English Dub Review: Possibly the Greatest Alchemist of All Time “Let’s Choose a Party Name!”

Overview (Spoilers Below):
Takumi gets a new party member in the form of Reyva, who strives to improve her alchemist skills.  After leaving the Royal Capital, Takumi and the group are tasked with choosing a name for their party, while Takumi’s influence starts to gain more attention from outside forces.

Our Take:
Takumi’s party has grown even bigger, as he hired another member, Reyva, to join the party.  Fortunately, her common interest in alchemy would help Takumi strive in his business.  That is if he can keep it going without drawing attention to himself.  This episode shows that it’s still easier said than done, as Elizabeth seeks to dispose of Takumi by sending her believers after him.  However, that didn’t make much of an impact until the end of the episode, when the masked men ambush them at their mansion.  Instead, the episode focuses more on Takumi figuring out a party name for his group while tackling an escort quest to Kilbus, where he gains a sense of nostalgia from the village’s food.
Undoubtedly, even though my interest in the show’s plot was still waning, “Let’s Choose a Party Name” does manage to be a bit more tolerable than the previous episode.  One reason is the struggle to choose the perfect party name while Takumi is training with Barack.  There’s just something about seeing Takumi being thrown around like a rag doll that always brings a smile to my face.  I guess that’s one of the perks of watching an anime: the physical slapstick that’s both cartoonish and visually appealing.  Another reason was the moment between Takumi and Sofia, where they discuss embracing what’s ahead instead of focusing on the past due to Takumi remembering his old home in the real world through Kilbus’s supply of milk and cheese.  During that time, they came up with the party name, “The Wings of Nolyn”, after the Goddess Nolyn.  Hopefully, Nolyn would approve that name as well.  These reasons helped “Let’s Choose a Party Name” improve the show slightly but not by much regarding its middling approach to the genre formula.