Feb 19, 2024
This anime is a masterpiece. We have not seen this type of fantasy show in a long time. It's much more introspective than it might even initially seem. There's magic and demons and fights and death, sure, but the small moments between characters are where Frieren truly shines most brightly. The search for a particular blue flower is much more compelling start to finish than any of the show's combat sequences, though it's no slouch in that department either.
It follows the adventures of Frieren, an elven mage and former party member of the group that defeated the Demon King decades ago. The rest of
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her party – Himmel, Heiter, and Eisen – do not live as long as elves, and therefore she's got a bit of a skewed sense of time. For the rest of the party, 10 years is a long time to have been running around together, but for Frieren, it's just a small fraction of a percent of her life. For someone that is effectively immortal with roughly 1,000 years (or more) under their belt, what does it mean to come into contact with, grow beside, and perhaps even love someone that will only ever have roughly a tenth of that if they're lucky? And if you realize, perhaps, that those moments actually were precious and you were wrong to downplay them, and now it's too late, what then? Where do you go from there?
Frieren: Beyond Journey's End is a heartfelt, story that is retold well here, and beautifully animated. It flits between the present, past, and distant past fairly quickly, framing stories from multiple angles. Each new chapter or episode is typically first placed in relation to the aforementioned meaningful death, and regularly includes how Frieren previously experienced something, how she experiences it now, and how the latter recontextualizes the former. Put in writing, that might seem overwhelming, but the anime balances it well by letting scenes take as little or as much time as necessary.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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