Don't look past me. I'm always the center of attention.
Summary:
The timer on the bomb hits zero and Maria's car explodes. Canaan feels Maria's disappearing presence, but rather than falling into despair Canaan suddenly sees things more clearly than before. Alphard doesn't like the change in Canaan's gaze and attacks, but she is quickly disarmed by Canaan. Seeing the situation turn in Canaan's favor, Alphard decides to run for it. A helicopter appears along side the train and peppers the train with bullets, and this allows Alphard to pick her pistol and move to another car. The train enters a tunnel and re-emerges with Alphard on the roof and Canaan in hot pursuit. Alphard wonders why Canaan is chasing her rather than tending to Maria, and Canaan adamantly states that Maria isn't dead. It turns out Canaan is right as in the dying seconds Yunyun ran back to the detached cars and saved Maria from the explosion.
Yunyun is GAR!?
Mid-air display of affection!?
Alphard states that the root of Canaan's strength comes from her guiding light which is Maria, but Canaan states that Maria is not her guiding light but her friend. Alphard laughs off the suggestion and prepares to leave via a ladder from the helicopter, but Canaan refuses to let Alphard leave and jumps on the ladder as well. Alphard and the helicopter's gunner try to shoot Canaan off, but Canaan shoots Alphard's pistol and the gunner, and the helicopter machinegun swings back into the cabin and kills the pilot. Alphard and Canaan are forced to jump back onto the train as the helicopter crashes into a cliff face. The train enters a tunnel and Canaan pins and pistol-whips Alphard, but during the beating Canaan sees weird colors from Alphard and finally figures out Alphard's motivations.
Instead of giving a speech, maybe Canaan should have pulled Alphard up first?
The train re-emerges into the open onto a bridge over a ravine. Alphard gets away from Canaan but she slips and falls off the train, but Canaan grabs her arm in time. While holding on to Alphard, Canaan states that Alphard's heart had died when Siam died, but she is not going to let Alphard die again. Alphard realizes Canaan is right and she wanted to get closer to Siam by creating another person with Canaan's synesthesia. Canaan's pistol slips off the side train roof and Alphard catches it with her free hand. Alphard points the pistol at Canaan and declares that she'll break free from Siam's curse, but instead of shooting Canaan she severs her own left arm with the gun and falls into the ravine.
Alphard can never belong to just one woman, but at least Canaan gets to keep the arm as a souvenir.
Minoru showed up because the episode needed a token male character.
Minoru spends the next day or so wandering around town. Minoru visits the park where he ran into Hakkoo and also Santana's cosplay bar where Minoru breaks down into tears. The day has arrived for Minoru and Maria to return to Japan, and they are driven to the airport by the awesome taxi driver. During the ride, the radio plays the song "Silk Road Buns" by Nene, and Minoru and Maria reflect upon their trip to China. Meanwhile in different parts of China, Yunyun is working at a fruit stand and thinking that she'll meet Maria again; Cummings is still alive and is now a monk; and an one-armed woman is sitting at an airport. Back in Shanghai, Canaan is looking at Maria's plane through the scope of her sniper rifle. Some time later in Japan, Maria and Minoru holds a display showing the photos they took during their adventure in China, and among the display are the mugshots of Canaan and Alphard hung on the wall side by side.
This brings back memories...
...and so does this little fruit/seed, which remind Cummings of his beloved Liang Qi-sama's pellet gun.
Guess who?
In an European city, an older Canaan, sporting Alphard's hairstyle, gets a phone call from Natsume. Natsume has a job for Canaan, and the target is an one-armed woman.
Alphard-style Canaan.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
That's the finale of CANAAN, but it's not really an ending. Canaan, Alphard, Maria, Minoru, Yunyun, Natsume, and even Cummings are still alive, and Alphard is still causing trouble at the end of the show. As I kind of expected, the final episode didn't touch at all on what happened with the Borner's program and Ua virus data other than the fact that Natsume is still alive and giving Canaan odd jobs. I suppose we'll just have to presume that Natsume and the NGO got what they want.
As for the main conflict between Alphard and Canaan, Alphard predictably did all the bad things because her devotion to Siam and her jealousy for Canaan. "Making another magic-eye-powered freak in order to get close to Siam" doesn't really make much sense, but then again jealousy is not rational. Beneath that calm and calculating exterior, deep inside Alphard is actually a bit like Liang Qi as both don't handle jealousy very well. It's still a little strange to see Alphard losing her cool just because Canaan's gaze changed though. I'm disappointed that we still don't know what really happened on that fateful day on the train between Siam, Canaan and Alphard. It's debatable whether Alphard was able to free herself from her past due to the fight with Canaan. She lost her tattooed left arm, but she's still alive and apparently causing trouble, so my guess is maybe not. Canaan seems to be liberated from her past though (after having hallucinations last episode), and this is probably thanks to Maria even though Maria did diddly squat at the end. Canaan stated that Maria is her friend instead of her guiding light, but is there really a distinction from two. The way I see it, Canaan just replaced Siam with Maria, and Alphard seems to agree with my viewpoint. It's curious that Canaan took up Alphard's hairstyle at the end, and I wonder what other aspects of Alphard rubbed off on Canaan.
Moving on to the other characters, Yunyun was pretty awesome yet again. I'm convinced that she has special Borner powers now, since how else did she save Maria from the exploding train in the span of 30 seconds? I'm also glad that Cummings is still alive. The man has moved on from his criminal life, but it's obvious that he'll always remember his beloved Liang Qi-sama. And finally there's Minoru and Maria, neither of which did very much during this finale episode. Well, at least Maria took a decent mugshot of Alphard before she got shot, and Minoru... uh... turned off the TV at Santana's bar to save electricity.
So nothing is really resolved in this so-called finale. No clear-cut winners, no real yuri relationships (only long distance ones?). There's definitely a possibility of sequel, and I'll probably watch the sequel if it ever happens. Overall, CANAAN was a decent show. It has good production quality, fast-paced action, some cool characters, and delicious yuri subtext going for it, but the story is bit too meandering for my tastes. The underlying story of the show isn't actually that complicated, but the show made everything more confusing than it needed to be. The whole setup about the Ua virus never amounted to much and I find that pretty disappointing. In conclusion, I found CANAAN to be an enjoyable watch, but it had the potential to be better.
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