Sakura’s school is having its annual ball sports festival. A climactic showdown between Sakura’s boyfriend and her new best friend is cut short by a sudden unexpected hailstorm centered on the school. Clearly, this is the work of a card. Sakura and friends must capture the card before anyone gets hurt.
The Card
It seems like the old rules where the person who forces the card to show its true form owns the card are no longer relevant. Granted, that hasn’t been relevant in a while, but they’re bringing everything else about the first season back. Why not one of the driving sources of conflict as well? This would have been a great time to give Syaoran a card since he’s the one who did all the heavy lifting this episode.
Do you all remember when the original dub was being brought over? It was marketed as just Cardcaptors, and the localization team did everything they could to make Syaoran a more prominent character so that it would appeal to their young boy target audience. It feels a little like CLAMP is trying to do that.
Once again, I’m a little disappointed in how these battles are going. I mentioned it in last episode’s recap, but Sakura’s greatest asset is her ability to think on her feet. The fact that she’s been forgetting basic things like “attack the ice card with fire” or “capture the card while it’s vulnerable” is upsetting.
It’s interesting that Syaoran has access to higher level spells, and his line about the old ones not working as well anymore may suggest some interesting plot developments down the line. But that makes me wonder; if Sakura is as powerful a mage as everyone says, why isn’t anyone teaching her any magic? She can use the cards, but she seems totally in the dark when it comes to non-card based spells.
I’m starting to wonder if Sakura being slower on the uptake than usual is a plot point, or if it’s just bad writing.
Akiho
This episode finally confirms what fans have been speculating about since Akiho was introduced. Akiho is the mysterious cloaked figure from Sakura’s dreams.
This is good for a number of reasons. Namely, the plot might start moving forward soon. To be honest, them drawing it out for so long was getting a little insulting. It was obvious to anyone watching that Akiho was the mysterious cloaked person, because who else could it possibly be? One of Sakura’s non-magical friends who aren’t mysterious transfer students who live in Eriol’s old house with their magical butler?
Kero
They’re only beginning to sow the seeds on this one, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Kero dies or gets close enough to make everyone very emotional about it by the end of the season.
Yue and Yukito have brought up the fact that if they run out of magic, they will die multiple times over the course of the season. Kero has been eating and sleeping more than usual like Yukito did before Toya gave him all his magic. With the Clow Cards, the source of magic that keeps Kero alive, in the state they’re in, it wouldn’t shock me if a future episode centered around trying to save Kero from disappearing.