Representin' America over at Genetics, Cathy Lockhearte.
Cathy Lockhearte is introduced this week, and I’m a huge fan of Kugimiya Rie (I’m really liking her character in Gintama at the moment) and feel that it’s fine casting to put her in the role of Cathy (Cassie) Lockheart. We’re quite familiar with Rie filling the role of tsundere, loli-type characters, and while she’s fantastic as those girls, it’s a nice change of pace to hear her portray a character as strong, sweet and more instantly likable as Cathy is; Cathy didn’t get to do enough fighting to make her seem really cool, but with all of the in-fighting going on at West Genetics, she’s certainly a breath of fresh air as she has her own concerns to wrestle with.
Cathy considers retirement after graduating from Genetics.
Cathy is the 1st rank of the 4th Years at East Genetics, and apparently has a 90% compatibility rating with Kazuha, receiving most of Kazuha’s stigmata from when she passed. You’d expect someone like that would flaunt it around and be filled with arrogance, but Cathy is probably the last person that wants it, even to the point of wanting to retire after graduating. I won’t get into it too much, but some of Cathy’s past written in the manwha wasn’t divulged during the episode. I think it would’ve added some more pain to Cathy’s past and make us, the viewer, really sympathetic toward her as to why she’d want to retire after graduating. In the anime, it kind of feels like she’s just a scaredy-cat throwing away so much potential to save the world from Nova, bringing a negative bullet point to a character that I quite like. She and Bridget have met before, with that moment opening Cathy’s eyes to what real battle could be like, seeing Bridget’s rage.
"That was my favorite dress, you bitch!"
Not one, not two, but four Novas are on the attack as Genetics must fight them off. Bridget and Rana didn’t take part in battle this week as anyone else that wasn’t a 4th year stayed back. The school only allows 4th year Pandoras to go out on the field against Nova, but with a rather disappointing showing against the Novas as everyone was absorbed by the them, you can forsee the younger people being called into duty with Bridget and Rana eventualy getting mixed into the fray. If the 4th years couldn’t take down a single Nova, what exactly are we supposed to expect from anyone else? It’s a tricky situation, but hey, seniority doesn’t define strength, right? (see: episode 7)
What Would Gendou Do?
One thing introduced this week during the big battle is the whole concept of Decoys, Finishers, etc. in Freezing battles. Each Pandora is put into a class that best fits their strengths/weaknesses, which is a really intriguing concept given that there already is the Pandora/Limiter relationship. Ecchi series usually don’t have these kind of strategic elements to an anime, and when they do, as Freezing shows us, it is underutilized or shown off too late. I really like the concept behind it and wish that there were different teams formed; instead, Freezing opted to focus on the relationship format, and for that, we can actually blame the manwha author.
Bridget really, really needs a hug, and someone to help with those burgers.
I mentioned in the Freezing – 08 blog that the development between Kazuya and Bridget can be ignored, and in this episode, Bridget is seen running away upset after listening to Kazuya talking about Bridget having some of his sister’s stigmata and that it being a contributing factor as to why he wants to be with Satella. Love is a battlefield of its own kind, and as I try to figure out who’s most at fault after the burgers hit the ground, I can’t really place blame on one side for acting the way they did. You just gotta hope that things will play out well for those two kids. Pardon the pun, but there very much needs to be an unfreezing process between those two.
The Nova is slowly savoring absorbing Cathy.
As a fan of both the anime and manwha, seeing the Nova attack is easily the prime highlight of the series. In its own way, the Pandoras going up against each other is cool, but when the Nova shows up, there’s infinitely more at stake as the sense of danger is amplified tenfold. The battle concept is cool and I wish it was something introduce much earlier, but I wonder if the Pandoras are all trained well ahead to be Decoys, Finishers, etc.
Breasts of the Rest:
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