Tuesday 31 May 2011

Gosick - Episode 19

It's Christmas time in Saubreme - but never mind, Christmas Day also happens to be Victorique's birthday, making for a double dose of celebrations for Kujo.

As he muses over what kind of presents he should get for his friend, he ends up being waylaid by Sophie on a trip to buy some tickets for a forthcoming production of a play - "The Blue Rose of Saubreme".  It's against the backdrop of this event that the remainder of the episode plays out, acting ostensibly as an opportunity to flesh out the back story of Cordelia and (to a lesser extent) Brian Roscoe.


Needless to say, this isn't a particularly wholesome tale to tell, consisting as it does of Cordelia being kidnapped, forced to bare a child against her will and then cast out into a mental institution.  Despite all of this, her relationship with Roscoe persists, and it is this which leads to her eventually making that fateful first meeting with her daughter, who she now watches from afar once again as Victorique finds herself tasked with solving an age-old mystery as events threaten to tear herself and Kujo apart once again.

Essentially, this particular instalment is really just all about setting up the final required elements of the story before letting it gallop out of the gate to its finale - something it does in a suitably moody and depressing way, but via story telling that was never really going to set the series alight.  Still, we're now most definitely stood at the precipice of everything Gosick has been building up to, so this is the moment where it will either prove itself or fall flat on its face like Victorique trying to run in a frilly dress.  Let's just hope it's the former.

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