This was a better episode than I expected. You can see Van in shock from his defeat. I didn’t think he would recover and beat Metsä all in the same episode. The part with naked William and his Oedipus complex wasn’t very pleasant to watch to say the least. Other than that part though, the rest of the episode was good. We learn a bit more about Van’s past. We also get to see at the end of the episode that Van being nicer to Wendy may be a long-term thing now. Oh, then there’s Van solving the puzzle he has been playing with for the entires series. For the moment it really seems to be “just a puzzle”. I thought it would actually be some sort of “key” to extract Dann’s hidden potential or something.

Based on last week’s preview, I thought this was going to be primarily another filler episode. As it turns out quite a bit happens in this episode. We get to see metsä, another one of the Original Seven yoroi’s. I would have liked to see them extend the fight longer, but in the end Van is easily defeated by William. I wasn’t expecting to see Pricilla anymore either. It looks like we’ll soon see her and El Dorado V help Van out.

One new piece of information we find out is their destination is somewhere in the ocean. They probably won’t get to that place for at least another 3-4 episodes. As far as filler episodes go, this one was quite entertaining. After learning about Joshua’s current state Van happily suggests they should ditch him. We meet Pricilla who seems surpringly similar to Nono from “Gunbuster 2″. I thought it was pretty funny to see both Wendy and Carmen99 shocked that Van was able to memorize her name so quickly.

This episode marks the end of the first half of the series. Van catches a glimpse of the clawed-man which reaffirms his goal. Gadovedo mentions Van isn’t using Dann to its full potential. It makes me wonder when we’ll get to see Van learn how to use it properly. Wendy ends up travelling with Van once again. It appears Carmen99 will go with them as well. We’re back to what looks like another filler episode next week.

There’s a lot of new information in this episode. We learn about the mystery behind Dann and its connection with Van plus the story behind the “Original Seven”. There should be a total of 7 satellite yoroi’s. So far we know of Dann, Diablo, and the yoroi Michael is in. That leaves 4 more yoroi’s we haven’t seen yet. This is also the first episode where we get to hear Elena’s voice. Gedobedo, Diablo’s pilot, is the one responsible for connection Van with Dann. The other big thing in this episode is we get to see the identity of the clawed-man. As it turns out it’s an old man trying to fulfill a dream. He looked pretty harmless until the end. In the last scene you can see the insanity in him.

Taking into account that we’re not exactly at the half-way point of the series yet this episode felt like something you would see late in a series’ run. So Wendy finally gets to talk to her brother. It turns out Michael has decided to stay with the clawed-man out of his own free will. I found it interesting even Michael and his allies don’t mention the name of the person Van is after. They only refer to him as either 同士, 同志, 同氏. They’re all pronounced “Doushi” and I think any one of those 3 would fit into the context they were used in. We still don’t know what exactly the “Original Seven” is, but we get to see everyone who are supposedly part of the “Original Seven”. When you see two siblings with a questionable relationship you can pretty much guess they’re going to be villans. The machine that was contained within the cargo from Zonnett looks like it may be a yoroi. Something interesting you’ll notice is “Original Seven” and “Saudade of Sunday” are engraved on the side. It seems like Saudade is Portugese. Once you know the meaning of the word you may be able to come up with new theories.

Now that I know the series is at least 26 episodes long, I’m not so worried about the rate at which the story progresses. Not surprisingly this is yet another filler episode, at least for the most part. Details about Van’s yoroi is still pretty much a mystery, but we do learn that Van himself doesn’t know everything about it. They end up reaching their destination of Zonnet where they’re supposed to meet up with Carmen99. We’re left with Wendy noticing that the person standing across from them is her brother. All I have to say is, that is no guy. It looks like we’re in for another Kazuki from “GetBackers”. Ironically the seiyuu is also Souichiro Hoshi.

I was hoping to get a Carmen99 episode since watching episode 2. Although it isn’t only focused on Carmen99, we get more scenes with her than previous episodes. We don’t get to see the face of the new character who apparently works for the clawed man. Overall this episode was pretty close to a complete filler. There is SOME development, but it’s minimal. It seems like the flowers being grown has some greater purpose for the clawed man, but I’m not sure if they will actually expand on that anymore in the series.

Another non-filler episode!? I didn’t think we would get 2 in a row. We’re introduced to Joshua in this episode. As it turns out, he has been chasing Ray. Now that he has decided to tag along with Van and Wendy, it may just make things more difficult for Van. He seems to be knowledgeable about “Yoroi’s” but besides that he appears to be quite useless. I wonder what sort of information is hidden on the item Van obtained from the Yoroi. I hope it turns out to be something that contributes to the story instead of it ending up to contain nothing but useless information.

This looked like another filler episode at first. Fortunately we do get some information pertaining to the story. It looks like the guy Van is after is aware of him chasing after him. He also has other people working for him. Just how many people is anyone’s guess at this point. Probably the biggest point in this episode was finding out that Van is one of the “Original Seven”. What exactly is the “Original Seven”? That’s something I’m pretty excited to find out about. On an unrelated note, it looks like Wendy’s brother is voiced by Souichiro Hoshi.