So, I recently just finished watching the complete DVD’s of Witchblade and I have say that I’m a little disappointed with the ending. We spend all this intense time watching the series to have it fall flat at the end. It became less about the Witchblade and more about Masane. 
I wanted to know more about the Witchblade. Who or what was she, what are her true powers and who was her stylist? (just kidding) She came off as a half dress (more than half dressed) character who had this appetite to fight (and that was great!). The series was at its best when she was fighting and kicking a**. But then somewhere along the line it got all personal which equals boring (to me). I’m like “bring on the fights, skip this boring stuff”
I thought the story may take a different turn when the Witchblade powers began to increase and she took on a different appearance but no. It followed the plot line I was afraid it would (predictable, boring, and sad). It seemed as if they just threw in all these emotional scenes to get you to cry and stopped providing us with info about the Witchblade. Good grief, less tears and more scantily dress fighters (I mean come on!) They tease us with fight scenes, Witchblade & Cloneblade wearers and a tiny bit of additional information about the Witchblade and then in the end they leave us just as confused and demanding more information (I dislike series that do that). Were all 6 discs building up to a “Mother’s Love?”
When I first started watching Witchblade I was really into it and hoped against hoped that it would have a complete and satisfying ending. Nope, didn’t happen! The good thing about all of this is that now since the series is over and I can move on to another new series (you gotta find that silver lining). And as always, I’ll hope against hope that it will end with a complete and satisfying ending (nothing wrong with hoping, right?)
T.A.G.
{ 46 comments… read them below or add one }
The ending was really sad but I thought it was satisfying. I almost cry (ALMOST) everytime I watch the ending, but I thought it is the best possible way to end it,
SPOILER WARNING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
after all it would have been really cheesy for her to have Masane to have lived.
@Anon thanks for sharing your thoughts about the witchblade ending.
Yes, it was a touching ending (I’ve been known to actually cry while watching anime. Not the witchblade though). :cry: My issue: what was it all about? I just didn’t get the point of the final episode/scene. The ending left me with many unanswered questions. I’ll admit I like my endings to have a nice red bow on top. :-D I haven’t gotten that with too many anime series I’ve seen, so I’ve come to accept not all anime will end leaving me completely satisfied. But witchblade . . . I can’t accept this ending.
I do plan on doing a walkthrough of this series starting in Jan 2010 and maybe I’ll learn/notice something I had miss the first time around to bring everything together.
I hope you’ll come back and share your thoughts and explain stuff I missed or just don’t get ;-)
I had recently bought the Witchblade DVD boxset and watched the whole series. To me honestly it was a good anime that i have seen in awhile.
The ending was a bit tear jerking but it wasn’t satisfying, but i wouldn’t mind the ending if the creators went deeper into the story, like “What is the Witchblade exactly?” and “What created the Witchblade, the earth. some god-like being, or is a tool of some sort?”.
Now, it does make me a think a lot, but way too much with too many blanks. I just wished it had more detail or just long enough to explain more of the artifact since majority of the series already focused more on the characters.
@eddy
Thank you for taking the time to express your views about the Witchblade. I totally get where you are coming from and also wish for more details about the Witchblade. I might have accepted the ending more if there were more background info like you mentioned and such.
I mean, Masane was turning into this ultra-fighting Witchblade but they didn’t go much into that aspect of it which I wish they would have.
Well, I hope you don’t think it about it too much. With so many unanswered questions and the possibilities of what could have been – it’s enough to drive one a bit crazy (I know. I’ve been there, done that, and still doing it) :silly:
I recently watched Witchblade and enjoyed it but didn’t understand what happened to Mesane at the end. It seemed like she just desintegrated or something. I would have liked to know more about the Witchblade as well, background and stuff.
@lacy
That’s totally how I felt about it. The series took me on this amazing, intriguing ride but all the fun and intrigue abruptly disappeared at the end.
Maybe if they had briefly shown Rihoko’s and the others’ life afterward, I maybe could have had a better appreciation for the ending and would not be so disappointed in the “motherly love disappearance” of Masane
Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
This is a great anime for guy, we got our nude, while the girls have their emotional parts, the crimson fighting, and a moral lesson at the end. The anime targeted their audience pretty well in my opinion, i just hoped that that whiney ass b***h got the witchblade and died instead of the mother. i mean why doesn’t she just cut off her arm. i mean really that Taka guy and rich enough to surgically get her a new arm. If he can turn dean guys into weapons then i’m sure he could’ve just done so. i get why the blade is preventing her from taking it off, but can’t the thing just pick some other b***h to leech off of it’s not hard to just wait is it?
@thepeakoflife
You made some interesting points. She wouldn’t even have to cut off her whole arm just the wrist. I agree, Reiji Takayama could have come up with some type of substitute for a hand. It probably won’t have taken his team long to create one. At least that way Masane could be around to watch Rihoko grow up.
I think it was mentioned in one of the first episodes, Masane told Takayama he could cut off her arm, because she didn’t want the Witchblade, and he told her that he couldn’t, because the Witchblade’s defenses would’ve kicked in, and prevented that from happening.
In one of the later episodes, Masane’s in a garage trying to break off / crush the Witchblade, and it’s defenses kicked in, and destroyed the hydraulic press, or whatever it is she tried to break the Witchblade with.
@Animefan
Yes, yes that’s right. But there should be some type of manual override on that Witchblade like with your car. Maybe if they look closely there’s some type of button they just need to push to pop that thing off (sorry about the car reference, everything in my car went out except the battery. I could start it but it would not allow me to change the gear to drive that was until I found the manual override button and I was able to put in drive and get myself back home)
Shouldn’t something like that be built in? The Witchblade seems like an advance technology in which something as simple as an override button would automatically be there. I understand it’s defense mechanism. But why force yourself on someone who doesn’t want you? Or is it, that deep down the chosen ones really do want it? Or does it just like messing with the bearer because it loves having that power over them?
It’s like some psycho-mind game. It’s all like “I know you Love the power however in return I’m going to destroy your life, ha ha and there’s nothing you can do about!” :-P
Thanks for commenting thepeakoflife and animefan :-)
I’m just guessing, but it’s probably for the emotional impact of the viewers [the reason why there's no "manual override"]. If there was an override, it would probably be way too easy for the Witchblade to switch users – and have more characters in the anime to focus on than needed.
I just really wanted some kind of epilogue, so we knew what happened afterwards. Did the Witchblade disintegrate too? [I'm guessing no], but then that would mean one of the sisters [or someone else compatible] could go pick it up from wherever it landed.
@Animefan
I would have appreciated some type of closure concerning Rihoko. She was my favorite character :-D but atlas that was not to be. Oh, well. In my ending she lives a very full happy life.
That is a really good deal on the Witchblade Blu-ray I know what I’ll be doing this weekend. Stocking up my anime DVD collection (thanks!)
I watched the series between yesterday and today, because I wanted to see if it was worth buying. I felt that the ending was satisfying, *spoilers* since they really didn’t spend any time trying to figure out if there was a “cure” / solution to what happens to the Witchblade user.
That said, I really wish there could have been a happy ending, where Masane could’ve survived, since the whole series was about her, and her love for Rihoko, or at the least, had a short epilogue, showing future scenes with Rihoko and the rest of the gang.
I liked the series over all, and ended up buying it.
It’s cheap for the blu ray $22.99 / viridian dvd set $22.49 on amazon.com right now.
In fact, a lot of animes are on sale there, I picked up quite a few.
I justed recently finished watching the series, and my overall thought was…its a good anime, but all good things have flaws. For instance they started to explain masane’s past, but then dropped that and continued on with the series…also they explain so much about the neogenes but kinda left the main point of the series, well one main point the witchblade…they didn’t explain where it came from, if it was some super-natural creation or something…The ending…the ending made me feel like i was kick in the crotch and left their to die…i mean they could of at least had an epilogue to show what to the remaining main characters and the sub characters…and some of the moments in the anime were predictable, but overall i enjoyed the anime very much, but due to some of the issues…it left me not really confused but, extremely curious…i hope some how they continue the series and better explain the whole reason for the witchblade…besides i loved the characters and would love to see a continuation of the series…
@Dinoboy
Very well said! :-D I couldn’t agree with you more. There were a lot of stories that started but none of them finished. You didn’t know which storyline to follow because it kept constantly changing. And each storyline had the potential to be really entertaining and great had they taken the time to develop it completely before moving on to the next (incomplete storyline).
Thanks for sharing your thoughts about the Witchblade with us. I think you summarized it wonderfully :clap:
Just finished the series and I thought of many different ways they could have played out this to be a top seller. I mean so many plots we’re put into this but they just cut them off and kept cutting them off. Of course there were the unexpected twists, the wondrous battling systems, and the comedy parts, but really, how in the world could you make that into a 24 episode anime? It just doesn’t seem logical. I was looking around on the internet and found out that their is indeed a manga! Along with this information it was a TV series as well, and you know what else? They are planning on making a live action film on this whole thing. Jeez, talk about a 3 hour movie at most right? Maybe a saga? Haha, if only.
—Going past this line will lead you to spoils. You have been warned.—
Back to my complaints. One thing, where were they before they made it to Tokyo? That one kind of bugged me. I mean it was not needed but it would have been a good plot to go with. Secondly, How in the hell did they have the witch blade in a sleeping state? I mean really, they go on and on about the wearer has to die and when that happens it finds another host, so in that aspect… they lied to us! There should have been a way to get it back into that state! Anyway, there was the fact that I noticed that the mother daughter thing from the beginning was weird. they looked nothing alike… and why the f@ck didn’t they do the DNA testing when they found Masane, who couldn’t even remember anything, with a baby in the middle of the everything that happened. GAH!
What about the bit about her past, they found her real name… Why couldn’t they look for her parents names? I know Takayama said he did, but he was just so nonchalant about it. Don’t even get me started on the two types of weapons. All of that was another story on it’s own. What in the world happened to everyone else?! The ending was just not their. A good ending should at least tell us what happened to everyone. Fill in the blanks a little right? I am just so frustrated with this whole mess they did. This anime was to good to just for that ending.
Hi ThatOneAnimeGirl. I hope you remembered to breathe :-)
I totally understand your frustration. Been there did that. That feeling of “what the heck did I just spend my time watching” stayed with me for a looong time. However with time it passes (until another anime comes along to frustrate the heck out of you).
I hope you were able to let it all out ….. Like you said “This anime was to good to just for that ending” Excellent way to sum it up.
Thanks for stopping by.
If you need to vent some more, about this or any anime, leave a comment or better yet contact us. I would love to feature you in a blog post.
-T.A.G.
I’d just like to throw in my two cents, considering how this is the only thread I’ve found regarding Witchblade that seems to still be alive…Over the course of three years, interestingly.
Anyway. I finished watching Witchblade about two days ago and I have to say…It’s left me haunted. Thoughts regarding the build-up to the end just aren’t going away, and I suppose I just have to get this off my chest.
Initially, I started watching Witchblade for the promises of action and fighting that it had seemed to promise. Eventually, however, my want of the fights and the action made room for more time to spend watching the relationship between Masane and Riohko. I felt my heart crack more times than I’d like to admit, especially during scenes where it seemed the pair would either separate, reunite, or risk losing each other again.
The images left behind in my mind are, as I said, haunting. I keep recalling the last “family photo” with the apartment gang, the talk with Riohko in the park about heaven (the remarks regarding the big house Riohko wants really started to jerk at me), Masane losing her sense of taste, and, finally, the last “goodbye” of sorts when Masane finally dissipates. Oh, and the shell. Damn that shell.
Anyway, I’m going to be moping over this for awhile, oddly enough. I’ve never really had anything affect me media-wise, so I’m rather confused by how this managed to get to me. I keep thinking it’s the idea that the plotline had Masane fighting so hard to keep her daughter with her, as well as to keep her safe and secure. And, despite everything, the only way to have Riohko safe was to give her life up for her. Sorta like fate kinda dealt you the lousy hand.
Sacrifice. I guess that’s what this series ultimately became about.
I do agree with a lot of the messages here, however. I do wish they tied up more of the story than they did. Past, present, future, etc. A lot of questions left unanswered, a lot of ideas that just fell flat. I am glad they kept strong with the connection between Masane and her munchkin, though.
Thanks Troy for sharing your opinion on Witchblade. Welcome to the Club! ;-D
It’s the “It Had Such Great Potential but What Happened” Club (or something like)
wow, has it really been that long?
Really has been. I still can’t stop watching the final scene for some reason. It just…intrigues and bothers me all at the same time.
i just finish the series of witchblade, omg im so crying! T_T why did she die, i was hoping she would live and be with her daughter! NOOOOOO she dies…….looking at the group pics of her and the kid, makes me cry. does any1 agree with me?
Hello warheaddemon,
Welcome to the club :-)
I feel your pain
Call me optimistic, but in the end it doesn’t show for sure if she died… I believe the ending is left for our imagination to take over, we can give Masane the happiest of endings back with Rihoko or give her the heroes death she deserved…
Lmao it’s funny that this post goes From 2006 to 2011 and I’m pretty sure going to keep going. I thought I was the only one pissed off at the end or mybe I was just sad. Truly for us to write about it and how far it as gone we got emotionally attached to the main charc and the plot , enough to see they could have added more detail to the anime. Did they get lazy? Also I feel even though she basically killed her self at the end her Kidd would still be the next bearer right? But then that would have made it worse.. Smh o we’ll it was a great story only fans could point out the flaws.
Welcome to the club :-) I find with each new comment I get a different insight on the series and how it has effected each commenter differently and yet in the same way.
Thanks for taking the time to comment. I still can’t believe its been that long. When you put numbers up like that, it surprises me. I guess, because it seems like it was only yesterday that I finished it.
Aww man I kinda hate sad endings in anime I would have really loved this anime if she would have found a way to live in the end and not have died. I think they just tried to hurry and end the series didn’t really want to try on the ending
I, too, feel like the ending was rushed. Maybe if they had given the ending a bit of thought while writing the beginning and middle we wouldn’t have been caught of guard like that. :-)
Thanks for taking the time to comment.
Well I actually love the ending!!! It was stated By Takayama that the witchblade ultimately consumes it’s host, and with no way to remove it, Masane came to terms with it. What she could not accept was that Rihoko was the next host for the Witchblade. To me the motherly love scene makes sense, I believe the witchblade was longing for the love of a mother from the very beginning, which is why it chose Masane while she was holding baby Rihoko as if she was her own child during “The great quake”. She sacrificed herself and the witchblade to save Rihoko from the same tragic death they both eventually would have endured, and I find that touching. All that aside, I found the ending to be very deep, I loved the character development and found a connection to each of them, and I think it had the perfect ratio of touchy/action moments considering the plotline. Overall I have to say, it’s my favorite anime series of all time!!! I’m glad to see people still discuss it!!! :3
Thanks for taking the time to comment and giving us all a different prospective on the series.
For me, like you said it was stated that the witchblade would consume the host however I didn’t expect it to happen so quickly and for the motherly love theme to be thrown in like that. It’s a nice idea and all but it seemed to come out of nowhere. Maybe if we had some tiny hint or something I could go back and say “Oh, now that makes sense” but I wasn’t able to do that.
For me, it had the momentum to be something spectacular but towards the end it fizzled out, unfortunately :-(
http://wapedia.mobi/en/Witchblade_%28anime%29
this explains at least a bit (;
http://wapedia.mobi/en/Witchblade_%28anime%29
hope this explains it to you a bit, i dunno if my comp is spazzing or not but here’s my unoriginal (and not written by me) two cents
WTF like really,I could have came up with a better endin and besidesmaybe it’s just me but as ihard as it mite of been for Masane to do why didn she just let riohko go call me mister obvious to point this out but without riohko there would be no reason for the witchblade to be drawn to Masane and I guess whoever was her gurdian would be the bearer instead of it destroyin her they could have kept passin it on anyway very disappointed
For me, it’s just one of those anime were you feel you really got short changed.
You keep hoping and hoping after each episode and hours of watching that it will all come together but it never does.
Since so many people like myself were so disappointed what would a “perfect” ending to the Witchblade look like? Or what could they have changed in the storyline to make their original ending justifiable? hmmm
Oh, well. Thanks for commenting Williedarnellie.
Look, I’m not saying anyhting about other shows, I’m merely talking about Witchblade as a whole. That being said, Witchblade, to me, didn’t seem like the show to have the massive explanations. I mean, yes, it would have been nice to have a little more fighting and a little less “Masane?” but the way they handled things, I think they did better than if they had 4 extra episodes explaining and fighting. Witchblade isn’t too long, and it doesn’t feel short. There’s a character arc, and the ending is fitting. There can’t be a continuation, so this in the end is pointless anyway.
Think about it for a second. Compare it to one of Stephen King’s books. You like the characters, you like the plot, you like almost every part of it, then you get to the part where it’s made up explanations. It leaves nothing to the imagination. The imagination is the best writer a team can use. If you’re left wondering with enough to make some things yourself, while still leaving not enough to build more episodes out of, then you’ve done a good job. Having absolute 100% no loose ends means that when the show is done, it’s done. If you don’t like it, then oh well, you’re screwed. The flexibility makes it so if I want the creator of Witchblade to be some meteor, I can have it that way, while you can have it be a God’s artifact. It’s up to the viewer, rather than up the writer. The writer is there to please, not to enforce after all.
Oh and my parting comments, I got really teary at the end, and I always will whenever revisiting Witchblade.
Thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts on Witchblade :-)
So..in the story of WitchBlade the main point they seem to try and get across is the relationship between Meloney(Masane lol) and Rihoko. Throughout the series Masane’s top priority is to protect Rihoko at all costs. At one point we discover that Masane is not actually Rihoko’s biological mother, but that has little to no effect on how Masane feels about her. It also portrays through Renee that blood doesn’t make any difference when it comes to family and relationships, she was nothing compared to the mother Masane was to Rihoko. So the question asked is why does the WitchBlade choose who it does? Well, I don’t know if it was specifically looking for a mother as Masane says at the end..but maybe it chooses its owner by their heart. Perhaps the WitchBlade is laying under the rumble where the last scene took place..or perhaps, it was looking for a person that would finally understand that it is not just a weapon, but at some point a living being(like the eye units made by deseased humans) Maybe the WitchBlade disappeared along with Masane, because someone finally understood it.
yeah i really liked the show and when it ended i was kinda like wait what just happened did she die what was the whole thing about the girl with the witch blade 2 needing a mother and all so yeah i was confused but i still liked the show and like some one els said it would have been cool if they had show some of there life after that would have helped you understand more.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on Witchblade – Yeah, despite its lacking a fulfilling ending, it still is a good series.
It obviously has something compelling about it because it has some viewers (including myself) wanting more but sadly our desire is left unanswered.
I AGREE I wanted more info on the witchblade – history, how it works, it’s abilities. sometimes something interesting would be mentioned about the witchbalde but then it never got expanded on. Even other things like the Tanaka x Misane romance were touched on and then never explored. They kiss – huge YES moment – and then we pretend it didn’t happen. And the mystery of misane’s past, how she ended up with amnieisa, a random baby in her arms, and the witch blade scar (which then turned into the braclet) were never fully explained.
More fight scenes would’ve been great, or at least longer. I do feel like the fight scenes were a bit of a tease after all of misane’s “i want to fight” urges and after the witcblade gets powered up and everyone is like “omg it’s sooo powerful, unbeliveable!” But then we only get tibits of fighting, and not a good sense of the variety of moves / attacks misane may have.
The ending was a bit of a let down, only because of the above-mentioned left-hanging points in the series and the lack of closure that the vauge glowing scene at the end left. So is Tanaka gonna shed some tears or what? So is Rhiko getting the witchblade now?
Thanks for taking the time to comment and share your feelings about the WitchBlade
Honestly, I thought the ending was one of the most touching endings I’ve seen throughout most animations. I’m not really too keen on how the series did a 180 in the general plot halfway through, but the flow of the series was maintained well enough to not be bothered by it until looking at it in hindsight.
However, I do hope that one day there will be an OVA following the events of the animated series. I want to see how Rihoko and Reiji continue living after the Tokyo Tower incident. I want to see if there’s any possibility that Masane is simply spread about the particles that were unleashed during the final episode, and could one day return, much like the sea shell Rihoko gave Masane. I also want to see some of the more minor things clarified and/or taken into fruition, such as Tozawa’s scoop, why Michael is apparently “famous”, and what happens to Mariko and her residents.
There are so many elements left open to interpretation. This series is well deserving of at least an OVA followup. If Masane truly is gone, I sincerely believe that she deserves a memorandum, and is one more reason of why the series needs a followup. She is by far one of the most touching characters I’ve ever seen in any form of media, especially when paired with Rihoko.
I like the series a lot, but oh god the ending… It’s nice to see a lot of people relate. It’s not that it was bad by any means. It really speaks to the character development in the show that so many people would be upset at the way it ended. It just kind of made me have a sad.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on Witchblade
I finished watching the series myself, and felt a sniffling desire to -find more- info. Thus i came upon this here page.
As already stated many times, the series has lacks. So many questions go unanswered, so many characters that could be so much more, yet we only scratch the surface of their potential. And finally, the inescapable sorrow, when we as viewers start to realize, Misane will not get the blade off, she will die in the end. It left me wailing like a banshee inside. It was a cruel, unforgiving fate, because we’ve come to enjoy Misane and her personality by now. She is a cocky, not-too-smart, average person, that tries to do her best for her daughter. As such, a relate able person for most.
But with all my regrets and desires for -what could have been- i will also take the fact in, that we are sitting here with all the clues. If you were to see it from the “inside” of the series, a lot of the characters really only have small fragments of the whole picture, so knowing may not be important for them. It was stated that in the past, secret wars have been fought over the blade. So we can assume that its ancient. Thus, if it actually got destroyed in the end, or just “vanished” once more. I could see a potential OVA for something like that. The issue i find with it, is that the concept of the blade is very unforgiving. User gets, user has power over 9000, user dies. And the user is our main focus, it becomes like reading a book you know the ending for already… so why watch it at all (i dont wanna see Rihoko die! T.T?
Well, im happy i did, the fan-service was “a bit” over the top *cough cough*. But, in the end, it was the characters and development that made it come to life for me. And ill praise it for that.
Thanks for keeping the posts up, and sharing your thoughts.
<3
Thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts on the WitchBlade.
I have to say, I am surprised how long this thread has been active for. It’s quite amazing.
I just finished watching Witchblade today, i first came across this series a couple of days ago and I immediately became interested in it. I was to begin with more intrigued about the action and fighting factors of Witchblade as well as it’s origins, however I soon came to love watching the relationship between Masane and Rihoko.
I must admit there were many moments between the two that left me in tears, I quite like series like that. But once it came to the ending I was a little more than unsatisfied. I didn’t mind the fact that it changed from action and fighting storyline to more of a sad relationship focused storyline, but if you’re going to do that at least make the ending way more emotional than it was. I understand that Masane sacrificed herself to protect Rihoko but it really wasn’t as saddening to me as a lot of the previous episodes were.
I just felt like this was something I needed to get off my chest, and I really wanted to see if anyone had thought the same about the ending as I do. I’m glad I found this thread, I can now see what other people’s opinions of the ending are.