English Dub Review: Lord of Vermillion: The Crimson King “The Delicate Flower Bud is Both Medicine and Poison”

The battle for humanity’s fate begins now, apparently.

Overview (Spoilers Below)

The second collapse has been averted, but Shoko is deeply jealous of Chihiro’s power as the Lord of Vermillion. Meanwhile, Grumman follows the child, Chiyu, who has made a replica of a house in Grumman’s basement, for some reason that isn’t made very clear. Then, Grumman shows Yuri the footage of Chihiro killing people at the theater, and uses some kind of mind control (Maybe? It’s not very well explained) to convince Yuri that she needs to “save” Chihiro by killing him, or something.

Shoko, meanwhile, plots to become the Lord of Vermillion but gets quickly executed by Kark. Dux doesn’t care even a little, which disturbs the heroes of the Heroic Lineage greatly. Chihiro then meets with Yuri, who soon turns on him, but Cerdid arrives at the last moment to save the day and gets killed trying to fight Yuri.

Following this, the forces of Chaos manage to activate the keystones throughout Tokyo. Disaster is night, and so Chihiro and the remaining members of the Heroic Lineage must set out to stop the ensuing chaos.

Our Take:

Things just keep getting worse here on Lord of Vermillion. Week after week, this show continues to impress, proving just how bad an anime can be, even in this day and age. Get ready for a confusing, awkward 22 minutes, chock-full of boring exposition and vague storytelling.

This episode, like so many of the others, has difficulty in just the act of telling a story. As in, I still have very little idea what’s going on. Character motivation, plot progression, these things are just speed bumps for a show like Lord of Vermillion, that doesn’t feel the need to give these issues the proper time they deserve. Most puzzling this time around is Grumman’s bizarre reverence for his daughter, who is some kind of super genius I don’t really understand. On the Church side, we have Shoko, who is going crazy for some reason? She wants to be the Lord of Vermillion, but what that even is isn’t exactly clear, so I can’t understand why she’s so motivated to pursue it.

The cackling, mustache-twirling villains that work for the forces of Chaos are just overflowing with cringe. Jun, Kark, and Drayle are a Hot Topic wet dream, characters so edgy one get worried they might accidentally prick their eyeballs every time they come on-screen. Not to mention, they lack any sense of empathy. Kark can be kind of fun to watch, but my tolerance of him quickly goes sour when he starts flapping his gums too much, delivering some of the ugliest anime dialogue you will ever hear.

Not to mention, things are just downright boring this week. I mean, more boring than usual. Once again, more main characters get killed off, and once again, not a single tear is shed for their loss. Things just sort of…happen. There’s no sense of tension because there’s no internal logic that indicates what can and can’t happen. If anything goes, then nothing really matters.

There’s only one more episode left in this strange, strange show, so there’s not much time for this series to wrap things up in a coherent way. I imagine, like a drunken college student, Lord of Vermillion will stumble to the end before puking on its own shoes. Melodramatic, ugly and insane, this episode doesn’t do a whole lot to make anything about this show any better.