Fate/Zero – 18

フェイト/ゼロ Episode 18
Fate/Zero – 18

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

Fate/Zero - 18A young Kiritsugu is living on the island of Alimango, where his father is working on time manipulation magic along with his assistant, Shirley. Kiritsugu’s father has managed to stop the time on flowers, so that they never grow old. While Shirley has practiced some, she’s not skilled like Kiritsugu’s father, and he won’t allow Kiritsugu learn yet. Shirley tells Kiritsugu that one day, he’ll inherit his father’s magic research. However, she also tells him that the islanders don’t trust his father and that Rev. Simon gave her a blade to protect herself. The next day, Kiritsugu’s father asks if him if he’d been in the atelier. Since Kiritsugu hadn’t, his father tells him to stay indoors. However, with Shirley not around, Kiritsugu goes to find her, only to discover that she’d turned herself into a vampire by accident, and she wants him to kill her.

Fate/Zero - 18Kiritsugu gets Reverend Simon, only to have the priest attacked by zombie-vampires and turned. Kiritsugu sees church exterminators and mages slaughtering the vampires and burning the village. Kiritsugu flees from other vampires and is saved by a woman, who calmly shoots them dead. She explains that they are Dead Apostles, and gives some background. She asks about where the source is, so he takes her home, where he finds his father destroying notes. His father says they have to flee, and when Kiritsugu tells what happened to Shirley, his father’s words let Kiritsugu know that his father was researching Dead Apostles. As such, he stabs his father with the dagger Shirley had been given, then takes a gun and kills his father. The woman takes Kiritsugu to safety off the island.

Thoughts/Review:

Backstory — loved it!

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I’ve been fortunate to have a lot of knowledgeable people explain a lot of things in the Type-Moon universe. I seem to recall someone mentioning that one of the Type-Moon series deals with Dead Apostles and vampires, so now, I may have to check that out sometime.

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Regardless, seeing this episode really does explain why Kiritsugu became the cold killer he was. After all, the older girl Shirley, who was like a sister to him (and I’m guessing he was attracted to her), was basically used by his father and became a vampire thanks to some potion of his father’s. If I’d seen the girl I admire, to say nothing of my friends and their families, turned into vampire-zombies thanks to my father, I’d probably do the same thing Kiritsugu did.

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One thing that puzzles me is that if Kiritsugu killed his father, and his father presumably had some sort of magic crest, did Kiritsugu obtain it in order to have the time manipulation ability that his father had?

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Also, I didn’t really understand the whole Sealing Designation thing that was mentioned. I’m guessing that Kiritsugu’s father was considered rogue or something, and thus why so many members of the Church and Mages were on the island after the infestation broke out.

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It really is a shame about Shirley.  I’d never heard of her before this episode, yet I found myself liking her a lot rather quickly, thus making her death more tragic. Kudos to the writers for that.

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Finally, the woman who rescues Kiritsugu is someone I’m going to presume decided to raise him.  I seem to recall someone mentioning a woman who wasn’t his mother raising him.  It would be interesting to get a little more background information about Kiritsugu growing up and partnering with the Einsbern family.

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In the end, we had a surprising backstory episode that was really quite enjoyable and explained a few things regarding Kiritsugu’s attitudes today.

Fate/Zero - 18
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20 Responses to “Fate/Zero – 18”

  1. Lan says:

    What a frustrating episode! >_<
    It was only mildly interesting as apposed to events in real time where its insanely awesome. Bring us back to the story dammit!

    • AstroNerdBoy says:

      Well, it is a cold interrupt for sure. I’m guessing something is about to go down in the present, thus the need to show Kiritsugu as a child and how that impacts what he does in the present.

    • Random_Passerby_Number_612 says:

      This should have been placed after episode 16, right after Kiritsugu’s dialogue with Saber. It’s her words that can be said to have “triggered” the flashback in the novels.

    • evgenidb says:

      I agree with Random Passerby.

  2. Cube says:

    Re:Sealing

    From what I remember, the Mage Association is all about “Preserving Magic”, and thus, when a mage achieves huge success, but they do not want anyone else to replicate it, they designate him to be “Sealed”, which is quite literal. They capture the mage, and preserve his body (think cryogenic sleep, but magic), so they do not lose the magic he discovered, but also do not risk having it too readily available for everyone else.

    • evgenidb says:

      Why not just kill him? And how they’ll know what the magic is if they seal him?

    • AstroNerdBoy says:

      Hmmm…so, Kiritsugu’s father researching immortality via the Dead Apostles is a huge success, or was it his time research? Probably the former now that I think about it.

    • Random_Passerby_Number_612 says:

      Actually, the latter. The former is taboo as per the Association’s agreement with the Church.

  3. evgenidb says:

    I think the woman is his master (she is like a mirror image of the older Kiritsugu with one exception – she went all Rambo, while Emiya would just snipe them from a distance (or at least I think that he’ll do that)).

    And I believe that the next episode would deal with their relationship and probably how she met her end.

    P.S. By the way, I voted for you, ANB. Checked the other site but didn’t like nearly as much as yours. The other blogger reviews a lot of recent anime like FZ and Jormungand, but for me your reviews have a better quality. And the comments! I admit that about half of the quality is the comment section and the discussions there which often greatly expand the topic.

    • AstroNerdBoy says:

      Jormungand will be reviewed by me on an episode basis after things like Fate/Zero end. ^_^ I’ll be behind the curve, but I will be there. The images I saw of Koko made me go, “I’ve GOT to check this out.” *lol*

      BTW, have you read Viz’s “Jormungand” manga?

    • evgenidb says:

      No, I haven’t. There is Jormungand manga wit Russian translation that just waits for my attention, but it isn’t the only manga out there. Chances are I’ll never read it. 🙁

      Anyway, Jormungand reminds me of Full Metal Panic without the school stuff (and the love story, at least till ep. 3). The anime is fun, it’s got action, the plot is not that deep like FZ, but still a lot better than most of the anime, mostly ecchi and moe where showing girl’s panties is considered a plot twist that should be used at least 3-4 times per half-episode.

      Btw, I watched Ozma. Nice anime, old school style drawings of the characters (but somehow I didn’t like it that much, but it was rather fresh and I appreciate it). In 2nd and 4th episode there is ship-to-ship battle but not really convincing – it happens undersand, but it feels like it is happening underwater. Anyway, more or less, it is nice.

      P.S. Try Level-E. Try LEVEL-E! TRY LEVEL-E! It’s better than Jormungand in my opinion. Better witty humor, but minus the heavy action. But it is still worth it. You can watch it before Jormungast in a story-arc way (3 episodes – 1 episode – another 3 episodes – then some eps I don’t remember where the stroy arcs are (some were stand-alone) – last 2 episodes that’s gonna rock your head).

      Also try http://anidb.net/perl-bin/animedb.pl?show=anime&aid=2150 – a rather short, but very good and fun old anime. And the black-cat detective rocks (and eats)!

    • evgenidb says:

      Oh, by the way, try the manga “Cat Shit One” (in US known as well as “Apocalypse Meow”). It’s the Vietnam War through the eyes of Rabbits (US), Cats (Vietnamese), Bears (Russians), etc. soldiers. It’s really fun in its seriousness. It’s worth it. More than Jormungand.

      There is also an OVA – same bunnies, but in Middle East this time: http://anidb.net/perl-bin/animedb.pl?show=anime&aid=6473

    • AstroNerdBoy says:

      I’ve got Level-E on the list. I’ve heard of Cat Shit One, but the name (including Apocalypse Meow) have never inspired me to do much. ^_^;

    • evgenidb says:

      “Cat Shit One” is nod to “Dog Shit One” – that’s how the rookies were called in Vietnam War (or something between those lines – I think there should be an explanation in the first volume (at least in the Russian scanlation)).

      “Apocalypse Meow” is a nod to… you can guess the movie. It’s an US translator’s idea, since probably he/she didn’t get “Cat/Dog Shit One” connection (or never heard of “Dog Shit One” before). Anyway, although there are bunnies, cats, pigs, and other animals and some jokes with them the manga is quite serious, a lot of research of the Viet. War was put, including strategy and tactics, weapons, some historical events and so on. It’s very well made, I guarantee it!

      So forget about the name and just read it. In my opinion it is a lot better and more worthy than Jormungand (not that J. is bad – it is a lot better than a lot of other anime, but still loses in my opinion).

      Also, try later “The Enemy’s the Pirates” – it’s also worth for the laugh, especially the baseball (guns and rockets included!) episode. 😀

    • AstroNerdBoy says:

      I’ll put it on the list (which is insanely long already).

  4. Farray says:

    Vampires in the Nasuverse are divided in two groups: Dead Apostles(Shito) and True Ancestors(Shinsou). True Ancestors are the true vampires and nature spirits. They don’t have to drink blood to sustain themselves, though they do have vampiric impulses. Dead Apostles were basically made by True Ancestors, as they are former humans who were bit by True Ancestors. However, to become a fullfledged vampire, you need to have the magic potential and it usually takes many years to become one. The steps are basically Ghoul–>Living Dead–>Vampire. If you don’t have the potential, you’ll just become one of “The Dead”, a mindless familiar of the one who bit you. However, there were cases where magi managed to become Dead Apostles by using magecraft, like Nrvnqsr Chaos, one of the 27 Dead Apostle Ancestors. Shirley is basically a failed Dead Apostle who couldn’t control her impulses. Also, Dead Apostles need the blood of the living to sustain themselves. It doesn’t necessarily have to be human blood.

    Dead Apostles are more part of the Tsukihime franchise. One of the heroines, the priestess Ciel, is an Executor of the Church who hunts down the Dead Apostles, since most of the Dead Apostles are considered a threat for humanity(the elite of the Dead Apostles are the 27 Dead Apostle Ancestors). One of the rare exceptions is for example the great magician Zelretch, the one who wields the Second True Magic and the one who trained the first magus of the Tohsaka clan, Tohsaka Nagato. He is the reason why the Tohsaka are specialized in jewel magecraft.

    Sealing Designations are titles “of the greatest honor” bestowed by the Magic Association to people. Or actually not. Anything that is seen unique and precious by the MA, may it be your research, traits, talents, whatever, needs to be preserved and protected. The MA doesn’t necessarily care about the target itself. You don’t have to be awesome like Noritaka or Aozaki Touko to get a Sealing Designation. Shirou and Sakura(and possibly Rin too) also possess unique traits that make them potential targets. The MA’s Enforcers will hunt them down, that’s their basic task in general.

    Noritaka was a genius. Note, that Noritaka is only the fourth generation, yet he got a Sealing Designation because his research was too outstanding. Basically, he had the theory that if he can’t go backwards to find the beginning in order to reach Akasha, then he can at least go forward by time manipulating/infinitely accelerate the flow of time in a compressed bounded field to see the end of the universe, as Akasha is supposed to be the beginning and the end(as far as I have understood it). Furthermore, he wanted to use his Innate time magecraft to recreate the Dead Apostle’s immortality – the Curse of Restoration, which works with reversing time. He needed more time to complete his research, that’s why he wanted to become a Dead Apostle. Noritaka got his Sealing Designation already 20 years before the incident on the island happened(hiding himself for 20 years from the Enforcers is quite… impressive). He was … actually pretty boss. :p It was only a matter of time when he would fled, the Enforcers arrived very quickly actually, which means that they almost found Noritaka already. The incident was an unfortunate coincidence for both Noritaka and the Association.

    • Farray says:

      Now that reminds me. Iirc, Akamatsu is a Type-Moon fan. Maybe that’s where he got the ideas with Evangeline and the vampire/shinsou stuff.

    • AstroNerdBoy says:

      Thanks for all the info. ^_^ It is possible that Eva being a shinso is a nod to Type-Moon.

  5. Farray says:

    One thing that puzzles me is that if Kiritsugu killed his father, and his father presumably had some sort of magic crest, did Kiritsugu obtain it in order to have the time manipulation ability that his father had?

    Don’t know if ufotable will mention that, they skipped ao many things already… though in this episode they added a lot, since unlike in the novel we were missing a lot of Kiritsugu moments and his thoughts. Furthermore, the added content is better for the story flow. Anyway, I’ll just say what happened in the Crest, this might be a potential spoiler already if they’ll show it next episode, though I doubt it.

    Let’s just say the Enforcers took his father’s corpse… and the MA was really reluctant to give Kiritsugu the Magic Crest. It’s because of Natalia’s negotiation that he got it, though only about 20-25% of the original Crest. I don’t know what happened with the rest, maybe they deleted the rest or kept it for themselves. Kiritsugu later used the time magecraft knowledge to invent his Time Alter abilities. He is casting a Reality Marble on his body to be precise.

    What I generally don’t like in the anime is the one-sidedness right now. Okay, Kiritsugu is already taken care of, but Tokiomi and Noritaka in this episode just look like emotionless assholes. Sure, Noritaka didn’t seem to care a lot about the village and perhaps Shirley too(maybe saddened, but he didn’t regret anything), but he cared a lot about Kiritsugu, as it’s stated in the novel. He had to raise Kiritsugu alone, since about ten years before the incident, shortly after Kiritsugu was born, Noritaka’s wife was killed by the Enforcers. Both Kiritsugu and his father loved each other. However, Kiritsugu didn’t want to make the same mistake twice and no longer hesitated to kill the ones he loved, as he couldn’t in Shirley’s case.

    Last notes: The fire magus you see is probably Cornelius Alba, a character of Type-Moon’s Kara no Kyoukai series.

    Also, Kiritsugu liked Fujimura Taiga, the daughter of a friend of Kiritsugu’s and also Shirou’s English teacher in high school, a lot because she reminded him of Shirley.

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