By The Meijin and Lady use the Kampfer Amazing and Zaku Amazing in a Gunpla Battle that Mirai announces is the official opening of the Meijin Cup. The Shikis criticize Kei’s disqualified Lafressia, while he sits on a toilet in the bathroom. Shimon, Mamoru, Keiko and Mahiru examine Mamoru’s entry, a Destiny Impulse. Shimon asks where Kaoruko is, and the girls explain awkwardly that she’s coming later. Sudou and Yasu marvel at Yuuma’s entry, the Lightning Z Gundam. Akira calls their attention to Sakai’s entry, which makes Yomi laugh uncontrollably. Outside, Fumina meets Yuuma and Ral, and she asks Yuuma if he’s heard from Sekai. Earlier, Sekai had skipped the tournament’s award ceremony and left a note that he was going on a training trip. Yuuma tells them to go on ahead to the exhibits because he and Sakai had agreed to not see each other’s work before the award ceremony for dramatic purposes. A young female fan approaches Fumina and says she wants to become a fighter too. Sudou approaches Yuuma and congratulates him for his work, while Yasu and Yomi laugh when they see Fumina. Fumina becomes very self-conscious when she notices that the crowd is talking about her. Inside, Mirai announces the start of the award ceremony. Lady announces that the winner of the junior course is Tateo Sazaki’s Gyan, and Kaoruko cheers for her little brother’s victory. Yuuma wonders how many Sazakis there are and comments that they’re like the Zabi family. Mirai asks Tateo for a comment, and he declares that Mamoru is his rival. The Meijin unveils that the winner of the open course is Yuuma, who walks up to the stage to accept his award. The Meijin notes that Yuuma has now won both the tournament and the Meijin Cup. Fumina is surprised by Sekai’s sudden appearance and was worried that he wouldn’t return, but he says he’s come to fight with them again. Sakai storms the stage and objects to Yuuma winning the award, so he shows off his own design, the MS Girl Super Fumina. The real Fumina is overcome by embarrassment when she sees the Gunpla.
Sakai shows off all the features of the Super Fumina, including blinking eyes and moving hair. Fumina comes up to the stage and yells at Sakai that he’s an idiot. Sakai demands to know what’s wrong with his Gunpla, and the Meijin answers that even though Gunpla is freedom, there are minimum rules to follow. The Meijin notes that it’s inexcusable for Sakai to not have gotten permission to use Fumina’s likeness, so he and Lady suggest that Sakai and Yuuma settle their differences in Gunpla Battle. The entire floor beneath them activates and transforms into a large Gunpla Battle system. A space level is selected, and Yuuma uses the Lightning Z Gundam, while Sakai chooses the Super Fumina, much to Fumina’s consternation. Sakai makes poses and asks Yuuma if he can shoot such a cute Gunpla. Sekai then joins the battle with his new Gunpla, the Kamiki Burning Gundam. Fumina and Kaoruko wonder who helped him build it and get their answer when Shia shows up. Fumina and Kaoruko join the battle with the Star Winning and R-GyaGya and attack Sekai for accepting Shia’s help instead of theirs. Sekai explains that he wanted to surprise them, but they don’t like it. Shia uses her G-Portent to defend Sekai, and Tateo attacks Sekai for making his sister cry. More and more fighters join the battle with their Gunpla, and Kei begins attacking people with his Lafressia’s Bugs. Several fighters join forces to destroy the Bugs, and the Shikis use their dragon to help destroy the Lafressia. Stray Bugs threaten Mirai’s Beargguy, so Yuuma comes to her defense. Sekai blocks a sword attack from Fumina and explains that he and Shia are just friends. Shia teases him that he shouldn’t be shy, but Kaoruko is annoyed because Shia is just pretending that they’re more than friends. A large explosion signals the arrival of the Meijin’s Gundam Amazing Red Warrior, but his first attack is blocked by Ral’s Dom R35. Lady joins the battle with her “Kurenai Musha” Red Warrior Amazing and tells Fumina that she’ll keep her promise to fight. Kaoruko and Shia want to fight, so Lady offers to take them all on together. Akira challenges Sekai to a one-on-one fight against his Gundam Leopard da Vinci. Sekai regrets not finding Gunpla Battle earlier, but Yuuma envies him for being a beginner who gets to experience everything for the first time. Fumina reminds them that their goal is still far away, and Sekai performs his new Houou Haoh-Ken. After returning to school, the Try Fighters are overwhelmed by the number of students who want to join their club. Saga has an X-ray on his wrist, while Wilfrid and Shia fly to Europe to visit Lucas. In Guiana, Junya meets his old master. Later, the Try Fighters prepare to fight in the West Tokyo qualifiers for the open tournament.
With the main tournament story over, this epilogue episode wraps up the thread about the Meijin Cup and teases future developments. The Meijin Cup represents a final showdown between Yuuma and Sakai that answers the question, “Who is the better builder and fighter?” Sakai certainly goes for broke with his non-traditional MS Girl Super Fumina. While he definitely put a lot of work into it, he never bothered to get her permission and thus gets himself disqualified. A duel between the two of them quickly gets out of hand and becomes a cameo fest featuring obscure suits like the Xi Gundam from Hathaway’s Flash or the Gundam [TR-6] Wondwart from Advance of Zeta. We also get to see the debut of Sekai’s new Gunpla, plus the return of pretty much every minor character. I was amused by the reveal of their being yet another Gyan-crazy Sazaki sibling, and little Tateo would do his big brother proud. A quick jump to Junya reveals to no one’s surprise that his and Sekai’s master is literally Domon Kasshu. It’s funny that Sekai started the series with zero knowledge of Gundam even though his master is a doppelganger for one of its lead characters. The episode ends on the note of the Try Fighters competing in the regional qualifiers for the open tournament. If there’s another season, perhaps we’ll see them on the world stage finally crossing paths with characters like Sei and Fellini. Overall, this was a fun finale for a series that has had its ups and downs. I felt like too many battles were unnecessarily drawn out to two episodes to stretch the story further, and some of those battles were pretty bland and uninspired. Look, there’s no doubt in these sports-style tournament shows that the protagonists will win, but you have to earn those victories with some sweat and pain. I don’t feel like the Try Fighters ever had that much of a challenge, and even when they fought poorly with no strategy, there was always some gimmick to save them. Despite the team focus of this series, too many battles in the end came down to Sekai being the finisher, which runs counter to the point of teams. Also, structurally, the smaller scale of this series hurt it a bit. The original series had Sei and Reiji fighting on the world level, so an under-19 tournament limited to Japan is inherently less interesting when there’s a wider world of Gunpla Battle out there. I still enjoyed Try despite these issues, but I hope any future series will avoid making the same mistakes.
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