OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

Within the walls of Academy City, 80% of population are Espers, AKA people with supernatural abilities. Every year, the annual Daihasei festival occurs to best showcase how the city has been utilizing those students with powers by putting them in competitive events. With it fast approaching, a group called the Steering Committee is tasked with pulling in at least two of the seven Level 5 espers to help be examples of Academy City’s work in honing their skills by taking an “Athlete’s Pledge” at the opening ceremony. They reach out to fourth-ranked Mugino Shizuri and second-ranked Kakine Teitoku, but both are wrapped up in underground gangs and refuse to participate, while the sixth-ranked Aihana Etsu is a total enigma, and first-ranked Accelerator is too tired from having just finished the first season of his spin-off.

But they’re not the only ones with problems, as Uiharu Kazari tells her friend Saten Ruiko about her anxiousness over being a Judgement officer, while Kuroko Shirai is in the hospital recovering from a previous encounter. Mikoto Misaka, the third-ranked Level 5, also gets the invitation to take the pledge, but is hesitant, especially after an encounter with her schoolmate, fifth-ranked Misaki Shokuho, who she has some bad blood with. Later, a group of esper cheer squad members have a beef in front of the stage for the opening ceremonies, forcing Uiharu to step up to them. When this doesn’t stop the two in charge from fighting, the seventh-ranked Level 5, Sogiita Gunha, gets involved and resolves things with a single punch, which leaves Uiharu and Saten to save people from the falling wreckage. And when that’s not enough, Misaka saves them with her signature Railgun attack.

In the end, Misaki accepts the pledge, though talks to a man named Keitz about information regarding Misaka’s clones. Sogiita also accepts, but Misaka ends up turning it down.

OUR TAKE

We return to the Raildex universe one more time with the third installment in the Railgun spin-off, which has been on quite the extended hiatus like its sister show Index had been before its own third season. Railgun last aired in September 2013, a little over six years ago. Railgun is kind of like the “Agents of Shield” to Index’s MCU (at least for the first few seasons of AoS). In the manga it’s based on, most of the main arcs up until this point in the story have been expansions on previous Index storylines. Besides the “Level Upper” arc, which took place slightly before the beginning of Index, the second manga arc focused on showing Misaka’s perspective during the “Sisters” arc, which makes sense considering that arc focused on her in both versions. To borrow the MCU analogy again, it’s much like how Captain America: The Winter Soldier’s events had major impacts on the end of Agents of Shield’s first season. The first two seasons of Railgun also had a lot of material just for the anime, though it usually served that well by expanding on this show’s cast as its own thing separate from Index while also being connected. Not counting the Febri stuff.

With this third season, they move on to covering Misaka’s side of the Daihasei festival, which was actually covered in Index’s second season. This is also where some of the issues of being a spin-off come in, as certain major things have happened between the end of Railgun Season 2 (or S) and this. For one, the end of that season was between Episodes 15-17 of Index Season 1, while in the in between, Kuroko got hospitalized, Touma fought Mugen from Samurai Champloo, Misaka started realizing her feelings for Touma when she got him to play her fake boyfriend to escape an Aztec face-stealing assassin, and Accelerator had his own spin-off which has somehow not been addressed despite the world almost ending in it. So, for new viewers who only watch Railgun and feel like they missed some stuff, they probably did. I value accessibility in a show over many things, though in this case I guess I can give it a pass.

As for this first episode, the man focus seems to be putting emphasis on the Level 5’s and the beginning of the festival, as well as reacquainting the audience with the standard standout qualities of the four girls in the main cast. Misaka is level headed and crazy powerful (so naturally the episode has to end with her firing her signature move to remind us what show we’re watching), Kuroko is crazy for Misaka (while being probably the only prominent lesbian character in the series so…that’s unfortunate), Uiharu is a cute worrier with a flower crown who believes in justice, and Saten likes to flip her skirt and sometimes carries a bat. Okay, everyone caught up? Then let’s move onto the next episode where things will hopefully be much more eventful.

Score 7/10