We start off where we left off at the the end of Kyoto Inferno, where, by chance, Kenshin meets his master Hiko Seijuro, played by actor-singer Masaharu Fukuyama. Kenshin then begins training to gain his sword style's ultimate technique - and spends a sizeable part of the movie contemplating and discovering himself in the process.
In contrast to the massive buildup of Kyoto Inferno, where a ton of characters and situations are established, The Legend Ends is far more introspective, looking into the development of Kenshin as a person as he begins to distinguish himself from his assassin roots. It is his former nature as an assassin that ties him to his nemesis, Makoto Shishio, and it is in abandoning that nature where, the film tells us, Kenshin will be able to defeat him.
Unfortunately, in the process, the film has to truncate much of the other developing storylines even more. Aoshi's subplot is trimmed to almost the bare essentials. Kaoru and her relationship with Kenshin is understandably not fully fleshed out. And the backstories of the Juppongatana, Shishio's Ten Swords, are not fleshed out as well (a shame, given that their backstories make their villain characters more human, and add a level of complexity to the story.) But it's all for the sake of storytelling, and it's Kenshin's story that is the most important, in retrospect. That's the problem that a movie adaptation has when it tries to adapt a large amount of source material - things don't always pan out. This focus towards Kenshin's story slows down the movie a bit; I suspect that if the two movies were shown together, this would be the part where we all take a breather. I compare it to the duology of the Dark Knight, which has lots of large character moments and a large scale, and The Dark Knight Rises, which is more of a personal story about our hero overcoming his faults and rising above them.
The action scenes are once again top notch. Kenshin now has to battle a large succession of foes, ending with Shishio himself. The battles are complex and dynamic, never boring us or oversaturating the running time with fighting scenes.
The movie deviates a lot from the anime/manga, but still keeps a lot of key scenes and character moments. There are also a few plot holes that are not fully addressed (whatever happened to Houji?) as the movie ends.
It's not the most faithful adaptation in terms of content, but in terms of the themes it presents, The Legend Ends is a nice way to end the Kenshin live action trilogy. If only they would make the last arc of the manga, which brings all of Kenshin and his journey towards salvation full circle. My fingers are crossed.
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