Übel Blatt

Episode 11

I'm so done with Übel Blatt, thankfully there's only one episode to suffer through after this. Episode 11 is supposed to be an all-action spectacle, the culmination of Köinzell's battle against the second of seven corrupt “heroes,” the paranoid Batterygrave Barestar. Barestar is dangerously unhinged, using weapons of mass destruction against the Free City's innocent inhabitants, all the while plotting to steal chief bad guy “hero” Glenn's state- of-the-art airship for himself. His clumsy characterization is so hopelessly cartoonish, so cacklingly evil, that he completely fails as a viable antagonist in a story as ostensibly serious as Übel Blatt. The show's utterly abysmal mishandling of character backgrounds and motivations extends to the out-of-place Demon Slayer-esque flashbacks clumsily jammed in before Barestar's inevitably messy execution at the end of Köinzell's blade.

Barestar, it seems, was the incompetent son of a successful merchant. So terrible at the family business was he that his father essentially forced him to sign up to the military and join the fateful mission that would end Ascheriit's life. A poorly-integrated flashback of the seven cowardly “heroes” debating how to handle the faithful Ascheriit and friends, who successfully completed their mission, attempts to explain the reason behind Glenn and Barestar's betrayal. It seems to boil down to “boo hoo Ascheriit will make us look bad.” Eh? The whole conspiracy plot against Ascheriit can be boiled down to simple envy and cowardice? How disappointingly banal.

Said flashbacks also give us zero context for how Barestar became the pathetic, snivelling wreckage of a man he is now, as his secretly-built Death Star castle crumbles around him, pummeled by the flagship's laser, fired by moral knight Elsaria who has Finally Had Enough Of This Shit. (I feel your pain, Elsaria.) At least Barestar's men know what's up, fleeing the flying fortress like rats from a sinking ship, even kicking him back from entering an escape vehicle. That made me snort in laughter.

Barestar's equally cartoonishly evil magistrate minion also meets his end, I think… It looks like he's incinerated by a massive beam of magic, but the shots are so poorly composed and sequenced that his fate is unclear – was that his wyvern that seemed to survive the beam, or was it Köinzell's? Oh, I don't care any more. I know the show is trying to provide an intense, climactic spectacle, but it fails at almost every level. Nothing about Koinzell's struggle against his idiotic enemy, not the flashbacks, nor the inappropriately sentimental (yet somehow still excellent) soundtrack moved my heart in any way. Near episode's end, as Barestar pleads and Köinzell cries, I feel nothing.

Despite only adapting a fraction of the length of its original manga, I thank God that Übel Blatt is almost over, so I can wipe this terrible show from my memory.

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