English Dub Review: ID – Invaded “Extended”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

Due to Narihisago’s coercion of the Pyrotechnician to suicide, the “Kura” organization (as they are apparently called) test out Fukuda as their next pilot into an Id Well, trying him out in the Pyro-technician’s well (which is apparently still accessible?) as “Anaido”. Unfortunately, Anaido proves to be a poor substitute, forcing them to bring Narihisago back from solitary confinement on their next case. A girl, Keiko, has been supposedly kidnapped by The Gravedigger, a killer whose MO involves burying his victims and livestreaming their gradual deaths online, which brings in tens of thousands of views. The Gravedigger’s never been tracked through Cognition Particles before, but for some reason they read loud and clear this time.

Sakaido finds himself in a set of empty buildings full of charred corpses as the buildings are engulfed by fire. Kaeru’s body is also burnt, but oddly in a place that doesn’t seem to have been burnt itself. The only other living thing in the world seems to be a younger version of Keiko, around ten years old, who’s on the stretch of buildings across from him. Through trial and many, MANY errors, Sakaido is able to find a way across, but the multiple deaths start to strain Narihisago, forcing Momoki, head of the unit, to feel surprising sympathy for the guy. The younger Keiko is rescued, but from her room, Sakaido notices an older man, Genpei Oono, holding a torch. It’s revealed that Kaeru’s body was indicating that her “death” was meant to be covered up in the fire of someone else, meaning that Oono isn’t the Gravedigger, just someone who meant to use the Gravedigger’s crimes to hide his own kidnapping of Keiko, who he thought saw him try to kill his family. Even worse, the real Keiko’s feed wasn’t live, but a recording. She died before the police could find her.

Momoki tells this to Narihisago, who admits that he’s killed five people but that he did it because he felt he could. Still he considers Momoki his only lifeline and friend. Hondomachi and Matsuoka cover the crime scene but regret that the Gravedigger is still out there. Though before she leaves, Hondomachi sees Haruka Kazuta, another of Fukuda’s victims who also has a hole in his head. Suddenly, he kisses her on the lips, surprising her.

OUR TAKE

Okay, this one felt a LOT easier to understand than the last few. I think part of that has to do with the fact that this episode starts exploring how the people running “Kura” have their complicated feelings about Narihisago. He’s a good pilot due to his smarts and seems like a decent enough person, but it doesn’t change the fact that, as revealed in this episode, he’s a serial killer just like the people they hunt. It does seem like he has more of a motivation to help victims because of being a former homicide detective which makes him more endearing, but the end of last week also showed that he has quite the dark side as well if he apparently has the ability to drive five people to suicide. And yet the people he works with do seem to have varied opinions on the guy. Matsuoka apparently despises him despite their previous partnership, Hondomachi kind of thinks he’s cool for his abilities, and Momoki (the one in charge of putting him in the wells, looks to be somewhere in the middle. Now that the rest of the cast is slowly but surely starting to become defined as people, I’m looking forward to seeing how they continue to develop.

We also get to see a little exploration of what happens when people other than Narihisago use an Id Well in the role of the “brilliant detective”. Like him, Fukuda also gets a new look which gives us a peek at what he looked like before he went Gurren Lagann on his noggin, likely based on a younger version of himself like Narihisago’s Sakaido look is. And through this, we learn that not just anyone can use this sort of device (we were told this last week in a really drawn out explanation but I much prefer showing to telling). One would need Narihisago’s level of smarts to truly make use of it, but I don’t think that necessarily means that only he can use it. I certainly hope we get to see more people in the cockpit, maybe see Fukuda take on a proper case once he’s gotten enough practice. Either way, I think I’m really starting to warm up to this show now, even if I don’t really see the brilliance I’m seeing other viewers and commenters talk about. But with two thirds left, there’s certainly plenty of time for that to change. At this rate, we might just get there.