Summary

Hitomi dreams of being back on Earth and hears her beeper go off. It is Allen, who stands a few feet behind her. Hitomi and Allen have fun at various places on Earth. Allen tells Hitomi how he gave up everything to be with her. They are about to kiss, but Millerna shows up in a carriage. Allen pushes Hitomi aside and embraces her. Watching in horror, Hitomi backs up a few feet and watches a tower in front of her get struck by lightning. The ground beneath her collapses and she falls into a chasm. Suddenly, a winged boy rescues her, just like the vision she had earlier. Hitomi awakens from her dream; Merle taunts her for calling out to Allen in her sleep. Merle offers Hitomi some bugs to eat then reveals that she’s eaten the food Hitomi had in her duffle bag from Earth. She also tosses around a bunch of stuff she had stolen from Hitomi earlier, like her lipstick, watch and pager. Hitomi yells at her and she runs up onto Escaflowne. Later, Van practices with his sword and Hitomi comments on how her pendant looks like the crystal on the chest of Escaflowne. She tells Van that she got it from her grandmother years before. Van asks her about her family, and she tells him about them. Van tells her how his parents died when he was young and how Folken ran away from his dragon hunt and betrayed Fanelia. Van tells Hitomi he’ll find a way to bring her back to the Mystic Moon. Meanwhile, a large fleet of Floating Fortresses arrive in Palas. Allen looks at them from a prison cell. Upstairs, Millerna argues with her father about letting Zaibach head through their country like this. Upon hearing him say that he wouldn’t allow this if Marlene were still alive, she figures out that Zaibach will be attacking the nearby duchy of Freid. Elsewhere at the Dragon’s Graveyard, a Zaibach excavation site, the commander gets a message requesting more energists from General Adelphos. Escaflowne flies over the site, having been led there by a tarot card reading by Hitomi. Van lands Escaflowne nearby.

At the cell where Allen is being held, Millerna comes downstairs and distracts the guard by falling then lifting up her skirt. Gaddes hits the guard in the head, knocking him out. Meanwhile Hitomi, Van and Merle spy on the excavation site. Van explains to Hitomi how Drag Energists are obtained from the fossils of dead dragons and used to power Guymelefs and leviships. He decides to attack the excavation site so Zaibach won’t be able to use them. In Asturia, Millerna tells Allen of Zaibach’s plans to attack Freid as they reach the Crusade. There waits Eries, who demands Millerna return to the castle. Allen brings Millerna back into the carriage and tells her to stay. He kisses her then takes off on the Crusade with the others as the Asturia Royal Guard arrives. At the excavation site, Van lands in Escaflowne and attacks. Escaflowne is able to take out two of the Zaibach Guymelefs relatively quickly. Van attempts to destroy the Drag Energist storehouse but is attacked by another Guymelef, which he chops the arms off of. The excavation site leader watching from afar realizes this is the infamous Escaflowne that Dilandau is after. Merle and Hitomi watch from nearby. Merle grabs a salamander walking by but it detaches its tail and flees. A guard standing behind them catches the two of them but Merle is able to escape. Van destroys another Guymelef and is attacked by a Bulldozer Melef that he also quickly disposes of. However, the commander reveals that he is holding Hitomi hostage so Van surrenders. Later, Van is tied up and struck repeatedly while Hitomi and Merle, who is hiding nearby, watch. The commander asks Van questions but Van refuses to answer so he strikes him a few times. To get Van to cooperate he walks up to Hitomi and lets his poisonous snake Nina get close to her. Nina wraps herself around Hitomi and is about to bite her when a noise goes off. It is Hitomi’s beeper that Merle still has. Van takes the opportunity to kick a sword out of a guard’s back which cuts him loose. Van proceeds to kill the guards and cut the head off the snake. The commander draws his sword but topples off of the cliff behind him, striking his head on a rock below. Van gets back in Escaflowne and transforms it into its dragon mode, hoping to destroy the energist storehouse. As he approaches the storehouse Escaflowne’s energist glows and the energist storehouse explodes, causing the ground to crack and crevices to appear all over the place. Hitomi slips and falls down one of them. Seeing this, Van tears off his shirt and jumps off Escaflowne, sprouting wings and saving her, just like in Hitomi’s visions. Later, Hitomi awakens in the woods to hear her beeper go off. It is Amano, who is attempting to page her from Earth. Behind her stands Van with his wings.

Commentary

This episode’s really good and ends with the reveal that Van was the winged boy from Hitomi’s visions. It probably isn’t the biggest surprise considering we saw Folken with wings several episodes back and Van is his brother. Speaking of Folken, this episode is a rare instance in this part of the series where neither he nor Dilandau appears. Outside of the excavation site scene at the end, this episode serves mostly as character development. We learn a few things about Hitomi and Van’s families (much more of this next episode) and Allen’s storyline appears to be moving forward in a new direction. The scene with Hitomi, Merle and the salamander is an interesting bit of symbolism. Speaking of Merle, she continues to provide a lot of comedy relief in this episode. Amano paging Hitomi comes at an opportune moment, but one wonders why he does this now when Hitomi has been gone on Gaea all this time.

Original Review: April 1, 2006

Overall Rating
4/5

Escaflowne Info

Director:
Kazuki Akane

Writer(s):
Shoji Kawamori
Hiroaki Kitajima
Akihiko Inari
Ryota Yamaguchi

Mechanical Designer(s):
Kimitoshi Yamane
Junya Ishigaki
Mahiro Maeda
Koji Sugiura

Character Designer:
Nobuteru Yuki

Musical Composer(s):
Yoko Kanno
Hajime Mizoguchi

Format:
26 episodes

Airdates:
Japan 04.02.1996 – 09.24.1996
U.S. 08.19.2000 – 10.17.2000

Comments

Comments are closed.