No.  Apparently no one in this show has any sense of the situation, the chain of command, or basic freaking propriety.

——

Episode Five

We finally get some plot progression in this episode, but it’s very poorly executed.  The episode opens with a lot of fanservice and talk of friendship between Dizelmine and Villaguilio despite how Dizelmine is obviously off his freaking rocker and is just manipulating everyone around him, including his sister and her friends.  He lures Madoka into a false sense of security and then attempts to merge her brain with Yurikano’s in order to harness the power of the Rin-ne.  All the techno-babble in this episode was intensely annoying; I really hate when anime that use advanced technology feel the need to throw in people babbling about what the machines are doing.  I can suspend disbelief and just think it does what it does because it’s the future; having a ceaseless stream of nonsense just spewing from everyone’s lips just annoys the fire out of me.

And although the plot moved on this episode, the pacing was terrible.  As I said, the first half of the episode was just lip service, and the second half went way too fast to set up any sense of tension or high stakes.  We see Lan turn on Muginami, but before we can really even form an opinion on it, it’s revealed about three minutes later that it’s just a trick so they can find Madoka.  Madoka’s scene with Yurikano also rubbed me the wrong way; I just can’t get over how preachy and meddlesome she’s become, and I was really happy that Yurikano get in a few punches before Muginami broke up the party.  Upon reflection, her attitude hasn’t changed that much from the first season, but with the stakes infinitely higher, it’s just so inappropriate I want to throttle her.

The best part of this episode was probably Dizelmine.  He’s manipulative, he’s conniving, he’s misguided and self-righteous and I love it.  He’s toeing the line between being morally grey and just straight up evil, and I think it makes him a great antagonist for the series.  That said, I’m absolutely dreading the moment when he inevitibly realizes how wrong he’s been and becomes ~friends~ with everyone.  Ugh.

GO Rating: 2.5/5

——

Episode Six

So as we reach the halfway plot point, it seems like everything has been wrapped up (albeit in the worse way possible).  Yurikano and Madoka switch bodies for about ten minutes before switching back in absolutely anticlimactic and nonsensical way.  It seems like there are so many things that the story writers wanted to get done, but instead of spreading it out over the course of the first six episodes, they just crammed it all into two.  The result is a way over paced story that doesn’t answer any of the questions posed.

Dizelmine, who in the previous episode is just absolutely manic when trying to combine Yurikano and Madoka’s minds, suddenly turns into this sad little puppy who’s just in love with Yurikano and that apparently explains all of his actions.  Attempted genocide, performing painful experiments on his sister and her friend, kidnapping, conspiracy; it’s all good, he’s just in love!  What?  That doesn’t explain anything at all.

And there are tons of questions that I have that look like they’re just going to get pushed to the side.  What are the red crystals?  Why was Dizelmine trying to combine Madoka and Yurikano?  Why was Yurikano’s existence so detrimental to the universe?  Who was the apparition that Madoka saw in her cockpit several episodes ago?  With all the conflict supposedly “solved”, what the hell is the rest of the season going to be about?  Stay tuned to find out!  (Or probably not find out.)

GO Rating: 2/5