English Dub Review: Blood Blockade Battlefront & Beyond “A Phantom Hospital Ward Rises”

Turn your head and cough. Or else.

Overview (Spoilers)

Okay, Zapp is in an ambulance helicopter, barely clinging to life. The incident had something to do with a heavily armored vehicle and Zapp’s face, so put those together. As the helicopter is heading to the hospital, and Zapp’s spirit is getting restless for the next world, they come upon a startling discovery. A hospital has appeared out of nowhere in the middle of the city. It seems to be staffed with biohazard-suited men and little doctor girls, so Leo is a bit concerned. He calls Steven and Klaus over to check the place out. As it turns out, they recognize the place. Back during the first cataclysm, the two of them encountered the place while looking for a place to take an orphaned baby they found. It was functioning as a triage ward at the time. That’s when they came under assault from a blood breed and his “dog”. Though they fought valiantly, the dog monster got past them and attacked everyone in the hospital. The battle ended when the Casters erected the seal that holds the two realms apart. Klaus and Steven woke up in Hellsalem’s Lot, and search though they might, they couldn’t find the hospital again. Since they last saw it, the building came under new management. A Beyonder used his powers to rebuild one of the doctors. As a newly minted Beyonder, Dr. Luciana Esteves could create innumerable clones, allowing her to administer multiple treatments by herself. This is good because the number of the fallen that now had to be placed on a form of life support was staggering. However, now that the hospital has resurfaced from the Beyond, these victims were having their life force drained out, meaning that the monster that got them is still around, and on his way… there he is. Esteves takes down the monster by fusing her clones together into her true form and dicing him with a scalpel. The monster’s owner jumps in to take revenge but quickly finds himself overwhelmed by Klaus, who seals him away with his true name, acquired by Leo. Evil defeated, Esteves returns to treating the wounded. Which is good, since Zapp got himself hurt again. Can’t take this guy anywhere.

This episode gave us a bit more of the past, which has always been a bit of a mystery in this series. Here, we learn not only that the crew of Libra were monster hunters prior to the cataclysm, but that Klaus is from our world. I had always assumed, given the fangs, that he was some form of troll or something. This means that there is a bunch of pre-cataclysm stories yet to be explored. I dig the setting of this episode, and that goes double for Dr. Esteves. She’s funny, intelligent, and kicks much butt. I hope we will get to see her more.

Our Take

This episode has it all. There is drama and action, all sandwiched between two slices of pan-fried comedy. The vast majority of the episode happens as a flashback, but enough new information (and solid action) is presented that it doesn’t just feel like “storytime with Klaus”. Pretty much any time you see Zapp in this episode, he’s making with the funny and inspiring schadenfreude. Ian Sinclair does a great job here, playing with different ways to manipulate Zapp’s voice. He and Leo are easily the most expressive characters in the show, and their voice actors are great at bringing the comedy to what could just be a battlefest. I wish I could find the voice actress for Dr. Esteves. She had a good amount of range, given that we see her at three different ages, each of which got voiced slightly differently.

The animation in this episode was excellent quality, as usual. The visual direction gives us interesting angles that direct our attention effectively to what is going on, and often play around with the ambient light for different effects. In the lobby, there is a bunch of white light coming from the front windows. This streams a warm light in the middle, where the actual conversation takes place. The outer edges feel darker and out of focus by comparison. In the scenes that happen in the beyond, everything has a dark feel, but the bright crimson lightning flashes set the hellish tone and tell you where you are. The main combat portion of the episode keeps things fresh with dynamic camera angles. That means the show uses relatively few cycled frames. Though this episode may not have any of the insanely flashy sequences that we’ve seen in the past, the action we have is well directed, and the animators kept things smooth and error free.