The Third: The Girl With The Blue Eye Vol. 6: Final Decisions Review

In episodes twenty one and twenty two of The Third, Honoka and Blue Breaker will make their way into the inner sanctum of Rona Fauna. The Third are powerless to stop Rona Fauna should she decide to set off the Wormhole Driver and destroy the planet. Inside though, Honoka will learn the true grim reality of Rona Fauna.

            In the final two episodes, Honoka and Iks take a stand against The Third. While Iks is heading to the Steel Gorge on a personal mission, Honoka is going in protest. Her mechanic Joey has been punished for breaking the Technos Taboo and can now never be a mechanic again. The Third have no intention of letting the two of them in though and will throw an entire army at them to make them stop. There’s something inside that top secret section that they don’t want to be seen.

Good and the Bad

            So with this volume, The Third meets its conclusion starting with the end of the Rona Fauna story arc. Seeing this story end in the middle of the volume actually surprised me. I was completely under the impression that this story arc was going to carry us through to the end. So imagine my surprise when the series decides to end it in one of the most anti climatic ways possible after a drastically hasty build up.

            The start of the next story arc helps things not a bit. The Technos Taboo has been nailed against Joey barring him from ever being a mechanic again. Let’s forget about the fact that we haven’t even heard about the Technos Taboo since around volume two which will wash away the convenience of this.

            With these episodes, the audience really has every right to feel a little robbed. The action fans never really got their big climatic battle scene and the sci-fi fans never really get a really satisfactory conclusion to all the interweaving storylines. Even the relationship between Iks and Honoka ends on a very shaky note that left me with no real impression on where they were going with each other besides exploring partners.

Music

            The music in this volume continues to be one of the strongest points of this series. The piano theme that plays during Honoka’s final approach in episode twenty one is really tense and sets a great mood going in. The insert song on this volume is also a lovely composition. The soft vocals match well with the scene and help the mood considerably.

Dub vs. Sub

            Both casts did their best with this mop up but Rachael Lillis stands out among everyone. The episodes that wrap up the Rona Fauna story arc could not have worked without Rachael’s heartfelt performance in these episodes. The sadness that Honoka and Paife keep describing in these scenes can really be felt in her words.

Extras

            For the final volume of the series, a couple of new extras are included for audience members. Starting with the character bios, these are very short little blurbs on two minor characters, Joey and the Observer. Moving quickly forward, also included on this volume are two karaoke music videos.

            Technically though, these aren’t karaoke music videos since the original vocals haven’t been removed though the lyrics do appear on screen. Also not included with the extras are the titles of the songs or who sings them. Other than that, the music videos are placed over footage from the series making them fun to watch once at least.

Overall

            While the series always had potential to be different and exciting, the staff never really found their focus and ended up drifting rather aimlessly from one story to the next. In the end they were left with nothing and wrapped things up as neatly as possible and hoped no one would notice. The audience would have to be blind not to notice in this case though and as stated above, have every right to feel a little jilted. If you need closure than you can go ahead and check this one out but the rest of us can really just stop at volume five.