Wait a minute… hold on… you can’t just leave us with an ending like that! But I have to hand it to them that they do give us some pretty effective cliff hangers. And if I’m honest, I really think this episode benefited from having a cliff hanger at the end because I don’t have too much to say about this episode. Of course, it put our characters in a new situation and completely changed the mood from happy and confident to oncoming hopelessness and despair. If definitely felt like more of a recap episode rather than actually advancing the plot, but if it’s setting up for next week’s episode, I suppose I’ll forgive it for now.
But because it was more aligned with a recap, there isn’t too much to talk about in terms of the new content. So, I do apologize for another short entry! But I’ll try to focus on the new things that came about in this episode. First and foremost, it seems we’re leaving Kahabell for good, since her portion of the quest has been completed. I find it kind of sad, because she quickly became one of my favorite characters from the series. Though that ominous look towards her sword before we switched over the heroes makes me think she still has something up her sleeve and that she’s not going anywhere anytime soon (I mean, with a literal blizzard outside it’s actually hard to go anywhere). But I will say that the beginning of the episode especially with Kahabell was really stunning to look at. And as an add on, I think they really knocked the music out of the park with this episode! I did a really good job emphasizing emotions in episodes and giving us an oncoming sense of dread so hooray for stress inducing music!
But while Kahabell remains in the city in warm shelter, our heroes are not so lucky. At first, I didn’t mind that we went to check on each of the characters as they were battling the snow by themselves, but the repeated back and forth was a bit frustrating especially when it turned into more a flashback for both Kusue and Iu. It didn’t really happen for Yuka because… well her role is otome otaku and doesn’t really have any of the emotional connections to the situation as the other two do. At least we haven’t been introduced to them yet. And that’s fine! It might have been even more frustrating if she was another sad story added into the mix. Because then Yotsuya really does turn into the fix-it protagonist so she and Kahabell really did add good contrast to the other two. That isn’t to say that the sad backstories of Kusue and Iu are bad. In fact, I liked that we revisited Kusue’s situation because she’s honestly the one I think about the least. And these flash backs did give a good segue back to Yotsuya’s “If they are better or more worthy than me, I’ll do everything I can to save them” ideology. So, I’m not terribly upset that this was a re-cap episode
As for the blizzard itself, that was something I wasn’t expecting at all. I mean, I figured they were going to run into trouble at the very end because nothing seems to go easily for this group, but of all the things that could have happened… a blizzard was an interesting way to go. But hey! It brought out the interesting moment where Yotsuya had to take on the Yeti-like creature. Honestly, I think a lot of watchers, myself included, thought that he was going to either crawl inside the yeti for warmth, or at least take some of the hide with him. But… given the time constraints it was probably best for him to leave it behind. Also, with his comment about the Yeti babies being virtual, I’m really expecting a twist with that – in that this is some alternate universe or something. But until then we have bigger fish to fry – Like that massive fall Yotsuya took at the end of the episode! Part of me thinks it will all work out in the end, like maybe he was able to travel the remaining distance with that fall, or perhaps that dead screen didn’t belong to him. But on the other hand, how cool – or rather unexpected – would it be if they actually ran with the fact that the heroes are dead and the next two episodes are just the destruction of the world?
But unfortunately, we have to wait until next week to see how things end up playing out, but in the meantime, we have some neat merch that we can get for the series promoted by the ending’s singer! And on that note, I loved the way they did the ending this time, with the singer actually playing out in the snow. It was very fitting, and I just have to say that I’m a fan of whatever the heck the studio decides to do for the endings for every episode.
