Kamisama Kazoku – 13 (END)

Summary:
Returning to Kumiko, Samatarou pulls out a baseball bat and says that it’s his duty to protect her. As he’s sleeping later, Kumiko kisses Samatarou on the side of his head. It is at right before midnight that the Kamiyama house erupts in a fireball. Samatarou runs downstairs with the bat to find Fumiko standing over a pool of blood and the body of his mother. He goes into a rage and charges at Fumiko, but gets stopped by his mother’s chibi form who tells him that violence doesn’t solve anything. According to Mama-san, violence awakens the small demon in everyone’s heart. Samatarou has no choice but to throw away the bat, but then Meme comes downstairs and sees the body. When she screams and her eyes turn red, Fumiko uses her powers to smack Meme against the wall. Misa then jumps downstairs and shows Samatarou that his anger is making him no different from the demon.
On his sister’s orders, Samatarou brings Meme upstairs to Kumiko and Tenko, leaving Misa to face Fumiko. Unfortunately, the demon makes short work of Misa and then goes upstairs to Tenko’s room. Samatarou and Kumiko find Fumiko standing over Tenko’s body, with her scythe at Tenko’s neck. Fumiko reveals that she’s doing this because of Kumiko’s betrayal and she wants Kumiko to come back. Against Samatarou’s warnings, Kumiko decides to return to her mother. Fumiko seems ready to kill Tenko anyway, but Kumiko stops her by saying that she trusted her. Fumiko then takes Kumiko and tells Samatarou that she’ll be waiting at the park. If he doesn’t come, Kumiko will probably die. At first, Samatarou falls to his knees in despair. But then he quickly pulls himself together and bandages up his mother and sisters, giving them each of them a kiss on the cheek. To the still sleeping Tenko, he kisses her hand, telling her that he needs her and asking her to always stay by his side.
On the way to the park, Samatarou is joined by Suguru. Samatarou stops and takes the time to deposit 500 yen into the piggy bank. Because of this, Suguru spits out an omikuji for Samatarou. Unfortunately, he gets kyou (bad luck). At the park, Samatarou and Suguru are met by Fumiko riding on top of a huge dog. The dog’s roar immediately blows away Suguru, leaving just Samatarou. Fumiko announces that he will die here and that Kumiko will be the one to kill him. Kumiko has an energy sword of some sort in her hands and appears ready to do it. But before she can, Samatarou tries to persuade them to throw away their weapons and give up. He even asks Kumiko to go home with him. After Samatarou finishes talking, Fumiko sends her daughter to get Samatarou’s delicious soul. Kumiko tells Samatarou that their time together was very important to her and that she’ll never forget those memories. However, the time for them to separate is now, and it’s not likely that they’ll meet again. She says goodbye and attacks, but, to Samatarou’s surprise, it is directed at her mother.
Kumiko succeeds at piercing through her mother’s abdomen, but Fumiko won’t be taken out so easily. Kumiko doesn’t consider Fumiko to be her mother anymore and wants the return of her kind and gentle mother; the person in front of her now is just a demon. Fumiko declares that it was all an act, all a lie, and then knocks her own daughter away with the pole of her scythe. Samatarou rushes to Kumiko’s side, and she asks him to save her mother. Having pulled the sword out of herself, Fumiko considers her wound to be a handicap to make things more interesting. She throws the sword to Samatarou because she thinks that he’d want to kill her, but he kicks it away. Fumiko and her dog proceed to beat up on Samatarou and then get ready to finish him off. Tenko appears and yells for Fumiko to wait. Samatarou tells Tenko to go back home, even jokingly appointing her the head of the going home club. Tenko of course refuses because of her feelings for him and her duty as an angel to protect him. Fumiko then beats up on Tenko, but Tenko still refuses to give up and go back. She tells Samatarou how happy she was with what he told her at her bedside earlier and how she won’t forget that ever in her lifetime.
Hearing Tenko’s scream, Samatarou looks up and finds her in the dog’s mouth. Samatarou appears unable to control his anger and reverts to his red eyes. He grabs the sword and seems determined to do something. After Fumiko announces that the weak point of demons is their heart, Samatarou surprises her by stabbing himself in the chest. Refusing to be swallowed up by the hatred, Samatarou is doing this to get rid of the demon inside of him. What’s more, stabbing himself in the chest also seems to cause Fumiko pain in the same area on her body. He declares that this is the end for Fumiko and pushes the sword deeper into himself. As even more light comes out of Samatarou’s body, Fumiko goes up in flames and her body turns to sparkles that rise up into the sky.
With the battle over, Samatarou falls down and blacks out. Tenko and Kumiko both eventually wake up and go over to his body. Tenko suggests that they pray for a miracle and asks Kumiko to believe in her own power. Kumiko doesn’t think she can because she’s a demon, but Tenko then notices that something has appeared on Kumiko’s back: angel wings. In fact, Tenko has also sprouted wings, and both girls now have halos above their heads. As they pray for Samatarou to be saved, their wings open up and Samatarou’s body starts to glow. As a result, Samatarou does indeed wake up and Tenko immediately tries to kiss him. Watching Samatarou resist Tenko, Kumiko starts to laugh happily.
Several days later, the Kamiyama family is working together to repair the house. Mama-san tells Samatarou that his room will be halved to make room for Kumiko. Meanwhile, Tenko asks Suguru what his relationship to Fumiko’s mother was. Suguru explains that they’re old colleagues from when Fumiko was an angel. Fumiko fell in love with a human and they had a baby together – Kumiko. But man couldn’t deal with Kumiko being an angel, and so he left Fumiko. This wounded Fumiko’s heart to the point where she became a demon and directed her revenge towards mankind. Tenko realizes that this is why Kumiko became an angel when they were praying for Samatarou – because she used to be an angel. Suguru then says that it’s time, and asks Tenko if she’s ok with not returning to Heaven. Tenko is fine with it because she considers her family to be here. As Suguru flies up to the sky, Tenko asks him to send her regards to her mother and father in Heaven. Tenko then goes to Samatarou’s room and finds him reading. She’s got something to say to him, so she snuggles up. When he turns his head, she kisses him and says that even as an angel, she wants to become happy.
In Heaven, Suguru is visiting Papa-san, who is proud that Samatarou seems to have become an adult. Papa-san asks if Suguru is lonely after having to separate with Tenko, and Suguru responds that it’ll probably take a while to get used to being alone. Papa-san remembers that Tenko had sent her regards, meaning that it is still a secret. Suguru confirms that it is indeed still a secret because Tenko is in the best situation right now, causing Papa-san to remark that fathers have it hard. He rummages through his pockets and finds 500 yen to deposit. The resulting fortune that Papa-san gets from Suguru is dai kichi (excellent luck). A happy Papa-san then announces to Suguru that starting from today, he’ll be working in a pair. His partner is a newcomer named Fu-san who is mosquito coil holder shaped like a pig with wings. This Fu-san introduces herself and says that she has no memories of her previous existence, but she’ll do her best. As Suguru realizes who Fu-san really is, Papa-san asks him to teach her various things about angels and humans. Back on Earth, Samatarou and friends are getting ready to leave for school. Kumiko is now wearing their school’s uniform, though Mama-san is too. All of them take a picture together, and that picture ends up in Tenko’s diary.

Well that was quite a satisfying ending. It more or less wrapped up all the plotlines and there were even some interesting revelations. For one, they heavily imply that Suguru is indeed Tenko’s father (no word on her mother). Given that Fumiko was turned into a mosquito coil holder shaped like a pig, I wonder if Suguru had a human form previously and why he got changed into a piggy bank but still kept his memories (if that is even the case).
I also like how demons and angels (and gods) aren’t different groups, but rather everyone has a little bit of demon inside of them. Letting the hatred get control is what seems to make you a demon. So Kumiko started out and now ends up back as an angel; It now makes sense why the OP hints that Kumiko and Tenko are the same. Speaking of the OP, this final episode REALLY REALLY makes me want to hear the full song. They played it in it’s entirety at the end there, but obviously there were still things going on and things being said. Shame that the OP and ED don’t seem like they’re going to get an official single release. Well, we can always hope to hear it some other way.
If I had to complain about the episode, I’d probably say that it wasn’t serious enough during the parts that it perhaps needed to be. Specifically whenever Kumiko was throwing Samatarou or Tenko around, they’d make comments about how it really hurt. But just by having them say that diffused the seriousness of the situation quite a bit. It even felt a little comical at times, like they were never in any real danger. Still, that’s not too big a deal since Samatarou stabbing himself was a fairly dramatic scene in relative comparison.

Final Thoughts: I really wasn’t sure what to expect of this series back when it first started airing. Matthew had said good things about the novels, and the first episode was fairly impressive. I’m glad now that I kept watching this because it was a pretty solid series throughout, certainly better than a lot of the stuff out there (such as the series I dropped to blog this instead). For me, the second arc with Ai and Lulu (episodes five through eight) could have been a lot more interesting, but the last five episodes made up for it. All things considered, I think this turned out to be a great show. Now if only I could get my hands on that opening song, everything would be perfect…