this post was submitted on 11 Sep 2025
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I wanted to sleep on this one too see if there would be anything I would appreciate after some reflection, but...no, not really.
I think this is a big part of what didn't work for me. They really wanted to get to the fireworks factory, and sidestepped most of the interesting potential in order to get there.
The extended fantasy/hallucination was the strongest part of the episode, but...it seemed to be entirely about Pike. Did Batel even experience it? The episode seemed completely uninterested in what she might be going through as she prepared to sacrifice herself.
And the conflict itself suffers from the "pah wraith problem" - I'm fine with the idea of a conflict between primordial good and evil...but it's hard to make it interesting. All you can really do is focus on how it affects the people involved, and they were only semi-successful at that.
From what I get it, the fantasy/hallucination wss made by Batel for herself and Pike, because she knew they would never see again andshe (somehow, I guess that's part of the Beholder superpower?) constructed a fake world so they could, in some way, live their life together. That's why Pike didn't suffer the accident, and that's why Bayel thanks him on her deathbed and tells him to open the door. She got her life together with him, it was time to get back to reality and become the Guardian.
That's also why the falling star happears in the planet, she told him she would follow everywhere in his heart, and a falling star happears ("here I am" she says in the fantasy life).
Yeah, I think you're right - that's the only anwer that makes any kind of sense. I was just thrown by the fact that Real Batel showed absolutely no awareness of, or interest in, what had happened when Pike snapped out of it. At least, that's what I remember - I haven't gone back to double-check.
The entire episode, while enjoyable, was prettt rushed, if it was split in a two-parts season finale they would probably fit in more explaination scenes, like at least an aknowledgement from Batel and some more explaining/exploration of what she was.