The Hypernatural and Supernatural in Madlax -- Episode 8

Episode 8: lost memory and clairvoyance

"Soul Words ~soul~": (魂言: Kongen)

Though this anime has been assuming the mode of a situation drama, in which each story is concluded every week, the disguise is abandoned at this episode. The show depicting the action of the bibliodetective as the main character is continued in this episode extending the story of the episode 7. Looking back the previous episodes of Madlax, it must be corroborated that the story lines have been developing on plural story axes, never reaching to a definite conclusion in any one of the episodes. This episode indicates the existence of the meta-perspective element, that functions in the attempt intentionally overthrowing the conventional patterns of serial anime shows that are usually aired each week, by means of its peculiar hypernatural directing method.

The avant shows a small village located in the middle of the jungle. A girl wearing a cape is addressing a woman with long hair. “So this is where you were, Lady Quanzitta.” The woman answers her, saying, “Nakhl, the mystic words are riding the wind, about to alight here.” These two characters dwelling in the village called Dwaiho are introduced with their names at their first appearance. Lady Quanzitta seems to be a kind of priestess who performs the duties of prophesy. Nakhl appears to be a sybil serving the priestess, but she seems to be performing some more important roles. But as usual, peculiar information is not afforded that tells her exact position or attributes. Viewers with keen awareness on the mode of fictional perspectives will be especially concerned with the newly introduced characters, regarding as to whether they are going to appear in the following episodes or not.

Madlax and the bibliodetective are riding their car through a dangerous battle area where bullets are shooting and shells exploding all around. A foreign car passes the checkpoint following after them, it seems to be in search of Eric Gillain. A copy of his identification card is clipped in front of the driver’s seat of the car.

Margaret is waiting for Eric Gillain’s mail at her home, but the promised scheduled contact does not reach her. In spite of that, she seems to be confident of his honest working. Elenore asks her, wondering, “You’ve only met him once, and yet you’re going to trust him that much?” Margaret innocently asks back, “Is that strange?” Elenore answers, saying, “No, I think it’s very like you, Miss.” Margaret answers too, “Oh, good. I’m glad it’s like me.” It is discerned through their casual conversation, that Elenore harbors deep affection and trust in her mistress more than usual faith entertained as a maid. That is because Elenore is not only aware of her sincere responses not restricted by generally accepted conventional ideas, but also of her intuitional ability with which she is able to grasp truths beyond the reach of logic.

At that time in Gaths-Sonica, Carrossea and Limelda are riding a helicopter in search of Eric Gillain and Madlax. Carrossea has adopted her as his direct subordinate pulling her from the position of elite guard officer. Asked for the reason of her allotted assignment, Carrossea answers her explaining the possibility of the reunion with Madlax. It seems Enfant has the power to rule the military organization, but his own particular reason why he has decided to keep Limelda to his service is not disclosed. A similar situation to the occasion of Chris Krana is again going to be enacted, who came to Gaths-Sonica in search of his father, reported to be the leader of the armed resistance group. By this repetition of actions that has the similar effect to cut-back presentation, it is observed that some kind of relationship is going to be established between Madlax and these two characters, now working as Enfant’s subordinates. But it is not yet clarified whether that is Limelda or Carrossea, who is going to be prorated with the meaning axis that determines the basic perspective of this show in the end.

Being forced to sleep outside the car by the hired agent in their camp, Eric Gillain is complaining of Madlax, “What a woman… Come to think of it, I don’t know her name.” Gillain wasn’t acquainted with the name of the agent he had hired for his protection. This trivial description is going to function as an ingenious underplot afterward around the end of this episode, suggesting the existence of an important perspective to be revealed in this fictional work.

Quanzitta readily welcomes Eric Gillain and Madlax as soon as they have reached the village Dwaiho. Though Gillain and Quanzitta begin introducing themselves, Madlax will not tell her own name, for some reason. Here, it is shown that Neither Eric Gillain nor Quanzitta were not afforded by a chance to be acquainted with her name. Madlax, leaving Gillain and Quanzitta to have their talk between themselves, goes back alone to the woods in order to intercept the pursuing soldiers. In the mansion, Gillain is asking Quanzitta about the book Margaret is in search of. Seeing the copy of the book, Quanzitta denies ever having seen a book written in ancient Eries letters that are called “The Holy words of Saruon”. Quanzitta tells Gillain that she has no measures to understand what the words mean, though she was taught how to read the script phonetically. It seems the title of the book reads “Sarks sark.” Quanzitta had another important information to tell. She tells Gillain of a cave painting written in Eries script near the village.

Quanzitta shows Gillain the way to the cave, where the letters similar to the ones shown at the beginning of the episode 7 are painted on the wall. She goes out of the cave leaving Gillain alone. Just before she leaves, Gillain asks her, watching the letters on the wall. “How do you pronounce the words painted here?” Quanzitta shows him how to pronounce them. “Eluda taluta.” They are the words the masked man intoned in the episode 4, when he used them as a means of mind attack in order to ruin Anne Morey and detective Marini. The expression on Quanzitta’s face is meaningful, when she pronounced these words looking back to Gillain. In this anime, expressions assumed by the characters carry subtle implications that are not easily fixed in conceptualized form, constructing peculiar effect with many angled perspectives.

At that time in Nafrece, Lucille, the linguist Eric Gillain had consulted with on the identity of the book, is talking with someone on the phone over the cave painting and Gillain’s past conduct. The person’s face she is talking with is not revealed on the screen. There is some vacancy of information left in the background of the fictional world, that the audience is not allowed to be acknowledged. The contents of Lucille’s talk, expressed in cut back presentation adopted as before, suggest something eerie is about to occur endangering Eric Gillain who has got into the cave.

“Eluda taluta. Sarks sark.” When Gillain utters these words, Madlax senses something during her battle with the soldiers of Enfant in the woods. At the same time, the girl with a doll in her arms and the boy Poupee who always accompanied her reveal their figures in the cave. “I wonder how many years it’s been since we last met someone.” The girl mutters. Asked by Eric Gillain, she answers her name, “Laetitia.” It is the name Madlax had used as her disguised name in her ID card in episode 3. “What are you doing in a place like this?” Gillain inquires wonderingly. In answer, the girl named Laetitia speaks mysterious words as before, “Just the normal. …Yes. This is a very normal place. But the place where you’re standing is at the edge of normal. Why did you come here?” It is not yet clarified about the true identity of the girl called Laetitia, and what kind of space the “normal place” is, she answered as the place she is located in.

Eric Gillain recovers his memory he had lost, presumably triggered by the influence he got by stepping into the “normal place”. At the same time in cut back, Lucille’s voice is heard talking to someone far away in Nafrece, about Gillain’s past conduct and the reason of his lost memory. “To put it simply, a memory block. Say, did you know that the brain contains neurotransmitters called ‘cannabinoids’?... A cannabinoid inhibits the flow of glutamic acid within the brain. In other words, it has the property of interfering with the process of memory creation.” Gillain had an abhorrent memory that he didn’t like to recall. The details of the recovered memory of his past conduct he had concealed is shown skillfully in cut back visual presentation. He had carried out his revenge too far to the delinquent youths who had violated his sister. It is inferred that his conduct was too ferocious a one to be recollected, and he had to confine them in the unconscious region of his mind. Gillain seems to have recovered the sealed memory by the influence of the words working like a spell. But there is no explanation given, concerning the psychical mechanism that caused him the result. There is no explicit information gained in any way of commentary, whether some logical explanation is affordable or supernatural power is actually ruling this fictional world. This work goes on with its hypernatural presentation to the end, without affording the audience with any conceptual clues that make objective understanding affordable for them.

As to the blanks between hypernatural descriptions that are given without logical explanation in the course of presenting incidents just as fictional facts, it may be understandable by applying whether multivalued logic in which plural opposite meanings are allowed without the restraint of exclusion principle that demands the alternative between affirmative or negative only in its logical inference, or the idea of parallel worlds theory advocated by quantum physics that presupposes the forking generation of many worlds. This depicting method must be evaluated as an expression strategy of fictional presentation to try to attain peculiar type of visual effect suggesting amorphous archetypal mode where fictional world is to be constructed containing various modes depending on the interactive procedure with the subject of consciousness. Numberless inconsistent elements coexist there, as a bundle of possible states of information before they are materialized in the form of actual phenomena. This viewpoint modality which is capable of catching glance of the phases in latent pleroma state is going to be developed into one of the significant perspectives that construct the main subject of this anime.

Eric Gillain says to Madlax, who has returned having annihilated the trackers Enfant sent, “It doesn’t matter anymore. It’s over now.” Gillain hands a letter to Madlax and asks her to send it to Margaret. At this occasion, Madlax hears the name of Margaret, another heroin of this show, for the first time. Gillain continues, saying, “I’m counting on you, Madlax.” Madlax asks him in wonder, because she had not spoken her name to him. “How do you know my name?” Gillain answers, “I don’t know. Somehow, I just know.” And he continues to say, “You know, I was supposed to just be rationally getting revenge. I was supposed to be avenging my little sister. But that wasn’t what it was. I just didn’t notice what was sleeping inside me, that’s all. …The ones who made me notice that were Margaret and Laetitia… and you.” After saying this, he jumps down the cliff and kills himself.

Returning to the city, Madlax sends the letter as Gillain had asked her to do. She has a queer sense that she has known the name from before. “Margaret Burton… I’ve heard that somewhere before.” It is not shown how she felt the sensation like deja-vu, at seeing this name on the envelope.

Carrossea is reporting the annihilation of the trackers sent after Erick Gillain and his death discovered afterward. But he tries to disguise the identity who requested the mission to Eric Gillain, reporting the person as a man. It is suggested that this man is equipped with some other purpose and will other than acting as a minion of the international criminal organization Enfant.

Margaret is reading the letter sent from Eric Gillain. “Eric was crying. …He was. I can see tear taints.” It seems this girl is endowed with some intuitional power that enables her attain judgement surpassing the limit of logical inference that is based on the analysis of cause-and-effect procedure of events. It has something to do with the ability of clairvoyance Eric Gillain gained in this episode.

Last scene of this episode shows Madlax immersed in thought. “‘Normal’? What’s that supposed to mean? What’s normal about it?” It seems there is not enough information afforded yet, concerning how the word “normal” the girl with a doll in her arms was telling in the ruins, is connected with the association of ideas in the existing knowledge system. The audience’s concern will be centered on the question what exactly was the incident that occurred on Eric Gillain, and its relationship with the other characters’ consequences of fate. As Eric Gillain has gained a mysterious connection with Margaret in his loss of Memory, the peculiar experience is going to be shared with other characters also.