English Dub Review: Ranking of Kings “The King and the Sun”

Overview (Spoilers Below):

Now that King Bosse and the demon are gone, happiness reigns supreme. Miranjo pledges to try to make Daida happy and he forgives her for everything, causing everyone else to follow suit. Daida even gives Bojji back the kingdom—but that creates a problem for Kage, who feels uncomfortable with his pals new position and decides to leave the picture. However, Bojji isn’t content to just sit on the throne without him.

Our Take:

The final episode of Ranking of Kings has arrived and it’s kind of a weird one. After spending what feels like forever with battles and power dynamics and immortality, we get an entire episode that’s basically the opposite of that. The King and the Sun is all about peace and happiness and friendship—which is nice and all, but doesn’t necessarily make for an entertaining finale.

We start with the reassertion that Daida and Miranjo are getting married, which is still just as weird and possibly problematic as ever. Not only do they barely know each other, but Miranjo is like hundreds of years old and Daida is a kid? The less said about this whole thing the better in my mind, and luckily the episode doesn’t dwell on it too much, choosing instead to put the focus back on Bojji.

He’s proved himself worthy of the throne, and so Daida decides to give it back to him. It’s a commendable move, and one that definitely puts a good bow on top of the brother/brother relationship that started off so sour and has turned into something with a little more power behind it. The only problem is that apparently Kage isn’t satisfied with this new twist and decides he can’t be by Bojji’s side if the lad is a ruler now…

Which is kind of a load of bunk? Kage has always been willing to go around with him no matter what people thought of him, and as the closest thing Bojji has to a best friend, it strikes me as very strange to just abandon him without even saying goodbye. It really feels like they had to have some conflict in the episode but didn’t want to think about it too much or for too long. Not only does it not really make logical sense, but there’s like zero time devoted to seeing it through. We get a few short scenes of Bojji by himself and Kage traveling through villages, and then they’re back together again.

Overall, The King and the Sun was a confusing finale for a show that had some high highs and low lows. We get the manufactured Bojji/Kage conflict, some out of place scenes of Kingbo coming back and freeing Ouken, and then—nothing. There’s still plenty of questions about what comes next, and the show is content to leave that to viewer’s imaginations… or to season two, which isn’t unlikely based on the response so far. Would I have liked this show to go out on a more ambitious final note? Definitely, but at the same time, it’s hard to deny the simple strength of ending things on Bojji and Kage reuniting and going to start a kingdom of their own.