Train to the End of the World – Episode 05

Episode Synopsys:

Shizuru and Reimi escape from their Gulliver-like captivity with the help of another person working unwillingly for the town. Together they knock out the guards and rescue the doctor from the boss running the place (who turns out to just be another full-size human). Reimi goes on a rampage and destroys most of the military equipment while Shizuru takes out the boss, leaving the citizens in charge of their town. The doctor helps the girls to successfully treat Akira’s mushroom-induced behavior changes.

Episode Review:

A fun and mostly silly episode, with the girls working together to make short work of the tin-pot dictatorship that grips Gulliver-ville. I appreciate that they set the dictator up to be a scary, strong leader of this crack military force:

Only to have him turn out to be some nobody that always wanted to play around with military equipment, and now has the opportunity to do so because he’s bigger than everyone else.

His stupid sign is almost adorably childish

Of course, the high point of the episode was watching Reimi embrace her inner King Kong, climbing buildings, swatting at planes, and tossing tanks around like toys.

In terms of larger plot implications, there was an interesting detail relayed by the doctor – 7G changes you into what you perceive yourself to be.

Reimi’s behavior change and seeming paralysis was due to her own belief that the mushrooms had grown too far and once removed would harm her. A lot of questions raised there – can the people of the town imagine themselves big again? We’ll have to see if this comes up again.

Lastly, the show’s tone does continue to give a little whiplash from time to time. All episode, the violence has been mostly cartoonish – the girls are never hurt by the bullets, the planes Reimi takes out are clearly shown with people ejecting from them before the crash – but when we learn what happened with Pontaro’s wibble-wobble surgery, it’s all operating tables and drill bits.