Recap: Yoshino tries to talk down Mahiro from joining Samon and explaining the paradox. Meanwhile, the Army prepares for its final assault as Evangeline keeps Natsumura busy.

When I was reviewing shows last season, I had one show that really surprised me out of nowhere, and one show I enjoyed but proceeded to crap all over itself in the last few episodes. This season I still had one surprise hit, but I thought I was going to be cursed with a mediocre show in Tempest. Its pace is somewhat slow, and the action, which has a lot of potential for fast paced and engaging scenes, has been put mostly to the backburner. Thankfully, these last few episodes have shown the series can put out a decent show without needing to rely on that crutch.

While we still get a short fight scene with Evangeline, Tempest really showed it can stand on its own legs without it and really made the scene seem somewhat surperfluous. The real fight was a Death Note-esque duel of words between Yoshino and Samon, in order to keep Mashiro to change sides. I loved the flow of the conversation, however one thing I’ve really found weird about these past two episodes was the purple haze that surrounds Samon when he gets frustrated. It looked really ugly and didnt really add anything to the scenes where it appeared. The use of CG skeleton also looked kind of ugly so putting them together just was not a good visual.

You have to give major props to Yoshino, as he really is a tricky bastard. Even I didn’t realize he was purposefully full of shit in order to make everyone realize whats been true this entire time, that the world will always favor Hakaze. Speaking of the girl, I really felt sorry for her. The directors this episode used every angle possible to exploit her and gave her this creepy wet t-shirt effect to up the fanservice.

Life did offer to me one reason to worry going into these final episodes: this is an unfinished manga. The way things are going, all the major plot points are wrapping up and everything seems like it’s coming to an end, but that just can’t be right if this is a story that hasn’t completed yet. While it would appear we will find out the truth about Aika’s killer, I cannot imagine the whole conflict within the Kusaribe clan will be solved with just these two episodes.