Rinne no Lagrange - Episode 9

While it's a little hard to know who we should be cheering on and who we should be fearful of within the intergalactic politics of Rinne no Lagrange, one thing we do know for certain is Villagiulio has no immediate plans to go anywhere.

For now though, he appears to be no immediate threat, as he sets up a hideout for his subordinates while waiting for reinforcements from Kiss to arrive.  The trouble is, said henchmen soon get rather bored with sitting around the house, and for Izo in particular television proves to be not so much of a distraction as an inspiration, leading to him deciding that his best course of action is to challenge Madoka to a duel.

As Izo sets off, so his two colleagues soon give chase to try and stop him while an unaware Madoka guides her new Jersey Club colleagues through the various odd jobs required to prepare for the school's culture festival.  However, our impromptu Kiss task force find themselves faced with all sorts of obstacles that prevent them from completing their missions - not in the form of physical resistance, but rather more mundane hurdles such as public transport, paying for goods and dealing with a bunch of excitable high school girls.  Eventually however, Izo's fighting spirit is diminished not by this, but instead thanks to a tale of Madoka's childhood and how she became the energetic girl she is today.

All of this combines to create by far the funniest episode of Rinne no Lagrange yet, which makes the most out of its Kiss pilots and their "fish out of water" experiences in the name of comedy to create some quality material.  Add in the usual frisson of Madoka's joyful obliviousness to everything going on around her, and perhaps gloss over the slightly forced dive into her back story, and you have an instalment that was a whole lot of fun, even if it only provided minimal development in the show's main plot points in the process.