Captain Harlock (1978) 1.16

Kei - A Farewell Song

Kei returns to her childhood home and visits the graves of her parents. She runs into her father's assistant, Kazuya. He shows her around her parents house. He is continuing the work of her father. Her father was killed experimenting in space. Kazuya said her father was crazy at the time but now he knows he was wrong and seeks to make up for it.

Kazuya wants Kei to stay and work with him. Saki, his younger sister who is in a wheelchair, lives with him. Kei thinks about it. She talks it over with Captain Harlock and decides to take Kazuya up on his offer. The first thing Kazuya asks her to do is get in a centrifuge. He then proceeds to interrogate her while the centrifuge is spinning around. He wants to know how the Arcadia acted on its own and rescued Captain Harlock, in the previous episode. She tries to tell them that she doesn't know, which is the truth, but they don't believe her.

Kei wakes up later, unaware of what just happened. The crew of the Arcadia comes to visit but they are chased away by Commander Kiruta. Miime sneaks into the house. She shows Kei what she has been unable to see up to that point, not all is as it seems. Kei sees Suki, whom she thought was an invalid, get up and walk around.

Kei goes to the beach with a shamisen, that belonged to her mother. Katsuya come to see her. She accuses him of killing her father to advance his career. He denies it. She pulls a gun on him. She shoots and kills him when he won't stop walking towards her. Saki sneaks up on Kei and is ready to kill her but Captain Harlock shows up and shoots her. Saki burns like paper after Captain Harlock shoots her.

The episode ends with Kei playing a farewell song on the beach as the sun set.

Thoughts

The title of this episode made me wonder if it was going to be Kei's last episode. It doesn't look like that is the case.

A shamisen is a three-stringed Japanese instrument.

Mayu is in this episode. She comes with the crew of the Arcadia when they go to see Kei but she is not with them at any other point in the episode.

There are no air, space, or undersea battles in this episode. I think this show benefits when it doesn't have them in every single episode.

This is by far one of the more interesting episodes. It did not seem to follow the usual structure. It gave some insight into Kei's past. It isn't great but it definitely ranks up there in terms of episodes of this show.