English Dub Review: Fena – Pirate Princess “Mutiny on the Blue Giant”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)
O’Malley brings Fena in to Abel, who shuns her for minor injuries that Fena received. Abel explains to Fena some things about her mother and the rumored infamy of the Goblin Knights. O’Malley later learns that Fena’s heart shaped pendant matches one that she once gave Abel, leading to a fight that gets her crew forced off the ship, but she then decides to attack it with her ship. The Goblin Knights manage to escape the mine, but find themselves at a crossroad when deciding whether to rescue Fena, as their main goal was getting the coordinates to Eden, which turns out to be the location of a legendary sword called Kusanagi. Yukimaru goes after Fena anyway, even with an enforcer named Kei on his way to punish them for possible desertion.

OUR TAKE
As we reach the halfway point of the series, we also see a turning point where the factions involved in this race towards Eden begin to fracture. What started with it being more or less being down to the Goblin Knights vs Abel and O’Malley’s forces has splintered as recent events force individual motivations to conflict with others. We now know what the Goblin Knights have been after all this time, which is apparently a very powerful sword. What they need the sword for is unclear, but we are learning that their previous associations with the Houtmans, Fena’s family, may have been on good terms but were mainly for this purpose. We also see that they are so dedicated to this goal alone that Fena as a person is not entirely necessary for their plans once they’ve received the coordinates to get to Eden. Obviously we see that the crew of the Bonito see Fena as part of their family and were all gung ho about getting her before given conflicting orders. Now only Yukimaru is alone in going after her, possibly at the cost of his family and maybe his life. Credit to him, I may not fully buy his romance with Fena but he is sure working for it.

On the bad guy’s side, we learn probably the most we’ve gotten yet on Abel, who knew Fena’s mother to…some extent. I guess this means he’s not Fena’s dad because that would have been a pretty easy thing to say and be a pretty strong chance of getting her to see his side of things. Her not knowing her blood family hasn’t been a huge part of her character so far, but I could have seen a “blood family vs found family” thing going there if we were headed in that direction. And I don’t see him mudslinging the Goblin Knights really accomplishing much since we know for a fact that the crew Fena has been with genuinely care for her. So maybe Abel’s a former lover or childhood friend, but he seems quite invested in using whatever’s in Eden to revive Fena’s mother somehow. Though hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, which is just he’s done to O’Malley, who is now about to attack his ship because of how badly that whole situation went down. So yeah, everyone seems to be turning on everyone. Let’s see where that goes next week.