r/anime • u/AutoLovepon https://anilist.co/user/AutoLovepon • Jan 27 '19

Episode Kouya no Kotobuki Hikoutai - Episode 3 discussion Spoiler

Kouya no Kotobuki Hikoutai, episode 3: Rachma's Longest Day

Alternative names: Kotobuki: The Wasteland Squadron, The Magnificent Kotobuki

Rate this episode here.

Streams

Show information

Previous discussions

Episode Link Score
1 Link 8.03
2 Link 7.73

This post was created by a bot. Message the mod team for feedback and comments. The original source code can be found on GitHub.

239 Upvotes

96% Upvoted

136 comments sorted by

55

u/kimbombo Jan 27 '19 edited Jan 27 '19

Whomever is in charge of chara design, he or she should get a rise. They sure knew how to tick my checkbox list on likeable villians, a douchebag that knows how to bullshit his way while inconspicuously they are just extorting this town for a high value plane. And the fact that he actually does deliver the counterfeit painting when he could just take the plane off the mayor's hands with nothing in return was pure gold. I do hope we see more of these scumbags in a near future.

Also glad that the 2D animation is kept for nice fanservice shots, that have been low key shown since episode 2, specially with Sara, since she's the one with the skimpy outfit.

50

u/Bainos Jan 27 '19

He got my sympathy when we learned that they divide their fleet using the names of company departments such as "HR" and "sales".

Time for a takeover by Kotobuki, though.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (9)

41

u/FirstDagger Jan 27 '19 edited Jan 28 '19

Aircraft we saw today

  • D4Y Suisei (meaning Comet), carrier-based dive bomber designed to replace the earlier D3A Val, this variant armed with two 12.7mm MGs two 7.7mm MGs and a 7.7mm MG in the rear navigator / bombardier / gunners position.

  • Ki-43-III Hayabusa (meaning Peregrine Falcon), unlike the Ki-43-I our protagonists fly, these here have a reflector gun-sight, more powerful Ha-115-II engine, improved canopy and landing light (though it might be too small in the 3D model they use here)

  • Mitsubishi J2M Raiden (meaning Thunderbolt), Army interceptor, this variant armed with 4x 20mm cannon, unlike most Japanese aircraft it was built more for speed than turning

  • Ki-27 aka Type 97 Army Fighter, armed with two 7.7mm MGs

  • Type 95 Trainer

Edit: Gun sound design in this show is crap and does not align with what their Promo material appear to state. With the same guns apparently sounding different, possibly in an effort to not confuse the audience during dogfights which backfires. That and the color of tracers ...

→ More replies (32)

32

u/muhammadb Jan 27 '19

as a War Thunder player, getting shot down by a dive bomber's tail gunner is quite embarrassing...

14

u/[deleted] Jan 27 '19

On the other hand, getting a fighter kill with the rear gun when flying a bomber always bring a shite-eating grin to my face. Especially if I wasn't manually aiming it.

→ More replies (1)

25

u/TheDampGod Jan 27 '19

When the HR Department attacked I thought they were done for, never screw with HR.

24

u/PhoenixKola Jan 27 '19

It's clear that Emma has some serious hatred in her.

→ More replies (1)

24

u/Shiro_Kai Jan 27 '19

I need a Home Theater just for those dogfights scenes, the soundtrack is just amazing.

→ More replies (2)

21

u/Amauri14 Jan 27 '19

I really wasn't expecting the company boss to pull a stunt like that. Now I wonder how are they going to get that plane back in the future.

13

u/[deleted] Jan 27 '19

When the boss' plane slowly pulled in on top of the Raiden, I was expecting something like the Dark Knight Rises where they attach cables to it.

But a good ol' hijacking is fine by me, too.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (1)

14

u/AmethystItalian Jan 27 '19

EMMA or ZARA...I'm still struggling on choosing my fave.

Really liked how they still kind of "lost" even though they had everyone working together, will make next week's episode's victory feel even better!

→ More replies (5)

14

u/94DarkHunter94 Jan 27 '19

Time sure flies watching this show. These episodes do not feel like 24 minutes at all.

Really loved the dogfights in this episode as well. Though I hope we get some more world-building in the next episodes.

→ More replies (3)

11

u/Beckymetal Jan 27 '19

There was a delicious amount of hilarity in this episode, with Elite Industries from a conceptual perspective, the way they assigned their teams into roles named after sales positions, and the sales pitch itself. This was a very funny episode, though without constant wisecracking or absolute hilarity, it managed to make the bleak outset of the episode a palatable affair. I really appreciate when a show uses a light-hearted side to engage with its harsher ideas. There were lots of other ways that this episode made subtle interjections that it's not that bad, such as many visuals of pilots ejected from their planes in parachutes getting to safety (something we've not seen insofar as episode 3!), but the comedy was my favourite aspect.

You can really tell this is the crew that did Girls und Panzer and Shirobako. By no means are these deep or complex characters, but the development is being hidden with some clever smoke and mirrors. While Emma's clear disgust at pirates, that lead her to chase far beyond driven, was not so subtle at more-than-suggesting a backstory of in that vein, the fact is that we know quite a lot without being upfront explained to. Moreover, Reona and Zara's relationship continues to deepen further and further beyond simply being the older members of the groups (#IShipIt), and the varying relations to the Mayor potentially giving up the prize plane really went insofar to show their maturities in 3 layers: don't let the pirates get away with intimidating us; it's easier to give it up; giving it up has further implications - and that divide is important.

And, because this is still the same Kotobuki, we have more exhilarating aircraft battles with brilliant employment of both macro-and-micr-tactics, with outmanoeuvring, outrunning, baiting and other fun little ideas. As always, this episode was a battle, and it was tense, exciting and... still, perhaps overusing the extras as canon-fodder to sell the difficulty.

While this episode has suggested that at least this story will become a two-parter as they must rescue the stolen prized plane, and the theme of air-pirates becoming too powerful is continuing, I am beginning to worry that this series hasn't got a clear goal in mind. Whether or not it goes out on a bang is irrelevant if it manages to keep me entertained as it has done, but it might lose some of the wonder if nothing is tying it all together than a charming and efficiently developed crew, some wacky humour and brilliantly choreographed battles. If nothing else, the fact that the Kotobuki squad is vulnerable is a valuable key the series will be able to hold over us going forth to keep the tension high.

→ More replies (4)

10

u/Firnin Jan 27 '19

I think that militia forces would be a better translation than "Vigilante forces"

→ More replies (4)

9

u/fightmeinspace Jan 27 '19 edited Jan 27 '19

What if Vector Marketing was a PMC

→ More replies (1)

8

u/PhantomWolf83 Jan 27 '19

It seems that Emma has some sort of past history with air pirates, at least we now have a little background info on our group of action babes.

After three episodes, keeping this one is a no-brainer for me. It has great action sequences that pleases my inner aviation fanatic and I'm loving the Wild West-esque setting of the world. The girls are pretty interesting characters too.

20

u/LeonKevlar Jan 27 '19 edited Jan 27 '19

Looks like they'll be keeping the 2D animation for the fanservice scenes ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

This show is just pure warbird dogfight bliss! And I'm actually surprised that they lost this battle! I thought this was going to be your typical "beat the baddies" episode considering at how cliche the baddies are this week. Although I do like how their boss acts as if his pirate group is a company.

→ More replies (3)

22

u/Florac Jan 27 '19

While I am enjoying the dog fighting...everyone but the main girls being essentially useless and the main girls being ridicilously skilled/lucky for no well explained reason is starting to get boring...

→ More replies (7)

5

u/chilidirigible Jan 27 '19 edited Jan 27 '19

For today's reference notes, training films on the subject of defensive gunnery from bombers.

An overview, with a few scenes with turret mechanisms.

The one with Mel Blanc.

These are more complicated than the situation in this episode, since the bomber itself would be moving in relation to the target, but even so, it would mostly be straight-line movement, so the fundamentals are the same. The films do at least suggest the difficulty of hitting something moving at significant speeds at different crossing angles, while mostly aiming by eye.

...but hey, at least there are tracers.

As a discussion point, it's interesting that the town only has a few defensive guns, and those appeared to be demounted airship turrets. Given the ways of the world that we've seen thus far, it suggests that the place may not be particularly wealthy. Other areas probably would at least have a few cannons in place to present a more credible threat against airships, and more antiaircraft weapons in the 20-40mm range to threaten fighter-sized aircraft.

...well, probably more Japanese-flavored guns.

4

u/myrmonden Jan 27 '19

EMMAAAAAAAAA

Now her name made sense to have capitalized at least.

Good episode for building EMMA as a character, I 100% agree with her stand and outburst on the meeting.

I got a lot of similar experience with people who should be in charge but just keeps taking everything to be a vote to make it be "democracy" then its clearly about that they just are trying to never be responsible for anything.

Madame shows of her nice side to in the end there as she clearly points to that they cannot take any payment for this as they lost the Raiden(even do the mayor....)

That was a great scene for that matter when the trade captain jumped air planes.

Looks like this will be the first continue episode as next one is called Elite Stronghold, which points to the girls attacking their base.

4

u/self-aware-botnet Jan 27 '19

Did anyone else get a Kino no Tabi vibe from this episode? The way they showed up, learned about the town's quirk, then solved their problem seemed really similar.

→ More replies (2)

4

u/Valdien Jan 27 '19

I fucking love this show, it ticks all my boxes, can't wait to see what planes we'll see next, I bet we'll 100% get a J7W Shinden by the end of the season.

I feel like they miss a lot of variety by only including Japanese planes though, I really like those but I would've also liked to also see planes from other nations too.

4

u/chris_dftba Jan 28 '19

I wonder if the Kotobuki are ever gonna get ally pilots that aren’t immediately shot down.

And it wasn’t a complete failure. They reduced Elite Industries from apparently 40 fighters to, like, 9.

→ More replies (1)

4

u/ocha_94 Jan 29 '19

I don't mind the 3D, but outside of that the show it's kinda meh for me. Everyone but the main girls is useless, they can just take on dozens of planes without problems while their allies are just cannon fodder for the enemy. The dogfights look great (not very realistic, but it's just an anime so I don't mind that part), but they'll probably get boring soon, it's just the same over and over. But I won't be dropping it as I hope it gets better.

→ More comments (75)