*This review contains major spoilers for both the various The Irregular at Magic Highschool TV anime and this film as well.

As humans, we love stories about overcoming challenges—be they practical or romantic. Even if we’ll never be facing down magical soldiers or grappling with a love that can never be, we can empathize with those feelings—and hope that our favorite characters will be able to overcome all that stands against them, even if we are unable to overcome the mundane challenges in our real-world, everyday lives.

The Irregular at Magic Highschool as a whole is a story about Tatsuya living in the shadow of his far more traditionally talented sister while overcoming the prejudice directed towards him (and other outcasts like him). The story ultimately shows that being different doesn’t mean being weak—nor does being hyper-specialized in one specific area.

However, this film focuses not on the practical challenges facing Tatsuya but rather the romantic challenge facing Miyuki: that she’s deeply in love with her brother. Unlike many anime out there, the incest angle in this film is not played for titillation—nor is it played for laughs as it has so often been in previous iterations of this franchise. Rather, it is played for pure, serious drama.

Miyuki knows her feelings are wrong on both a scientific and societal level. However, that doesn’t change the fact that the idea of being married off to another man—being forced to be intimate with someone other than Tatsuya—makes her physically ill. So does the idea of Tatsuya becoming romantically involved with someone else and leaving her behind. The cold truth of reality clashing with what she wants but knows she can never have leaves her on the edge of a psychotic break, curled up on her floor, bawling while her desires taunt her rational mind.

Honestly, the series up to this point has done a great job of showing us why Miyuki feels the way she does. In her cutthroat family clan, Miyuki has had one true ally; one person she could count on regardless of the situation: Tatsuya. He always puts her and her feelings first and is literally the most loyal man out there. But, of course, that’s only half the story. While he has grown a bit emotionally over the course of the story, the fact remains that his mind was initially altered so that the only emotions he would feel would be love for her. She knows this and no doubt harbors guilt around the fact that his feelings for her are the chain around his neck. With all this context, it’s understandable why she might feel so unnaturally attached to him, even if she knows it’s wrong.

In the series thus far, things have been in a holding pattern while the siblings have been at school. With this film, however, time has run out. While Miyuki knows she can never be with Tatsuya as she wants to be, if she even wants some hope of being able to keep the status quo—both her and Tatsuya side-by-side and single—then there is only one choice: for her to become the next head of the Yotsuba family. Only then will she have control over both her life and her brother’s.

What’s truly interesting about this film is how it manages to both sidestep its incest dilemma for a happy ending and fail to do so at the same time. Basically, Miyuki gets both permission and an excuse for why it would be okay for her to be with Tatsuya romantically. However, there is one often overlooked issue that still remains: Tatsuya’s own feelings.

While he is not disgusted by Miyuki’s feelings towards him, he doesn’t reciprocate them either. Miyuki is his sister—this was forcefully hard-wired into his mind. He cares for her and loves her, just not in a romantic way. It’s not something he can simply switch off—not even with the reveal of a few loopholes that would make such a relationship just this side of moral if you squint right. And on a more meta-textual level, it also substantially changes the status quo for the pair going forward. Miyuki’s love for Tatsuya is now out in the open, and the two of them will have to learn how to deal with it both at home and school.

As the main dilemma for the film is an internal, dramatic one—and its solution gained through expositionary dialogue and flashbacks—there isn’t much action in this film. Of the four fights seen in the film, three are over in a scant few minutes. The remaining one, while longer, doesn’t even have the needed importance to act as an action climax for the film, leaving the film without one.

However, that doesn’t mean that the film is boring to watch. There is a lot of visual creativity to keep things interesting through the endless series of conversations. There are slow camera spins, low-angle shots, camera focus on relevant background objects, and more than a few surreal bits of visual exposition to make what the characters are thinking about clear. Flashbacks are given a mostly monochrome color palette, and the characters’ faces, hair, and clothing have distinct highlights based on the color of the nearest light source. All in all, this is the best The Irregular at Magic Highschool has ever looked by a fair margin.

Musically, the background soundtrack works at bolstering the moments of tension, drama, and joy in the film. And, as is par for the course for the series, this film also comes with a new LiSA song—and while it may not be the best of the best, it’s a catchy enough tune.

The Irregular at Magic High School THE MOVIE – Yotsuba Succession Arc – serves as the emotional capstone to the story so far. The truth behind Tatsuya and Miyuki’s origins is laid bare, as are their feelings for each other. But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t forces both within the Yotsuba clan and without who refuse to tolerate a pair of codependent teens with the power to destroy the world as we know it. Plenty of danger still awaits our heroes even as they enter a new stage of their relationship.