GATE - Episode 21 Discussion / Poll

[Kairin]

Welcome to the discussion thread for GATE, Episode 21.

Thread Guidelines

• Raw requests and offers are not permitted anywhere on this forum.
• Spoilers or hints about future events must not be posted in this thread.
  If you need to reference something that would spoil a future event, reply directly with a private message, or seek out a more appropriate thread.
• Discuss your expectations of the episode if it has not aired yet.
• Be polite to your fellow forum members.
• Please try to keep the discussion on-topic.
• Character bashing is not on-topic and will not be tolerated.
• Do not post multiple times in a row. Please edit your existing post if you wish to add additional thoughts.

Episode Thread Spoiler Policy

• Any comment that discloses events, characters, plot or other information before it is revealed in the anime is expressly forbidden whether or not it is behind spoiler tags.
  Spoiler tags should still be used where appropriate.
  Please consult the AnimeSuki Spoiler Policy for more information.
• Adding a Spoiler tag:
  

  Just highlight your spoiler and click the button found on the "Quick Reply" and "Reply to Thread" forms. Make sure that you include a useful title!

• Please use the Report button if you see any inappropriate spoilers:
  

  Click the button found to the left of the post, just under the poster's avatar. Using the Report button is anonymous and helps the Moderators locate and deal with problems quickly.

• Posting inappropriate spoilers may result in a ban.
  Note: Reporting a post does not mean the poster will be banned instantly.
  The Moderators will use bans if warnings are repeatedly ignored.

[Stark700]

Preview:

[Brother Coa]

Finally we are going to see representatives of another countries.

And Kurubashi's sister is back as well.

[Top Sergeant]

Originally Posted by Stark700

Preview:

Paratroopers!! ( 0:18)

And as Brother Coa pointed out Kuribayashi's sister is back for another appearance. And as for those from other countries:

At 0:22 the guy on the right with a beret, glasses and mustache is a US Army Infantry Officer judging by his uniform (light blue shoulder tabs and cord, crossed rifles on collar). I think the guy in the middle in grey is from the Bundeswehr (Germany) but I'm not entirely certain. If he is he's a Panzergrenadier (Mechanized Infantry) going by the green piping. I think the man on the right in white is French, and the one on the far left is mainland China. In front of him in brown I think is Russian. No idea about the last one.

Looks like blood will be spilled at the Jade Palace; there's no going back now. Very much looking forward to this episode!

[Stark700]

Looks like the buildup for an upcoming battle/war. I feel bad for Pina getting involved in all this because of the darker plan in the background. The more I think about it, the more I dislike Zorsal now.

At least Itami and the others are taking action too.

[Brother Coa]

Next week episode could very well be called 'Operation Market Garden'. It will be so epic, I cannot wait...

This episode was nice buildup, everything is set in motion now. Pina is captured for a moment and Empire own military is put under Zorzal control. The war can officially start...
Itami and others are left out of the big loop, but giving this show nature I am sure they will find their way into current situation by the time crisis get to the height.

All in all, nice episode this week as well. Next week we can finally get back to one thing we all love and that's BRRRRRRRRRT.

The only two things I didn't like:

1. That journalist ( very reason why I said that civilian oversight of military is bad idea ).

2. Japanese prime minister response 'We have no power to take over Empire right now'.

Dude.... you have tanks, planes, artillery, logistics and you can very easily have public support ( Empire people to be precise ). Plus you have 250.000 active soldiers, and around 50.000 in reserve. And you can mobilize 22 million men and 20 million women out of entire population, Only around 100.000 is enough to hold down entire Empire together with continent.

And if you have trouble mobilizing SDF quickly enough - ask USA for help. They have 56.000 soldiers in Japan stationed alone, 15.000 of which are USMC.

But as always... it's all about politics, public opinion and trying to be morally right...

[BWTraveller]

Two things I noticed here, journalists are the same the world over, and the author had the good sense to have at least one truly worthy politician. That journalist made me sick, but he's not wrong. Journalists and news companies always talk about their job/business being getting to the truth or to the "bottom" of a story, but really that is at best secondary. The business is to find something that will sell, and for that corruption and waste are much more lucrative than honor and integrity. The result is that anything that can be turned into something they think the public dislikes will be made into worthless scum. As for the politician, the only people truly worthy of sitting in office are the people who, like in this episode, don't mind trashing their careers and losing all hope of reelection if that's what it takes to do the right thing. No matter how much one may worry about one's future position, it needs to be remembered that a leader's job is first and foremost to support and help the people; it's a position of service.

Also liking Sherry's increased role. Last episode she showed her childish side a good bit, depending on the kindness and mercy of a man she chose as her future husband on account of a smile and a single gift. Beefeater was right in her assessment of that girl's crush as being pretty typical of a 12-year-old, not that such a childish crush can't grow into a deeper, true, lasting love. But here we see that she's still quite mature for her age, refusing to avert her eyes from the consequences of her actions, no matter how gruesome they may be; and she also recognizes that the deaths before her are somewhat tragic, rather than glorying in the demise of her parents' murderers. This little girl really impresses me.

Lastly, looks like we're still getting a lot of the stuff people expected in Lelei's story. I recall people talking about there being more that was supposed to happen at Rondel, and several of the things they complained were supposed to happen either happened or were hinted to happen in the near future. Take care Itami, work hard to protect your wife (regardless of the legality of your marriage).

[Top Sergeant]

Excellent episode. That reporter was right: his profession is a business, not a moral watchdog.

I'm glad they found something for Noriko to do. Keeping busy should help her recovery.

Looks like a Band of Brothers airborne assault into the Capital is on for next week! The paratroopers are ready to go. They won't be able to get any heavy forces there in time, unless those self-propelled howitzers that stomped the two young dragons did not return to Alnus and instead have been sitting in a staging area a few hours from the Palace? Sneaky, if that's the case, and handy as well.

Once the Empire and Japan start fighting, I wonder how long it will take before Tyuule sticks a knife into Zorzal? Or maybe she'll leave him alive to make sure the fighting lasts as long as possible.

My admiration for Sherry has climbed even higher. Surugawa, if you don't marry her in four years you're a fool

[ReddyRedWolf]

Dammit politicians! You wont protect the pro-peace faction, you wont protect your own diplomats if I was among those other countries I'd ask WTF you guys are doing?!

[Anh_Minh]

So. A cartoonishly evil villain of journalist, because of course, and an army so pure it doesn't have its own propaganda arm and is therefore completely at the mercy of outside forces when it comes to PR.

Originally Posted by ReddyRedWolf

Dammit politicians! You wont protect the pro-peace faction, you wont protect your own diplomats if I was among those other countries I'd ask WTF you guys are doing?!

Yeah, it's rather funny they don't seem to consider the negative backlash of the Jade palace getting overrun.

[DmonHiro]

Welp.... goodbye Zorzal, you moronic bastard. The green men are coming for your ass, and there's nothing you can do about it. And this time, it's not Itami's peace-keeking squad, it's a trained infiltrate-and-destory squadron. You are so boned.

[BWTraveller]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

So. A cartoonishly evil villain of journalist, because of course, and an army so pure it doesn't have its own propaganda arm and is therefore completely at the mercy of outside forces when it comes to PR.



Yeah, it's rather funny they don't seem to consider the negative backlash of the Jade palace getting overrun.

I get the feeling the PM is thinking what I initially thought people were thinking previously with their talk of making no action to protect the Doves: we don't want to be seen fighting. Far as I can tell, they don't want to be seen as doing things halfway. If they try to push to force a ceasefire, they suspect the result will have them practically running the country, in which case others might say "why not just make your conquest complete?", only they don't have the financial, military and raw resources to completely eliminate any possible resistance and establish a well-defined government just yet. I'm guessing that's another reason they want to gain some of those mineral sources, to get enough capital to solidify the relationship whatever it may be. So, rather than hit hard and be pressured by neighbors and their own people to "finish the job" before they could do so properly, the PM apparently thought it would be better to face the potential backlash of letting an embassy fall. In other words, the PM is an idiot and a sheep who's too cowardly to try and move forward. The defense minister (that's what he is right?) is a prime example of what government officials SHOULD be, while the current PM is an example of what we all too often get.

[Wandering Soul]

Now that the military is mobilizing, Zorzal's reign is about to be brought to an end. He really has no idea what's coming his way.

Sherry continues showing how mature she is by choosing to accept the consequences of her actions. She refuses to turn away from the people dying. I'm glad they were able to save her last relative after all.

[thundrakkon]

Wow, last week I mentioned Benghazi as a reference to an embassy being attacked and was sure that the JSDF will come right away. However, wow, really wow... the story is actually taking a lot of the political aspects of the Benghazi situation as well, such as the election concerns, media perception concerns, and orders to not take action. I really did not think the author would go this route, so color me surprised.

Sherry is becoming ever more wonderful by the episode. She will definitely be the one in control in the relationship.

I'm still waiting for Itami to go back, but I'm sure that he will accommodate Lelei to the capital and find a way to save the day.

The journalist is very typical of irresponsible reporting, which is very much the norm nowadays. Journalistic integrity is very rare now, and a lot of the "news" is questionable at best.

At least I got to hand it to the author. He doesn't shy away from controversy, and he hits it with a blunt hammer.

[Cloudedmind]

The journalist is just a caricature of what outside people who've never dealt with real journalist or companies in the business of journalism seem to think all journalist act like. Oh sure there may in fact be journalist who think and behave like the guy did in this episode, but thankfully in the seven years I've worked for a major newspaper company I've never met one. Yes, it's a business and you of course want people to buy your papers and click on your website to read your articles. But that does not mean anything goes and their just out for doom and gloom, everything else be damned.

[thundrakkon]

Quote

Originally Posted by Cloudedmind

Sorry; dynamic content not loaded. Reload?

When was the last time you read an article that did not have an agenda or bias in it? Good old fashion news reporting no longer exists, as far as I can tell, and I read a lot of different news sites from across the different political spectrum. The news bloggers are even worse, as they often do not even back up their claims with real facts, reasonable tests, or even research. So yes, the journalist might be a caricature, but he is there representing something that a lot of people see in media today.

Sometimes you just have to step back and see what the ulterior motive is. It really annoys me when I have to read through an article and recognize patterns to figure hints of what actually happened and what information is intentionally excluded or twisted in order for the article writer to push his/her agenda/bias.

So, yes, the journalist is a caricature that might not be completely like every journalist, but he is there to capture the essence and generalization that is perverse in today's news.

[BWTraveller]

All I can say is that I have heard major news corporations openly admit that their purpose is to make money before anything else, including questions of bias. It didn't sound like this journalist was looking to make stuff up, but he WAS looking to catch anything ugly he could find as evidence of the corruption he knew "had" to be there. From what I've seen there is a certain degree of bias to make the news more "interesting" through a bias toward the negative. It might not always go all the way to "doom and gloom", but there certainly seems to be a tendency to try and make things uglier and more dangerous than they really are, unless they're REALLY ugly and dangerous. I'm not saying that newspapers are always trying to make things as horrible as possible, but there certainly seems to be realistic precedence for assuming that some journalists for major companies might come in with the initial assumption that anything that makes the SDF look good and noble is highly likely to be faked to hide how bad they are.

This could also be an assumption based on the situation. The Empire may have invaded first, but that doesn't change the fact that the SDF is an alien force that has seized control of a part of their territory; it wouldn't be all that strange if a lot of people thought of them as evil invaders.

One things sure, I hope this all finishes before that one general's ideas of setting up criminals disguised as soldiers to commit various atrocities. It doesn't matter if they could account for every single soldier's whereabouts at the time of the crime, the stink of a supposed murder, rape, or other act of violence would be almost impossible to wash away.

[Harbinger]

Interesting episode. Now, it's time for killing.

[quigonkenny]

The worst part about bias in journalism is that those who are guilty of it often don't even realize they are. They have certain expectations going in, so they focus on anything that justifies that bias and miss the things that invalidate it. It's usually the editors that are most politically minded, and thus most actively slant the coverage. This affects what the journalists under them cover, because anything that would make the editor unhappy doesn't ever make it to his desk.

[rladls2121]

Seriously, this episode really makes me laugh in many ways.
But, it is also actually sad in many ways too.

Like how I criticized the SDF.
Im actually wrong for judging it.
I have no right to decide its future after all.

That was the Prime Minisiter, the one with the glasses who was talking with the other two.
Sensitive of judgements to military movements from many countries and its own country, so most of the people's opinions are quite burden to the politicians since it is enormous dangerous powers to affect one big country and possibly surrounding countries from an another world.

The Journalist speaking of how the relations between the Special Region and SDF actually are, depending on people's answers in Alnus, most topics are going to be about daily lives, not some big incidents.
Just imagine the answer coming from Delilah's life in Alnus, how story ended up to fight against Yanagida and that is rather going to be the most interesting topic though.

To foreign modern military officers, the Empire's map it is a valuable information sold expensively in the convenience store, to me it look like the one female officer using their team's expense to save Special Region from the possible world domination.