My thoughts meander a lot on this show. It’s difficult to pin down. There are elements I love so much that occasionally they blind me to other stuff. I try to explain this a lot better in this week’s episode review over on 100 Word Anime.
It doesn’t apply to the visuals though. There’s not much I don’t love about the way Fire Force looks. I may make a point to seek out this director’s works from now on!
The two first images are from Tamaki’s current situation (a slight overlap with last week) and the rest are a flashback to her earlier days on the 1st with Rekka, Flam and Li. And those are cool indeed. Flam’s power of turning flames into ice changes the bright yellow to a light blue which completely changes the tone of the scenes.
You can see those scenes aren’t about Tamaki. She’s an observer and a framing device. She’s away from the action, set at the edge of the screen or framed independently and boxed in by the scenery. That’s too bad, I would like to see more of her story.
Have you notice that Fire Force has a lot of vertical lines. It’s a bit like the characters are caged.
I could have broken up the screencaps more but the first half of the episode is just one extended fight scene broken up with awkward fanservice and as you can see, it all looks very similar.
Not much to say, the very yellow palette from the last episode is carried through. A somewhat monochrome looking sequence that emphasizes all the flames going around. Tamaki has weirdly changing proportions.
This is the end sequence of that same fight scene and as you can see, things are getting intense. For one the light has gone from yellow to blood orange and dimmed. The flames are now much brighter focal points and they cast shadows over everything else. Rekka’s eyes have also gotten much smaller, well, his pupils have. This can’t go one much longer.
Here we have the second fight of the episode, a sniper battle. Not exactly but you know what I mean. As the sun sets, everything just keeps getting redder. I do think there’s a lack of shadows in these scenes but that last cap is a brilliant composition. The frozen Rekkas between the two heroes of the battles, the sun blindingly shining through. Very nice. A bit obvious but very nice!
It feels good to be home! I’ve noticed that a lot of shows this season use orange as a predominant colour. I quite like it. It’s a little softer than yellow but gives that same warm feeling!
Oh and I ended last week’s gallery on a photograph, mentioning I might start a Pinterest board. The Pinterest part is not important. Look at this:
Last week’s photograph. I really like it. The sepia tone, Flam’s expression. It’s a good picture. If you blinked at any time you may have missed it this week. It was just thrown in during one of Flam’s lines:
It’s not the same image. The light is different, and those oddly weathered edges aren’t there. And those tears. I said in my review that Rekka’s death is treated very casually by the characters but there was this one tiny little image. It was great!
