The final confrontation between Maka and Crona is at hand!
Creative Staff
Story/Art: Atsushi Ohkubo
Translation/Adaptation: Stephen Paul
What They Say
DWMA braces for the final showdown as the Kishin awakens from his slumber at heart of the moon. Unable to contain his rage, Noah is the first to attack, the Book of Eibon and “BREW” fueling his assault. But despite his formidable efforts, Noah is overcome not by the Kishin, but by the sudden appearance of Crona. With the world hanging in the balance, DWMA can only wonder who will prove to be the greater foe–the Kishin…or Crona…
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Four shall enter, one shall leave.
Eibon, the Kishin, Crona, and Kid’s DWMA group have all met on the moon.
We knew that this battle was coming but not in what form it would take. As this volume opens we’re treated to some wonderfully screwed up depictions of madness attempting to claim the lives of the leads. Body parts start turning to putty, eyeballs melt out of sockets, mouths twist into long slanting lines falling off faces. It’s all very unsettling and awesome to look at. Crona eventually starts to look more and more like a deranged muppet than anything resembling human.
I’m a bit disappointed that Noah isn’t able to put up much of a fight against the Kishin. He was built up to be a fearsome foe, and he’s able to hold his own against the Kishin for a short time with his creepy ant ladies. However he falls extremely quickly to the machinations of Crona.
Stripped of their weapons, Maka and Black*Star have to resort to back up means to get them back. For Maka that means a brief team up with her father. The two have been at odds through most of the story, with Maka being embarrassed around her father like most kids her age are. The brief bonding moment is a nice touch. It’s also the bond which emotionally breaks Crona and allows the Kishin to gain the upper hand. Eventually this all leads up to the moment of the hero shot, where Kid, Maka, and Black*Star show off their best sides against the ultimate foe.
While Kid and the others are battling on the moon the rest of the cast has been returned to Earth (including Kid temporally, the series humor has not been lost even in these most trying moments). Death watches everything from a distance, realizing that whatever past mistakes that he made that lead to this moment will soon no longer be his to worry about.
It seems a bit telling that Kid and the Asura look awfully similar in that face off in the final pages of this volume. The preview of the next volume seems to confirm that maybe the two are more alike than it first appeared. In fact the moral of the story is building towards ‘don’t deal in absolutes’ and we’re seeing why that’s a bad idea first hand.
This volume closes out with the author’s gag comic blowing up his bar. As a comic tucked inside a fairly weird comic, the Punch & Judy antics of the author’s imaginary helpers has been the strangest part of it all. There’s also a preview of Soul Eater Not volume 3 and an extensive and perhaps far too spoiler filled preview of the final volume.
In Summary
There aren’t many surprises in this ultimate showdown, but it’s certainly fun to watch it all play out. I wish Maka and Crona’s battle had gone on just a bit longer, it seems to go by in a flash, but I really liked the team up which brought Crona to his knees. It’s no surprise that by the end of this volume DWMA and the Kishin are the two remaining forces. The cast has been pretty good at getting their butts kicked in some previous challenges and we know the Kishin is no pushover. One final volume left. One final battle with the Asura to fight. All the training, the battles, everything has been leading up to this moment. I really hope it delivers!
