As Platinum End hits its midway mark I look back on these twelve episodes and just wonder how this has stretched so long already and just why it feels the need to drag this on for another twelve episodes. For me, I’m letting it go now that I’ve finished the fall season and I’ll be writing up my final thoughts on Platinum End soon but it is pretty clear that this was a disaster of an anime and episode 12 is no exception.
Basically we’re put in a situation where Mirai needs to take action and everyone is standing around either crying, shouting at him to act, or mocking him, but no one is actually doing anything. Except the guys in charge of the soundtrack. They are working over time to try to make this Ferris-wheel standoff actually look like something vaguely tense.
Platinum End continues to be one of those anime that just make you wonder who okayed the script.
On that note, I’m kind of glad I didn’t take the whole virus threat very seriously because clearly the writers didn’t either. Given the crazy girl goes to release the virus and Mirai stabs it with a white arrow.
Seriously?
Can someone explain to these people just how small a virus actually is? I mean, sure I saw the green ball of stuff in the capsule as well but assumed it was a large quantity of the virus that would be scattered if released. Instead, it turns out it is a single ball that can be pierced with an arrow.
Hello, scientists, you can just stab a virus to death with a magic angel arrow.
Wow. Dumb. Even by Platinum End standards.
Of course that doesn’t end the standoff because now Mirai is holding the arm of the girl and Metropoliman is going to shoot him with an arrow. Meanwhile the girl is going to launch fingernail syringes at him. And everybody else is going to stand around…
Until they don’t.
Saki takes the initiative, and jumps directly in front of the syringes and hugs Mirai.
Girl if you are finally going to do something at least do something useful like attack Metropoliman while his white arrow is occupied, or knock Mirai out of the path of the syringes or literally anything other than turn your back into a giant target while you both stand there and do nothing.
But the end result is that Platinum End isn’t willing to kill of Saki, despite her serving practically no point so far in the story. Instead the sword wielding guy she shot with a red arrow who is convinced he loves her jumps in to cut the syringes but he misses one and takes one for the team melting in what should be a truly horrific moment but with the farcical nature of the fight here you can’t even take a guy liquefying seriously.
More than that, he spends his whole death scene confessing his love to the girl whose name he never learned and whose face he never saw. Because he found happiness and meaning through being brainwashed by a red arrow.
I genuinely didn’t think I could take much more of this scene when it mercifully ended with both the crazy guy and the virus girl dead (yeah he somehow lodged his sword in her before melting).
Apparently even the characters are over this silliness though as Platinum End decided it really didn’t need the third lackey brought along by Metropoliman to do anything and so he decided to up and leave.
Points for being the only person with brains in this scene. Having watched the last two lackeys get either injured or killed horrifically with Metropoliman not caring a bit, would you charge in and be the third act?
However, clearly they didn’t want the Metropoliman and Mirai fight until the start of the new year so instead of wrapping this up we get Mirai philosophising about happiness and killing people and justice and wow I didn’t think this episode could get worse but here it is.
With that I’ll end my Platinum End journey and wish those who choose to continue it well. Review of this first cour available here.
Images from: Platinum End. Dir. K Kise. Signal MD. 2021
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Karandi James
