Toppa Bashin – Episode 42

It’s time, time for the battle at least I’ve been waiting for, the ol’ Trope of 2 buddies, going at it in a fight to the (not quite) death.

I got nothing else to say for this intro, nothing witty or rude to say about the show, the only thing I want is some good ol’ fashioned Card Games.

Don’t disappoint me, you’re slowly worming your way into my good books Toppa Bashin.

“Death Is Rebirth” does suggest that this battle will fully eliminate “Jack Knight” and we’ll finally get “J Sawaragi” back.

Uchuuchouten repeats himself, that whoever wins this Battle is the one who has enough power to challenge the uh… currently unfought as of yet, King Uchuuchouten.

And almost as if this was planned, the Isekai Dome opens to a Night Sky.

Good audience signifier there, they’re showing us that its still daytime outside.

So the only way it could be Night time in there is if the sky they’re seeing isn’t Earth’s Sky, and we know of a place that has recently been darkened with a Night Sky, even during the Day.

It appears the Dome opening and connecting to Isekai suggests progress in Nine’s plan, the Domes were being built to draw out those who held Cornerstones, but it appears they may not even need the others if they’re all gathered here.

Responding to Isekai’s presence, The Cornerstones start glowing!

I got no clue what this means, Cornerstones glow for any fuckin’ reason nowadays. They responded earlier to the group’s feelings when Jack Knight left the stage and the only other time they have done is when a Chosen Card Battler awakens or when opening the gate to Isekai.

So it’s like what? Then again Nine said something to similar effect when he was defeated by Kyouka, perhaps he finally concluded that all the Cornerstones were gathered?

Jack Knight could be making the same observation, hence Uchuuchouten’s sudden wish to battle.

Bashin isn’t very good at being ignored. But in a battle with stakes this high I wouldn’t blame someone for getting offended that their opponent wasn’t even paying attention to them.

A Battle, from Turn 1?!…

No this has got to be a Joke, you wouldn’t reward my patience with THIS would you?!

Bashin makes a standard opening move, summoning DarkDinohound. He’ll have to end his turn after this.

Strangely, the Battle System doesn’t respond to DarkDinohound’s summon.

Before the absolutely MASSIVE bastard shows himself INSIDE THE ARENA.

It eventually hops up and takes its place in the Sky, at the very least we kind of know what’s going on.

Now that this Dome is effectively connected to Isekai, the Spirits will materialize here.

Oh fuck off, they couldn’t even give me that! Bastards! Jumping to the 28th turn!

I guess they needed that first turn to actually capture the evidently surprised reactions of everyone but still.

Bashin’s got a board of Spirits that are almost entirely Blue and 2 of which are new, so lets look at em.

Sharkhammer has the really situational effect of refreshing itself when your Nexuses are destroyed, while Deep-Arnold is just a vanilla.

Both are from BS03, so nothing astonishingly shiny.

Jack Knight has nothing particularly new as well, Dualcannon-Bell and The Sacred Mjolnir at Lv3.

His prior development when he used a Yellow Nexus has been exacerbated here, once again he’s here with an off-colour Nexus, this time Green.

5 Lives aside, they really do need to do the splitscreen for this more often.

Bashin seems to be well-focused on his Awaken strategy, deploying The Plateau of Duel.

Which is… Fairly strange considering his board is entirely comprised of Blue Spirits.

TwinRowdy Diranos follows the Nexus at Lv2.

His Board doesn’t really have any Terra Dragons, so I guess he’s just hoping to make strong attacks with Diranos refreshing after the effect, which makes sense given he hasn’t levelled up his Nexus.

Can’t forget to randomly destroy the opponent’s Deck at times.

Despite J’s offcolour Red Dragon and Green Nexus, he’s still predominantly using White in his Deck, which makes his use of the random ass off-colour cards even more confusing.

I did forget that Deck Destruction has other uses besides just winning, it can take out cards before the opponent has the opportunity to use them, Bashin might have been aiming to deal with the DarkDragonEmperor before it had the opportunity to reveal itself.

Bashin FULL attacks with everything, and the announcers go completely nuts trying to figure out how Jack Knight will respond.

And they show his COMPLETE disregard for the opponent by ignoring the problem and eating the lives. (5->1 vs 5)

He DOES have a Fruit of Life on his board so I guess it doesn’t matter too much.

And this is a strategy, the only life that matters is your last one, the rest is potential core gained.

There we go, that’s the name, a “No Guard” strategy.

You simply allow your opponent to play up until it would actually lose you the game, reaping the benefits of every other life lost until then. Its a thing you can do in Vanguard as well as damage accrues Counterblasts and gets you closer to a Limit Break.

Here we get commentary from the Peanut Gallery, Striker says the move let Jack Knight draw 4 cards, but Kyouka also points out that its reckless because its not like you can get 4 lives back.

…Wait, I’m pretty sure there is a way to get a hefty number of lives back.

Oh are we gonna see High Elixir?

Jack Knight is barely even looking at his opponent, he’s in an actually relatively bad spot all things considered, he’s at 1 life to Bashin’s 5. And with only 2 Spirits to Bashin’s 5 attackers.

So the fact that he’s just kinda “Meh” about the whole thing would be pretty irritating for any opponent.

J calls The Gigantic Thor at Lv3, and attacks with Mjolnir.

Follows up with an Invisible Cloak on Dualcannon-Bell

I know they’re doing this to expedite the process of Jack Knight’s attacks but 2 spirits attacking at once isn’t a thing.

…Once again, I feel the need to give the caveat of “Yet”, there are of course cards that do allow 2 Spirits to attack at once.

Bashin takes both hits from the Life (1 vs 5->3)

Thor attacks, which Bashin also takes from the Life (1 vs 3->2)

J destroys Mjolnir to refresh Thor and he attacks again, Thor’s currently stronger than Diranos, so even though he definitely doesn’t have enough attacks to win, he’s hard aiming to get rid of Bashin’s X-Rare.

With nothing but his usual combo no less.

Bashin eats that one, now its 1 Life vs 1 Life.

Jack Knight destroys Dualcannon-Bell, refreshing Thor once more.

How dismissive does one have to be to throw a combo that Bashin has surpassed before and likely will do again, while completely ignoring their existence?

Also J’s got only 1 Life, if Bashin lives this, he’s in very immediate danger.

Bashin has no other options than to sacrifice his X-Rare here.

Thor, with 8000 BP, happily wipes out the 6000 BP Diranos.

I’m not fucking sure what YOU’RE looking so smug for, your board consists of 1 Exhausted Thor and you have 1 Life, and a Green Nexus that is useless when you’re at 1 Life.

Even with responses in your hand, god forbid Bashin plays a Divine Chain on your ass, then your plan would be screwed.

Yeah its amazing what one can do when you spend 30 turns faffing about and then both players are reduced to a single life in one move each.

It would need to be in a refreshed state to begin with.

…Isn’t that a good thing?

Ah, God forbid we let Jack Knight have another 5 cards in his deck, this Deck destruction strategy is moving awful slow Bashin.

At least at Lv2 it beats out Thor’s BP scale almost entirely if Jack Knight relies on it to refresh.

With only 1 Nexus, Bashin destroys 5 cards in Jack Knight’s deck.

Still predominantly White, I also find it kind of curious, the Number of 2 reduction Red Cards Jack Knight uses, like Flame Tempest, as their reductions will be entirely fulfilled with a single DarkDragonEmperor.

This seems to confirm that Bashin’s attempts at removing the cards Jack Knight still needs from his Deck is pointless, he likely already has a method to win in his hand.

Bashin no likey Jack Knight big hand, Bashin go attack Jack Knight Life.

Jokes aside, he’s got an exhausted Thor, not attacking would just mean Jack Knight gets to keep the cards he’s using for defense.

Pure Elixir is not the show stopper I was expecting, perhaps a Silent Wall follow up post-block?

Deep-Arnold gets punched the fuck out.

Ah, there we go, that would do it, Pure Elixir into Silent Wall makes a nice defense when you have a remaining Spirit.

But again, god forbid Bashin was teching in Divine Chain.

Anyway with Pure Elixir, Jack Knight blocks Deep-Arnold with Thor, destroying Deep-Arnold, and Silent Wall ends Bashin’s turn.

They believe Bashin has made a mistake here by attacking with Deep-Arnold instead of Castle-Golem, as had Bashin made the same attempt with Castle-Golem, it would be Thor being destroyed, not Bashin’s Spirit.

While it is true, it could be that Bashin is aware of the DarkDragonEmperor being in Jack Knight’s hand, so he wants Jack Knight to bring it out at his earliest convenience so Bashin can fully defeat it.

Though I’m fairly sure we had an episode before where Bashin was too focused on destroying an X-Rare to actually continue winning from there.

Nevermind, apparently Bashin ALSO admits he fucked up.

WELP.

OUR PROTAGONIST PEOPLE, DUMBASSERY IN THE FACE OF HIS MOST PASSIONATE, EDGEY RIVAL.

What a mood-killer.

Though its welcome, Tensions are indeed high, sometimes you need a diffusal from it.

Jack Knight levels Thor down to Lv1 and then offers it as a Tribute.

Once again Hard-summoning his Cost 9 Red X-Rare, The DarkDragonEmperor Siegfried, at Lv3.

Upside, at Lv3 its BP, 12000, Matches that of Castle-Golems. So he can’t foolishly attack.

Jack Knight attacks with Siegfried, and its Lv3 effect goes off, wiping out all of Bashin’s Non-Red Spirits with 4000 BP or less.

Rock-Golem and Sharkhammer are both destroyed, leaving Bashin with MobileFortress Castle-Golem.

This situation is similar to before, Jack Knight needs a power boost AND a refresh to win from here.

Bashin blocks and then follows up with Scramble.

Scramble grants every “Fighting Spirit” +3000 BP during the Main Phase, but Bashin didn’t use it then, instead electing to use its Battleboost effect to bring Castle-Golem to 15000 BP.

This is the same conditions Jack Knight won under last time, Bashin attempted to overpower it but Jack Knight instead responded in kind, though this time Jack Knight doesn’t have a Spirit available to exhaust for United Power.

Pfft? Really show? Do you think I’m that dumb?

A BS04 Red magic, designed for use alongside The Dragon Emperors of BS04, by requiring their Double Symbol.

It hits a hefty 7000 BP or below Spirit on your Main Step, and during Flash Timing, awards a massive +5000 BP battle boost.

Both effects require a Spirit with 2+ Symbols to use, and the Battle-boost can only be given to the 2+ Symbol spirit.

This puts the DarkDragonEmperor Siegfried at 17000 BP.

Castle-Golem’s destroyed.

This really isn’t going well, twice now has Bashin pushed Jack Knight into a Corner, and Twice Jack Knight has used the opportunity to blow apart Bashin’s X-Rare.

Its almost like he’s saying “Throw the next one at me, I’ll beat that one too.”

He’s got almost nothing and yet he’s still hanging on by a thread with a big X-Rare.

Bashin’s got no board besides his Nexus, No Hand.

This smells like a job for Double Draw, and if we’re feeling generous, maybe Fourth Draw.

Though Jack Knight is likely holding another refresh Magic somewhere in his hand, there’s no way he doesn’t realise Bashin drawing a Spirit could be a problem.

There it is, Fourth Draw!

With an empty hand, Bashin gets to draw 4 cards.

One of those cards was evidently Siegfried, which Bashin summons at Lv2.

Bashin uses Call of Lost to bring back Diranos from his Trash and summon it.

Still scratching my head at Jack Knight’s defense plan here…

Here comes the Refresh.

Another Pure Elixir? Come on show, at least get a bit creative, you did that LAST time.

Either way, Dark Siegfried is refreshed, and blocks Diranos.

Invincible Shield? I don’t remember that card.

Oh, it gives a Spirit Armor to all colours besides Yellow and White.

Diranos gets vaporized by Dark Siegfried.

It appears the Nazo-Otonas don’t believe that Invincible Shield, a White Magic will stop Jack Knight, as he’s a Master of White.

You’d think a Master of White wouldn’t freely sacrifice his White Ace for a Red X-Rare?

Or Yellow cards, let’s not dismiss the fact that he can use Yellow Cards too.

There’s this really annoying frame by frame sequence where each member of Team Shomen Toppa say after each other, that Jack Knight has no White cards to use.

Probably the most humiliating position for a Master of White to be in.

Oh? He does have a White Card.

But its not one that can protect him in this situation, he has a Deadly Balance that he could otherwise use to destroy Siegfried if it weren’t protected under Invincible Shield.

Instead the only thing he has is White Magic that can make his DarkDragonEmperor Stronger, and not White Magic that can save him.

It appears Bashin’s trying to remind Jack Knight here that he’s a White-user, not sure why he’d need reminding of that, his Deck has been mostly White up until now?

Jack Knight has a bit of a breakdown, declaring that he could wield any of the other 5 colours he’s become proficient with (Not that we’ve actually seen him use a Blue card) but is now unable to win because of a card that is White. And of the cards that could save him now, he needed a White one.

But they’re classically ignoring that he could use Yellow but White would indeed be more effective in this instance anyhow, he’d need like a Same Tired or something to shut down Siegfried’s attack.

As Black is the inverse of White in this instance, “Black” seems to represent everything that White is not, which is to say, any other colour. Jack Knight’s break down appears to be that he can’t be expected to wield a colour that’s so far removed from what he is, The Black Jack Knight cannot be expected to wield White.

Its a bit of a silly conversation but Bashin completely sets aside Jack Knight’s complaints about Colour, an attempt to shield himself from the responsibility of his loss because he can’t deal with a White Card, claiming that cements him as “Jack Knight”

Bashin sets that colour nonsense aside because Bashin ultimately says it doesn’t matter what colour J intends to use, because its an entirely irrelevant point of discussion, the problem is not that he’s the chosen White Battler, its that he’s trying to be someone he’s not.

Its also possible to link this back to the “Adult” and “Child” theming going on with the show, this is effectively J trying to become an Adult far too fast, declaring himself to be, and completely discarding his child persona to do so, and everyone is effectively reminding him that yes, he his a child, and he shouldn’t be ashamed of being one.

Bashin wins, as Jack Knight is unable to answer Siegfried’s attack.

Bashin didn’t quite defeat the DarkDragonEmperor, but at the very least, he didn’t need to, he just needed to beat J.

You can’t hear it since this is a silent post, but J actively starts laughing.

J removes his black outfit, immediately returning to his usual White uniform.

The Lighting immediately changes to accentuate this shift, its very similar to how Spiderman 3 does it, actually watch it, Spiderman’s Red and Blue suit is accentuated with much different Lighting than his Black Suit.

Its the same here, the lighting is used to make J almost look like a shadow in his black suit, while it immediately shifts to accentuate the light tones of his White suit once he removes it.

Note how J uses the term, “I used all the power I was given“, he WAS using the Nazo-Otonas as a fast way to become much stronger, knowing he was already skilled. And yet still lost to Bashin who got even tougher with everyone else.

Can always count on Bashin to go through a tough situation and then end it with “AYO THAT WAS LIT, LET’S DO IT AGAIN”

They fucking hug that shit out. Most shows might avoid this, straying away from the gay, but this isn’t a situation that has anything to do with romance, sometimes you literally just need to hug it out.

Another thing that’s quite interesting is J felt like that was his only route to closing in on Uchuuchouten the way he was, which is why he was so ready to betray Bashin, the second it turns out that didn’t work he immediately discarded it, being shown another way out.

The guy’s probably so happy that there’s another way up to where he wants to be, no wonder he wants to hug the guy that showed him that.

Sportsmanship!

This was indeed the fight for the right to face Uchuuchouten. But this early seems, a bit weird.

Uchuuchouten orders him to open the gate. I wonder how this will go.

Wait are they seriously going to fight in Isekai? Now!?

Apparently its a little different, since Bashin is being summoned to the field as opposed to taking the position of the battler.

So, are they going to battle? Or is this just a chat? I’m fairly sure Bashin earned the right to straight up take you on no?

Bashin suggests that because Bashin is even here, that makes him the strongest card battler in the universe.

Tooting your own HORN a bit there Bashin?

Uchuuchouten confirms this is the case, apparently Uchuuchouten has standards for who his opponents are, impossibly high ones.

Bashin psychs himself up to fight Uchuuchouten but is caught off guard when Uchuuchouten finishes off Bashin’s Catchphrase.

That’s… a bit strange.

Alright, I’ll stop playing dumb for a bit, Bashin’s got a missing father who thoroughly enjoys battle Spirits and now we’ve got a Red-Haired “King” who’s completely unstoppable, known to be strong, and served by those who knew Bashin Touha.

And to hit the point home, finished off Bashin’s catchphrase, which at this point would be the first time he’s ever heard it. Because he’s never spoken at any other point in the series.

Therefore, analytical members of the audience may come to the conclusion that Uchuuchouten, is infact, Bashin Touha, Bashin’s father.

Bashin dismisses the strangeness of Uchuuchouten knowing his catchphrase, and decides he wants to say something.

Bashin thanks Uchuuchouten, because it was his interference that fully forced J into confronting Bashin as Jack Knight.

But then says that the two of them should not be members of the Thousand Spirits Group based on their position, and requests their release from the Numbers Elite.

In a surprise twist, it turns out both of them handed in resignations BEFORE Bashin took on Jack Knight. There’s no one for Uchuuchouten to “Let go of”

One might draw the conclusion that “Wait, doesn’t that mean Jack Knight thought he would lose? Then why did he think he could beat Bashin”

Just keep a note that Jack Knight would have immediately fought Uchuuchouten after his battle with Bashin, he resigned because he would have had no need of the Thousand Spirits Group after winning the battle, as he’d have attained what he wanted, fighting Uchuuchouten.

Oh, right, this, yep, gotta ensure that Bashin doesn’t go full hypocrite on us for the sake of coolness.

Bashin recalls that he promised he would defeat Uchuuchouten alongside J. And therefore can’t face him unless its with J.

Uchuuchouten initially responds in anger, I guess as the supreme ruler of Battle Spirits and the only other battler who could be considered the strongest in the universe, you don’t really get to experience many interesting battles.

He quickly mellows out, laughs and fucks off.

Well, I guess Bashin’s back from Isekai, damn I really didn’t remember much about this particular segment of the show.

That was kind of cool at least, seeing Uchuuchouten actually hold a conversation rather than ominously speaking to a crowd.

The NORMAL people in the room are promptly losing their shit because to them, Bashin said a couple words, Vanished and then got zapped back, and that was AFTER a hectic fight with real spirits happening infront of them.

Bashin informs J and Kiano that both of them sent in resignations.

A person’s resignation is usually a private matter for them, so J is quite confused that Kiano willingly sacrificed his position as Three when he adamantly refused to do so earlier.

And after far too long than should be considered normal for ANY father to make a compromise, Kiano promises to communicate with J more openly.

Notable here is what J says and how the subtitles refer to it. Normally he’s referred to his father as “Chichi-u-e” which is “Father” quite literally.

But here he says “Oto-ou”, which is more like “Dad”, as the subtitles represent here.

And here we learn that the reason J does not use a Kyoto accent is that he actively suppresses it, and occasionally falls into it when he’s “acting spoiled”

Imagine being rich and not using the opportunity to act spoiled.

Man they’re all just going down like dominoes, even NUMBER TWO is quitting, not having the inventor of the Battle System, and the creator of Battle Spirits will make exacting your plan much much harder.

Though it seems Uchuuchouten doesn’t really care too much about that, he didn’t seem concerned when Kiano left, and only ever seemed bothered when Bashin refused to fight him.

It just occurred to me that we still don’t exactly know what Uchuuchouten wants.

After everyone’s left the Kyoto Dome, we see Nine here alone with an empty and darkened stadium.

Well that’s not ominous at all, he’s exchanged his usual Black Suit for a Red one, and seems to be painting ALL the previous events as a “Game”

I guess with the locations of all 6 Cornerstones and their respective battlers known, he can finally move on to the next stage of his plan.

And that’s the episode! WOO!

A couple criticisms here and there, I really didn’t like how they sort of ignored that J could respond with Yellow Magic and acted as if White Magic was J’s only response, but I guess one could look at it as “Damn, he’s limiting the responses to Yellow and White Magic, takes balls to do that going against a White user”

The second complaint is that Bashin hasn’t yet defeated that DarkDragonEmperor, he managed to sideline it by charging an X-Rare into it to get it out of the way and get to J, but otherwise he’s yet to find a way to truly overcome that Spirit.

This could be an indication that the card may come back to bite him, given its yet to be defeated onscreen.

We’ve seen many new BS04 cards at this moment, but it occurs to me that we’ve only seen 2 BS04 X-Rares, one is currently in Bashin’s hands and the other is in J’s.

Another thing that comes to mind is, what will happen with J’s copy of The DarkDragonEmperor Siegfried? Will he continue to use it or will he stop? Will he offer it to Bashin? It IS a much stronger Siegfried but its also, well, indicatively Evil.

I am unsure that Bashin would so readily take the Key Spirit that represents Jack Knight.

I guess we’re not done with the show yet, so these might be questions for later.

The Batosupi Lecture just talks about Bashin and J’s battle, but notes that Red and White are “Best when closest together.”

It’s not entirely wrong, each Colour represents an opposite of another Colour, Red and White are opposites, Green and Purple are opposites, the same for Yellow and Blue.

And when mixed together you actually get quite hefty results because they cover the other’s bases, Green exhaust can support Purple’s anti-exhaust, etc.

Something to think about when you’re deck building.

In any case, we’ve got 8 episodes remaining, I’ll see you during the next one!