Ballad of a Shinigami Episode 6

    June 02, 2008
Release Date: December 24, 2007



What They Say
Sakura is engaging in idle conversation with her friends at school, when she notices that something is amiss. Deciding not to take lunch, she heads over to the music room. There, Sakura sees her sempai whom she adores playing the piano, but he ignores her and leaves the room.

Then, a shocked and depressed Sakura remembers something that happened at school a few days earlier...


The Review!
The shortest finale ever!

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)

Ballad of the Shinigami's final episode is the story of Sakura, who it appears, has passed on but has only just realised this when she is ignored by her friends at school. She is also rather embarrassed around her senior class man who also seems to ignore her but this could be of what happened a few days earlier. Sakura is being shown how her family and friends are coping with her absence by Momo and Daniel and the results shock and upset her.

That's pretty much it really; there is a nice but predictable ending that ensures that this episode goes out with a small heart warming whimper instead of an emotional big bang. The character of Sakura is easily identifiable though coming from a place we have all been at one time or another in our lives, we may think sometimes certain situations mean the end of the world and we might as well chuck it all in but through Momo and Daniel she realises things are never that bad.

This episode is also surprisingly much shorter then the others and at first I thought something was wrong with my browser when viewing it. I thought I had missing the beginning or something but after watching it twice, but it is definitely 12 minutes long.

This episode is sadly a bit of a disappointment. The story is very simple and predictable. While there are some interesting moments in seeing things from the departed point of view it is still too short and could have been explored a lot further. The animation and music still hold up nicely but I just wish there was more to it , I would love to see the series expanded with more episodes and maybe with more of a focus on Momo but then again it may be that because I always want more what we get is all the more interesting.

In Summary:
Ballad of the Shinigami as a whole has been rather surprising to watch, going into it I thought it would be a rather depressing affair with someone dieing every week and everyone else being miserable but I was completely wrong. Each episode did something different and while there were a few common elements on the whole the show was a nice sweet surprise. It's not going to be a huge title for a lot of people but I still think it deserves a few more episodes and more coverage. This show makes you feel good about the world and in this day and age I think that's quiet and achievement.

Features
Japanese 2.0 Language,English Subtitles

Review Equipment
Dell Inspiron I6400 Latpop running Windows XP Professional SP2