Fate/Kaleid Liner Prisma✫Illya 3rei – zwö12te [ENDE]

3rei 12-lead

Pajamas are important….

All in all, in the end, Silver Link finally gave me the show I wanted to see the most…and I just now notice the bamboo leaf pull strings on Kuro’s panda pajamas, and that is awesome, and so wonderful, and cute! Excuse me. But, so far as content goes, how did this mess turn out? We start where we left off…

“If there is any justice in this world…”

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…this little girl will kick you upside the head!

It terms of narrative conclusion this one approached more of a middle than it did a finale. Even in the concluding minutes, we have many unanswered questions, and so many unmet expectations, and only so much time to spend. Despite that, 3rei has always wanted to pack a punch all it’s own. Illya’s story has always been one of backs and forths, ups and downs. When Hiroyama set out to give mainline Fate’s Illyasviel von Einzbern an actual story, removing her from being a mucked up wish granting homunculus cup, he set out to give her all the story he could, including all the hesitation that a young girl would give in the face of danger and destruction. You know, in addition to the cute antics!? I rather loved it when Rin voiced her recollections and her amazement at what Illya has become, daring and all, fun and all. It was a nice bookend to the first series, and it needed to be said.  If it could have been a bookend? But regardless of endings, this Illya is very much ready to take on all the risks she needs to in making her choices. It’s the heart of the franchise.

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Not all wish granting cups are created equal…

But all that means she still has opposition to face, and in Julian/Darius that opposition is still a blind spot. There is so much that she and the rest of the Prisma✫Gang are unaware of, and with Gil having given Julian that last bit of advice about needing two cups, and then beating feet out of there, there also goes a source of information, no matter how goofy he was this series about it. So while all the action showed that Illya is ready and willing to take this fight all the way, she only manages to beat Julian back just enough to get one part of of her goal, and that’s making Miyu secure again. She can save the world and Miyu it seems, but she still doesn’t know the exact price yet? Hmmmm. The cards, as it were, are stacked against her, and this fight took a great deal out of her side. Julian knows to much, Beatrice is rested and way to powerful, and Erika’s transformation from innocent little girl to this mud-born creature – all of which spells out that retreat is the better part of valour, or as always 3rei cheats us on conclusions, and that is what they do. Bit of a downer in some respects.

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..but fear not, the story isn’t over yet!

But, they do bring the story back into the light. The much needed break in the action and exposition. So, of course, Shirou still has access to the old Emiya Kiritsugu house, of course, it’s going to make a new base of operations, and of course, it has enough bathing space for all these females. This is how the lemonade gets made, folks. Even when they inherit an Angelica sized lemon. But it’s back to form the last half, bringing the fanservice it does so well. Sure, it brings the obvious type, but that cannot discount the much warmer and sweeter variety. That is really what Illya and Kuro have fought for this series, to reunite these two family members, even it it doesn’t bring a conclusion, it’s a great place to pause. But with all of Illya and Kuro spying and while both of them have their own special, onii-chan, feelings for Shirou, it’s Miyu’s feelings that pay off the best dividends. She’s safe, happy, and secure, and it’s thanks to her friend’s perseverance, and love that that is possible. EXCALIBUR! All’s right with this world. For now…

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Because this is worth a million Fate battles….

The obvious type, and then some…(MNSFW)

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Illya receives a rather warm hand…

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Well, when you get right down to it, I enjoyed 2wei Herz significantly more than I did this one. Whereas the first 2wei suffered from uneven composition and presentation, this one was also spun around and lopsided. There was too much left unsaid at the beginning and the end with not enough in the middle to support much of that. That middle always managed to feel like whole episodes were composed mostly of “we’ll do something with this later” bits, along  with many many many telegraphed varieties of significant looks. Promises. Those didn’t fulfill in my mind, because the promise of telling a complete story now wasn’t fulfilled, and I’m not sorry, but cagey, weird, magical, mysterious “business” and “this will play out next cour” stuff…are not plot points, the deep Fate footnotes are just notes, not the story…and that bloat brought the story down in my mind, it didn’t add much. All of that is flavor, nothing more and nothing less, But that was the middle, too much flavor, not enough meat to hold the characterizations up, which is a shame cause they were ready to work…But that’s just plain text without much subtext to back it up.

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Fine, if you don’t want to party, we can just leave…

But even given that, a convenient pause was the best shot it had in adapting a long running manga that already a metric ton of overhead, and that’s what they gave us. But in making that sort of ending it just took Julian/Darius’ threat and watered it down to weak tea. And when you have a story of a character finding themselves in the face of opposition, what you build for that protagonist is dependent on that antagonist…The opposition arrived, but with poor animation and combat dynamics, it felt tacked on and dry. Rin’s recollection and amazement are well placed, but suffers from some poor new structure during this fourth outing of the franchise. It would have registered as a very powerful punch, had it had the strength in front of it, as there was plenty behind it already. That to me was the worst part. But, as I said last time, I’ll spare the flogging of the expired equine when I can. Saying all that, I really loved the last segment, a return to form in my opinion. But no matter my complaints, the show knows how to end…

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…on a hopeful image!

Thanks for Watching!!!

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All around nerd that enjoys just about any anime genre. I love history, politics, public policy, the sciences, literature, arts...pretty much anything can make me geeky...except sports. Follow me @theskylion
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8 Responses to “Fate/Kaleid Liner Prisma✫Illya 3rei – zwö12te [ENDE]”

  1. zztop says:

    The Illya movie could be a sequel to this season. Only problem being we’d have to wait even longer for subs to come out.

    • skylion says:

      From what I can gather the large backstory of Miyu’s world is going to be the story of the film. I hope they call it something other than Prisma Illya etc. I’ve read the manga and it’s ten chapters of mostly Shirou, and it’s mostly a retelling of FSN only with slightly different circumstances and names, same old characters. So yeah, I’m glad that would be a a film, if that is true.

      • Di Gi Kazune says:

        Prisma Illya – Heaven’s Feel.

        • skylion says:

          At this point, looking like the mangaka gave in to either Type-Moon, the fans or both to add a bunch of FSN repeat material to this manga, I wouldn’t doubt that they would do the same and make Primsa Illya follow Heaven’s Feel near point for point.

          • Di Gi Kazune says:

            Miyu is better than Sakura.

            • skylion says:

              Yeah, but has Sakura ever had even a remote chance of telling her story beside being a potential Shirou squeeze, or the designated broken bird? Of course Miyu is better, if not actually very broadly characterized…

  2. Di Gi Kazune says:

    Okay, time for a short one. My ARP Nachi is eating into available time. ^^;

    NekoArc = Good
    Mr. Panda = Good
    Oh Sweet NekoLOLi! = Excessively Good.

    Will buy the BDs.

    And, the Miyuverse is a version of Notes. With their Liners.

    Okay, back to Rise of Nations. Then maybe taking ARP Nachi for a spin again.

    • skylion says:

      Yeah, I looked up Liners and information on it when Prisma first came out. WTF that is some convoluted, over-complicated stuff. I mean, Marvel and DC have some jacked up and silly “history of” so-called “continuities”. But Nasu messed about and made his on what feels like a weekends worth of time, compared to those two publisher’s decades upon decade of BS. Geez, I read it for like a minute and gave up….it sounded really pretentious and dull…

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