Drifters Ep. 6 Thoughts

The latest Drifters episode continues where the last episode left off. Toyohisa is furious seeing the Elven women being used as Comfort Women by the Orte army and resolves to kill every Orte soldier in the castle by execution. This upsets Nobunaga, who intervenes and knocks out Toyohisa and carries the execution himself, citing Toyohisa as unfit to pull such dirty tactics. The tension between the two Drifters goes further when Toyohisa refuses Nobunaga's proposal to be king, and rather establish a council that will govern the Elven race.

We later learn more of the Orte Empire being originally founded by Adolf Hitler himself, and continued his campaign from World War II, focusing instead of subjucating the demihuman races. Hitler, for reasons unknown, commits suicide and the Count of St. Germain becomes its current leader. But with knowledge of the Drifters rallying virtually the entire Elven race to revolt against Orte, Germain decides to go turncoat.

We briefly see another Drifter, Tamon Yamaguchi, aiding Griffin riders take on the Orte Empire's naval fleet.

Back with our main Drifters, they see that the Elves are only good with Archery and not much else, so it becomes an issue for Nobunaga when he wants to produce firearms for the campaign. We hear mention of Dwarves that can help with the crafting of such weapons, which reminded me of the Dwarf race from Warcraft. The episode ends with Joan of Arc and Gilles de Rais approaching the Drifters' camp. So we can expect the very first Drifters/Ends battle by next episode.

So this episode is a calm before the storm, and we get to learn a little bit of the new world the Drifters and Ends are in (which by the way, was never given a name, as far as I can tell). Not much is there to be said really. Both Nobunaga and Toyohisa continue to bring their philosophies from their time. Yoichi continues to be more on the sidelines, despite being among the three main characters. Issues I have with the episode are the introduction of Tamon, which is very brief and nothing to show interest for, as is Saint Germain.
With the series now at its halfway point, it's understandable that the pacing has sped up a bit to get to the major arcs as depicted in the manga. At the same time, it's a bit unsettling that this will be a short series as the manga is still ongoing. Like Attack on Titan and One Punch Man, we may have to wait a couple of years before a 2nd season is announced. That said, given the reputation creator Kouta Hirano and the Hellsing team on Drifters, I expect nothing less than epic fight next episode.