Rating: A-
Before I get into the review, a bit of news. According to a report first posted on ScreenRant, episodes 45 and 46 will air as normal over the next two Fridays, but episode 47 will be delayed by a week, thus airing on June 27th instead of June 20th. In its place a special episode featuring some of the series’ key Japanese voice actors will air, though whether Crunchyroll will get this or not is unclear.
But that’s three weeks off, and there’s certainly plenty to talk about concerning episode 44. The biggest, of course, is the absolute confirmation of what I was speculating about in my episode 42 review: that Loulan is Shisui – or, to be clear, the Shisui that the audience is familiar with. However, what Suirei explains to Maomao is nearly as important, and even more loaded than it might seem. She is Loulan’s half-sister and the original Shisui, fathered by Shishou before he married into the Shi clan, which certainly explains why Shishou’s current wife Shenmei hates her and why she was forced to give up a name with the family name in it. But it’s also previously been heavily implied that Taiho was Suirei’s mother. Does that mean that Shisou was the doctor in the tale told a couple of times previously about the one who fathered a child by a servant? The details between what Jinshi mulls over in episode 42 and what Suirei reveals in this episode don’t seem to perfectly align on that point, but it’s still a plausible scenario if at least one of the two isn’t completely reliable in their understanding of events.
No less important is the first look at Loulan’s thoughts. (For consistency’s sake, I’m going to refer to her by that name from this point out.) They, combined with her comments last episode, clearly show that her demeanor as the high-ranking concubine is the personality she developed to avoid the wrath of her mother Shenmei. Combined with snippets showing how Loulan interacts with Suirei outside of her mother’s presence, it reinforces that her Shisui personality is more genuine. (This and Suirei’s previous words also suggest that using “Shisui” as her alias when pretending to be a servant girl was a very meaningful choice, likely meant to honor her sister.) But it also gives the impression that, though she’s not essentially on house arrest like Maomao is, she’s every bit as trapped in her role here.
This all raises even bigger questions about why Suirei and Loulan coerced Maomao into coming along. While Loulan is clearly covering for Maomao in the opening scene, was filling the role of a missing apothecary the original intent for bringing Maomao along, or just a convenient way to get her out of punishment? And was it more by Suirei’s will or Loulan’s that Maomao was brought along? Suirei increasingly feels like she holds nothing against Maomoao, and both she and Loulan seem to have reasons for wanting Maomao to be aware of what is transpiring, especially since neither can stop the brewing rebellion. Since Suirei, at the least, knows who Maomao’s biological father is, was Maomao perhaps kidnapped as a way to force certain powerful individuals into awareness and action? If so, they still have to know that the bloodletting which will result from all of this will be severe. Hard to call either a tragic figure yet, since Suirei, at least, was definitely directly involved in an assassination attempt, but the story feels like it’s shading in that direction.
Events are momentous in the Jinshi front, too. With Lahan providing further evidence that Shisou (or, perhaps more accurately, Shenmei through Shisou) is fomenting a rebellion and Lakan no longer bothering to pretend that he doesn’t know exactly who Jinshi is, Jinshi’s being backed into a corner. The only way he can both rescue Maomao and deal with this building problem is to finally assert himself in his true identity. The amusing thing here is how deferential Lakan is to Luomen when he arrives (brought by Lahan!) to rein Lakan in. I especially liked the subtle shift in the lighting when Luomen finally convinced Lakan to approach the situation in a more proper fashion, one that Jinshi would have a harder time resisting.
The Next Episode preview suggests that most or all of next episode will take place on the Maomao front, but a move towards a big confrontation is now building. This is the most plot-intensive run of the series to date, and the storytelling quality certainly isn’t hurting for it.
NOTE: Due to travel plans, reviews for the next two weeks could be much later than normal and may be combined into a single review for both episodes 45 and 46.
USA Anime 