Infinite Dendrogram (Episode 13) - Those Who Bind the Possibilities

The King of Destruction is busy taking on Franklin’s monsters, giving Ray a chance to confront him head-on. It’s not going to be easy, especially as Franklin has more tricks up his sleeve. Can Ray rescue the Princess?

What happened?

Ray made it to the control platform of Franklin’s embryo and confronted him. He told Franklin that there were three reasons for him doing so. Number one was to save the Princess, number two was to ask him if he believed that this was a game or not, and the third reason was to kill him. Franklin wasn’t too worried for as long as he had the Princess, Shu wouldn’t unleash his battleship on Franklin’s embryo, however, the Princess had gone. Marie Adler had swept in while Ray kept him distracted. Then, as Ray sought to end Franklin’s attack once and for all, Hugo leapt to Franklin’s rescue. Ray attacked and defeated Hugo, losing an arm in the process. He then killed Franklin and cemented his place in this historic victory.

Infinite Dendrogram Episode 13 Hugo protecting Franklin

What was your favourite element?

As always the fights are pretty entertaining, but the final battle with Hugo and then Franklin was excellent, even if there wasn’t actually that much the fight itself. I’m not sure why Ray had to sacrifice an arm, but the fact that he caught Nemesis in his mouth and was able to stab Hugo with it Zoro-style more than made up for that odd circumstance. A couple of things that I feel need to be clarified, because I’m not sure this series did too great a job of flat out saying it. Ray’s death earlier in the game was at the hands of Marie Adler. The forest that he returned to had been levelled by a battleship wielding Superior… Ray’s brother Shu.

Infinite Dendrogram Episode 13 Ray holding Nemesis with his mouth Attack Hugo

What have you learnt?

For the most part, I’ve enjoyed this series, but it certainly hasn’t been perfect. It hasn’t really connected us with the characters and that showed in my Best Boy Winter 2020 post as Ray was beaten by Rook because of Rook’s interesting back story. We never really found out much about Ray outside of the “game” and I think that made him a little flat. He is obviously heroic and considerate, but it would have been nice to feel these emotions with him. This series also spent too much time telling us things and not showing them, but amazingly also wasn’t explicit enough about some things. For me, making a connection with the characters is so important and with regards to story elements, it’s fine to be ambiguous with somethings, but you also need to know what the audience absolutely must know.