Amaim Warrior at the Border Episode 12: The Ghost of AMAIM Present

Hi Irina! I suppose the day this comes out will be the day after Christmast so hopefully you had a good time with great people. I am at my parental house at the moment and only had one cousin come over to it which is one more family member from the beyond that usually shows up.

Plus we have those plans of having a Prime Rib and a movie somewhere afterwards. Spider-man this year. Yeah, that’s about it for us.  We aren’t the most  exciting family here. Everyone else is usually states away so that is just how it’s been for a while here. Not a sad thing because we do like each other.

That sounds fabulous. We’re doing something similar though less family and more friends, also hot pot instead of prime rib. I’m really looking forward to it. Plus, we have a nice little layer of very white snow which is quite appropriate. I do hope we get an extra little dusting before the 25th because as you probably well know, white snow doesn’t stay white very long but I’ll take it. I was afraid we’d still have green grass for Christmas so this is nice!

So anyway, AMAIM. An anime where we spend time with the comfiest pair of mecha pilot terrorists we could spend time with. I mean resistance. This is not a good segue, but I’m trying. I would like to spend some time with them though.

I would as well. They seem like nice kids. I do think that the bulk of the conversation would actually be carried out by the AIs. Nice kids but not huge extroverts, you know?

I loved the opening stinger of this episode. Such a good opening action stinger with the reappearance of Ghost attacking and destroying the Asian forces on an island. Such a good James Bond or general action movie kind of cliche that I can’t help but enjoy every single time. I am a massive sucker for them.

I’ve come to realize through this episode that Ghost is in fact a pretty great antagonist. It’s what I call an uncomplicated evil. We know next to nothing about Ghost, their background, motivation, character… Heck, it may just be some stray programming misfiring without sense or reason. But I find that whenever Ghost is on screen, the tension tangible rises. And that’s not easy to pull off while keeping the character so mysterious and all.

At a corner of all the discussion and displays of all the information that the crew got to make sure it was verifiable. Especially since, to them, it did come from an questionable source, to them, of Brad Wyatt. Seeing the small bits of down time and tension building up as their next mission is being tested and measured upon. Poor Gashin and his continuous training or Shion and her worried pottery making. Amou just stressed out watching them. Yeah, definitely a good time…

Speaking of that Brad guy, I am kind of interested to see what his plan is like and how he is going to come out on top. I know he is waiting for the right moment to do something. I just kind of wonder what it is. Provides some good tension to the situation at hand.

I was also thinking, are they really going to base some big military strategy based on what some rando told them in a bathtub… Ok, it wasn’t a bathtub but it sounds funnier that way. These sure are some cuddly, sweet and trusting little terrorists… I mean resistance fighters.

I was also wondering exactly how Brad is planning to come out on top. I figure he’s basically throwing two enemies at each other. In all likelihood, at least one problem will be solved for him and I guess the worst case scenario still leaves his opponents weakened while he doesn,t have to take any risks with his people.


The amount of thought and little bits of strategy and preparation when doing the whole situation of the Ghost attacking the island. The saving of civilians and distractioning of Ghost itself. Lots of work gathering fishing boats and the AMAIM crew, including Shion who wasn’t involved last time, getting prepared to coordinate their plan on attacking the Ghost together.

I was a bit surprised by how the Asian commander acted and was actually treated in this episode. As evil as the guy was earlier in AMAIM, he still cared about his men and stuck around with all of them as they were running away from Ghost. Plus, the way our resistance members decided to take them along with the civilians on the island onto the mainland was great as well. Such small moments that might mean something later on. Or not. Hard to tell or we won’t figure out until later.

I had no doubt that the Japanese would show mercy. After all, they have been nothing short of innocent angels throughout this whole series. And really, in my opinion, that’s probably one of the weak points of the series. It sort of makes the entire thing a lot shallower than it could be.

But like you, I’m happy that they are starting to give some nuance to the antagonists. For a while it was just one impossible good side against a series of unfailingly evil antagonists and it was getting a bit tiresome. But this is more interesting. At least to me.

As for the main action of the series with it being simple but effective in the later half. Especially as the Ghost got stronger and our three kids just got more and more stressed out as the Ghost literally took everything that our kids gave it and more. That evolving factor of Ghost is kind of horrifying. They di some their combat creativity by pushing the pressure as much as they could on Ghost leading to the explosives, but nothing really hurt it. The cliff hanger of this episode is so strong and tension building.

So yeah, I liked this episode. It was Generally good with a lot of what it established and I was on the edge of my seat (despite watching this in bed) throughout the its run. It felt like a culmination of so many elements of the show over the series it has worked or established on to this point. The helping of Japanese civilians and fighting the Ghost at the same time. The Asian forces put international tension the episode in some interesting ways. It felt pretty decent all around. Could have been two episodes, but that’s ok.

Like I said earlier, Ghost is a great baddie. I was pretty wrapped up in this fight. I found it genuinely exciting and the cliffhanger ending had me actually saying No Way! It was cool. It is making me wonder what exactly is Ghost anyways. I hope they ccan figure out how to modify their own AMAIM to be that durable as well!