All In and The Hardest Thing

"All In" and "The Hardest Thing"
Amphibia episodes
File:Amphibia All In title card.webp File:Amphibia The Hardest Thing title card.webp Title cards
Episode nos.	Season 3 Episodes 17 & 18
Directed by	Roxann Cole Joe Johnston Jenn Strickland ("All In" only)
Written by	Gloria Shen, Jenava Mie & Michele Cavin ("All In") Todd McClintock & Adam Colás ("The Hardest Thing")
Featured music	"As If It's Your Last" by Blackpink
Original air dates	May 7, 2022 (2022-05-07) ("All In") May 14, 2022 (2022-05-14) ("The Hardest Thing")
Running time	48 minutes ("All In") 29 minutes ("The Hardest Thing")

The two-part series finale of Amphibia consisted of the third season's 17th and 18th episodes, the 57th and 58th episodes overall, and the 105th and 106th segments overall: "All In" and "The Hardest Thing". Both episodes were directed by Roxann Cole and Joe Johnston. "All In" and "The Hardest Thing" aired on May 7 and May 14, 2022 respectively. Both episodes garnered 0.35 million viewers when they premiered.

"All In" revolves around Anne, Sasha, and their allies trying to stop King Andrias and the Core from conquering Earth, while "The Hardest Thing" revolves around Anne, Sasha, and Marcy trying to save Amphibia from being destroyed by the Core, which has taken control of the moon and is trying to crash it onto Amphibia's surface.

Both episodes "All In" and "The Hardest Thing" received critical acclaim from audiences, critics, and fans of the show.

Plot

All In

The episode begins with a flashback of Anne, Sasha, and Marcy pulling a prank with a K-Pop puppy dance party. After they are caught they are sent to the principal's office. While Sasha and Marcy are let off the hook, Principal Murphey has a talk with Anne about her friends roping her into doing the prank. She asks Anne to write an essay about who she wants to be and what she wants to do with her life, then wishes her happy birthday tomorrow.

Back in the present, Anne, Sasha, Sprig, Polly, Hop Pop, Grime, Olivia, Yunan, Frobo, Joe Sparrow, and Domino 2 are held captive in Andrias' castle while he is about to invade Earth. They all manage to escape with help from Frobo and land safely in a pool. Andrias then announces his invasion plans to the people of Los Angeles and unleashed his robot army along with two giant mind-controlled herons that Hop Pop recognizes as the ones who killed Sprig and Polly's parents. Anne and her friends try to fight off the Herons, but are rescued by Mr. X and Anne's parents, who are now FBI agents. They all regroup at the school by eating some homemade Thai food and Polly upgrades Frobo with Earth tech. Meanwhile, in the Core's hive mind, Marcy meets Andrias' father King Aldrich, who creates a fantasy world for her to enjoy so she be assimilated into the Core.

Back at the school, Anne and Sasha then come up with a plan. Anne, her parents, the Plantars, Domino 2, and Frobo will fight off against the herons and the robot army while Sasha, Grime, Yunan, Olivia, and Joe Sparrow sneak into the castle to shut down its force field. Meanwhile at the castle, while the Core/Darcy is having fun destroying the city, Andrias remembers the day he first met Marcy and came up with his plan to the Core stop her and her friends. Back in the present Anne and her team manage to defeat some robots, but face trouble when the Plantars get scared of the herons. However, they manage to suck their fear and defeat the herons using the Plantar family hunting dance and free them from Andrias' control. Meanwhile, Sasha and her team manage to infiltrate the castle and reach the force field generator. However, Sasha and Grime are confronted by Darcy, who fights them off.

Back outside, Andrias arrives with a mech suit and makes an ultimatum to Anne. If she could beat him in combat then he'll call off the invasion, but if she doesn't, he'll destroy the city. Anne accepts and flies on Domino 2 to begin the fight. Anne then begins to fight Andrias with her powers, while Sasha and Grime try to fight off Darcy, which results in Darcy cutting off Grime's arm when he tries to save Sasha. During Anne's fight with Andrias, she claims that she feels sorry for him due to burying his feelings and closing himself off from others for a thousand years. However, during the fight, Anne starts to become exhausted and is on the brink of defeat, but Mr. X and Anne's parents manage to get Anne to continue the fight by playing her favorite song throughout the city. Meanwhile, in the Core's hive mind, Marcy begins to realize that none of what she sees is real, including her friends. She claims she is done running away from reality and that she rejects both the Core and Aldrich.

Anne still continues to fight off Andrias, but as she's on the verge of defeat, Sprig shows up with the piece of paper he found in his family's hidden tunnels, and with help from Mr. X's glasses, reveals that it's a message from Andrias' old friend Leif. Leif reveals through the message that after hiding the Calamity Box on Earth, she knew she couldn't go back to Newtopia so she started a new life in Wartwood and founded the Plantar family. But, despite all the changes, she never forgot or stopped loving Andrias or all the good times she spent with him and Barrel. She also hopes that Andrias would not close himself off from others and that someday he would forgive her. After hearing this, Andrias breaks down in tears and now truly regrets all the horrible things he has done. Darcy tries to force Andrias to continue fighting, but Sasha is able to defeat her by cutting her connection cord, thus causing the Core to deactivate and freeing Marcy from its control. Anne is then able to defeat Andrias, who lets himself get defeated, ending the battle and revealing that Andrias is a cyborg, which is how he was able to live for a thousand years.

After the force field is down, everyone rushes toward Marcy, who apologizes for her actions. Anne and Sasha forgive her, stating that wherever they are, they will always be friends, and everyone shares a group hug. However, the helmet of the Core reactivates and sneaks away. As Mr. X and Anne's parents clean up the damage, Anne and all of her friends transport back to Amphibia, where the resistance is still fighting Andrias' robot army. When the castle arrives, Olivia declares that Andrias and the Core have been defeated. However, just as everyone thinks it's over, Sprig notices the moon getting closer.

The Hardest Thing

Continuing where the last episode left off, everyone cheers for their victory of defeating Andrias, when the helmet of the Core blasts off into space, takes control of the moon, and drives it closer to Amphibia. When everyone notices it, Andrias reveals that the moon was where the Core's first pet projects were made and that the moon itself has been turned into a doomsday device meant to destroy Amphibia in case it's ever freed from the Core's control. Marcy realizes that the reason the Core is doing this is that it's afraid of being forgotten, so it's going to destroy Amphibia and claim the stones of the Calamity Box for itself. Mother Olm then arrives, informing Anne, Sasha, and Marcy that the prophecy is near and that they must stop the Core. As everyone gets ready, Mother Olm tells Anne while the stones themselves aren't strong enough to stop the Core, there is a hidden power that will work when someone has all the stones together. However, the cost of using it is the user's life.

When Anne arrives at the castle, Valeriana is there ready to restore the power of the stones to Anne, Sasha, and Marcy. All three girls gain superpowers and colorful armor, and then fly up into space to stop the Core, but it fights back with an army of space robots. While the girls fight back, Aldrich, through the Core, tries to convince Andrias to help him. In response, Andrias finally stands up to his father and the Core, destroys his crown, and orders his robot army to help the girls stop the moon. However, despite their best efforts, Sasha and Marcy start to get weak since they're not used to their powers like Anne is. Anne decides to stop the Core alone by taking all three stones to use the hidden power within them. After a tearful hug and goodbye, Anne sends Sasha and Marcy back to Amphibia and prepares to face the Core.

When they get back, they tell the Plantars what Anne is going to do, so Sprig hops on Frobo to try and stop her. Anne and Sprig then share a tearful goodbye and Sprig heads back. Anne then uses all the power from the stones to launch a huge blast of white light that destroys the moon, killing the Core in the process. However, Anne's body now turns to stone because of the power and falls down to Amphibia. She is then saved by Frobo, who takes her back to her friends, where she dies. Suddenly, Anne wakes up in another world with a small house. She enters the house and meets an entity known as the Guardian, who takes the form of Anne's cat Domino. The Guardian reveals that it created the stones 10,000 years ago and that Anne was the only one to use their power for good. It also offers Anne to take its place as the new guardian, but Anne refuses, saying that she still has her whole life ahead of her. The Guardian accepts this and resurrects Anne so she can live her life and become the new guardian after dying of natural causes. After her revival, Anne's friends happily reunite with her. Anne then finds shards of the stone in her pocket and everyone celebrates the defeat of the Core.

Marcy states that the shards are a one-way trip home, so the girls says their goodbyes to their Amphibian friends. Marcy says goodbye to Oliva, Yunan, and Andrias, Sasha says goodbye to Grime, while Anne says goodbye to the Plantars and gives Sprig her cell phone. All three girls then head home with flower crowns on their heads, and when the portal closes, the shards and the Calamity Box turn to dust and disappear. With that, the frogs, toads, and newts all decide to rebuild their world together.

Months later, Amphibia has now been restored back to its original state, with Andrias serving his time by helping to fix it. Everyone else starts living happy lives with Grime, Olivia, and Yunan as the toad and newt delegates for the new Amphibia government, Polly now a fully grown frog, and Sprig cataloging all the creatures in Amphibia using Anne's phone. As a statue of Anne is built within the center of Wartwood in her honor, Sprig goes on a journey with Ivy to unexplored territory.

10 years later back on Earth, Sasha and Marcy go to see Anne for her 23rd birthday. Anne now works at an aquarium in the amphibian section, where she remodeled it to look exactly like Amphibia, even naming a little pink frog Sprig. She then celebrates her birthday with her friends, ending the series.

A montage of certain places in Amphibia is shown with the final shot being a group photo of Anne, Sasha, and Marcy.

Production

Both the titles and the time lengths for both episodes were revealed by Matt Braly on both a ScreenRant interview and a twitter post he made. He even talks about much work, love, care, and effort he and his team have made into these last two episodes. Matt Braly even stated that the episode before these two "The Beginning of the End" was part of the finale since it lead up to these episodes and was a little bit longer than normal episodes. Matt Braly considers the episode "The Hardest Thing" his favorite episode.

Brian Sounalath also made his last voice recording for Mr. Boonchuy for "All In" on March 4, 2022. In some storyboard scenes, Marcy was originally supposed to be depicted in her containment suit for the remainder of the finale. There was also a cut final scene after the credits where Anne, having already died at age 91 due to Alzheimer's disease, was sent back to the world of the Guardian to take its place. However, Anne doesn't remember and fades away, then the last shot is of the stones depicted as shooting stars.

Reception

When Braly was making the last two episodes he claimed that the friendship between Anne, Sasha, and Marcy was creative especially when they met other new friends in Amphibia which allowed their friendship to grow stronger. Stating "You'd amazed when you go outside of that friendship, outside of that bubble, and you start hanging out with different people, because it unlocks different things in you." The episode "Hardest Thing" was also favored by the LGBT community because near the end a heart-shaped sticker with the colors of the bisexual flag can be seen on the review mirror of Sasha's car. Which implied that she was bisexual which Matt Braly confirmed, it was also a reference to how Sasha's voice actor was also bisexual. It even hinted that there was a ship between Lady Olivia and General Yunan.

Hope Mullex from The Geeky Waffle claimed that the episode "The Hardest Thing" was very sad and had lots of consequences, especially the part about Anne and Sprig never seeing each other again. Claiming "It's choice after choice where our characters have to choose where they end up. They must say goodbye to people they love with no certain future of reuniting." Mullex even described "All In" as an emotionally roller coaster where all the character's journey's come together. Even complementing on Anne's journey of finding out who she is supposed to be as seen by the flashback. In her own words "All In" is described as "a spectacle to watch" and complements how Matt Braly and his crew should be proud of themselves."

Jade King on the pop culture website TheGamer praised the episode "All In" for the dramatic battles between Anne and Andrias and Sasha and Darcy. King even stated how nervous he was about the episode due to the many individual storylines coming together. Even after Matt Braly told him ahead of time to expect a "blockbuster filled with epic moments and worthwhile payoff." Jade King also praised the episode "The Hardest Thing" for it's heartfelt ending, even commenting on how Anne's narrative was a good statement on what the show itself stands for. King praised everything shown in the episode for the beauty it had shown to us and the emotional moments it had. Claiming "The final episode is a whirlwind of hesitant farewells."

Matthew Moorcroft from Collider places the episode "The Hardest Thing" as one of the Top 10 Best Cartoon Show Finales That Still Hold Up. Praising the show for its "complex, three-dimensional character writing, engaging storytelling, and pushing the boundaries of what can be shown on children's television with some of the darkest moments in Disney Channel history." Moorcroft praises the finale for the characters facing their emotional baggage and claims that "while there is a bittersweet nature to their departure, it has maturity unlike other shows and allows our characters to have lives away from each other."