Shinra and his friends are back! Hot on the heels (pun intended) of…a bunch of exciting things from season two…they are training hard, in a montage that quickly reintroduces us to the main characters. But wait, what’s this? Obi, their commander, is under arrest? What are the evil White Clad doing in the heart of the Tokyo Empire, and in the central cathedral? It seems that something is rotten in the state of Denmark fantasy Japan, as it were, and even Captain Burns has been…converted. Fire Force Company 8 is forced to make the choice that every good person in a dystopian coup must make—do you resist evil to the point of becoming officially a criminal, or do you go with the flow to protect yourself and your loved ones? This being a shonen series, the answer is clear: Time to break some laws and limbs to get Obi back!

I’m glad Fire Force has returned, and I will be watching it—even if the brief recap at the beginning doesn’t quite jog the old brain cells enough to remember precisely what was happening when we left off. “White Clad? Yeah, the bad guys in the KKK robes, okay. The underground fight? Well, I remember the cool combat scenes and the reference to Steve Miller’s “The Joker,” if not all the context. Now, what was an Adolla Burst again?” I watched all of seasons one and two; but a lot of anime has flowed across the screen since 2021, and the recap was too minimalist for me. But that’s one of only two flaws in this episode (the other is Tamaki’s “lecher lure,” an excuse to focus on her chest and undergarments that has far overstayed its welcome). Otherwise, the action and the characters are solid, and the scenes with the White Clad Second Pillar, Haumea, were compelling and chilling, especially the one where she speaks with Burns. And the animation—oh, the animation! David Production is on point! Might need to check out a recap page online, but the final season of Fire Force is off to a blazing start!

Fire Force is streaming on Crunchyroll.

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negativeprimes

Dr. Steve, aka NegativePrimes, was introduced to anime while working on his Ph.D. in literary studies, when the local anime club showed Naruto’s fight against Zabuza and Haku on an auditorium big screen. His favorite anime series include FMA: Brotherhood, Erased, Snow White with Red Hair, and Gate, and he also enjoys computer programming, gaming, and technology. Where he finds the time for these, after prayer, work, and raising several children, remains something of a mystery.

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