The Ancient Magus' Bride

Episode 5

Love conquers all. The ramifications of this episode's title are not as romantic as it sounds. Sometimes, what love conquers is as vital as sanity and common sense. Out of love and the fear of losing it, Matthew becomes vulnerable to the sorcerer's deception. From what we know, Matthew wasn't a bad person, but he can only do those terrible things because it's for the sake of the one he loves. And because of love, he loses his mind completely after accidentally killing Mina instead of saving her in this episode's most powerful scene.

Apart from the strange medium long shot held early on in the tavern, the whole flashback was shot and scored effectively, with a few moments of brilliance in between. The eerie piano, Ayumu Murase's voice, and the sorcerer's character design tell us at first sight that we don't want this individual to get his hands on Chise, long before any cats start disappearing. Yūto Uemura effortlessly takes Matthew from devotion to madness, and when Mina wanders through the forest searching for her love, foreboding cutaways to Matthew's bloody cleaver make it brutally clear how their story will end tonight. It's a strong buildup to the even stronger finale, when Mina's gone and Matthew's blown past the brink of insanity.

The Ancient Magus' Bride has the advantage of adapting a strong and well-written story, but for the first time since the premiere, the show's execution is equally sharp, making use of wonderfully effective techniques like those jump cuts of the shed's open door, brutally echoing Matthew breaking point without having to shove the camera into his face. We know that it's over once he steps out of the shed's blackness, just as we knew it would be over for Mina as soon as she stepped through that door into the darkness. Despite the genuinely revolting nature of what's portrayed, I was delighted throughout the whole sequence. It delivered all the cinematic flair I felt was missing in previous episodes, conveying the story's emotion in a way only film can without going overboard into distracting levels of style for its own sake.

Restraint continues to work in the series' favor on the audio side as well. It's because the score knows when to shut up that it can be so effective in scenes like Mina turning into goo with minimal musical means. When Matthew's body hits the ground with a loud thump, the sound design alone is enough to make it feel like being punched in the gut – immediate and brutal. If the score showed less restraint throughout, the (now recurring) use of insert songs could easily achieve the opposite effect and end up feeling cheap and manipulative instead of moving and heartfelt. The show can press those big, red make-the-audience-sob-buttons because their use is reserved for special occasions. While I still love everything on the audio side, I do think this should be our last insert song for death-experienced-through-magic for a while to avoid wearing thin too quickly.

After involuntarily witnessing this splendidly executed human tragedy, what lesson does Chise draw from the experience? Given that Mina and Matthew are already dead and non-existence would be the preferable option to staying as they are (for the inhabitants of Ulthar as well), why does she refuse to answer Mina's plea to erase them from existence, effectively ending their suffering because it would never have begun? Chise, of all people, should be able to relate to the wish of non-existence.

It's not so much the idea of sending them off into nothingness that terrifies her, but taking away what they had in life along with it. Because even after all the suffering Matthew brought upon himself and others, he acted out of love, and it's their love for each other that gives meaning to their lives – and deaths – in Chise's eyes. It's something she can't possibly take away from them, just like she can't let Molly sacrifice herself, no matter how fulfilled the king looks back on her life (or lives in this case), echoing and building upon Nevin's perspective on death. There's a little girl waiting for her cat's return, and because Molly is loved and would be missed, Chise ascribes value to her life.

It's obvious how much Mina and Matthew's deaths affect Chise emotionally, but instead of telling herself that she doesn't care, as she still tried to do with Nevin, she now makes the conscious decision to use her powers and rely on the guidance of others to preserve the memory of lives she considers to have been worth living. It's the first time she takes this initiative beyond refusing seduction or manipulation from others, and it can only happen because she now has a place and person to return to. Death is no longer the same liberating prospect it was before. Renfred lost that battle the moment he talked about setting her free. Chise doesn't want to be free, she wants to be wanted, even if it means becoming a slave for now. Even after the somewhat bumpy and unequal start to their relationship, Elias has yet to disappoint her on that front. He'll still have some explaining to do in the near future about why he hasn't started to save her from her own powers yet, what his true objective is, and why in the fairy kingdom's name he thought it appropriate to lick her wound, but as long as he keeps saying that he wants her to be part of his family, no prospect of freedom will be able to compete for her now.

It's wonderful to see Chise take action, and it's also wonderful to see non-existence turn from a promising thought to something possibly dreadful. Only the blossoming appreciation of being valued can enable Chise to turn a potentially meaningless act of exorcism into a true spiritual cleansing. I can't shake the feeling that Elias knows much more about what his goals for her than he lets on, though.

Rating: A-

The Ancient Magus' Bride is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

Anne is a translator and fiction addict who writes about anime at Floating Words and on Twitter.