English Dub Review: Fire Force “Groping Through the Fire”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

Chaos erupts throughout the town as numerous Infernals pop up in the wake of Inca’s emerging powers. Company 8 does what they can to stop as many as possible while the regular Fire Department tries slowing them down with their hoses in addition to tackling the actual fires. Obi quickly deduces that some of these Infernals are being made with the bugs and that Haumea is the one giving out orders, so he sends Arthur, who has shown to be immune to her powers, to face her and disrupt her communications. But things soon escalate as a Demon Infernal also pops up to fight Hinawa, Vulcan, and Tamaki (who briefly is dressed in sister garb before it all falling off, as is her usual schtick). Thankfully they get surprise assistance from their friends and allies in Companies 1, 2, and 5, including a small army of Sisters for prayers (which is apparently very necessary for killing Infernals?). Soon they just have the demon left to beat.

Nearby, Shinra fights Charon and tries to save Inca from being taken, though his hero act and assurances of safety seem to be pissing her off more than calming her down. She’s desperate to avoid safety at all cost, even commenting on how the Fire Force makes people rely on them by saving them too much. Shinra is understandably baffled by this but has to focus his efforts on beating Charon, who can trigger explosions with just his footsteps. Shinra also has the ability to do this, though with less control and impact, with the Corna hand sign that flows his ki in a way to make him explode.

OUR TAKE

Okay, we need to talk about Tamaki. Yes, she’s a pretty minor part of this episode, but her gag of being the fanservice one regardless of how little sense it makes has been going on way too long to not address this. It’s played for laughs in that the joke is supposed to be “see, fanservice is so dumb because it just happens out of nowhere!” by making it make zero sense as to how she ends up nearly naked during serious situations, which seems to be a commentary on that being a recurring thing in Shonen stories in general. The problem with that is pointing that out and making it more obvious doesn’t seem to have much of a point to it other than pointing out the obvious, while the only thing it accomplishes within the story itself is make distracting unfunny comedy bits during serious story-driven moments AND making Tamaki look like a useless waste of space who can’t get dressed properly in the middle of a battle. It tries to be satirical about the subject but doesn’t have anything to say about it, leading me to believe this is just another poor excuse for an author to just draw cheesecake into their story. If you want to do that, fine! Go ahead! Just don’t lie to me and say you have a bigger point to make with it.

Anyway, we get a little bit more with Shinra and Inca, though the main thing to mention there is how Shinra’s constructed persona of being a hero is completely falling flat with her, since she wants to be in as much danger as possible. I’m seeing that Inca is rubbing some viewers the wrong way and she could turn out to be totally annoying later on, but right now what I think is interesting is that she is proving to be someone who Shinra’s idealized version of himself is not going to work on, which sheds light on where trying to play the hero does inevitably fall short. Whether that will lead to her joining either side has yet to be seen, but it is interesting to bring that to the forefront. As for what’s going on with everyone else, I’m glad that the rest of Company 8 is getting something to do to get their share of the action, as well as Obi being quite smart in throwing Arthur at Haumea now that they know his powers are a bit of a weakness for her. It was something I was hoping for when they established that near the end of last season, so it’s good to see it being implemented at the next possible opportunity. We’ll see next week if they continue that momentum, hopefully with less Tamaki.