Rating: B+
Original novelist Isuna Hasekura is most commonly lauded for the way he uses medieval (and sometimes modern) economics as foundational plot elements in his story arcs, but another area he excels at is driving tension. Even if you know what’s coming – whether because of reading the novels or seeing the first adaptation – his content always does an impressive job of generating tension when warranted and regardless of what the stakes are. This adaptation succeeds quite well at that, too, as it brings the Amati arc to a climax.
In actuality, not much is going on here plot-wise. The market has opened, prices go back and forth as new sellers and buyers come into the picture – and Lawrence is getting nervous about Diana’s representative not showing up. Curiously, Amati seems to be getting a little concerned, too, when Holo seems to do a disappearing trick after conspicuously showing her hood’s feathers to Lawrence. What’s most interesting about this is where the true dramatic climax actually lies. The break point in the tension is when Holo plunks a bag of pyrite down for sale at the same time Lawrence does, thus triggering the selling frenzy which dooms Amati, but I’d argue that the true climax comes when Lawrence calms down a bit and decides to trust Holo, as for him, everything is downhill from there.
The main takeaway from this is that one should never, ever cross Holo, as she doesn’t need to turn into giant wolf form to savage a person. Amati is barely shown at all after the climax (and never again in the series), so gauging how he responds to all of this is difficult, but he clearly got totally blindsided by Holo, at least partly because of some unspecified offense he made (the source novel is no clearer on this) but also probably partly because Holo was pissed at both him and Lawrence for putting her in the middle of their silly merchant’s duel. Their conversation afterwards also clarifies that she never seriously intended to go with Amati. She was manipulating both of them most of the time to drive home points about trust, commitment, and not treating her as a commodity, and nearly everything she did – from the marriage contract to conspicuously flashing Diana’s feathers – was meant to guide things a certain way.
The aspect of this that I’ve never liked – and this version does no better on – is that Lawrence comes away seeming totally at fault here. While he definitely shares some of the blame, the outcome too easily lets Holo off the hook for what she did to push the mess forward. She may have been caught off guard by Lawrence initially misunderstanding her apology back in episode 16, but she’s also wise enough that she should have understood how easily her actions could be misconstrued under the circumstances and she certainly took no initiative to explain things better – and no, the helpful details about Amati’s finances don’t count here. Lawrence has been shown stumbling over his own arrogance more than once, but here Holo gets tripped up by her own cleverness and tendency to be obtuse.
To a degree, though, Holo’s comeuppance does come, in the way that Diana messed with her over her relationship with Lawrence. Having talked to both of them, Diana was clearly deliberately vague and misleading about Holo being the one she was negotiating with, and she was manipulating the situation a bit for her own amusement; her “good luck” to Lawrence in parting in episode 18 now could be interpreted as having sarcastic intent. The post-climax revelations also clarify something heavily implied by previous visits to Diana: she is an avatar much like Holo, only of a giant bird and apparently capable of hiding her bird characteristics fully in human form. This does also explain the impression given in some previous shots of her being perched in the chair, and Holo being present for Lawrence’s last visit explains the meaningful look towards the staircase cast in episode 18’s visit. In other words, this time around the truths were hinted about in ways that the audience could reasonably figure out.
Once again, this adaptation covers the exact same ground, and makes the exact same points of emphasis, as episode 6 of season 2 of the first adaptation. Even more so than in previous episodes, the differences are almost entirely in trivial visual details. This is the last episode where I’ll be able to say that, though, as with the next one the series moves into new animated territory. That’s definitely something to look forward to!
USA Anime 