GARO -Vanishing Line-

Episode 14

Luke's journey is taking him to unexpected places in GARO -VANISHING LINE-, and I don't mean in just the literal sense. His trip to the small village at the center of this week's episode is a very literal detour away from finding El Dorado, but it also represents how removed he's become from the core of this adventure. These past Luke-centric episodes have been entertaining explorations of a guy who was once GARO's least compelling protagonist, but Luke's character development has come at the cost of stranding him in the grand scheme of GARO's story.

As a purely episodic entry in -VANISHING LINE-'s canon, “RELIC” is a perfectly serviceable piece of storytelling. Luke stops off in an anonymous but sweet little village to protect it from a bound Horror whose seal is due to break any day now, and he ends up getting taken in by a charming young lady named Stella and her grandfather. Stella is something of an occult enthusiast, and her research has led her to believe that Luke is the Demon Sealer of legend who's destined to save them from the Horror's destructive wrath. Stella's cute enthusiasm is undoubtedly the highlight of the episode, and she plays well against Luke's stoic humorlessness. This is good, since that breezy back and forth makes up the crux of the entire episode, and scenes like watching Stella scramble to chase her grandfather's runaway wheelchair play the comedy as broadly as we've ever seen from GARO. I appreciated this overtly lighthearted tone, since it helped keep the episode entertaining even when it wasn't dishing out any lore bombs or strong action beats.

The second half of the episode does thankfully deliver a little of the ol' shoot-em-up spectacle, making for a decent enough climax. -VANISHING LINE- has always had a difficult time with Luke's action beats, as his gunplay-based fighting style tends to feel unwieldy and less visually dynamic than what Sword and Gina routinely dish out. Luke's confrontation with the Knight-turned-Horror is maybe the best of his fights so far, besides his big battle against his dad back in episode eight. It packs a bit more punch than many of the usual quickie horror battles, and emotionally it brings Luke's arc of rediscovering his own sense of justice and heroism to a satisfying new level. The flashbacks to his mother's death and his father's downfall drive home the point that Luke has decided to fight not just for personal vengeance, but in order to uphold the heroic ideals of the Makai Knights.

This leads us to the main issue of the episode, which is that this snippet of character development can't necessarily carry an entire episode's worth of story. The feelings and principles that Luke reaffirms in the final battle had already been planted in the last Luke-centric episode, and I feel like this slight nudging forward of those ideas could have been presented in a story that connected more to the main Sword-Sophie-Gina plot. The fact that Stella and her grandfather have their memories wiped at the end of the episode makes the preceding events feel even more superfluous, since it means that they will likely not have much impact on future events. The end result is a story where Luke restates something he already learned weeks ago. This doesn't make Luke's time with Stella any less fun or entertaining, but it does make the whole affair feel too slight.

Mostly, "RELIC" ends up proving that it's time for Luke to rejoin the fold and meet up with the rest of the party again. I can appreciate the classical flavor of Luke's wandering-warrior journey, especially since Sword has remained a static character so far, but I don't know how much is left to be gained from having Luke's story remain so disconnected from everything else that's happening in GARO -VANISHING LINE-. Let's hope that Luke can interject himself into the “family road trip” dynamic that's made the series such a treat to follow in its second cour, because that would mean more Sophie and Gina, which can only be a good thing.

Rating: B-

Garo -Vanishing Line- is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

James is an English teacher who has loved anime his entire life, and he spends way too much time on Twitter and his blog.