Nanatsu no Taizai 277 Review: Shoo Out The B-Cast

The Seven Deadly Sins, Chapter 277: You Can't Free Yourself From Love

Sometimes in a huge battle, you just kind of need to get rid of the secondary characters, either by knocking them out, writing them out or just killing them off, lest you end up with a problem that plagued the final arcs of Naruto and Toriko, where every other page is just a blathering montage of everyone not involved with the actual final fight reacting and going "oh my god!" over and over again. And sometimes the dramatic death of a secondary character is a shocking death that raises the stakes. I don't personally think Derriere's death last chapter really ended up being that due to how obviously telegraphed that was. 

This one is slightly better, although it is kind of an obvious "have a final flashback to a character before he/she dies" deal, with Derriere having a random flashback where she witnesses Monspiet being willing to abandon his viewpoint in life (he was originally supportive of Meliodas) just to be with Derriere. It's nothing too game-breaking, but it's something neat to find about Monspiet nonetheless.

Meanwhile, Sariel ends up nearly dead (and I think dies at the end of this chapter) because of Tarmiel lowering his attack in the previous episode, and Tarmiel is just panicking and the poor three-faced dude is just really up in arms. He's upset that he's fucked up, but he's also equally upset that he is forced in a position that he has to fight his mentor and friend Mael -- and while neither of these two archangels really have been important characters (I forget which is which most of the time, honestly) it's not something that I can really condemn Tarmiel much for. He ends up being sliced in twain by Mael's random laser beams at the end of this chapter, though,  after delivering the exposition about how only a human, giant or fairy can defeat Mael. 

Or Gowther, as it seems, since he's resolved to fight instead of just laying down and accepting the guilt of what he's done to Mael. Who, by the way, has absorbed Derriere's commandment and is just transforming into yet a new form that's 'beyond' angels and demons or something? It's a neat little Cell-esque power up, although it's starting to wear somewhat thin. Overall, though, a neat enough chapter that, while not particularly impressive on its own, does end up resetting the admittedly overstuffed characters involved in this battle.