A Record of Grancrest War Ep3 an Unsteady Alliance (Winter Games 2018)

• Genre : Fantasy, Adventure, action, political
• Studio: A-1 Pictures

As the Grancrest War rages on, the battle for the Winter Games in heating up.

Between his energetic and surprisingly successful martial endeavors and his insistent heroism, Theo was bound to draw some attention to himself and that’s exactly what happens.

After gallantly running to the rescue of a village ripped apart by chaos, Theo suddenly finds himself under siege by the army of the ruler of the land. Thankfully, it seems that good deeds do not go unnoticed and the people Theo had protected and spared are now ready to pay him back and bind into an impressive army to overthrow King Savis.

In three short episodes, Theo has gone from a lonely nobody to King of the land with a huge army at his disposal. If you’re thinking – well that was quick, I am too. Grancrest continue to be the most generic fantasy adventure, although it also continues to be generally pleasant if somewhat forgettable. A few scenes at the beginning of the episode attempt to rekindle the veneer of complex political machinations behind the scenes but once again, these fall a bit short of anything with real substance.

As I was watching the episode, I got the impression that someone read the script then a day later, went over to the studio and told them about it and that’s what got animated. I can just picture that script littered with “and then this happened, and the that happened…”

And although the general is pretty predictable (despite our poor results in the Winter Games), the episode did take a couple of unexpected directions, at least for me. First, there was blood, quite a bit of blood. So far battles had been lighthearted and mostly non lethal but this episode featured quite a bit of graphic deaths. Unfortunately, this studio cannot create believable wounds. They just seemed like random red stains on charters which are likely to take you out of the moment if you had accidentally stumbled into it.

The animation is still serviceable but the grand war scene was a bit too straightforward and tidy to convey the feel and excitement of an actual battleground. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the horrendous but blissfully brief touches of CG.

The second surprise was an obvious budding romantic plot line between Theo and Siluca. Don’t get me wrong, I was expecting those two to get together eventually but I thought it would be much later on and more direct. When did Siluca become a fragile blushing flower? I hope she gets over it soon as a flustered Siluca is pretty boring.

The episode raps up on an intriguing scene of behind the curtain machinations from Siluca. I’m still of the mind that this show doesn’t have much to set it apart but I won’t deny that I’m enjoying the easy watch.

Predictions

Plot: Lady Marinne will accept the alliance but under conditions

Character: Siluca will continue to grapple with her evolving feelings for Theo – possibly becoming jealous of the priest Lady.

From last weeks predictions, I’ve learned that keeping these super broad is the way to go but those aren’t as fun. Let’s see what my worthy opponents have decided to do, check out Astral, Leap and TPAB‘s posts.