Fractale Episode 4: Departure

Clain reunites with Phryne, but the light hearted adventure is gone when the price paid for the carnage ending the last episode begins to hit home for the Granite clan. While there are comic moments to be found, the series is darkening quickly as the Temple responds to the terrorist attack. Fractale: Reiterated continues with HD screen captures & revised text.

After the shock, if not whiplash, induced by the change in tone at the end of the third episode I had wondered where Fractale was headed.  Departure shows that the change is no fluke and integral to the storyline. More than that, it depicts that there are consequences for what you do in this fictional world. Harsh consequences…

Things pick up where the previous episode left us, with the Granites and the Temple having slaughtered many helpless civilians in their crossfire only to be interrupted by Phryne appearing out of nowhere to halt the bloodshed.  Another mystery is added to the storyline when the little priestess who looks like Nessa addresses the older girl as her sister. Interestingly, she has auburn hair half way in color between Phryne’s brunette locks and the fiery red of our favorite doppel.
Phryne completes the interrupted prayer and ceremony for the Star Festival, which in turn finishes the update from the Fractale system.

This releases the worshippers from their trance and they view the bodies of the dead with disbelief that quickly turns into panic.  Is it a comment on blind faith being oblivious to suffering or just a dramatic tool?  I’ll let you decide for yourself, though I suspect the latter.

As they stampede in fear, one moment jumped out at me and it was of the mother holding her wounded or dead son.  Despite her pleas for help, nobody stops to help her.  This is a grim reminder of how societal ties have frayed in the world of Fractale. It is also telling how the Temple priestesses do not care about the innocents killed.

Displeased with all the running people in the way, Sunda resumes the attack on the priestesses with a new objective of capturing Phryne.  Meanwhile, Clain and Nessa manage to catch up with the girl as she’s being led off by the other priestesses.  The sight of Nessa surprises her greatly and it is not an expression of joy on her face.

Further mayhem ensues as Sunda forcefully captures Phryne and Enri makes Clain retreat to the hovering Granite airship.  The grim events and loss of one of his family don’t seem to phase Sunda at all as he even finds time to make a wise crack about Phryne’s weight – which I admit was clever in execution.  But the humor in this episode is hard to find and usually understated when employed.

The somber mood of the episode becomes even more pronounced as Enri grieves over the corpse of the fallen Butcher, while Clain contemplates having seen death for the first time in his life.  Needless to say, the boy isn’t happy with the Granites and rightfully thinks they are murderers. Taking advantage of being ignored for the moment, Clain and Nessa set forth to rescue Phryne from where she is tied up.

Once again, Clain does not get the reaction he’d hoped for when the newly unbound girl slaps him with great anger. The source of that anger?  That would be Nessa having been awakened by the curious hacker. Utterly baffled that he is somehow the bad guy, Clain tries to explain, but the fiesty doppel has had enough and tries to work over Phryne.  Problem is she can’t touch anyone who hates her, as explained in the previous episode.  That doesn’t stop Nessa from trying, however.

This scene isn’t played for laughs and the furious little virtual girl makes her dislike for Phryne very clear to Clain after Sunda drags off the priestess for a private conversation.  Nessa may like liking, but she does not like Phryne.

Having arrived at the village, a funeral is held for Butcher and Clain is disgusted with the honors being given to the fallen terrorist. Even Nessa going into charming mode fails to alleviate the moodiness of the scene since all it accomplishes is getting the youngest girl of the clan yelled at.  Once again the Day Star song is heard and I believe it has been heard in every episode so far.

So what have the Lost Millennium terrorists gained from the raid?  Well, they now have the “key to the world” in Phryne and one dead family member.  But they are about to get more attention than they need, for the Grand Priestess decides they must die for taking “the beloved maidens of the world.”  Yep, another title for Phryne and Nessa – one that needs to be remembered.  But her motivation goes beyond that since the “stars” that make up the Fractale system are continuing to fail.  Somehow that is connected to the wayward girls.

Fed up with both the Temple and Lost Millennium, Clain decides to leave with Nessa. Yet he can’t get his mind off of the imprisoned Phryne and this sets off a temper tantrum from Nessa who wants him to only think about her. Ah, ten year olds.

Quite the wide range of emotions for an A.I. too.  In this episode she exhibits protective anger, shock, sadness, hatred, and rampant jealousy.  Nessa acts far more like a real person than a program to the point that people around her are starting to accept her as one.

The tantrum is interrupted by the arrival of a Temple airship; one that is considerably more advanced than anything we’ve seen so far. Time has run out for the Granites and a new adversary debuts. Actions have consequences, after all.


Thoughts

The return of Phryne takes an unusual turn in that she isn’t happy to see Clain or Nessa.  It raises more questions about her motivations than are answered, so there is also a feeling of things being setup for future episodes.  One thing is clear, she is not a happy girl and harbors a great deal of animosity toward the Fractale system.

One of the highlights of the episode are the always interesting visuals with some very striking night time scenes of battle.  The airships are always interesting and make heavy use of cel shaded CGI, but don’t look horrifically out of place.  On Blu-ray, they are even better integrated than the broadcast product. Keep an eye out for subtle wind effects in the final scenes that speak to the attention to detail by the animators.

Episode 4 may have a lot of things happen in it, but it seems slow by comparison to the previous episodes. I think that mainly has to do with the social commentary taking a backseat to the plot. Without so much of it layered into the story, the density of information presented lessened. It is by no means a bad episode and it marks the beginning of a typical second act slow down. Relatively speaking, that is.

I did have some issues with the English dub in one particular scene, which can be found in the spoilers below.

Fractale episodes can be viewed at Hulu.com.

BEWARE! HERE BE SPOILERS!!!

 

 

The attack by the Temple forces on the village of the Granites features a very strange piece of music that doesn’t fit the mood of the scene or the rest of the soundtrack of the series.  It felt like a particularly bad Doctor Who score from the 1970’s and took me out of the battle despite the nice images on screen. Come to think of it, the attacking robots did resemble Daleks as can be seen on the view screen in the shot above.

The battle itself isn’t very exciting but it serves its purpose of driving the Granite family out of the village and giving the episode its name. But more importantly, it introduces a creepy villain who is way too familiar with Phryne and rants about how she “stinks.”  No, that’s not a comment on her personality, which he separately and utterly destroys during their face to face confrontation.  The dub completely changes the lines to refer to the Granites instead, which takes away a great deal of foreshadowing and also dilutes his tear down of Phryne.

One thing Fractale can be counted for is character development. Clain’s problems with his attraction to a most frustrating girl almost leads to his death as Phryne once again jumps off a cliff, but taking Clain with her.  Her impulsive and self destructive behavior is another clue to her problems being very deep. 

But the biggest thing is her point blank asking Clain if he likes her (Funimation is going too literal in the translation by using “like” in my opinion) while on the trike. Before the stunned and on the spot boy can say anything, she launches into a rant that she “dislikes liking.”  In the dub, Phryne says she isn’t that kind of girl.

Yeah, she’s damaged goods but Clain has no clue just how badly.  Which brings me back to the Creepster, as I dub our new villain. A lot of foreshadowing goes on with his arrival.  His confrontation with Phryne leads directly to the suicidal drive off the cliff.  Knowing what happens later in the series explains why she’d rather die than go with him.

Clain is poorly equipped to deal with all the madness he’s been dumped into.  The one thing he is still holding onto are his feelings for Phryne and it leads to a split with Nessa, who is very unhappy with him choosing the older girl. But it isn’t a completely blind infatuation with the priestess.  Between being frustrated with her being a tomboy despite her looks and lecturing her on making decisions without telling anyone, he’s not ignoring her faults. This is a nice touch and it shows he does have some backbone.

Actually, he stands up to Phryne throughout the episode, which makes Clain a less wimpy protagonist than you usually see in anime males.  Even more impressive if Clain is younger than the sixteen year old, since he looks to be around thirteen.

I found the above scenes interesting from a purely artistic view.  Having the little clone Phryne and Nessa watching the Granite airship fly off at different points of the episode intrigues me. Clone Phryne watches Phryne fly off into the darkness, while Nessa watches Clain fly off into the dawning sun. 

For me, the stars of this episode were Phryne’s eyes which were dwelt on quite a bit:

Check them out during her conversation with Sunda and when Nessa attacks her as well.  One of the strengths of Fractale’s animation is the very expressive faces drawn throughout the show.

I did enjoy the all too brief battle between the airships. It was a very pretty scene.