Impression:
Redundant. That should be the name of this episode.
I apologize for beginning on a rather blunt note, but, ultimately, I simple couldn’t help myself. Tell me, I implore you, why exactly are they performing the Ofunehiki again? The obvious answer here is to retrieve Manaka’s lost ability to love – again, this is obvious – but I ask you: why didn’t they see this coming? As they, once again, performed the Ofunehiki, the Sea God was, once again, angered, and, once again, they all fell into the ocean…oh! And what’s more? Yet another main cast member was dragged down deep into the depths of the oceans. Boy-oh-boy what a great plot twist! Totally didn’t see that coming. The banality of today’s episode was, yes, extremely redundant. They took no safety measures, each of them knowing full well what happened last time they tried this, and I find that to be a ridiculous oversight, especially seeing as the Ofunehiki occurred less than a month or two ago for at least three of them. What? Are you trying to tell me that they didn’t realize the Sea God was a complete and utter arse? What? Are you trying to tell me that these adults were all irresponsible enough to allow teenagers onto a boat that – let’s be honest – they all knew was going to be sucked down into the ocean? No one even raised an eyebrow. Akari was all for it, and she almost died last time! I couldn’t take any of the more emotional moments seriously after witnessing such idiocy because I was so angry and that’s simply not fair – it’s the penultimate episode, for god’s sake!
Sure. Fine. Maybe they went out on this boat knowing that they might die because they were willing to die for Manaka whom they love so very much. But we’re back to square one. Okay. Sure. Fine. Maybe the pendant that’ll save Miuna’s life is floating on down into ‘The Pit’ and this was their full-proof plan. But aren’t Manaka’s feelings in that pendant? If the Sea God takes the pendant, is he not then taking Manaka’s feelings? Or does Manaka now have the ability to love again because Miuna hugged her? And if that’s the case why didn’t Miuna just hug her earlier, the catalyst really only being Miuna’s love for Hikari. The plot at this point is a bit fluffy and I’m not quite sure how they’re going to wrap everything up in twenty five minutes next episode, but I’m sure we’ll see Mari Okada try. Don’t let me down, girly.
But I digress. Rant over.
The former half of episode 25 of Nagi no Asukara was actually pretty good, despite my earlier complaints about the latter half. Sure we’ve seen Tsumugu and Chisaki perform the same old dance before, he confessing his love for her, she not being all that sure, but we did see Chisaki acknowledge, albeit silently, that she loves (and I use the term loosely because it was only really implied (though quite heavily) Tsumugu – and that’s progress! We found out that Manaka’s loves “Hii-kun” as well, the answer we’ve been waiting for delivered to use in a somewhat ironic twist as the love struck Akira steals ‘Manaka’s love’ and drops it into the ocean, Manaka then confessing her love for Hikari. Oh! And speaking of love… Miuna the masochist has Hikari tell her (Miuna) that he loves Manaka, over and over again. Maybe it is a little out there for me to be calling her a masochist – she only wanted to reaffirm the pairing in her mind, after all – but watching our poor loser not-so-lucky-in-love (as everyone else) hopeless romantic fall onto the tracks, then only to break into tears, felt like the more poignant of episode 25 moments, if only because Hikari didn’t come to save/comfort her this time. Ultimately (and I’m not saying this to be mean), if Miuna is the sacrifice, it works out best for everyone, everyone then having their respective pairings without tension amongst the odd-one-out…okay, that last line was a bit much. My bad.
To conclude…the latter half of the episode ruined, in my eyes, what would have bee a perfectly adequate episode. Episode 25 presents nothing new and to top it all off nothing is ultimately gained or learned. Put simply, episode 25 of Nagi no Asukara was the same old blood rush with new touch…that touch being a slightly diluted version of the same old blood…
– Chris.
To be fair, they had the sense to not use a human sacrifice this time- they went along with the wooden doll, remember? And it’s been implied that people have using wooden dolls for the Ofunehiki for years without anything happening. But from their perspective, there was little else they could have done… in terms of safety precautions or in terms of solving Manaka’s problem and delaying the apocalypse. They could have not involved the girls at all… but then the Sea God would have been furious that they weren’t doing the ceremony properly. It was either they do that or they do nothing at all, and face the imminent apocalypse and have Manaka live, robbed of the ability to love. And the fact that Uroko seemed more sincere in his offer to participate this time around (I always detected a tone of underlying mockery in the first half) probably bolstered their confidence a bit. He is a scale of the Sea God, after all.
A lose-lose situation, really, which makes it even more tragic.
I understand that they chose not to use a human sacrifice, but the fact that they had to be there at all mitigates the aforementioned entirely. That said, I understand your point entirely – it was a lose-lose situation and, ultimately, there was nothing they could have done. But, I believe, there were many other options they could have taken and many different ways this episode could have been presented. As you say, ’twas indeed a lose-lose situation, but everyone on those boats (people we haven’t even been introduced to either) jumped aboard, knowing how unsafe it’d be, and seemed surprised when a wave appeared out of nowhere… From my perspective, it felt like I’d seen this episode before (and indeed we have: episode 13) and perhaps that was the intention, bringing things full circle. I simply felt that so much more could’ve been done in this penultimate episode…
But yeah, this was definitely a tragic episode.
It was pretty much a trainwreck in the latter half of the series. At times, it seemed almost as if Mari Okada did not have a clear direction as to where the show was trying to head. It was pretty obvious what the major threads of the show were and what their resolutions might have entailed but there were so many wasted episodes dedicated to zero progression or to quite maudlin teen drama that you really do get fed up with the whole thing. On the note of this episode, “bringing things full circle” did indeed feel like a rehashing of the earlier plotline. I think surely Okada could have done better as opposed to getting Miuna to play the victim. Seriously it feels like all the girls were martyrs at least one point in the show. Tragic as in Okada couldn’t deliver more and set up for a strong ending.
I never really love Miuna. I tolerate her. As time passes by I begin to like her more and more. This episode, I felt something. I grieve when Miuna cried her heart out on the train tracks. I ship Manaka x Hikari now but damn Miuna – what a way to go!
I agree. The first half was amazing, and then… well. A little cliche, and I can already predict what would happen in the last episode. Still, it was a good one.
Continuation from above: and heartbreaking. I can’t wait for the next episode.