[Fish Sandwich]

Honestly not the best conclusion to a two-parter, but I've also resigned myself at this point to just being a hardcore Saber apologist, so even as I say that, it's not like I'm disappointed or didn't enjoy myself watching it or anything.

The overall problem with this two-parter is that it has a real holding pattern feel to it. Any progress for the story or the characters is in these microscopic little bits of connective tissue that will only hold meaning in later episodes, while the meat of the plot is essentially a rehash of the two-parter right before it. I can't complain that this is something unique to Saber, however, since I distinctly remember having this exact problem with the second post New Years two-parter of both Zi-O (the Quiz arc) and Zero-One (the one about houses), which is maybe why I feel inclined to take it easy on this show. There's a weird general trend going on here and I suppose I'm simply used to it by now.

One problem that's a little more specific to Saber is having callbacks to dialogue from the Retsuden shorts, which are dropped in such a manner as to imply we'll all be familiar with them, which is not an assumption I like the show making. There's a way to loop that miniseries into the main show and make it feel important without treating it like mandatory viewing, and this is distinctly not that. It's a not some catastrophic issue (at least at the moment), but it was a bit of a bummer, all the same.

Outside of that all that though, I mean, I had a lot of fun? Yuri being weird, Mei being adorable, Touma doing more HEROIC SHOUTING, I thought all of it was great, even if Touma's epic speeches feel too good for the plots they're a part of, sometimes. There's not ~quite~ as much as heft behind that spiel about understanding pain as I might wish, but again, I still supremely appreciate the continued emphasis the show is placing on what exactly Touma's priorities as a hero are. Like, just the raw visual of Dragonic Knight doing the heroic back turned to the exploding monster thing, except he's beaten to heck and barely standing, that's wonderful imagery. This is maybe ironic praise to give the show about books, but sometimes a picture really is worth a thousand words.

Plus, it's a good showing of how much I love Kousuke Asai's very expressive suit acting as Saber, which I need to remember to bring up more. There are always so many awesome little touches he does in any given episode. Note how he consistent he is about pretending his left arm is broken throughout that scene, for example.

So yeah, this ended up being merely a very decentish two-parter, overall, but the delivery did a ton to keep it entertaining. Special shout out to Mei getting involved in the transformations in a comedic manner, which is apparently a staple of Ishida-directed episodes now, and I am so not complaining. If Blades gets another upgrade and she isn't in the background making goofy onomatopoeia, I might actually be disappointed!