Mahou Shoujo Ikusei Keikaku – 12 (Fin)

Whoops, miscounted: here I was thinking for some reason there’d be two episodes left, but this turns out to be the finale. And you know what? I’m fine with that, even if the epilogue was a little rushed.

The epic final battle between Ripple and Swim Swim goes on while Fav continues to verbally torture Koyuki, who doesn’t want to be a magical girl anymore. The damn cyber-bird-thingy finally broke her spirit.

But then, when she finally hears the truth she probably should have known for some time now — that this was nothing but a deathmatch for Fav and Cranberry’s shared entertainment — she transforms once again, hoping not to be too late before Ripple and Swim Swim kill each other.

This is Koyuki finally focusing her grief over the patently unfair, grisly ordeal she’s been through into action. It’s very satisfying watching her smash her terminal in rage, even if we know it’s not yet the end of Fav.

The battle between Ripple and Swim Swim, pockmarked as it is by cuts to Snow and Fav, at least shows Ripple has learned a thing or two, both from her own first fight with Swim and from others who didn’t quite get her.

Ripple uses light and sound to disable Swim Swim, pulling her out of her magical girl form. This is when what had been a satisfying battle between a super-strong kunoichi and a super-powerful magic-user stops being fun.

That’s because Swim’s transformation back to normal shows us that Swim Swim was only a small child, and a deeply troubled one at that. She was doing what she thought she needed to do to become her idol, Ruler, and Ripple takes no joy in finishing the tyke off.

That being said, things got satisfying again when Ripple puts Swim Swim’s magic spear through the Master terminal, which takes Fav off line for good (cue grumpy cat GOOD pic). I also liked the cleverness of Koyuki being able to hear that Fav was in trouble, and that the spear would indeed do him in.

Snow was too late to save Swim Swim (not that she would have listened to reason if she were still alive when she arrived), but she does end up saving Ripple by inspiring her. With Top Speed avenged, Ripple wants to go back to being a magical girl in the vein of Snow White; that is, someone pure and righteous, not someone who ends up having to stab children.

In the aforementioned speedy epilogue, Koyuki abandons her normal life, and for six months, toughens her mind and body — with Ripple’s help — and pulls off increasingly big, flashy feats — having come a long way from doing little kind deeds here and there.

Going big picture as she does, and rejecting the selection process and the raising project, is likely Koyuki’s way of making up for all the other girls whose lives were lost so that she could, as Fav put it, rise to the top without “dirtying her hands.” Now she’s a little less bright-eyed and naive and more world-weary and wise. And she’s determined to do everything she can to make the world a better place.

Other than Fune wo Amu, which was handed off to me by Zane, MGRP was the last show standing on my Fall ’16 watchlist. A big part of that was that it was an elimination show that kept me involved right to the end, despite almost never properly developing characters in the right way or at the right time. (A notable exception being Alice).

Anyway, I’m glad I stuck with it, and would recommend it to anyone who enjoyed Madoka. It wasn’t nearly as good, but it was a fun ride.