「否定の彼方へ」 (Hitei no Achira he) “To the One Who Rejects Me”
“Beyond the winding road”

Would I really let the final episode of Pandora Hearts slip by without saying something about it? Hell no. Read on if you’re following the series, but stop here if you plan to watch it later.

So after the Will of the Abyss went haywire last episode, we were probably well on our way to an anime original ending. Seeing how there was only one episode remaining, there was really no way they could tie up all the loose ends. To be honest, I had no idea how they’d go about concluding the series when it had followed the manga so closely thus far, but felt pretty ripped off while watching this final episode. In short, they completely ignored the Will of the Abyss, Jack Vessalius, Vincent Nightray, gathering the rest of Alice’s memories, as well as explaining how the Will of the Abyss is Alice’s other half.

Instead, they focused on resolving the issue between Oz and his father, the “Leader” of the Baskerville group who dropped him into the Abyss ten years ago. This late revelation comes as no surprise to me though; it’s been listed in the credits that Ookawa Tooru plays them both ever since episode nine. That said, I’m happy that Oz was able to finally get his resolve together about existing as himself and nobody else, convey that to his father directly, plus use his yet-to-be-explained power to take the Vessalius’ Gryphon Chain head on. However, ending on that note is just frustrating. There’s still so much left to do that this series just begs for a sequel. But now that they’ve gone anime original, I don’t see that ever happening. This reminds me of Claymore, where everything was built up so well via manga material, but ended abruptly with plenty of stuff unresolved. Regardless, the series leading up to that point has been awesome. Even with this ending, my opinion of the series hasn’t tarnished much. It just left me wanting to see more. Maybe that’s a good feeling to be left with…?

I watched the first episode when the series started airing back in spring, but never really got into it. A few weeks ago, I decided to give it another go and found that things really picked up after a few episodes. I was hooked from that point on and caught up on the twenty or so episodes I was behind in a couple of days. With a soundtrack composed by Kajiura Yuki and an opening song featuring four singers who have worked with her under the FictionJunction collaboration, that alone is usually enough to get me to watch a series. When the story is this good too, all the better. On that note, I’ll leave you with the PV of the opening, “Parallel Hearts”, which features WAKANA, KAORI, KEIKO, and YURIKO KAIDA.

P.S. If you’re slightly disappointed with the ending too, let me know!

 

48 Comments

  1. I liked the ending and felt that they did a good job of coming to a conclusion, given that they didn’t have the time for continuing the manga story. And given that the manga is still on-going, I saw nothing wrong with this.

    Hey, lots of other series get sequels, maybe Pandora Hearts will too someday when there is more manga and a clearer direction for an ending.

    Dave Baranyi
  2. “Parallel Hearts” is good.

    I agree with Xrtear. Divine, please blog the final ep of Phantom ~Requiem for the Phantom~. To me, Phantom is the most underappreciated show of the year (even though I hate the ending that they decided to animate).

    pierce
  3. Thanks for agreeing with me, Pierce. You’re right about Phantom being underappreciated, because if you compared it against Princess Lover! Phantom would’ve definitely been a solid winner. The action is exciting and the drama is interesting. Though, I kind of hated how Cal had to go…. >_<

    Xrtear
  4. yea i’ve always liked the manga better since watching the first 2 episodes of this then finding the manga, but how could this ever have gone the way we loved, it was still fun to watch, cept for some. anyways moving on, u know where.

    Chimasternmay
  5. i always hate it when they branch off the manga.. i mean, changing the original story really makes the anime sucks than the manga.. i wish they just wait until the end of the manga before animating it to preserve the story.. (well One Piece,Naruto, and Bleach are some exeptions due to the ability to make filler episodes)

    early219@yahoo.com
  6. I usually hate when an anime is based off still-running manga, because it almost guarantees an anime original ending, which is usually less than great. However, with Claymore, after the anime ended I got hooked on the manga since I wanted to see what “really” happened. I haven’t seen Pandora Hearts, but I’d probably approach this the same way.

    That PV for Parallel Hearts is good, I’m surprised I missed it since I usually follow FictionJunction fairly closely.

  7. opps.. accidentally post a non-comment post.. can’t delete it
    I not sure i disappointed with it or not.. cause even they ignore those stuff, they manage to show Oz’s father is the one hu throw him to Abyss and Oz knew about it and brough Alice, Oz, Gilbert and Break to Sabrié without anything happen.
    However i really like Lacie lyrics.. They also somehow ignore about Lacie, Gil and Vic’s past..

    freya
  8. I kinda wish it tied up maybe one of the endings. Particularly Vincent, because like 3 episodes ago or so, he was like ‘no one should know the truth’ all suspiciously. It was begging to be resolved and then it wasn’t! Yay for reading the manga and knowing what happened.

    But I really enjoyed this series. =D

    Satoida
  9. Why do ALL ‘alice’ anime suck. C’mon, anything that had to do with that creepy girl was trash. The first 5 or 6 episodes of this series was lackluster but otherwise fine – content wise. Then the crap blew up. I wonder just how ppl get into stuff like this. Not only was the animation unsightly (which I don’t complain about too often), but the plot was complete shit. Its like they mixed up Alice in Wonderland & Hellsing or some shit. Now Hellsing was damn good & Alice in Wonderland was about as good as it gets, but this – is SHIT!

    Megas
  10. Megas:
    I’m not really sure what you’re referring to by the “crap blew up” after 5 or 6 episodes, but you’re entitled to your own opinion so fair enough. I loved Alice though, being a tsundere character played by Kawasumi Ayako.

  11. I read the manga so I was really happy when they decided to follow the anime almost play by play. Though, two episodes ago, 23, I noticed that it changed drastically. I knew it was heading for an anime original ending so I dropped it there.

    Irational Promise
  12. Yay, you’re amazing for blogging the last ep of Pandora x3!
    Thanks a lot, I really enjoyed the series compared to a lot of the other summer ones and I love reading the commentary Random Curiosity provides. And dun worry about chur hater ;3 for everyone one you have, you have 100 times more fans <3

    Kristyn
  13. I got the same ripped off feeling as you divine, this ep kinda just ruined Pandora.

    Well, I went on Xebec’s site to taje a look, and they said tht was the last ep…*sobs*

    Havin said that, Rozen Maiden finished after ep 12 but later Traumend came out to continue the story, so maybe Xebec will do the same thing, I hope.

    XO I really wanna see Sabrie arc aninimated, it was pure awesomeness.

    Asonara
  14. I think that if an anime can get you into the manga, then it’s done its job well. Nice to hear that was the case for you.

    Personally, I don’t go out looking for new manga to read since I prefer the whole moving pictures + voices aspect of anime. As in your case with PH, I tend to get into a manga when the anime adaptation piques my interest enough. This is why I’m not familiar with what’s anime original material in a lot of stuff I watch. At the same time, it ensures that all the anime I watch is pretty “refreshing” for lack of a better word.

  15. The final episode was ok, but not great. I really loved hearing lacie being sung in English and all in all I rather enjoyed the series for the most part. I was annoyed by the anime original ending.
    But, they better do a second season otherwise I will not forgive them.

    Phoenix
  16. I’m quite satisfied with this ending. The overall anime stay true to the manga and pace is acceptable. This might implies that the fans will have to rely on the manga for the continuation of the story (alice, alice and alice).
    @divine: Thanks on covering this episode.

    tylon
  17. @divine: I really meant that the first 6 or so episodes were fine, then they started to merge the flashbacks with the present in episode 7. It was hard as hell to follow when you didn’t even know what timeframe the flashbacks were coming from. But I guess that’s the story in itself. I have no problem with the ‘Alice’ character. She was really the only reason I was watching this stuff. Everyone else was just too emo to pay any attention to 😛

    Megas
  18. I was shocked with the last episode. Then i decieded to check if it’s true that its really final or not. Its the last & no 26 episode even in projects. Actually i’m also interested in the REAL end of the story. The “final 25” episode didn’t show or even give a hint what really happened in Soblier & what the real role of all charactes was.Moreover in 24 episode Alice asked Oz who they are but also no answeres. I didn’t like the 25th, i can’t agree that its the end, just i think that it spoiles all anime in general!, that’s my opinion. & the last one, the grave belongs to …..????

  19. Megas:
    The whole ten year time lapse thing and Raven being Gil was what had me watching. I inadvertently came across a spoiler that Raven is Gil and thought, “really now?”, and kept going through the episodes to see how that is.

    Tata TS:
    I figured that was Alice’s grave after Vincent killed her. It’s what brought Oz to Alice/The Will of the Abyss and had the Jack’s musical pocket watch on it.

  20. waaahaaaaa its over NOOOOOOOOOO
    This is the worst week of my life!!!
    07 ghost just ended now THIS
    oh well 07 ghost has a satisfied ending for me and is gonna have season 2!!!
    I REALLY HOPE THAT PANDORA HEARTS HAS A SEASON 2 XD

    Kaoru
  21. Oh, bout that grave, Alice find out who’s it is in next arc in manga, along with Gil and Vincents backstory, not gonna spoil for you guys xD

    Well, mite be bit late, but heard Kuroshitsuji’s getting season 2 and that was no where near as popular as Pandora, so, still hopin

    Asonara
  22. The way they ended it surely makes its CERTAIN there’s a second series! They ended it like that coz it’s a great ending to a first series. if they were planning to end it in 25 episodes then they wudn’t have had built up SO MANY unanswered questions, even in the last few epsiodes there were MORE new mysteries to solve! i just can’t believe they wud write and end the anime like that without the intention to continue it, becoz that just wastes everything they did up until then? Why bother?
    Also i agree, even though the fight at the end was pretty awesome, it was so rushed! They have so much comtemplation going on, how many times did Oz go on about his personal situation? I got the fact he was depressed and had a sh*t life after the first couple of monolougues. Don’t get me wrong, they weren’t bad, but by getting rid of sum of the talking they could have had more action! Plus the sudden abyss episode where everything went wrong was almost laughable, it didn’t fit in at all and was sorted in an episode!
    Anyway i do regret they didn’t build up the will of the abyss’s character more, i thought she was pretty awesome!!! They cud have had 25 episodes just dedicated to her story!

    Animecrazed
  23. Oh i forgot to ask, does anyone else thin that this anime is a lot like Blood+? Gil is almost the spitting image of Haji, clothes and all, though Haji is SO much cooler 😀 And then there’s the no ageing thing, the twin sisters, one evil one good, who are doomed to hate each other. It’s all very similar really 😀 And the eerie theme tunes!

    Animecrazed
  24. i cant whait til the 2 season!!!!
    there is one on the way, right???
    i got the manga but havent have time to sit down and read it yet.
    i love the songs from pandora hearts!!!! (favorit :everytime you kiss me and lacie)
    …. anyway, how long dos it take to finish 1 anime season???

    skorpios
  25. terrible ending. Or rather just an incomplete series. It feels like they could of wrapped things up with a few more episodes. Perhaps there will be an OVA?

    its a shame but these cop out endings are common in anime.

    akito38
  26. The ending was really rushed..
    Maybe they thought they could have fit everything in 25 episodes..?
    This makes me wish there was a sequel because there were
    many things they didn’t answer like…Elliot’s dream..? Who is echo? Who was the cross belong to..? What about what happened 100 years ago!? I mean there were fragments of it but it was never completed D:

    Cappy
    1. Woahhhhhhh calm down mate it’s probably better than you think

      Also why rage here?? Why not rage at the people telling you to watch it Divine or anybody else isn’t asking you to watch it so ??? Who exactly should Stfu??

      Torrigan

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