I’ve read a lot of talk on the internet about how this show is similar to Death Note.  I understand that both series are psychological thrillers that form the main character(s) as villains but in how Death Note and Zankyou achieve at telling a strong and solid story are entirely different.  Death Note’s story was an interesting one- write names in a notebook and they die.  It also had a superb soundtrack by Hirano and Taniuchi I will give it that.  The acting however not so much.  There ended up being too many dramatic scenes that were unnecessary for the plot.  I’m not saying its a bad series at all, I just don’t see the correlation between the two anime like many do.

Noitamina this is the best series you’ve ever aired on your network.  Shiki was frightening, Tatami Galaxy was a great introspection into college-life, Nodame Cantabile gave us a neat look at classical music, among many others but none have done consistently well as much as this series has.

I applaud this series for handling the story so well.  The music, the characters, even the cinematography was finely tuned and amazing in this one!  I will even go a step further here.  After watching this I can clearly see now that this is the best work that Shinichiro Watanabe has ever done.   He sure has grown as a director with his series of works over the years.

Cowboy Bebop pulled off as an insurmountable science fiction series- one that merged eastern and western cultures into a fictionalized cowboy-esque set of adventures.  I would like to add- Cowboy Bebop had set the standard for the anime series of today.  Samurai Champloo developed that same pattern but with hip-hop and Edo-era Japan.  Sakamichi no Apollon was all about tradition.  The days of the 60’s where jazz was re-emerging at the fore front of Japan after being banned and called the “enemy music”. With this in mind Sakamichi no Apollon was establishing itself with friendships, romance, and music that deliver very passionately.

Zankyou no Terror is a delicate series.  It is a wonderful exposition on what American dealt with on September 11th, 2001 and produces a fictional story around that.  Very creative actually.  It doesn’t stop there!  This show not only managed to create criticisms portraying it’s two major characters as terrorists but also a tribute to today’s events and issues with so much research planned out.  It payed off a ton especially in this episode! Thermite Reactions, Bitcoin, Amazon, buying a credit card for a dollar, but this didn’t even touch the level of what we had here!  What a beautiful episode and quite possibly the best one we’ve had of this series so far!

Where Yuasa’s Ping Pong had strong characters- Zankyou no Terror introduces the cast with struggles and puts them into even larger situations.  The bombings, Lisa’s fractured mother, kids at school troubling Lisa, the riddles for the police to solve and now FBI agent Five.  Lisa is welcomed with open arms by Twelve but it’s intriguing to know that Nine sees this back-firing later on.  Foreshadowing the inclusion of him breaking down?  I would think so.  Lisa proves her innocence quite a bit this episode and I can only see her getting a lot stronger as the story gains momentum.

From the start it was looking like this episode was going to continue the formula that the other ones had set.  Solve the previous incident, uncover more truth about Sphinx, another bomb is set, and try to stop it.  This was dismantled so forcefully resulting in Nine panicking on what to do next.  From the start every move has been in their control and now here is where we finally get to see it out of their hands and into the fire so to speak.  It was fantastic and highly intriguing to see Nine actual do something drastic here!  That is one way to reinvent his character!  So the FBI or rather Five intervenes and this turned out completely different than what I had imagined!  I have to wonder if there are going to be casualties in this bombing since there hasn’t been a single one before. Sphinx is going to dissolve sooner or later, and for some unknown reason Five is going to make sure of that from what it seems.  The allusion with Lisa’s cooking mishap only amplified this point a lot more.

The episode as intense as it was managed to confirm a lot of areas of the plot we’ve been left in the dark about:

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1.  Sphinx isn’t trying to hurt anyone. We see that with the bombings having no casualties and minimal injuries.

2.  The Rising Peace Academy, a non-profit organization that we learn about this episode directs its attention to authority. Nine and Twelve are attempting at getting Shibazaki to make this connection with the Sphinx bombings.

3.  Nine, Twelve and Five  as from what is seen in this episode have an increasing level of hacking abilities and intelligence.  Were they trained to be in a spy program and things just went wrong?

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Interestingly enough that the writers placed in a past segment featuring Nine and Twelve at a cafeteria one that I am sure we will learn later on.  Shibazaki discovering the connection between the bombings from Sphinx was just the tip of the iceberg here!

As it stands the addition of Five to the story is even further proof to my theory as to whether or not Zankyou is about homegrown terrorism more than anything else this series has offered us.

Outright amazing and a very intense episode- cannot wait to see what happens next!

Did anyone notice the FBI guy voiced american dialogue.  Higashi no Eden did this same thing too.  Very authentic when a series does this.

If I had one gripe about this show as I stated before its the recap.  It’s only about half a minute or so but those could add up in expanding the story.

OVERALL IMPRESSION: 10/10

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