10 Second Anime - Musaigen no Phantom World - Episode 12

Things are going well for Team Haruhiko, but a scary new Phantom and the sudden reappearance of Haruhiko's mother ratchet up the comedy and suspense.

Episode 12 - "The Mother Hath Returned"

Heh.

Even with only one episode left, the Device is still only a foreshadowing, er, device. After all this time, Haruhiko finally showed it to Koito who already knew what it was. She was there when Ruru picked it up! Ah well, I guess it will be important now that Haruhiko lost his powers.

Also, this Phantom Vampire is the first blatant thing to show the larger scarier world of Phantom World. What's worse, is that the power she stole from Haruhiko, the ability to summon other phantoms, may usher in some world wide war of phantoms against people. Unless the Ruru character becomes the key to making this story a one season-length story, any other edition of this adaptation will have no room for a fluffy harem comedy.

Ruru. Jungian Archetype.

Haruhiko is back with his exposition prologue and it's the closest we've come so far in explaining who Ruru is. The big clue was how Ruru also fell unconscious when Buxom Vampire sucked out Haruhiko's powers. Who knew that Haruhiko's Shadow could be so adorable?

Good End Before Bad End.

It's almost Summer Break and the Haruhiko team members have become minor celebrities. Also, compare the kids cheering from the school windows instead of looking forward to a good laugh like in the first episode. Not only that, Koito has totally accepted being part of the team, enough so to joke around with Mai about it.

Everybody's got fans! Except for Haruhiko. Much to Ruru's consternation, she doesn't count.

My big complaint is that the drama and suspense for the last episode had to interrupt the coming beachside training camp. Damn you, Buxom Vampire! I wanted to see some real swimsuits instead of the gym uniform types we had for that crazy onsen gorilla.

Dangerous Colors of a Phantom World.

A couple of weeks ago, a stray Phantom Witch was granting other phantoms wishes. She may have had altruistic intentions, but she still ended up causing some potentially dangerous trouble. Her entrance into the episode was the rose-colored mirror image of this week's Buxom Vampire. Big hat, great figure, but dark colors, man eating eyes and sharp teeth.

My first impression was that she was dressed as a vampire hunter like Van Helsing, but she was going to be the vampire. Yup.

She scandalized the kids twice! First time by full-on sucking tonsils with a hot girl. Second time by making a dude's hot mom stick her tongue down his throat. That's two ecchi fetishes in one episode!

When Buxom Vampire first flashed her eyes at Cthulhu ("bu-bu boo!"), I thought she may have had a weakness against something Haruhiko summoned. It turned out that she was just surprised by his unique power and after she disappeared went to work on acquiring this phantom summoning power.

The officials had code-named her Enigma and had no description of her. Did she suck out people's memories too and Haruhiko's team was the first to escape an encounter without being compromised? I would have liked some clarification on that, but I guess we're running out of time for exposition dumps.

Mothers Are a Force of Nature.

Even if we have no idea what Haruhiko's mother's personality is really like, since Enigma was possessing her and taking advantage of her memories, it was still a lot of fun to see a mother without shame ask about her son's harem dynamics.

Obviously, Haruhiko's looks come from his mom. His hair must come from his dad.

Lending credence to the Jungian Shadow idea, Ruru was skeptical of Haruhiko's mom when he wasn't. Usually, it's the other way around, but Haruhiko missed his mom and didn't seem to care about details like where her luggage was, where she was living, why she left her second husband, etc.

Koito was on guard, like she was with Ruru's big girl self. Something smelled like a phantom, but not exactly the same.

Classic horror story phone call from Himeno-sensei, complete with scary glowing eyes behind Mai's shoulder.

The dinner conversation about Haruhiko's future wife was hilarious. More so because every girl, even Kurimi, thought she had a chance. That is how you manage a harem with a useless main character type.

Hmm.

Things are looking grim and exciting for the final episode. The Device will finally get to show its stuff, but what will the world look like on the other side? Are we going for fluffy anime adaptation ending? Are we going for a dark buzz building ending to invite more anime versions of the source material? Are we finally going to get to go to the beach and see Mai in a bikini? Some of those answers and probably more we don't want to even think about will be coming next week for the finale. I honestly don't know which way the story will go in either satisfying source material fans or keeping the light tone we've had with an anime original ending. Whichever happens, Ruru will be the key.