English Dub Review: Knight’s & Magic “Hide & Seek”
Well, those Silhouette Gears were surprisingly useful!
Spoilers Below
Fort Casadesus is under attack! The Order of the Bronze Fang, led by Lady Kerhilt, snuck in with a stolen Silhouette Knight. Their goal, to steal all of Ernesti’s newly developed Telestale units. As soon as the attack begins, Ernesti volunteers his support, but Marquis Dixgard forbids it. He deems Ernie too valuable to risk on the battlefield. Despite bringing the Scarlet Rabbit’s ace unit into play, the rogues escape with two mechas. At first, they have some difficulty using the Telestale models, due to the vastly improved power output, but they quickly adapt and develop new strategies to use the back weapons. They destroy the drawbridge, making it impossible to follow directly after them. The hijackers run into a complication they were not counting on, however.
Edgar and Dietrich meet them on the road, escorting a wagon carrying Kid, Addy, and a trio of Silhouette Gears. Dietrich’s Guair has been upgraded, using the new upgraded crystal tissue and back weapons. He and Edgar’s Earlcumber are strong enough to take on one Telestale and an older model, but Lady Kerhilt has one of the experimental Telestale with additional tissue to store mana. It’s hard going, three on two, and the enemy is more intent on getting away than winning the fight. The two stolen Telestale make a break for it through a smoke screen, while the older unit delays the Guair. At first, it seems Edgar is outnumbered and outgunned, but Kid and Addy arrive in their Silhouette Gears. Using their superior maneuverability (they have limited flight, as well as grappling guns) The two of them take down the other Telestale, leaving Edgar to fight Kerhilt. She’s rapidly getting better with the unit, and Edgar’s mecha is still of an older design, so she gets the upper hand and escapes, covering her back with a horde of demon beasts. Meanwhile, Ernesti gets a hold of his Silhouette Gear, and uses it in conjunction with his in-depth understanding of the Telestale’s systems to take out the enemy still inside the fort. From there, he and the Scarlet Rabbit Knights take out the remaining demon beasts. The sortie resolved, Ernesti’s team is summoned to by the King. He sees the great value in Ernesti’s work and believes the secrecy of it is worth protecting. He decides to found a new order of knights, The Silver Phoenix. With Ernesti leading this new order, things are certainly looking up for our young inventor!
This episode was all about the action, and it was worthwhile action at that. It was good fun seeing all these Telestale finally in action, and their added firepower made for an interesting fight. The Silhouette Gears made for a surprise for me. I didn’t expect them to beat a Telestale. While there were technically two of them, Addy’s arsenal didn’t seem to do much damage to a full Silhouette Knight. Really, Kid did most of the work, even if it was by accident. The Silhouette Gears were traditionally animated, even though their enemies were animated by CG. These smaller units zipped around the battlefield with great agility, and are well animated, but nowhere close to Attack on Titan level. It does work well against the CG units, so it isn’t distracting. What I did notice was that the horses were CG, and weren’t the best CG either. They moved stiffly and really weren’t realistic at all. They also didn’t mesh well with their surroundings.
I’m interested in seeing what these new developments could bring about for Ernesti. Being the head of the Silver Phoenix not only brings him a better standing but more resources with which to develop Silhouette Knights. I bet he’ll be able to solve the power consumption issue pretty quick. Given that we’ve seen flying mecha in the opening, we know that is coming, too. He demonstrated that he could use spells to disable Telestale units. Perhaps he could weaponize that to make more effective weapons. I doubt it, though. That would go against his aesthetics. It’s also very likely that this new position will also bring Ernesti a whole new mess of troubles since he’s now a part of the political drama. Though it seems like the Bronze Fangs are from another country, it may be interesting to see this as a fight in two areas simultaneously. So, with its good action, and solid animation, I would give this episode a respectable eight stolen mecha out of ten.
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