Fire Force Season 3

Episode 5

Of course, Arthur would end up fighting a giant son-of-a-gun named “Dragon.” It is proof positive of our beautiful idiot's destiny as the “Knight King” that he should be the one to take down the giant monster that stands in the way of Company 08 rescuing their beloved Captain Obi. I'm not sure where in classic Arthurian legend Fire Force plucked the bizarre detail of Captain Obi fending off the White Clad's Insects by body-builder flexing his egregiously ripped muscles like he was competing for the Mr. Universe title, but I'll allow the show some more of its “creative liberties.” Arthur is fighting a literal fire-breathing dragon. What kind of bastards would we be to take the grandeur of this achievement from him?

Truth be told, I was initially really irritated by the payoff to last week's cliffhanger, which saw the Insect just about to burrow its way into Obi's flesh. Yes, the show technically foreshadowed this insane development with the Cap'n's boredom-induced workout routine, but seriously, Fire Force had a great opportunity to seriously amp up the stakes of this final season by at least pretending that Obi's fate might genuinely be up in the air. Then again, this is not a story that has ever relied much on dark drama and character deaths to move its plot forward, so I ended up warming up to the sheer goofiness of the idea after a while, since I doubt the series is going to be significantly worse of if it doesn't axe one of its longtime players.

What might end up dragging Fire Force down, though, are these increasingly inconsistent and underwhelming production values. The show hasn't dipped so low in quality that it is becoming out-and-out terrible to look at, but the storyboarding and editing on display are lacking in a big, bad way. The fact that the animation itself has gotten so stiff and unwieldy is bad enough, but now the connective tissue that could have held those shabbier pieces together is also starting to fray, and at the most inopportune time.

There's also the matter of this particular arc's lopsided focus. We've spent two whole episodes on the ground-level crew's fighting while Joker and Shinra take care of Burns and defend Obi, but the pacing of these episodes makes it difficult for the show to maintain its narrative momentum. Even though over forty minutes of screentime have passed since this battle kicked off, it cannot be more than maybe, what, five minutes that have gone by for our heroes? This kind of storytelling decompression is not at all uncommon in battle manga that are in the thick of a big showdown, but it's still weird for the show to only occasionally cut back to Shinra and Joker's battle, where almost no progress at all has been made, which makes it seem like everyone on the roof is just standing around and twiddling their thumbs whenever the camera cuts away from them.

All of that said, I didn't have a bad time with “Chance Meeting with an ARCH-Enemy.” It's a fun next phase in this extended prison-break mission, and even the ridiculous Captain Obi developments end up entertaining enough, if only because it's hilarious to watch the entire Company come up with ways to shower their leader with praise for his inhumanly shredded physique. I wish that Studio David could muster up more of that showmanship that made some of the previous seasons' best fights so memorable.

Rating:

Fire Force is currently streaming on Crunchyroll on Fridays.

James is a writer with many thoughts and feelings about anime and other pop-culture, which can also be found on BlueSky, his blog, and his podcast.