Black Clover Finale Review: A Great Send-Off with Room for More

Black Clover‘s been a long, long way since it first debuted in Fall of 2017. When it first premiered, it garnered a divisive reputation among fans as it gave many a rough first impression. Yuki Tabata’s original manga series does admittedly take an arc or so to truly introduce all of the fun moving pieces in the narrative, but the anime had a rougher time through its adaptation. Nearly four years later, the anime is at a much different place as its final episode is worlds apart from the first.

The Asta we have seen in action these days has grown so much, and this sense of growth is carried throughout the entire experience in the anime’s final episode. This makes for a fantastic send off for the anime, but there’s also so much room to explore further with new releases. The major cliffhanger definitely stings, but it’s nowhere near enough to sour the entire package. It’s bittersweet instead.

The final episode of the series isn’t a full closure moment for the series as a whole, or its various characters, and that’s probably its biggest knock against it as an overall series finale. It’s progressing the story forward to a point that it won’t complete for quite a while, so that unfortunately means you won’t get the same sense of completion with this finale as a series finale would usually differ.

The anime’s ending at an awkward place, and there’s really no avoiding that considering Tabata’s manga continues. The anime makes up for this in spades, however, as it chooses to focus its final moment on reflecting on Asta’s growth by filling some very important gaps. Revealing more about Asta’s mother, his devil, and the surprising connection between all three of them, this finale is instead choosing to offer a sense of emotional closure.

While this is nowhere near an ending for the narrative, it’s a great ending for this time in Asta’s life. The Asta we met in that series premiere was loud, brash, and generally much less evolved than the version we meet in the finale. The scene of Asta gripping his sword and his arm swelling up not only shows how he’s physically grown, but mentally as well. There’s even a remix of the first opening, “Haruka Mirai” (which the title of the episode is drawn from), to unite the two Astas.

As satisfying of a moment this is for the anime as a whole, it leaves so much room left to explore with either the new movie or a potential new slate of episodes in a year or two when more of the manga releases. So at the end of the day, Black Clover’s series finale is a fine end for the series for now…but we definitely need more. It’s kind of like this finale is the tip of the iceberg for a more explosive finale coming. This anime deserves that for how much work it’s put in over the years.

But what did you think of Black Clover’s episode? Was it a good end to the series in some ways? Are you excited for the new movie coming our way? Let us know your thoughts in the comments or you can even reach out to me directly about all things animated and other cool stuff @Valdezology on Twitter!