Allison to Lillia - Episode 24

Another day, another episode of Allison to Lillia as we draw ever closer to this magnum opus of drug-fuelled insanity. Or something. Anyhow, episode twenty-four brings us "The Great Train Operation", although "The Implausible Train Confusion" seems like a more apt title if you ask me.


Of course, after bumping into Treize unexpectedly, Lillia demands to know what he's doing on this train packed with security agents while accompanying a beautiful woman. I was really hoping that he might... you know, tell the truth? But no, instead he somehow drags Princess Matilda into his single-ply tissue of lies, and as per usual Lillia takes it all hook, line and sinker. No wonder her own mother calls her dumb and pitiful later on this episode... Speaking of Lillia's utter stupidity, even Matilda notices straight away that Travas is her father (although bizarrely only on the basis of eye colour, which I guess means that Frank Sinatra is my father), while she is also at least human enough to think that abandoning your wife and daughter so that you can play secret agent and get to wear some kind of Madonna in concert headset on a train is a little upsetting.

Anyway, with Lillia placated and drinking tea like the class dunce that she is, something is afoot amongst the passengers - A student has collapsed (from drinking too much milk, judging by the animation), and the passengers are furious. Someone has poisoned their lunch boxes! No, I know it makes no sense, but this is Allison to Lillia we're talking about, so bear with me. The passengers then go to the train's buffet car to have it out with Travas and company, and while this is going on some masked assailant is spotted on the roof of the train and captured. One passenger admits that this female assassin wannabe is his wife (except she isn't - again, bear with me here), then takes Lillia hostage until Allison shoots at him and threatens him unless he lets her go. Seeing as Allison was useless with a gun in the first half of this series, shooting towards someone who is holding your only daughter in front of them seems like a rather risky business, but I suppose at least it's better than our hero Travas, who just stands around with his mouth agape wondering why this never happens when Madonna wears her headset. As the whole poisoning plot is revealed by Allison (who also seems to have inherited Travas/Wil's brains for such conundrums, again making him look like the secret service's answer to Inspector Gadget), by some miracle of chemistry and pharmaceutical genius the two guilty parties pass out in pain, having been poisoned themselves using some magical serum that only starts working once you've been caught carrying out your evil plot I assume.

So, with danger still clearly imminent, Travas makes the decision to split the train in two, somehow magically procuring a second locomotive, while also leaving his own daughter and wife on the other half of the train to their own devices, and possibly death, thus surely cementing his nomination for "Worst parent of the 21st century". However, even this little trick doesn't stop yet more people involved in this cunning plot to appear out of nowhere in what just happens to be exactly the right place, thus holding up the train containing the princess. During this scene, Travas also tells the train driver to ignore a car on the track and to "just push it out the way", which I suppose confirms if nothing else that physics (and specifically collisions) never was his forte at school, although to be fair given the number of times the laws of physics have been broken in Allison to Lillia he may well know better than me (and Scotty from Star Trek) on this occasion.

Really, trying to wrap my head around the 'nuances' of this particular episode's plot have made my head hurt, so I'm not even going to try rationalising it any further. I must go now, lest someone try to poison my lunch box....