Assassins Pride Episode 3 Review

This Is Unbeatable…
No, I Am Unbeatable

This episode seemed to be going along fine enough for an anime that hasn’t made the best first impression and then somehow in the second half we have power-ups mid-battle, reveals that seem to come out of nowhere (though at least now his stupid name makes sense) and the whole plot seems to be going onto a different tangent. Assassins Pride is looking like it is going to be a mess of ideas that while linked aren’t exactly connected in the smoothest of ways leading to an uneven and at times bewildering viewing experience. All that said, I’m still kind of curious as to where it will go though now I’m very much expecting this one to literally fall apart under the weight of its own issues.

The episode begins with Melida preparing for a festival at which point we get some pointed and incredibly clunky reveals from Kufa that he had never really been to one. He’s still vague about his origins but given he’s keeping the fact that he’s an assassin secret from her that’s all fine, but it does make you wonder where he grew up considering his response. Anyway, Elise and Melida are all fired up about the festival and then Elise doesn’t get to wear the school dress and after her classmates react she runs off to cry and Melida follows. That’s when they get attacked.

And seriously, Melida gets attacked more often than Bella Swan did in the first book of Twilight and that’s saying something given that girl was an accident waiting to happen.

However, this leads to a relatively cool and logical moment where Melida, desperate to save the two of them from a medical procedure that will probably kill them both, uses Kufa’s teachings, and the fact that she’s never been able to use mana so doesn’t rely solely on it, to fight back. This is definitely the high point of the episode and a nice step on her character journey as Melida has continued to show strength and resilience over three episodes and is assimilating new techniques in order to be more effective. If that had been the peak of the episode it would have been great.

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Unfortunately the girls are overwhelmed and rescued by their respective tutors, which also makes sense. What is a little less sensible is that Kufa then pursues the bandage guy and after exchanging some weak banter the bandage guy unleashes a man-made monster that is apparently fully maxed out. Despite that, Kufa fights the bandage guy and holds off the monster, though loses an arm in the process. We then get a random power up where Kufa essentially laughs off the claim that the monster was designed with maxed out abilities and proceeds to defeat it easily.

At this point I was wondering if this was going to be one of those anime that just kept pulling powers out of their ass during each encounter. The ‘you haven’t seen my true power’ moment that just kind of kills any conflict credibility. However, they take this one step further and give us a reveal about Kufa that on paper probably sounded cool but in reality just makes me wonder about the whole premise of this story. Maybe when we get a bit more explanation it will all make sense but right now I’m not sure who is still targeting Melida and why and I’m also not sure why Kufa suddenly wants her to become some juggernaut who stands above the whole world. It is all just a bit confusing.

While I haven’t been oblivious to Assassins Pride’s shortcomings, episode 3 puts on display the fact that there are going to be some real issues with how this narrative rolls out and it makes me wonder whether this will become critical damage or whether Melida being a pretty decent character will be enough to hold it together. I do know I’ve firmly decided I hate the OP. Anyway, I’m still watching this for now but I’m really thinking I’m watching at this point just to see if it falls apart.