DESCRIPTION

CAST

MOVIE ActionKara no Kyoukai: Satsujin Kousatsu (Kou)
MOVIE DramaKara no Kyoukai: Mirai Fukuin

REVIEWS

• 

  lublei

  1/100
  An insult to the medium of animation

  This is a horrendous OVA that I can't fathom was produced by ufotable. The Garden of Sinners movies are all generally excellent and have very high production values so when I watched this OVA I genuinely felt scammed. For context, the entire 30-minute-long episode is 2 characters talking to each other. That might not have sounded as bad as it is, but that is literally all that happens. The characters don't move around, the background stays the same, and they just talk until the episode finally ends. We don't even see the character's bodies for most of the episode, just a talking head in front of the same snowy background. Putting the voice actors in VR chat and recording them would have made this more interesting since they would inadvertently move around a bit during the 30 minutes rather than standing and talking like dolls.

  What really pisses me off about this abomination is that it being an anime significantly detracts from it. This conversation would have been better portrayed in a pamphlet, a PowerPoint presentation, or a docx document with a gif attached. At least then it would have taken less time to consume. The fact that a word document and a gif file would have conveyed everything this anime did, perhaps better, really makes me question why and how this thing was created. It is an extra episode they could have just not produced it but someone wanted to make this garbage. Someone thought this was necessary to make and that it was a good use of animation.

  This episode doesn’t utilize anything about the medium of animation, and barely even has any animation. 2 actors could film this in live action and it would be more interesting to watch without losing anything. Even the PowerPoint presentations disguised as the final 2 episodes of Evangelion are more animated than this trainwreck. In those two episodes, there are frequent cuts, perspective changes, etc. At least they put some effort into making those episodes, while this thing puts the expressionless faces of being characters on top of a snowy background for minutes on end. This has no passion and no value behind it. Even pieces of absolute garbage like ex-arm and mars of destruction at least tried enough to become animated works. You cannot adapt ex-arm 1:1 to a word document but you wouldn’t have much trouble adapting this. Ex arm at least tried, no matter how badly, and failed while this epilogue didn’t even bother.

  I would recommend this as an audiobook if you want to listen to something as you do chores and really like the garden of words. It is very rare that an anime fails so utterly at being an anime. This thing is an insult to its franchise and to every single animated work that had a shred of effort put into it. This thing genuinely offends me.

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• 

  R2R

  79/100
  Far from being an insult to animation.

  https://anilist.co/anime/6954/the-Garden-of-sinners-Chapter-8-The-Final-Chapter/ "4 years later, _they_ meet again".

  ---

  The final chapter that quite a lot seem to ignore just because it's all words and doesn't have all those cool fights or "GREAT ANIMATION". This is untrue, by the way. Because the movie is definitely well-animated, especially considering the fact that it's just about a conversation between two characters.
  Just like the beginning of the story (i.e., the beginning of part 2), Mikiya walks with his umbrella under snowy weather only to get a glimpse of the same person he met 4 years ago, 「Shiki」.
  Shiki's true identity has been explained in three different archetypes in this film: Shiki as a body, Shiki as a psyche, and Shiki as a soul. As she argues, this 「Shiki」 we see here is the soul, an empty soul.

  

  The entire film reminisces on many events from previous films, such as the similarities between Shiki and Fujino which Shiki stated in part 3, the concept of the Soul and its origin which is the central concept in part 5, and finally answering my personal question about the consequences of not forgiving Shiki. What also pleasantly surprised me was the subtle similarities between Mikiya and Shiki, that Mikiya fell in love with Shiki, because of how similar his normalcy is to her abnormality.

  ##### ... who leads an ordinary life.

  Expects nothing and receives nothing, neither looks into the future nor regrets the past, never hurting anyone nor yourself. That is the normal person he is. There's a tiny line between Mikiya's nature of life (as in to live in the present) and 「Shiki's」 origins (from the nothingness), and it's a bit lovely that these two characters, each on the other side of this boundary, were able to fall in love with each other.
  This film feels more like an epilogue than a typical film because it is highly filled with dialogue, with animation and music only providing enough support to make the most of the least so as to not make it a drag to watch, although this will undoubtedly be the case for many. The peaceful and languid tempo contrasts sharply with the preceding parts' blood and gore; one could even call this an artsy entry to the franchise rather than a commercial movie. Though I do agree reading this entry in the novel works better as it is full of words, by no means this film is an abomination. Only people who think that good fights = good animation will get to that conclusion.

  ---

  Conclusion

  This is definitely a great addition (and the true conclusion I would argue) to the franchise. However,
  If you're enjoyability factors are just cool animation and fights, then you will not like this film, or even hate this film for that matter.
  If you are more interested in the characters, however, then this will be a beautiful movie to watch on a winter night.

  Fun Fact: The voice actors for Shiki (Maaya Sakamoto) and Mikiya (Kenichi Suzumura) were married, 6 months after this film debuted. I don't know, I just found it cute.

  
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• 

  ScarletCutter

  100/100
  Arguably the best ending in the entire industry

  __[!] THIS REVIEW CONTAINS POTENTIAL SPOILERS [!]__ Ever since the start of Kara no Kyoukai, it was a tale of Shiki being trapped in various figurative forms of prison with the help of Mikiya’s pacifistic investigation. We’ve been through 7 chapters solving murder incidents and puzzles made of black magic. After that twisted journey, not only did we abolish the invasion of the magus unleashed by Araya but we finally gave Shiki the freedom she wanted despite her failure we see in Chapter 7. This chapter is where we meet her light. This is the final chapter of this series. …but also the most complicated and/or controversial one at that and I’d imagine it would be very difficult for me to piece my thoughts on it together. Despite being the last chapter, this is the biggest hit-or-miss Kara no Kyoukai has offered. On one hand, it does wrap everything up as it’s the introduction of Void, the third personality of Shiki which is unleashed after slaughtering every evil that is sighted around her surroundings. But on the other hand, the story presentation is very complicated. You either like or hate it depending on your personal view, whether you’re a fan of the Kara no Kyoukai series or not. For me, personally, I wasn’t so sure how I would feel about it and that is before I get into it. Based on the summary of it, I was kind of expecting that it would be this series’ infodump saved for the end. But after taking a closer look at it, I’m starting to like it a lot more. In fact, this might arguably be the best chapter this series has ever created right after Chapter 7. There’s a lot of personality and soul put together in this quote-unquote “epilogue” than one meets the eye. Hell, contrary to what others would say, this isn’t really an epilogue all things considered. It’s more of a true ending since Shiki doesn’t really show her full happiness until she disintegrates every evil she sees on sight. --- If you start Chapter 2 through a chronological watch order of the series, the snowy road right from the start was where Shiki and Mikiya met for the first time. Since then, Mikiya studied the beauty and mystery of Shiki while Shiki herself studied the faults and twists the world had. Their results have been fulfilled regardless of their mistakes throughout and here, this is where they reunite on the same road we see right from the start. From here, they start talking about the philosophies and connections between the surrealistic reality and Shiki’s existence. Like I said, this is really hard for me to talk about. Despite its short runtime, there are a lot of things to pay attention to. This movie shows how Shiki ventures throughout the world and how she studies every single mystery and ideal involved. Not to mention, all of this also relates to the relationship between Shiki and Mikiya. Their relationship, for the most part, was very non-linear. They are love couples but they also point out their characteristics, all while they find out figurative patterns in what scenario they’re in. After some rethinking, I think I finally found my personal answers. Part of why this is a brilliant addition to Kara no Kyoukai comes down to recapping not only the features and flaws of the magic invading the series but also the personal details of Shiki. This does a fantastic job of recognizing the philosophical identity of the series by having Shiki explain and visualize every encounter she met when she ventured around. She points out how the black magic caused by Araya swarmed around with visceral questions as well as putting her in various tests regarding her characteristics and abilities. Alongside those things, she herself is an enigmatic figure in the sense that she learned a lot about developing her personality to begin with. Based on my observation throughout the whole series, she’s probably the most skilled in that department for better or worse. The reason that is is how hesitant she can be when it comes to developing magic. The fact that Shiki had issues when she learned all of this was what caught Araya’s attention in the first place and this perfectly communicated with his tragic and twisted past and ideals. If you think about it, Shiki viewed death as something valuable while Araya is the opposite. Void was actually created prior to this chapter but because of the black magic surrounding the world, it remained hidden until everything was cleansed. Speaking of, let’s talk about Void. The reason why Void was created in the first place is because it represents what Shiki really aims for: personal happiness. It embodies what Shiki wants throughout her entire life. This part is handled extremely well because not only does saving this element for the very last makes so much sense but it gives off a very bittersweet and cathartic impression of how Shiki was holding her light back until she achieved her freedom. It also conveys the dynamics between Shiki and Mikiya greatly, especially when considering the fact that Mikiya was studying what Shiki was capable of. --- And that’s it. I don’t think there’s much for me to say about it since it’s half an hour. Honestly, say what you want about this chapter. The animation may have dipped slightly compared to the first 7 chapters but at that point, I don’t care. This isn’t an epilogue but more of an ending and what a phenomenal ending it is. It quietly yet poetically celebrates the freedom of Shiki and Mikiya and represents their conclusions very well. It may not be the most exciting thing ever but I don’t think it has to be. What matters more is how it handles its context and again, that context is truly right on the spot. So in my opinion, not only is it a fantastic ending but it’s arguably the best ending in the entire industry.
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