Asleep in the Ice Prison
Star Fleet Episode 17
Every TV show has a certain amount of filler. Because Star Fleet is a serial, there’s always a lot of time spent recapping certain events for the benefit of those who may have missed an episode. Now in the age of Wikipedia, streaming services, and tedious fan blogs like this one, some of that filler is less necessary. Spoilers ahead…
Now that we know the secret of F-01, we might expect the plot to take off. Actually, it’s going to meander for a bit. Putting the word “Asleep” in the title is never a good beginning for an exciting action-based series.1 Still there is a very cool new environment to introduce and lots of themes to explore before we get back on track.
Before we begin, I’d like to give a shout out to my supporter, Suzy, for completing a Star Fleet fan story! Star Fleet - Trinity takes place after the events of the series and begins with a focus on Lamia. Fan fiction sometimes has a bad reputation, but in reality it’s a great way for budding writers to hone their craft using familiar characters and settings. Plus it gives fans the opportunity to get new stories when new episodes aren’t forthcoming. I hope to do a post on Star Fleet fan fiction… but I still have quite a few episodes of Star Fleet to get through first! Meanwhile, please enjoy Trinity and all the other great fan-penned yarns over on xbomber.co.uk
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As you no doubt recall, last episode ended on something of a bum note when X Bomber came crashing back to ground shortly after takeoff. As if to reinforce the unserious nature of this cliffhanger, this episode opens with PPA’s cheery line: “that was a happy landing, fellas.” I love when the robot starts joking around.
Because this is Star Fleet, the worst epithet Shiro can come up with is “Darn that Makara!” That’ll teach her. Golly. Gee whiz.
Hercules expresses some admiration for Makara’s tactics and PPA is all over him like a cheap suit on a used car dealer. If you don’t respect your enemy, you won’t be in the fight for long. What’s going on with PPA this week?
Dr. Benn brings everyone back to reality, pointing out that they did not explode or die in the crash and asking about injuries. Lee, being the closest person aboard to a medic beside Benn himself, reckons all that was damaged was pride. I certainly would be a bit embarrassed if I crashed like this right after the Skull seemed to get through with no problems whatsoever.
Benn calls for a check up on the ship. Repairs have to be started up again because Lamia’s fate has been left in their hands. “Get a move on!” He commands. “Yes sir!” they chorus.
But no one stands up! Bunch of ingrates. Lamia is doomed.
On the sinister baddie bridge, the termoids report that they’re 20,000 millitons off from the Allurian prison. Orion gives himself a pat on the back. Makara teases him about receiving an Imperial Alliance medal and Orion practically starts drooling at the prospect.
Makara laughs at his foolishness and then warns him. “Wait till it’s around your neck!” Denise Bryer delivers this line with a real sense of threat, as if she is talking about a noose instead of an accolade. Her calm, competent manner is a nice contrast to the heroes, who have yet to pull their finger out this episode.
Makara believes Lamia has been broken. Orion agrees that she has lost all hope.
Makara pauses in this unual frame to reflect on the fact that even the Imperial Master fears the power that Lamia is about to become. I wonder if Makara is tempted to try and seize control of that power herself? After all, she could become an Imperial Master herself if Lamia was at her disposal.
We don’t get to hear the redhead’s thoughts, becasue we cut to the imprisoned brunette who has thoughts of her own. Far from being without hope, Lamia is continuing to call aloud to Dr. Benn and “my brave Shiro.”
A termoid shuts her up. “You can talk when we reach out destination.” This naturally leads Lamia to question where she is being taken and the termoid spills the beans with absolutely zero hesitation. Well done, Imperial discipline!
Lamia is informed she’s off to the Allurian prison from which there is no escape. MWAHAHAHA! Between his evil cackles, Lamia defiantly says she would rather die than face eternal imprisonement, which only triggers more jeering and taunting. It seems as F-01, she won’t or can’t be killed. More on that later.
Somewhere out there among the stars…
…Lamia’s defenders are grounded once again.
Any guesses what Lee is actually doing here? My guess would be checking the structural integrity. I have no idea what structural integrity is, but I was watching Star Trek the other day and they say it almost constantly so it must be a real and very important part of space flight.
Lee announces that the repairs are done and PPA notes they got off very lucky– not nearly as bad as it seemed. Hmm shocking. It’s almost as if that crash was staged to create a cliffhanger at the end of an episode rather than dramatically necessary to the plot of the story!
Lee takes a bit of umbridge since he thinks they’re moving fast because of how good they’ve gotten at fixing X Bomber. Even PPA has to admit that this is a good point. After all, they do crash a lot.
While Lee is already finished, Shiro and Hercules are still at work, probably because they are thinking about Lamia. Shiro thinks it was all “our” fault– presumably because the group should have done a better job of protecting her.
Hercules has a whole different load of guilt to bear. While Shiro’s guilt is part of the team’s collective failure to save Lamia, Hercules played the role of the doubting Thomas to her spectacular, messianic powers.
With all this in their thoughts, it’s not surprising these two rivals for Lamia’s affection get into an argument.
Fortunately, Lee comes along at just the right moment to put a stop to it. After all, he points out, it’s the Alliance who will benefit from this petty squabbling. Sometimes I think John Lee should be in charge.
Alright! Time to figure out where Lamia is! But wait a minute, didn’t Lee set a course for the Aurelian star cluster in the previous episode? In fact, they went into precise detail, informing the audience how far this cluster is from the Callinean star cluster and which quadrant of the Volga nebula it is located within.
Dr. Benn is suffering from amnesia on that front. He’s been looking for a rainbow colored star cluster on the star chart and he can’t find it. Obviously, the Doc would never find it because the chart he’s looking at is all green and not rainbow coloured in the slightest. He decides to check the course Makara’s battlecruiser took, which I guess they have a record of? It seems like the trail would have gone cold by now.
PPA asks Benn if he believes that Lamia is even still alive. “That I must believe,” he says. Without her, all hope is lost.
Makara has arrived at the outskirts of the Allurian star cluster. On the verge of completing her mission, she warns all the troops to perform duties with the “highest allegiance.”
Lamia is in a bit of a stupor, possibly drug-induced. She wonders why she can’t hear Halley, but she continues to reach out to him. This time, she does so mentally and silently so the guards won’t notice. Will she reach her friend aboard the Skull?
But there’s no rest for Captain Halley. Although last week his suspicious behaviour led me to suspect that he might have devious motives for letting X Bomber do all the work, it seems like the guy is actually just out there by himself, sleeplessly scanning the skies in hopes of receiving a signal of some kind from long lost Lamia. It’s a bit touching, especially because they don’t manage to make contact in this scene.
Enter one of my favourite elements of this episode; the rainbow planet. The talented behind the scenes team really knew how to create stunning visual environments. Although I suspect the science behind a rainbow colored star cluster/planetoid is highly dodgy, the results of this high concept are gorgeous to look at.
Lamia has arrived on the prison planet!
There’s a scramble of activity in the brig as Makara and Orion arrive. Some serious stuff is about to go down.
Makara tells Lamia that she’s in her new home– a place from which no one can be rescued. “You must resign yourself to that!”
The purpose of all of this intimidation seems to be to break Lamia and deprive her of hope. This begs the question– have Lamia’s powers grown to the point that she could actually escape? It’s a big fat cliche to suggest that the power of love can move mountains, but isn’t it possible that Lamia’s emotional state could have some effect on her new abilities? It is almost as if Makara is afraid of what Lamia’s capable of if she overcomes her fears.
Lamia plays clueless. She claims she’s “just an Earthling” when Makara says she was born with powers to control the universe. Not without logic, she says such a powerful person could never be captured.
This sends Makara into a fit of the giggles, always delivered brilliantly by Denise Bryer. In Bond-villain let-me-tell-you-everything-you-need-to-know fashion, she reveals that in two-Earth months Lamia will have enough power to single handedly defeat the Imperial Alliance… but not until then. Not only did Makara reveal some key info to Lamia, she even converted the time units into terminology she could understand.
Lamia is absolutely baffled by all this. Rememer, she wasn’t present for the conference with Halley in the previous episode and the guy hasn’t told her anything else about her past.
“If we had managed to capture you when you were born, the universe would belong to us,” Makara remembers. Some stock footage from last week’s flashback to Esper appears unaltered. We’re basically getting a full confirmation of what Halley claimed. Makara agrees with him that Lamia is the F-01, that she was born on Esper, and that her upbringing by humans was simply arranged as a ruse.
The 31st century, the year 3000, will be the dawning of the age of the Imperial Alliance. Lamia actually interrupts this rant, and it’s pretty rare to have two characters speaking at the same time.
Lamia wants to know why they don’t just kill her and Makara compliantly informs her that the Alliance wants to harness her power– only they don’t quite know how yet. This implies the existence of a team of Imperial research scientists, imprisoned in a lab, trying to work out how these mystical powers work and how they can be controlled. Definitely an interesting fan story to be written there!
“Can you not feel the changes within your body?” Makara asks. This is a key sentence if you choose to interpret this as a coming of age story. Lamia’s pubescent transformation from a girl to a woman coincides with her ascendency to goddesshood. Her powers aren’t just spiritual, they are also somehow linked to her biological maturation.
Of course, Lamia ties it all back to the moment Halley blasted her with a strange beam. What exactly happened here? Did her mysterious powers need activation? What was the light? Some kind of radiation from Esper’s sun?2 Or was it a frequency of light only visible to the people of Esper?
This memory leaves Lamia even more confused. Makara adopts a motherly tone as she realizes Lamia is feeling the changes.
“Tell me who I am,” Lamia begs her captor. It’s a heartbreaking moment.
“You’ll have a long time to think about that,” Makara sneers.
Orion orders her released and taken away to prison. Makara gives him one more warning not to let Lamia contact Halley. “I will not fail,” Orion promises.
This is a strange scene. For one thing, it lends creedence to my theory that Makara was once in a similar position to Lamia– meaning she too was captured and indoctrinated by the Alliance at a young age. There are very few other reasons why what Makara calls an “interview” actually consists of the captor telling the prisoner a bunch of information that they want to know. What are Makara’s true motivations here? Is the Imperial commandant capable of some kind of twisted empathy?
Why interview Lamia at all? And why inform her of nascent powers? One possibility is that Makara is provoking Lamia in the hope of gaining more control. Lamia rendered powerless would be useless as a tool to the alliance, but Lamia brought to her full potential too quickly would be devastating. No matter how you slice it, Makara is playing a very dangerous game.
On Molphane, Shiro has taken a few moments to go and comfort Kirara, which is quite sweet. Although I suppose it’s possible he’s come here to spy on her stuff. Shouldn’t we be taking off now anyway? What would comfort Kirara most is to get Lamia back.
This last point is the one echoed by Hercules when Shiro finally arrives back on the bridge. Sheesh. That helmet-headed guy can sure miss the point some times.
Hercules, Lee, and finally Shiro have completed all their checks. Dr. Benn cuts off Shiro and Hercules’ attempt at a squabble by ordering Lee to trace Makara’s course. Just as everything is finally ready and the order is about to be given… they get a phone call from the Skull. WILL WE EVER GET OFF THIS PLANET?
Captain Halley reports that one of Lamia’s efforts at telepathic communication got through. This means, to the crew’s joy, that she is still alive. But her “thought line was cut off” so he can’t say where she is. Of course, we all know where she is. Why this wasted time?
As Hercules curses Makara, Dr. Benn neglects to ask Halley how he successfully escaped the minefield unscathed and why they didn’t bother to warn X Bomber. Instead he asks him to keep the crew informed of any further telepathic communications.
As the screen goes blank, Dr. Benn encourages his team to be positive, even though “while she’s in their hands, every breath could be her last.” He also warns them not to celebrate until she is safely aboard once again.
Yay a takeoff! And Lee says he’s plotted a course safely through the minefield! Could it be?
Yay! It’s finally in the rear view mirror! Don’t get me wrong, I love the design of this planet and the atmospheric lighting but the plot was really starting to drag. Better late than never!
Amongst the blue and purple glaciers, Makara’s battlecruiser glows green and orange with menace. The colorful sky casts rainbow light everywhere like a burst packet of Skittles. Out of the florescent maw of the catfish ship, a new vehicle emerges. Like the minivans from the assault on X Bomber, this Imperial ground craft looks and moves like a Matchbox toy.
The production design team have really outdone themselves with this planet! I can almost hear the discussion in the writer’s room– we’ve just done an orange planet. What if we made a planet that was every color of the rainbow? This ambitious idea is pulled off brilliantly.
Lamia looks wistfully out the window as Orion, feeling a bit introspective, asks her what she’s thinking about. He soon reveals he’s only interested in distracting her from using her powers of telepathy. If she gets a message out now he is presumably in big trouble.
Lamia wants to know where she’s being taken, but he won’t talk.
Snowy winds whip across the landscape. This buggy ride seems to last forever and the pacing creates a real sense of descent– as if Lamia is heading down into a hellscape hidden behind all the pretty hues and shades.
Aboard the Skull, we get an unusal high angled shot made possible by the wide spread of Halley’s cloak, which hides the puppet controls. It’s also an early look at the previously unseen interior of the Skull. It’s very spartan and gray– a stark contrast to the colorful prison planetoid where Lamia is.
Naturally, Halley is still trying to get through to Lamia. Realizing she may not be able to talk, but that she may be able to listen, he starts sending information. Speaking aloud, he tells her X Bomber’s crew are safe and looking for her.
Lamia hears him, but only for a moment. She calls out, mentally, but there’s no answer.
The puppet scale ground vehicle is a good match for the smaller model used in the wide shots. I love the details like the gull wing doors and the mechanical parts exposed at the rear of the craft.
The two guards get out first, then Orion leads Lamia into the snow. “This,” he announces in a weirdly stilted delivery, “is the entrance to the underground prison where you’ll stay for all time.” Way to sugarcoat it, Cap.
Lamia, in her desperation, calls out silently for Halley or Shiro– not Hercules or Benn.
As the four march forward into a cave, a pair of doors slam closed, displaying this strange insignia. I could be mistaken, but I don’t think it’s an Imperial symbol, perhaps implying that this prison is older than the Alliance and built by an extinct elder race, such as the one referenced by Makara a few episodes back.
Aboard X Bomber, Kirara is tired of hanging around crying in his mistress’ room. Now he wants to go berserk for awhile. He doesn’t seem to speak a language so he could be a bit telepathic himself– or at least have a telepathic link to Lamia. If so, he might know what is happening to her at this very moment.
Shiro is on the bridge, hoping Lamia can read his thoughts and earnestly believing she has the power to save a solar system. You gotta admire his blind faith.
As Lee adjusts their course 50 degrees, Benn orders Shiro to change acceleration to quantum speed. This is a rare discussion that indicates exactly who does what on the bridge and, as always, it’s super vague. There’s very little to build a head canon around if you’re trying to work out how the ship functions.
Shiro is lost in his thoughts and Hercules has to snap him out of it. But instead of biting his friend’s head off, Hercules offers him some comfort. “We’ll find her as long as we keep our cool.”
Like King Kong on a tear, Kirara storms into the room and immediately makes monkeys out of everyone.
Dr. Benn starts to talk to the agitated beast, but Kirara either throat punches him (from the gurgling cough Peter Marinker gives), punches him in the face (he falls over backwards) or chucks him under the chin gently as it appears in this freeze frame.
With no one to monitor the controls, X Bomber immediately begins to list and career all over space. If you know anything about interstellar travel, you’ll know that this isn’t going to happen unless Kirara just started firing some thrusters all over the place, but it’s a nice touch for dramatic effect.
As Kirara auditions for the part of the monster in a 50s B-movie, the others comically pop up their heads just out of reach of his pummeling fists. “He’s gettin’ kind of playful,” says Hercules as the others thank God that they aren’t dead.
Dr. Benn gives the order to use a tranquilizer gun. Hercules complies.
The use of a tranquilizer, which is apparently just a mode or setting on Hercules regular gun, might have come in handy back when there was an infestation of Mon-Mons.
After much groaning and growling, Kirara loses consciousness. Dr. Benn looks on with compassion. Apparently, stunning him was the only option.
The cave entrance leads down to an eerie underground chamber– it’s full gothic down here, complete with candles, shadows, and strange machinery right out of Frankenstein’s lab. This is hardly the austere gulag I was expecting!
A termoid guard informs Orion that it’s time to start the ceremony. Orion, in turn, tells Lamia that this is a gift from the Imperial Alliance. What is going on here?
I’m truly not sure what to make of this ritual. I did a bit research to find out if there are any Shinto or Buddhist rituals offered to the condemned before incarceration or execution and so far I’ve turned up nothing. Some of my friends in Japan pointed out that caves and candles are all an important part of Japanese religion so there’s definitely a spiritual vibe here that would clash with the Alliance’s fascist squashing of all culture. Maybe this room and the altar are leftover from an elder race that built the prison?
Alternatively, the Alliance could have a religion worshipping the Imperial Master. Could Lamia be unwittingly participating in a kind of demonic, occult worship?
Editor’s Note: The word translated in English to “ceremony” is “gishiki” which I’m told connotes more of a ritual than a ceremony. This word is a big deal in Japanese tradition where it can mean household rituals (see the 1971 film Gishiki) or something more major. For example, the “Engishiki” is a book of laws and customs dating back to the 10th century on the Western calendar and a “gishikiden” is a Shinto shirne mainly used for weddings. Thanks to Adam and Aika for their help with this!
If anyone has any additional information on what this scene might mean, please do let me know!
Kirara sleeps standing up. Shiro reminds us all that Kirara looked after Lamia since her infancy. If they don’t find her soon, he will “go wild” again. This leads into another flashback scene to Lamia’s childhood that sort of plays like a dream. Kirara is so single-minded that even his dreams are about protecting his mistress. It’s as if he was bred and genetically engineered to only have that purpose in mind.
“We’ve just got to find her, Shiro,” says Lee, heartbroken at the sight of this noble beast in such a state. Maybe you would find her faster if you got back to flying the spaceship?
After bowing his head for a second, Orion declares the ceremony over. Then he goes into full creep mode, calling Lamia “child” and saying he’s sad he won’t be able to see her face anymore. Gross.
Lamia posits a simple question for Orion. Sounding very calm, she asks him if he thinks what he is doing is right.
“Don’t talk to me of right and wrong!” Orion dismisses her question by labelling her as an obstacle to Imperial conquest. Lamia questions the need for conquest at all. Couldn’t we all be at peace?
Orion, lit by an eerie flickering effect, says that it is not the way of the Alliance. They are taught by the Imperial Master that they have a right to dominate others.
When Lamia continues her efforts to give peace a chance, Orion strikes her and she falls to the floor.
“I will hear no more of your sentimental philosophizing!” he cries. Possibly he’s showing off to make himself feel powerful or perhaps her gentleness has touched some part of him not completely destroyed by Imperial conditioning.
Orion is so intent on his rant, that one of the guards has to walk over and point out that Makara just entered the room.
Makara apparently overheard this moral discussion and sarcastically asks Lamia if she could really believe the Alliance capable of befriending other cultures.
“Why not?” Lamia is a trifle naive, if well meaning.
Makara asserts, like chairman Mao3, Stalin, and all other dictators, that conquest (military might and force) is the key to power. She also seems to believe power is an end unto itself and that the lure of it will overpower any positive instincts. She questions what the people of Esper will do with Lamia’s power.
Lamia thinks they will use it for peace. Makara counters with a familiar refrain– there can never be peace and those who think otherwise are naive.
“We all seek power. There will always be conflict!” she declares. Perhaps she’s been reading Robert Greene?
Giving herself the final word, Makara orders Orion to place Lamia in the capsule. He then orders the termoids to do it. The termoids have no one to order, so they have to do it themselves.
Now, Makara believes, nothing will be able to stop the Imperial blitzkrieg. Lamia can’t understand such senseless brutality and tries again to argue as she is dragged away.
Lamia’s prison turns out to be a stasis field contained in a plexiglass box. “Your fate is worse than death,” Makara claims. In this eternal prison, Lamia’s powers will be rendered useless.
Every limb gets clamped in place. Makara gives her best evil laugh as she says the Imperial Alliance will conquer the universe. Many trials have stood in her way, but the Alliance has prevailed. This is her ultimate victory. For some reason we don’t get to see her face as she monologues. At last, she comes to a control panel and throws a lever.
A second lever is thrown and Lamia’s capsule seems to flood with gas.
With one final evil laugh, the Alliance leaves Lamia in this weird contraption. It’s important to note that however she is about to be suspended, Lamia isn’t completely frozen just yet.
The moral debate in this scene is actually a good summary of the good nature versus evil nature plot of the entire series. I actually have some issues with both sides.
Lamia seems to think that if everyone tries hard not to fight, peace will be possible. But think how many conflicts arise between close friends and within families where everyone has the others’ best interests at heart. The solution, I believe, isn’t conflict avoidance but learning how to deal with conflict in a healthy way that doesn’t lead to escalation. The show presents a universe where some characters seem to be too far gone to get back to that state. The Imperial Alliance, despite Lamia’s efforts, seems to be a hive driven by a force of greed and selfishness. Yet I’ve detected traces of doubt in both Makara and Orion. Is there a chance for them to redeem themselves?
Makara’s argument, that there will always be conflict, is self defeating. If the Imperial Master conquers the universe as she now believes he will, then the only possible conflict will be internal and internal conflict is very much against Imperial conditioning– in which case there will be no more conflict. Her philosophy is like a snake devouring it’s own tail.
In the Christian tradition, human beings are both fallen (sinners from birth in need of divine grace) and also made in the mold of a perfect God (Imago Dei) so therefore valuable and worthy of love from fellow human beings. Shinto and Buddhism tend to advocate for a more neutral view of humanity, where individuals are swept on or off the course of goodness by external forces rather than internal moral failings. Hinduism, a religion sometimes cited as older than any other, is also one of the earliest to adopt a concept of dualism based on theories of consciousness-nonconsciousness. I’m grossly oversimplifying, of course. Dualism, and the idea that people are both good and evil, makes its way into every culture.
What’s the answer? Lamia will have plenty of time to think it over.
As the Alliance leave, the candles blow out; as if to say that all hope is lost.
As they leave, it is snowing. Snow is a nearly universal symbol of purity and frequently used in moral arguments as an analogy for innocence. But Makara has left the debate behind and reckons pragmatically that it will be useful for covering their tracks.
Lamia reflects on everything she has learned about her identity. What happened to her parents? Why didn’t Halley tell her the truth about herself when he had the chance? It’s a very good question, Lamia. What if Makara has been lying? What if Makara and Halley are both liars?
Halley and Lamia keep on trying to reach each other, but it seems unlikely that they will manage to make a connection now. Is this the darkest moment in the series?
As Makara arrives back on the bridge of her ship, a termoid takes a chance and commends his officer for a job well done. She doesn’t bust him down to cleaning the latrines, but she does completely ignore him.
For the first time in eons, Makara uses her symbiont to call the Imperial Master.
She reports in her masculine voice that Lamia, the F-01, is imprisoned in the electro-magnetic capsule. The Imperial Master is pleased and orders them to return to base for a celebration. Why doesn’t the Master imprison Lamia at the Imperial planet? Then he could keep a close eye on her. This is another reason that I think this prison was not built by the Alliance, but in fact left here by an elder race. They don’t seem to understand how it works and can’t move it.
Orion reckons that Makara is now gonna be promoted to the “executive counsel.” Sounds like a desk job with lots of opportunities for royal court backstabbing– perfect gig for Makara! She giggles with delight.
As Lamia pronounces that she has faith and Halley calls out to her, the Alliance leaves the prison planet unguarded. I guess the idea is that since this is a pretty anonymous place, X Bomber will never be able to find it, but in the Star Fleet universe the course of spaceships can be traced and tracked. Are you sure you don’t want to leave Orion behind with a couple of carriers, Makara?
She’s sure.
X Bomber and her crew are never giving up!
But the gang have a problem. Makara has “jammed the laser tracings on the radar screen” according to Lee. Everyone is frantic. They’ve lost the ability to track Makara’s course.
“We must have faith in [Lamia’s] power,” the Doctor says.
Shiro wonders is she might be dead– although Lee stops him from saying it. Hercules, always prone to anger rather than despair, wonders why Halley has been so quiet.
Does no one remember that last week Halley confirmed she was in the Aurelian Star Cluster? If Benn can’t find it, couldn’t Halley?
Snow is absolutely dumping on the rainbow prison planet, covering all tracks and traces of Makara’s presence here.
Deep within the prison, Lamia grows afraid. “I’m going to die,” she says.
And that’s the end! Talk about a cliffhanger.
You may have gathered by now that I am not overly fond of this episode, particularly the first half. The contrivance of the minefield and the amnesia about Lamia’s location undermines the best parts of the episode– such as the philosophical confrontation between Lamia and Makara. There is also sorts of nuance in the relationship between these two women. They are almost mirror images of each other. In addition to these great character moments, there is the moral viewpoint of the story laid out more starkly anywhere else except for the grand finale. That provokes me to a lot of thought and contemplation on the problem of evil, yin and yang, and other big ideas beyond the scope of this blog. And although the ending is one of the most dire and dramatic, it is undercut by ignoring a few pertinent facts that have been revealed to the audience already.
This episode also has a slow pace and very few action scenes. It’s a bit of a drag and I’m looking forward to picking up the pace next time!
I am learning just what a nuanced language Japanese is! The variant of “nemure” used in the Japanese episode title means “to sleep” or “to cause to die” implying that Lamia’s imprisonment may be lethal. https://www.tanoshiijapanese.com/dictionary/entry_details.cfm?entry_id=51105&element_id=65392&conjugation_type_id=26
Like Kal-El AKA Superman, Lamia’s powers could be drawn from the stars.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_power_grows_out_of_the_barrel_of_a_gun