Was that an awesome episode or not? It’s really great to see that the characters haven’t lost their sparks at all, and now that the story has set in, it’s really time for them to show how they’ve developed. Seriously, if you’re looking for a good fantasy-adventure, then Wellber no Monogatari is the way to go. It may start out mundane, but it just gets better and better.

And this episode is exactly the reason why I love strategies so much in anime. Strategies like these really allow the writers to play with their characters. Rita and her father end up together, going after the king of Wellber, Tina and Loden end up together, trying to sabotage the ship. Rita and her father quickly get captured, because their guards quickly die, and they find it too risky to keep fighting. In there, Rita gets separated from her father, but gets saved by Galahad, while her father tries to find out why the king of Greedam started acting so strange.

I must say that the reason was a pretty good one. It turns out that the king of Wellber and Greedam were twins, but Wellber’s king was found to be just a bit older, so he had to be the crown-prince. He always was treated better and more importantly, and didn’t even seem to realize how much this hurt the king of Greedam. Then, however, the king of Greedam was assigned to take care of Greedam, which turned out to be living hell at the time. It must have been extremely hard to get all things back together for the guy, and all this time, the king of Wellber, who never had to experience such hardships.

In the end, he turned out to be a spoiled brat. Not in the way that he acts arrogant to everyone, in fact, he is rather kind, but he’s almost too kind, and way too naive. He’s never really been through hell, to try and survive, which is why Loden would have made a good king.

And yes, I said “would” for a reason. The guy’s dead now, trying to protect Tina! It really seals her hatred towards him in an excellent way. And I must say that it has been developed really well. Right till the end, taking revenge was still on Tina’s mind, even though she knew that he was sorry about the things he did. Usually, anime is a tad too forgiving with revenges, and they’re quite often just forgotten (apart, obviously, from Jigoku Shoujo).

And to think that Galahad kicks the bucket in this episode as well! This really signifies that Wellber no Monogatari ~ Sisters of Wellber is about the “sisters” of Wellber, or Rita and Tina. And really, Galahad died like a man, and he never showed a sign of weakness in front of Rita.

Seriously, this is exactly what a final battle should be. All attention should not be directed to just the main characters; every character should play an important role, and it really helps if the side-characters are well-developed as well, like this series has done magnificently. Now all that’s left off is to end this series off nicely. There’s enough material for a decent climax, but the ending itself is always a whole different story.

And another series where its finale has begun. So far, it hasn’t been anything amazing yet, but I never expected this series to deliver an awesome climax. For now, it was entertaining and without flaws; it was built up well, so I’m happy. The fights were entertaining, and the themes on friendship may not have been as well-developed as in, say, Higurashi, but still there’s nothing wrong with it.

In this episode, Seijuu basically gets his hands on the path that leads to god. It turns out to be the music box that Mayuki’s mother gave him when he was one… which makes me wonder why he didn’t just get it in the first place, but I think that that can be explained because Mayuki unconsciously led him towards it. So anyway, the end of the episode shows Seijuu getting into God-mode, and if things go as I think they will (which is very likely), then the next episode will feature a very flashy fight as a climax of the series, where Mayuki defeats Seijuu.

The entire success of that episode will probably depend on how Seijuu will develop. There’s still one question left: why did he leave is wife to become God? I’ve seen this series long enough to know that it can very well give background and push its story forward at the same time, so there should be no worries about this series having a rushed ending, or questions that are left unanswered, that plague quite a few other series.

One thing I do hope is that Seiran, Sanae, Hitsumi and Byakko find something to do in the next episode. One very common pitfall is that final episodes very often neglect side-characters, and these guys often end up cleaning things up after the main character and his antagonist. My prediction is that Seiran/Sanae/Hitsumi will give Mayuki the final edge in defeating the big bad Seijuu because of their friendship, but Byakko could prove to have one final card up her sleeve.

In any case, I think that this explains pretty well why I like endings that try to do something different. I’ve seen so many anime end now, that I’m getting better in predicting how they’ll end, especially the ones with generic formulas. Series like The Third and Night Head Genesis are great examples of series that really tried to be different in their endings. Series like Bokura no and Kemonozume both really succeeded in their endings that had a completely different mood, and Ooedo Rocket greatly subverted the overdone ending-trope. I’m hoping that the end of this season will add one more series to this very small list, but that one most definitely won’t be Suteki Tantei Labyrinth. :P