A good chunk of this episode features Mio investigating Marie’s parents, trying to suss out whether or not the letter from Marie’s little brother is legit. We get to see Kyros’s head maid don many faces, and even perform her own stunts. After all, what sort of anime prince, lord, duke or what have you doesn’t have a super maid who can do it all? And even though Marie’s parents try their best to hide their duplicity (well, not really), ace detective Mio sees through it all quite easily. Again, what a super maid!
Honestly, I’m pretty tired of the super maid trope in anime. Where did it even come from anyway? I know Japan has a fascination in general with an idealized perception of Western European culture, but I would love to see a deep dive into the portrayals of maids and butlers in anime over the decades. I especially want to know who started this super servant nonsense. What was the first manga or anime to do this? And then who popularized it? Plus, I’ve always opposed the idea of servants devoting their entire existence to their masters like it’s some sort of personal calling. Reading “The Remains of the Day” has only hammered that in even harder. There’s gotta to be more to life than this. You’ve got so much in front of you, and you just… want to serve? For the rest of your life? Ah, but look at me. This is supposed to be a love story, and here I am pissing and moaning about Mio being a super maid. What’s wrong with me, huh?
It’s just funny that the love story between Kyros and Marie is lowkey the most boring thing about this anime despite being the prime billing. They go on a date of sorts, and I could barely stay awake through it. I’m not feeling any chemistry between them. And speaking of rants, I’ve always felt like you shouldn’t try to cure a person with romantic love. Marie’s parents stunted her growth, so in terms of understanding herself, who she is, her place in the world, and what she wants to become when she gets older, she’s like a young child. And as such, she should be allowed the opportunity to explore the vast world in front of her without worrying about love. Marie needs to build herself up to become a whole ass person before worrying about another whole ass person much less get married to them. Basically, I’ve never liked these romances of this sort. Hell, maybe this is a good argument from dropping the series altogether.
Anyways, it looks like the story is opening the door for Anastasia to make her triumphant return from the dead. Not only could they not find the body, Marie hears her sister’s voice while randomly shopping in the city. Then there’s that mysterious blonde child at the end of the episode. Coincidences don’t exist in fiction; she’s totally alive. We can thus assume that Anastasia was sick of being the golden child, so she faked her own death. As corny as that sounds, it is nice to think that the two sisters genuinely cared for each other despite their cartoonishly toxic and evil parents. It even looks like her little brother cared about her too. Somehow, these three apples fell quite far from the tree.
