Unveiling the Top Couples in ‘Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End’ – A Definitive Ranking

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End offers much more than just a romantic narrative, yet it’s hard not to be captivated by the beautifully crafted couples that emerge throughout the saga. While love stories are a rarity in this perilous universe, they stand out as one of the series’ most compelling aspects—an element the anime has embraced wholeheartedly in its second season.

Central to the tale are the romances of Frieren x Himmel and Fern x Stark, yet this hasn’t stopped fans from imagining connections among other characters in the background. Although characters like Methode and Sein might not step into romantic roles soon, several figures outside Frieren’s immediate circle already possess intricate love stories woven into the narrative.

A significant romantic cornerstone in Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End is the relationship between Denken and his late wife, Lektüre. As a 78-year-old First-Class Imperial Mage, Denken shares a unique bond with Frieren, grounded in their experiences of loss. Though his eighty years pale in comparison to Frieren’s millennium, he has spent decades mourning his wife by the time he encounters Frieren during the First Class Mage Exam.

Denken x Lektüre Have Frieren’s Most Beautiful Marriage

Image via Studio Madhouse

Denken and his late wife Lektüre are one of the most important romantic pillars in the story of Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End. As a 78-year-old First-Class Imperial Mage with a long-deceased wife, Denken is one of the only human characters in the story Frieren can relate to about Himmel. Though 80 years is nothing compared to Frieren’s thousand-year lifespan, Denken has already grieved his wife for decades when he meets Frieren during the First Class Mage Exam.

As a young man, Denken trained tirelessly to become a mage with access to the power to prevent his wife’s illness from killing her. Denken avoided visiting her grave in their homeland for years after her death, eventually losing access to the grave site altogether as Sage of Destruction Macht’s Golden Land continued to grow and freeze everything in place in solid gold. Determined to return to his wife’s grave, Denken pursues First-Class Mage certification to get the clearance to travel back to their home, where he mirrors Frieren’s ongoing journey to put grief and regrets to rest.

Fern x Stark Is a First-Love Romance For the Ages

Image via Madhouse

Fern and Stark are the clear fan-favorite couple right behind Frieren and Himmel, and it’s not hard to understand why. Frieren Season 2 broke the internet with Fern and Stark’s first date, which depicted every awkward misstep in painful detail that felt all too relatable for fans with dating experience. Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End masterfully transforms their sweet first-love story into the ultimate instrument for exploring Frieren’s relationship with Himmel.

Without Fern and Stark, the Frieren x Himmel romance loses critical layers of emotional depth. Pairing a powerful female mage and a rambunctious warrior with Frieren as apprentices was an expert story decision that has paid off handsomely by making it incredibly easy to project Frieren’s past experiences with Himmel onto them. Fern and Stark’s budding romance creates a beautiful opportunity for the romantic catharsis that Frieren inadvertently denied herself with Himmel before it was too late.

Übel x Land’s Slow-Burn Romance Drives Frieren Fans Wild

The most unexpected romantic pair to emerge from Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End so far is, without a doubt, Übel and Land as a playful will-they-won’t-they duo. At a glance, Übel and Land hardly seem like a compatible match; the refined and reserved Land finds Übel’s reckless violence distasteful and minces no words about the subject. Still, he refuses to let anyone lay a hand on her when real threats introduce themselves.

The events of the First Class Mage Exam funnel Land and Übel together for the first time, and the traces of romantic tension between them steadily grow in proportion to the dangers they face along the way. At the climax of Übel’s fight against her magical clone in the exam’s third phase, Land makes a bold return to save her after appearing to have used a clone to flee. When they finally reunite later in the story, Übel even reveals a hidden soft side by helping Land find the strength to move on after the death of a loved one.

Frieren x Himmel Is the Greatest Romantic Tragedy of Any Modern Anime

Frieren and Himmel’s love story is, without question, the heart and soul of Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End. The story’s very premise is Frieren making a great pilgrimage to Aureole, The Land Where Souls Rest, to reunite with Himmel’s spirit for closure after not realizing the depth of their relationship until the full weight of his death finally hits her. Every sweet detail makes their precious romance even more tender and tragic on a level that truly challenges the greatest romantic tragedies of all time.

Frieren‘s story uses every step forward to look back on a great elf mage’s unlikely romance. Time was always working against them from the very first time they crossed paths; Frieren was already centuries old when she cast a flower spell that made Himmel fall in love with magic as a young boy when he was lost and alone in the forest she was passing through. Although Frieren and Himmel share a brief period through a time travel magic mishap later in the story, Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End fans will be hanging on the edge of their seats until the two finally meet again in Aureole.

Release Date

September 29, 2023

Network

Nippon TV, YTV, FBS, Chukyo TV, RNB, FCT, STV, KNB, HTV, YBS, RAB, TVI, YBC, UMK TV Miyazaki, TSB, MMT, TeNY, RNC, NIB, KKT, KTK, NKT, ABS, JRT, Daiichi-TV, FBC, RKC, KYT, KRY

Directors

Kento Matsui, Kota Mori, Takahiro Natori, Morio Asaka, Lim Ka-hee, Taku Kimura, Ken Ando, Hirotaka Mori, Ayaka Tsuji

• Atsumi Tanezaki

  Frieren (voice)

• 

  Kana Ichinose

  Fern (voice)