CANAAN - Episode 6

Despite suffering from such a rough time almost since the start of this series, things are finally beginning to look up for Minoru and Maria in journalistic terms, with the former beginning to get his head around the whole "Borner" phenomenon, although admittedly his colleagues back at the office of this publication don't seem too enamoured of his story thus far. Still, with a pair of press passes for the upcoming International Security conference left under their hotel room door, all is well in the world for these two. Or is it?


Of course, for those of us watching at home the appearance of those press passes all but screamed out "It's a trap!", and while Minoru forgoes his pass to continue the investigations for his big story, Maria makes her way to the conference alone. From here, both individuals get some big shocks, as the former learns of the special power belonging to the seemingly mute Hakkoh, while Maria finds herself in the midst of a full-on terrorist assault on the conference, with explosions, gunfire and death all around. It's at this point that we see for certain that her prescence here is no accident, while Canaan once again races against time to save her friend, although in the grand scheme of things there may be some bigger issues at hand to worry about...

After mentioning last episode that I was starting to get a little tired of CANAAN's slightly unbalanced and daft-humour slanted plots, it almost seems as though someone out there was listening, for this sixth instalment is far, far stronger in almost every discipline that it needed to be. Yes, the humour is still there, but this time it feels utterly appropriate and in line with the circumstances at hand, and even then it was never allowed to shadow the actions and plot progression on show. Once more, it's that action that really grabs the attention, with some incredibly brief but fantastically well animated moments that are hugely pleasing to watch in their own violent way. The rivalry between Canaan and Alphrad is also beginning to come into focus properly too, leaving us with a series where all of the pieces of the jigsaw are finally beginning to come together. If it can lay off the over-use of humour, the next episode promises to be a superbly action-packed one, so fingers crossed they get it right.