As I was watching this episode of Hyouka, a beautiful, ephemeral ending with all its implied beginnings, I couldn’t help but recall the lyrics to “Once Upon a Time” from the musical All American (my favorite version of the song, sung by Bobby Darin).
Once upon a time a girl with moonlight in her eyes // Put her hand in mine and said she loved me so // But that was once upon a time very long ago
Well, it’s been one heck of a wild, emotional, sometimes frustrating ride, but we’ve come to the end of Your Lie in April. Somethings have ended, but others stretch out for as long as we remember them. It took this episode a few minutes to get going, but when it kicked into high gear, it really kicked into high gear. As expected, the aesthetics truly took charge in this episode and, even if there was a little more digital work than I would’ve liked, the end results was something pretty special. So, now it’s time for one last look at Your Lie in April.
Let it never be said that Akatsuki no Yona can’t do cliffhangers when it wants to do them. I thought last week’s cliffhanger was bad. HA! Laughable! Child’s play! The easiest of easy modes compared to the cliffhanger Akatsuki no Yona dropped on us this week! I almost don’t want to review the other events of this episode and just talking about that, but I’m sure if I tried to do that now it would come out as a blast of incoherent ramblings—so let’s see what this episode had for us.
So, we finally come to Ryuuji’s arc. I don’t remember the entirety of what happens with him here, but he’s the only major character left who hasn’t undergone significant development, we’ve got three episodes left after this, and if he doesn’t change everything that’s happened up to this point will have gone to waste. All the factors necessary to push him to change have come to bear: the revelation of Taiga’s feelings, Minori’s continuing distance from him, and Ami’s consistent, pressuring presence. Whether he likes it or not, the status quo he’s been holding on to has been shattered and how he picks up the pieces will define him as a person and a character.
Mage in a Barrel 