You wanna talk some fucking Kantai? Let’s talk some Kantai.
Episode 6 features the cutest, most fun “filler” episode yet as the group of young girls is deadset on winning the shipgirl’s curry contest. Luckily for them, pretty much everyone destroys themselves during the actual competition leaving them with one true competitor, over whom they prevail anyway. Akatsuki, now you can finally consider yourself a real lady! (She’s easily the cutest – I’m always rooting for her).
Ok, back to manly stuff – first division’s Kaga gets severely wounded and unfortunately will need to be replaced in Emergency Mobile Unit 5 for the next operation. She is replaced by Shoukaku, and the operation actually goes quite well. Unsurprisingly, Kaga is worrying about her kinsmen the entire time she is in the docking bay. I wonder if she saw Falco while she was there?
Episode 8 features my favorite ship girl who has thus far been unaccounted for (You may have spotted her in the archive headers for these posts, most recently) – Battleship Yamato makes her appearance! She’s so powerful she can destroy entire fleets singlehandedly with ease…the only issue being her fuel consumption. Such as power comes with a price unfortunately, and Yamato cannot be deployed because her fuel consumption is just so great. Fubuki had an easy enough time overcoming such a limitation by taking her out on a rowboat though. Hey, she’s resourceful when it comes down to it!…How did she not drop straight through that row boat, anyway?
When ship girls “level up”, they get remodeled – however, not every ship girl is eligible to be remodeled. Not unlike the classic RPG system of gaining experience before proceeding to the next level, they must put in enough training time, receive enough damage, and demonstrate a certain level of proficiency before they can be remodeled. Yuudachi, because of her secret nighttime training, becomes eligible and even her appearance received a rework, although a later episode mentions that this is not always typical. As a result, she becomes much stronger. Naturally, this leaves Fubuki feeling left behind by her friend. No worries, Fubuki, something wonder for you is right around the corner…
The Admiral has gone missing – Fubuki recalls how the admiral had asked her to join the fleet. Strangely enough, the admiral left behind instructions for their final operation, involving Fubuki as the crux of the operation. She is to be remodeled as part of the arrangement, Nagato says. In order to become Akagi’s escort, she subjects herself to the harsh training Kaga has offered her, and ultimately succeeds and is, in fact, remodeled. However, her appearance has not undergone a drastic change by any means – but her power is very real.
The final Operation MI is ready to go. I was a little disappointed that Fubuki didn’t have a substantial rework as Yuudachi did, but the power is really all that matters. I’d really love to see more of the Admiral but I know the show enjoys making him some super smart faceless/voiceless guy that works in the background. Oh well.
