As expected, Thunderbolt Fantasy ends with a blast. While it does close the arc nicely, I can’t help but feel slightly underwhelmed by the climax. This final episode ties up two main storylines: Gui Niao challenged Ming Tian Hai in swordfight, and Shang Bu Huan faced the fearsome demon god Yao Tu Li, and provides us a nice little epilogue in the end. Well, not the end exactly because it was announced that Thunderbolt Fantasy will have a second season. Way to go anime industry. The world needs more puppet shows. I already feel blessed with the news myself.
Back to where we left of last episode, Gui Niao decides to ridicule Ming Tian Hai on what the antagonist truly proud of: his swordfight. Turns out that Gui Niao is an overpowered badass who not only good at deceiving people, but also a master swordsman. To put it more coherently, because he’s so good at sword fighting he eventually gets bored and becomes a master thief instead. This of course doesn’t bode well for Ming Tian Hai. I died laughing at the ridiculous of it all, so was the guy. Literally. The battle is so over the top that it shook the world, apparently. At this point, Reigan’s voice on the other show keeps popping in my head: These guys are children who failed to grow up. The way Ming Tian Hai felt crushed because he is defeated by Gui Niao, that he has to break down the sword, let the world destroyed, and died laughing. These actions are not unlike those kids who their favorite toys taken away from them, so they just make a nonsensical scene. But Gui Niao actually falls for that. He expects Ming Tian Hai submitted himself as loser, so when things don’t go as plan he loses his cool for the very first time. Oh pride, the most serious sin of them all.
I love to point out how important the swords represent in this series. For villains like Mie Tian Hai or the Screaming Phoenix Killer Sha Wu Sheng, the swords represent power and destruction. Mie Tian Hai seeks the ultimate power in the legendary sword, while the Phoenix Killer mercilessly kills everyone stand in his path. Our two mains don’t see it this way. Gui Niao realizes that using the swords excessively would eventually lead him to the path of killing and villainy, which he despises. Shang Bu Huan witnesses many people misuse the swords, so instead he collected them in order to dispose them altogether. The sword he eventually carries around is a piece of wood that he painted silver, same as Gui Niao with his pipe-sword. The legendary sword, on the other hand, ends up being destroyed meaninglessly. That irony plays very well with both the tone and the theme of Thunderbolt Fantasy. The show never intends to be a straight wuxia show, so it only makes sense that Gen Urobuchi flirts with all the tired cliché and makes something new of it. Furthermore, In the world of Thunderbolt Fantasy, swords are ultimately just a tool for human, as Shang Bu Huan puts it: “Whether it cuts something or protect someone just depends on who uses it.” It’s nothing deep I know, but it’s thematic relevance.
Shang Bu Huan steps up for the climax against Yao Tu Li, the female demon god. It’s interesting that the only two demon gods we see in this series are female. It should make sense though because like a notion of life and death is meaningless among demons, the same could be said for their gender. The way they reproduce is more of the process of replication, right? It is then revealed that not only Shang Bu Huan has a legendary sword for himself, he has 36 of them. When the right time comes he would choose the checklist of his swords’ inventory like you’d choose a weapon on your crappy online games. By the way 36 is not some random number, that number (and its multiplication) have been widely used in traditional Chinese literature/text (36 Stratagems; The Monkey King knows 72 transformations, there are 108 outlaws in Water Margin) and I’m again amazed that Gen Urobuchi takes note of that. While this fight is amazing, I can’t help but feel that all this resolution is way too quick, and thus too easy, for our main characters, especially since last week they built the stake up really high. In the end, both Gui Niao and Shang Bu Huan are just too overpowered that all the suspense is gone through the back door.
But in the end, I had a lot fun watching Thunderbolt Fantasy, considered that I know nothing about its existence up until the first episode came out. Now 3 months later it’s one of the most entertaining anime I’ve seen this year. Well, I will tell you in details once the final review comes up. But definitely you will see me talking about this show again when the second season is aired.
Well, apparently Taiwanese dub voice for demon god is male. So probably the “beyond gender” sort of deal indeed.
It was indeed rather easy climax, but I enjoyed it for the “Seen this shit, tired of it” factor Shang Bu Huan has going on. Seriously, everyone else in series(including the demon god) are rather melodramatic and full of themselves while he is someone outside of their context who they shouldn’t be messing with xP
Just want to add that I actually read your reviews almost every week, but usually too lazy to write anything fancy. Thanks for reviewing this gem as I still rarely saw this being covered by other aniblogs.
That, and I actually don’t mind the anti climax ending (I think it’s perfectly intentional). Just like what guy above me said, it’s just that for Shang Bu Huan is already too tired with this kind of overhyped “World Destruction Demon”. The only special thing about it is that it’s immortal, so he was just ” let’s just open up a new dimension and seal her there for lulz and get this done.”
See you in series review post I guess.
Thanks zeroyuki92, it’s reassuring to know that at least there were some readers who follow the posts, because sometimes I got the feeling that I just keep babbling to meself. And I understand that writing something, even the reply would take some efforts and I’m guilty of being lazy as well. But that also means I need to do a better job of engaging readers to read and reply.
It’s no brainer for me really to cover Thunderbolt Fantasy, and I fail to see why it didn’t get too much coverage (I saw some other blogs did a one-time review, and as far as I know only ANN covered it). Weird! They missed out a truly great gem I say.
Yeah, I think it’s intentional as well but part of me wanted it to be more epic. Like Juan Can Yun the spear wielder put it, Shang Bu Huan has a penchant for being surprised at something silly (his stunned reactions when he tries to grab Xing Hai’s demon logic are pure gold), so his rather uninterested attitude towards “the end of the world” situation is so fitting.
Now I think it only makes sense for the One-Eye Impaler to shoot Juan Can Yun in the eye. How did the Archer’s lose his eye anyway? Was it the same case as Juan Can Yun? Will the young guy become like his mentor in the future?? haha
And you can see me sooner than that. Just read up the first impressions to see which shows you feel like watching
I’m not sure if it’s about the lack of engaging content. Sure, that might help (maybe end the post with some kind of engaging question?), but I guess it’s just the habit of commenting in blogpost has been slowly declining.
I have been following several aniblogs for 5-6 years I guess (I just bookmarked psgels this year tho), but comments number are dwindling for sure. Even huge aniblog such as RC almost never reach more than 100 comments nowadays.
I guess it’s because the change of demographics. I am still following aniblog because old habits die hard, but 90% of the time I don’t visit them on PC anymore (I visit them on smartphone only on spare time). I rarely have the time to watch shows regularly because of RL duties, let alone commenting on aniblogs with a smartphone lol.
Meanwhile I guess the younger demographics tend to pick simpler methods such as Facebook page/Streaming sites comment section, or simply pick an entirely different media (Youtube vids?).
Maybe change some things to encourage comments/other kind of interactions? Change the homepage to show only bite sized paragraph and put the rest of the content and comment section after that? Make a share to social media button? Make a rate/what is your impression button? That depends on what kind of blog you want this to be, I guess.
That’s right. We’re after all just doing this as our hobby, and I admit that I write mostly for myself. I’m basically at a stage when I’m just trying new contents to see what I really wanna write.
It’s indeed an old habit die hard. I remember not so long ago I still checked other aniblogs while having some fast food lunch (mostly Subways) through my smartphone. Now I’m enjoying myself reading LNs at those time haha
If things go according to plan we’ll have some exciting news after these impressions end. Make sure to check back here more often my friend.
Not sure if you will see this, but I guess I’ll post it here anyway. I don’t follow anime blogs, but you are my go to place whenever there’s a real quality anime that just fail to get the attention it deserves, and I just have to see it get appreciated. I would then come here and leave very satisfied, including this time. It was also the same with Kyousougiga. You have no idea how much I appreciate this blog for that.
@Niello: Well, thanks Niello. Since Kyousougiga, this blog has changed quite a bit, mainly the main writer of this site, psgels, decided to have a break from anime and we then joined to contribute our inputs. But I take your comments as a compliment anyways, because us new writers love to uncover underappreciated gems. You can count on us on that.
Btw, Thunderbolt Fantasy series review will be out this weekend or beginning of next week, so be sure to head back here again.