Plot: Aoyama’s consciousness has breached Deep Blue’s, and now he has to face what he has done. Even if it wasn’t really him that caused all of this destruction, the guilt weighs heavily on his conscience. Ichigo embraces him and offers comfort by explaining that she always believed in him, and no matter if he blames himself or not, she knew he would return to her.
Their emotional exchange creates a glow between them – it’s the final Mew Aqua. It’s been inside Aoyama all along. He now knows what they must do. They have to use the Mew Aqua to reverse the damage and ease the pain he has caused on the planet and the people.
He embraces Ichigo one more time, but suddenly his consciousness is wrestled away by Deep Blue and he starts strangling Ichigo.
A massive internal conflict between Deep Blue’s desires to kill Ichigo and Aoyama’s desire to protect her at all costs causes Aoyama to thrash about in agony.
It seems like Deep Blue has won the battle for his body, claiming Aoyama has been truly erased for good now, though Ichigo still refuses to believe it even after Deep Blue attacks her again. He tries to use the Mew Aqua within him, but he’s halted yet again. Aoyama rises once more and grapples with Deep Blue’s spirit, ripping them both from his body.
He holds Deep Blue in place and tells Ichigo to deliver the final blow to Deep Blue while they have the chance. Ichigo struggles with this decision since she’s worried that attacking Deep Blue, especially when they’re grappled like this, will cause Aoyama to vanish as well. Aoyama tries to reassure her and pleads with her to believe in him.
Deep Blue resists and attacks Ichigo. She’s able to block, but she can’t muster the power to create an attack. Sensing Ichigo’s dilemma, the girls, who are exhausted and laid out on the ground from the Mew Aqua beams, band together and collect as much energy as they can to send to Ichigo.
With the power of her friends surging within her and trusting Aoyama with all her heart, she launches a Ribbon Strawberry Surprise at Deep Blue, who counters with a blast of energy. As the two collide, Deep Blue realizes Aoyama’s plan. He’s going to release the Mew Aqua from his body when he’s hit with the Strawberry Surprise and fix what he’s destroyed. However, he will most likely be killed as a result.
Ichigo’s attack finally breaks through, and Deep Blue’s influence is destroyed. Aoyama happily releases the Mew Aqua within his body, proclaiming his love for Ichigo one last time before he sacrifices himself.
A wondrous rain of colorful lights cascades over the city, repairing the damage, regrowing plant life, healing the Mews and even seemingly bringing Taruto and Pai back to life.
As Aoyama falls into the abyss after expelling the Mew Aqua, Ichigo rushes to his aid and refuses to let him die. With a kiss, she transfers her life energy to him.
The lights fade, and everything falls silent. Ichigo and Aoyama lay on the ground unconscious with their hands intertwined. Aoyama awakens in the rubble, but is devastated to find Ichigo’s lifeless body laying next to him.
The other Mews arrive and grieve over their lost friend. They suddenly lose their transformations and find that they can no longer transform at all. They’re finally regular girls once more.
The girls and Aoyama have little time to process what has happened because the base will soon fall apart. With Aoyama and the other Mews as normal humans once more, they must figure out a way off the base without plummeting to their deaths.
Kisshu, revived from the Mew Aqua, offers his assistance as a form of repayment for Ichigo saving him. Pai and Taruto, realizing the situation, also rush in to help bring them back down. Kisshu reveals that the tiny bit of Mew Aqua left behind from Aoyama and Deep Blue should be enough to fix their current planet so they can save their species. They say their thanks and teleport the group back down to the ground.
The aliens take hold of the base and ensure that it dissipates without falling. A part of the base turns into a ship that they use to return home.
Shirogane reunites with the girls and learns of Ichigo’s fate. As they all finally take the time out to properly grieve, Aoyama kisses Ichigo one last time.
Surprisingly, Ichigo suddenly glows and floats in the air. She loses her cat ears and tail, and her red data animal disappears from her body. She awakens from her slumber and can now spend the rest of her life by Aoyama’s side as a normal girl.
Some time later, the lives of the former Mews have returned to normal, barring the massive forest across the city people are still trying to deal with.
The girls all coincidentally wander to the now-closed café for a walk down memory lane. As they enjoy some nostalgia, Shirogane and Akasaka appear from the shadows and explain that they’re just in time – a new enemy has appeared and Tokyo Mew Mew is needed to take them down right now!
Understandably confused, Shirogane points out that their Mew marks have all reappeared and their powers have returned. Apparently, their loss of powers was just a temporary side effect from the Mew Aqua exposure. While the girls are disappointed that their normal girl lives have once again been interrupted, they happily don their Mew gear once more and head off to save the world.
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– I mentioned how the previous episodes have gotten quite the animation hike thanks to them being the finale episodes, but this episode is all over the place in quality. For the most part, the scenes are moderate, but then you have beautiful shots like the Mews on the ground before they transfer their power and then you have ick shots like this.
It’s like they were playing Hot Potato with the budget throughout the entire final episode.
– I thought they specifically said the final Mew Aqua was in the flying base. Or was the Mew Aqua within Deep Aoyama Knight the final FINAL Mew Aqua?
And if there was Mew Aqua inside Aoyama this whole time, why did it never glow when he and Ichigo had so many tender and emotional moments?
– Awwww they had Zakuro’s wolf ears twitch!
– I don’t know why Ichigo’s suddenly out of energy now besides making an excuse for the girls to transfer their power to her, but I won’t complain. It’s better than just letting them rot on the ground and do nothing.
– It’s kinda funny that, technically, Aoyama was the biggest hero in the end.
….Wait, okay, it’s not funny. Especially when coupled with the whole ‘the aliens got to do way more impressive/memorable stuff than the Mews’ thing from the previous episode.
I’m sorry, it’s just, you’d think the girls would get the most memorable/awesome/emotional things to do during the finale of a magical girl show, but almost all of it is the dudes. Not saying take those moments away from aforementioned dudes, but there’s room for everyone to have their big moment in the sun.
Yes, Ichigo gave her life to save Aoyama, but….did she? We never really get confirmation that she died. You’d think if she was dead, she’d have de-transformed, considering they de-transform when they’re exhausted, but that doesn’t happen until Aoyama kisses her awake. For all we know she was just unconscious for a long time and no one bothered to check her pulse.
And, even if she did give her life to save Aoyama, Aoyama still seemed to have saved her life right back, so, the scale is in Aoyama’s favor.
– Beautiful rainbow light show after Aoyama’s sacrifice, though. Not many ‘magical’ shows really give off such a magical vibe as this moment. It’s just so pretty.
– I don’t think Mint’s VA gives nearly enough oomph to that ‘Ichigo!’ yell to warrant the echo-y visual effect.
– I never understood how the tiny bit of Mew Aqua left behind was enough to fix the planet the aliens currently inhabit. If that were true this whole time, why did they even need to do all of this? The instant they got their hands on some Mew Aqua, their mission should have been complete. Were they really that intent on reclaiming a planet that had already been destroyed naturally once before and one they’d have to destroy again and rebuild from the ground up that they’d go through so much trouble for it?
– Part of the base just happened to be a spaceship? What? Also where’s the spaceship they came here on?
– Soooo….as I mentioned, was Ichigo ever dead or is normal human Aoyama magical? How did Ichigo ‘come back to life’? You can’t say Aoyama has more Mew Aqua in him because Kisshu took the last bit and Aoyama didn’t glow at all.
– Ah let’s treasure our one last bit of Ichigo favoritism – why was Ichigo the only one where we saw her animal leaving her and running off? Guess it fits considering we never saw the animals for the other girls fusing with them at the start either…
– What is up with Shirogane’s face here? Either his eyes are closed or his eyes are missing.
– Wow, that kinda sucks. The Mews save the world and all of humanity, and now people are complaining about them because they made a huge forest across the city that is making everything inconvenient….I mean, realistically, yes, that’d be a massive problem to suddenly have a forest covering a huge part of the city, but it’s just sad that everyone’s focusing on how they created a problem and not that they, ya know, saved the world.
– This sequel bait never made any sense to me. They all found that they couldn’t transform anymore and we even literally saw Ichigo’s cat leave her body. Yet, for some reason, the girls have their powers again. Akasaka says it was just temporary as a result of the Mew Aqua explosion, but that also makes no sense.
Since when does exposure to Mew Aqua kill their powers? It’s supposed to make them more powerful. Hell, the only reason the girls were able to transform again after losing so much energy the first time around is because Shirogane exposed them to Mew Aqua. If that is true, why was there such a delay between the Mew Aqua explosion and when the Mews all de-transformed? Why was there such a gap between when the other Mews de-transformed and when Ichigo did? Why did we see Ichigo’s cat leave her if it was just lying dormant or something?
Not to mention that, if you ask me, it kinda tarnishes the ending. The girls fought enough. They just want to be normal. It’s cool that they’re still ready and raring to go save the world from this vague ‘new enemy’ Shirogane doesn’t even bother telling the girls about before he sends them off, but I was content with the idea of the girls just living a peaceful life after all of that. Will they ever be able to live normal lives?
Why sequel bait and then follow that up with a title card that says ‘The End’ too?
I haven’t yet read the final volume of the manga, so maybe it was just following suit, but seems kinda weird is all. I know the manga has a sequel, but this kind of ending doesn’t properly lead into that story, does it?
– Oh hold the phone. Apparently we weren’t quite done with the Ichigo favoritism because, one last time, they have to have a transformation mashup and, OF COURSE, Ichigo’s the only one who has her transformation full out. The music even changes when it gets to hers. You honestly, legitimately, really couldn’t be bothered to squeeze in an extra handful of seconds worth of runtime to let every girl have their full transformation at the very last scene? Are you that intent on rustling my jimmies, Tokyo Mew Mew? I’m trying really hard to be pleasant.
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It’s been one hell of a journey, hasn’t it? Ups, downs, all-arounds. It was pretty fun going through this series again – yes, even if I raged and ranted my way through several episodes. I mean no ill-will towards this series, honestly. I have fun watching it even when it’s illogical or the annoying running issues keep popping up. I wouldn’t have watched this series so many times if I hated it or didn’t enjoy myself while watching it.
It’s just that those disappointments that tend to get to me above all, like the utter neglect of the other Mews and the Ichigo favoritism, didn’t need to happen. They were beyond easily fixable. Not to mention that after watching this series numerous times and knowing how shafted the girls get the whole way through makes me a little saltier each time. But I’m quite certain you’re done listening to me jabber on about that, so let’s just move on to my thoughts on the final episode.
It was very much….okay. I hate saying that because I really wanted to sing the finale’s praises after a handful of really good episodes building up to it, but the finale just doesn’t stand up as well as the previous few episodes. The emotional impacts didn’t hit me as much, the action wasn’t on the same level, and they even made the mind-boggling decision to make the final episode, of all things, have very inconsistent animation quality. I’m glad they saved the money for the better finale episodes, and the episode only has a few scenes that look really blech-y, but it’s still just weird to have such noticeable quality shifts in the penultimate episode.
The finale does have its moments, such as the reunion between Aoyama and Ichigo, Aoyama sacrificing himself to restore the earth and lives that were lost at his hand, the really beautiful rainbow light show, and Ichigo…’sacrificing-ish’ herself to save Aoyama, but the rest is a mess of convenient coincidences that neatly tie up literally everything and somehow manages to feel rushed. Everything is either explained away by ‘Mew Aqua did it’ or fixed by the Mew Aqua, and you can’t do that. It’s just lazy.
I was also disappointed that we didn’t get more time with the aliens before they left. No touching reunion between Taruto and Pudding at least? I wanted to see a better sendoff than them literally only thanking Ichigo for saving them before leaving. And even barring the obvious annoyance with that, Aoyama’s technically the one who saved them….
And then their final scene is…somehow sensing that Ichigo’s okay while they’re in deep space?
In regards to action, I was kinda bummed that all this Mew Aqua was around but we didn’t get any cool new attack or technique or transformation or anything as a final hurrah. They didn’t even bring the Mew Aqua Rod back out.
Finally, I may be in the minority of this, but I didn’t really want to see them taking up the mantle of the Mews again at the end. Can’t they just live in peace? Shouldn’t Shirogane and Akasaka be able to move on with their lives?
Even this sudden turnaround was so ridiculously convenient. The Mews, who haven’t seen each other in weeks or months, all ended up at the café at the same time somehow (I don’t think their powers lead them there. If that were true, the other girls would never have needed to be found in the beginning of the series) and Shirogane and Akasaka just happen to be waiting for them with a new assignment to fight a new vague enemy right then. Shirogane and Akasaka are not in the least bit guilty about this when they promised they could return to being normal girls after the alien threat was eliminated?
Again, it’s cool that they’re fine with returning to superherodom, but I’m just a bit disappointed that they’ll seemingly never see an end to the fighting.
But, at the end of the day, the series finale is very much okay. It’s fine. It’s not topping any ‘Best finale’ lists of mine, but it’s certainly not approaching any worst lists either.
And with this I finally close out this Shoujo Step-By-Step that has technically been going on for seven years. I wish I was kidding, but apparently that’s my abysmal consistency in completing these series. I first did the Sub/Dub Comparison for the first episode of Tokyo Mew Mew/Mew Mew Power, which acts as the start of this review series, back on a different website in June 02, 2013 (Fitting that I’m also ending in June, damn near on the seventh anniversary no less.) I am such a terrible blogger. Lol
But, hey, I’m still not done with this franchise. I still have to complete the AniManga Clash and the review of Tokyo Mew Mew A La Mode. Not to mention that there’s a new manga out, though I’m not sure if it’s finished or available in English yet, and a reboot is coming sometime soon.
I really hope you’ve enjoyed my reviews on this series. I’ve certainly had fun writing about it and talking about it with all of you. Thank you for being patient with me through the rough spots and enjoying the good moments alongside me. See ya around, nya~!
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The Anime Madhouse 