ラストエグザイル-銀翼のファム-/Last Exile: Ginyoku no Fam
Last Exile: Fam, the Silver Wing – 09

Dio goes looking for Fam with a bouquet of flowers for her birthday as Fam pays a visit to Gisey, who’s determined to return home to Kartoffel. She says she’ll tell the others that Fam is remaining behind and tosses her scrap book in the trash, saying Millia can do the Navi job just as well as her. Meanwhile, Dio reports in to Tatiana and Alister, teasing them about the encounter with Glacies, which in turn causes them to jab him for not being there during the fight. Fam goes with Dio and a towed Vanship to the sunken Anshar, where repairs are made to get the ship flying.

Fam and Dio have a heart to heart regarding Fam’s situation with Gisey as they fly their prize back. Fam realizes she never considered Gisey’s feelings and so is going back with her. Dio remarks that he is staying with the crew of Silvius, which is where he belongs. Back on the Silvius, Gisey helps put out a fire that Millia made in the galley. Millia apologizes to Gisey for putting such a burden on her, causing Gisey to realize her own selfishness in that Fam’s actions were motivated purely out of a desire to help someone in need. As such, the two, along with Teddy, decide to cook for Fam’s birthday, leaving the ship to buy supplies.

Meanwhile, Fam returns and is depressed to hear that Gisey has left the ship, thinking she returned home. She gets drafted to help clean the deck of the Silvius, which then turns into an impromptu game of hockey, using the tip of the mast as a puck and deck brushes as hockey sticks. Gisey and Millia return and seeing Fam play, Gisey is reminded of how they grew up together. As such, she and Millia end up joining Fam’s team. To even the odds, Alister drags Tatiana to the other team and though Tatiana makes some nice saves, Gisey gets the winning goal.

Afterward in the galley, a surprise birthday party for Fam is held, attended by the entire crew of Silvius, including Tatiana and Alister. Dio sings a birthday song and gives her the bouquet. Tatiana congratulates Fam on her birthday, and when someone asks if Fam is leaving, Fam announces that the hunting of skyfish isn’t over and that in order to overcome the Federation and liberate Turan, she’s staying on the ship. As such, Tatiana’s present is to officially make Fam, Gisey, Millia, and Teddy members of the Silvius crew.  The party is joined by the Supreme Commander of Anatoray’s Vanguard forces, Vincent Alzey, who makes a point of greeting Millia as head of the Turan government in exile.

Yay! The conflict between Gisey and Fam is finally over. Because Gisey has such a doe-eyed look to her that makes me automatically want to take her side, I really hadn’t considered her actions selfish for wanting to return home. I still don’t. It was wrong of her to trash the scrap book, but not wrong to wish to see her family. However, her own maturity in looking past her own desires to see that Fam was helping someone in trouble is what made Gisey a winner.

The incident also was a good one for Fam, who’d been taking Gisey for granted, as she clearly understood.  However, now that the two of them have cleared the air, I look forward to even greater feats being pulled off by this dynamic duo. ^_^

I found it interest that Glacies decided to allow the Silvius retrieval team to get the Anshar unchallenged. No doubt, securing such a warship for themselves would have been helpful, but maybe they decided to keep things with the Anatoray people open in case an alliance is needed in the future.

Speaking of the Anshar, I had wondered how Fam and Millia sinking the ship would count as her fifteenth score. Now I know.  Because the ship sank so close to the Glacies border, I guess Ades decided to not retrieve it themselves and risk further confrontations with Glacies.

While the hockey game and birthday party allowed for a cheaper episode to be produced (understandable after the major action of the last episode), it was also good from a story perspective, not just because it allowed Gisey and Fam to make up, but also because Fam and the crew of the Silvius needed this downtime to rest, repair, and recover morale.

Does Vincent showing up at the end of the episode mean that Anatoray is going to officially do something to help Turan?  It seems like they might, otherwise why have a high-ranking person show up?

Finally, it appears that the expected chink in Ades is showing up as Vasant expressed some concerns to Kayvān regarding Luscinia. We’ll see where that goes.

So, another good episode, even if it wasn’t action packed. ^_^