot between the two, but that’s much more a little tidbit than a focal point. The big overall question is whether or not Cid’s absolute focus on living out his fantasy scenarios is finally going to come crashing headlong into inconvenient reality. My guess is that it will all work out in the end.