Lycoris Recoil Episode 8 aired on Saturday giving fans the most bizarre episode of the season yet. But don’t take that as if it was disappointing or anything of the sort, quite the opposite. With the first half of the episode feeling like a slice-of-life anime with a mix of comedy, the second half provided what we’ve all grown to love about the series—drama, action, and a wonderful cliffhanger to top it all off.
Whether it was Takina making a social media trending parfait that resembled the poop emoji, or Chisato replicating Bruce Lee during a mission, the first half of this episode was quite odd, to say the least. While it was enjoyable to watch, the argument can be made that everything that occurred during it kinda slowed down what was set to come.
It almost felt as if the episode needed some filler moments just to buy time until the story-altering moments happened in the latter half of the episode. However, the argument can be made that it was finally a good thing the series actually showed the cast focusing on the cafe and their usual day-to-day life. I mean, the official synopsis of the series definitely feels like it explains what we saw in the first half of episode 8 than at any other time during the season.
That all being said, what happened in the latter half of the episode started to become even weirder. Never mind the fact that Chisato admits to her hatred of needles despite being stern in the face of a barrage of bullets. But Chisato and Majima having coffee in her secret base having agreements on characters they´ve seen in a series as if they’re ex-friends left an awkward feeling nonetheless.
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But the ending to episode 8 is everything that makes Lycoris Recoil one of the best series of the year so far. The encounter with Takina and Majima outside of Chisato’s door. Chisato is being taken and experimented on. Yoshi making a promising threat to Mika. Takina runs in a panic to end the episode to find Chisato. It gave us that heart-pumping adrenaline that makes the series a blast to watch.
This episode didn’t necessarily feel like the others before it where a bunch of highlighted moving pieces begin to converge later on at a single point. Despite everything that happened over the course of episode 8, the ending with Chisato on the operating table with her heart glowing really made me kind of forget everything that occurred beforehand.
But even then, the ending was actually built up throughout the entire episode. It was almost as if Director Shingo Adachi wanted the viewer to get lost in the angst, or build up emotional value for Chisato, just to mask what was inevitably going to happen at the end. And with Takina being so hard on Chisato this episode and forcing her to go to her physical, one can only guess that she may feel a great deal of guilt somewhere soon down the line.
Was this the best episode of Lycoris Recoil so far? Well, that can be left up for debate. Was it the most bizarre one of the season that drifted away from its consistent script? Absolutely. Episode 8 still holds its fair share of incredible artwork, composition, and overall moments. But with that way it ended, that’s the factor that could transition us to an utterly incredible episode 9.
Lycoris Recoil Episode 9 will air on Saturday, August 27, exclusively on Crunchyroll.
Screenshots: Crunchyroll
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