SciLab finally has completed their own
dimensional area generator, which presumably doesn't run off the souls of NetNavis, and they've also managed to complete the vaccine chip, a battlechip designed to reverse the effects of Dark Chips. With everything in place, it's time to get ProtoMan back.The cast lay a trap for ProtoMan, knowing he'll show up to destroy SciLab's dimensional area generator for Nebula to retain their advantage. They lure ProtoMan out there, then trap him inside with Lan, who will use his Cross-Fusion to plant the vaccine chip on ProtoMan. Chaud also manages to sneak into the dimensional area before it goes up.
The plan works, almost, but the Dark Chip is regenerated in ProtoMan, and apparently much stronger than a normal chip. ProtoMan blasts Lan, but Lan and MegaMan take the shot dead on, trying to absorb ProtoMan's dark aura. Lan continually suffers the beating, draining off as much energy as he can. Chaud joins the frey, as he jumps straight into ProtoMan and Cross-Fuses with him. Now Lan has to deal with a dark chip corrupted Chaud, as Chaud and ProtoMan duke it out in their combined mind.
Memories have been sealed away in ProtoMan, from earlier times of Chaud and his past. ProtoMan tries to fight back against it, but Chaud is persistent. Chaud even takes direct blasts from ProtoMan, which phase him, but don't keep him down. Chaud gets close enough to ProtoMan, and hugs him, telling ProtoMan that, "no matter how dark your heart has become, you'll always be my NetNavi." This, combined with Lan draining more of ProtoMan's dark aura destroys the dark chip, and ProtoMan becomes free of it's grasp.
ProtoMan is back, although completely exhausted, along with everyone else, especially Lan, who is pretty fucked up from the ordeal. ProtoMan musters some strength to apologize and thank Chaud for saving him. Chaud thinks it's time for a vacation.
Critique
Some episodes in an anime are more anime than others. This episode is definitely a 10 on the anime scale. If you're not exactly sure what I mean, you might consider cutting down your anime intake just a bit. But lets not hold that against the episode. Let's also not hold the title, which is the fucking 5th episode to be titled "Soandso Returns," because at least this time it makes some contextual sense.
This episode doesn't really go out of it's way to make a hell of a lot of sense, but it doesn't dwell on anything like the last train wreck of an episode, and for once, the dimensional area doesn't look like ass. This is one of the key episodes of the season, so you would expect a bit of a higher quality for it than normal, and I think it delivers what it promises. Yeah, it goes off on the power of friendship trope a lot, but that's pretty standard for Battle Network in general. This is a good episode to watch though, and it brings resolution to the biggest story arc of Axess.
Let us bow our heads in a moment of silence though, for the loss of Evil ProtoMan. I've prepared a eulogy..., Ahem...
I knew Proto Man as that asshole in Mega Man 3, who would annoyingly get in my way between Shadow Man, Hard Man, and Magnet Man. I would forgive him though, for he had sunglasses and a scarf, which made him look at least three times cooler than Mega Man, and style matters quite a bit.
In Mega Man 5, Proto Man would stand with his trade mark smirk among eight new worthless robot masters. This Proto Man would turn out to be a phony, but the sentiment remained the same. In Mega Man 7, Proto Man thought it necessary to attack us in Shade Man's stage for the hell of it, but at least he gave us a present.
Proto Man then took his evilness to the next level in the Ruby-Spears production of Mega Man. Proto Man cast away his moral ambiguity for a more conspicuous stance, "being the bad guy is awesome." From his creation of just randomly smashing shit for the hell of it, to attempting to blast Abraham Lincoln, Proto Man reveled in his new found love for doing the wrong thing.
He had a soft spot though, he always tried to convince Mega Man to, "join the bad side bro." And Mega Man would one day reveal, that even Proto Man's awesomeness would not go unnoticed by him. "The truth is, I've always really wanted a brother relationship with you, Proto Man."
And who wouldn't? How many of us can say we've had a brother half as cool as Proto Man, even if he was evil? ProtoMan.Exe would then take stints in the Battle Network series, acting more like an asshole than straight up evil, but the corruption of the Dark Chip would bring back that smugness we all know and love to the role, delivering such memorable lines as, "Chaud, you mean nothing to me!"
Eventually, ProtoMan would cast aside his evil ways, and even actively help Mega Man as recently as Mega Man 10, and that's a damn shame. Evil Proto Man, we hardly knew ye, but at least we still got Bass... for now...
Rating: Thumbs up!
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