Joran The Princess Of Snow And Blood “Past And Future” Review
Joran The Princess Of Snow And Blood “Past And Future” is the eleventh episode of the Joran anime. Following the fury Sawa felt at Kuzuhara in episode 10. He openly admits his crime but tells Sawa to meet him later for him to explain. Meanwhile, Kuzuhara is figured to be the double agent he is and Elena is revealed to be alive along with someone else very special to Sawa…
The Past
Beginning the episode after his confession. Kuzuhara opens a secret door for Sawa and helps her escape. Yoshinobu sends his special forces to get her and he refuses to give away her position. The special forces can tell that Kuzuhara is tough minded though and know torturing him won’t get them anywhere.
Sawa escapes under the tunnels and is saved by Elena. They bond a bit but there’s not much time. Elena takes her to a secret exit where they’re met by Rinko. She is in no mood to let Sawa escape and she does everything to kill her or at least injure her. But to no avail, Sawa overpowers her after a heated battle and she ends up left alone crying massively injured by her own abilities.
The Future
Sawa is led to a safehouse by Elena who explains to her that power outages have been happening everywhere as the Ryumaku is drying up. She explains about how extreme the politics in Tokyo is getting as the Tokugawa Regime can feel their control slipping away. Then, finally. Sawa is introduced to the third member of their secret hideout: Asahi.
Turns out that Asahi was saved by Doctor Todoroki, the one Kuzuhara was threatening. She’s been alive this whole time. Elena goes to give them some privacy but her waters break and the baby is on the way. Sawa is forced to help deliver it as there are no midwives. The baby is safely delivered amongst the chaos outside and both mother and babe fall asleep. Sawa and Asahi have a heart to heart outside where she’s open and honest with the young girl. She looks to Asahi’s future and gives her learning resources so she can educate herself and have a bright one.
Once Asahi is asleep, Sawa leaves and goes to meet Kuzuhara at their rendezvous point.
Review
This was a slowly paced but beautiful episode. I don’t quite know how I feel about Asahi being alive. I like her as a character and how she softens Sawa but it kinda feels like a slap in the face to Sawa’s character arc. Even before the Asahi reveal Sawa was a changed person for the better, she no longer wanted to fight and was mostly peaceful.
She openly says and hints often she’s like that now because it’s a way to keep Asahi alive in her heart despite her death. Bringing her back was sweet and it made for cute viewing but I’m now wondering what all of it was for? What was the point of her dying in the first place if they’re just gonna write her back in? It almost feels like the writers were onto something good with Sawa’s post-Asahi arc but were too scared to stay committed to the idea.
I honestly feel like some are gonna love it but some are gonna hate it. But it’s done now so I assume the writers have a reason. The whole episode was beautiful. From the fighting scenes being epic as hell to the peaceful birth of Elena’s daughter. Sawa is an actually interesting and somewhat fun person at the moment. She’s been through so much but she still shows kindness to Rinko.
All in all this was almost the perfect episode except for the Deus Ex Asahi twist and the fact that not a lot is revealed in this one. At this point, episode 12 has no choice but to be an info dump. Or have Sawa just go “you know what? I don’t care.” And I’m a bit worried for it. I do love that Elena is alive and OK though.
