Short Synopsis: With the final arrival of a new release of Popolocrois 1998, the 2003-series also enjoyed a new release. In this, some side-characters are left behind, the Remnus is boarded and the Demon’s Passing is crossed.
Good: Great to see this back again; Gaude and Paanya.
Bad: Half of the episode was recap.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7.5/10

Ah, it’s great to finally see a bit of Popolocrois again. You could call this episode a “calm-before-the-storm”-episode, in which people prepare for the final four episodes. It’s probably to make sure that the next few episodes won’t be too rushed, but the episode itself did remain rather standard, in comparison to episode 22 of Popolocrois 1998. The recap of the great moments was nice, but I think I would have preferred some original content.

I’m not sure if it was a good idea to just cast away half of the crew, and focus on the children. Still, it may be good to focus on the characters that are really important to the story, but I wonder why Aina was included. What role does she still have in this anime, apart from wooing over Marco?

Still, Gaude and Paanya surprised me. They’re actually sprites! I’m not sure if it hadn’t been mentioned or I simply forgot, but their roles now suddenly became a lot clearer. Paanya also joined Zephys because he hates the Law of the Moon, because it took away his mother. I suspect Paanya has a similar reason. That’s also why we never saw Paanya on the sea, and Gaude on the land.

Short Synopsis: After a fansub-hiatus of six months, Popolocrois Story 1998 is finally back!! It’s a definite Hyuu-episode this time, when the wind-kind line up around the castle and she actually almost marries Gamigami!
Good: It’s Back! It’s Back! It’s Back! Hyuu, Ston, Sanda and Gamigami were amazing!
Bad: Bad points? Popolocrois? Hah!
Overall Enjoyment Value: 9/10

I was SO glad that finally, after six months of inactivity this series finally appears again. It may be my joy that it finally returned, or it may be the episode itself, but the fact remained that this one was amazing. Lots of juicy plot twists and awesome characters. :D

First of all, Hyuu has been an extremely unpredictable character. I kindof forgot this, though, which made her decision to marry Gamigami and become the queen of Popolocrois quite a shock. She really doesn’t want to go back to the wind-kind. For this, she decided to use her last resort, make Gamigami swear he’d protect her. Quite an incredible moment, but things get even better.

Most of the episode develops the preparations of the marriage. Ston and Sanda have finally had enough, and they head to Hilda’s house in order to search for something. The latter happens to be away, to investigate the strange stone which appeared in the previous episode. No results yet, though. In any case, Ston and Sanda were quite funny when they tried to guess why Hyuu would want to marry Gamigami anyway. ^^

Then the time of the marriage. Everything goes well, until an entire ARMY of wind-kind appears. Then, when Gamigami is about to protect Hyuu, Ston and Sanda appear, and drench him into a cure of the love-potion! His love for Hyuu is now finally over, and he’s back to worshipping Narcia again! That is so awesome! Because of this, she runs away, and attempts to use Gamigami’s transportation device, in an attempt to run away. However, Gamigami’s inventions are known to be rather busted, so instead, it switches Gamigami’s and Paolo’s castle back to their original places, while leaving Hyuu. The episode ends with Pietoro noticing the same thing, and heading over to the castle.

This episode already was amazing. I can’t imagine what the final three episodes would be like. Especially since Gamigami is back to his original self again, while Pietoro now is the only one Hyuu can turn to. And don’t forget that Hilda and Narcia didn’t just spent an entire episode near a giant stone without a good reason. ;)

It’s such a pity this show is so unknown. It’s awesome! :D

Short Synopsis: In the end, Hervé spoke the truth. It’s now up to Kate to tell the others about it.
Good: Kate; Claire; Rose; Rachel; Amanda; Hervé; Anna; Lise; Emilio; Yes, about everyone who did anything significant in this episode.
Bad: I expected a bit of Lula, but she was nowhere to be found.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8.5/10

Seriously, I expected an aftermath after the eventfulness of the previous episode, but I never expected it to be such an awesome one. Most aftermaths are quiet, but this one was probably even better than its previous episode. So many characters were involved in so many awesome ways.

In the end, it’s true. Kate and the others will lose their memories after everything is over. She now has to tell everyone about this. It’s almost freaky how different everyone reacted. More on that below. Kate also has to cope with her sister, now that Emilio has dumped her and disappeared.

The news is quite a shock for Claire, but as usual, she manages to control her feelings. Still, she was so sad through the episode. First she tells Kate that she’d rather have that they won’t have secrets for each other anymore, but when they have to tell the news to Rose, she suddenly understands how difficult it is to tell someone some sad news. When they saw that Rose grew so much, and that she finally was able to see her father again, who is working hard for his family, they just couldn’t bring her the news that her memories would just disappear. They expected the same with Rachel, based on episodes 4-6, so they didn’t even bother to try and tell her.

Rose indeed has grown so much. Just compare her with Rachel, who’s currently in the midst of losing all her friends. When the anime started, I could never have imagined Rose actually comforting Rachel like the way she did now. Still, in the end she’s grown so much because of her memories of her family and friends. She breaks when she hears that she’ll lose her memory in the end. She actually starts yelling at Kate.

And OMG Rachel. She actually doesn’t care whether she loses her memory or not. In this episode, we see her officially break up with her friends. After this, she obviously has nothing left. And surprise, Sam, the rather goofy guy who always remained in the shadows gets worried about her, and tries to comfort her. She obviously doesn’t realize this, but I wonder how Sam will act in the future.

Also, Rachel gave some interesting information about Amanda. When Rachel still was alive, she was probably the most popular of her group, and Amanda always seemed to look up to her, and she always wanted to be like her. She now finally managed to win over Rachel, it seems.

Hervé, meanwhile, has been locked up. He’s probably going to escape any episode now, but it’s now clear that he’s cut his ties with his former “allies”, who are now all worried because Lise remembered Hervé. Because of that, they ignore Anna, who’s starting to cough up blood because of her sudden separation with Hervé and Mireille.

And boy, Emilio made sure for an awesome cliff-hanger in the end. He’s obviously not going to directly help Hervé anymore, due to the fact that he’s lost his girlfriend, but it does seem that he’s begun acting on his own. How? By kidnapping Lise. This can become really interesting. Especially if the latter happens to run into Claire, Rose, Rachel or Kate. ^_^

And finally, I must praise the ED. It’s a great way to succeed the already exciting cliff-hangers.