The Gift (S5x07)

Airdate: 24 May 2015

Written by: David Benioff & D.B. Weiss Directed by: Miguel Sapochnik

Running Time: 58 minutes

Following the profoundly contentious and narratively dubious conclusion of Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken – Sansa Stark’s brutal marital rape at the hands of Ramsay Bolton – the subsequent episode, The Gif”, initially presents itself as a formulaic calm before the storm. It adopts the series’ now-standard structure of checking in on its scattered, sprawling cast, methodically advancing each piece on the board. This gives the instalent a procedural, almost predictable rhythm, a necessary breather after the previous episode’s emotional violence. Yet, to dismiss it as mere table-setting would be a mistake. Beneath its composed surface, The Gift is busily laying explosive charges under several key characters, culminating in one of the season’s most melodramatically potent cliffhangers. It is an episode of quiet desperation, failed machinations, and sudden, seismic shifts, all directed with a steady hand by first-timer Miguel Sapochnik, who would later become the series’ premier architect of large-scale chaos.

The narrative, as ever, hopscotches across the map. At the Wall, the episode handles two significant passings. The first is the gentle, natural death of Maester Aemon, a moment rendered uniquely moving by the knowledge that actor Peter Vaughan, like his character, was blind during filming and passed away a year after the season aired. It is a rare moment of peace snatched from a world of strife. The second passing is of Jon Snow’s presence, as he departs with Tormund Giantsbane for the doomed mission to Hardhome. In his absence, Samwell Tarly’s fragile authority is tested. His attempt to protect Gilly from the crude sexual harassment of two Night’s Watchmen results in a beating – a clumsy, televisual alternative to the books’ more plausible scenario where alcohol, not fisticuffs, lowers inhibitions. While the subsequent love scene between Sam and Gilly is commendably unexploitative and sweet, the preceding violence feels like a manufactured shortcut to Sam’s moment of courage. The intervention of Ghost, Jon’s direwolf, to end the assault is a welcome nod to the supernatural bonds of the Stark children, but it underscores the episode’s occasional reliance on convenient, crowd-pleasing solutions.

In Winterfell, the atmosphere is one of claustrophobic dread. Sansa’s flicker of hope, kindled by a seemingly broken Theon’s agreement to help her escape, is cruelly extinguished when he betrays her to Ramsay. The consequence is the flaying of an old woman, a graphic reminder of the Bolton signature. The ensuing conversation between Sansa and Ramsay is a masterclass in psychological torment, with Sophie Turner and Iwan Rheon excelling. Sansa, learning fast, points out the threat posed by Walda Frey’s unborn son to Ramsay’s inheritance. Ramsay, however, is chillingly confident, correctly diagnosing that the advancing winter is his greatest ally against the besieging Stannis Baratheon. This strategic insight – that Southern soldiers will perish where Northerners endure – is a rare moment of tactical acumen for the otherwise psychopathic character, grounding his villainy in a cold, pragmatic truth.

That truth is vividly illustrated in Stannis’s camp, where the King’s army is quite literally melting away. Men and horses freeze and starve, a visual representation of a campaign unravelling. Ser Davos, the voice of grim reason, advocates a retreat to wait out the winter. Stannis, the inflexible iron, refuses. This desperation creates the fertile ground for Melisandre’s most horrific proposal: the sacrifice of Princess Shireen to the Lord of Light. This plotline, a significant deviation from George R.R. Martin’s novels (where a different royal bastard is demanded), draws clear and intentional parallels to the myth of Iphigenia from the Trojan War. It is a testament to the show’s willingness to forge its own, often darker path, though one questions whether this narrative invention serves character or merely shock.

Elsewhere, the quality of deviation is less inspired. In Dorne, the plot remains the season’s glaring weak point. Jaime’s fruitless plea to Myrcella and the Sand Snakes’ imprisonment could have been tense. Instead, the dungeon scene devolves into what can only be described as gratuitous exploitation. The prolonged focus on Tyene Sand (Rosabell Laurenti Sellers) disrobing feels like a transparent excuse for nudity, ticking an obligatory “spicy” quota for the episode. The subplot is saved from utter absurdity only by Jerome Flynn’s charismatic performance; Bronn’s defiant, excellent rendition of “The Dornishman’s Wife” during this scene provides a much-needed dash of authentic Thrones grit and humour, even as the framing undermines it.

The episode’s centrepiece, however, and its namesake, unfolds in Meereen. Here, the writing is notably more confident. Jorah Mormont, having captured Tyrion Lannister, is himself enslaved and sold to the fight pits of Yezzan zo Qaggaz. Tyrion, with characteristic wit, engineers his own purchase. Their arrival at the Great Pit of Daznak coincides with Daenerys’s reluctant attendance, advised by Hizdahr zo Loraq to witness the “culture” she has suppressed. Her visible disgust at the brutality is palpable. This setting provides the perfect, public stage for Jorah’s dramatic re-emergence into her life. Throwing aside his helmet after dispatching a foe, he presents a chained Tyrion with the simple declaration, “A gift.” It is a fantastically melodramatic cliffhanger, the kind of convening of major characters that the television medium excels at, and it irrevocably steers the series into uncharted territory. This moment is critically important, as it marks the point where Tyrion’s storyline definitively advances beyond the latest confirmed events in Martin’s novels. The Gift thus becomes a clear signal that the television series, for better and worse, is now committed to forging its own path, free from the constraints of its source material.

Nowhere is the adaptation’s handling of source material more faithful – and effective – than in King’s Landing. The political intrigue here is razor-sharp. Lady Olenna’s attempt to bribe the High Sparrow fails spectacularly, revealing the depth of the sparrow’s fervour. King Tommen’s impotent despair is pitiable. And Cersei Lannister, believing herself the ultimate player, makes her fatal error. Her gloating visit to Margaery Tyrell’s cell is a delicious moment of villainous triumph. Yet, in her subsequent meeting with the High Sparrow, the tables are turned with breathtaking ruthlessness. Accused of her own sexual crimes (specifically, her affair with Lancel Lannister), Cersei is arrested and imprisoned. This comeuppance, taken directly from the novels, is intensely audience-pleasing. It delivers poetic justice, giving the female villain a taste of the humiliation and powerlessness she has so often inflicted on others, all while feeling entirely believable within the logic of the story.

Directed by Miguel Sapochnik in his series debut, The Gift exhibits a confident, unfussy style that would later define his legendary battle episodes. He manages the episode’s numerous tonal shifts adeptly, from the quiet sorrow of Aemon’s death to the spectacle of the fighting pits. The storylines are well-condensed and comprehensive, each receiving just enough time to advance meaningfully. In essence, The Gift is a workmanlike but crucial episode. It is burdened by some of Season Five’s worst tendencies – exploitative nudity, occasionally clumsy writing – yet it is elevated by strong performances, several genuinely powerful moments, and one of the series’ most iconic cliffhangers.

RATING: 6/10 (++)

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Released in 2000 and directed by Dominic Sena, Gone in 60 Seconds is a remake of the 1974 film of the same name, but it fully embraces the flashy energy and style of the early 2000s action era. This is not a deep crime drama trying to reinvent cinema. It is a movie about stealing incredible cars, escaping danger, and looking cool while doing it.

Nicolas Cage stars as Randall “Memphis” Raines, a legendary retired car thief pulled back into the game when his younger brother gets in trouble with a dangerous criminal. Cage plays Memphis with that unique mix of intensity and laid back charisma he brought to a lot of his best action roles. He never overcomplicates the character because the movie works best when it keeps moving.

Giovanni Ribisi plays Kip, Memphis’ younger brother whose failed car theft operation starts the entire plot. Ribisi brings nervous energy and desperation to the role, helping establish the emotional reason Memphis risks everything to come back.

The plot itself is simple but effective. Memphis and his crew have to steal fifty high end cars in one night to save Kip’s life. That setup immediately gives the movie momentum because the audience knows the clock is always ticking.

Angelina Jolie plays Sara “Sway” Wayland, one of Memphis’ old crew members, bringing attitude and style to the film. Jolie has a natural screen presence that fits perfectly into this kind of movie, even if her role is not deeply developed.

Robert Duvall is also excellent as Otto Halliwell, Memphis’ mentor and father figure. Duvall brings warmth and credibility to the film, grounding some of the more exaggerated moments with his calm presence.

Then there is Delroy Lindo as Detective Roland Castlebeck, the police officer obsessed with finally catching Memphis. Lindo clearly understands the movie’s tone and leans into it perfectly, creating a fun cat and mouse dynamic throughout the story.

Dominic Sena directs the film with a heavy focus on style, and honestly that is exactly the right approach here. The movie is built around cool cars, night time city chases, flashy cinematography, and nonstop momentum. It feels slick in the best possible early 2000s way.

Of course, the real stars of the movie are the cars themselves. From Shelby Mustangs to Ferraris and classic muscle cars, the lineup is incredible. The film treats the vehicles almost like living characters, especially the legendary silver Mustang known as “Eleanor.”

The final chase involving Eleanor remains one of the movie’s biggest highlights. It is over the top, unrealistic, and absolutely entertaining. That scene alone explains why so many car fans still love this film decades later.

Now yes, parts of Gone in 60 Seconds are definitely a little corny. Some dialogue is cheesy, some characters are exaggerated, and certain emotional moments are pretty predictable. But honestly, that is part of the charm. The movie never pretends to be something deeper than it is.

What makes it still work for me is the energy. Everyone in the cast seems to understand the assignment. The movie is not trying to be gritty realism. It is trying to be fun, stylish entertainment, and it absolutely succeeds at that.

The soundtrack also deserves praise because it perfectly captures the mood of the era. Combined with the fast editing and flashy visuals, it gives the whole film a cool late night adrenaline feeling that fits the story perfectly.

Over time, Gone in 60 Seconds became a comfort movie for a lot of people who grew up on action films from that era. It may not have the critical respect of some crime classics, but it remains endlessly rewatchable.

In the end, Gone in 60 Seconds is still a classic to me because it understands entertainment. It delivers cool cars, strong pacing, a fun cast, and enough charm to make the whole thing work even when it gets ridiculous. It may be a little corny around the edges, but sometimes movies like that age better because they are not afraid to simply be fun.

Rating: 100/100

Screenshots from the site https://www.imdb.com/es/title/tt0327597/?ref_=mv_close Thumbnail edited in Paint Google Translate

Rating: 100/100

Originally posted through scrobble.life/movies.

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Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken (S5x06)

Airdate: 17 May 2015

Written by: Bryan Cogman Directed by: Jeremy Podeswa

Running Time: 53 minutes

From its very inception, Game of Thrones conditioned its audience to expect the worst. The brutal, unexpected death of Eddard Stark in the first season established a cardinal rule: no character, no matter how noble or ostensibly central, was safe. Over the subsequent years, viewers endured a litany of mutilations, tortures, and graphic murders, becoming inured to a certain level of narrative cruelty. Yet, a tacit covenant remained. For all its nihilistic violence, the series seemed to spare its core protagonists from the most intimate, degrading forms of violation, particularly sexual violence aimed at its key female heroes. Season five’s sixth episode, Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken, shattered that covenant. The backlash was immediate and volcanic, flooding social media with outrage that many commentators would later identify as the moment the series irrevocably “jumped the shark.” Beyond the moral revulsion, however, the episode laid bare a more insidious rot: the creative limitations of showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, whose deviations from George R.R. Martin’s source material began to feel less like bold adaptation and more like a fundamental misunderstanding of the story’s soul, underscored by technical and narrative failures elsewhere in the instalment.

The episode’s title, the proud motto of House Martell, promises a tale of defiant resilience. The Dornish plot, however, delivers something closer to farcical incompetence. Jaime Lannister, accompanied by the ever-cynical Bronn, infiltrates the Water Gardens to rescue his daughter Myrcella from a perceived threat. The irony is thick; Myrcella, happily betrothed to Prince Trystane, has no desire to be saved. Their clumsy mission coincidentally intercepts a separate assassination attempt by Ellaria Sand and the Sand Snakes—Obara, Tyene, and Nymeria—leading to a climactic fight in the sun-dappled gardens. This sequence, meant to be a spectacular set-piece, instead became a secondary point of intense criticism. Choreographically, it is a dismal failure: a clumsy, weightless scuffle that feels more like a stage rehearsal than a life-or-death struggle. The blame lies partly in fraught production. Shooting at the real Alcázar of Seville came with severe Spanish governmental restrictions—daylight hours only, extremely limited space—which hamstrung the directors. Compounded by a seemingly under-rehearsed and geographically dispersed new cast, the result is a fight scene devoid of the visceral, emotional impact that defined earlier battles like the Mountain vs. the Viper. It is a telling symptom of a production beginning to prioritise exotic location over narrative substance and executional grit.

In King’s Landing, the political machinations are more assured, yet equally grim. Petyr Baelish, summoned by Cersei, reveals upcoming Sansa Stark’s marriage to Ramsay Bolton, using the crisis he created as leverage to barter for future rule of the North. More intriguing is his witness to Cersei’s unchecked creation of a monster: the Sparrows. What begins as a formal inquest into Ser Loras Tyrell’s homosexuality—a mere political formality—explodes into a masterful coup. The High Sparrow, using the testimony of the male prostitute Olyvar, not only condemns Loras but arrests Queen Margaery for perjury. The scene is a potent display of Cersei’s short-sighted arrogance. In her zeal to humble the Tyrells, she unleashes a fanatical force that recognises no ally, leaving a helpless King Tommen and a humiliated Olenna Tyrell in its wake. This subplot works because it understands the series’ core strength: power as a chess game where every move has unintended consequences. It is a stark, effective contrast to the blunter instruments of trauma deployed elsewhere.

Meanwhile, the narrative threads on the road to Meereen and in Braavos serve as functional, if unremarkable, vignettes. Tyrion and Jorah’s capture by slavers (their leader Malko being played by formidable Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje) allows Peter Dinklage to exercise his character’s signature wit, as he talks their way out of immediate execution by touting Jorah’s potential in the fighting pits. In Braavos, Arya’s training continues with her introduction to the Hall of Faces, a visually striking moment that reinforces the mystical lore of the Faceless Men but feels like narrative marking time. Both subplots are competent, but they are mere preludes to the episode’s devastating, and devastatingly controversial, centrepiece: the wedding of Sansa Stark to Ramsay Bolton.

The marriage, officiated by Roose Bolton in the godswood of Winterfell, is a bleak ceremony. Ramsay’s consummation is a meticulously crafted act of sadistic theatre. He forces Theon Greyjoy—broken into “Reek”—to watch, weaponising Sansa’s last vestige of familial connection to amplify her humiliation. This moment proved to be the most controversial in the series’ history to that point, and it remains a fiercely divisive fault line among the fandom. Some critics defended Benioff and Weiss for adhering to the world’s brutal logic, arguing that to shy away from such violence would be a betrayal of the story’s ethos. For a vast multitude of viewers, however, the transgression was not in the act’s brutality, but in its fundamental narrative unjustifiability.

The critical failure is one of context and character. In Martin’s novels, Sansa never returns to Winterfell; it is a different character, Jeyne Poole masquerading as Arya Stark, who suffers Ramsay’s abuses. By transplanting this horror onto Sansa, Benioff and Weiss made a conscious, drastic deviation from the source material. The gamble did not pay off. Sansa’s arc, over four seasons, had been a gradual, hard-won evolution from a naïve, entitled girl into a nascent player of the game, learning manipulation and resilience in the court of the Vale. Thrusting her back into the role of helpless victim felt like a profound regression, a negation of her growth purely for shock value. It alienated a significant portion of the audience, particularly those who saw in characters like Daenerys, Brienne, and Arya a version of Hollywood feminism—flawed but aspirational—that this move seemed to brutally reject.

Ironically, the scene itself is not graphically explicit by the series’ own lurid standards. The violence is largely implied, a choice that may reflect Sophie Turner’s rising star status or a last-minute concession to taste. This lack of visual extremity, however, only heightens the sense of narrative exploitation. The effect is exacerbated by a clumsy preceding scene where Ramsay’s jealous lover, Myranda, bathes Sansa and recounts the gruesome fates of his previous partners. The dialogue is expositional dead weight, telling the audience—and Sansa—nothing they do not already know about Ramsay’s psychopathy. Furthermore, the scene’s staging creates a bizarre dissonance: Sansa’s nudity is carefully obscured, while Myranda (played by Charlotte Hope, who had appeared nude before) is fully clothed. For an audience attuned to the show’s usual visual language, this selective modesty breaks immersion, feeling less like a creative choice and more like a cynical, inconsistent calculation.

The backlash was of such magnitude that Benioff and Weiss notably absented themselves from San Diego Comic-Con in 2015, avoiding the traditional panel and its inevitable interrogation. This retreat spoke volumes. It fuelled speculation that the controversy made the showrunners risk-averse in subsequent seasons, perhaps leading to the narrative conservatism and rushed, fan-service-oriented conclusions that would later plague the series’ final chapters. The Sansa rape scene, therefore, casts a long shadow not just as a moment of character assassination, but as a potential catalyst for creative paralysis.

Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken is a stark watershed. It is an episode where multiple strands of failure converge: a poorly executed action sequence born of logistical compromise, and a central narrative catastrophe born of a profound creative misjudgement. The Dorne plot showcases a show becoming clumsy in its spectacle, while the violation of Sansa Stark showcases a show becoming morally and thematically adrift. It demonstrated that the showrunners, once praised for their deft adaptation, could mistake gratuitous character trauma for depth, and shocking deviation for narrative necessity. The episode did not break the series’ quality in a single stroke, but it undeniably bent it, exposing structural weaknesses from which it would never fully recover.

RATING: 4/10 (+)

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There's a number of things that a zombie film does, apart from providing jump scares and satisfying people's need for horror. They can critique society, such as Dawn of the Dead where the characters hide in a mall, the institution of our mindless consumption, or Train to Busan which highlights how co-operation trumps self interest as a response to class inequality. When they're not a metaphor for social ills, they can also operate as field to play out our fantasies of the old order collapsing and what might spring from the new, such as such as The Walking Dead, which imagines the collapse of modern institutions and explores how new forms of community, leadership, and morality emerge in their place - even if they constantly collapse and must begin again (thus the show must go on).

But zombie films are also about how we interact with death, and our relationship with the dead. Is the boundary between human and corpse is as absolute as we’d like to believe? Do the dead retain any of the qualities that make the living human, such as empathy and love? What qualities remain in the dead such as emotional feeling?

'We Bury The Dead' is the latest zombie flick to grace my television, and if you didn't know before, I'm always eagerly waiting any kind of zombie film, this more so as it's set in Tasmania (albeit filmed in Western Australia, which was slightly disappointing). The US has attacked Tasmania in a secret weopon's trial resulting in the lost of all life on our apple isle - including pademelons, which I found disappointing, as I find them terrifying in real life, with their tattered ears and fleas and way of looking at you as you cook a camp meal.

Sorry, I digress. Back to the teams sent in to clean up Tasmania, finding the dead and burying them. Given the scale of the clean up, volunteers are brought in from the mainland and they begin their sweep from north to south, as Hobart is still burning, likely from explosions created from the lack of human attendance. Ava, played by Daisy Ridley, is one of the volunteers, albeit with an ulterior motive like many: to find a loved one and bury them, both literally and figuratively, as we must when some one dies. We must bury their loss, our dreams and regrets. Told in a series of flashbacks, Ava's relationship with Mitch shows what emotional horror one must live through when someone we love is taken from us suddenly, with no chance for closure.

Have a quick look at the trailer:

This is where the movie immediately falls down for me - firstly, I'm disappointed that the US motives and actions weren't explored more fully - and a lost opportunity to explore the rage people must feel toward Americans in general for what amounts to genocide, with obvious parellels to Israel and US involvement in the flattening of Palestine (this is framed as an 'accident' - oh like the accidental killing of the kids in a school in Iran? Sorry-for-getting-political-not-sorry).

Secondly, why they didn't vet volunteers with view to understanding what psychological suffering would ensue finding their dead son at a dinner table or daughter snorting coke with bikies in a shed (people died in the exact pose they were in - including yogis in child's pose, which wouldn't be a bad way to go) - what a shit show. Perhaps the scale of the destruction meant they simply needed the human resources. Some are there for redemption, like the very good looking tradie whose role in the film is to help her move from north to south, where she knows her husband is at a retreat in Woodbridge.

I was also disappointed, as they moved through the landscape, that this wasn't exactly the Tassie I would have liked. They did a good job of mimicking it and it would be good enough for international audiences but I wanted to see the stunning landscapes of Tassie and imagine the reality of an apocalypse there - including pademelons and quolls.

Yet there were some novel scenes - the poignancy of a re-animated (or 'online' dead, as the military called them) motorhome driver burying his family. These moved my sister - perhaps me less so, who has read and watched a lot of better moments in the zombie canon, such as 'The Girl with all the Gifts' or 'The Reapers are the Angels'. My sister was also taken by how Ava is under threat more by the living than the dead, but that is quite a trope with all zombie films. One just needs to be alert and aware and handy with a baseball bat with the undead. The living can do a good job of pretending to be human, but can be cruel, vindicative, self interested, greedy or just plain fucked up. In this way I found 'We Bury the Dead' to be more formulaic than interesting, including the ending.

Still, it must be hard to get funding and support for a zombie film - they're certainly an acquired taste 🧟 - although this film wasn't so much about zombies, but our relationships with grief and what makes us human.

Score? Jamie was irritated and doesn't like zombies and gave it a 5.5 🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟 and I found it watchable and interesting enough for a review, and gave it 6.5 🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟, although I'm not sure I would watch it again. My sister gave it an 🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟 8, but she doesn't understand the genre.

Plot spoiler #1: The birth of a baby from a zombie isn't new either. In the recent 28 Years Later, an uninfected human is born to a woman infected with the rage virus. However in most zombie flicks, if a pregnant zombie or pre zombie (bitten) mother is infected, the baby will become a zombie too. To me this was a bit of a problem, showing the film's inability to explore the rationale behind the 'online' dead - or what we'd think of as zombies. Why do some reanimate and become frightening, and others protect their babies and dig holes for the dead? Is that just a mirror of human nature, like some people are just evil, and others will always follow their 'good' human nature to protect and nurture others?

Plot spoiler #2: I loved the scene with Ava and her tradie side kick in the pool at the resort. One great thing about any apocalypse is one can take advantage of having the entire world for free - including drugs and posh resorts. I would have jumped his bones for sure. Who cares about your dead husband you cheated on and that you found dead in a room with another women? Live it up, baby! Zombie films should be sexier.

Plot spoiler #3: Well done for the casting of indigenous actor Mark Coles Smith - gorgeous. Great to see an indigenous actor on screen. His character could have been better developed, rather than a threat from the outset. He was there for closure as well, and grief makes people do some pretty fucked up things. My sympathy was definitely with him. It did make me think a series would have been great as there was a lot of characters that deserved their stories to be fleshed out, so to speak.

_{Images are from Imdb.}

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Hello, anime fans. Today I’m bringing you a romantic comedy that’s a bit different from what I’ve shared with you before. It’s a gem that went unnoticed at the time due to production and broadcast issues. A typical high school story very similar to other works, yet very different at the same time for various reasons. Based on the light novel series of the same name written by Hiromu and illustrated by Raemz, Chitose Is in the Ramune Bottle is an anime adaptation produced by the studio Feel. Check out this anime about the daily life of the school’s most popular guy.

Hola, fanáticos del anime. Hoy les traigo una comedia romántica un tanto peculiar a lo que les he traído antes. Una joya que pasó desapercibida en su momento debido a problemas de producción y emisión. Una historia típica de adolescentes de preparatoria muy similar a otras obras, pero muy diferente a la vez por diversas razones. Basada en la serie de novelas ligeras homónimas escritas por Hiromu e ilustradas por Raemz, Chitose Is in the Ramune Bottle es una adaptación animada producida por el estudio Feel. Conoce el anime de la vida diaria del chico popular de la escuela.

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Source: FilmAffinity.

Plot

The anime begins by introducing us to Saku Chitose—or rather, that’s how he introduces himself after delivering a philosophical monologue in which he describes spring and the start of a “new year” full of surprises, opportunities, and changes. After one of his friends, Yua Uchida, comes over to say hello on their way to school, Saku shows her his phone, displaying the derogatory comments other people have made about him. She doesn’t deny anything, but instead encourages him, and he sarcastically wonders why people hate him so much when he’s just the most popular guy in school, as well as one of the hardest-working and most sociable students in the entire class.

Trama

El anime inicia presentándonos a Saku Chitose, o bueno, así se presenta él mismo luego de darnos un filosófico monólogo donde describe la primavera y el inicio de un “nuevo año” repleto de sorpresas, oportunidades y cambios. Luego de que una de sus amigas, Yua Uchida, se le acerque a saludar mientras van de camino a la escuela, Saku le muestra su celular a ella con comentarios despectivos que hacen otras personas sobre él. Ella no niega nada, sino que le da ánimos y él se pregunta de manera sarcástica por qué la gente lo odia tanto si solo es el chico más popular de la escuela, además de ser de los más estudiosos y más sociables de todo el salón de clases.

Trailer & Review

Here's the trailer for the anime:

By: Crunchyroll

To wrap things up, here’s the anime’s Opening:

Tell me, have you seen this anime yet? What did you think of it? Feel free to leave your thoughts in the comments.

Dime, ¿ya has visto este anime? ¿Qué te ha parecido? Puedes dejarme tu respuesta en los comentarios.

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Babel (S01E05)

Airdate: 24 January 1993

Written by: Michael McGreavy & Naren Shankar Directed by: Paul Lynch

Running Time: 46 minutes

From its very inception, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine set itself apart from its predecessors by embracing a distinctly darker, more morally ambiguous tone. It traded the Enterprise’s hopeful exploration for the grim reality of a war-torn, politically fractious frontier outpost. A prime and early example of this deliberate tonal shift is the fifth episode of the first season, Babel. Its premise is, upon reflection, quite terrifying—a creeping, silent disease that dismantles the very fabric of society—and is rendered all the more unsettling because it is rooted in a real-world medical condition. The episode’s genius, and its ultimate failure, lies in how this horrifying concept is initially presented through a lens of the mundane and even the faintly comical, a disarming tactic that the script never fully capitalises upon.

The episode begins in a deceptively mundane tone, perfectly capturing the station’s central metaphor as a decaying, bureaucratic nightmare. Chief Miles O’Brien, the everyman engineer, is visibly frustrated with the Sisyphean task of maintaining the Cardassian-built station. His life is a litany of constant repairs, particularly of the malfunctioning replicators left behind by the former occupiers. It is during one such routine repair that he accidentally triggers a hidden device,. This is the episode’s first masterstroke: embedding a planet-killing weapon within the banal headache of faulty plumbing. At first, the consequences seem minor. O’Brien merely acts more exhausted and irritable than usual. Then, with chilling suddenness, he begins to talk in gibberish. He is swiftly diagnosed with aphasia, a condition where the brain’s language centres are compromised, severing a person’s ability to communicate with the outside world. When Lieutenant Dax begins exhibiting the same symptoms, Dr. Bashir realises this is an infection. Captain Sisko’s order for a quarantine comes too late; the silent plague begins its inexorable spread through the population.

The investigation that follows reveals the virus’s insidious mechanism. It infiltrated the station’s replicators, which the entrepreneurial Quark had been illicitly rerouting to supply his bar. Initially spread through contaminated food, the pathogen mutated, becoming airborne and untraceable. Dr. Bashir discovers the virus is an artificial creation, a sleeper weapon planted during the Cardassian occupation. As the command staff, including Sisko, succumbs to the gibbering silence, the burden falls to Major Kira. In a race against time, she identifies the creator: a Bajoran scientist named Sumrak Ren (Matthew Falson), a former resistance fighter. After he refuses to help from the safety of Bajor, Kira has him beamed directly to the infected station. Once infected himself, his self-preservation instinct overrides his principles, and he is forced to develop an antidote.

Parallel to this central crisis, the episode offers its most successful element: the burgeoning ‘frenemy’ dynamic between Quark and Odo. With the station in chaos, a Boslic freighter captain, Jaheel (Jack Kehler), attempts to breach the quarantine to save his spoiled cargo. His damaged ship, still docked, threatens to explode and take the station with it. Quark, revealed to be immune, and Constable Odo, whose shapeshifting biology makes him invulnerable, are forced into an uneasy alliance. Their efforts to jettison the freighter, which succeeds in a safely distant explosion, provide the episode’s only genuine pulse of tension and heroism. It is a compelling subplot that saves the narrative from becoming a static medical mystery, showcasing the series’ unique potential in pairing its most ideologically opposed characters.

The script, co-written by television veteran Michael McGreavy and Star Trek’s unofficial science advisor Naren Shankar, is built upon an intellectually intriguing premise. The concept of aphasia as a vehicle for societal breakdown is potent, illustrating how the collapse of language unravels professional, familial, and communal bonds, leading to a near-apocalyptic scenario. Yet, the pervasive sense of doom is fundamentally tempered by the audience’s conditioned expectation. Much like the recurring ‘Enterprise will explode’ plots of earlier Trek, there is an inherent safety net; viewers know that by the episode’s end, the status quo will be restored. This inevitability drains the narrative of genuine stakes. The solution itself arrives with an almost deus ex machina convenience—the discovery of the Bajoran scientist and the subsequent development of the cure happen with remarkable speed, and the actual administration of the antidote is relegated to a voiceover narration. The crisis is resolved off-screen, a narrative cheat that feels particularly egregious given the build-up.

This structural weakness is compounded by a more profound script-level disappointment: the decision to make the creator of the bio-weapon a Bajoran resistance fighter rather than a Cardassian oppressor. This is a twist with immense potential, one that could have forced a brutal examination of the ethical quagmire of freedom fighting. What moral line is crossed when a resistance movement contemplates a weapon of apocalyptic devastation against a civilian population, even that of an occupying force? Does the cause justify any means? Babel raises this provocative question only to immediately drop it. Sumrak Ren is less a character than a plot device, his motivations and moral conflict left unexplored. The episode sidesteps the rich, dark complexity it itself introduced, opting instead for a simple, race-against-time thriller resolution.

To a degree, this failing is compensated for by the excellent character work, particularly the scenes between Quark and Odo. Their antagonistic yet weirdly respectful partnership is given room to breathe, and their action-packed subplot allows them to emerge as an unlikely heroic duo. It is a glimpse of the nuanced character dynamics that would later define the series. Furthermore, the direction efficiently sells the creeping horror of the outbreak, with the station’s corridors growing progressively quieter and more chaotic as language fails.

While Babel is a solid piece of television with a memorably terrifying premise, it remains a disappointing and largely forgettable episode. It does not transcend the standard clichés and procedural limitations of 1990s American broadcast television. It introduces profound ideas—the weaponisation of communication, the moral compromises of rebellion, the fragility of society—only to resolve them with a safe, conventional, and intellectually lazy conclusion. It is a fascinating blueprint for what Deep Space Nine could be: darker, more challenging, and willing to stare into the abyss. For this early instalment, however, it merely glances at the abyss before quickly looking away and restoring order with a comforting, and ultimately hollow, voiceover.

RATING: 5/10 (++)

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