Plot: Flashing back to 18 years ago, we learn what really happened when the half-demon princesses were born to separate them from their parents.
Breakdown: I realize I’m very far behind, and I even wanted to do another lightning round batch review to catch up, but I had way too much to say about this one so I opted against it.
So this is the episode we’ve all been waiting for. The big backstory episode explaining what the hell has been going on.
I’m already on my Word processor writing about how confused I am…..when I’m not even to the opening theme song. Come take a 20 minute walk with me. I feel the path is going to be rocky.
This episode, as I expected from the next episode preview, is fully a flashback. Hosenki II has finished creating a black pearl after being loaned the green rainbow pearl and Izayoi’s rouge by Riku. This allowed him to create a new black pearl in four years when it usually takes 100.
Also, this confirms that Riku’s definitely not human, but what exactly he is, I don’t know either.
Hosenki goes to Kaede’s village to give Inuyasha the black pearl, but not before asking him to demonstrate his father’s ability – the Adamant Barrage. The instant he asked Inuyasha to do this I knew Inuyasha would destroy something with it and Kagome would get pissed at him. Lo and behold, he did. He destroyed their house…..Ya know, Inuyasha may not be joining Mensa anytime soon, but I refuse to believe he’d be THAT reckless and stupid. Especially considering, from where I stand, there’s no reason that wouldn’t have hurt/killed Kagome. She was standing in their doorway.
Cue Sit Boy.
Hosenki tells Inuyasha and Kagome that the black pearls are actually Izayoi’s tears? And that they were turned into pearls after her death? And one of them was the black pearl in Inuyasha’s eye – the one that houses his father’s grave? What? How does that make sense? Why was anyone keeping her tears or turning them into pearls? What purpose would that possibly have? She’s human. There can’t be any mystical powers behind her tears. Where did he get one of Izayoi’s tears four years ago? She’s been dead for 20 years.
Apparently, he needed Izayoi’s rouge because he needed her deep sorrow in order to complete the pearl…..Why is her sorrow held in her rouge and why her TEARS aren’t ample enough sources of her own sorrow – I dunno.
But hey let’s turn a page in the Big Book of How Not to Write Inuyasha.
This is post-series Inuyasha. He’s matured quite a bit. He’s loved. He’s lost. He’s grieved. He’s found love again. He’s saved the world numerous times. He’s found a new family. He’s ‘married’ now….I assume. Later, it’s confirmed that Kagome’s already pregnant at this point (which means he almost just hurt/killed his unborn child with that stunt too, nice. So much for the ol’ overprotective expecting father). He may still and always be the reckless hothead we’ve come to know and love, but he’s not an asshole.
So why, pray tell, when Kagome’s like ‘Isn’t it great Inuyasha? We have two keepsakes of your mother now.’ he’s all ‘Why the hell would I need those things anymore?’ That, by the way, is word-for-word what he said.
Even when Inuyasha trusted no one and pretty much hated humans he still kept his mother’s rouge near and dear to his heart, so much so that he gave it to Kikyo as a gift that she, in turn, treasured (we’ll get to that elephant in the room in a second.) Why would he act like such an ass about these keepsakes now?
And yes I get it, Inuyasha’s still not good at showing his feelings, Kagome even says as much, but being reserved about your feelings isn’t the same as basically saying these keepsakes of his mother are garbage to him and he finds no point in keeping them. He even scoffs at the idea of bringing the items to his father’s grave out of respect.
Instead, he shoves the new black pearl into his eye, which, as Hosenki points out, means he won’t be able to retrieve it except in times of great need. Can he just keep an infinite amount of black pearls in his eye or does he need to pay for an inventory upgrade at some point?
Kagome insists that they keep the rouge, though. Inuyasha told Hosenki that he was surprised he managed to ‘find’ it and we get a brief flashback to Inuyasha giving the rouge to Kikyo. Yeah. In case you missed the late edit I made to my review of episode five, I suddenly remembered that Inuyasha didn’t just give the rouge to Kikyo. Naraku broke the rouge into teeny pieces right in front of Kikyo when he attacked her. So not only do we have to believe that the rouge was kept by….someone for the past 50 some-odd years for some reason, but also that it magically reassembled itself.
A little while later, Rin is giving birth to Towa and Setsuna. Judging from how old the twins and Hisui look right now, I’d say we’re only a few years out from the end of The Final Act, where Rin was 11, according to the Wiki. She’s 29 now….and her kids are 14……Meaning she’s 15 at this point.
Okay, we kinda can’t avoid this now….this is just squicky. Especially considering that it’s very possible she was 14 when she conceived…..
I figured she would’ve been at least a few years older, which still would’ve been squicky but not AS bad. As much as I suck at math I can determine that 14 year old + 200+ year old (at least) = eughgh.
I do have to be kind of fair and point out that this is still the Feudal Era – times were different. Like I said before, I really don’t want to research this too much because I’d prefer not having a bunch of questions of this nature in my search history, but it wasn’t terribly uncommon for adult men to have relationships with very young girls and boys back in those days. Hell, all across the world girls were getting married off when they were like nine to men who were 30+. The average marriage age back in feudal Japan was still 16, but from all I’ve read it wasn’t really viewed as a very official act back then (which might explain why there was no hoopdeedoo around Sango and Miroku and Inuyasha and Kagome getting married.) Feel free to correct me on any of this by the way.
So….on a social level, back then, this is probably viewed as being just fine.
…….HOW
EV
ER
I must point out that it’s not like Inuyasha is a series that strives for period realism. Sure, they have some historical figures pop up, and they’re probably fine in the realm of keeping the wardrobe, architecture and whatnot accurate, but that’s where the buck stops because our main character is part dog. He uses a sword that defies the laws of physics and has more forms than Frieza. He was in love with a clay zombie. His wife is a reincarnation of aforementioned clay zombie, and she can move freely between two set yet somehow simultaneously moving points in time via a well. She had a magic jewel stuck in her stomach because somehow the jewel burned with Kikyo’s body and somehow was lost to existence for 500 years before randomly reemerging. They were friends with a tiny transforming fox demon who used toys as weapons and could turn into a balloon. They flew around on a magic fire cat. One of them had a black hole in his hand. That same guy is friends with a giant tanuki. They spent a decade trying to track down and kill a half-spider demon who honestly should’ve been half-cockroach he was that difficult to kill. Said spider-dude split himself off into numerous other people with completely unrelated powers – one of which was a woman who controlled wind and flew from place to place on a giant feather, another was a small emotionless albino child who had a magic mirror and another was a creepy baby with a ball. They collected approximately 70 billion jewel shards to finally complete the world’s most annoying MacGuffin, and the grand finale to stop all of the fuss surrounding the thing was to have the jewel literally be wished away.
Sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo, I don’t think it’s entirely unreasonable to ask the writers, who live in modern times, to maybe tack on another few years to Rin’s age to make this not so icky, even if it’s, inevitably, going to be a little icky considering their circumstances.
Literally nothing else would have to change. Even if Towa and Setsuna ended up being a little younger than Moroha, it’d be fine. Hell, technically, you wouldn’t even have to do that. If it really is difficult for half-demons to reproduce, you can just say Kagome took a long time to get pregnant. That’s basically what they’re already saying anyway considering Kagome’s only now getting pregnant and she’s been married to Inuyasha for a few years. They don’t really have any reliable birth control in this era. Unless it took them THAT long to do the marriage dance, which, considering it took them until the very end of the series to kiss canonically……yeah, that might track.
Moving on, it’s the night of a lunar eclipse, and Riku comes to meet Kagome and tell her about the Grim Comet. Once every 500 years, the Grim Comet passes by earth. Fragments of the comet break off and threaten the lives of the people in its path. 500 years ago, Inutaisho and Kirinmaru worked together to destroy the fragments that were falling. Now the comet is a mere seven days out and Inutaisho is dead while Kirinmaru has fallen into a deep slumber for some reason.
Kagome proclaims that Inuyasha will definitely help in his father’s stead, but wonders how they can awaken Kirinmaru. Riku explains that awakening Kirinmaru is a bad idea. He hates humans and detests half-demons. If he awakens, chances are he’ll murder Inuyasha, Sesshomaru’s children and even Kagome’s unborn child. The only way to stop the comet fragments is by getting Inuyasha and Sesshomaru to do it together.
……..Wait, the comet comes by once every 500 years?…Modern era times are 500 years off…..which….means………Uhhh are we all dead now? Or is this another thing that just doesn’t exist in modern times because reasons?
Sesshomaru’s listening to his children being born from a couple miles away….why he’s not actually there providing Rin with support, I don’t know. Can’t lose that stoicism that made the fanbase swoon, I suppose.
Zero drops by and basically just taunts him, threatens him and his family vaguely concerning Kirinmaru and tells him about the comet. After she leaves, Sesshomaru goes to see Rin and his new twin children.
Consensus on whether it’s weird for Rin to still call Sesshomaru ‘Lord Sesshomaru.’? Zero even said they’re married now too.
Sesshomaru just comes in and swoops the twins away, not even commenting on Rin or their new children. So just to recap – the first instances we see of these two as a couple are him listening to her give birth from far away and not reacting and him snatching up his newborn kids and making off with them with barely a sentence in response as to what he’s doing with them and no words to Rin whatsoever.
You guys are definitely going to have to do better than that. I mean, anyone who’s watched the original series knows how much they care for each other, but that’s on a, and I hate to go here, but it has to be said, a father-daughter level. Romance is a different level. The levels should never connect, but here we are. Any emotion in this scene, what little there is, is quite shallow considering it’s not only void of any romantic or tender moments between Rin and Sesshomaru but also between the two of them and their daughters. Rin names them and that’s it.
Kagome asks what he’s doing, and he simply says it’s the rites of courage and cowardice. Kagome asks if it has anything to do with Kirinmaru, but he just leaves without saying anything more. Rin tearfully whispers that she has faith in Sesshomaru. Jaken hands Kagome a paper explaining when and where Sesshomaru will face the comet fragment. He can do it on his own, but he’s giving Inuyasha the information just in case.
As Sesshomaru heads off, he’s confronted by Joka. Remember her? The Ka demon that you stopped caring about almost immediately? Who was then killed off almost immediately? She’s been tasked by Zero to take/kill the half-demon twins, but Sesshomaru just swats her away and easily cuts her arms off, revealing that she was using two rainbow pearls in her arms – the silver and gold pearls.
He mentions that the rainbow pearls are Zero’s tears…….???????
Sesshomaru takes the pearls and flies off. He leaves the twins at the sacred tree, giving them each one of the rainbow pearls that are implanted into their eyes—wait, is that seriously the origin of their rainbow pearls? Just that Joka literally came the fuck out of nowhere, had them, Sesshomaru swiped them more easily than a credit card and then sticks them in the eyes of his daughters? Okie dokie. Guess it’s about as disappointing as the origin of Moroha’s red rainbow pearl.
Jaken tasks himself with caring for the twins until they can take care of themselves. He also explains that he’ll bring Rin there soon enough. Wait, what? He’s raising the kids in Rin’s stead….but he’s also going to bring Rin there?
In order to have a safe place to raise them, Jaken puts up a powerful barrier all around a half-mile-ish radius from the sacred tree. Neither Joka nor Zero can sense the twins now, so they’re kinda stuck.
Cut ahead to the set meeting time and place for Inuyasha and Sesshomaru to take down the fragment. It’s at Sesshomaru’s mother’s place for some reason (even though she isn’t there). They take care of the fragment, which was a demon….comet….fragment I guess?, in less than a minute, and then they just leave.
Phew.
Nail. Biter.
…..What purpose did that whole comet thing have to do with the plot, by the way? Feels like it was a big pointless waste of time. It affected nothing.
Cut to Kirinmaru’s….Pirate ship…house?…..Cool? He is awoken by Zero who shares the news of Sesshomaru and Inuyasha’s half/quarter demon children. It was prophesied by the Shikon jewel….somehow, that a being neither human nor demon who could transcend time would be Kirinmaru’s downfall, which, logically, even pointed out by Zero, would mean MOROHA’S the one he has to watch out for…..but apparently this series wants to focus on the twins.
I know the one who actually transcends time is Towa, but that’s not even her doing – it’s the power of the silver rainbow pearl.
Anyhoo, Sesshomaru comes in and acts as if he’s going to help Kirinmaru kill Inuyasha (and I guess the kids?) Also, we’ve time skipped a bit because now Moroha’s born. We’re at the exact scene where Moroha’s dreams were shown in an earlier episode. Kirinmaru and Sesshomaru face off against Kagome and Inuyasha, Kagome gives Moroha the rouge and sends her off with Hachi, why Hachi’s there I don’t know, but we now get more than we did then.
Kirinmaru and Sesshomaru attack Inuyasha. However, to Kirinmaru’s surprise, Sesshomaru rushes ahead and sticks his fingers in Inuyasha’s eye, grabbing the black pearl. He uses the pearl’s power to suck Inuyasha and Kagome into the world within the pearl. Kirinmaru is surprised Sesshomaru helped them….dude, you’re thick as a milkshake made of cement. Of course he helped Inuyasha and Kagome – he’s allied with them now. He has taken a human as a bride. He has two half-demon children he’s clearly protecting. If he really wanted Inuyasha dead, he’d have done it long ago, especially considering Miroku no longer has his wind tunnel and there are times where Inuyasha loses his demon powers entirely.
He’s definitely nowhere near as intelligent and conniving as Naraku if he fell for such an easy ploy as that. Combine that with how he seems to be manipulated by Zero and….I sense a lot of suckage on the horizon with this dude. I hope Zero’s the real villain because wow. Riku might be the villain, but I dunno. He’s been very morally gray.
Now you’d think Sesshomaru would be in deep shit for that. Afterall, he just betrayed and tricked the big bad Kirinmaru and kept him from killing those filthy half/quarter demons he hates so much.
….Nope.
Kirinmaru just kinda brushes it off. Jaken says they’ll need Inuyasha’s Meido Zangetsuha some day for whatever reasons and Kirinmaru’s all ‘Lol whatever.’ and then he walks off with Sesshomaru.
We see that Moroha was given to some new character in Koga’s wolf demon tribe to care for her, which is cool. I was wondering where Koga was and it makes sense that she would’ve been raised with them given how she acts. In hindsight, it’s kinda funny. One day, Inuyasha will have to deal with the fact that Koga, of all people, was one of the people who helped raised his daughter (I think?) I would pay to see his expression when that news drops on his head.
Using the dream-gazing thingy, Zero is able to see where Towa and Setsuna are, so she plots to burn down the forest where they reside. Sesshomaru, knowing he can’t refuse or else he’d show his hand, seemingly complies and walks off.
You know the rest.
Then we cut back to present/Feudal era time where Riku is breaking the fourth wall as he’s been the one telling us the story. That wasn’t really necessary, but okay.
And, uh, that was it.
I am thoroughly underwhelmed.
I really hate that I keep saying that about this series, but it’s true.
Like I said in the last episode’s review, I wasn’t really expecting much from this episode. They’ve dropped the ball with so much that I had little to no faith they’d pull off something impressive with this backstory – and they didn’t.
At least I didn’t get mad at it, but it also left me awash in a sea of ‘Meh.’ which, oftentimes, is quite worse.
It’s just a lot of…things….happening. But none of them are particularly interesting things. The things that SHOULD be interesting like Towa and Setsuna’s births as well as Moroha’s birth were flat and unemotional – we didn’t even get to see Moroha’s birth. She just appears. Sesshomaru being an ice queen about his kids I expected but I kinda wanted to see Inuyasha being sentimental about his kid. Instead we get him nearly murdering his pregnant wife just because he wants to show off and can’t aim in a reasonable direction and him being an ass about his mother’s heirlooms.
Considering the lack of emotional connection and caring between the girls and their parents is already an existing and glaring problem even before the girls have ever met their parents, the fact that there’s little shown on the opposite side of the fence is a really heavy blow. Inuyasha used to be nearly melodramatic. What happened to the emotion in this series?
In terms of action, that was even worse. The comet thing was poorly explained (why did no one mention it was filled with smoky demons. WHY is it filled with smoky demons? How did they get in there? Are there SPACE DEMONS!? That’s way more interesting than anything ever presented in this entire franchise.) and they did the job so easily I’m not convinced in the slightest that only Inutaisho or his kids could have destroyed it. There was no tension whatsoever in that scene. It was literally two shots – one to slice the rock and the other to defeat the smoky space demon. It’s always a little cool to see Sesshomaru and Inuyasha working together, but that’s about it. Like I said, the entire comet subplot seemed like a massive waste of time, especially in a backstory episode for god’s sake.
The “battle” between Kirinmaru and Sesshomaru vs. Inuyasha wasn’t even a battle, hence the sarcastic quotation marks. Not only did no blows actually get traded, but I knew from the instant Sesshomaru walked into Kirinmaru’s lair that he was playing Kirinmaru. There’s no reason he’d go through all that trouble to protect his family just up and decide to kill Inuyasha for no reason.
It’s cool that Sesshomaru helped them out, as rough as his plan may have been, but the fact that Kirinmaru didn’t do anything to Sesshomaru after the fact is just lame. He didn’t attack him or threaten him, he didn’t even try to take the pearl– he just shrugged and they walked off together.
The one interesting hanging thread in this entire episode is where Inuyasha and Kagome actually are. Jaken acted like they were sent to Inutaisho’s grave, but there are two problems with that; 1) They spent way too much time focusing on the second black pearl at the start of the episode and making it a point that Inuyasha put it in his eye that I can’t imagine that wasn’t a setup for a switcheroo. 2) If they were in Inutaisho’s gravesite, then they should be able to leave whenever they please. They’ve done it before.
I wonder if Inuyasha and Kagome came up with a plan about this with Sesshomaru before he went to meet Kirinmaru. I can’t imagine they did because I’d assume they’d send Moroha off to safety before Kirinmaru and Sesshomaru faced off with them.
This episode also did clear up Sesshomaru’s intentions a bit, which is good. It’s tough love, really tough, but he means well. I still don’t entirely get what he’s doing, and I feel like, if he wanted to, he could kill Kirinmaru – especially if he teamed up with Inuyasha. We already know his Perils are jokes. He just doesn’t give off that impressive of a vibe. He’s a doof in a mask. Oh by the way, Naraku called, he wants his ‘using an animal head as a mask’ shtick back. Plus, he hasn’t even really done jack shit over the course of the series so far. In fact, the one thing he was actually shown doing was HEROIC. He helped Inutaisho destroy the comet fragment 500 years ago, saving countless lives.
Some things are obviously still missing from the backstory like how Rin became comatose within the Tree of Ages, what Sesshomaru’s grand plan is, what happened to Setsuna after the fire, how and when Setsuna came into contact with the Dream Butterfly, how she got her boa, how she ended up being trained by the demon slayers, why she said that thing about a rite of courage and cowardice when Sesshomaru said that mere moments after she was born, why Kirinmaru hasn’t just slaughtered these kids himself yet considering he now knows where they are, and, just for good measure, where the hell Shippo is. He is not here. Did the writers forget he existed? We saw him in episode one, right? Where did he go? I’m not letting this go. There’s no reason he hasn’t so much as made a brief cameo, especially in a flashback episode.
I dunno, guys. My interest in this series is tanking faster than a tank of gas in a tank as it drives around a tanker truck filled with tiny toy tanks. There’s a reason I haven’t gotten around to reviewing this in so long. Dread was a part of it, but I just found myself failing to care enough to press ‘play.’ It’s gotten to a point where it’s hard for me to care about what they wrote for the original Inuyasha crew because it’s just so boring and badly written, and that’s a big problem.
I am several episodes behind, though. Someone tell me they’ve already arrived at greener pastures.
Next time, we get Moroha’s backstory with her old master from the wolf demon tribe. I actually DO care about this, but, again, I’m not expecting much. The way they treat Moroha by default is crappy, despite her being the best new character, but at least it sounds like we’ll learn why Moroha’s in debt.
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The Anime Madhouse 