English Dub Review: Sorcerous Stabber Orphen; “The Tower of Fangs”

 

 

Overview (Spoilers Below)

His cries for Azalie unmet, Orphen reflects upon the past that has come back to confront him. 

Our Take

The majority of this episode is spent recounting the past, specifically Orphen’s student days at the Tower of Fangs, an elite school for sorcerers. 

There’s no hard reason given why this school called the Tower of Fangs, but one might generate a potentially good idea, given that it’s stated most of the students who attend die before they graduate. We’ve already seen the dangers of dabbling in magic through Azalie’s fate; it’s like they named it that to discourage all but the brave or insane from joining. 

Through an intermittent series of flashbacks, we’re introduced to Orphen’s class at the Tower. First of all, Orphen’s real name is Krylancelo, which is a real mouthful. Then there’s Azalie, a prodigiously talented sorcerer, but also a reckless, perennial troublemaker. Azalie is certainly the star of this show, but this class has no shortage of oddballs. Of note, particularly because they appear in the future, there’s the subtly creepy Heartia and the aspiring mad scientist Comicron. They’re all lead by their teacher, Childman, who we’ll also be seeing later. 

While the antics that all of these studious sorcerers get up to are amusing to watch, the heart of this recollection of memories is the bond between Azalie and Orphen. At first, the rather soft-spoken Orphen appeared to simply act as the gofer for the haughty, bossy Azalie. What at first seemed like reluctant subservience then reveals itself to be bashful affection. Orphen is no slouch in magic himself, being the #2 in class behind Azalie, and is enraptured with her as she explains all the ways she hopes to innovate sorcery. Azalie, in turn, respects Orphen’s interest in her with warm enthusiasm. Everything Orphen says and does is all for the purpose of placing himself next to Azalie in every way, that he may devote his time to her. His behavior is very sweet, but it does also enter the territory of emotional dependence for him. 

This is what makes what happened to Azalie all the harder for him to accept as we’ve seen up until now. When the Tower staff held her funeral, he smashed her empty coffin and refused to accept her death. Banishing himself from the academy to focus on saving her, he repudiates his name and chooses to go by what considers himself to be: an orphan. We know he has no parents, as many unfortunate students at the academy are. But at the same time he may also be considering Azalie to be something of a maternal figure here, hence the insistence on being explicitly referred to as orphaned. It’s a bit of a silly name, given, but it is a lot cooler and easier to say than Krylancelo. 

Back in the present, after being thrown in jail, Orphen goes to meet the head sorcerer in Totokanta: Childman, his former teacher. As the other participant in the magic experiment that resulted in Azalie’s demise, Orphen demands answers. Childman had met a much less grievous fate in the experiment, being left in a coma for five years. Since he was able to recover from the ill effects of the experiment, it is reasoned that Azalie may also be able to return to normal, which may explain why she stole the Sword of Baldanders. 

With Orphen’s hopes newly rekindled, they are soon threatened to be snuffed out. Childman and his sorcerers plan to hunt down and kill Azalie and ask Orphen if he wants to join them. Orphen obviously opposes killing Azalie but joins them regardless so that he can guarantee he will reach her at the same time they do so he can stop them. As Orphen succinctly put it, time has stopped for him for these past five years and now he has the chance to move forward. 

The character animation throughout is still on point, operating at a very high level of quality that adheres to the uniquely quasi-retro style I mentioned in the previous review. The magic is still explosively cool. The dragon Azalie looks a little disfigured, but perhaps there’s a small chance that’s intentional to make her fate seem all the worse. 

There was an awful lot of exposition in this episode, but it didn’t feel too cumbersome. It was all complemented very well by the detailed introduction of the color Azalie and the bond Orphen shares with her. His motivations made crystal clear, we eagerly await to see how he’ll try to pull off the seemingly impossible.