OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)Shit hits the fan. Plain and simple.OUR TAKEWe have arrived at the penultimate episode of the arc, which is only a little bit undercut by the fact that it is not the penultimate episode of the season, but even knowing that, it is PRETTY GODDAMN HEAVY. In just these twenty minutes we have: the existence of demons being about to be announced to the world, Yukio’s ongoing mental breakdown and gaining of Satan powers brushing up against this, Mephisto getting shot on live television, Yukio getting blamed even though the shot hit Mephisto’s forehead and he was going to shoot from the side (and I honestly thought for a moment that this may be an animation error and he actually did it), Mephisto needing to drop the demonic barrier in order to maintain his body and allowing more demons in, Rin leading a fake coup in order to bust Yukio out, and Yukio actually being able to communicate with Satan somehow. It seems that that first arrival of a public demon is part of someone’s plan to destabilize things and the Order of the True Cross has played right into it to some degree. And despite their notable absence from this half of the season, the biggest suspects are pretty clear: The Illuminati.Though they were introduced as a mustache twirling villain group last season with seemed like they would be dealt with more directly, it would also make sense that they would be working on their bigger plans in the shadows while the plot focused on more present issues like…a literal snake who liked grooming and raising young girls. Yeah, did you forget that was how this season started? Because I didn’t. Regardless, while I have had my issues with how Yukio’s crashing out has been handled in this (and how much it, again, resembles the now non-canon anime original arc from the latter third of the first season), having it juxtaposed with how the Order and possibly THE WORLD is similarly crashing out is a good way pair those plotlines up. And that just leaves the end of the arc next week, which I would feel quite frustrated about if it were in fact the end of the season! Thankfully it is not and we have at least another dozen episodes to see how everyone picks up the pieces after this has occurred, but we still need to see how this arc ends, so I will see you here at the same time next week to see once and for all how we get beyond the snow!
