English Dub Review: Fire Force “A Brother’s Determination”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

After giving Shinra a brief glimpse of the fiery hellscape from which the Adolla Burst came from, Sho reveals how his powers work: He slows the expansion of the universe, which cools as it expands forward, in orderto make it look like he can stop time, meaning Shinra has no hope of catching up. And yet, in true shonen protagonist fashion, he refuses to give up, which translates eventually to being able to moving even faster than Sho, faster than the speed of light in fact. This fascinates Licht, who is thrilled to be witnessing this, even if it might open a black hole or destroy Shinra’s body. The Evangelist’s assistent Haumea, who also has an Adolla Burst, theorizes that this might be made possible by the Evangelist herself to bring about a FOURTH generation of pyrokinesis.

OUR TAKE

The final battle continues in earnest as the the conflict between Shinra and Sho begins to take on further importance. Which is honestly not a bad add on, especially since their relationship as brothers is pretty limited. This is only their second meeting since being reunited, so there’s naturally only going to be so much they can do with that dynamic beyond Shinra being relieved to see Sho alive and Sho being annoyed and dismissive of his would-be brother. They used that about as well as you could expect in this episode, cutting about as deep as is possible into Shinra’s motivations of wanting his old family back, while Sho is pretty much only dependant on the Evangelist’s influence, so Shinra will have to break that link if he wants his brother back.

Beyond the emotional aspect of things, the other side of focus is the escalation of the brothers’ own pyrokinetic powers as their fight drags on, actually dipping into the ridiculous at times. My initial guess regarding Sho’s power was more that he turned himself into light and made time slow that way, which turned out to be what Shinra ended up doing. Sho’s actual ability, cooling the universe around him to slow everyone down, is…certainly different, I’ll say that. Naturally, Shinra has to match that as the protagonist, which translates to going even faster by turning himself into particles. This looks like it’s getting the attention of everyone around them, good and bad alike, which seems to be for the reason that they are breaking physics while fighting. For all we know, that could be exactly what the Evangelist wants, which would explain why she’s pulling a Snoke and manipulating the brothers’ connection like this.

With only two episodes in the season to go, things look to be ramping up to a massive fireworks display for the finale, but I do wonder if they can really keep this particular fight going for two more episodes when things look like they’re just about done anyway. Thankfully, I’m fully invested and totally willing to see where things land when that last light goes out. Can’t imagine things could possibly get more crazy than they already are! Although then again, I should know not to underestimate this author to go completely nuts when the time comes, and I would certainly say that time has come. So, let’s light it up.