Best episode of the series so far. Starts with a big gooey explosion and ends with some basketball.
Fantastic opening sequence. The little clip before the opening credits was incredible. For some reason they decided that if one is going to communicate with a dragon egg clothes are a bad idea. Aside from that little awkward piece it was appealing it see the response of the egg to the human. The whole pseudo-tentacles turning into a killing tool was a handy little trick. Similar to Elfien Lied with the telekinetic arms and Akira with the monstrous flesh mutations. The exploding blood was a good way to portray what happened without over stimulating the audience. Basically they could have done a whole show about the opening clip and it would have been great.
The storytelling was decent in this episode. It was not full of the clichés that plagued earlier episodes. One thing that could have been a huge negative would have been the usage of a transforming sequence. Happily they left that out and stuck more to action or storytelling. The episode did not get bogged down with any over detailed arcs and keep on track. When Gio and Jin needed to meet again there was the deus ex machina with Gio seeing a movie with Toa in it. This show does not have any delusions of grandeur. It is simply a story that involves some action
One compliant is that some of the women are so disproportioned. I think that some of the characters would have troubling walking with how high their center of gravity must be. The traditional hand drawn anime is good. One thing I notice about Code Geass was that they seemed to thin and tall. There is not such problem with this show. Toa has some junk in the trunk and in the order of Flight of the Conchords “if that’s what you are into.” The CG is a waste. It doe not enhance the show and is not that detailed. They are smart in limiting how much is CG but they are trying to be too clever including it.
The show is really displaying some decent promise. The story is moving along at a decent pace without being drawn out. There is not nearly the same amount of problems that plagued the earlier episodes. The characters are more compelling and they are not incredibly whiney and annoying. This episode is a great turn for the better. 75%
