OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

Company 8 prepares to enter The Nether, an underground network usually forbidden to go into due to a belief that it is cursed and evil, in order to hunt down the White Clad that they believe lurk under there. The night before they move out, Shinra has an odd dream about his naked body surging with energy in front of a naked Iris, along with a sudden earthquake.

They enter the area the next day but are soon separated by an enemy diversion set by Mirage. Iris and Tamaki are fooled briefly by Yona’s shape-shifting but that’s cleared up due to Tamaki’s fan service quirk. They then fight Assault, a Knight of the Ashen Flame, who Tamaki initially struggles with but manages to beat in…a similar way. Meanwhile, Maki encounters Flail, defeating him handily with help from Vulcan’s new toys for her.

OUR TAKE

We begin the final arc for this season as Company 8 finally takes the fight to the White Clad. And we’re doing that usual shonen thing where everyone gets their own boss to fight and show their stuff and how they’ve grown over the course of the story thus far. Though while this kicks off that story arc, it also focuses primarily on two (arguably three) characters that have gone under-appreciated in the show thus far: Iris, Maki, and Tamaki. We hadn’t seen Iris do much besides be cute and pleasant, likely because she doesn’t seem to have much going for her besides that, but it’s nice to see her be in the thick of things for once as opposed to being immediately sidelined or not very helpful. Alongside her in two fights is Tamaki, who has had a…bit of a rough time in this show. Her being the main source of fan service for the series, virtually always without much reason or purpose, has not exactly done wonders for her reputation. This isn’t really any different by the end of this episode, but she’s able to show she can pull her weight and use her really cool looking powers for once. And any sign of growing friendship between her and Iris is welcome in my book.

The other lady in the limelight this week is Maki, who has probably gotten the shaft the most out of any other Company 8 member prior to now. Despite a strong first impression made in the second episode, Maki seemed to pretty much fall into the background as events went on, losing favor to Tamaki’s usual shenanigans and…pretty much everyone else having more identifiable quirks than her. I mean, let’s face it, her main schtick is that she is pretty beefy and gets mad when people call her a gorilla. Not a very distinctive character archetype when the rest of her squad stick out far more. Still, no reason they can’t expand on that more or give her more time to show how strong she is, which we thankfully get here. I wish it hadn’t taken so long to get to this point, nor do I think she got as much time to shine as she probably should have, but hopefully things will look up for her exposure going forward.

Five episodes remain until the end of the season. We have several characters left to show their stuff before a likely fateful reunion between Shiro and Sho, my main guess being a proper match between Vulcan and Giovanni, but until then we must hold onto the flames of excitement in our hearts.

Score 7/10