Trigun Stampede 12

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis

Knives attempts to impregnate all Plants around the planet by making contact with the Core. Outside July, Zazie and worm insects flee, encountering Wolfwood, who’s observing the tentacles flooding the city. Inside, Meryl screams through the glass to the inert Vash, even futilely shooting her pistol at the glass. Within the dream world, Vash sees a flower grow in his hand and hears Rem’s voice and flees. Rem’s voice becomes stronger and Vash grows older. He then hears Meryl’s voice.

Knives is ejected by the core. Vash closes the gate and releases the Plants. He absorbs all of the root-tentacle stuff into energy, contained in a crystalized cube. Knives rushes back to kill Meryl, but Vash stops him. The two battle all over July as Wolfwood returns to save Meryl. The July military see Vash and open fire. He tries to get them to flee, but they won’t listen. As such, Knives slaughters them all and resumes his fight with Vash.

Eventually, Vash uses the cube to “load” his gun, causing an organic-like weapon to form. Vash flees to space, followed by Knives. Knives argues his case to Vash, but fails to get through. As Vash falls back to the planet, the energy releases into space. Knives is slowly stripped away as he continues to attempt to get the cube. Eventually, most of his flesh gone, Knives gives up and is gone. Vash crashes into July, the residue energy causing the city to be destroyed and a crater to be formed in its place.

Two years later, Meryl returns to the crater to pay her respects to Vash. Zazie joins her to tell her the worms will be watching. Meanwhile, Meryl’s boss orders her to return to HQ to get her new partner, Milly Thompson.

Thoughts/Review

And so Trigun Stampede 12 brings about an end to the series for now, as a sequel has been announced.

Actually, a Prequel?

I have heard some folks speculate that maybe this series is a prequel to the events of the manga. Before Trigun Stampede 12, I dismissed this as a possibility. Sure, July was around, but the anime story itself was unique and not representative of the source manga lore. The destruction of July in the manga happened prior to the start of said manga. Ditto the OG anime. While Vash’s “Angel Arm” is the cause of the destruction, it was because Knives attempted to learn more about Independent Plant abilities. In that regard, Trigun Stampede is completely different, even if July was destroyed.

That aside, here’s what I think will happen. Dr. Conrad, in his floating UFO-lab, will hook up with Bluesummers. He will then form the Gung-ho Guns gang to find Vash and get revenge. The two will find the injured Knives and nurse him back to health. Whether or not Bluesummers retrieved the bodies of the others that had been killed, I won’t say. However, there are plenty of other “Gung-ho Guns” members who have yet to be seen.

Meanwhile, Wolfwood will eventually find Vash, as will Meryl and Milly. And then Knives will use Conrad’s lab-ship to absorb Plants in order to gain more power to wipe out humanity. Of course, this presumes that the second series follows the manga more closely, sans certain things already covered in Trigun Stampede.

Final Thoughts and Conclusion

Since I’m insanely busy with work, let me wrap up with some final thoughts.

• Pretty ugly how Knives talks of saving Plants while raping them. They all have this horrified, “What is happening?” look on their faces. It made me want to throw up in anger and disgust at Knives.
• I dislike cliched stuff such as Vash magically regaining his memories ’cause “plot”. Basically, the writers put themselves in a corner, then have to rely on the old, “He’s not quite dead yet” trope.
• Speaking of Vash, he’s lost his memories…again. I wonder if in the second series/season, he gets his trademark spiky hair back.
• Glad to hear Milly is going to be there for the next season/series. I really missed her.
• Folks have asked about why the subtitles incorrectly spell July as “JuLai”.  Based on my experience, translators are hired with no knowledge of the source material. Further, they aren’t expected to know. And an adapter with knowledge is not sought. Thus July became “JuLai” and “Kni” became “Nai” (though I’m sorta okay with that later one).

In the end, Trigun Stampede 12 was entertaining enough, providing an all-new but manga-similar reason for July’s destruction. I’ll try to write a series/season review. And if I’m lucky, do a video.