Utawarerumono: The False Faces

Episode 13

Well, I said I was going to take a week off after the last episode, but in a surprise turn of events, U2warerumono took a week off too! Now we've got a new opening sequence, a new war plot, and hopefully a new round of second chances to bring this show back from the brink. And what better way to win over questioning viewers than with twenty minutes of labored exposition?

This episode begins with another impromptu teatime chat between Haku and the emperor, who still insists on being called "Mito" even though his cover's been thoroughly blown. Apropos of nothing, Mito has decided to explain Yamato's "general hierarchy" to his new amnesiac BFF, running down the positions of the nation's ten military leaders. (This is valuable information and all, but its timing in-story sure is suspiciously convenient.) Four of the generals are primarily concerned with combat, while six are concerned more with governance. Oshutoru and Mikazuchi function as the emperor's left and right hands and have superiority over the other generals. Munechika guards the capital city with her phalanx of infantry as the emperor's pillar of defense. Vurai runs Yamato's bloodthirstiest militant forces as the emperor's pillar of offense. Those four are the biggest guns in terms of firepower, but the other six are key to keeping the peace across the emperor's giant empire. Woshisu, Raikou, and Dekoponpo have jurisdiction over the huge mainland of Yamato. Oozen has jurisdiction over the sister nation Kujuuri, which also makes him the father of Princess Rurutie. Soyankekuru has jurisdiction over the sister nation Shahhoro, which also makes him the father of Princess Atui. And finally, Tokifusa has jurisdiction over the sister nation Izuruha, which we haven't learned much about yet. (All of these locations are dead ringers for real-world regions across the continent of Asia, so more geographically inclined viewers now have a crystal-clear image of where U2warerumono takes place at any given time, which is neat.) The emperor also goes out of his way to say that all his pillar generals are worthy of their positions except for Dekoponpo, who basically got his job because his dad was a cool dude and the emperor owed him a great debt of gratitude. Gee, I wonder if he's about to screw everything up for the rest of us?

So that's a lot of critical information to trust a stranger with, as Haku is quick to point out. Why is Emperor Mito so interested in him anyway? The only explanation the sovereign offers is that Haku has zero connection to him or his country, which may be the very worst reason I've ever heard for plucking a dorky stranger out of the crowd (who happens to be friends with your favorite general) and bouncing matters of national secrecy off him over brunch. The only thing that makes this situation remotely acceptable is the high probability that the emperor is full of shit. I continue to hold out hope that "Mito" knows something major about our protagonist that we don't, and his reasons for confiding in him aren't literally "well, you are the player character."

Okay, so what's this war all about in the first place? General Woshisu explains it all at a meeting of the pillar pack, and the new enemy he's describing already seems suspiciously sympathetic. Apparently, there's a rash of starving villages living in the shadow of Yamato's empire, collectively known as the "Uzuurussha," and a giant brick-stack of a warlord named Gurundua has recently united them all to invade Yamato's allied nations on the way to the mainland. Now that the Uzuurussha have amassed enough force to plow right through Yamato's main border, it's time for the big guns to mobilize. Frankly, it seems like these starving tribes might have some valid beef with the massive empire that razed their lands, and I'm going to take a wild guess that the real brunt of punishment will fall on Gurundua for taking advantage of their desperation. Viewers will definitely want to keep an eye on some footsoldiers amongst these "barbarians" for potential allies, like the enthusiastic yet naive Entua, obvious future harem-member and daughter of the already more sympathetic barbarian general Zeguni.

Still, the Uzuurussha are pulling some real nasty tricks under Gurundua's leadership. They've been snapping up Yamato captives during their advance and putting these hostages on their front lines. When Woshisu suggests rescuing these poor souls, Vurai shoots him down. If they're real men of Yamato, they'll survive the battle, and if not, they're worth sacrificing. That eyebrow-raising suggestion, along with a flashback that shows him being humiliated in a duel with Oshutoru before the emperor, puts a pretty big red flag on Vurai's head. If Dekoponpo is the egoistic bumbler that gets our heroes in trouble by accident, Vurai might be the one to betray them all in an act of malice. Getting back to Dekoponpo though, the other pillar generals might have saved themselves a lot of trouble by at least pretending to respect him a little. After everyone except the big-lipped smuggler gets marching orders for the offensive (he's just told "do whatever lol no one likes you"), Dekoponpo mobilizes his own unit the next day to try and win all the glory for himself, throwing Woshisu's well-crafted plan in the garbage as he struggles to figure out who he can deploy quick enough to prevent their weakest corp from being slaughtered. (Apparently, Maroro has been drafted into this squadron. Remember him? I thought the show had totally forgotten about him!) You know, this all could have been avoided if they had just given Dekoponpo a pointless distraction assignment to stroke his ego. Now Yamato will have to risk the safety of its two strongest generals by sending them out in the vanguard. (The generals of the Left and Right are the only ones with elite units composed mostly of cavalry. The other generals' primarily infantry-based units won't be able to catch Dekoponpo before he gets turned into a puddle of lard by the barbarians.)

Now that Oshutoru is headed for the front lines instead of staying back to guard the capitol, our harem will inevitably get dragged into battle along with him. Nekone joins her older brother as his liege, but I have no idea what role she's supposed to play on the battlefield. In RTS game terms, she seems like a story-essential character and not much else. If she doesn't show some prowess in combat or magic next episode, my guess is she's going to get kidnapped to up the tension. The others' roles in the battle are more obvious. Kiuru joins the squad as an archer, and princesses Rurutie (tank on quail-back) and Atui (water-magic lancer) will be fighting in their faraway fathers' places. Haku and Kuon are supposed to stay behind and wish their friend luck, so I guess we'll find out how that's supposed to go pear-shaped next week.

As much as I've been slobbering for the plot to start, this episode really doesn't bring the kind of excitement I was hoping for. I remember the battles in the first Utawarerumono series being entirely informed by personal investment in its characters. Hakuoro and his friends first rallied to war to avenge the death of a loved one, and all the wars that followed came as a consequence of the protagonist's actions and twisted secret identity. Between every battle, there were new character-driven scenes where the cast, even as archetypal and simple as they were, exchanged heartfelt emotions over everything happening around them. Every new enemy was personal in some way, and they all came together to escalate the story from skirmishes in a tiny village to the fate of an entire world. In U2warerumono, I don't know anything about these Uzuurussha barbarians except that they seem like pretty sympathetic people under a self-motivated wannabe dictator. They're up against an empire that Haku has no personal connection to, by admission of the emperor himself, and there was no impetus to their introduction apart from "well, I guess all the cute girls have finally been introduced!" Haku seems like a pawn in someone else's story, and all the mechanics of the plot around him are dry, circumstantial beats meant to get this video-game-chessboard-war from Point A to Point B.

Haku himself puts it best: "Nothing seems any different here, even with a war going on. I thought it'd be more tense, or something." The tone has certainly darkened, as Princess Rurutie quivers over her dimly lit marching orders and every new scene seems laced with foreboding, but it still isn't Haku or Kuon's story, and until we get that personal connection, I might as well have stopped watching a harem comedy and turned on a Let's Play of Fire Emblem instead. It's different! But it's not really better just yet.

Rating: C+

Utawarerumono: The False Faces is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

Hope has been an anime fan since childhood, and likes to chat about cartoons, pop culture, and visual novel dev on Twitter.