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Episode 16: New Power
Air date: January 17th, 2007
Channel: TV Tokyo
Length: ca 24 minutes
Summary
After a carefree day on the beach, Tokiko comes to the shore to speak with Gouta, a renkin warrior, late at night. At the same time, Kazuki is called to another place at the shore by Captain Bravo, who meets him in full armour and reveals a dire truth to him:
Now that Kazuki is using a black kakugane, he only has a limited time left as a human being, and to avoid Kazuki becoming another monster as dangerous and strong as Victor, Bravo's organization, the Renkin Sendan, have decided to kill him. Bravo's order is to assassinate Kazuki, and he is willing to carry it out.
While Kazuki must fight for his life against his own mentor, Tokiko learns the truth from Gouta, and hurries to Kazuki's help.
New characters:
Sekima Hiwatari
Additional voice cast:
Tomokazu Seki as Sekima Hiwatari
Shinji Kawada as Gouta Nakamura
Compared to the manga...
This episode covers the manga chapters 49 to 52.
While it stays close as usual to the manga, basically going from panel to panel, there are some additional scenes in the first part of this episode, which shows the time that Kazuki and Tokiko spend with their friends before meeting Gouta and Bravo at night. It's not much, but it kind of adds to the atmosphere.
There are some tiny changes, but they are minor. For example, two panels worth of a small scene where Kazuki accuses Captain Bravo of not being the real Captain Bravo have been cut, and the dialogue between Tokiko and Gouta has been moved around a bit, without actually changing anything about it.
Opinion
This is one of my favourite parts of the story, and its anime adaptation did not disappoint me.
The battle between Kazuki and Bravo is emotional and dramatic and the ending of this episode is guaranteed to leave people in desperate need for the next installment.
And finally, Gouta is just adorable.
(Written by Kaeli on January 18th 2007)