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Lazarushad a surprisingly weak outing with episode #3, but it still left plenty to be excited about for episode #4 and beyond. Despite the sudden stumbling block,Lazarus’ story feels as strong as ever, and hopefully, episode #3’s weak writing and overall presentation won’t be an indication of what’s to come for the rest of the series.
Lazarusepisode #3 picked up where episode #2 left off, with the Lazarus team discovering thousands of obvious fake Dr. Skinners when they tried to find him via facial recognition. The team had to follow more suspicious leads to try and track down Skinner, and soon enough,the Lazarus team’s search for Dr. Skinner brought them to his childhood home in Istanbul. There was a lot to digest in episode #3, despite the relatively weak outing, and episode #4 will hopefully be an even better follow-up.
What Time Lazarus Episode 4 Releases
Lazarus Episode 4’s Release Schedule
Shinichiro Watanabe’sLazarusis aToonami original anime, meaning that cable or other forms of TV service are required for watching new episodes live, although new episodes will be streamed the next day on Max. Assuming there are no delays,Lazarusepisode #4 will premiere on Saturday, April 26 at 9:00 PM Pacific Standard Time (PST), 12:00 AM Eastern Standard Time (EST), and 5:00 AM British Summer Time (BST), and it should be available on Max relatively early the following day.
Lazarus Episode 2 Review: A Notable Step-Up In Quality
Lazarus Episode 2 In Review
Lazarusalready had a great premiere, and episode #2 was an even better follow-up. In addition to still having plenty of great action and music, including the formal introduction ofLazarus’ amazing theme song, episode #2 also excelled narratively with how much it fleshed out the cast and the larger world, most notably with further developing Skinner as someone who grew fed up with everyone’s complete disinterest toward doing anything to save the world.Lazarus’ writing and overall direction continue to be nothing but spectacular with its second episode, and the rest of the series will hopefully follow suit.
Episode #2 also seems to have fixed the issue with the voice acting. While the voice acting in the premiere was notably stiff, everything sounded far more natural in episode #2, and while it still wasn’t perfect,the voice acting inLazarusepisode #2 gives hope that the stiff voice acting in episode #1 won’t be a regular occurrence. Overall,Lazaruscontinues to perfectly play into its hype, but unfortunately, episode #3, at the very least, failed to properly build on its momentum.
What Happened In Lazarus Episode 3?
Produced By MAPPA; Directed By Youhei Tsuchiya
InLazarusepisode #3, “Long Way From Home”, with facial recognition technology being a dead-end, the Lazarus team decided to follow new leads to try and find Dr. Skinner. Axel and Doug went to a homeless settlement to track down Doug’s college professor, an old associate of Skinner, and Chris and Leland snuck into Skinner’s house to find more clues. Chris and Leland’s search came up empty, and while Doug’s professor didn’t know anything,Doug’s professor gave the Lazarus team the idea to go to Istanbul and find Dr. Skinner’s beloved grandmother in the hopes that she would know something.
Axel and Leland took the lead in the mission to Istanbul, and before they could even start looking for Skinner’s grandmother, Bolinda, some thugs cornered them on the street. Axel had no problem fighting them off, but Leland was quickly cornered, and the thugs moved to cut off Leland’s hand to steal his shock bracelet. Before they could, though, Leland cried out that he was only there to eat some of Bolinda’s baklava, and surprisingly,the thugs who attacked Axel and Leland were all friends of Bolinda and stopped fighting them so they could take them to see Bolinda.
The thugs, true to their word, brought Axel and Leland to Bolinda, but unfortunately, she didn’t know where Skinner was and hadn’t seen him in years.The only thing of note was a video Skinner sent Bolinda where he said he hoped to see her later, which was noted to conflict with his plans to destroy humanity, and Axel, assuming that Skinner was watching Bolinda from somewhere, told him that they were coming for him. It was never explicitly stated that Skinner was watching them, however, and the episode ended with Elaina finding another possible lead on Skinner’s location.
Lazarus Continues One Of Shinichiro Watanabe’s Best Quirks As A Creator
How Lazarus Continues A Shinichiro Watanabe Tradition
If there was anything to take away fromLazarusepisode #3, it was how it continued a signature quirk of Shinichiro Watanabe’s writing style. When Axel and Doug were looking for Doug’s professor, Axel looked for his old friend Jerry for help, only to discover that Jerry had transitioned into a woman since Axel last saw her and now went by Jill. Axel, fortunately, was nothing but supportive after the initial surprise, soLazarus’ introduction of Jill shows that it’s a veryLGBT-positive anime, even if it only comes from a single character.
All of that is par for the course with Shinichiro Watanabe’s style. Most of Watanabe’s works have a notably progressive bent to them, with his characters and worlds always having different cultures built into them, and evenNetflix’sCarole & Tuesdayhad explicitly LGBT characters of varying importance. That’s always given Watanabe incredible depth as a creator by showing how much he wants to highlight the world, as a whole, soLazarusintroducing an LGBT character in Jill, combined with the pre-established international elements, makes it another Shinichiro Watanabe anime that perfectly captures one of the best parts of his style.
Lazarus Is Still Fun, But It’s Starting To Lose Steam
Why Lazarus Might Be In Trouble
Overall,Lazarusepisode #3 is probably the anime’s weakest outing to date. While the characters are still fun to watch and even got some good development in episode #3, the narrative has fallen into a pattern of everyone doing random things as they try and fail to find Skinner, and seeing how little progress has been made with the plot is already tedious after only three episodes.Lazarusis currently doing a poor job of balancing episodic storytelling with a serialized narrative, and it’s one of the biggest things currently holding it back.
Even the animation isn’t enough to hold the show together. As great as the animation is, it’s hard to keep praising the fight scenes when they keep serving little narrative purpose; not every fight inCowboy BeboporSamurai Champloowas important, but they served a purpose more often than not, soLazarusis falling short ofShinichiro Watanabe’s other animeby not making its fight scenes worth watching beyond a visual level.Lazarusstill has plenty of promise, but if episode #3 is an indication of anything, it won’t be as smooth as most people would have liked.
Be sure to watchLazarusepisode #4 when it releases on Saturday, April 26.
