LogFAQs > #956619073

#50: Giga Slave
Nominator: @KanzarisKelshin (3/4 remaining)
Character: Lina Inverse
Source Material: Slayers

Scores:
Aesthetics: 7
Dominance: 4
Damn: 4
Total Score: 15/30

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqEvG06iU78

Ah, 90s anime. In this 2020s hellscape, where the world feels miserable and media keeps trying to subvert everything, it feels so quaint and pure to see stereotypes played straight.

The way the move tears up the terrain and so effortlessly displaces the Dark Lord's own beam attack is delicious, and the animation of Lina controlling it -- and the devastation to her stamina afterward - give the move an appropriate feeling of weight. The fake-out regarding its efficacy, followed by complete petrification and crumbling, says all you need about its power. Even thirty-ish years later, it holds up.

However, I have enough nitpicks that they become... is there a larger unit for "nitpick"? Something in metric, maybe?

First, there's the two entire minutes of buildup to it. Again, this is 90s anime. We all know how Dragonball Z was. This is nothing new. However, it's a stereotype that detracts from how cool this could be; as I said earlier in this topic, if your move relies on your opponent being dumb without you setting a deliberate track and/or trick beforehand, the domination thereof is less impressive. Furthermore, Lina is calling on a power that is not her own, nor is she making it feel more like a team-up attack the way Bayonetta and her demon buddy do. I'll probably make myself a hypocrite for this later, but I struggle to be impressed with borrowed power without one adding one's own strength to it. Finally, though it's not relevant to the scoring -- why the hell is this move called "Giga Slave"? It's a petrification beam.

Can we appreciate how magnanimous the dark lord here is? Dude is petrifying and crumbling, his opponent has passed out from fatigue, and he doesn't lash out or bemoan his fate. He just applauds his slayers on a job well done. Nice.

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