When a story starts delving into time travel, I start to get this ache in the front of my head. It’s not because I don’t understand. As part of my engineering degree, I also minored in physics. I understand Einstein, causality, and the whole lot. The reason is because most of the time, it’s done so poorly. The one time I really enjoyed a time travel story, was watching Primer. For a budget of $7000 these guys made an amazing movie. Their practical exploration of going back in time, meeting yourself, and the effects on the future timeline and your future self was brilliant. It’s a pity more people haven’t seen that. Honestly, I hope Bones has, because what they are about to get into with Astral Ocean could either make or break this series.
Eureka is pregnant. This simple fact begins to unravel the paradox laid out before us. If Ao is sitting in front of her, how can she be pregnant? What Ao fails to realize, Ivica catches onto very quickly. This is not the same Eureka that he met 10 years ago. And when they realize that the Gekko-Go internal clock is 10,000 years ahead of the current time, they find that this Eureka comes from a different time that the one met previously. Or more accurately, she is from probably from around the same point as when she fell into Okinawan waters 13 years ago, prior to the burst there. Her two years of memories from being at this time are not there. And as Ivica flashes back to his first meeting of Eureka, during the fight against the Secret at Okinawa, it’s revealed that this current moment with Eureka may have been an influence on past events when when she first arrived. Our time paradox begins to grow.
The flashback is eye opening not only about Ivica, but Truth as well. 10 years ago, as Eureka flys (Yes. Flys.) away with the quartz, Nirvash is left to fight the Secret alone. In one final Scub Burst, Eureka disappears with the quartz. And the Secret is enveloped in Scub material, becoming Naru’s Sea Monster, and Truth. The transformation, from Secret to Truth, raises an interesting question. How sentient are secrets, and where do they actually come from? If Scub Coral is disappearing from the future to show up in the past, are secrets there to restore the balance? All we are left with is a ghostly image of Future Eureka, telling Ao that the Secrets are not his enemy.
Paradox’s, ghosts, meeting your past self as a baby in the womb, it’s all a bit heavy handed. Throw in a babbling Elena, and you start going from being a suspense sci-fi, to B rate film. While this episode is great, it’s also more of what we’ve seen in previous episodes, where we as the viewer get hit over the head with overwhelming amount of information and twists. What these feels like now, is that the series is moving towards an inevitable conclusion of scub coral taking over earth, but with a family reunion of Eureka, Ao, and Renton in the past. Or worst case, we develop divergent timelines between series, were the sequel becomes a prequel, which alters the future that negates the orginal.
Isn’t time travel fun?
ghostlightning
I am rather averse to time travel elements pulled into a story that isn’t a dedicated time travel narrative. That element does feel shoehorned in, as far as I’m concerned regarding this show. I’m just glad that Renton is somewhere beyond this heaven. All is right in the world.
We Remember Love 
Char could really do it, you know. He has that kind of influence. However, I think a repeat of that awesome bazooka headshot against Kycilia is in order.
Welp, Truth has officially raped whatever good can be associated with Eureka third hairstyle. Lousy, stinkin’ shapeshifter.
That half female change on the boat was also kinda freeky. Talk about androgynous.
Well that was disappointing
Hooray time travel! Did you ever get into Steins;gate when that was running? I don’t mind all this time travel stuff and I can tell the creators of Eureka Ao are having a fun exploring that idea with the recent episodes or are they having fun messing with our heads?! I certainly hope we get some solid answers soon!
Yeah I guess this Eureka arrived way to early! I wonder if Naru had something to do with messing up the timeline, but we did learn from Eureka Renton put the ship in the coral and he built that new Nirvosh? I just want to see him appear! I wonder if he is a bad ass older guy like Flint in the second arc of Gundam AGE hahahah
And we got to see ten years in the past and the creation of generation blue! That was some great stuff along with Ao and Eureka having the chance to actually talk, but yeah finding out your mom from the future is caring you inside her? Mind blown! Just imagine Ao having a younger brother but is basically himself…I couldn’t stop laughing at that thought!
Steins;Gate was somewhat different, as the entire theme was built around the paradox of time travel, much like primer. Here, it almost feels like an element to drive the plot to a deeper mystery. I know their messing with us, just how much is the question. With time travel a part of the picture, there is a good chance we’ll see Renton, which would be hilarious!
I hope Renton is rocking some facial hair like Flint in the 2nd arc of AGE ahahah
Speaking of steins gate, I can only assume i’m going to be reading about robotic;s notes here, right? Looking forward to it
Probably. I was a big Steins fan, and Robotics;Notes looks interesting enough. Too bad it’s in the noitaminA slot, which means we might only get 11 episodes of it.
But it comes with the obvious trade off of noitaminA, greater levels of creative control.
Agreed. I’ll continue watching with cautious optimism; however the series has done two things that frighten me a bit as a viewer, since they are two things that need to be done extraordinarily well to tell a good story. The first is, as you mention, time travel (and honestly, why haven’t more people seen Primer? It’s a great movie!) and the second, which you only briefly touch upon in this article but I think it’s equally important, is Elena. Or rather, the perspective that Elena’s episode had on the series. Her episode, which is very unreliable in terms of what is happening and what is “real,” casts a shadow over the entire series in terms of what is actually happening and what is in the minds of the characters only. In comparison, the original series was fairly clear about when characters were lucid dreaming during their trips into The Zone. There’s nothing wrong with either approach, but when Eureka Seven AO narrates unreliably and then throws time travel into the mix it’s making things very difficult for itself in terms of wrapping up the entire story coherently.
Cautious optimism. ^ ^
If you’re going to watch anything on time travel, it has to be Primer.
Elena is the wild card. Her episode leads us to believe that she has something important to do. What that is, it’s hard to say. She may even be another like Naru, who was exposed to a Scub Burst, and changed. I agree thta the story has been unreliable at times when the difference between reality and dream is blurred so much. Here’s hoping to a nice bow to tie it up at the end!
Think of how Elena matched 98% with Miller on the face recognition thingy. Now think how Eureka matched 98% with her old self. The 2% makes sense since Eureka was younger than the previous reading (changing only 2% after birthing a child, congratulations). Miller does seem older, don’t you agree?
Miller is Elena’s future self? maybe. With Time Pardox mode in play, you never know.
Pink hair: check. Bit crazy: check. Flies a heavily armed mecha: check.
Anemone’s offspring please step forward. (maybe).
While some people here are displaying cautious optimism, I was struck by this episode as a mark that the series has real potential. The time travel aspects may fail dramatically, but I’m not too worried at the moment – I like the idea of a time traveller who is passing through history in reverse, almost (their younger self comes further into the future than their older self will. Indeed this was the overarching plot of a series of Dr Who and it worked quite well there.
Dr. Who is an interesting point. There is a definite feel of that here. Hopefully the show can succeed even if the time travel element is a failure.
For me, the time travel thing is over and done with, at least for now. It took a moment, but I think everyone understands that the Eureka they’re meeting with now, is going to become the Eureka they knew… I think. Oh f*ck! Bloody, damn time travel! It makes even explaining the plot a bother at times.
The point is, that I think that now that we’ve established who Eureka is and where she comes from, we can move back onto the important mysteries of this time period. Mysteries like Elena and the Secrets… and that smug annoying bastard Truth. Overall, I thought this episode was stunning, though a bit messy.
Completely agree, stunning but messy. With the last half to go, still many mysteries to unravel. I’m looking forward to an all Truth episode where we finally find out what he really is.
Okay, at least the episode disproved one of my theories from last episode – that this Eureka is the real deal, only 13 years younger. I’ve also seen TIME PARADOX when Eureka and Ao started mingling and it’s way obvious that if this Eureka dies, Ao disappears from existence. That is, if this show follows that concept.
Also, it also disproved my other theory that Truth and Eureka aren’t working together, as obviously he was after her. Why Truth wants her dead is something I can’t put a finger on except that he probably just wants the Secrets to take over and screw the world, and Eureka can’t stop his plans.
However, the last theory I had was proved in this episode. The Secrets, apparently, are not the real enemy. Now, I am curious on how this will change the course of the conflict in this show. If only Renton shows up already, maybe he can help. 🙂
Well the next episode has the great revelation that they are making it out to be, then we may finally get that answer.
I actually liked how the story developed, I liked it a lot. From my experience in anime, most time travel tends to be of the kind in which the past can’t actually be changed. So, in the one only timeline in this series, eureka travels 10,000 years into the past, where she mets Ao and the chief. Then she travels 13 more years into the past, where she gives birth to Ao and where she disappears to an unknown time/place. I think we must still give time to the series to explain us a bit more since we yet don’t know what truth is.
The one line that said that Ao’s nirvash looked just like the one Renton was building gave me hopes for another epic turn of events.
So here is my take on which Eureka is which. The one from this episode is from an earlier time (her timeline) than the one that showed up in AO’s past. So the Nirvash that Renton was working on was complete in time for the previous Eureka to take it into the past, but not in time for this Eureka to be in it and brought back with the Gekko-Go. Does that make sense?
Mhm… I think there’s just one Eureka. This episode’s Eureka came from her time, 120000 years in the future, but I don’t think she went back to Renton, I think she directly traveled 13 more years into the past. In the flashbacks, the Nirvash with eureka looks just like the Nirvash she had now. I’m presuming that during that scene with the quartz she traveled again (we haven’t seen the result of this) leaving the Nirvash behind with generation bleu.
That doesn’t quite fit within the current series of events. She needs to go back to her time and bring the new Nirvash to this era for it to exist in this time. Right now she is in the Type zero (though no-one has pointed out that at the end of the original series it had changed to an all new appearance).
I think a third appearance will be necessary for them to set this world straight.
Wasn’t Ao’s Nirvash customized by the Japanese or something? That was the first impression I got; but anyways it could have got here from the future by other means than with Eureka like the Geeko. Thou, I believe they are the same Nirvash and whatever Renton was building is something else.
A third appearence? Of course! It wouldn’t be Mecha otherwise 😉
Well after watching episode 14 it’s all irrelevant.
I wont spoil it for you though if you haven’t seen it yet.
Nice writeup for a great episode. I totally agree with your point on the pitfalls of including time travel in a story. Up to this episode, I was more or less under the impression that they would play with the alternate realities/parallel universe thing, which allows the creative team a lot more room to mess around with. At least now we know why the moon is ‘love note’ free. Looking forward to the ‘revelation’ that the preview promised and a burly manly Renton to make an appearance at least in spirit.
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