This series just keeps getting better and better. I think the main reason is that all the main characters are well thought out and believable as characters.

Ahh, ain't she cute? That's Diane as a little girl. ("Little", of course, is a relative term.) Anyway, spoilers below the fold.

The first half of this show was an extended flashback giving the rest of King's back story, as well as a lot of Diane's back story. King was slashed by a human and fell into a river and was swept away. Diane found him and nursed him back to health, but he suffered from amnesia. They lived together for a couple of hundred years, about 700 years ago. During that time King's memory slowly returned to him, and eventually he got it all back and realized there was something he had to do, so he left her there.

This flashback made clear how and why King came to deeply love Diane -- and he does. He's certainly aware of her as a woman, but that's obviously hopeless. He also loves her as a friend and companion, and it's real love, deep and true.

The rest of the episode was battle, with King taking on Helbram. Turns out that Helbram was once one of King's very best friends. But Helbram went crazy and has come to utterly hate all humans, and has spent 700 years slaughtering them. King has to stop him, and does. But it's a complicated fight emotionally for King, since he once valued Helbram as a friend, but deeply hates what Helbram has become. King ends up fighting completely dispassionately, while Helbram almost froths at the mouth.

The protective field King put around Diane (and Hauser and Guila and her brother and I assume also Gowther, though they don't show him) also includes a healing spell, so they're all OK. Diane is still spent but I assume that a bit of rest will help that.

King emerges from this episode as a very complex, conflicted, and extremely interesting and sympathetic character. He's also strong as hell. I keep changing my mind about who is the strongest member of the seven. Meliodas, of course, but who's the second? Well, there are two more out there we haven't yet met, but I'm going with King now as the second strongest.

In the next episode we're probably going to meet Merlin, though, and maybe my opinion will change again.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste in General Anime at 10:20 AM | Comments (11) | Add Comment
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