I thought you were just a myth...

So, after marathoning the first 9 episodes, I decided to pick this series up.  Be prepared for some super-speedy catchup.

Summary:

Azuma Reiji is a Japanese tourist chilling in America, hoping to have a fun time and maybe run into some mysterious naked people.  Before Reiji can whip out his Johnny, however, he runs into a reporter who begs him to take some evidence to the police.  Reiji doesn’t have a chance to respond before the reporter is gunned down by a masked-girl, but Reiji puts on a surprisingly stiff fight.  Reiji’s intense struggle for survival (setting traps, surpressing his fear and hunger, showing instinctive melee moves) greatly impresses the assassin’s handler, Scythe Master, and so Reiji is knocked out, brainwashed, and reprogrammed as an assassin code-named Zwei.

Stick it in

Instead of eating fatty American food and taking dorky peace-sign pictures in front of landmarks, Reiji spends the next 3 months running in the desert, doing pushups, and taking Assasination 101.  Reiji can’t remember anything, and the original assassin Ein (henceforth referred to as Ellen) tells him that in order to live he has to forget all about his past life and just concentrate on following orders.  Ellen turns out to be Scythe Master’s creation, an unstoppable killer known as Phantom (because apparently the nickname Ein was not enough).  Ellen is tasked with training Reiji, which I can’t help but think is awfully similar to training your replacement.  Next thing you know, Scythe Master is going to tell Ellen that he’s outsourcing his assassinations to India.

Mini-golf would have been a better choice

All the main characters thus far work for Inferno, a sort of underground United Nations.  Scythe Master is fairly low on the totem pole, but he hopes to gain more power by having Ellen train Reiji to increase the number of jobs Phantom can take.  The training is almost like a cute date montage (you know, where you teach the girl to swing, but really you are just trying to get up on her), with lots of close quarters combat and love taps.  Reiji proves to be exceptionally skilled, and in 3 months learns what it took Ellen 2 years to learn.  I chalk this up to Scythe Master being a terrible/ugly teacher.

So this is the extra training that added 1.75 years to the Phantom course

When the time comes for a skills test, Reiji’s will to survive trumps his morals as he follows orders and kills a corrupt Navy SEAL that got too greedy with Inferno.  It’s shown that when Reiji really needs to get serious, his eyes change to a green color with a copper center.  This scores Reiji a followup mission where he gets to hang out in the mall and ogle Ellen in swimsuits.  Naturally, it turns out they are just acting out their roles as a happy couple while scoping where they will assassinate Don Lucio of the Dallas mafia.  Don Lucio is normally a homebody, but the plan is to kill him when he goes to buy a gift at the mall for his granddaughter.  Apparently Don Lucio has never heard of the internet or personal assistants.

Be careful with these masks, I paid extra for the colored stripes

Everything goes as planned, although Reiji does have to use some rainbow-Phantom-magic movement (rPmm) to pull Ellen out of danger. Phantom wins again, and Scythe Master’s prestige increases. This doesn’t sit well with Scythe Master’s boss, Claudia McCunnen (surprisingly not named Scythe Master Master), so she begins tampering with his experiment. She calls Reiji over for a little flirtation, and puts in his mind that he still can make choices, like how fast and hard he goes… whoa, wait a second…

Ellen's not the only one who needs extra training

Moving along, Inferno sets its sights on Tony Stone’s Melanie Square in Los Angeles.  Tony refuses to cave, and tries to lure Claudia into a trap.  However, Claudia’s bodyguard Lizzie Garland gets Claudia out safely while Ellen covers them with sniper fire.  At the same time, Reiji is sent to Tony’s house to kill Tony’s wife Eva and son Duke.

Reiji's not a Stripey fan

Tony vows revenge and tries to strike at Inferno’s weak point.  Inferno is made up of a bunch of traitors who betray their mafia and sell out to rivals.  Tony discovers 15 members who are likely secretly working for Inferno and decides to out these members to their respective mafias.  Unfortunately for him, Scythe Master has an even better plan to kill 12 West Coast rivals and frame the Stone family for the murders.  Scythe Master’s plan is so good that it gets him an invitation to all of the important Inferno meetings.  We then take a break from all this boring planning to watch Scythe Master indulge his photography hobby by taking pictures of Ellen getting molested by mannequins.

This is also training, right?

By having it all take place in one night and dropping the corpses of Tony’s gang at the murder scenes, Inferno is able to severely weaken their West Coast rivals to the point where they end up coming under the umbrella of Inferno.  Then by bribing Tony’s right-hand man Anton (who always hated LA, apparently) and Lt. Cyrus Gant, Inferno makes it look like the incident was just a big gang war that the police broke up, and thus Inferno is able to take control of Melanie Square without turning the place into a battlefield.

Always dress to impress

Reaction:

Well, after the first episode, this series really started to ramp up for me. The pace is surprisingly snappy for a Bee Train series, and there are barely any flashbacks. No stupid slooooooow scenes where some loli murders her family while a music box plays. At least they kept the typical Bee Train crazy villain, though, because I love those guys. I really enjoy the strategic chess match between Claudia and Scythe Master, especially because it always involves awkward groping and general sexual harassment of the Phantom crew. I’ve watched up to to episode 9 already, but this seems like a good place to stop for now, since episode 7 starts a new mini-arc if you will. I’ll probably have another catchup post for episodes 7-9, and then I’ll go back to my usual style for episode 10+.

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