English Dub Review: Sorcerous Stabber Orphen “Death Keening”

Overview (Spoilers Below):

While Orphen, Leticia, and Majic are on their way back from Majic’s enrollment, a masked stabber attacks Claiomh. Orphen’s first instinct is to go after them into the city, but Letitca talks him out of it, and goes in his place. It turns out to be a trap, and Hydrant manages to slice up her hand. Luckily, Azalie steps in to save her just in time.

Back at home, Orphen tries to heal Tish’s hand, but can’t completely finish the job. Then Azalie arrives, and the two of them talk. She tells him that Uoar Curlaine and the Uoar Class are planning on taking over the Tower. They’re just looking for the Browning Family’s World Transcript, after which they can exterminate the Childman Class. Azalie tries to enlist Orphen to help her attack back, but he isn’t so sure.

Our Take:

The twelfth episode of Sorcerous Stabber Orphen is a bit clunky, but overall it was pretty entertaining. What with Tish’s fight against Hydrant and Swaine and Azalie’s mysterious appearance and revelation to Orphen, there was plenty of action and suspense. However, I can’t help but feel like the plot could’ve been executed in a more seamless way… and of course, I wish we got more of Claoimh to add in more humor.

The first evidence of clunkiness came when Tish started tracking down the stabber who had attacked poor Claoimh. The signs of a trap were so obvious, and she even comments to herself that “there must be some reason for them wanting to lure me here.” I mean, c’mon Letitica! For such a strong sorceress, her brain seemed a bit underpowered. Then later on once Orphen has patched her up, Azalie comes along and lays out what the Uoar Class plan is. Orphen reacts like it’s some big revelation, but Leticia literally could’ve told him most of the info based on her run in with Hydrant.

While there was a good amount of excitement throughout Death Keening, I can’t help but wish we got a little more levity along with all the dark magical plotting. Claoimh getting attacked would’ve been a good way to draw her into the proceedings a little more, but after getting beaned in the head with “some sort of finger attack”, she’s absent until the last scene of the episode. Even with her limited screen time, she got in the funniest line, which happens after Orphen has finished a particularly in-depth talk with Azalie: “What’s wrong with him? I really hope he didn’t wake up the neighbors.”

Overall, Death Keening was an alright episode of Sorcerous Stabber Orphen. Seeing Tish getting some action was nice, even if she did it in a pretty dumb way that ended up backfiring on her. Azalie’s continued involvement got cleared up a little bit, which was nice to have. Now that she has laid out the plotting of the Uoar Class to Orphen, it’ll be interesting to see how far he takes things in the struggle for justice.