While not as intense as previous episodes, this one made me quite emotional! But rather than tears of sadness and desperation, they are happy tears because we are able to have so many friends back and alive with us! I mean, there were some darker moments in the episode… but overall, this was a seasonal high! People are alive and thriving!
Immediately into this episode, Bon relays to Fushi everything that has happened and thankfully Fushi has Bon’s powers to see spirits. I know it’s really frustrating that Bon kept a lot of secrets from Fushi throughout the season, but I really think he played his cards right. During the course of this season, he’s really learned a lot about the value of human lives and that even if you don’t particularly know them they still deserve a chance at life. Earlier in the season he was a lot more selfish with the people he interacted with – I mean, I fully understand why he would hate the church of Bennett, but letting that mind set carry over could have been really dangerous. On the flip-side, when we get to Renril, I would also argue that he’s selfish because he wants to do everything himself and not let anyone help. Sorry, but I don’t think it’s possible for a single entity to win a war and not have any casualties… so I think it was important for Fushi to go through some self development.
That being said, the most impactful part of this episode would be Fushi reuniting with everyone again. Even if Fushi is in a state of shock, the absolute joy from Gugu made me so emotional. They’ve been waiting so long for this. They care about Fushi a lot and now they can finally be reunited with him forever! I also really like how they described the differences in who he could see. Humans are given a choice when they die: they can either live in reality or in a dream. It’s incredible to see, especially at the end of the episode, how many people chose to live in reality! But that does bring a question for me in the future – Can people choose to move on? Or are you stuck in reality forever now? I know Fushi can bring you back and there are people you would stay with for all eternity, but I would think… at some point you lose the reason why you exist and may want to escape to the dream? Honestly… I wonder if they will ever touch upon that subject in this series…
But! For now we have friends back!! Along with the beast that is Oniguma, Gugu is able to make quick work of a lot of Nokkers. It really makes me remember how valuable of a form he was for Fushi. He’s been gone for so long. Gugu, please don’t leave us again. I can’t go through you dying again. Thanks to everyone coming back, we are in a much better position to defeat the Nokkers… in fact, we reach a happy ending in this episode. Fushi is able to bring everyone back who comes to him, whether or not he formed an emotional attachment to them. Even Bon’s companions got to have bodies again! It all happened really quickly, but I’m glad that we got a happy ending for almost everyone involved.
I guess there was something that happened in this episode that wasn’t so great. Eko, for a majority of the episode, is being dragged around by the Nokker. Kahaku technically comes to her rescue, but ends up fighting with Nokker. The two of them go at it for a little bit and eventually the Nokker returns to Kahaku and he leaves towards Yanome for good. Honestly, I think they could have done more with this whole moment, but I have a feeling they were pressed for time, so I won’t be too hard on them. But I would like more clarification about Kahaku’s future. He was with us for most of the series and while he may have been a pain, he was still, mostly, an ally. However, I am glad that Bon said that killing Kahaku was always an option. I think it’s really important to consider that Fushi did want to keep him around. Fushi didn’t want to kill him just because of having a Nokker… or being one of Hayase’s descendants. A problem? Absolutely. But Fushi really did try to give Kahaku a lot of chances. I’m glad that Kahaku was able to leave on his own – likely realizing he would only cause more harm by staying with Fushi. Will that be an issue for the future? Probably, but for now, the evil is gone!
All around, this was another nice episode and leads in very nicely to the final episode next week!! I want them to bring on all the happiness of Fushi living with all of his friends once again.
