Big Order

Episode 4

Against all odds, in spite of everything working against it, Big Order was actually kind of good this week.

If you need to take a minute to process that, I understand.

Now granted, I'm using “good” in very relative terms here; the series didn't become a masterpiece overnight or anything. But compared to the inconsistent and messy affair we've been working through the past few weeks, this episode of Big Order was a legitimate breath of fresh air.

It probably helped that the focus this week was much more defined. Our protagonist needs to manage The Rock God scenario while also dealing with the nuclear warhead that the UN has launched at the abandoned city he's stuck in. Instead of trying to go in six different directions at once, the plot boiled down to a simple problem and how Eiji could solve it. Hell, even last week's baffling pregnancy bomb was left temporarily unresolved, since Iyo was more or less completely incidental to the plot this week. This bothered me a lot less than I thought it might, because that extra time was spent telling a coherent and more-or-less tonally consistent story instead.

Despite her awful design, Taira The Rock God Order is one of the most interesting characters the show has produced. Her motivation to kill Eiji is clear, concise, and effective characterization, helping to humanize the End of the World in a way that even Yin's ridiculously tragic backstory couldn't. Plus, the fact that her Rock God is made up of the gravestones of the people Eiji killed is the first legitimately interesting power to come out of the Orders so far. It's a little on the nose, but I don't know how capable this show is of actually communicating anything with subtlety.

Either way, it works, and the battle against Taira also made Eiji as likable as he's ever been. He's still not very compelling, but I wasn't getting actively frustrated with him this week, and that's something. Some of his moping and bewilderment was tiring, but for the most part I could follow along with his goals and ambitions in a way that has not clicked for me at all in the previous episodes. It probably helped that he and Rin had virtually no interaction this week; it's amazing how much more I like both of them when they aren't together. I still don't know how this Pregnant Iyo thing will play out, but if it means less of having to deal with Rin and Eiji's off-putting “relationship”, then I'll take what I can get.

Still, I'm using “good” as a relative term here. There are still some underlying problems with the show that can't be solved by one relatively competent episode. In general, Big Order's slapdash approach to storytelling makes the series' long term prospects dicey. Even if audiences are engaged by the visuals or the action or the core premise, I can't see anything that would keep audiences invested long term. The overarching plot of Big Order doesn't feel any more clear than it did back in episode one, which by now almost feels like it belongs to an entirely different show. Almost every character is underdeveloped. Even Eiji's defining characteristics are all drawn from the borderline inappropriate affection he has for his MacGuffin of a sister, and that's not nearly enough to carry this show for an entire season.

But maybe, just maybe, this episode signifies a turning point for the show. It's possible that I'm wrong, and next week will continue to defy my expectations as these disparate pieces start adding up to a decent anime. Based on everything that's come before it though, I'm hesitant to get my hopes up. I worry that this kind of quality is just an outlier, a brief reprieve before we're thrust back into the low standards Big Order has already set for itself.

Rating: B-

Big Order 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.