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[Spoilers] May I Ask for One Final Thing? - (final) Episode 13 discussion
May I Ask For One Final Episode?
This show is heavily carried by characters (read: Scarlet). She's surely unlike other villainesses. I know that there are tons of OP villainesses out there, but she might be the first one who always takes the problems into her own hands, quite literally. A villainess who brute-forces her way through with fists. That's quite refreshing, TBH.
While other characters might not be as interesting as her, they are not bad. Seeing Julius teasing Scarlet is also quite amusing. I thought Vankish would be yet another generic narcissistic prince, but he turned out to be a surprisingly fun character. While the romance option for the main couple is quite limited, the side couples filled in the gap quite well.
The animation quality is fine. There are some noticeable still frames here and there, but it delivered when it counted. The OP - Senjou no Hana, might be the best OP of this season for me. While I can't say the same thing for the ED, it's still solid, especially the visuals.
If I have to pick one weak point, it must be the story. I'm quite disappointed by Tereneza's secret. And I don't really care much about the war in the final arc. The show would be more solid if it could improve on this part.
Overall, I truly enjoyed it a lot. Watching Scarlet punching all those bad guys was something I looked forward to every week. It's just that fun. If I can ask for one final thing, I hope this gets another season. For now, I will miss this brute villainess lol. - 9.5/10
Scarlet x Julius chemistry needs to be studied for at least next 100 years..its just that good ><
And yes..that war arc was so shitty..it's just felt flat like their no weight behind it :(
Also Tereneza's story felt incomplete..she didn't get much screentime nor proper backstory despite being the main antagonist
The adaptation is hot garbage, and that might be the source material's fault.
Episode 12 focused on that Pope and a new Inquisitor, both of whom pulled random powers out of nowhere and were never developed as antagonists.
Episode 13 didn't even focus on Terenezza, whose motivations are entirely contradictory and never offered a challenge vs our heroes. Instead, we focus on Julius and some random new blessing out of nowhere, one that solved all problems. Also, the final fight was solved by the power of love. In a show where the MC manipulates time.
Scarlett and Terenezza both deserved a far better story and show.
Julius," My most beloved Lady of Beatings." Scarlet want to punch beloved Julius, " Cheeky, aren't you? Well, in the spirit of fairness, may I ask for one final thing as well?" Scarlet looks mad, "To put it bluntly, my prince, you're an insensitive black-hearted son of a b. May I kindly knock your f* teeth out?" Love the ending LOL, LMAO. End music fits Scarlet personality. I hope we get season 2 next year.
I feel it started well, but then it declined considerably and tried to salvage the plot a bit in the final episode. Of course, there are plot holes and things that could have been explored a little more, but considering the number of episodes, there’s only so much that can be done. Btw, I love that Scarlett, despite being in love with Julius, shows no compassion toward him. ★ 6.5/10
This was my take on it too. I loved the premise in the beginning, but it started to feel stale about halfway through. The ending felt rushed as well. I gave it a 3/5.
Time of Chronoir. I know it's a time stop, but it seems to be... more than that. Getting Domain Expansion vibes.
Either that, or Scarlet's been really wanting to punch her that hard.
When Julius activated his blessing I was worried that he'd be the one saving the day, but he basically mostly acted as a shield for the real star, Scarlet, so it's fine.
Overall the whole series gets an 8.7/10 for me, both Scarlet and Julius are 9/10 characters, I could never get tired of seeing her happy after punching people and seeing him mess with her.
Oh my fucking god dude ok. This anime pissed me off to be honest. See, it started really good!!! It did!! I loved the premise, but a fucking shitstain ruined it. Julius ruined the entire anime for me genuinely, hes such an irritating asshole that sucks all the joy out of EVERY single scene hes in, and then the final episode??? They have the GALL to make scarlet blame herself for julius's injuries because "Oh i should have loved him back" SHE IS NOT OBLIGATED TO. GOD. Of course they had to make them kiss too cus of some corny ass "Oh the power only works when two are in love!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Tl;dr, julius kys
NO YEAH THAT PISSED ME OFF!! What do you mean ' I should have loved him back'??? Julius is one of the worst male love interests that I have had the misfortune of watching. He is not romantic, he is not charming, there was never a moment where I truly believed he cared for her in a meaningful way and I hate that the anime rewards him with Scarlett kissing him and then he has the GALL to basically say 'yeah your kiss was bad, make sure next time to do a better job' in front of everyone!! The audacity of this guy!!
He's one of those dudes that your supposed to love to hate. Really the charm of this anime, definetly not for everyone, and for me at least, I always enjoyed watching Scarlett dismiss/reject the shiii out of him with the sly remarks. And the ending was pretty satisfying because Scarlett was about to justly beat the shiii out of him for all that BS he planned. If you were to read the reddit, you would also see a ton of people that are just in love with the show with how Scarlett carries herself too
If you want to feel better about Julius, I recommend watching Yakuza Fiance. THOSE male love interests are something else I assure you
To be honest, that wasn't how I saw that scene at all w/ Scarlet admitting her feelings. They've been sprinkling hints that she cares for Julius through the last half of the season fairly clearly. She was kinda busy though and never really allowed herself to explore and think on those feelings, but there are multiple short but tender scenes between them where it's shown in how they both break character. Scarlet's character development throughout the season has been to be more honest with herself, what she wants, and to take it. While I didn't love the scene set up, it was a scene where Julius' care for her from the beginning was exposed, and she was forced to look at it and realized, oh, I do love him. Her just thinking really hard that she likes him wasn't enough, she had to actually love him or it wouldn't have worked. If it did work like that, the charm scene would have gone WAY differently if shallow/forced feelings were enough.
Julius always teased her to get a rise out of her so that she would be her authentic self and not the version of herself that she was trained to be for her previous fiance. He adored her stubbornness, her fiery passion, and the true joy she got for delivering a beating to the deserving. He protected her at fairly great risk a couple of times, and trusted her deeply in his own annoying way. He's absolutely an annoying character, sure, but he acted as an emotional foil to Scarlet really well.
How did you completely misread Scarlet's words that badly. These two have been in love with each other all this time, they both dance around and hide behind false words and threats. Scarlet isn't saying that she needs to fall in love with him or any obligation, any words of regret she felt were in hiding her feelings and risking his life.
His power only activated because of their "mutual" love. Mutual love requires both to admit their feelings. Hate Julius all you want but both characters love each other and they've both shown this throughout the entire season (don't forget Scarlet's reaction when she thought he was going to confess and he chickened out). The kiss was great, the blush was great, their love is tsundere galore.
His power only activated because of their "mutual" love.
I was previously a defender of the show, but the last episode strongly disagrees with this assessment. She was literally under duress when she made her confession. No one should believe that segment was truth.
His power activated because she needed him, and she spoke some magic words.
Speaking as someone who finds Julius amusing, I think it actually weakened their (Julius x Scarlett's) relationship that their confession and kiss was done so that they could survive a fight.
The only reason I've never felt different about it is because all the situation did was cause them to be honest. It didn't make Scarlett or Julius suddenly fall in love, all the situation of duress created was a moment for both of them to pause their tsundere acts. They both had to. The power didn't activate until Julius also dropped his act
But are they honest? You don't know! They thought they were going to die. Literal Goddess in the room trying to kill them.
Scarlett asked for clarification that if she confessed, if his power would activate and save them. So she did. And they lived.
It's very transactional. Not exactly the start of a long-lasting relationship. And the show ends with her believing she was tricked, so perhaps the author agrees with my assessment.
If we're being technical, the only thing that was happening at the time was Scarlett was going to lose her blessing. Not a life and death situation as Diana is well and alive from losing her blessing. You are correct, I'm not them so I can't know undeniably but all the clues have pointed to this.
To your 2nd point, yes she clarified because she was embarrassed to do so. She even mentions that during the fight, and is even blushing ear to ear during the moment.
To your 3rd point, I don't really think that's the start to anything; If anything it's a similar moment to the "visiting the love interest when sick" trope in romcoms. That whole final scene in the carriage isn't based off anything other than Scarlett's assumptions simply because of all Julius has done to her all season. It's not really the LN writer or mangaka agreeing with your point, just them bringing the two back to the dynamic they've had rather than making them lovey-dovey (which i'd argue is a better choice cause these two work better as cat and mouse than lovebirds)
The show continuously made me hate Julius so I actually despise them together lol. I am not a fan of male leads who belittle their love interests and toy with their feelings because they think it's funny. Scarlett deserves someone who makes her feel at ease and who will treat her with the same compassion she gives to others she deems worthy of it, not someone who treats her like a spectacle and an animal. The anime started off well but felt like it just fell flat partway through and the ending just made me angry because of my hate for Julius, glad she sent him flying at the end.
Scarlett deserves someone who makes her feel at ease and who will treat her with the same compassion she gives to others she deems worthy of it
But... she doesn't care about that. She wants someone who will let her let loose. If she wanted that, she'd fall in love with Nanaka. It's girl who loves getting riled up and guy who loves seeing her riled up.
As someone who feels indifferent towards Julius (I don't hate him, but I also don't necessarily like him) I find all the furious hate comments hilarious tbh, Julius is a professional ragebaiter and I'm certain he'd laugh his ass off at these comments
Well, I don't hate him because of his ragebait, infact it's the only part of his character that I like.
It's just... he's very bland... like an average... forgettable side character.
There's really nothing I find interesting or just good about him, so the fact that he's been cemented as the deuteragonist, was a little disappointing to me, since he adds nothing to the anime in 95% of his scenes (imo)
Fair point, it's just that I feel like most of the others that are raging here right now mostly hate him for his attitude (aka ragebaiting) which I just can't take seriously tbh, I mean that is literally the thing he would want to see when ragebaiting others (mainly Scarlet) and that fact is just funny to me
ngl, even Scarlet has about the same level of characterization as Julius, and everyone else is even worse. The show's basically just riding the villainess trend and shōjo tropes, with the only twist being a more violent, emotionally explosive female lead.
Early on, Scarlet's fights and her dynamic with Julius carry the show, but once the world expands and the cast blows up, that dynamic disappears, the fights stop feeling fresh, and the weak writing gets exposed. At least the last two episodes refocus on Scarlet and Julius and kinda save it.
Julius blessing always lowkey made me wonder how the heck does it work. Because you could in all sincerity make an argument that the person using the blessing must be convinced that they love someone and that person loves them back, not necessarily meaning that the love is true. And tbh without ability to measure how his blessing works, audience is in their right to assume that Scarlet doesn't actually feel anything and was playing maiden in love to convince him in order to make the blessing work. Because tbh I think the only thing she loves about Julius is punching his face. And from what I remember in the manga it was never stated by Terenezza that love must be mutual for full activation. It was more implied that the charm was hindering full activation. And only later Scarlet concluded that her confessing her feelings helped with full activation. From those facts the only actual rule is the user's love for another person and in Julius case he often pushes down his feelings and hides behind awful behavior so some form of encouragement to not push his feelings down was needed. Kiss could have been faked if the author really wanted it to be, but instead author makes Scarlet talk about it as if she felt some kind of love that needed confessing. Which tbh isn't really in tune with the premise of the story unless bloodthirstiness is a form of love lol. TBH I don't really mind this hateful love dynamic in fiction. I just personally think that Scarlet is far better when she is not in love with anyone except fighting. Her story doesn't need romance. Or more like, the men can ofc try to get her attention, but story is better when she doesn't choose any and loves fighting above them all. (You think why I compare her to Goku).
Honestly glad it's over with. The last handful of episodes fell off for me. The second half overall just wasn't that interesting. I usually like political intrigue too but this just wasn't engaging. Scarlett and Julius (fuck the haters) hard carried the show. Great chemistry imo. But yeah 6.5/10
P.S Terenezza is fucking garbage in terms of personality and just overall character quality
How am I going to spend my weekends now, without the adorable, emotive and heartful expressions of the delicate Scarlet?? No, but honestly, her faces were the best part of the anime for me. You can understand her whole character just by a couple gestures in an episode.
As for the anime in general, I liked very much. It's simple and fun, with a charismatic lead. That's pretty much all I expected from it after the first episode. The rest of the cast is just OK, though I felt a little bad for Terenezza (did she actually died at the end?) because I also liked her design. And the ending was perfect. Turning Julius into Keitaro Urashima was the cherry on top of the iceream and pie.
Honestly pleased with how they adapted this series. Ended right where I expected it to; but I fear with the way it ended and the LN not being one of the most popular around, we're prolly not getting a S2 anytime soon.
Seto Asami, thank you for absolutely killing it as Scarlett. Truly nailed the voice I envisioned when I first read it
The perfect ending for me. Even when possessed, Julius is able to get on Scarlet's nerves and be an absolute rage baiter.
This is the most unique anime for me in terms of why I watch it and what satisfies me about it.Some anime are watched for the plot, others for the comedy, and others for the action. Saigo is unique enough that you watch it for the action, but not in the same sense as battle shounen; you don't care about the action itself.What you care about is seeing Scarlet beat and torture bad guys while enjoying herself immensely, which translates into the viewer's enjoyment. You watch to see bad guys suffer, not just to beat them up.
And I won't deny that Scarlet and Julius have cracked me up comedically many times. They're the best comedy duo this year. I honestly don't understand how people can dislike Julius. He's such a lousy jerk and a rage baiter that it's hilarious. I laugh every time because of his rage bait, and I don't get mad at him because at the end of the day he's a good person, he's just having too much fun XD. And the guy loves Scarlet for beating people up and loves watching her do it, how can I not like a guy who has the same taste in women as me? XD
Sure, the anime had its problems, but you watch it mainly for Scarlet and Julius and the scenes of beating up bad guys, and on that level it delivered incredibly well. I'm hoping for a second season, but if there isn't one, I won't be mad because the series delivered what I wanted. For me 8/10
The story is a 6 or 7... But Scarlet is a solid 10.
Julius' blessing is a straight up ass pull. I would have rather preferred the author go with Julius was just pretending to be charmed.
I feel the final punch on Tereneza could have been a touch more satsifying then it was, not enough slow-mo and crunch effect lol. Also she probably should have been fleshed out a bit more than she was but eh limited time.
Anyway, while I preferred the show as a comedy to the straight fantasy story it was trying to straddle, it was an enjoyable watch with a memorable MC and some great (mostly punch based) moments.
The romance completely ruined the anime for me. Not sure how Scarlet can love a guy who repeatedly calls her a "toy". But whatever. The last episode was very weak in general, I would've expected a bit more substance for Terenezza and her goddess's ambitions. Also, Nanaka best boy.
I'm a little disappointed Tereneza didn't get a single win, since she was the most interesting character by far. I love how she's an amoral pile of trash with zero cognitive dissonance in regards to how she's committing vile deeds despite seeing herself as a hero. Alas, the show has zero stakes and nothing has any tension, because any actually dangerous problems will be resolved immediately with no consequences. Aside from the first and last episodes, the fight budget wasn't great, which I'm fine with. This wasn't that out there, in the past. It's just that now, animators are being turned into paste for great animation, so the moral substitute is kinda...lacking, in comparison. The politics also felt very surface level after the slave auction, especially near the end.
I gave it a :\, but I'd be much less generous if I used number scores. This was like - assuming 5/10 is the average - a 3/10. Great as a jumping off point for fanfiction (Tereneza did give me some inspiration for my own ideas), but it otherwise needs to be a genre you're into to get something out of. But then, I watched all 13 episodes, so joke's on me.
