Mecha-Ude: Mechanical Arms

Episode 11

In every hero's journey, the protagonist must confront their Abyss, a terrifying, seemingly insurmountable challenge, the conquering of which leads to transformation. In Hikaru's case, this literally means death as he spends most of this episode with his body immobile as a cold, still corpse, while Aki and Alma mourn helplessly at his side. His mind is adrift somewhere, presumably in the gradually dying embers of his neuronal synapses as they flicker their last.

Instead, we focus on Jun, and his transformation from snarky, whiny antagonist to Hikaru's stalwart friend and savior. Jun, Oner, Twos, Kazuwa and a group of school kids are all trapped beneath rubble from Fist's apocalyptic attack on the city. Although it's Jun who ultimately shoulders the burden of leadership, it's former comedy character Meru whose innocent questioning leads to the group's escape. Unfazed by Kagemaru's witterings, she understandably asks why Twos and Kazuwa's shackled Mecha-Ude can't speak. Twos seems ambivalent on the matter, but Kazuwa is actively hostile to the idea of letting his “tool” think for itself.

Jun convinces them that in order to escape they'll need the full abilities and cognition of everyone, including the enslaved sentient beings serving Twos and Kazuwa, thereby freeing them. We learn that Twos' excitable Mecha-Ude Sight's real name is Ayumi, and that she's essentially a robot gyaru who compliments Twos' “beautiful lashes.” (They are quite striking, she has one of the coolest character designs in the whole show.) Kazuwa's Adel is a deeply intelligent strategist, and although it's clear he isn't exactly thrilled that he's been shackled for so long by Kazuwa, he doesn't erupt in anger or seek retribution. Ayumi is incredibly forgiving of Twos, stating “you weren't the one who captured me,” when asked if she's angry. Perhaps Mecha-Ude are just a really chilled race when it comes to oppression? It could also be there's no time left in this show's ultra- streamlined plot to explore such details, another sign that Mecha-Ude could have done with twice the episode count.

Rubble escaped, our merry band of strange accomplices meet up with Aki, Hikaru, and the rest of the cast in order for Jun to implement his self-sacrifical plan. If we recall back a few episodes, Jun was a sickly child, and required to be derized with a Mecha-Ude to remain healthy. His synthetic Mecha-Ude Ascelpius is a one-of-a-kind piece of advanced tech only he can wield, and its main ability is to redirect the flow of Arbitrium. Despite protestations from the others, Jun inspires everyone to basically join hands with him to donate large quantities of Arbitrium, enough to resurrect Hikaru – whom he explicitly calls his friend – at a grim cost to himself and Asclepius.

Hikaru perceives this intervention as the color-coded hands of his two closest friends Aki and Jun pulling him through his dreamscape, even punching him to get him to wake up! It's only once Alma himself intervenes that Hikaru is dragged back into the light… Only as things turn from bad to worse. Now weakened and without the protection of Asclepius, Jun is vulnerable to a newly mono-winged Fist, rocking his best Sephiroth cosplay, hungry for a new body as Yakumo's finally crumbles away.

We're left with a fantastic cliffhanger with the newly combined Jun/Fist confronting a resurrected Hikaru/Alma, both sporting wings of iridescent fire, a perfect setup for what's hopefully to be an explosive and satisfying finale next week. It's a double whammy of friend against friend, with Alma versus Fist and Hikaru versus (an unwilling) Jun. Will the power of friendship prevail like it did in this episode? Who knows, but Mecha-Ude continues to delight with its earnest yet creative use of standard shonen storytelling tropes. I'm going to miss this one when it's done.

Rating: 4.5/5

Mecha-Ude: Mechanical Arms is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.