English Dub Review: Sand Land “The Final Battle!”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

The Sand Land Team storm Flying Fortress Garam, with Rao and Thief taking on Bred, Beelzebub faces Muniel, and Anne looks for a way to sabotage the ship and eventually wanders into the fight against Muniel. Eventually, he gets fed up and starts absorbing the Aquanium, taking on a larger and bluer form.

OUR TAKE

While THE FINAL BATTLE isn’t quite over yet, this episode is very much the majority of the climax, with a lot of the fighting getting taken care of here so we can save the finale for wrapping up the Muniel fight and the falling action of the whole show (as well as the literal falling action of the flying fortress that probably won’t be flying for too much longer). It has also dawned on me that this is pretty much just a video game plot complete with boss fights, said bosses having second forms and, most likely, escaping the final boss’ lair before it explodes. I guess that means the video game was written and made first and then this plot was adapted into the anime? It’s apparently been figured out that Akira Toriyama’s writing involvement with this half of the show was not as, well, involved as was previously thought, which certainly makes the contrast between the two story arcs make that much more sense, though I’d still say it has some strengths over that first half even if it doesn’t have as much of the original Toriyama eleven herbs and spices, which I’ll be sure to get to talking about in the Season Review in a couple weeks.

So yeah, this is basically the last chance for Rao and Thief to get a chance to do some big action move and be in a big fight, and I think they manage to pull that off pretty well, being up against the big cyborg man Bred with just their shitty tank. Though they’re also working with Bred’s sudden change of heart regarding the probably wanton destruction that’ll occur if Muniel goes a bit too crazy with the giant super laser. As for Muniel and his fight with Beelzebub, it’s also pretty solid! It repeats a bit from his fight with the Insect Men from the end of the last arc, along with going into his kinda sorta power up form when utilizing the Power of Darkness to gain a boost (I swear to god I thought he got a more visible form change when I first read it but I guess that was a Mandela Effect thing), but it’s also neat to see an ostensibly powerful demon face off against the only other being who could possibly match him, that being an angel. And we’ll see how that battle concludes next week in the final episode of Sand Land!