10 Second Anime - sin Nanatsu no Taizai - Episode 12 [END]

The Archangel Michael arrives to subjugate Hell. Lucifer and the other Mortal Sins oppose her as Maria makes a decisive sacrifice. Season Finale.

Episode 12 - "God's in His Heaven - All's right with the world."

Hmm.

I'm glad. No, not that this show is finally over, though there is that. No, I'm glad that the ultimate mystery of the show has been answered: why was Maria involved in all this? Since this is an aggressive lesbianism ecchi show, the battle scenes are mainly used as an excuse for dialogue to explain the characters' motivation. That's the convention. I'm including the sexual torture/teasing scenes as battle sequences... But Maria and Lucifer never had one of those scenes, even in the second episode when Lucifer was literally playing around with her heart. That scene was to introduce Lucifer as someone playing a long term strategy. Later episodes, like the one with Beelzebub, started showing a deeper connection between Maria and Lucifer, one of seemingly real concern on Lucifer's part.

The details, that Maria's mother introduced her to the idea of talking to a statue of the great angel Lucifer and how her untimely death led to Maria turning Lucifer into a mother figure before they even met, explained why Lucifer fell first to the church where Maria prayed. Lucifer became a fallen angel because she didn't want to see Maria killed along with the rest of humanity when God unleashed the next purge. Maria's prayer to the archangel Lucifer not only saved humanity, but made an angel fall in love with her. Lucifer even complained about how much Maria talked about the slutty friend we saw in the first episode. See? She listened!

This was the best part of the last episode. All the major questions of why this was all happening now were answered. Too bad the delays really messed with how much a weekly audience cares about the characters, but I suppose that it matters less in this binge-watching era.

Heh.

Well, the final episode aired late, right on schedule. Wait...

Also, all those short specials have been released on YouTube, all 19 of them, but they're the censored versions. I'll have to wait for the Blu-rays for those.

As we saw earlier, Belial promised to surrender Hell to Michael and the Heavens. She should have got it in writing that she could get her wings back.

Michael was named as the new leader of the Lively Virtues after Lucifer was banished. Similar to the Demon Lords, the Leader gets the perk of the Wings of Loyalty. Naturally, she gets six, since an archangel is a Seraph and those highest ranked angels have six wings.

Lucifer, proudly, still thinks God is making a mistake in pursuing His extermination plan. I'm still not clear on why Hell was involved in all this other than a subterfuge to get Lucifer out of the way.

Oh ho. These angels have some nice uniforms under those robes. I was hoping they'd be naked, but I suppose they have battle uniforms. Michael looks like she's a band leader for a military outfit.

Ha. Satan's itching for a fight but Belphegor says she's not really, but it can't be helped. No, it really can't be helped.

How convenient. Michael can't be defeated until those six wings are destroyed, Belial (or Satanael) took out the first one, leaving five for the remaining Mortal Sins. I love it when numerology mixed with mythology helps a plot flow like that.

Belial and Astaroth were sent away. Where? Has to be Earth since a defeated angel or demon becomes mortal, right?

Somehow the bureaucracy in Hell moves fast. Levi and Lu got their statues and thrones real quick even while the rest of the Pandemonium throne room was destroyed.

This makes sense. The Mortal Sins have to use their particular evils to destroy an individual wing of Virtue. I liked how Bub ate one and Asmodeus, er, pleasured herself on one. I don't get how Mammon's elixirs count as greed. Perhaps it's how she turns every material item back to dust to prove the futility of accumulating material items.

Michael's wings have been clipped so now it's angel versus fallen angel.

Well, of course the Lance of Longinus is going to show up at some point in a story using Christian mythology. I don't see why a mortal weapon used to pierce a mortal God should have any extra effect on angels or demons, but the power to cut God, no matter His aspect, is supposed to be important.

Oh man. There's some real dying happening here. Lucifer had to really die for Maria's real sacrifice to mean something.

Wow, that's a real something that happened. Lucifer is now a Trinity unto herself. Angel, Devil, and Mortal all within her. Not exactly the Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit representing Past, Present, Future or Origin, Imminence, and Aspiration, but it's something.

All sorts of miracles happening now. The Madonna crying tears of blood is a symbol of the Mother of God weeping for the suffering of all of Humanity and now Lucifer is doing so for Maria.

Flawless victory. Season two will feature those other 6 Lively Virtues. Just kidding. The Hobby Japan will have to find another animation studio since this one is selling itself off in pieces.

Aw. Levi was sad about Maria. She was even self-aware enough to know that she should be happy about her being gone, but she still missed her.

Yay! Happy Ending! Maria's last bit of angelic blood she got from Lucifer brought her back. That means Lucifer is all sexy demon now, right?

It's clear from the end card that the other half of this story had already been through the character design phase. We've got chibi versions of the six other Virtues' sexy designs. I'm pessimistic on a second season ever happening.

Geh.

I was hoping, but I wasn't sure, we would get any more nudity than Belial running around naked from last episode, but you can thank battle damaged armor and clothing for NSFW scenes from this last episode.

The only sour note with Belial getting some revenge on Michael was how she convinced Gnosis to become her armor again. She admitted she was not a descendent of the demon Byrnedale name, yet she used that name as a point of vanity in talking to Gnosis. Wasn't Gnosis listening to all the Satanael talk? Ah, whatever. He got to jiggle Belial's boobs once more.

This show knows what its audience wants. Sexy new Angel introduced in the last episode? Yeah, she's getting naked.

The end card shows sexy Michael with the other Virtues. Their designs and personalities are already formed well enough for this illustrator to make chibi versions doing stuff to fit those aspects. Maybe in two years, after BD and figure sales, we'll see them as they were designed for anime.

Final Thoughts.

This show was pretty much everything I hoped for. Lucifer was a sexy bitch and she got as naked as any of the other beautiful girls in the show. All the girls were great and there were character types to fit every kind of preference. The producers were definitely casting a wide net.

Unfortunately, the producers were a bit too ambitious, as they tried to include a musical character in Astaroth along with character songs. This obviously contributed to the delays. While fun and a nice idea, it really wasn't necessary.

The one thing I'm feeling bad about this show is the uncertainty of a second season to show off the angelic characters. There is obviously more story to tell, like what all the upheaval in Heaven is all about, but we ended at a good enough place where we have the official Mortal Sins in charge of Hell. They've got statues and stuff!

This show was definitely worth a watch if you like sexy naked demons. I'm not sure the Blu-rays will add much more value to what was aired on television, but the peripheral market of art books, figures and soundtracks just might be enough to justify a second season. We really do need one to complete the story and make Maria the new God. I mean, that's the endgame of all this, right? That's how it seems to me, anyway.