English Dub Review: Zombie Land Saga Revenge “The Saga Incident, Part 2”

Overview (Spoilers Below):

Kiichi keeps going on in his quest to restore Saga to the way he thinks it should be, but not everyone wants to do things his way. Despite gathering enough supporters to make a difference through petitions and non-violent means, Kiichi is not able to convince his supports to have patience. Instead, they start forming a rebellion that attracts the attention of the army and Kiichi is forced to flee while Yugiri takes some of the blame for inciting the rebels.

Our Take:

Yeesh, I’m glad that story is over. While following Yugiri into the past to help start a rebellion against tyrannical overlords may sound fun in theory, these last couple episodes have been my least favorite of the season. In practice, they’ve been dull, monotonous, and rather pointless. And boy, do I hate Kiichi.

After enough begging and pleading he eventually attracts enough followers to perhaps make a difference, but due to his youth and inexperience, he can’t keep them united and infighting breaks out as a precursor to actual fighting as the rebellion grows larger and more violent than the lad intended. While Kiichi is whining about signing petitions, his recruits are planning on an armed revolution and Yugiri is making plans with friends in high places to ensure Kiichi’s continued safety post-rebellion. Honestly, any character in this story other than Kiichi would’ve probably been more interesting to follow.

Itou finally is revealed for the fake friend he is, but it happens in one of the silliest ways possible, as Kiichi finds him standing in a crowd of killed rebels and Itou says something like “told you this would happen”. I think the shock on Kiichi’s face when he realizes his only friend is working for his enemies is supposed to be sad, but it just comes across as really funny. This kid really is dumb.

My hopes for Yugiri taking a more sizable role in the story for part 2 were fulfilled, at least in part. She is relegated to things like making sure Kiichi’s old man takes his medicine and listening to Kiichi’s whining for the first half of the episode, but in the second half we discover that there’s more to her than she lets on. Kiichi’s fake friend Itou finally unveils his true colors and ends up challenging her to a duel in which he loses. That was the coolest part of the episode for sure, but it just made me question why we had to have so much screen time for Kiichi’s groveling when we could’ve been following Yugiri and her secret warrior skills.

In the end, The Saga Incident is probably the worst couple episodes of the entire show to me. There’s no real sense of stakes, because we have no idea what kind of Saga Kiichi wants since he only speaks in platitudes. There’s no real sense of danger because we already know Itou is a traitor from practically the first moment he’s on screen. And worst of all, the story that supposedly is meant to give us more insight into Yugiri leaves her on the sidelines for the vast majority of the double header. I definitely can’t wait to leave this old Saga behind next week.