Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End 17
葬送のフリーレン
Sōsō no Frieren 17

Spoiler Summary/Synopsis:

Before Sein leaves, the party decide to spend another night in the village. A blizzard hits the next day, causing them to hunker down for a month. During this time, Sein enjoys himself at the local tavern. He mediates a disagreement between Frieren and Stark. However, he wants them to start dating. Frieren opens up on why she got Sein to join her party. Eventually, Sein goes after Gorilla while Frieren, Fern, and Stark continue north.

Stark fishes and makes breakfast while Fern and Frieren sleep in a cave. When Star discovers Fern is sick, he and Frieren head out to what’s left of a tiny village. There, the local dairy farmer puts them up in her cabin. Frieren embarrasses Fern by holding her hand in bed. Stark and Frieren head out to gather herbs to make medicine for Fern. Once Fern is well, the trio head out again.

Thoughts/Review

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End 17 fooled me. I knew Sein left the party from reading the manga. I forgot that Yamada-sensei found one more manga chapter to get out of Sein before releasing him back into the wild. Still, this part of the story does provide more insight into why Frieren wanted Sein to join. It tied back to Himmel recruiting her. But now Sein is gone for real this time.

In addition, the Fern x Stark relationship gets touched on. At this point, the two are just party members. They’ve gotten closer to be sure, but I don’t think there’s anything romantic there. They would be a good couple though. That aside, I did get a chuckle out of Sein’s drunken cry that those two should date already.

For the second story, Madhouse made more scenery changes. They added a couple of caves that weren’t in the manga. So Frieren’s party had shelter from the elements with the cave. As such, the need to find proper shelter is lessened in the anime than the manga, where they are just in the woods. Further, Madhouse had Frieren and Stark build a fire at the mouth of a cave to warm up. So why not build one at the first cave?

On the other hand, I did approve of their remote village change. In the manga, this “village” was a single hut in the woods. There was no sign of a village, even though it was discussed. So the anime actually depicting other (if empty) houses was a positive change.

Finally, there’s the cute, motherly Frieren taking care of the sick Fern, who’s a young woman now. As such, I liked her conversations with Stark about Fern growing up.

Final Thoughts and Conclusion

In the end, Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End 17 was an enjoyable episode, slice of life pair of stories.