English Dub Review: World Break: Aria of Curse for a Holy Swordsman “Dwell within My Sword, Magic Flame”

I don’t even know where to begin  this week. “Dwell within My Sword, Magic Flame” introduced something new to World Break: Aria of Curse for a Holy Swordsman, and I am not entirely sure that it was needed right now. A rank and file was introduced, including a ranking for classes, and a elite group of students who are charged with taking care of the Metaphysicals that attack Tokyo. This elite group of students are called The Strikers, and they have some pretty nice rewards. With a promotion to this group, Moroha and Shizuno are given full scholarships that cover expenses, and guaranteed a position in the Order of the White Knight. I’d take it.

Once Moroha and Shizuno are in, the actual training is glossed over. I would figure that the training would be somewhat important, because of how powerful and prestigious the group is. Instead, we get a 15 second training montage, and another awkward confrontation between Shizuno and Satsuki. This is what will probably propel all three to be better, so I guess that’s what the show needs. I know this takes place at a high school-esque place, but this love story is distracting a bit.

To me, the story shines a lot brighter when the focus is the competition between Shizuno and Satsuki on the battlefield, and less when it’s Satsuki pining for Moroha and Shizuno just doing to him what Satsuki wishes to do. That said, when the two girls started their fight with the Dreadnought, that’s when “Dwell within My Sword, Magic Flame” got interesting. It was refreshing to see Shizuno and Satsuki working together, because much of the first two episodes were these two working against each other. In fact, I thought it was cutesy when Shizuno and Satsuki were just chilling in the mall. There has to be more sides to these two besides the constant competition, and “Dwell within My Sword…” did a great job later at showing this dynamic later on in the episode.

I’m glad to see that the writers are able to bounce back from a bad beginning of this episode. Like I’ve been told many times before, “How you start isn’t important, it’s how you finish.” And this was the great work! A show had this special kind of fulfillment that comes from watching redemption. You don’t see it often, and when it’s a terrible start, normally it ends terribly. This week, World Break, Aria of Curse for a Holy Swordsman showed that there is hope for fixing an episode.