Seven out of ten. Berserker's speech was the highlight of this episode, nice to hear the guy do something other than roar in a gutteral fashion. Some fanservice (which got a bit too over the top), and some nice imaging going on.
Detractors for me were Saber (almost the entire episode, actually), and Rin's little spiel about the Excalibur's sheath. Rin talking (though I do love to see her have her go at exposition) was too... contrived? Perhaps it was just the translation I was watching, but it seemed like she was saying, effectively "Hey, by the way, here's an explanation of a plot point! Wasn't that cool!"
Believability, Studio Deen. Believability.
And that brings me to the first (though treated second) problem I had with this episode, and that is Saber. It is quite enjoyable to watch her changing into a human being with feelings and emotions. Very nice and all that. But happening over the course of twenty four hours? She has been showing some minor (very minor) feelings since the incident in the park (which was in itself highly contrived, I can't be bothered finding where I wrote that right now), but since the transfer of Shirou's magic circuit, she has become... girlish. Which happened, Fate time, the night before last. And it probably happened in early morning, etc, so in total, it's been only a day or two since she decided that she would develop feelings at all.
Saber's character before that in the series has been very resolute and very unemotional - or perhaps more detached than unemotional. It's all well and good to say that there is now an emotional bond between them that is strengthened (which Saber does say when she mentions spiritual links), but it should not happen this fast.
The amusing thing for me here is that in terms of anything actually going anywhere - almost the entire thing is rather one sided. Saber is the one who is getting 'emotionally attached,' far more so than Shirou. He is still acting in friend-mode, where he has been the entire show, though there have been murky and oblique references either way. But regardless of the relationships unfolding in the show (which I will be elaborating on again in the near future, as I did eight or so episodes ago) the evolution of Saber as an emotional 'female' character is too fast.
Reminds me of some rather silly arguments I've had over evolutionary biology with various devout religious people, who seem to think that evolution is claimed to be an 'instantaneous' process. It definitely isn't - and neither is the development of emotions in a real sense. And it shouldn't be shown as such.
Oh, one final thing:
-Andiyar
[edited for corrections and tone]
Sure they can show Saber going all red but!, I dont really enjoy they way they are doing in right now, the scenes sometimes just feel like fanservice + showing Saber Blush.
). With the boy meets girl type story, but I was hoping that it would of been a little better in the way they do it ^^; Not to say its Bad, because I like Fate/stay night ^^ but alot of the Character development isn't something I'm really going to remember the anime for.
Graphic Designer
