Shakugan no Shana III (Final)

[Kou]

Spoiler: episode 23

RIP Khamsin (this time for real)

He was there at the beginning (being one of the few Flame Hazes alive to have shoved Snake into that Eternal Prison back then), and he has witnessed the end (Snake coming back to create the Paradise that would take all Denizens away). Talk about coming full circle.

For this “Child of Both Worlds” thingy, there is an entire prequel dedicated to that, involving Shana’s predecessor, Wilhemina, Sophia, Chiara’s predecessor, Lammy, Merihim and all that.

In a nutshell: there was once this Crimson Lord who used to be contracted to a Flame Haze, and over time fell in love with her. When she got betrayed and killed by the humans she was protecting, he went berserk and decided in order to continue with her “legacy”, he went on a plan to “conceive” a being by splicing the Powers of Existence of him – a being from the Crimson World, and his Flame Haze – a being from our world, to create a hybrid – a “Child of Both Worlds”.

To do so would require a complicated Unrestricted Spell powered by even more PoEs. Naturally, this led to war.

Though with the creation of Xanadu, there would be no such problem to conceive and give birth to this “child” of Pheles and Johann’s, as there’ll be an abundant amount of PoEs there.

 

[Terumi]

Spoiler: 24 and series review

24 = To be frank, I lost track of the plot when the final battle in Misaki city occured. I can remember what the flame hazes did to alter Xanadu in ways they could to hinder the Tomogaras, and their many well executed plans throughout the delicious battles. But in 24, watching the flame hazes going xanadu left a big question mark above my head, and 'exiling' poor Wilhelmina yet again with the child of Johann and Pheles. Ending was that, nothing unacceptable, :D

Series review : 6 long years. My first LN-adapted animu with the typical Hino Satoshi and Kugimiya Rie combo from JC for the final season has been great. Befitting of its popularity and expectations, Shana III has shone brightest in its many battles, especially in this final 24 episodes, which just went to show what the franchise is all about. The whole love plot was its charm to me along the way, but the wide range of characters and delicious fights kept the fire burning. For anyone who watched the the first season, the whole series has come a long way. Nothing else to add, but great series to the end. :D

 

[Kou]

Spoiler: episode 24

That was a very well-done ending.This ending soars spectacularly strong in one key area: Much unlike the Guilty Crown ending, the Shana III ending implicitly knows what its viewers want at a basic emotional level, and it delivers in flying colors. The emotional payoff here is simply huge, and it makes for a rewarding conclusion to a truly epic anime series.

There's certain minor things that perhaps can be nitpicked over, but the overall "big picture" execution of this episode and series is good enough that it's very hard to care about those. The final painting is gloriously gorgeous, and that's what counts the most.


But aside from the emotional payoff of this episode (including the Yuji/Shana kiss, of course), there was one key element this episode had that, for me, makes this ending not only very good or excellent, but an actual masterpiece. And that was the decidedly unexpected salvation of Yukari Hirai.

I never expected in a million years that we would see that. I myself had almost forgotten all about her. I honestly had forgotten the fact that Shana was technically impersonating her. But Yashichiro Takahashi, to his credit, remembered it. This is truly the sign of great writing. At this point in a very long overarching narrative, to remember a character and detail that was once important (a catalyst of sorts for Yuji, in fact) but was now seemingly lost in the mists of time, is truly impressive.

It so marvelously brings the Shana series full circle in a decidedly uplifting way, as though it was wrapped in a nice package and bow, and given as a gift for a heartwarming occasion.

What happened to Yukari was so dark, so troubling, that it made the very first two Shana episodes a bit hard for me to watch. And so this narrative reaches back, into the most personalized example of the horrors brought about by the Flame Haze/denizen system, to put the enchanting final note on Yuji's decisive victory over that horrible system.

Why did Yuji do this? He did it not only to help ensure that there would be no more Yukari's, but also to ensure that Yukari herself would be saved. And he also did it for Shana's sake, of course.


Magnificent ending, that I couldn't ask for anything more from. In addition to what I've wrote, the action scenes made for a great watch, and had at least decent character motivations behind them.

Spoiler: final impressions

Despite all of the stumbling and flaws the Shana series has finally come to an end after 7 years of fun. It’s a nostalgic kind of feeling I’m getting. Shana was one of the first anime series I watched back when I started downloading anime through the net 7/8 years ago. Feels like the end of an era. Having a lot of infodump to adapt, they adapted nicely by cutting out the backstories for the side characters as the most important part is always Sana and Yuuji. I would encourage ppl to read the one entire volume of the LN that is devoted to the previous Enpatsu Shakugan no Uchiete and Banjo no Shite. The anime only flashbacks about them briefly. Like the Great War where they stopped Asiz which Alastor summarized in 10 seconds that is actually an entire OVA series by itself. Thank you so much, the production committee of Shakugan no SHANA, J.C.Staff in particular, for providing an fitting end to this anime and being faithful to the novels.

No more urusai, urusai, urusai. ;_;

 

[rising crescent]

a very genius plot where the lovers comes to hate and love one another ..

 

[cloud910]

I kinda felt disappointed in the end, wanted a better ending but i dunno, maybe i was expecting too much

 

[catanx]

at the halfway the story goes boring......and for the final battle....what is the meaning for the battle.....at the end flame hazes go to new world too....it's meaningless

 

[orisa]

How is it meaningless? Sairei no Hebi tried to create an utopia for Tomogara while Flame Haze wanted to create law and order in it. Two different ideals are bound to bring conflict and that's what the final battle was.

You know not everything has to be black and white...Shana III wasn't one faction vs. another faction and there were never going to be winners or losers. But I guess the flashy battle scenes distracted people away from that point.

 

[Kou]

The 1200 Flame Hazes are going there to be a peacekeeping force which is more effective than the UN.

If I read the light novels correctly, what was not clearly indicated in the anime version is that Sairei no Hebi declared a 10 year moratorium on hostilities or the like and see how things pan out. If things don’t turn out well the Bel Peol will resurrect Bal Masque. The novels’ epilogue is still sorta open about the ending but is clearer about how things will turn out. Like everything that starts anew, there are going to be hiccups along the way but that is for the inhabitants to work out how to get about resolving it.

In the end, Shakugan no Shana is an infodump type of show. The is a lot of background that was not covered. Fate/Zero is already taking 26 episodes to cover 4 novels and even that assumes that people know what the Holy Grail war is about. So we actually need 5 seasons of Shana at least! Or kill out the highschool melodrama. Can you imagine the complaints about too much chatting and not enough action. People are already complaining about the chatty exposition bits which I actually find to be more interesting.

One of the things I find poor executed is that the seasons are disjointed. Then again, that comes about from animating a light novel series that is less than halfway through to start off with; there is no direction.

 

[Danny]

So... What happened to the end of Shakugan no Shana Final?

Right, I've just watched Shakugan no Shana Final and I am confused to f*** at the last episode.

If someone doesn't mind, can they please tell me in detail:

Spoiler:

Why is Shana and Yuji still fighting before they left the current world and went to another world?

 

[Animaksiat]

Re: So... What happened to the end of Shakugan no Shana Final?

the appropriate topic is already available, please use them instead of making a new one!
http://www.anime-sharing.com/forum/anime-talk-9/shakugan-no-shana-iii-final-26351/

edit: it's removed now!

 

[TujAuS]

Ohh.. I forgot about this whole final season. Gotta start watching :)

 

[Danny]

Re: So... What happened to the end of Shakugan no Shana Final?

the appropriate topic is already available, please use them instead of making a new one!
http://www.anime-sharing.com/forum/anime-talk-9/shakugan-no-shana-iii-final-26351/

edit: it's removed now!

Sorry about that :P

 

[Velvet]

I hated the way they rushed everything half of the cast were extrangers if you didn't follow the LN, for example who the f..k were the guys in the van? well i guess a rushed last season is better than leaving the serie die with the season 2 fiasco.

Anyways it was a good last season but it could have been better.