Steins;Gate - Episode 24 (Completed)

Just when it seemed that all hope was lost, and with Okabe about to give up the ghost, up pops his future self with a foolproof plan to save the world and the girl.  Put can Hououin Kyouma, mad scientist par excellence, really pull it off?

While it takes a detour to the Future Gadget Lab to assemble the final piece of the puzzle, Okabe is soon ready to go back in time once again in the hope of saving Kurisu while simultaneously fooling his past self into thinking she'd been stabbed and killed - it'll be his one and only shot and success too, with Amane reporting that her time machine only has the energy for one more round trip.

So, Okabe sets about putting everything right to avoid the pitfalls of other timelines, only to find that his plan is about to go seriously astray in one core area.  With the liquid he'd brought with him to simulate Kurisu's blood tried up over time, what's he going to use to convince himself of Makise's death?  Desperate times call for desperate measures as Okabe takes a potentially sacrificial action for the greater good - a decision which not only pays dividends in the short term, but also pays the way for an ultimately happy and completely satisfying ending.  All's well in Steins Gate, it seems.

So there we have it - an excellent, complete ending to a fantastic series that would probably get my vote for the best show of the year were it not for a certain SHAFT-produced magical girl anime.  Despite its slow start.... in fact, no, because of its slow start, we became so drawn into the world of Okabe and his menagerie of friends and follows that as the shock twist of the show's half-way point hit we suddenly realised that, just like Okabe himself, we were in too deep with no hope of escape.  From there, the twists and turns of the series have thrilled me each and every week as the intelligently crafted, knowingly written story unfolded before us - I really can't express enough how strong the story-telling was in Steins;Gate throughout, helped along by some great characters and plenty of snappy dialogue from beginning to end.  So powerful and intelligent is this show, that I wonder if it isn't the creation of some kind of mad scientist... I just hope The Organisation don't try to block any plans to release the series on Blu-Ray in my native UK - this is an anime series par excellence that I simply must own and watch again.  El Psy Congroo.