A Certain Scientific Railgun T

Episode 9

Like most episodes of this franchise, episode 9 has a lot going on, though in this case it's mostly little pieces of the bigger picture than any major events. Still, that approach gives all of the major cast members roughly equal amounts of screen time.

The safest roles this time go to Kuroko and Uiharu, who spend their appearance first in their Judgment branch and later in a records-keeping place called Bank Control Center, all investigating the girl who held Uiharu and Mikoto's mother hostage. Her name, which is also the episode's title, finally formally comes out as Mitori Kozaku, and unsurprisingly, she is someone who was sent to reform school for terroristic actions but is now supposed to be dead. More interestingly, she actually doesn't seem to be working for Kihara Ginsei. That raises the question of who arranged for her to get out of the reform school and make it look like she had died, or what her true role in this whole scenario is. Ginsei is clearly going after the base of operations for Misaki where 10032 is recovering. . . and apparently where something else very important to Misaki is located as well. But what is Mitori after? There's a lot still to be revealed here.

Saten also gets plenty of screen time, especially considering that she's the most unpowered regular character in this whole setting. And my, her talent for getting into trouble hasn't changed one bit, has it? She never seems to fully appreciate that Academy City has a very dark side and she's best off not probing into it, especially without Kuroko or Mikoto around for back-up; frankly, Xochitl smacking her on the head for her almost getting herself killed was letting her off easy. She also encountered Touma (who makes his first cameo here in a while) as he was doing a scavenger hunt, an event he was not shown doing in A Certain Magical Index II. Hence that places the current events of this arc after the end of the Oriana Thompson/Stab Sword incident, possibly even the next day but definitely in the gap between episodes 13 and 14 of that season.

Mikoto and Misaki naturally get the biggest chunk of attention, and I must say, I'm not buying Mikoto being even slightly convincing dressed as a security person; that the other guy seemed more concerned about her being from the wrong unit, rather than how young she looks, flabbergasted me. (But hey, this is a universe where Komoe is a real adult, so. . .) It's an amusingly different look for her, but one I was not disappointed to see be temporary. gensei's stunt with the double is pretty slick, but also predictable when he seemed to get captured too easily, especially when he was seen talking to Xochitl on the phone. But this is the first time that we have seen Misaki nearly panicked, so that again raises questions about what she is protecting. So does a character shown with a young Misaki in the Next Episode preview who looks very suspiciously like a Mikoto clone but acts differently, and the episode being called “Clone Dolly” (most likely a reference to the famous first-ever cloned sheep) only furthers that impression; could she, perhaps, be the first of Mikoto's clones? There's also the matter of what the mysterious “Exterior” project mentioned is. A lot of big truths should be revealed in the big flashback next episode, and I am looking forward to it.

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A Certain Scientific Railgun T is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.