Sousou no Frieren Episode 15 Discussion

The dancing scenes were really interesting. The background characters did look stiff and a bit out of place (which is a rarity for how consistent the series has been in all visual fronts) but the actual focus on Fern and Stark while not perfect, still looked magical enough to work and there was a lot of focus on actually showing the dance routine and not just their facial reactions. Loved how the bond developed throughout the dance.

As a whole, it was a good episode. By no means the best but it just flew by well, and I also did like the moments that Sein and Frieren had, and seeing Sein acclimate to his new party, especially when having to deal with the curse that the flower monster was responsible for. He had his moments to display what he could while learned to rely on Frieren through the words of someone he respected a lot while growing up in the past. The series is a bit overdependent on reflection moments like these to the past for everything but it worked and Frieren got to show how capable she was with as minimal amount of time as she had after the awakening spell was cast on her. That looked awesome too. In terms of action, Madhouse and the staff involved with animating and constructing these scenes have been pretty much flawless and it continues on. The dance stuff was not as seamless and flawless but that was also difficult and to be fair to them, they did handle it better than what I would expect from a number of anime. Last time I enjoyed a dance scene was with Mushoku Tensei and I can't recall too many off the top of my head in anime that produced magic with it like that and this one in particular.

Also, some of the outfits in that 2nd half looked great, especially with Fern. She definitely gave off princess vibes there.

Its all about the cake.

So much happened in this superb episode, the world building, the interactions, the dynamics and the callbacks all seamlessly and naturally presented.

Whole dance sequence was entirely CGI and it looked amazing.
Also, the faint, yet geniuen smile on Fern face during the dance. 😊 Ship is sailing, bois!

Sein is already proving to be a great addition to the team. His worked hard in dealing with the tricky plant enemy that left Frieren, Fern and Stark asleep with its sleep curses. Sein helping to wake Frieren up and having her blast the enemy in one hit was not only awesome, but also showcases, yet again, how great the animation quality is with this show.

That same praise carries over to the second half of the episode, when we were introduced to Orden, whose family did hail from the same village where Stark grew up. Stark had to pretend to being the noble son of Orden, who sadly died in a battle not too long ago, just to make sure the town's morale didn't collapse. Along with Fern, both learned about the etiquette that goes with nobility and the end result at the formal occasion was a huge success. Seeing Fern and Stark dance, with the same smooth and impressive animation, made me smile while also making me ship this pair a lot more now.

As for Frieren, she's like me. When asked to dance by Sein, she chose to eat cake instead. As a lover of cake and sweets in general, I love Frieren A LOT more as a result! XD

A great episode overall, and also a good lesson from the latter half of the episode with Orden, where saying things you'll end up regretting, but then losing the opportunity to apologise and/or forgive when you never see that person ever again hurts. All the more reason to avoid arguments if possible, especially in that world where action and death are more commonplace. =(

Damn, I was pretty sure it was roto-scoping from the way it looked. Came here to look what other people thought only to find this. That's pretty incredible, it looked so good.