Overlord S02E11 Review: The Swarm That Walks

Overlord, Season 2, Episode 11: Jaldabaoth

Yeah, I certainly didn't expect the episode to suddenly have its big fight be the happy bug maid Entoma! I am definitely pleased by this.

the episode starts off with a meeting of a huge group of Ainz's forces, managed by Demiurge as ordered by Ainz in the previous episode. Among their numbers are Shalltear, Mare, and the full complement of the Battle Maids. We have a fun bit where Demiurge and Sebas have a brief conversation about rescuing Tuare, something that Demiurge agrees with because, hey, it's the wishes of Lord Ainz. That, and weak humans can't be resurrected, so it'd be troublesome to actually have her die. We get a fun bit where Demiurge specifically calls out Shalltear to not fuck up and remember that they're strictly on a "don't get seen" mission, with Demiurge donning a mask.

Also, interestingly, Demiurge creates an image of a person that's not seen to the audience, noting that they can't kill this human by all means -- and it seems that it's someone that the Nazarick forces are unfamiliar with, so it doesn't seem to be Tuare. Also, Demiurge has also planted one of his shadow demons on at least someone in the royal meeting (so either Renner, Zanac, Raeven or Gazef), which informs Demiurge of the existence of the eight locations of the Eight Fingers' base.

We then have Sebas (who's allowed autonomy to rescue Tuare) meeting up with the Royal Army, and then Sebas walks straight into the location where Tuare is apparently held, with the stage being set up like a boss fight round. The other members of Zero's "Six Arms" are arrayed before Sebas, we have the corrupt nobles standing on top going ufufufufu as they watch, and we have a somewhat elaborate introduction of them and their epithets, and they have actual unique character designs! You'd think that this would actually be the main focus of the episode... but apparently not.

Sebas boasts that he will allow all four of them to attack him at once, because maybe they'll last ten seconds (while Solution, unseen, gloops up to find Zero)... but Sebas gets angered that one of the four warriors before him is a Lich that styles himself "Undead King". Sebas just one-punches man his head off, and the proceeds to wipe out the rest of them by punching them so hard their heads turn into sprays of blood. I think it took less than ten seconds for Sebas to actually kill them.



In a different Eight Fingers facility,  we have the blonde Emma Frost looking lady, Hilma, waking up in her mansion seemingly in a weird illusion, and meets Mare, who's as unsure and confused and ever. Hilma tries to get him to tell her what's going on... and then Entoma walks in, on-nom-noming on a hand through the space underneath her chin, with that adorable face not even emoting. And then Mare breaks Hilma's leg with his staff, and drags her by the hair as one of their 'loot', not changing his unsure-little-child demeanour.

Pretty adorably, as Mare leaves with a swarm of bugs that carry all the loot within the place (hey, Ainz was scrounging for New World currency, right?) Entoma waves at them with the human hand that she's eating! Entoma's adorable.

And then we have the arrival of Blue Rose's Garagan and Tia the ninja, who asks Entoma what she's doing. The two of them mistake Entoma as a monster that the Eight Fingers keep around, while Entoma is actually initially apologetic, asking them to forget that they saw her. Gagaran is a good-aligned warrior, however, and she's  not going to let a man-eating monster roam around free.

So yeah, we've got two adventurers facing off against a battle maid, which isn't the strongest characters in all of Nazarick -- Entoma would be around the level of Narberal, then, I assume? Entoma notes that she is an 'Entomancer', able to control bugs, and summons a couple of bugs that transform into an arm blade and a pulsating beetle-shield on both her kimono arms. She also uses talismans to fight, summoning spiders, thunder-birds (???) and causing explosions with the talismans she shoots out from her long kimono robes. Also, among her bugs, she also has a swarm that she shoots out like a goddamn machinegun! Entoma's cool.

And as the fight progresses, we get hints that Entoma's not just a cute girl that uses bugs, because we hear glimpses of something screeching just beneath her voice, and she salivates from her chin. Oh, and she really starts going berserk and taking the fight seriously when Garagan stains her  clothes. And as Entoma summons a giant centipede (that connects to her back!) to finish off the wounded Gagaran and Tia... Evileye jumps in to the rescue with a big-ass ice spear.

Evileye mocks Entoma, noting that "no one would be pleased with a horrendous maid like you attending them", which just makes Entoma go completely angry, speaking briefly in a deep, guttural voice. As Entoma and Evileye fight a bit, Evileye unleashes a spell called "Vermin Bane", which ends up really hurting Entoma as it's an insecticide spell... and it causes Entoma to reveal her true form.

See, the human-like face is actually just a beetle that latches on to Entoma's real face, and her cute voice is caused by a little "lip worm". Entoma's true form is actually a horrifyingly awesome spider-creature, with four giant legs that sprout out from her back, and a monstrous spider face under that fake face. It's still pretty cool-looking for a bug monster, but sadly the ensuing fight ends up taking place mostly offscreen after Evileye shoots a couple of crystal spells and Entoma shoots out spiderweb blasts.We cut to Entoma on the ground, and... and it's the first time that anyone from Nazarick has actually been given trouble, huh? Hell, Entoma might straight-up die at this point if Demiurge didn't show up. Thank god for Demiurge, then.

It's actually an interesting bit that serves to really underline that, hey, not all members of the Tomb of Nazarick is untouchable. In the past episodes, the only time a Nazarick member was ever in actual peril was when Ainz and Shalltear fought each other. And yes, granted, Entoma is weaker compared to the Floor Guardians and she's fighting three-on-one and very nearly killed two of them singlehandedly.

Of course, Demiurge is a whole other matter. He introduces himself as "Jaldabaoth". Entoma is carried away by her bugs, while Evileye warns for Tia and Gagaran to flee and don't look back, while she holds back this clearly far more powerful warrior. Demiurge casts Dimensional Lock in response to Evileye's very transparent "I'm going to teleport out of here when you guys escape!" which I thought was hilarious.

Demiurge then casts Hellfire Wall, a spell that's meant to be weak enough to knock out Gagaran and Tia... but ends up accidentally killing them off! Straight-up murdering them, and Demiurge apologizes to Evileye, noting that he based the power of the spell on Evileye, and then further questions why she would hang out with two so much inferior warriors. Evileye's doesn't have a demon-icide spell handy, and none of her silly Shard Buckshots do anything to even faze Demiurge. It seems like all of these adventurers that bullied Entoma is going to be killed off by Demiurge...

When suddenly, there's a huge explosion as the mighty Adamantine-ranked Adventurer Momon arrives, landing on the ground... and it's a pretty damn badass entrance, with him announcing "tell me -- who is to be my foe!"

I'm genuinely not sure if Ainz/Momon actually consulted with Demiurge over this, by the way, so I might be completely fooled by the opening -- I had expected that all the business with Sebas has caused Demiurge to lose faith and act independently in some sort to Ainz (and it might very well happen because of this), but it seems that their opening fight is just them maintaining a cover of sorts, which is actually kinda hilarious! It's a pretty damn great episode, if you can't tell from my glowing review. The lines between who to root for really get blurred in this arc. Clearly the Eight Fingers are the 'big' villains that we root to be brought down, whether it by Demiurge's hands or Evileye's.  It's genuinely interesting -- we're rooting for Ainz's people like Mare and Entoma despite them viewing humans as scum and casually brutalizing or eating humans... but they're just technically following orders to help Sebas liberate Tuare, and they're just going to bring down the entire organization and steal their loot while they're at it.  Meanwhile, Evileye, Gagaran and the rest of Blue Rose are just adventurers who found themselves up against a threat they couldn't face, and it's hard to dislike them since they're basically the same sort of people as the likes of Climb.

Overall, a pretty fun episode, honestly. Sebas and Entoma getting to be badasses are clearly my personal highlights.