The end is almost near as the living sacrifice is in place and being sacrificed.
What They Say:
Ernst’s plan to destroy Gehenna backfires when Satan reveals to Yukio the truth behind his and his brother’s origin before taking posession of his body.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
With the nature of this series, there are moments where things that are obvious when you know about it become known. For instance, discovering that the roof of the True Cross Academy is actually an ideal gateway between the two worlds and that Mephisto was the one that built it. With the plans to use Rin with the gateway, essentially becoming a living sacrifice, it makes sense that they wanted Mephisto out of the way during this so they can do as they see fit. Of course, it all boggles Yukio that they’d do this, and that they think Rin has enough blood in his body to be of use in this way, but his heritage is the tricky part that makes it possible.
There’s a really beautiful moment here at the start of it though as the sacrifice gets underway and Yukio becomes involved, knowing that it’s the only way he can try and save Rin. Yukio’s relation to Rin has been an awkward thing since the start since he’s been the one without any of the demonic side as it all went to Rin, but as we see here, there’s far more to it than that and things can be drawn out. It goes so big, so disturbingly creepy and terrible so quickly, that it leaves you speechless. Going through all of this to try and destroy the gateway between the two worlds, with a very creative idea of dropping a bomb into an open gateway, has a lot of appeal when you look at the big picture. But the personal cost, not even talking about their souls at this point, is phenomenal.
While the episode goes big for the first half, it gets very personal for the second half as it goes back in time to give us a look at how Rin came into being. We get to see his very headstrong and stubborn mother, Yuri, as she believes that there are many demons that can coexist with humanity and that they’re largely misunderstood as it’s their vast curiosity and intelligence that drives them to our world in order to understand it all. It’s a pretty good piece that helps to cement how she ended up with Satan’s seed in her and the way the Vatican got caught up in it through their own rules and fears. It’s rushed since it’s trying to put a lot into about ten minutes worth of time, but it covers the key points, does it well and has a great sense of design and atmosphere to it all that makes it clear why things are as they are now in the present.
In Summary:
As the series gets closer to the end with only a few more episodes to go, it hits some high notes here even as they take the main cast and basically keeps them out of the picture for the majority of it. The first half has some tense moments as we get to understand the scale of what’s happening and it’s definitely impressive, story wise and visually, but it’s the second half that sells it. Giving us the chance to really understand what it is that happened in the past and how it all came together for the two brothers to be born and what the Vatican did to try and contain it works really well. There’s a whole lot to like here and it definitely makes you wish a lot more of the series handled things this seriously and straightforward.
Grade: B+
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Sony KDS-R70XBR2 70″ LCoS 1080P HDTV, Dell 10.1 Netbook via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.
