When we last left off, Klara was about to go berserk. As such, it’s up to Sakura to try and bring her back from the brink. Like I said in the title, nothing here is what we haven’t seen before.

— Sakura embraces the girl even though the latter bites her hard enough to draw blood. We are then transported to a mystical plane where a naked Sakura approaches Klara’s metaphorical heart, i.e. the crystal cocoon. It’s all too familiar and thus all too boring.

— Once Klara returns to normal, it’s now Valery’s turn to reveal that the fight ain’t over just yet. So like every JRPG villain, he has multiple forms. First up is this half-crystal incarnation of Valery. He’s too fast and nimble for any of the girls to keep up with. Unfortunately, he barely gets any fighting time, because he has yet another form to show off and we only have one episode.

— Seijuro has arrived with backup from the other Combat Revues, and they proceed to lay waste to the Sevastopol with their combined firepower. It’s just funny, however, that some people have been left out. Yui has Xiaolong, Lancelot has Arthur, and last but not least, Elise has Margarethe. None of those three are in present in the anime, though. Maybe their voice actors were unavailable. Or maybe the studio just didn’t wanna pay them.

— Anyways, the Sevastopol goes down with Valery in it. This, however, simply allows him to merge with his fallen ship and become this giant, hulking monster. Great. And somehow, this final form can summon forth hordes of demons. Sounds bad, right? That’s when Klara shows up in a mecha of her own. In the Tenjin, yet another top-secret weapon that Sumire’s company had secretly been working on, the girl manages to defeat every single demon that just came through those portals. What? Doesn’t that make her really powerful? That’s what I would assume, but the power levels here are kinda inconsistent. She kinda doesn’t really do much for the rest of the episode. Kinda.

— Valery then charges up a big laser to destroy Tokyo, so of course, everyone pools their powers together to block it. After neutralizing the attack, Sakura and Klara then combine their mechas in order to beat Valery. Now, you might have expected something cool to result from this, but no. It just looks kinda… awkward.

— Even with their combined powers, Sakura and Klara can’t exactly beat Valery outright. So of course, Leyla’s spirit or whatever shows up to restrain him. ‘Cause she loves him. I don’t really get it. I mean, sure, some people fall in love with really sick people, but the show barely developed Leyla as a character. Like I said last week, it was literally “I’m so ugly but he called me beautiful!”

— So in the end, fuck all that technology. All you need is one plucky gal and her mother… I mean, sword. Eh, same thing.

— To the very end, Valery doesn’t understand why they are disobeying god, which just makes me think he’s really stupid. For a god, he’s pretty lame. All he has is fancy lasers. And even then, he wants to kill everyone who doesn’t follow his orders so yeah… no big surprise that no one wants to obey you.

— In the denouement, we see that Klara has officially joined the Imperial Combat Revue and thus joined them onstage. This is one of the things that disappointed me about both the game and the anime. I honestly expected to see more performances especially in the game. The Imperial Combat Revue were pretty much in shambles before Seijuro showed up, and even then, it took them a while to whip themselves into shape. I really wanted to see more of those growing pains. But instead, Anastasia showed up, Claris wrote an original stage play, and it was just smooth sailing for the girls from there on out. Even in the anime, this is nothing new. We’ve seen this exact same song and dance in the first episode. For a show about a revue, I expect a little more variety. Basically, I wanted more singing, acting, and dancing.

— I’m not a Sakura Wars veteran by any means. I’ve played a grand total of one game. Nevertheless, I get the feeling that the series’ strengths lie within the slice-of-life stuff with the girls. The anime, however, assumes that you already know everything that you need to know about the main team. I guess Hatsuho kinda got the short end of the stick within the game, so there’s a chapter in the anime devoted to her throwing a tantrum over Sakura being the captain. Nevertheless, the focus is mostly on Klara, and I don’t know if she’s really charming enough to carry the series by herself.

— We then see Hakushu spread her wings and take off to destinations unknown… but she has an orphanage to run, so probably just back there. I guess she really was the demon that Valery originally saw? This still doesn’t really explain to me why he thought that she was disappointing, though. I feel like that subplot was never fully realized.

— Then right before the episode comes to an end, we see someone looking over a crystal as it dissipates back into Shadow Tokyo. Is… is that someone Leyla? She survived? Why wouldn’t she be with her sister? Wasn’t the whole point of this side story that demons and humans could coexist? Didn’t she want to find place where she could live with her sister peacefully? Isn’t that place with the Imperial Combat Revue? Unless, of course, Leyla is still dead somehow and we’re just staring at a ghost. Meh, whatever. I’m tired of this show.

— I’m also disappointed that there’s one giant loose plot thread from the game that the anime never bothers to address. As far as I know, the original Sakura and her team (minus Sumire for obvious reasons) are still stuck in Shadow Tokyo. We didn’t save them in the game, and that’s not even brought up here. Maybe they’re reserving this for a later game or something, but it seems kinda silly to me that no one is actively trying to save them.