I didn't realise it was angling to be a prequel. Fascinating.
It's a bit... Incongruous though, given, well, the Nebraska family's already dead, and many other villains from the original series are dead as well. Knives may have been jet-engine-full-body-degloved, but I have no doubt he's not dead. Given he was still talking down to skull, bones, and muscles, I think he'll regenerate.
Ah well. I liked the callbacks, and the hints of S02. I think Vash's whole reasoning was a bit... Underexplained. Like he himself didn't really know why he was doing any of what he was doing.
I would have been happier if he'd declared that trying in spite of failure was the defining trait of Humanity, and chose to persevere on the Higher Road because of that, instead of just... Kind of agreeing with Knives, that he wants to just be a pet that lives alongside Humanity. His determination seemed at a disconnect with that outcome, but, it was still a good ending. Some actual, y'know, rebuttal against Knives' absolutely stupid reasoning of 'I genocided our crew for you, ergo it's your fault.' Like, that's nothing, Vash. Of course it's his fault. Knives didn't have to do that, and Vash would have survived just fine, as he has in this clearly worse version of reality that Knives created. Fucking awful manipulation, honestly.
I liked how they handled the Angel Arms idea way better in this. As simplified as it seemed, having an actual explanation behind the arm and its power made it way more palatable, as did the idea of all the destructive force being, literally, an issue of energy expenditure in the least harmful direction. Much cleaner and yet still interesting.
My only real gripe is Vash's general downgrade in tactical planning. Like, he's good, but he's very much instinctive. I always liked the perception that the dumbass-ness was a front, and he was extremely calculating, if only so that he could be a dumbass. His tool of choice was his gun, and it really was a tool, since he used it almost exclusively as a tool, and not a weapon. I felt like they replaced a lot of that with... Gun-kata, basically? Which is... Not nearly as interesting. I would have liked to see him do more cool moves with his bullets - more integration into his tactics beyond just shooting a thing. Strategic weaknesses, object movement, ricochets, etc.
I'll never forget Vash in the OG series putting 5 bullets in Nebraska Jnr's fist, in an aligned row, to throw off its center of gravity as it spun in the air, making it useless as a projectile, saving the 6th round for disabling the arm entirely. Fucking brilliant. Things like using tomato sauce as fake blood to look like he'd been greviously wounded in a shootout, etc. Loved that shit. Goofy on the surface, clever underneath.
Maybe we'll see more of it in S02. Maybe not. I enjoyed this take. I hope they bring back some of the old Vash.
His new black/blue outfit was p. cool tho.
