frieren episode 26 thoughts! i haven't done this since the end of the first examination and now we're almost at the end...
firstly: the camera angles in the flashback to fern and frieren talking about their strategy is great — they went for something similar to the handheld camera effect, wherein we follow the perspective of frieren's and then fern's eyes respectively. it's a great choice given that the conversation is so intimate, which only makes it more personal. this is between a mentor and her mentee who she believes has the capacity to rise so far above her. i like how, when we cut to fern's perspective, she's slightly looking up to frieren since she's sitting down whilst frieren is standing—it's a bit on the nose, but i like that metaphorically, fern still looks up to frieren, but frieren is not unreachable to her at all.
secondly: the side characters in this exam arc are so interesting and once again they get highlighted here. i love methode and her "i have many talents, but i'm really great at stopping people". i love wirbel's "i don't trust people easily, but i'm not stupid enough to let a winning horse get away."
but i think the easy highlight of this episode is übel. übel is so fascinating as a character, because she's so scary because of her capabilities. if she wanted to just go rogue and kill everyone, she very much could. so it's been really fun seeing her interact so thoughtfully with other characters, particularly her budding friendship with "glasses boy". i also like that we hardly know anything about her background, but we do get so much info from her brief flashback to her sister watching her sister cut fabric—in that her sister probably has a lot of influence on her and helped shape her character. i haven't sat down and thought about übel enough but i undoubtedly think her sister was a good influence on her.
thirdly: i love the themes of the second exam being about working together and being strong in numbers. if they had done this from the start, they would've done a better job. but i like that they obviously don't lol this is what makes them so believable as characters, after all. still, it shows that despite starting off scattered through the dungeon, it's never too late to try to work together, and make it work they did.
something i also like about this exam is the motif of knowing when to quit. "we can retake the exam in three years" is a sort, but very a heart-wrenching moment.
"This thought was quickly followed by horror as I totted up every feature that matched me. I had a lot of male friends. I said I wasn't like other girls - and if I didn't say it, I was always thinking it. But I was never saying it to show I was better than other women. All I wanted was to find out how to be like other girls and it felt increasingly impossible. The pick-me girl appears to me as just another way to dismiss female autistics."