keyofnik: WELP GONNA BE LIVEBLOGGING THIS FOREVER AM I OF THE WHITE MOON? IS THIS MY INESCAPABLE LABYRINTH TRAP SET BY NEHELLENIA? THIS EPISODE?? My god, which of you do I start with? Okay let’s go with just loosely how I think this pairing (WHICH I AM SO EXCITED ABOUT HOLY SHIT) is going to go. First is this world they’re in. Now we just saw that Ami and Haruka’s trap was an endless loop where time and space don’t play by the rules. Until shown otherwise, I’m going to assume the same is true for Rei and Michiru. So they are in a place where these two people who rely on intuition and instinct have had that stripped away from them. I suspect that right now they’ve both been cut off from that sense entirely, or it’s spinning wildly and they can’t trust it. They’re like airplanes flying without instrumentation right now. It’s not them, it’s where they are. BUT THEY OF COURSE DON’T KNOW THAT. SO THEY OF COURSE DON’T KNOW THAT IT’S AFFECTING THE OTHER TOO. NEITHER ONE OF THESE TWO HAS A SINGLE FUCKING CLUE RIGHT NOW WHAT TO DO. But here’s what I think is going to be so beautiful about this, because Rei’s can’t keep like every single emotion ever from crossing her face, meanwhile hiding every single thing no matter how tiny is how Michiru lives. This is ANYTHING but tiny. I AM JUST MAKING MYSELF MORE AND MORE EXCITED ABOUT THIS YOU GUYS Okay. Okay. SO. So here we have THIS PERFECT MOMENT. Michiru. MICHIRU, YOU PASSIVE-AGGRESSIVE BEAUTY. Still with tiny smile in place, still looking completely unaffected, Michiru says, “What do we do?” LIKE SHE ALREADY KNOWS THE ANSWER. MICHIRU DOES NOT KNOW THE ANSWER. I think Michiru just fucking picked a direction like Rei did, but REI CANNOT KNOW THAT. Rei can’t know that Michiru is utterly lost, so Michiru completely evades having to make the choice at all. “Well we’re both clearly such intuitive people who have somehow divined opposing answers, which is certainly unusual. I’ll let you make the call though, surely you won’t steer us wrong.” And if Rei were confident, she’d pick her way, and Michiru would probably say something like, “You know best!”, and it would just look like she’s being the bigger person here and wanting to work with Rei. And if Rei picks Michiru’s way, then Rei isn’t too confident either, in which case any way is as good as other, and it won’t really matter, and again Michiru won’t have to look bad. MICHIRU CANNOT LOOK BAD. Rei gets this. Rei can’t look bad either. The problem of course is that in Rei’s eyes, Michiru is already winning the game that Rei has been playing her whole life. (HOW LITTLE SHE KNOWS.) I could spend another thousand words here on Rei and Michiru’s relationship but if I would like to not roll over onto Day Four of this episode it’ll keep. So instead I’ll just say, REI. THIS IS REI ADMITTING SHE ISN’T SURE YOU GUYS In front of Michiru — MICHIRU — Rei is basically saying she trusts Michiru’s instinct in this over her own, because she knows hers has failed her. REI. And if Ami is Answer Girl, Rei is Psychic Girl. This is what she DOES, and yet she already knows something’s wrong and she can’t trust that part of herself. That has to be killing her. BUT SHE DOES IT ANYWAY. Rei has come so far that without hesitation (disappointment, yes, but no hesitation), she admits that she can’t rely on her own gut, and so follows Michiru’s instead. Because it’s just too important. Rei is setting aside her pride, her entire sense of who she is, because it’s much more important that they get the job done. Michiru comes off looking the cool, calm, confident, in-control one, but she has to save her image above all else. Rei’s learned to let her arrogance on that go, for the sake of her friends. I AM ALREADY FUCKING LOVING THIS SO HARD
