Claymore Manga/Anime

That poor crazy girl.

Ophelia was actually the first character I read about when I was first introduced to Claymore (via the anime), and I just found her so deliciously loopy that I was rather saddened by her death.

I wanted to write a Crack Pairing ship fic where she was the one sent to Raki's village instead of Clare, but then I learned all about the region and ranking systems. Sadface indeed.

A)Like canon details ever stopped fanfic writers.

B)And now I am curious how Raki would even survive their encounter. Even if he did, he would probably have a completely different view of Claymores than after he met Clare.

Ophelia does a lot of crazy stuff on a whim. Admittedly mostly of the rapemurderkill variety, but it's not entirely implausible to suggest she might be amused enough for some reason to put up with Raki. For a while. Then things will get messy.

If she didn't kill him she'd just end up leaving him alone in the woods with out food or water. Possibly clothing too.

I disagree with the interpretation that Ophelia do crazy thing on a whim. Most of her interaction with Clair are perfectly logical: she strongly suspect her to be an awakened being, but isn't completely sure about that, so she test her by giving her strong incentive to release everything she has.

I see Ophelia as an Unfettered which reasoning is something like this: my most important goal is to kill Priscilla. To do that I need to be very strong, which can be done with a lot of training such as fighting and killing awakened being, so I will do everything which result in her fighting an awakaned being.

But yes, she certainly is surprising and interesting.

Nah, Ophelia's just plain unhinged. I mean, just look at all the totally unnecessary games she plays with Clare; both when she first met her and after she awakened. And then she "encourages" Clare not to give up just when she's about to burn out. If Ophelia really wanted Clare dead she should have done it in five seconds. (I wouldn't agree Ophelia is trying to provoke Clare into awakening, she seems genuinely confused about whether Clare is an awakened; and shows real surprise at some of the things Clare did.)

edited 16th Mar '12 10:18:47 PM by ashnazg

How would you test if one of your fellow Claymore who travel with a boy she cares about has awoken or not ?

And the final game she put on Clare is a test of strength and willpower that she wanted Clare to win (that's why she yelled at her and "cheated" a little in Clare's favor).

"Wanting someone to kill you, just because" counts as unhinged in my opinion. Also, I really don't think Ophelia was trying to do anything like a methodological test. She's genuinely surprised by Clare's reactions.

Moving on, I picked up a box set of the anime at a convention on the weekend. Being a despicable heretic who not only enjoys the anime but also watches it dubbed, I'd say it was well worth my money.

Two words: Tongue probing.

One more word: Animated.

Disc 3 won't play in my Xbox for some reason, though, which means I miss out on the entire Ophelia arc.

Bah, I dislike the anime mostly for it throwing in a Gecko Ending when there was a perfectly reasonable break point there (i.e. the apparent Downer Ending where it seems the Pieta team got completely wiped out). Would have served as a great sequel hook too; or if they didn't want to tease the audience too much, they could have started off the first part of the Clarice arc.

Also the animation wasn't too great.

Finished the anime series. Yeah, the Gecko Ending was unnecessary and kind of came out of nowhere, but it wasn't as bad as I've heard. I really hope it either gets a second season or an OVA treatment in the same manner as Hellsing.

Also read up to volume 16 of the manga now. Those Abyss Feeders are A-grade horror.

Judging by the bonus scene in volume 15(?), Ophelia was quite the troll, too.

You mean the one where she tries to get Miria to awaken?

Also I think the concept of the Abyss Feeders was pretty cool.

Chapter update. Amusing to see they seem to be trying to create a backstory with occasional cross-references between past characters like Rosemary. Feels a little forced; but I suppose it's not too implausible. Though really, when Hysteria was talking about some mystery girl, I thought she meant Roxanne. Weird Priscilla manifestation was weird though.

And finally, Raki meets someone he knows who can help him! The question now is how they're going to break the news about Clare...or whether they'll be able to before the next Bad Thing (TM) happens. Like Priscilla breaking free and gatecrashing the party or something, like Dae hoped.

I also have an ominous feeling about Cassandra just going off like that. Maybe she genuinely decided to spare those there; but it seems pretty certain she's not just going to live quietly...probably going off to devour an entire town or something.

That said mystery girl was mentioned as having "a faint smile" should be a BIG hint.

edited 6th Apr '12 12:35:16 AM by nervmeister

Theresa had a faint smile...heck, it was her title. Roxanne also had a creepy smile. That description is just too vague.

Wait, now that I bring that up - the timescale seems a little off. As I recall, when Irene described Priscilla, she mentioned that she was not only recently promoted, but only relatively recently recruited as well. Yet Hysteria's description puts Priscilla as a new recruit at the same time that Rosemary was number 4; meaning that Rosemary had to be promoted to number 1, be surpassed by Theresa, awaken and be killed...all before the number 2-5s gathered to execute Theresa. The timeframe seems a little short.

Though come to think of it, Rosemary having been a number 4 may have been another subtle Four Is Death reference.

Wait, who's Rosemary?

Rosemary was the number 1 before Theresa appeared, after which she was demoted to number 2.

Not satisfied with this, Rosemary awakened and tried to kill Theresa but failed miserably

edited 6th Apr '12 3:13:57 AM by burninganimefan357

I don't see why you think Hysteria was saying anything about Priscilla being a new recruit at the same time Rosemary being No.4. I think the mention of a faint smile and Rosemary make it pretty clear that she was talking about Theresa.

Priscilla's "ghost" appearance there probably was caused by Hysteria's memory of Theresa, which ..somehow trigger Pris's "lingering thought" in her flesh grafted to Hysteria.

Or that was simply a mind screw.

Thanks, I remember her spiel now. It's hard for me to keep track of the events of the manga with the monthly release schedule.

Oh, huh. So the general opinion is that she meant Theresa? Interesting. I didn't get that impression at all, I thought she meant Priscilla directly. But I suppose yeah, Theresa fits the timescale better.

So is it safe to say that Cassandra "shit-talking" and subsequently killing Roxanne was a CMOA?

edited 7th Apr '12 5:02:42 AM by nervmeister

I would definitely say so. That's how I felt.

...you know, I just had a thought. At this point, Cassandra has eaten Roxanne and a large chunk of Hysteria. And she was muttering something just before she left, the same way the Priscilla image was. What if Priscilla's youki is influencing her and she's headed towards the main body?