English Dub Review: Alice & Zoroku “Friends”

Understanding leads to uncertainty, and the quest for the answers will only lead to better questions.

Spoilers Below

Zoroku has business in Yokohama, and he can’t leave Sana alone while he does it. Thankfully, Ichijo has been acting as Sana’s tutor, and will watch the little one while he arranges the job with the client. I’m actually a bit impressed that this government agent is not only an astoundingly competent field operative and magical girl par none, but a licensed elementary school teacher to boot. Man, how much training has this woman had in her life? That’s just… wow. Anyways, her tutelage of the magical tot has its strengths and weaknesses. Sana has passed right through elementary-level math, and could likely take on the high school stuff. She’s beyond Ichijo’s ability to teach in that department. On the other hand, word problems, social studies, and reading comprehension just confuse her to no end. She describes the experience as feeling frazzled, but has difficulty elucidating. The two ladies meet up with Zoroku afterwards, but in the process, run (literally) into someone else: The Hanagiri Twins have returned! Aaaaaand they’re gone. Sana gives chase, even going so far as to rocket after them on an actual rocket. In the middle of the city. As she catches up to ask why they are running, Sana’s powers activate on their own, generating a giant coal boulder above their heads! It’ll crush them, and everyone on the streets below! Just then, Ichijo arrives in full mahou attire, summoning a giant wolf to destroy the boulder and subdue the girls. With some well-placed fireworks, she’s able to play the whole thing off as filming a movie.

After a good meal together, the twins apologize to Sana, but not for what you think. You see… oh, wait is it time for the backstory flashback? It is! Set the way back machine! You see, the twins came from an abusive home. When their powers appeared, Yonaga summoned her bow and arrow to kill her father, defending her sister. They were in the custody of the police until the research facility picked them up. At that point, the two were so in sync with each other, even THEY didn’t know which was which. They literally had to use their powers to figure out who was Yonaga and which was Asahi. And it was just them for a while until they met Sona. They taught her, played with her, named her. But they kept one thing from her, the knowledge of the outside world. They didn’t want her to leave them. But she did anyways. That is what the apology was for. For withholding the world from her. She forgives them and they make friends again. But that night, Sana is overwhelmed with her “frazzles”, and cries out. Sanae sits with her as she tries to explain. She’s trying so hard to understand everything, but it doesn’t make sense. It makes her feel like there’s another person inside her trying to come out and is slowly taking her over. The older girl isn’t sure what that means, but she reassures her that it’s okay to not know everything. It doesn’t quite quell the feeling, but it makes it easier to bear.

This episode had a great balance of action-y awesome and earthy drama. I loved the scene where they were getting Sana some train fare. It was a real world scene that plays out every day, and it gave the characters an authenticity in how they reacted to it. Pains have been taken in the writing of the story to make sure we can see the human child in Sana, in everything from how she talks and reacts to how she moves. I am interested in Sana’s Errors, and if her “frazzled” state is a result of emotions as she grows up the errors or something else entirely. Maybe this is the result of having met her older self a few episodes ago. I don’t know, but I look forward to seeing more. Sarah Wiedenheft did a good job of voicing her during those scenes where she was explaining about her frazzles. I thin I felt around three different emotions competing in there, and it was fun to hear. Tia Ballard was also great as Sanae, just the sweetest, kindest voice I could imagine.

The chase sequence was loaded with great animation, with CGI and traditional animation blended so perfectly, I had to look close to tell the difference. They disguised the CGI by having it move very quickly across the screen. That way, you couldn’t look close enough to tell if the cell shading was by hand or computer. You might ask, what’s the difference? The computer is too perfect, most of the time. It tends to show you things with a realistic, logical eye, and miss out on the subtle language of the lines and shapes that the human hand creates. If used well, as they were here, you can’t tell the difference, and it blends seamlessly together as a single “language”. Done poorly, it’s obvious, and pulls you out of the universe you are experiencing. Like someone suddenly saying a few English words in a perfect American accent right in the middle of a natural Spanish diatribe. It’s jarring. The art in this episode is good since we’re on the topic. I only just now noticed the choices they’ve been making with their line widths and colors. It gives the characters a sense of grounded weight, without being too heavy. Analyzing how they do this might get a bit boring for you. Sorry, I’m an artist, I like to look at these things.

All in all, this series continues to please the artist and the writer in me. It’s delightful and fun, and I always look forward to more. I’ll give this episode eight giant coal boulders out of ten. Oh, and on a good note, the eight lost little girls I gave out on the last episode have been found by one of our readers and taken back to their proper home. Thank you!