And so it has ended. I originally thought that Sasuke would arrive to do something crazy, but this also was the perfect way to end this series with: an entire episode dedicated to the ceremony of Sennou Rikyuu, committing harakiri. It gave a beautiful closure to this series and definitely set the standards for the endings of the rest of the year. As usual, Bee-Train definitely did not disappoint.
The build-up in particular was wonderful here, and I especially loved the last moments between Rikyuu and Sasuke, who was the one who ended up killing him. The final scene of the series really made an impact here: it was just Sasuke carrying Rikyuu’s head. No aftermath, nothing. It was entirely about the ending of a visionary.
Overall, the last third of this series turned out to be completely different from what I imagined. The reason for this was that suddenly the main character role shifted to Rikyuu, and this series started to explore exactly why he ended up committing harakiri here. It was completely different from the first third, which was centered around Oda Nobunaga’s conquests, and the second third, which was about Sasuke building up his influence. The fromer were crazy, while this was far more dark and brooding. The picture they all paint together however is wonderful.
I can only hope. Hope that there will be more series like this that don’t care one single bit about being moe or delivering bishies. Series that just have a completely unique vision and aren’t afraid to fully go with it. It perhaps didn’t end up as an utter classic due to a bit of a slow pacing here and there, but it once again reminded me why Koichi Mashimo is one of my favorite directors. I am really, really looking forward to his next work.
Rating: *** (Awesome)
