Ménage à twits.
Creative Staff
Story/Art: Atsushi Ohkubo
Translation/Adaptation: Stephen Paul
What They Say
Ding-dong! DEAD-dong! Class is in session, but even DWMA is preparing for the annual Death Festival held on Halloween. But while Death City is abuzz with excitement and delight, something sinister is brewing within its shadows…and it seems the girls’ carefree school days are in for a rude awakening with a shocking betrayal! Can DWMA stop the nefarious witch Shaula Gorgon’s schemes before it’s too late? And will Tsugumi ever get to make her choice?!
It’s a savage but super-fun conclusion!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The side story about the NOT! trio is coming to the close, with the battle against the witch that no one knew about. Shaula Gorgon makes her move with a bold attack against DWMA on their home turf. She infects the NOT students with crazy, and patient zero was Meme.
Meme has been my least liked character in this story. The spacey ditz’s sole existence in the story seemed to be stripping down for laughs. We learn here that her forgetful behavior may actually have been a side effect of being Shaula’s plaything. Her friends track her and learn she’s being controlled, but that information comes too late to prevent disaster. Which means by the end of the story I’m not actually sure if Meme’s personality is something completely different. She certainly seems to act differently once completely free of Shaula’s spell. We don’t get enough follow-up time after the story wraps to learn if that was true.
When all hell breaks loose Anya is ordered to return to her home country. She nearly gets her and her butler killed trying to get back to Tsugumi in order to go rescue Meme. The big casualty of the attack is Sid, who apparently is stuck down by Meme offscreen, although we see the aftermath which would be shocking to anyone who read this before the main story. (We who did know that Sid is turned into a zombie by Stein, and thus lives through his death. Which makes the scene extremely amusing.)
It’s entirely convenient that such a dangerous witch was allowed to wreak havoc on Death City. As Meme is restored to herself and Tsugumi gains her edge, the three girls strike down the witch. They just happen to be the first meister/meister/weapon pairing in DWMA history. They also happen to be the first NOT students to take down a witch. (You’d think such a formidable trio would get moved up to the EAT class, but nope.) We do get one good fight in this series, which makes up the conclusion to this series. It lacks some of the psychological punch many of the main series fights had, but it does have the visual flair. The ending is full of the twee feel-good vibes you’d expect from this light-hearted romp. At least Tsugumi finally develops an edge.
The story ends with one last punchline about how Tsugumi is just as indecisive as ever. You would think that the author would have some better final words to close out his major series. We get one final Atsushi-ya segment where he quotes a bunch of famous sayings and tells everyone off, as expected.
In Summary
The Soul Eater saga comes to an end. For those who were looking for more Soul Eater in the vein of the original series, NOT! isn’t really going to scratch that itch. The drama here is light and the stakes amazingly low. It’s mostly a goofy, fan-servicey filled romp with an extremely light message about friendship and painted in light yuri tones. There is the highlight of seeing exactly what killed Sid (resulting in him becoming a zombie in the main series.) Beyond that, unless you’re a completionist and need to have this to finish your Soul Eater collection you can easily ignore it. It’s not bad, but it’s unremarkable, which is surprising considering how weird and wonderful Soul Eater can be.
Content Grade: B –
Art Grade: A –
Packaging Grade: B +
Text/Translation Grade: B +
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Yen Press
Release Date: July 21st, 2015
MSRP: $13.00