Where do I even begin? I guess the beginning would be a good place. Certainly didn't expect to start this season with Nagisa having such an ominous dream (ominous to who, though?), but it definetly woke me up, and good thing, because the next 6 minutes or so were a true festival of color, music and non-creepy CG animation. That's what I call starting with a blast. And what a great way to announce the return of the center nova.
Of course, the main highlight of the episode is that we actually saw some of the girls getting captured by DES, and even taken to a public trial, which for some reason, didn't seem nearly as stupid as I expected it to be, in fact, it seemed pretty damn evil. Fortunately the awesome Chieri managed to turn things around by being her strong, unrelenting self, and her voice during that speech of hers was great, just exhuding pure absolute confidence, despite the terrible situation at hand. That's what makes Chieri awesome (well, one of the things that makes her awesome). And of course, Yuuko was awesome this episode too, pretty much for the same reasons (even having her own awesome speech that might just convince me to add something AKB relatedas signature), and show that you can be friends and rivals at the same time, a lesson I really hope got through Nagisa's thick skull, I don't want to spend the entire season hating her.
And of course, there's the small details, like Yuka and Orine hijacking the news to make DES look like a band of bufoons for blowing up their own place
Shizuko bluntly reminding us of Grumbly's lack of prominent features, not forgetting the issue with Takamina and the succession, showing Nagisa's dad during the rescue and so on. This show knows how to make you appreaciate the small things
Oh, and Chieri's dad is a dick.