And here we are, finally at the end of this long journey with Radiant. A part of me is relieved to finally end this series but another part of me is sad that we didn’t get to see this series be at its full potential.
In any case, everyone seemed to be getting on Seth’s case about Melie. First Alma gets on him for making her worry and such. Which is understandable considering how he was acting. But the one who made it frustrating was Doc, which isn’t surprising. Doc really just goes above and beyond to prevent me from liking him. I understand some of his reasonings, but then he tells Seth if it’s fair of him to drag Melie into messes like the one at Rumble Town. Which again is understandable, but that just makes it feel like Doc is pinning everything on Seth. Why not ask Melie herself what she thinks? If she wants to help Seth, let her do it. If she deems it as too dangerous, let her sit it out. It isn’t fair to decide what to do without her input, especially when it involves her.
This definitely puts a lot of pressure on Seth as it gives him something more to think about on top of what it actually means to go after Radiant. Not only will he have to fight more battles like at Rumble Town, but he also has to deal with knowledge that not all Nemesis are evil as Hameline said. At this point, what Seth really needs to do is search for the truth in the matter. The world that he lives in isn’t as black and white as he originally saw it. Not all Nemesis are evil, not all Inquisition members are as judgemental, and not all sorcerers are good. Everyone has a story and Seth needs to get to the root of all this insanity. Which definitely won’t be an easy feat since no one can see the world changing. I do like Seth’s positivity in searching for Radiant though. And he’s right, if he doesn’t find the root of the problem, he won’t get any answers.
The final bout of action in this series comes in the form of hundreds of Nemesis eggs flying down around Artemis. I had a feeling that they wouldn’t end the last episode with just an uneventful finale. So of course they’d have to make it more exciting. And while I can appreciate their attempts to make it more interesting for the last episode, it still felt pretty shoehorned in. Especially when this didn’t even happen in the comic. However, it was pretty sad at how it ended. After being told that not all Nemesis are evil, I feel like Seth was torn about fighting it. Especially after he initially knocked it out, hoping that it would calm down. He desperately wanted to be shown that Nemesis weren’t the evil monsters they were made out to be, just like Hameline said.
It felt really out of place in this episode for Seth to suddenly go into his rage state. It happened way too suddenly and soon after its first appearance. And then disappearing just as fast as it appeared. I understand that it was trying to show how Seth isn’t able to control this form and there was still a long road ahead of him if he hoped to change. But I couldn’t help but feel a little underwhelmed by it. However, I can still sympathize with how hard that must have hit Seth especially after what Hameline told him. Not to mention that he did this in front of Melie, who he had been guilted over worrying this entire episode. Which must have hurt him even more.
With all of these things in his mind, it prompted Seth to decide to search for Radiant without his new friends. Guilty over worrying them and putting them in harm’s way. It was sad to see Seth just leave his friends behind with just a letter of gratitude. I’m sure it hit Melie hard after realizing Seth left. Especially since we know how much Melie treasures her friends and it must have stung to find that Seth left without telling her. Seth was the first friend she made that stuck with her despite her curse and to have him leave without saying anything to her face… UGH MY HEART. Not to mention Seth claiming that if he sees them, he’d want to stay with them broke what was left of my heart. Come on man, we all know you are able to do so much with your friends by your side. T^T
The episode ends with Seth leaving with Alma to his new destination of Caislean Merlin to find the Knight-sorcerers who are also searching for Radiant. Which is probably Seth’s biggest lead at the moment. This was definitely a very melancholy way to end the series where no one is freaking happy. After all the pain and suffering, we end on a sad cliff hanger. RADIANT WHY?! However, it looks like things won’t stay sad forever as we are promised at the very end for a season 2!
Overall, this final episode was okay. It wasn’t the best but it wasn’t the worst. I can appreciate it for what it was trying to do as the season finale. But can we just take a moment and admire the scenery this episode? I don’t know why, but Lerche just decided to go above and beyond with the beauty of the backgrounds on that other island and the sky when Seth was leaving. The lighting and the atmosphere… It all looked SO GOOD compared to the usual bright and unvaried color pallet of Artemis.
We also got some charming character interactions throughout the episode… and not so charming ones. The one that surprised me most was with Lord Majesty. And while I still don’t approve with how much debt he continues to pile on top of Seth, he did stop to check in and see how Seth was doing and even listened to his concerns. And while he didn’t give Seth any useful answers, Lor Majesty does have a certain amount of trust in Seth. Trusting that Seth will come back to pay back his debt without worrying that he’ll just run off. That honestly takes a lot of trust and I commend Lord Majesty for believing in Seth’s integrity.
And then we get to see ol’ Grimm just kind of chilling in the background a lot this episode. It also seems that he’ll be tagging along with Seth possibly in secret for the time being because he’s curious about him. Which I don’t mind because Grimm is a fun character and I would love to learn more about him and his quirks. However, the character I wasn’t too thrilled to see was Nick. And apparently the guy IS in the original comics so I was wrong about him being this annoying one-off character. Not that it makes him redeemable in any shape or form. He definitely got what he deserved when Seth shoved him off his broom to use to get to the island where Melie was. If this guy is ever redeemed, it will be a miracle.
Final Impressions:
DO I HAVE A LOT OF THOUGHTS ABOUT THIS SERIES. Though the one that sticks out the most is disappointed. It was very promising with all the hype around it being based off a French comic and would be screen written by the guy who did the screenwriting for Assassination Classroom. Not to mention the world that they live in is REALLY interesting. I’m disappointed that they didn’t delve more into it. Which they totally could have done with the amount of filler they filled this series with. Instead, they chose to just make filler for the sake of filler without really delving into the more interesting things of this series. They could have totally fit two good arcs in this season or even just had this one cour. Either one would have worked a lot better.
The characters were pretty interesting. Some more than others but that’s to be expected. I ended up liking Seth a lot more than I expected. Probably because I really like his design and how his morality kind of shifts around a bit after meeting others that put his beliefs into question. Dragunov even ended up being a pretty complex character even if I’m not completely sold on him. A lot of the characters grew on me (except Doc and the other Inquisition members) and I’m interested to see where their characters develop when I start reading the comic.
I enjoyed the action and the action shot compositions were LEAGUES above what I saw in the Persona 5 anime. Music wasn’t too memorable but it did its job so I can’t complain. Animation was fine for the most part. But I didn’t like that blurry effect that would happen from time to time during action scenes. I did really like the scenery on the other islands. Especially in the final episode.
However, it is what it is and it can’t be changed. It has a lot of good morality questions and some pretty good action. Unfortunately, it felt like the series didn’t know what to do with itself half the time and definitely shot itself in the foot for having so much filler at once at the very start of the series. I’m actually surprised that it announced there will be a season 2 of this. And despite my gripes with this series, I want to see where it goes and if the anime can learn from its mistakes and give this series the justice it deserves. I want to see this as a good series and if they just follow the comic a bit better, it could turn out to be as good as it’s hyped up to be. So I’ll probably be talking about this series again in season 2. See ya then!
I’ll give this season a final score of 6.8/10. I know it can be better and I hope it redeems itself in season 2.
