Blue Exorcist: The Blue Night Saga

Episode 11

The previous episode showed the end of the Blue Night, and the resolution of Shiro's journey. He started as an embittered youth, re-enacting the cruelty of his own birth. He finished forever changed by the kindness of the woman who lives on in him. It felt like a finale, despite a few untied ends. What the show could do with the last couple of episodes?

Well, the first of them is weak. One mistake is that there's still no sign of present-day Rin, though presumably he's still invisibly observing these events together with Mephisto. It's perverse that the season showed him reacting to his dad's promiscuous wild years, but we don't get to see him watching Shiro becoming Rin's single dad, feeding Satan's child milk and wiping his bottom (“What kind of color is this?”) That could have been the opportunity for both hearty humor and an exercise in empathy, educating Rin in what he owes to the person who raised him. It's such a wasted opportunity.

It's still mildly amusing to see Shiro having to endure a “bringing up baby” scenario. There are a few other touches of emotion – for example, Shiro's discovery, long after the fact, that Rick perished in the Blue Night, leaving Maki a widow. But most of the episode feels like box-ticking. So the conspirators are still conspiring? Tell us something we don't know.

It's not just dull, it lowers the impact of what went before. Last week's episode ended with Satan (apparently) destroying Yuri's soul in Gehenna. It was a beautifully tragic scene; it conveyed a light being extinguished in a place beyond human comprehension. In this week's episode, we're back in Gehenna like it's just another Bad Guy hideout. Satan is holding court with all his fellow demi-gods, and it's standard, cackling-villain stuff.

I've been impressed by how this season built towards a genuinely emotional finale, bringing in not just Yuri's saving of Shiro but also Shiemi's saving of Rin, and showing it was worth telling Blue Exorcist's backstory at such length. Now, finally, this season seems to have run out of things worth saying. Here's hoping the last episode has either a meaningful surprise, or else an emotional throughline instead of lots of spare story bits.

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