Escaflowne episodes 24-26 (end)

[kate_nepveu]

Finished Vision of Escaflowne over the weekend. Spoilers behind the cut.

Well, that was strange.

I'm really not the person to be impressed by a love-conquers-all ending, at least not such a woo-woo version. And Dornkirk's plan to end war was . . . to grant everyone's wishes? What made him think that would work? (Not to mention that it apparently didn't so much grant people's wishes as remove their inhibitions about trying to achieve their wishes, else there would have been, I dunno, multiple worlds where each country was on top, instead of just a lot of fighting.)

Or, perhaps it's unrequited-love-conquers-all, since the next time we see Van and Hitomi, it's apparently been decided that they must part forever. Why, I'm not sure; sure, Hitomi has a mom back on Earth, but they could have the solar system's longest long-distance relationship. (It's a bit odd, the way the series very resolutely ends with no romantic pairings (except Hitomi's two Earth friends). Nice, in a way, for not forcing it, but considering the love-conquers-all, odd.)

I wasn't expecting all that with Dilandau, but I think that's because no-one had hinted to me that there was a big reveal with him, for which I thank you all. I'm going to agree with the comments I've seen that it would have been much more interesting if it had come earlier; I think the point was supposed to be that even the most awful person wasn't intrinsically Eeeeevil, but it came and went so fast it was hard to tell.

It's really too bad that the series length was chopped in pre-production from 39 to 26 episodes, because it would really have benefited from the extra time, especially toward the end.

Random things:

• Everyone but me hates Merle. I didn't mind her, and was actually impressed when she tells Van how to get Hitomi back somewhere in the last few episodes.
• Everyone but me loves Folken. He got on my nerves all the way until the end. Sorry.
• Was the allied-country's secret weapon meant to literally be an atomic bomb, or just an obvious stand-in?
• The "don't grow to depend on others" theme came and went pretty fast, too.

Umm, I think that was about it.

Thanks again to yhlee for loaning us the discs to get started on this.

Comments

[kate_nepveu]

Perfectly good reasons! Music is just not a major draw for me unless it's, well, a musical, and I wish I could articulate why Folken got on my nerves, but I can't--it was even before the horrible cat-girls, I think.

Chad's been eyeing the, err, the space opera that isn't _Crest of Stars_ that you lent us, so we may try that next. And if you need any of those back, just yell--I know we've had them for a ridiculously long time.