Magic Knight Rayearth ‒ Episode 4
Fun as it was last week to reminisce about the older series and CLAMP more broadly, moving forward I'm going to try avoiding mentioning the 90s anime too much unless there's a pretty significant divergence that's worth comparing, or another really good reason to. You'll have to forgive me—you probably noticed I'm an old school CLAMP fan, so this is incredibly nostalgic for me. And while I do hope that plenty of old fans are having fun returning to Cefiro, I know plenty of others of you are here for your first time!
So on that note, this week we've encountered another pointy new face: Ferio's. And we actually don't learn much about him yet—instead, it's our introduction to a new face that allows us to learn more about our protagonists. Fuu, in particular, is the one this has us learning a lot about. After giving us a prime Light Yagami “According to plan” face, we see her improvise a really clever plan to get Ferio to act as something of a bodyguard for the girls. Of course, this ultimately leads to Fuu having an, “OH NO, HE'S HOT” moment upon getting saved by him. Even if romance isn't as core to MKR as it is most other CLAMP series, we're definitely at least starting to get a taste that there might be some here yet.
Speaking of saving, Umi is the next to get her powers because she wants to save Hikaru. Is it weird getting your world-saving spells through a magic Zoom call? Let's be so for real: Yes, it is. But somehow, it suits the vibes of MKR. Fuu gets hers soon as well of course—the healing power of wind. At first I wondered if having wind as a healing element felt off to me because traditionally, in fantasy, we're more used to seeing water fulfill that role. There's a new Avatar: The Last Airbender series coming out right now, and that's a perfect example. But then I realized: Actually, maybe this only feels weird to me because I hail from Oklahoma. Worded a bit differently, I grew up in tornado alley, so, uh, wind and healing aren't exactly common associations made in my mind. So, the rest of you will have to tell me if wind feels natural as a healing element, and if this is just a case of me having Oklahoma-brain.
This is all to say that the wheels are really starting to turn in this episode, and we're finally starting to see the story take on more of a shape than it has in previous weeks. Up until now, it's mostly been set up, and seeing the girls set forth on their first task. But now, as we start to meet more people and learn more about the world—even if at this point, there's still a lot we don't know—things are finally coming into focus somewhat. This is especially the case with Alcyone, who we saw again this week, and finally see the girls learning a bit more about. Speaking of, our protagonists have finally discovered their powers, so the idea that they really are the legendary Magic Knights that they've been hearing about is feeling less like some abstract concept, and more like the reality of their situation. Things are moving at a good pace here.
Finally, as always, the visuals and animation is absolutely luscious. Build me as many bridges as you want, I'll never get over this. I could tell in particular, the artists were—just as I'm sure CLAMP themselves were when they made the manga—having fun with Umi's gorgeous long hair flowing all over the place. CLAMP sure does love flowing long hair, and Umi's the only one of our protagonists with that in this series. Still, for as little of her as we've seen so far, Princess Emeraude also has that in spades—I have every certainty we're going to see more great hair as the series continues.
Rating:
Magic Knight Rayearth is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.
discuss this in the forum (19 posts) |
back to Magic Knight Rayearth
Episode Review homepage / archives
KioskNews shows a cleaned-up reading view extracted from the publisher’s page — the original always lives on their site, not ours.