Ascendance of a Bookworm Part 3: Adopted Daughter of an Archduke ‒ Episode 9

The opening volleys of this week's Ascendance of a Bookworm were a bit whiplash-inducing. I'd been wondering basically all season where the show was going with the subject of Wilfried, Sylvester's snotty son. So after several episodes of him popping up for a couple of minutes to be kind of a tool, then peace out, I was surprised to see them set up a seeming whole story around him. Except then that story turned out to be a sitcom-ass "switch roles for a day" plot with Rosemyne. Absolutely pedestrian—at least a proper body-switch plot would've gotten several people on my timeline to take notice of it.

At first pass, this feels like nothing but an exercise in impressing on Wilfried, and thus the audience, the real difficulties that Rosemyne's job as a High Bishop entails. Except the audience already knows all that, and it's not really worth it as a vector to teach Wilfried a lesson about it when his annoying spats have barely taken up any time thus far. Maybe it's a novel way to go through the procedural parts of the plot, but that's hardly an episode's worth of necessary interest. To say nothing of it feeling a little at odds with the heavier sensibilities I was praising in the show last week.

But then Bookworm has never been as flippant this season as I might've initially pegged the show as. Rosemyne reveals relatively early that she has an ulterior motive. And the anime even lets the audience play along and try to suss out what the scheme is before just dropping it on us. It's funny, I initially figured that Wilfried's agog reaction to the children at the monastery and workshop being able to read was surprise at their station compared to his own high-society literacy. After all, it'd be absurd to think that this child of an archduke, set to inherit a lordly position himself, wouldn't be able to read.

It's a delightfully understated uncovering, as the actual issue of Wilfried's illiteracy becomes apparent before cutting to a veritable parent-teacher conference that Rosemyne and Ferdinand are having with his lordship Sylvester. Turns out a fair few people are clucking their tongues and stroking their beards, wondering what's to be done about this boy Wilfried? It might be easy to attribute his lack of studious success to general affluenza, but the discussion quickly makes clear that the likes of Ferdinand and Sylvester did have to work to earn the roles they ascended to—never mind Rosemyne herself, whom Wilfried is being directly paralleled to in this setup. Rather, Sylvester's specific decisions in how that succession was set out for Wilfried have removed all pressure from him, handing him things on a platter.

The comparisons with, well, everyone stand out in Bookworm's multitudinous points about how hard it really is to succeed in an old-style society this fantasy realm is patterned on. This was drilled into Rosemyne last episode, but in this case, it's about showing that even those who always existed in the noble hierarchies didn't have things easy. Ferdinand reveals how he was not given any leniency by his mother when he was brought in, threatened to be cast out if he couldn't manage the baseline level of success demanded of his station. Especially following his revelations last week, one starts to understand how Ferdinand wound up as uncompromising in his own handling of Rosemyne, which he's now tasked with exercising on Wilfried here. It fits the theming, and it's amusing to see Ferdinand level it at someone besides the leading little lady.

Wilfried isn't the most engaging as a temporary deuteragonist, being a typically petulant brat who can't understand why he's not getting his way until it's drilled into him and gets pointed toward a path for improvement. What arc is here is mostly in service of reinforcing Rosemyne and Ferdinand's aforementioned efforts alongside Rosemyne's own sympathy for keeping anyone close to their family—this is further revealed to be a way to let Wilfried spend more time being raised by his birth mother, after all. In these respects, I can see more time spent to flesh out Wilfried and dig into the hierarchy of needs for someone in his unique position. But I'm also not sure that's necessary at this point or advisable as an additional layer of plotting so late in the season, with other elements in play. I'll wait and see. This episode was ultimately "fine" after making me trepidatious; it's not inspiring as a path for future, ongoing storylines, barring hitting some incredible highs. Which Ascendance of a Bookworm is totally capable of. I'm just making like Ferdinand with Wilfried and being sure I hold it accountable.

Rating:

Ascendance of a Bookworm Part 3: Adopted Daughter of an Archduke is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

Chris is back to hit the books. You can see him posting about anime, transforming robots, and other quality reading material over on his BlueSky.