English Dub Review: Infinite Dendrogram “Clash of the Superiors; The Beginning of Madness”

Overview (Spoilers Below)

“Clash of the Superiors”

As the tournament continues, Ray is about to bet on Figaro for the tournament’s next match, but Nemesis stops him, thinking he will waste their money again. They come across Xunyu, who is carrying an unconscious girl, but of course, that isn’t the case when Shu later steps in and defuses the situation and the girl was actually someone quite important who was. Ray and Shu then reunite with the rest of the party as the match begins, with Figaro and Xunyu set to fight each other. The battle itself is quite decent as Xunyu is able to land several hits on Figaro, but as Shu explains, Figaro possesses a special Embryo that makes him more powerful the longer he remains in a fight. Just when it looks like Xunyu is about to deliver a killing blow, Shu reveals a trick him that Figaro’s both have up their sleeve to counter it, thereby winning the match. but the episode ends on a cliffhanger when Flamingo interrupts and reveals himself to be Franklin, a scientist working for the Dryfe Imperium, but the episode ends when he reveals something else…



“The Beginning of Madness”

Picking up immediately from the last episode, Marie, being friends with Elizabeth becomes determined to save her from Franklin, who reveals that the arena is surrounded by a magical barrier, and if players attempt to break through, the monsters under Franklin’s control will destroy the entire kingdom of Gideon. While Marie goes on a solo-rescue mission, Ray discovers a unique loop-hole within the Barrier itself. As Ray, Rook and other under-leveled players fight players affiliated with Dryfe. Franklin brags about his evil plan Elizabeth that will leave Altar vulnerable in an upcoming war against Dryfe. Marie briefly saves Elizabeth and inflicts lethal damage from Franklin, but Franklin transfers all the damage he sustained to his monsters and survives. As he recaptures Elizabeth, he deduces Marie managed to kill a high-ranking player using only an under-leveled Embryo and orders his henchman Veldorbell to eliminate Marie. Meanwhile, a group of low-ranking players proceeds to breach Gideon’s west gate, but the episode ends when Hugo isn’t just going to let them do what they want without resistance…



Our Take


It’s good that the show is finally back to finish being dubbed and was long overdue after the “COVID” mess we all had to endure. Even if the visual quality dropped noticeably, the main fights & twists within the game world of this show were easily the highlight of these two episodes as Figaro proves why he’s one of the top players in the game while Xunyu proves he is not to be taken lightly. Even if Figaro won, Xunyu made him work for that victory. Better yet, the season is finally moving onto the main event, as the Dr.Penguin reveals his true identity and initiates his plan like some classic cartoon super villain.

The 2nd episode, however, moved a bit too fast for me, and tried to do so many things at once. We finally learn Marie’s real identity and connections to Ellie and we see Hugo take his place in Franklin’s plan. I felt that these story-beats moved at a brisk pace and didn’t give viewers a chance much to understand what’s going, but still, they were more enjoyable than Ray’s part in this episode, which was pretty standard action stuff but still cleverly written.

With only four episodes left, I really hope this show can top itself in some way.