[Sh Ranger]

I watched Gotchard Graduations!

When it was announced, I joked that Spanner would also do something, which turned out to be the whole point. While Houtarou, Rinne, Kajiki and Seina graduate from Furasu, Sabi and Renge graduate from Alchemy Academy and Minato and Kyoka graduate from being single, Spanner is the only one not graduating from anything and feels like he's being left behind. Just like Geats Jyamato Awakening, the gloomy tragic antihero is once more the main focus character of this V-Cinema.

Minato told Houtarou that his sentimentality about leaving is due to him having a fulfilling school life which gave him a Gotcha to motivate him to continue with the rest of his life. Spanner doesn't have anything like that. Despite his best attempts to push people away with his edgy behavior, he ended up making friends anyway and now that they're all going their separate ways, what's left for his future? Between this and his spoilery position in the poster, it wasn't surprising to me at all that he was the host of Ouroboros, the one resetting the time loop to prevent Spanner from having a future.

There are probably a lot of people who feel like Spanner, like me actually, who didn't have the fulfilling school life that Houtarou was fortunate to have. It's a mix of gladness and envy for those who are able to find out their Gotchas so easily. But the concept of eternity, of preserving one moment forever, it's the same as Geryon's world of gold. It's pointless. Spanner doesn't want that. He wants to live, even if he doesn't have a reason right now, he knows that something will happen. It's fitting that something as simple as turning up for Kyoka's and Minato's wedding is enough to motivate Spanner to escape from the eternal dimension, which reminds me of Yuki Gai.

We finally got confirmation from the man himself that Spanner "forgetting" Bolt wasn't the result of memory loss. He was literally just being an a**hole, which to his credit he apologizes for. Too bad for Bolt that Spanner getting dragged out of present continuity renders it a non-canon event, causing him to continue his petty revenge. Oh well.

Of course, the B-plot is still focused on our two main graduates. Some people thought the appearance of Rinne's love confession was going to get subverted, which it did, but also not really. She confessed she was going to study abroad in the UK (I guess they have an alchemy branch there?) and Houtarou bid her good luck. But Rinne's elated reaction to Houtarou adding that he'll be lonely (surely a big shot alchemist who made a whole planet can just teleport there whenever he wants?) strongly implies that she was gauging his interest in her. Considering how Producer Minato compared them to Sento and Ryuuga, this seems pretty deliberate.

Overall, a pretty good epilogue to the Gotchard story, which for a V-Cinema stays faithfully close to the presentation and tone of the show. I was also wondering if we'd get the origin story for Spanner's black flames and while it's not exactly stated, I think it might have something to do with the paradoxical nature of the Ouroboros, like, maybe Spanner getting hit by that beam 6 months ago somehow gave him those powers in the past? Just a headcanon anyway. No Movie War this year apparently, so I hope to see all these lovable characters in some future crossover.

The Hopper1 Spring Break prequel was cute as well.