Lance N' Masques

Episode 9 was reasonable with some amusing fights (even if it did seem that most of the enemy weren't going all out. Silvia's lance was cool and Yoriko living finally up to her reputation was very good (I think she is probably my favourite character in the series).

Also, is there a trope for being knocked unconscious from being punched in the stomach because it seems very common in anime?

edited 26th Nov '15 3:19:14 PM by SebastianGray

The fights followed a pretty standard "the good guys are in a pinch, have a flashback, and pull out more power for a last minute turnaround" formula, but they were pretty well done and nice to see. An all action episode is definitely better.

Also, "Alice Charge" was awesome. A flying headbutt.

Nice to see that Yoriko actually does care for Youtaro, and it's good that she killed the Chief, that's exactly what she deserved. I hope Youtaro will have enough guts to kill that red asshat too, that would redeem him for spending the whole arc being a little bitch.

Oh, and can someone smack Yuyan across his stupid face already? He pisses me off.

Everything annoyed the shit out of me this episode starting from the unnecessary flashback/lazy repeat of last week's ending. Youtaro now has spent the best part of three (four)? episodes being useless and spineless, which must be a record for the nominal protagonist of an action series, while the individual fights seem more like filler than anything meaningful.

This never was going to be a great series, but it seems to have wasted any potential it had.

Episode 10 was a little lacklustre for the end of an arc but I did find it interesting that the main character actually lost the final fight. It also looks like Youtaro's dad set the entire thing up for some reason as well.

I would be more surprised about Yotaro losing if he didn't cement himself in my mind as kind of a useless weakling.

I see that the Chief is getting away with abusing her power and kidnapping. Those anime military organizations are always like that.

Of course Youtaro dad is behind everything. That guy seems evil as heck.

Ah, Shirohime and her vaguely defined ability to maybe actually shape shift.

Mako finally figured out that Youtaro is Knight Lancer. High time.

And of course African Branch is going for all Egyptian look. I wonder if they like card games.

The arc was so-so. More action and plot than in the rest of the show, but many weak parts as well. It was curious to see the protagonist being the subject of Rescue Arc for once, even if it did make Youtaro look weak and passive.

Next episode: Back to school. And it seems Yuyan is going through some much needed humiliation. Hate that guy.

Once again I wonder about the inability of harem protagonists to feel anger. Your supposed friends kidnap you, attack your friends and tried to kill them, not to mention almost kill you and you forgive them this easily?

No consequences, not finally deciding to give up being a knight like you wanted to do since episode one, now you know the whole organisation is rotten to the core?

You need someone who is not capable of getting angry to deal with the crap an average harem protagonist goes through.

Episode 11: Looks like Youtaro's dad is making his move and it also seems that he was the one that Makio's father wanted to protect her from (what's the betting that she is really Youtaro's half sister?) Africa Branch Chief is a creep with mind control powers.

So why the hell was Yuyan wearing a maid uniform with no comment from anyone?

Yotaro continues to struggle against anyone that isn't a generic thug, too. Good for him.

Yuyan humiliation was the best part of an otherwise meh episode.

Alice is my favorite character. She actually tries.

Way too much pointless drama and angst.

Seems to be that the supposedly noble knights are just a bunch of assholes.

Youtaro continues to be totally worthless, even against mooks. Pathetic.

Youtaro dad shows up to save the day? Or that what it would look like if he wasn't such a creep.

Episode 12 sees the series end in a rather lacklustre fashion, it seemed like they were rushing things to get everything into the twelve episodes. Seems Youtaro's dad apparently had a relationship just like Youtaro has with Makio but with a worse ending which is interesting but it would have been better to have actually see the flashback rather than have a trippy sequence with just some dialogue. Yoriko was looking quite cute there at the end though I must say. We never did find out what the hell was up with Shirohime and her mum though.

Overall this has been a rather meh series that had some good ideas but never really capitalized on them.

Well, that was pretty bad. From the whole Africa branch being totally pointless, what with the leader running away in the first five minutes. To Shin being a creepy psycho with Vague motivation, Yotaro being a crybaby with unhealthy obsession on a ten years old girl and their fight having a cheap, lackluster ending.

We get a psychedelic "flashback" that explains a little and then the whole things just kind of ends.

Are we supposed to be happy that Yotaro decided to embrace Knighthood? Because frankly pretty much all the knights we see act appallingly and the series does nothing to dispel Yotaro notion that they are a relic of old times that should be discarded. When someone like Yoriko is the best knight we've seen things look pretty bad.

This was a weird series full of weird, disturbing relationships, vague confusing plots, questionable morals and way too many characters that serve no purpose and have no depth (like what's the point of that purple haired girl was?) Oh and we still didn't found out why can Shirohime and her mom turn human.

Still, I can't say it was a total waste of time, since I had some fun watching it, but it definitely could use some improvement.

Well... it had potential at the beginning, I think. I can't say it would have been anything amazing, but everyone's initial introductions were quite well done, the cast looked like it would have been a lot of fun... then it had to make all kinds of creepy relations between Yota, Makio and Yufeng, the villains were insanely underwhelming (especially Wutshername. She had like, a whole episode dedicated to, uh, whatever she was doing, and then is chased out of the plot just over a minute into the last episode?). The show got so ridiculously stale after the first arc, it's insane.

Re: Shirohime - I'd always thought the human form was simply for the viewers' benefit to more easily convey what she wants to say... but with every episode it happens, it gets less and less obvious, and it feels like it's just a thing that happens and no one really cares. Kinda like Maid Yuyan. Why is that a thing?

Like, she can turn human so why didn't she just transform when she wanted to got to school? It makes no sense. And nobody ever comments on it, are we to assume that all horses can do that?

Yeah, this series is a disappointment on so many levels. I have no idea if the source material was as incoherent and overloaded with superfluous crap, but this series shows the extreme failure mode of a light novel adaptation. Too much important stuff wasn't explained or explained badly while all those extra characters were put in without much for them to do, or like Yufeng, badly nerved after their introduction or like Yufan and psycho maid, just obnoxious without redeeming features. At the same time, the supposed protagonist was basically useless from episode six or so onwards.

Plotwise again too much was attempted to put into a twelve episode series, sacrifising coherence, with enemies attacking and fought off in the space of half an episode like with the African Branch, yet still managing to drag down the story, like with the whole kidnap arc. To top it off, the conclusion is basically that the villains won, as Youtaro is now convinced he should be a knight, despite all the evidence of the organisation's amorality he has had firsthand experience of.

And yet, there was potential here. With the final episode it tried to go back to its original theme of Youtaro coming to grips with being a knight, no longer needing a mask to hide behind, but like so much it was forced upon him, rather than something he came up with of his own accord. Furthermore, the whole knight/princess dynamic between Youtaro and Makio is downright creepy. Had it been more thematically coherent, less afraid to allow Youtaro to make his own choices, less dependent on his admiration of a ten year old girl, that theme could've been handled better.

But there was an even better story hiding in this series, that of chosing your own family over the family you were born into. That's what Lance N' Masques seemed to lead towards for me in the first half, as Youtaro and co built up their network of friends and allies and it seemed to fit with him grappling with the responsibilities of knighthood. It would've made sense had he picked up that role to defend his family rather than being manipulated into it by creeper dad.

Seriously, there were so many disturbing relationships in this anime. Yotaro and his father, Yotaro and Yoriko, Yotaro and Makio, Makio and Yufeng, the branch chief and red mask guy... none of them were what I would call healthy or normal. Just about the only relationship that didn't creep me out was Yotaro and Alice.

And the conclusion where Yotaro decides he wants to be a knight despite almost every single one he mets during the series giving him shit, and almost none examples of them being a force for good is absurd. Yeah the villains pretty much won.

But of course Yotaro giving in to the pressure shouldn't be a surprise, since he's a whiny passive crybaby, filled to brim with parental issues and creepily obsessed with a little girl opinion of him.

I mean, what was Yoriko's plan? She was trying to stop Shin from forcing Yotaro be his successor... by training him to be a knight to the point of psychosis and filling him with fear of opposing authority figures. What the hell.

I agree that this would be better as a series about creating your own family and finding a place in the world by yourself but sadly this aspect was not given proper attention as we wasted episodes on Yuyang being a little shit and Knight Order being jerks.