Katana Maidens ~ Toji No Miko

Episode 12: A Single SwordBy ThunderheavyarmThe time has come fans and readers alike, for the final fight against the protagonist and the big buffed up baddie. There aren’t anymore lackeys to get in the way, no more plot to flesh out, just swords and things to cut with them. Yet somehow the show manages to drop the ball so hard it’s left a deep imprint in my brain. So what the frikkin’ frick happened? I’m getting a little ahead of myself here, let’s start at the beginning of the episode.The episode opens where last week’s left off. Kanami and Hiyori facing off against the aradama possessed Commander Origami. Of course the girls are outmatched and easily overpowered since there’s only two of them in heavy combat enhancement suits. So after a little bit of sword play, the story remembers there’s something that it forgot to take care of in the last episode.So the story moves on to the left over fight from last episode. Which ends spectacularly...terrible. As I said before third member Yomi has the swordsmanship skills of a magic user. Looks cool on paper, really bad in execution as she gets taken down by Mai, arguably the least skilled of the squad. After a short final heart to heart between Sayaka and her director, spoiler she has feelings in case you hadn’t noticed, they move on just in time to help out in the end fight.But before that, we have to deal with a scene involving the other three members of the elite guard. Well two given that Yume died at the end of the last one due to plot complications. Turns out, chugging Noro turns you into an aradama. Meaning now the other two basically have to destroy the body. The story tries to have conflict, but then the camera switches back to the boss fight.Right, so back at the boss fight, the aradama has both of them at her mercy since neither is able to land a blow and can barely defend themselves. Revealing that the aradama’s power is apparently the ability to super observe and predict their movements correctly Kanami strikes on the brilliant idea that if she doesn’t attack it then it can’t tell what she’ll do next. Not joking, they stare at each other for a good 20 seconds before a brief attack pattern causes the aradama to get stabbed in the arm and decide that she can’t use her prediction powers anymore. This would be something equivalent to Goku not being able to use his kamehameha wave just because he took a punch to the stomach.Moving on, Yukari, the human being possessed, takes enough time to restrain the aradama only for it to super charge and gain four giant arms with equally large katana to swing knocking both girls senseless. Before it can deliver the glacially slow kill blow, Mai and Sayaka arrive to rescue them both and join the fray. Followed by Kaoru and Ellen as they burst through the floor into the Noro holding area. After a brief action sequence meant to show that they had team based training, the show remembers they couldn’t pull it off with just normal girls and all but Kanami and Hiyori are eliminated. Before in a swift blow Kanami is removed from the fight...only to be reincarnated by the spirit of her mother who beats the aradama to a pulp before passing out. Hiyori uses the secret technique that she tried in the first episode and manages to connect. In a direct recreation of a flashback done only a few minutes ago in the episode Kanami goes after Hiyori before she can be sucked into the netherworld and the two collapse on the ground as the end credits play.So where was I? Ah yes, what the frikkin’ frick happened? This show had almost everything going for it in the last couple of episodes. The show was really building up a good amount of momentum leading to this fight. Only to face splat into the wall that was the final episode. There was so much more that I think the series wanted to do and say, but couldn’t figure out how to do it with the limited time frame it had. So it decided to just shoehorn a lot of the missing information that it needed in the end, and hoped that the gaps that it needed to jump we’d just ignore in favor of the overly flashy sword fight. Instead, the final episode comes off as half finished and leaving a bit of a bitter feeling while the credits roll. To top it off, the series is going to be around in the next season, which begs the question what is left to go over? I wanted to be looking forward to the next story arc, but this one has definitely made me wary and taken away a lot of my interest in the show. Until next time, GG everyone.