Episode eight of Guilty Crown features yet another case where one of
Shu’s classmates gets involved in the GHQ/Funeral Parlor fight. Since he needs to infiltrate a GHQ facility in Oshima, Shu goes on a mission under the
guise of a vacation to get the job done. His friends Hare, Kanon and
Souta accompany him on the trip, where they stay in a mansion that is
supposedly Shu’s summer house. Souta is part of the trip since his void, an advanced camera capable of opening anything it's used on, is needed to defeat the facility's elaborate security system. Unfortunately, they get through the only to discover that the item they're looking for is gone.
Moments before they made their way into the building, a man carrying
the ID of Kurosu Ouma - Shu's father - went in and took it instead. 
A
portion of this episode took place on the beach, so naturally this made
for a lot of fanservice in this episode. But even before that we get more shots of Shu’s mother in her lingerie, hovering over Shu.
Honestly, it is a bit creepy that she fondles her son the way she does so often.
Meanwhile Hare finds herself jealous of Inori, so she steps up her game
by pressing her breasts against Shu’s body as she drags him to the
water. Later on the girls take a bath together and Kanon plays with
Inori...yeah. There have been fanservice moments here and there on the
show before, but this was just ridiculous. It doesn’t help that Guilty
Crown has maybe one strong female character, so moments like this really
bring to light just how objectified the women are. To further cement
this idea, later on in the episode Shu stops Souta from confessing his
love to Inori by shouting out that Inori is his.
Shu isn’t
particularly thrilled with going on a vacation with Souta. While Shu is
quiet and keeps to himself, Souta is loud and abrasive. Shu also dislikes that Souta has a crush on Inori. Souta is
apparently a fairly talented photographer, since he shows Inori a video
he made of her as a way of expressing his interest. Unfortunately for
Souta, Inori’s “interest” in him is all a lie to get him to help Funeral Parlor complete its mission. What’s worse is that Shu tells Souta
he has no feelings for Inori, even though he clearly does. By the end of the
episode the two get into a verbal fight, with Shu telling Souta he can’t
stand being around him. Instead of getting angry though, Souta just says he is
happy Shu opened up to him for once. While this is a nice outcome for their
friendship, it felt odd. Souta should have been more upset about Shu
lying to him about Inori, because that was a jerk thing to do.
Though the episode was filled with silly beach fanservice and
melodramatic high school drama, the ending certainly had an interesting
development. Shu’s father Kurosu was Haruka’s teacher and a big
researcher on the Apocalypse Virus. He died shortly after Shu’s birth,
but his ID is still good for security purposes and so the man using it invaded the base effortlessly. Gai never identified the item they were trying to
obtain, so who this man is and what his goals are is up in the air. A
part of me would like to think it is actually Kurosu and that he never died,
but it really could be anyone. Bringing Shu’s father into the mix would
definitely be crazy. It was also nice that for once, Gai’s plan didn’t go exactly
as he intended.
Some may find this episode
intolerable, while others will still appreciate it for the plot developments
at the end. I fall into the latter group, but I tend to be more
forgiving of fanservice than most. It’s creepy and weird, but at this
point it is to be expected in a series like this. Is that a bad thing?
Probably, but sometimes you gotta take the good with the bad.
|
|
|
