Notes of Coppelion Episode 6-7

I can’t begin to count how many facepalms would be appropriate seeing how easily Aoki allows herself to be captured.

• In the last episode, we met another group of survivors hiding out in a planetarium and the troops named 1st Divison that were constantly attacking them for reasons unknown.

• Summary of Episode Six and Seven: Ibara’s team has gone into hiding while Taeko is recovering. Unfortunately the 1st Division comes to attack and while the team seems to be prepared, Aoki is captured rather easily. Ibara makes the decision to rescue her comrade and she gets unexpected help in the form of another Coppelion squad member, Haruto. Unfortunately, Aoi gets left behind and she’s recaptured, but Haruto plans on using her as a decoy and eventually they find out where the 1st Division is relocating. While confronting the baddies, Ibara takes a hit and not only loses consciousness, but a shrapnel lodges itself inside her belly and she has to be operated on. The commander of 1st Division is locked up. Meanwhile the international conference is underway and although Ibuki starts going into labour, the vice principal’s hands are tied and he can’t send rescue. Ibara’s team is taking her to a hospital when a mysterious adversary blocks their path with barrels leaking waste.

• My impressions are somewhat mixed after viewing the last two installments in the show. I can’t say I’m bored with the show as there is a lot going on – we get to meet one of the girls’ classmates, we get a glimpse of how their school life looked like, everyone has difficulties to cope with – Taeko recovering, the vice principal busy with the conference, Ibara rescuing Aoi, and so on. On the other hand Aoi’s personality gets less and less believable for me with each episode.

• I’m curious how the 1st Division knew where the girls were hiding (…or how they even knew that the government has sent Coppelion children to the old capital?); they just showed up before the gates and took poor Aoi hostage, who really showed how airheaded she is. Leaving your post without informing your superior officer? I don’t know what kind of military education they received, but it seems they skipped Chain of Command 101. I get it that the wolf she thought had arrived is cute and all that (what’s up with the wolf anyway? It hasn’t shown up recently…), but there is a limit how reckless one can be.

  Anyway, Ibara promptly goes after her and with the directions provided by Kurobe they find the enemy hideout.

  

  I was going to say “that’s a lot of snub cubes”, but apparently they drew them incorrectly…

  That’s a rather ugly and obvious hideout, which kinda defeats the purpose of a hideout. I don’t know which one is less realistic; this abomination of a structure or the giant swinging cage they used to hold Aoi hostage. I’m more and more disappointed in Coppelion with each passing episode because they just continue throwing unrealistic things at me. Don’t get me wrong, there are some aspects of the series that I like, for example, there seems to be a consistent story arcing over the past several episodes, the politics aspect of Coppelion’s world getting shown as well, and let’s not forget the still stunning visuals (albeit used a bit sparingly now), but at the end of the day they’re just not enough to save the show.

• Speaking of things I liked, I was delighted that we caught a glimpse of Ibara’s and Haruto’s past; although not as much as I hoped, at least it’s something. I like our newest addition to the cast, as he looks like he has his head screwed on the right way. He’s composed and calculating, traits I would expect from someone with military training. I wonder what his special ability might be; maybe it’s dodging bullets seeing how he manages to take out the enemy soldiers when they attack the 1st Division in the middle of the night. I do have to give Ibara credit though for not screaming or blushing when he hears that Haruto has examined her completely checking how her injuries are.

  Yes, that’s it exactly, your body no longer holds any secrets from him.

• We are one more step closer to knowing what 1st Division’s goals are. It seems they weren’t the ones dumping the waste containers in the water reservoir in Episode 4, but they are definitely planning to do something evil with those barrels. At this point it’s plausible that they were the ones shooting down the transport helicopter at the start of Episode 5. In fact the commander declares their goals openly while he’s locked up in Episode 7. Now this moment was yet one of those things I couldn’t feel but being cliché. Were I in the place of the commander and were I set on delaying my adversary as much as possible, the very last thing I would do was laying my super mega evil plans out in the open. And they even had him do this traditional villain pose along this super mega evil laughter.

  Just imagine his laughter and the scene is complete.

  But no, the commander doesn’t stall for time and partly due to this he doesn’t seem to me more than a cardboard character. All that background we are given, how the government abandoned them and so on doesn’t really add depth to his character.

• The commander (holding Aoi hostage) saw through the diversion organized by Haruto and chief Kurobe as easily as if it was emmental cheese. To be frank, it was blatantly obvious even to me what they were planning and his countering Ibara’s move came as no surprise. I don’t really get why he orders the tank to fire a projectile at him when later in Episode 7 he’s shown as not having the resolve to die just yet.

• Now that Taeko is out of commission, I am more focused on Aoi and her antics. I’ve already said that I’m starting to think she’s an airhead, but seeing how she mentally breaks down when Ibara gets shot might just have been the last straw. I understand that she feels responsibility because the events unfolded as they did because she allowed herself to be captured, but at this point she’s completely unusable as a member of the team. Distancing yourself from reality (she’s clearly in shock after Ibara takes a hit; later on she locks herself in one of the storage rooms) is a natural reaction but ultimately you become a hindrance to your team. Even Haruto is unable to get her out of this state and decides just to leave her be. I’m torn between thinking “oh the poor girl” and “what a useless bum” here. Maybe if I knew more of her background, why she became the person she is now the latter feeling would be gone… And in the next moment she’s full of energy again, she kicks old man Kurobe aside and goes on to hold Ibara down while Haruto shocks the heart. But when they transport Ibara back and start to operate on her, Aoi starts to question herself again. I just don’t get these sudden swings (for a lack of better term) of hers.

  Ibara has all the sensitivity of an elephant in a china shop.

• The plot twist where the subordinate girls in the Cleaners’ division go rouge was kinda expected. Although I didn’t suspect them to be the culprits behind the leaking barrels of waste when Haruto mentioned that his teammates are not responding over the radio, it wasn’t that surprising in the end. I hope their motives will be explained in the next episode. On the other hand I predicted while watching Episode 6 that the reason why 1st Division needs the Coppelion children is to repair the downed power line of the trains; I’ve been completely wrong.

• All in all while the story of Coppelion is interesting from week to week, I feel that the overall execution of the show is lacking too much for it to be good.

  Though the visuals are still nice.