Some say it is sixteen in hexadecimal. Others say it signifies the grand finale. I beg to differ. Anyone worth their weight in cabbages would. Screw convoluted symbolism behind what a letter of the alphabet is supposed to mean; it's the grade this series deserves and "fail" in perfect harmony.
I other words, greetings and hello, I am j00ed, and I will be contributing my lack of notable thoughts on this blog.
Here's the deal; I like lolis. I especially like them if they go ツンツン 99 ways to next Tuesday. This is about the number of problems Zero no Tsukaima has, and tsundere lolis ain't one of them. I am already predisposed to liking that stuff—arguably it's the only reason I'm watching it to begin with—but the truth needs to be spoken, folks, I'm regretting the very second I picked it up. If there's any excuse for me to keep going, it's to laugh maniacally as the series delves ever deeper into So Bad It's Good territory.
Join me, comrades, as I pick this shit apart.
Let's just randomly dress up as a nun and get borderline molested by a horny overreacting teenager. Also lemons. I'm not sure if this is supposed to be funny or not, but it's disturbing either way.
I will conjure up the power of fire and compress it in gems. I'm aware that they can be used for death and destruction, but my evil overlord wouldn't use them for that, now would he? Oh, wait, he says he will? I am not evil! I'm not! I just helped him create weapons of mass destruction! Honest to God! I'm a good guy deep down!
Screw proper procedure and life-long training to become a nun, I'm the Pope, I can do whatever the hell I want.
Also, the religion I lead is supposedly less-than-friendly towards elves. Somehow someone thought it was important to stress that point, bring us hopes for some sort of plot development and conflict, but drop it, like, immediately afterwards, as if it had the temperature of the universe three planck times from the big bang.
The point I want to make here is how our redhead has been reduced to a decoration that clings to a teacher who is a few times her age literally all the time, and no one bothers to comment on this teacher-student relationship that is illegal and immoral in only about every human society since the dawn of history. But those are details!
I'm worried Saito is my familiar! I must find out! What other way than to kiss him! When he's a relationship! Yes! Excellent plan! How could this go wrong?
Also, Saito once again shows his character, by which I mean that every character but himself does to him whatever they fucking want. It's like he's a robot with basic chatterbot functionality and a voice synthesizer akin to Hatsune Miku to make us think he's human.
This mirror can transfer magical knowledge from one void mage to another. I really hope it doesn't work by staring into it, because if yes, I'm going to lose my brain. An evil nation kidnaps you and makes you stare at an ancient artifact while totally tied up, what better thing to do than stare directly and thoughtlessly into it?
Our enemy has brought out their entire fleet against us. They also kidnapped a void mage who can conjure up massive explosions. I don't think they intend to attack. Also, since you just believed me, I conclude you're all insufferable morons. Go attend a game theory 101 class before proceeding any further.
Notice how the leader of a nation believes this. How has no one taken over yet?
This guy just destroyed his army alongside his opponent's even though his could just destroy theirs. With a weapon of mass destruction, as opposed to, oh, I DUNNO, engaging in a battle and nuking them while they're distracted? Strategy, what strategy? You mean I'm supposed to play Starcraft before writing a series on warfare?
And, get this, he's apparently doing all of this just to spark some sort of remorse emotion deep inside of him.
Let me say that again.
The supervillain during the past few seasons is a supervillain because he explicitly wants to see if he can feel anything by being a villainous asshole. It's not even subtle posthumous psycho-analysis. He directly recognises it.
ARE THERE NO THERAPISTS IN THIS WORLD?
Hundreds of innocent people just died. Let's not show any emotion.
I have a gun. I can shoot my enemy wherever I want. I go for the leg. Because my opponent is a mage and we all know mages need to walk to cast their magic.
Wait, what?
Our huge-boobed elf remembers she can actually do something. Gee, I almost forgot, what with being useless during the past all episodes.
See, my power as a void mage is actually the most useful one you've seen so far. I can move at godspeed without loss of accuracy. This makes me a melee god. I can also assassinate pretty much anyone with it. No, I could not use it to cripple the entire opposition or kill the Pope. No, I couldn't intervene while you were busy fighting my familiar and perforate you eleven new assholes before could say "I want to jizz all over Louise's flat chest."
Also, this move can apparently be countered with the "mind's eye", because Saito suddenly remembers he's Japanese, somewhere deep down. Really, you wouldn't know, he only grew up there.
This is our Rei expy. The man who killed her father, turned her mother into a total lunatic, sent her through all nine levels of hell and back, and essentially turned her into an emotionally disturbed, traumatised and borderline emotionless, fragile little girl is before her eyes. She tries to kill him. Everyone says they're okay with it.
Yes, finally, a potentially interesting chance for character development in this series!
...Not. She, of course, forgives him. What, you thought the author of this series had a brain?
So, the archvillain of the past few seasons is dying. This looks like a good time to kill him. But of course, we leave him all alone with his familiar. It's not like we're in a series where healing magic is commonplace. It's not like it can heal wounds that are impossible to treat with real medical technology in the blink of an eye. And it's not like this servant is supposedly a master mage that commands ancient and obscure magics of centuries past.
WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG?
Also, an explosion supposedly kills them. Probably not. Killing off the archvillain three episodes into the season is too original for Zero no Tsukaima, which is pretty much the incarnation of all things cliche. Expect a powered-up return.
I always enjoy how the leader of a nation is acting like an immature little girl, because she is an immature little girl. Her country must lack influential, greedy bastards to take advantage of her. What a nice place it must be.
I other words, greetings and hello, I am j00ed, and I will be contributing my lack of notable thoughts on this blog.
Here's the deal; I like lolis. I especially like them if they go ツンツン 99 ways to next Tuesday. This is about the number of problems Zero no Tsukaima has, and tsundere lolis ain't one of them. I am already predisposed to liking that stuff—arguably it's the only reason I'm watching it to begin with—but the truth needs to be spoken, folks, I'm regretting the very second I picked it up. If there's any excuse for me to keep going, it's to laugh maniacally as the series delves ever deeper into So Bad It's Good territory.
Join me, comrades, as I pick this shit apart.
It is nice to see that the love triangle has been going strong for, well, yet another season. We've only seen it since the first one, after all. By this point we've taken the horse, killed it, beat it while it was dead, cut it apart, BBQ'd the meat and eaten it with onion topping. Have you counted the number of times the series has established Saito's "true" and "never ending" love for Louise? It's at least once per season finale, and that's me being very lenient with my definitions.
I don't really see the reason why whoever's in charge of the plot developments feels the need to re-establish for the billionth time already that everyone is after Saito's cock. I really don't. At the highest point of the series, something like a dozen girls wanted his genitals like bears out of hibernation want fish. Why does anyone even try? Last time I checked, the two of them had got fucking married, and Saito had explicitly risked his life for Louise once for every male or female that desires his privates.
CAN NO ONE GET A FUCKING HINT IN THIS WORLD?
So let's get this straight. The leader of a goddamned country invites what amounts to her elite order of knights in what she knows is an important political mission. I can get why the Void Mage would be there. I can get why her familiar would be there. I can even get why the best students and teachers available would be there. But, oh Mighty Forces of the Cosmos, why is there a need to drag pretty much the entirety of the recurring cast with them? What, exactly, is the reasoning behind bringing a bunch immature teenagers who probably can't handle the pressure of politics with you?
And, on another note, why does Louise have to bring her love rival numero uno with her? Are there really no other maids available in the entire Valliere household? Is she stupid or does she secretly get the hots for complicated love polychora?
Thus we learn of a religion and how it's less-than-friendly to elves, while bringing an elf with us and leaving her elven characteristics clearly visible to the naked eye. Also, boobs. It used to be somewhat funny, I guess, how Saito, the obligatory inexperienced virgin, overreacted at the very thought of large meatsacks. At this point I'm finding it hard to believe he hasn't grown used to the damned things, considering how he stumbles and drools over them a hundred times every day.
It's either that, or his integrity shines through by not being there at all. His "true love" is so strong, he can forget it the moment a couple of basketballs of fat jump in front of him. True strength of character there.
Hi guise, I'm your obligatory effeminate character, my eyes have many colours for some reason, and I bet you remember I'm a priest, because this series is so fucking awesome at reminding us shit. Also, I like how your elf which my religion is supposedly less-than-friendly towards walks around freely with no one bothering to give a crap.
So this dude with very official-looking clothes walks in, everyone shows massive amounts of respect to him, and for some reason, Saito can't get the hint. He's been in this universe for a year or two by now, and he just can't seem to realise that maybe, just maybe, sometimes it's good to go with the flow.
So, long story short about this scene, this other obligatorily effeminate dude is the leader of a major religion and everyone kisses his ass. The name of his position is "the Pope." Notice his age. Notice his status. Now back to me. He also happens to be a Void Mage. And he has a familiar. Which is the multiple-eye-colours altar boy from above. And our elf is also a void mage. As is the leader of the opposing country. And he wants all of our void mage girls to be shrine maidens.
WHERE TO FUCKING START?
All popes IRL are so old because you need to work your ass off to become one. Suddenly we learn that there's a whole bunch of a very special variety of mage that has only been the subject of the entire plot since forever. A character we've known for ages now is a familiar and a human, that means that he might have come from Earth, and of course no one asks a thing. A dudette we know is also this massively important plot device, and proper procedure goes to hell with becoming a shrine maiden.
And everyone' s like "OK cool."
Is this supposed to insult my intelligence or what?
By the way, I still haven't forgotten about how this religion is apparently less-than-friendly towards elves.
LET'S INTRODUCE A WHOLE BUNCH OF NEW CHARACTERS AT THE SAME TIME OVER A MINUTES AND HOPE THE VIEWERS CAN KEEP UP. SOUNDS LEGIT.
Louise and Saito get into a fight. Saito's complaint amounts to "why do you worship the leader of your religion?" and Louise makes random complaints about how much he focuses on them boobies, after having brought the fucking boobies with her all the way over to a foreign country. Then the boobies, which are love rivals with Louise, give Saito genuine advice. THIS MAKES TOTAL SENSE.
Also, did you notice how Saito, after becoming a knight of honors and the superhero of an entire nation, still doesn't have anything better to wear? Does he even wash his clothes anymore?
The people we introduced a while ago attack, beat the Pope's security, steal a massively important and thoroughly unprotected magical object. Louise tries to beat them on her own. Notice how she can't cast anything but "Ekusupurozion!" Also notice how it was shown in the very first season that you can protect important magical objects quite a lot if you really want to. Of course, the leader of this world's most major religion couldn't afford such help.
Saito gets in the mix, beats one of the thieves, and falls into an orb of pure magic that our Elf with huge boobs conjured up because she wanted a familiar. The point here is that Saito becomes her familiar, I suppose. That development wouldn't surprise me at all. It would even enhance the love polychoron that is taking place. And by "enhance", I mean make it more horrible.
ON TO THE NEXT EPISODE.
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Hi Saito~ Epicly overdone internal dialogue love confessions. Let's keep this love polychoron going! We've only done it a thousand times! What could possibly go wrong?
Let's just randomly dress up as a nun and get borderline molested by a horny overreacting teenager. Also lemons. I'm not sure if this is supposed to be funny or not, but it's disturbing either way.
Screw proper procedure and life-long training to become a nun, I'm the Pope, I can do whatever the hell I want.
Also, the religion I lead is supposedly less-than-friendly towards elves. Somehow someone thought it was important to stress that point, bring us hopes for some sort of plot development and conflict, but drop it, like, immediately afterwards, as if it had the temperature of the universe three planck times from the big bang.
The point I want to make here is how our redhead has been reduced to a decoration that clings to a teacher who is a few times her age literally all the time, and no one bothers to comment on this teacher-student relationship that is illegal and immoral in only about every human society since the dawn of history. But those are details!
I'm worried Saito is my familiar! I must find out! What other way than to kiss him! When he's a relationship! Yes! Excellent plan! How could this go wrong?
Also, Saito once again shows his character, by which I mean that every character but himself does to him whatever they fucking want. It's like he's a robot with basic chatterbot functionality and a voice synthesizer akin to Hatsune Miku to make us think he's human.
Oh noes, the enemy pulled off an ambush! How surprising! We're going up against a goth loli! Fap fap fap. Also, our enemies can jump a hundred metres high! Only our enemies can do that, and they never use it in real-time tactics, because, well, that might even disadvantage our protagonist, and that would make it look like he never even stood a chance. That's bad.
I'm a Rei expy and I'd like to tell you that the new villains you've been fighting the past few days are actually an elite order of mages that I used to be part of, and the enemy decided to make use of them now instead of, oh, I dunno, before everyone had leveled up to the point of matching their strength. Can anyone say "half-assed retcon from hell"? I sure can.
AND A THIRD ONE BECAUSE WHY NOT.
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| MOOOOOOLNING LESCUE~ LESCUE ME FLOM THIS UNDADULTELATED CLAP! |
This mirror can transfer magical knowledge from one void mage to another. I really hope it doesn't work by staring into it, because if yes, I'm going to lose my brain. An evil nation kidnaps you and makes you stare at an ancient artifact while totally tied up, what better thing to do than stare directly and thoughtlessly into it?
Our enemy has brought out their entire fleet against us. They also kidnapped a void mage who can conjure up massive explosions. I don't think they intend to attack. Also, since you just believed me, I conclude you're all insufferable morons. Go attend a game theory 101 class before proceeding any further.
Notice how the leader of a nation believes this. How has no one taken over yet?
This guy just destroyed his army alongside his opponent's even though his could just destroy theirs. With a weapon of mass destruction, as opposed to, oh, I DUNNO, engaging in a battle and nuking them while they're distracted? Strategy, what strategy? You mean I'm supposed to play Starcraft before writing a series on warfare?
And, get this, he's apparently doing all of this just to spark some sort of remorse emotion deep inside of him.
Let me say that again.
The supervillain during the past few seasons is a supervillain because he explicitly wants to see if he can feel anything by being a villainous asshole. It's not even subtle posthumous psycho-analysis. He directly recognises it.
ARE THERE NO THERAPISTS IN THIS WORLD?
Hundreds of innocent people just died. Let's not show any emotion.
I have a gun. I can shoot my enemy wherever I want. I go for the leg. Because my opponent is a mage and we all know mages need to walk to cast their magic.
Wait, what?
Our huge-boobed elf remembers she can actually do something. Gee, I almost forgot, what with being useless during the past all episodes.
See, my power as a void mage is actually the most useful one you've seen so far. I can move at godspeed without loss of accuracy. This makes me a melee god. I can also assassinate pretty much anyone with it. No, I could not use it to cripple the entire opposition or kill the Pope. No, I couldn't intervene while you were busy fighting my familiar and perforate you eleven new assholes before could say "I want to jizz all over Louise's flat chest."
Also, this move can apparently be countered with the "mind's eye", because Saito suddenly remembers he's Japanese, somewhere deep down. Really, you wouldn't know, he only grew up there.
This is our Rei expy. The man who killed her father, turned her mother into a total lunatic, sent her through all nine levels of hell and back, and essentially turned her into an emotionally disturbed, traumatised and borderline emotionless, fragile little girl is before her eyes. She tries to kill him. Everyone says they're okay with it.
Yes, finally, a potentially interesting chance for character development in this series!
...Not. She, of course, forgives him. What, you thought the author of this series had a brain?
So, the archvillain of the past few seasons is dying. This looks like a good time to kill him. But of course, we leave him all alone with his familiar. It's not like we're in a series where healing magic is commonplace. It's not like it can heal wounds that are impossible to treat with real medical technology in the blink of an eye. And it's not like this servant is supposedly a master mage that commands ancient and obscure magics of centuries past.
WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG?
Also, an explosion supposedly kills them. Probably not. Killing off the archvillain three episodes into the season is too original for Zero no Tsukaima, which is pretty much the incarnation of all things cliche. Expect a powered-up return.
I always enjoy how the leader of a nation is acting like an immature little girl, because she is an immature little girl. Her country must lack influential, greedy bastards to take advantage of her. What a nice place it must be.
The Pope openly admits he plotted the entire goddamn thing in hopes of waging a "holy war" against our supervillain, but he's a good guy deep down, because he didn't intend to harm Louise. He only wanted to wage holy war using his authority as the Pope and killing thousands, if not millions if innocent people in the process, alongside the usual hatred perpetuated against the enemy as part of a war's usual side-effects, just because he wanted to get rid of their leader.
Also, a few hundred people did actually die anyway. But it's all okay, because he didn't intend to harm Louise. And it doesn't matter that his poor planning endangered her, because Saito is awesome enough to save her. In a sense, he could plan on raping her, but he'd still be a good guy, because Saito would save her before the evil did was done.
No one points this out.
The protagonists are either completely immoral or completely stupid. I can't tell which at this point. What I can say is that Zero no Tsukaima F is probably the worst thing this season has to offer. It's on par with Twilight as far as sensible plots and character development go.
I can't wait to see how much worse it can get.
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