After all the exposition and flashbacking of "74", "Episode 75" of Bleach switches gears with a solid action sequence between Yoshino and one of Kariya's Bounts, a big guy named Koga. When Yoshino calls out her fire doll Goethe to protect her and Uryu, Koga responds with his own combatant, a creepy metal monstrosity name Dalc with a bizarre love fixation. (I hadn't noticed before, but it's neat that the Bounts' dolls always identify with the opposite gender of their host.) Ichigo and the others are in fast pursuit, but only arrive at the scene of the battle after Dalc and Koga have beaten Goethe and spirited Yoshino and Uryu away.
Some detective work ensues, with the mod-souls finally switching back into their original gigais; with their ability to sense reishi residue, the group finds the main Bount hideout, a mansion owned by a rich man that no one's ever seen. The team splits up–Chad and Orihime are soon lost, but Ichigo and Rukia make their assault on the house, only to lose their way as well. While they wander around opening strange doors searching for Uryu, something else finds them; a little floating eye monster that soon has hundreds of friends.
Uryu is having problems of his own, although not quite as bad as one would expect. His first conversation with Kariya is surprisingly sedate, with Kariya offering a truce to the defeated Quincy. It makes you wonder exactly what Kariya hopes to get–I'd assumed it was Uryu's soul, but even nice vampires aren't that polite with their food. "75" ends with Ichigo, Rukia, and the Mods finally breaking through to the mansion's main floor–and finding a whole host of Bounts waiting to take them down.
It's always a kick when Ryuk and Light have a chat about things. "Pursuit," this week's Death Note, has Light rejecting Ryuk's offer of Shinigami eyes for obvious reasons–Light's putting all this effort into creating a new world that he has every intention of ruling, so why would he want to limit his time as a god? Light's actually somewhat irritated at Ryuk for holding back the information for so long; it's like watching an old couple squabble, and even Ryuk is impressed by Light's complete lack of fear in the face of a monster.
Light still needs a way to deal with the man following him, and he decides to test just how far the powers of the Death Note reach. He kills six prisoners, but this time, in addition to the standard heart attack, he provides special instructions for each prisoner to commit before they die; it's an experiment that yields crucial results, showing Light that he can make the person he kills do anything, provided those actions are both possible and consistent with that person's pre-existing knowledge. L tries to draw conclusions from what the dead prisoners left behind–a cryptic note, a pentagram drawn in blood–but the real result comes when Light manipulates a paranoid drug addict into taking a bus hostage; a bus that has Light, his date, and his surveillance man on it.
By the end, Light knows his follower's name–Raye Penber–but the sad thing is, he need not have bothered. Before the bus-jacking, Pender had decided Light was just a typical high school student; his surveillance would've ended the next day. And really, even with L's brilliance, there's no immediate reason to think that simply having somebody keeping an eye on him would've put him in danger of being caught. Since all his Note-work is restricted to his bedroom, and considering the ingenious lengths he'd invented to protect the notebook from being found, all a stake-out man would've seen is what Penber himself observes. Wanting to kill him is just another example of Light's control freak personality, as well as his basic contempt for others. His brilliance will come in handy down the road when he confronts L (and L's successors) more directly, but there's something hateful about the human cost he's eager to pay at the slightest provocation.
The high stakes continue on Code Geass with "Cheering Mao." Lelouch, still rattled after his confrontation with another Geass user, demands answers from C2; while she's her normal evasive self, he is able to determine that Mao's powers have a range of 500 meters, give or take depending on his stress level, and while Mao can use his Geass as often as he likes on anyone, his big weakness is that he can never turn it off. We get a brief glimpse of the consequences of this when we see Mao stumbling through a library, assaulted by thoughts in the otherwise quiet room. The headphones he wears are his only protection, a constant loop of C2's reassuring voice.
Lelouch sets up camp at home, trying to determine Mao's next move. He sends the Black Knights out looking, which seems like a risky move; one of Mao's greatest threats to our hero is that he knows about the Zero identity. If any of the Black Knights were to actually find Mao, there's a good chance the game would be blown–but since it's doubtful the Knights could face down Mao without Zero in any case, he's probably just using them as a scouting team.
The endgame happens in a closed amusement park, with C2 meeting Mao on her own determined to remove him from the equation. She's unable to shoot, but Mao does not share her reservations. Lelouch's Geass powers don't work on C2–and neither do Mao's mind-reading abilities, which make her the only person on the planet who isn't constantly bombarding him with noise. Their separation has driven Mao insane; Geass goes a little over the top here, when Mao suddenly waving a chainsaw around. It looks weird, and it turns Mao from being sort of pitiable to a two-dimensional loon. Lelouch's method of defeating him is clever–distraction based on psychology–and while it's sad to see a character with that much potential get gunned down so quickly, once Mao went all Matthew Lillard on us, his death is probably for the best.
Mitzi has an itch in "Along Came A Rider," and since this is Shin Chan, it's a surprise that itch isn't related to a venereal disease. It is related (he said, trying desperately to rein in a metaphor) to a new Action Bastard spin-off series, "Biker Bastard, and its handsome star. She won't let Hiro watch a show on "poodle rapists" because it conflicts "BB," staying up late into the night enjoying her tape of the program, and it all comes to a head when her actor crush makes an appearance at the local mall.
In "Sleepin' It Real," Shin and his classmates have a sleepover at school. Lots of personality clashes ensue, between stuck up Miss Ai, Penny's control freak ways, Georgie's deep dislike of Shin, and Shin's basic Shin-ness. There's a nice bit here with Shin invading Georgie's personal space; while the show generally moves along at a fast clip (especially given the extra dialogue the dubbers seem to cram in), here it slows down long enough to sell the gag, with Shin's inability to not be annoying running into Georgie's slow-burn.
The episode ends with "Anything You Kendo, I Kendo Better." Someone (and it sounds like the crazy homeless guy who stalked Shin a while back) is peppering the neighborhood with fliers about Kendo training, but while Mitzi is determined to have Shin join up (believing, for reasons that are never entirely clear, that Shin could become a world famous martial artist and make them all rich), Hiro's two days of Kendo class make him intolerant of her money grabbing ways. The two engage in a mock samurai duel that's sort of funny, but like the other two segments of the ep, "Kendo" doesn't really have much build. The slice-of-life stories are the undeniable heart of the series, but these could've used more spark.
Grades:
Bleach, "Episode 75": B+
Death Note, "Pursuit": A-
Code Geass, "Cheering Mao": A-
Shin Chan, "Along Came A Rider, etc.": B-
Stray Observations:
—I didn't initially like L's voice, but it's growing on me.
—Well, Viletta is alive, but she has amnesia. Lame. (Fan service in some scrambled boob-age here.)
—Also, we have confirmation of what Shirley lost: all memory of Lelouch. He's got a story to cover for it with their friends, but I'm certain it's going to stick.