Kakumeiki Valvrave 2nd Season Episode 9 Discussion

DancingJack said:


Yes, but even so they could've atleast tried to state obvious points that speak against the footage shown by Dorssia, the whole thing was live streamed to everywhere, right?

skudoops said:


Not sure how they could have done that in a believable way. Dorussia provided proof and ARUS both provided proof on the spot. No amount of talking was going to get them out of that one.

BlueBusterJeff said:
They'll never even bother to mention about Aina Sakurai, Kyuuma's girlfriend (Glasses girl) which she died last season (EP7). I mean REALLY?!

Now he's dead too. I bet Aina is waiting for him in the other side...

Janoski said:
Oasfsfsdgfsdada, best episode so far. So sad one of my fav character just died -_- So there are 4 pilots left. I wonder who the other 3 will be? Weren't they called the Golden Seven in the flashforward?

Janoski said:
Oasfsfsdgfsdada, best episode so far. So sad one of my fav character just died -_- So there are 4 pilots left. I wonder who the other 3 will be? Weren't they called the Golden Seven in the flashforward?

wuhugm said:
Plot Hole #1

L-elf clearly has lost his will to live, won't even leave the storage room. But somehow he already inside the shuttle about to be launched? So during the mass confusion and students being slaughtered by ARUS soldiers, somebody forgot to save themselves and nearby others and instead saying, "Oh hey, we might be currently being killed right now, but instead of immediately evacuating why don't we get that guy that nobody likes and now sulking in dark corner of storage room and shove his ass into the shuttle because we are so free right now, yes?"

ex_necross said:


By your logic, L-elf using the bathroom in that room is a plot hole.

fst said:


Oh god... the mental images... cannot unsee ...

Makaizen said:
Mass-killing of people and relevant side character....Check.

symbv said:
The word "plot hole" is way over used and too often USED WRONGLY. Plot Hole should only be used when something happens that contradicts the inner workings of the fictional world. Thing not explained or left unexplained is NOT a plot hole.

wuhugm said:
Plot Hole #1

L-elf clearly has lost his will to live, won't even leave the storage room. But somehow he already inside the shuttle about to be launched?

symbv said:

Are we going to see a movie or even another series after this cour?

Mormegil said:
They're killing off characters in every single episode now. O__O

Akanezora said:
"WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME"
"YOU LIAR HURR DURR"
"YOU'RE NO HARUTO BUU"

I got cancer this episode.

I always wanted Shoko dead for obvious reasons but now the limit has been reached.

LittleStar said:
If somebody want blame somebody,
then should blame Saki for let enemies caught her.

killbethy said:
Ugh. The first half of that episode was asking for way too much suspension of disbelief. The entire reaction to Dorssia's whole little newscast was so unbelievable and just utterly ridiculous. The whole episode just came across as some half-assed attempt to shock the audience with copious amounts of senseless bloodshed and character deconstruction, but it just didn't make any logical sense for it to happen in the way and the amount of time that it did. The plot pacing for all of this was just bizarre. Marie got an entire episode of development just to be offed. Sure, it gave some explanation to the rune and memory bit, but that has been prevalent in so many other plot points that it really didn't need the development and deconstruction of an entire character just to get the point across. Now let's look at what we did IN LESS TIME... Generally destroying 20 episodes of world building, changing the entire political structure, killing off the majority of the extras AND rendering the main setting null and void is quite a lot to do in one blow. As if that isn't enough, we also get quite possibly one of the biggest character revelations of the series along with a major character betrayal; and that's all thrown in with the sacrifice of a core character and key moment of self-realization for the main protagonist. They tried to force feed so much at once that each individual event wound up getting a lot of its meaning sucked out, glossed over, or just didn't really make a whole lot of sense within the time constraints given. The decision to massacre an entire population, unite the human race with an alliance by two bitter adversaries, and subsequent declaration of war took about, what, less than a day in-story time? Seriously? And no one is even going to check the validity of accusations given OVER A TELEVISION BROADCAST by a country that was in the process of being sanctioning for war crimes? And... oh yeah, they just happened to begin said accusation with the apparent murder of a high school student. Sure, it might look like she comes back to life... but that's not a far-stretch from the entire world panicking over an eminent zombie apocalypse because a TV news crew shows an extra from The Walking Dead strolling down the street and claims it to be real. Screw fact checking. And if you're going to buy Dorssia's immortal soldier claim, totally forget asking yourself how they discovered that the high school chick they were rather illegally and unethically holding hostage just happened to resurrect after getting a sword through the heart. Doh.

Another big issue... lack of communication between characters is also just a terrible plot device to use to force conflict within any story. It just highlights the fact that there isn't enough real character development or solid world building for the plot to derive naturally from the interactions between the characters themselves and their environment. Unfortunately, it is fairly common across the board in the young adult genre and Valvrave seems to be having progressively more and more trouble breaking out of the confines of YA tropes. It's trying VERY hard to be a successor to Code Geass, but the only thing it is successfully doing is copying certain plot elements (*cough* stadium slaughter of the elevens/Japanese for this episode). Unfortunately, Valvrave's forced plot progression with characters just along for the ride causes it to lack the emotional resonance and believability that CG managed to pull off most of the time by having the characters take the plot from Point A to Point B instead.

)%(*)#$ I had so much hope for this show at one point... :'(

/end rant

ThangLong said:

That's the storage from of the same shuttle Shouko and the others used to escape. It's shown in ep8 at 12:30.

killbethy said:
Ugh. The first half of that episode was asking for way too much suspension of disbelief. The entire reaction to Dorssia's whole little newscast was so unbelievable and just utterly ridiculous. The whole episode just came across as some half-assed attempt to shock the audience with copious amounts of senseless bloodshed and character deconstruction, but it just didn't make any logical sense for it to happen in the way and the amount of time that it did

Another big issue... lack of communication between characters is also just a terrible plot device to use to force conflict within any story. It just highlights the fact that there isn't enough real character development or solid world building for the plot to derive naturally from the interactions between the characters themselves and their environment.

Unfortunately, Valvrave's forced plot progression with characters just along for the ride causes it to lack the emotional resonance and believability that CG managed to pull off most of the time by having the characters take the plot from Point A to Point B instead.

lol... And let's not forget that Shoko has also been lying to Haruto about the death of her father this entire time as well. And to add just a bit more irony to the situation, she also decided to *cough* withhold this truth from him out of a desire to protect him. If that isn't the pot calling the kettle black, I don't know what is.

ex_necross said:

You're missing a lot of key points. Most importantly, the fact that the news cast WAS forced, it was all a set up. It didn't have to be convincing, it just had to be a scapegoat. The governments were working together since the meeting some episodes ago. It didn't matter what the students did, they could explain away to their heart's content or (more reasonably) be in utter shock with the guns pointed at them, the end result would be the same.

You are looking at the episode like this: news cast happens, everyone believes it, massacre occurs as a result. That is NOT how it happened.

killbethy said:

Lol yes, it was a setup. But the collaboration of Dorssia and ARUS's governments were definitely not headed in quite this direction before regardless of prior meetings... Even if it turns out to be some grand conspiracy, it is the opinions and resulting changes in both politics and public opinion that is bizarre. The video also functions as a scapegoat in two ways: it can be used in attempt to justify the actions taken as a result from the video (ARUS, in which JIOR is the scapegoat), or it justifies the actions taken PRIOR to the video (which is the way Dorssia intended for it to be used, painting themselves as the scapegoat). Also, a scapegoat generally DOES need to be convincing for people to take it seriously and to affect any real change... and that's the problem. The video, as a scapegoat, just isn't enough to really be believable. It isn't proof, it's pointing a finger. That doesn't dig you out of a grave, it buries you in it.

This is like Hitler throwing out a Hail Mary with some shoddy "evidence" that Jews really are the detestable inferior race he believed them to be by publicizing ONE EXAMPLE to substantiate accusations that can't even be validated by the people it is attempting to convince. Instead of scratching their collective noggins or just completely laughing it off as the silly attempt of a last resort that it appears to be, the entire global population not only believes this "evidence" to be factual but are also swayed into adopting Hitler's viewpoint because of it. The public is primed and readied to be rallied into action to fight for the cause (even the Jewish population turns on one another in spite of being oppressed and killed by the Nazi regime for no other reason than the identity they share). But heck, who cares what the world thinks. Winston Churchill totally bought it, so now the Ally Powers call off their attack on Nazi Germany and instead form an alliance with them to eradicate the Jews. Now, we don't have Twitter in the 1940's lol, so let's say instead of the whole whopping 1/2 a day or so it took within the universe of Valvrave, this whole radical change in the global political atmosphere and consensus of the general population takes place in about 1/2 a week.

....

Right.

Oh, and don't forget that isn't even taking into account the fact that if you believe the Dorssian video is TRUE, the only thing that you have proven is that the student shown (Rukino Saki) has self-regenerative abilities that extend to fatal wounds. It doesn't prove that Saki is immortal, let alone that anyone else. Nor does the notion of immortality imply the whole monster idea. You have two SEPARATE clips: one that apparently shows Saki reviving from what should be a fatal room, the second of a ship that is full of people that APPEAR to be suffering or potentially dying from some unexplained phenomenon. Nothing even "proves" them to be related other than a TV anchor claiming that he found the ship on property that belongs to JIOR (which doesn't even mean it is theirs lol). There is so much leaping about to form the conclusion of the whole immortal man-eating monster idea that it would exhaust a frog.


Regardless.


It doesn't matter at what point in the equation the actual massacre takes place. The point is that it takes about 2.4 seconds for the entire world to do a complete 180 and believe that such an action would be justified, and that is without any solid evidence forming the basis of this complete turnabout in the political atmosphere (and also just general popularity... everyone is ready to abandon their darling little underdog of JIOR that they have been rooting for since we were introduced to the world of Vavrave).


Also, the lack of communication I'm referring to is, for the most part, between the main cast of characters, not really the "students" and government heads. Although, it is pretty funny that as viewers we are asked to believe and accept that these world leaders LEGITIMATELY RECOGNIZE JIOR as a foreign nation with equal political rights to that of their own (in spite of being almost entirely composed of high school students and led by a, what, 17-ish year old girl, as its Prime Minister with the power and authority such a position entails), but can still so easily strip it of the rights that they themselves have recognized JIOR of deserving? Either these people are citizens of a recognized foreign power whose rights are inviolable as your own, or they are just a bunch of visiting students subject to your own power and the laws of the land on which you are allowing them to stay. Which is it? You can't have it both ways. Nothing undermines your own authority quite like admitting the basis on which it is founded is wrong.