[Magnugiga]

Blade's second OP rocks. A much better tonal fit than the first one, especially in terms of visual, and immediately went up there among my favorite KR OPs (Build, Black, W).

The actual show has some weak moments with rather overdone tropes in this second half, but nothing too bad. They're kinda tying up the ends here and wrapping up on several character arcs in competent fashion, and I sure am glad Mutsuki's finally past his Possessed Jerk/Volatile Adolescent phase. Not a big fan of how the Tiger Undead was eventually used to get him out of this funk though, especially since she's one of the very few side characters in this show with actual presence; but sidelining/utilizing a strong and interesting female character for the benefit of male character development has been a long and proud KR tradition, after all.

Meanwhile, in Hibiki... there's a scene in the episode I just watched, where Akira returned Asumu's handbook and they went for a little walk. They had a pleasant chat for a bit, y'know, showing flash of the good ol' Hibiki vibe before The Switch (I also think these two are really cute together and should've been paired more, but that's neither here or there). Then, ominous swell of music, and a wild New Character appears! New Character uses Talk Idiotic Shit on Asumu and Akira! It's super effective!

Like, this whole scene and everything about New Character was so emblematic of New Hibiki's problems: a jarring tonal shift from everything that's been established before, and an extremely annoying tendency to stir up shit from absolutely nowhere. I knew I said in passing that Hibiki would benefit from a bit of increased tension, but cranking up the melodrama, rom-com, and overused tropes to the nth wasn't exactly what I meant, goddamit I take it back, this is horrible.