Heh, this was one of the few times at which a Deus ex Machina actually felt good. Probably because of Pino’s role. When we saw her wandering through Romdeau, I kept thinking that something bad would happen to her, but she actually didn’t play a role in this final arc at all. The creators just gave her an excuse to spend a bit of time, that’s all! Then she met up with Kristeva and returned to the Usagi again, without anything happening, and picked up Real. This moved away from the overused endings in quite an original and appreciated way.

Anyway, the final episode did explain a few crucial parts, though there are a lot of details which remained unexplained. Why did Ergo kill Monad? What exactly was the missile Raul sent towards Moscow? What’s Real’s link with Monad? Who, exactly, is the creator? This also is a series that you need to watch twice if you actually want to understand it. I might do this, perhaps after all of the fall-releases have died down.

This is what I think happened to the world:
- When the world was threatened to be destroyed by the exploding tanks of methane hydrate, the Proxies were created.
- Humanity fled to outer space with space-ships, waiting for the gas to fade away.
- Each of the Proxies created a dome of its own. Proxy One created Romdeau, Monad created Moscow, etc. For some reason, this was vital for the Proxy Project to succeed.
- The Heartbeat of Commencement, I’m still not sure what exactly it was. It’s never really explained. It involves Romdeau being destroyed, Vincent fighting Ergo, Vincent and Monad-Real flying through the clouds, Vincent going back and Monad-Real becoming one with a sparkling light. It was supposed to have happened way sooner, but the Proxies betrayed the Creator.
- Proxies die when they get in contact with direct sunlight. That’s why they refused to start the Heartbeat of Commencement.
- Humanity, meanwhile, has been waiting for generations in their spaceships, in an orbit around the earth.

I would’ve preferred that this anime would have had one extra episode. It’s exactly enough to fill in the remaining gaps, and make things a bit clearer. Overall, the ending was pretty nice. Not perfect, though not the horrible mess that other anime manage to become in their final episode. I’ll probably have the review of Ergo Proxy up tomorrow, as it’s getting too late for that now. Overall, it was a very nice series. I’m glad I watched it, and I’m sad to see it go.

The first half of the finale has started, and it really was awesome. You really can classify this as the answer-episode, as lots of revelations are made. This is going to be a rather short entry, as I already have episode 23 on my computer, just waiting to be played.

So,
- Ergo Proxy/Vincent escapes his death by ripping his arm off.
- Ergo Proxy/Vincent created Romdeau.
- Each Proxy created its own dome.
- Fake Real thinks only about Vincent.
- Daedalus only wants Fake Real to think about him, and he gets pissed off by her actions.
- Pino isn’t captured like I thought. She just ran into Raul’s home, drew a couple of pictures and left. She’s still roaming in Romdeau.
- Raul attempted to shoot Daedalus, but something happens which makes him shoot himself instead.
- When Raul reaches his house, he sees Pino’s pictures. One of these pictures shows the two of them, happily holding balloons.
- Raul meets his end when he roams around Romdeau, trips and falls on a shard of glass.
- Ergo created Vincent in the hope of forgetting about his sufferings as a Proxy.
- Finally it becomes clear why Proxy One and Vincent are different beings: he controls both Vincent AND Ergo Proxy! He’s the true creator of Romdeau.

This was a great episode. The next episode also promises to be awesome: how to kill someone who always wins? Pino wanders further through Romdeau (what were the creators planning to do with her?). And Daedalus has to either accept that Fake Real is interested in Vincent, or he has to take physical actions. Something tells me it’s going to be the latter.

(on a side-note: Ergo Proxy always is a bitch when trying to take screenshots. They always turn out too dark -_-)

I’m glad to see that .Hack//Roots has gotten better when the final episodes came along. Things finally become a bit interesting again. Especially Phyllo and Touta were great this episode, even though it’s still unknown what they exactly did. The next episode could actually promise to be a great one, if things go right. Seeing Haseo at the end of the episode, back in his original form also was very interesting. We also finally have another reference towards real life. Tabby did some investigations on her own, and found Shino. She also met Haseo in real life. He seems to be visiting her every day.

Still, there’s one thing I dislike.

Why does Haseo have “the element”? What makes him so special?

Yeah, I’m planning to through the garbage of the season first by watching the raws. It’s not like shows of this nature were known for their incredibly difficult language anyway.

Galaxy Ange-lune

This is another one of those failed attempts at comedy. We’ve got a cast of stereotypes, who try to be as random as possible, but aren’t really funny. It’s basically an excuse to give some cute girls a chance to drive space-ships, without any explanation for their huge skills. Thrown in a couple of fanservice-references, the standard cute pet (who seems to have the same voice actor as Randagio) who gets abused for the most standard reasons ever and the only guy in the show who moans when he speaks and you have a recipe for failure. The only moderately funny part was the red-haired girl, sleeping through the explosion.

Tokimeki Memorial

This anime takes place in a high school. Guess who our main character is? Yup, a transfer student. How original. In any case, the school president has come up with a “clever” idea for the school event. Coincidentally, it took place right on the day our main character joined the school. Because of that, our main character gets labelled with a pair of nekomimi-ears, and the one who catches him will get a date with the most popular girl in school. And yes, believe it or not, but our main character manages to outrun the ENTIRE male population of this school. In the meantime, he helps another cute girl in the library, reaching a book on the top shelf (seriously, couldn’t she have grabbed a chair or something?). I guess she’s in love with him now. The next episode will probably feature our main character, flirting with the top female athlete of the school. Seriously, this anime is another piece of garbage. The only good points came from the range of weird teachers this school inhibits. They were actually quite hilarious.

Love Dol: Lovely Idol

Surprisingly good, if you compare it to the two above. Still, that doesn’t really say anything. This show is mostly bad, though it does have its potentially promising moments, unlike the two mentioned above. First of all, it’s got a huge cast: 18 idols, one manager and one boss. Especially the four main characters actually try to move away from the stereotypes. If these are used well, things can become very interesting, though I’m not expecting that to happen. At this point, the show mostly looks like it intends to focus on cute girls and your occasional moment of fanservice. Still, the fact that the debut-concert was cancelled does show that things don’t always go as planned in this anime. That might be a good point. Still, my verdict is that this anime will lose itself in its huge amount of cute girls, directed to fanservice. And am I the only one disturbed by the fact that they were performing in front of a herd of wild otaku? Aren’t these idol-things mostly meant for young children and pubescent girls?