‘Trigun Stampede’ Episode 9 review: “Millions Knives” might have too many sharp edges

Now that Trigun Stampede is heading into what Studio Orange is calling its final part, the arc of the series is looping back around on its earlier episodes and trying to tie everything together. This episode, “Millions Knives,” implies that we’re going to see the flip side of what Vash received last week in “Our Home.” Unfortunately, while the opening is a strong look at our antagonist, the episode spends half its time slowing the pace and resetting the stakes for what could be the last time. 

The flashback resumes from “Our Home,” only moments before Vash’s reunion with Knives. There’s a great sequence of him once again playing an organ (with the colors of the keys swapped, very clever) and reminiscing on how, in the past, to do what he’s doing now would have required Vash. There’s some particularly great, subtle animation for Knives’s movements here that really makes you appreciate the skill Orange has put on display. 

Up to this point, what Knives’ deal actually is has remained one of the larger mysteries of Trigun Stampede, and unfortunately, that remains mostly the case now. It does make more sense to see his reaction to multiple plants being literally burned up, compared to what we’ve seen Vash do across two episodes. However, this split between Plants and Humans feels somewhat out of left field this late in the season. The implication seems to be that all the Plants we’ve seen in the various villages of Noman’s Land are on the brink of exhaustion, and that this is now being put firmly on the shoulders of the people who use them. 

All of a sudden, Knives makes sense.

This shift to a slight environmental message (I’m not extrapolating; the episode makes it much clearer later) would go down fine on its own. Still, we have the added lines from human soldiers that say things like “Plants exist to serve humans,” which don’t line up with the humans we’ve seen so far. By adding lines like this, while it does allow Knives’ own Wolverine sequence to have a momentary catharsis, it doesn’t exactly help that my main takeaway from everything we’ve learned in “Millions Knives” is that Knives makes a lot of sense. 

Knives is still clearly the antagonist of this story; we’ve seen too much misery and monstrosity from him and those acting in his name to think otherwise. The problem is that, just as Wolfwood is later on, when “Millions Knives” resumes the present-day storyline, I’m finding myself a bit sick of Vash’s crap.

Vash’s pacifism has been challenged throughout the season, but at this point, we’re not just having an ideology battle between these two brothers. Thanks to Zazzie, the Beast’s reveal to a kidnapped Meryl and Roberto, Trigun Stampede is now asking whether humanity, which failed to prevent climate change on Earth, deserves another shot at stewarding a planet. As things stand right now, Knives has a strong point, and maybe these humans shouldn’t be in charge.

Vash’s schtick is getting old. 

Vash’s argument otherwise in this case doesn’t amount to much beyond a stubborn anime protagonist attitude. While the survivors of Ship Three – revealed to have survived all this time and have been in hiding – have the germination of a proper idea to pollinate and power Noman’s Land differently, Vash doesn’t even seem like he’s aware of it, much less engaged with it. Instead, he’s putting his head in the sand, convincing himself that he’s going to find some third-way solution to this whole conflict. In most situations, this would be fine, enduring even. Here, though, with the full context of what a Plant actually is, it’s not enduring – it’s Vash refusing to engage with reality. 

More than likely, this is on purpose, and Vash is in for a very violent reality check. Yet, I can’t help but think of series like Deca-Dence, which feature very strong sci-fi concepts to discuss complex topics like worker exploitation, but fail to delve further into them before the series ends. With Studio Orange talking about the finality of the next handful of episodes and no second season announcement in sight, all of a sudden, I’m questioning if Trigun Stampede can stick the landing with the wrinkle they added.

Even if Vash somehow manages to “save everyone” in this situation, there’s now a permanent question of whether they can actually resolve the systemic conflict underneath. All before acknowledging that the Worms are definitely sentient via Zazzie and were here on Noman’s Land the entire time!

Trigun Stampede needs to be more than really good setup. 

This wasn’t a bust episode; there’s still plenty to appreciate here. Knives going full Wolverine that I mentioned before, is both satisfying and appropriately scaled down compared to his attack in “Bright Light, Shine through the Darkness.”

Vash’s gun, which has been both the point of contention for longtime fans and a major focus in things like Stampede’s OP, becoming a physical representation of the wedge he drives between himself and Knives, is a good touch. For fans, I think making it a random gun Vash grabs in desperation rather than a specific model is justified in this context, but your mileage may vary. 

It may be that I’m more bummed we didn’t get a proper Knives flashback to mirror Vash’s, so I’m zeroing in on what was chosen instead to focus on. That said, Orange decided to turn the subtext into text. “Millions Knives” might be the moment Trigun Stampede starts to take a hit on its way to the ending, but I’ll choose to be unreasonably hopeful like Vash and hope that there is an endgame plan for the series. Otherwise, Orange has leveraged some very potent and real topics with no interest in actually storytelling with them, which would be vapid and disappointing for a series that has been pretty thoughtful and rich to this point. 

Trigun Stampede is available to stream now on Crunchyroll.

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Featured image via Crunchyroll