Cardcaptor Sakura: Clear Card Episode 18 Review: Sakura and the Fire and Water Birds

This Cardcaptor Sakura: Clear Card review contains spoilers.

Cardcaptor Sakura: Clear Card Episode 18

Clear Card can’t seem to get past its obsession with nostalgia. On some level I get it. This series is pretty much meant for fans of the original series that want to see the further adventures of Sakura and company. It’s fun to occasionally refer back to old events or characters.

The return of Meiling was beyond delightful. Even the scene in this very episode where Sakura reexamines just how Kero recruited her into being a Cardcaptor was a great reference to the past without being beholden to it.

However a few too many plots in Clear Card are just lazily aping the original series’ iconography to make its audience feel something. I don’t think anyone in the audience has failed to notice just how many of the new cards are near direct copies of the old ones. Blaze, Aqua, and Gale. Firey, Watery, and Windy, right? What’s the point in having new cards if they’re just going to be copies of the old ones?

I get we can’t do another plot where Sakura has to upgrade her cards but you think with all the time between the original series and now we could have gotten some more variety.  The series tries to call out these similarities to let you know it’s aware of them but then doesn’t do anything to change it up. 

Clear Card is just fine replaying old events with only slight differences. Why are utilizing Alice in Wonderland again? Did the Blaze card really need to be a giant firey bird just so we can have a (admittedly fun) conversation about the original capture of the Fly card?

Maybe there’s some bigger part of the series’ overall arc that will help explain away why the cards are so similar but that doesn’t make having to watch all the same sort of battles play out any more entertaining.

This show needs to work on its over arching plot. It’s too full of vague mysteries that are progressing at a snails pace. It’s nice when we get little scenes like Toya figuring out Sakura is out and about at night and saying Yue’s name, but even those don’t feel like they’ll add up to anything.

Not every line of dialogue needs to add to the overall plot, after all a lot of the charm of Clear Card is just watching the characters go about their daily lives, but the series feels aimless. That doesn’t make it bad but it keeps from the greatness it could be.

Also, Kaito. I’m gonna need you to stop.

“You could have called.”“Nah girl, I’m gonna be as creepy as possible.”

Okay, it wasn’t exactly like that but it basically was.

Shamus Kelley is a pop culture/television writer and official Power Rangers expert. Um… how many Alice in Wonderland books like Akiho own? Follow him on Twitter!