English Dub Review: Knight’s & Magic “New & Old”

Oh, TWO fights? Aren’t you special…

Overview (Spoilers)

The mock battle between the Order of the Silver Phoenix and the Silhouette Knight Laboratory is in full effect! It’s six of the SKL’s Kaldatoah Darshes with experienced pilots versus the centaur-like Tzendolg, Ernesti’s blue, flying Toy Box, and two Telestale with Option Works. Though the Silver Phoenix prototypes are powerful in the extreme, they use up mana like Democrats use up tax money. With the more balanced Darshes in more capable hands, it ends up as a draw. This is exactly what the king wants, with the Silver Knights pushing the boundaries and SKL turning those ideas into more balanced, mass-produced units. Of course, this also comes right before King Ambrosious’ retirement. He passes the crown to his son, along with the royal Silhouette Knight. He then commissions a new private Knight from Ernesti. When Prince Emrys also asks for one, the two have a mock duel over who gets which of the two high-level mechs. Prince Emrys wins the golden one, but Ambrosious admits he knew the two units were identical in all but cosmetics.

Man, this episode was sooooo much fun! The battles were great. How great? I didn’t even have time to take a screenshot. Yeah, that fast paced! I dig these new units, though I feel like the Tzendolg was under-utilizing its dual-core nature. Had I built that thing, I probably would have given it a large shield and two back weapons. That would make it excellent as a blockade runner to breach enemy lines and shoot them from behind. That would also allow it to continue making attacks as it circles back around. The lance isn’t a bad weapon, it takes advantage of Tzendolg’s land-speed. Toy Box was the real wild card here, but it ended up not being much use in the battle. With that kind of mana drain, it shouldn’t be used for long-distance flight. Instead, smaller dash-like bursts would be better to maximize maneuverability. Another possibility would be to have a separate flight unit with its own core. That way, the unit could be ditched if need be, and would simply recharge while not in use. That way, the Toy Box wouldn’t be useless after a flight burst. Once the flight unit is fully charged, it trickles its charge into the main batteries.

The Flexible Cloak and Electric Flail were great weapons, especially in Edgar’s hands. Having a shield that can expand, contract, and hide away is useful, and the tactical possibilities of the flail in combat open up many new ways to deal with enemies. It allowed him to not only remove the enemy shield but disable an arm, giving the team a good advantage, especially in concert with Dietrich’s dual wielding option. I would like to see Edgar use the shield’s ability to open and close to catch enemy weapons and disarm them. In the hands of a battle master, the Flexible Cloak is almost as revolutionary as the back weapons. To be honest, I’d prefer Dietrich’s Telestale to the Toy Box. It may not be able to fly, but it is extremely agile. His broader, more triangular swords are proficient at parrying as well. When it comes to the Darshes, the English translation of the previous episode was misleading. It claimed that it increased power output by 30% and dealt with the power consumption. Reading some summaries of the light novel that this was based on, they blended the Strand-Type Crystal tissue with the plate-type. This only increased the strength by 30% over the base unit, instead of 30% over the Telestale. This means the Darshes were overall weaker than the Tzendolg and Telestale.

The second battle is nice, but the focus isn’t on the action. Instead, it focuses far more on the past of Ambrosious. It shows how he isn’t just a bureaucrat, but a leader that puts his subordinates’ safety ahead of his own. When presented with overwhelming numbers of demon beasts, he took the vanguard and used his incredible skill to take control of the battle. He earned their respect and loyalty by way of his own strength and wisdom. Gee, I wish we had rulers like that in the modern day… While he is exceptionally skilled with his spear in the battle with his grandson, Emrys has more training with the new back weapons. Since the Darshe got retooled into the Kardatolles, experience with the new systems is the gold standard, as it opens up your tactical abilities. Emrys proves that he is just as fierce as Ambrosious was in his youth, which was the ultimate goal of this exercise. He hopes to not only pass on his kingship but his mantle as the Lion.

Our Take

The plot and action of this episode more than makeup for the slow nature of the previous one. The mock battle is fast, action-packed, and impressive. I actually had to re-watch the first fight to fully understand all the new features of the units, since things moved so quickly. When people learn how to make anime mech battles, they should look at this fight. I’m noticing, however, just how much this series makes use of time skips. You get a fight or a new advancement, time skip. Reveal a bit more, time skip. I know it’s the nature of the beast since it takes a while to build these things, but it would be nice to see other things happening in the meantime. Perhaps fights on the front lines with demon beasts or more political intrigue. What are the logistical issues of being in charge of one of these orders? How does it change his life? Having a time skip or two in the series is fine, but having two or three per episode many feel like I’m missing out on things.

The CG animation during these fights was top notch. Smooth, but dynamic, and just pure fun. The only points you have to breathe are during the brief moments where we hear from the nobles. All I can say is that I want more of this. So much more. The fight between Ambrosious and Emrys was well animated. Though it wasn’t at the same level as the mock battle, it was still much better animation than some shows. When looking at the traditional animation, they loaded Ernie’s presence in the episode with emotion, and they didn’t slack off while animating the characters. The voice acting was rather standard, with the exception of Justin Briner’s acting as Ernesti, which keyed well off the animation’s expressiveness.

So, with its excellent animation and hard-hitting mecha action, this episode was all I’ve been wanting from this show in those regards. I would like a bit more depth in the storytelling, and a little more out of the voice actors. As it stands, however, I still give this episode nine Flexible Cloaks out of ten!