English Dub Review: Fire Force “The Spreading Malice”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

Shinra arrives on the scene to face Rekka and save Tamaki. Rekka’s madness is now on full display, though he takes a special interest in Shinra, who he identifies as having the “Adola Burst” which his leader, the Evangelist, is looking for. He also states his group’s true goal, which is to make more pyro-kinetics and Infernals with the bugs, have everyone consumed by flame, and turn the Earth into a star. A quick google search tells us that’s pretty much impossible, but something makes me think there’s more going on here. He also mentions that they take kids from fires, which Shinra thinks might mean they took his brother.

Shinra soundly defeats Rekka, exhausting him, though Karim and Li show up to secure him in ice. This is a big problem, but things seem to be resolved for now…until Rekka is shot by a pyro sniper from afar who then sets her sights on everyone else. Li loses an arm and Karim directs Shinra and Tamaki to get the sniper to back off. They won’t be able to question Rekka, but now they know there’s a bigger threat out there for them to deal with. Shinra returns to Company 8, but Tamaki ends up with them as punishment for her involvement with Rekka.

Also, Arthur got…lost?

OUR TAKE
Okay, come on, did we really need to strip Tamaki during the fight when she wasn’t even fighting? The animation is nice enough, it’s not like we’re going to get so bored we need partial nudity to keep our attention. And lamp-shading how she gets into uncomfortable situations doesn’t make it okay just because you’re acknowledging it!

Anyway, that’s another arc in the books, and despite its clear similarities to the last one, this does have clear differences in how it played out and what it set up for the weeks to come. After fighting Hibana, it would be natural to expect each arc after that would involve fighting all the captains one by one, but Leonard Burns was barely a part of things here. Instead, we have a bit of contrast, as instead of someone driven a bit mad by their cynicism and lack of faith like Hibana was, we have Rekka who was driven a LOT mad by his devotion to his radical faction. Company 1 is supposed to be the one more connected to the church, so while the ones following the Evangelist might not be all from there, they’re likely connected in at least some way. They seem like a distinct villain group from whoever Joker is following, especially since his side seems more focused on getting the truth out instead of just burning everyone, but we’ll see if we can get a clearer difference between them in their methods.

And we now formally have Tamaki on the main cast and as the second (or third if Iris is just playing it cool) girl with a crush on Shinra because he saved her. I wonder if protagonists move up to something like a higher tax bracket when their harem gets big enough? Either way, she does have some cool powers and will hopefully mesh well with the rest of Company 8, but she doesn’t have much personality to her at the moment beyond being kind of tsundere and being the designated catgirl of the show. Then again, these are still technically the early days of the story and these things can take a while to fully flesh out. I’m just hoping that it doesn’t take the rest of the season to get there.

Next week brings us a brand new arc with a new plot to focus on, which at the very least means cooler and better-animated fights to revel in.