Dr. Stone Episode 14

Master of Flame

I have a bold prediction here. When Senku’s last name is finally revealed it’s going to be something like “Einstein.” Sounds like a pretty good prediction, doesn’t it? If that’s the case I promise you right now that I’ll lower my rating of this series — currently it’s a 5/10 for me.

But this week’s episode actually had nothing to do with Senku’s last name. It’s just that the Grand Bout is coming to an end and I assume we’ll learn about Senku’s last name after it from Ruri. Oh, and I should also mention I was wrong about how the Grand Bout progressed.

I figured the fight between Kinro and Magma was over at the end of the previous episode, but clearly that wasn’t the case. I’ll be discussing this further in the next section.

For now what I want to mention is the new OP (and ED, though I have nothing to say about that) which premiered with this episode. First of all, the song for this OP is better than the song for the previous OP, so that’s already a plus.

But what this episode really does which the first one didn’t is make the series actually look like it’s going to be good. I still don’t think it will be good, but at least the new OP at least gives the impression that the series is going to be good.

We also saw a few new characters teased. One appeared to be a follower of Tsukasa and I’m assuming he’ll be the antagonist for this cour. Another was some girl dressed (barely) in pink who seemed to be eating cotton candy. Not sure who she is, but nice.

Cheaters Always Win

So going back to the fact that the fight between Kinro and Magma wasn’t completed at the end of the previous episode, what are the rules of the Grand Bout? There’s obviously some set of rules, but we aren’t really told what they are.

I think the only rule actually stated was that spectators weren’t allowed to interfere by hitting the combatants with things. They are, however, allowed to verbally abuse the combatants and attempt to distract them. That’s fine, but what about the rules for the combatants themselves?

Magma was clearly lying when he brought this up, but Kinro seemed to actually believe the melon helmet he got from Suika may have been against the rules. After all, it counts as outside help. The referee — I think Jasper was his name — decided that the helmet was fair game since it’s only a piece of clothing.

But if the referee and Kinro both had to consider the fact that the helmet may have counted as cheating, why did nobody call Magma out on cheating? He got Kinro to talk to the judge and then attacked him from behind while he was discussing the legality of the helmet. Is that not against the rules?

I guess that counts as a distraction in the same way spectators can distract the combatants, but it seems like a clear violation to me. And what makes it weirder is that nobody called Magma out for this action — not even Kohaku, Chrome, or Senku. Senku literally responds with, “Well, whatever.

This scene didn’t feel natural. It felt like the author realized having Kinro win easily wouldn’t be exciting, so he just made up an excuse for Magma to win which wasn’t executed well.

Gen Shows up Again

Gen shows up again in this episode, in case the section title wasn’t clear. And I kind of feel like he interfered with the fight between Chrome and Magma to the point of breaking the rules as well.

So Gen pretends to cast a spell on Magma and says that if Magma takes another step his heart will explode. Magma believes him because he thought he had killed Gen, so the fact that Gen is still alive proves he’s a sorcerer. Obviously if Gen was telling the truth this would be against the rules.

But, as Senku points out, if Magma takes a step and his heart doesn’t explode, then what Gen is doing is no more than a verbal distraction. And like I already mentioned, that’s fair game.

However, the problem is that although Gen can only be proven guilty of interfering if Magma takes a step, he can only be proven innocent in the same way. If Magma loses because he didn’t move, which is what happened, then the argument could be made that Gen actually interfered.

This is because as long as the minute Gen said his “spell” was in effect for passes without Magma moving, it’s impossible to prove that there was no spell to begin with and that Gen was bluffing. Therefore, that should be a violation of the rules, meaning Chrome loses by default.

Chrome Wins

I don’t have too much to say about how Chrome defeated Magma other than that it was extremely unsatisfying. We had to sit there for minutes, waiting for a small fire to start as the other character explained what was happening. That has to be one of the most anticlimactic ways to end a fight.

I get it, science won, but come on. You can’t honestly think that was fun to watch. There’s no way.

Also I just want to point out that all of the sweat and tears Chrome was shown to have used to make the lens the right shape weren’t there to begin with. He only had sweat and tears in the flashback while Senku is explaining what happened, not when it actually happened.

And one last thing I want to mention on the topic of Chrome winning is that while he’s still going to win the honor of marrying Ruri, I’m not sure he’ll do it (yet). Something tells me Chrome won’t want to marry Ruri because he won her as a prize. He’ll want to actually have a relationship with her.

I could be wrong. I was wrong about Kinro defeating Magma. But I’m not sure if this is the kind of anime that’s really going to objectify women like that. Aside from the fact that it’s already done that simply by having Ruri labeled as a prize to be won, of course.

Conclusion

Anyway, what are your thoughts on Dr. Stone episode 14? Did you think Magma was going to end up defeating Kinro? Do you think what Magma did counted as cheating? What about Gen? Let me know in the comments.

If you enjoyed this review, remember to click the like button ❤ down below and follow me over on Twitter @DoubleSama. I tweet out every time a new post goes live, so it’s the best way to stay up to date. Also, come join us over on Discord for anime discussions.

Finally, I’d like to thank HeavyROMAN for supporting DoubleSama.com at the Heika tier this month. To learn more about how you too can become a supporter of this blog, check out Patreon.com/DoubleSama.

My review of the next episode is available here.