Score 9 – “Blue Rose”

The mysteries continue this week in Karneval. Although they did manage to clear up thing, kind of. Yogi’s transformation was actually the result of some allergic reaction to Varuga air that was trapped inside that room in the mansion. That, and the fact that his band-aid fell off, which had been suppressing his “allergies.” It still isn’t clear why he has this condition in the first place, but I think we can assume it’s related to the Varuga experiments that are conducted by Kafka.

I’m really surprised that Tsukumo lost so easily to those nerds. Aside from the first episode, we never really get to see her kick much ass. The episode also leaves us with a completely ambiguous ending, at least to me it is. Is she dead, or isn’t she?! I’ll be fairly upset if she is, for multiple reasons. First of all, she’s barely had any screen time at all, so it seems really unfair to just kill her off (more unfair than the usual reasons to kill someone). Secondly, I really like her character and I want to see more of her. Thirdly, the way she “dies” seems like a total disservice to her character.

Karoku still remains a mystery to me though. He serves as this link with Nai, and he himself appears to be so weak (but not so weak to not carry around incapacitating needles), but other than that we don’t know much at all about him. We do know that he’s staying at a house filled with Kafka members like Erisyuka’s grandfather and that Uro guy. I also don’t know how Erisyuka fits into all this too, other than she’s infatuated with Karoku. The potential moral ambiguity of these characters intrigues, though.

I feel that there have to be a lot to explain the coming episodes to tie things together. Normally series like these draw the connections bit by bit, but I feel like Karneval has been leaving us in the dark for the most part. Either that, or I’m being inattentive/dumb.

B.W.