Claymore Episode 21—Invasion of Pieta (part 1)

In the jungle, the mighty jungle
The lion sleeps tonight…

Wait, this isn’t The Lion King…

SUMMARY: Having survived three Awakened Beings, the team of Claymores must now face even more powerful Awakened Beings that look like lizards, dinosaurs, komodo dragons, and other scary-looking things under the command of Rigardo, one of Easley’s chums (we hope their partnership was strictly professional and NOT strictly yaoi).

We see a flashback to episode 20 where Easley and Rigardo talk by the lake. We find out there was more to their conversation: Easley tells Rigardo that the three Awakened Beings sent to attack Pieta were all defeated but they were just sent in as sacrificial pawns to see how strong the Claymores were. Rigardo mentions he wanted to be sent in from the beginning but Easley tells him that he was just as quick to overreact as the three Awakened Beings sent in earlier.

Meanwhile in Pieta, Miria and the rest are all ready to take on these big bad Awakened Beings. They split up into their teams but are quickly overwhelmed by the YUUUUUGE power these Awakened Beings have. Is their power level over 9000? That is for you to decide. We see Pamela get sliced in half first and Claudia dies immediately afterwards in a similar, gruesome fashion (all the Claymores were ambushed). Easley, from a great distance away from Pieta, can sense the disappearing yokis of the dying Claymores and tells Raki that it was “wonderful” how “ephemeral lives” were being lost. This was a nod to the manga, by the way, where Easley and Priscilla both talk about lights disappearing in the distance one by one.

So, all is lost for Team Claymore, right? Time to throw in the towel like Lenny W. did with the Yankees back on April 28? I DON’T THINK SO, TIM. Flora and Clare double team an Awakened Being and chop him up into Fruity Pebbles. Other Claymores use their SUPAH POWAHS to pwn more Awakeneds; Deneve defeats an Awakened Being via headshot while Jean uses her GIGA DRILL MAXIMUM to rip apart another Awakened Being. Rigardo, off in the distance, can’t believe he lost three of his men and decides to go into Pieta himself.

As Easley and Raki continue their journey, Raki notices Priscilla was separated from the group. He looks for her but ends up finding her in some random cave naked (Chris Hansen is on standby so NO beasting from any of you) and eating a human. ZOMG SHE’s A YoMA!!!!11

As Team Claymore thinks they’ve won, all the remaining Awakened Beings disappear. Cue “Enter Sandman” because here comes big bad Rigardo with a yoki substantially bigger than all of the Awakened Beings Team Claymore was fighting before. He awakens and turns into the infamous Silver-Eyed Lion King.

No Simba.

Rigardo immediately establishes dominance by cutting both Veronica and Undine in half (Undine gets killed after Rigardo rips off her arms while trying to block his attack…ouch). While this is all going on, Raki thinks that he can get Priscilla to stop by going into his emo crying mode (it prevented Clare from Awakening in Rabona so I guess he can get her to stop being a Yoma here, too, right>?!??!1 lolololololol) but Priscilla goes into such a mood herself when she starts to cry over her dead family. Easley comes in and reveals to Raki that Priscilla isn’t just a Yoma—she’s an Awakened Being. OOOOOOOOOOOOH

Back in Pieta, Jean tries once again to use her GIGA DRILL MAXIMUM on Rigardo but he was able to avoid it entirely (wtf?!) and finishes Jean (word to Mortal Kombat fatalities) by driving his fist through her midsection, spilling blood everywhere. Just when Clare tries to attack with her yoma powers beyond 30%, she gets knocked away and Rigardo goes for Flora’s head and beheads her with one potent and powerful poke to her forehead (I made a mistake; she wasn’t beheaded.  Rather Rigardo sliced her in half vertically from the forehead down.  DAMN). The Fab Four of Miria, Deneve, Helen, and Clare all look on in shock at Rigardo’s sheer power.

RATING AND OPINION: 9.4 severed torsos out of 10. After a softer than cotton episode last week, the brutal violence we’ve come to expect and love from this show returns with a vengeance (no Die Hard with a Vengeance). The kill count for the Claymores after this episode is at I believe nine, with the YUGE losses of high rankers such as Flora, Jean, Veronica, and Undine. Rigardo has proven that his “Silver-Eyed Lion King” nickname isn’t some little punk-bitch kiddie name. And if you think he is just going to stop there, I don’t think so, Tim, because Rigardo is clearly NOT FINISHED YET (word to Cubicle Boss)

Those of you watching this show on ancient CRT monitors in pitch black rooms have been complaining about how dark this show is and I’m not going to downplay it at all; it is dark (but not Darker than Black HAR HAR HAR) but one thing I’ve grown fond of is the use of colors from the same palette in certain scenes. The scene with Easley and Rigardo by the lake featured lots of purples, and the moments where Jean and Flora got D-I-E’d both were accented with a heavy use of red just before we see the blood come out of their bodies. Then there were scenes in earlier episodes that featured lots of greens (Clare and Rubel in the forest, Clare and Ophelia in that town with the Awakened Being voiced by Nagato) and oranges (Clare’s first Awakened Being hunt and Galatea watching off in the distance). The use of red was a nice touch in the scenes before Jean’s and Flora’s respective deaths and the red was a nice touch during Rigardo’s awakening and in that last scene in the end.

SCREENCAPS (the rest can be found here)

Team Awakened Beings

Team Claymore

Unlike Bleach, people actually DIE in this show. Cases in point:

 

Rigardo is not amused

Jean: oh shit!

I’MA CHARGIN’ MY…awakening? O_O