Season 4 Proved ‘The Legend of Vox Machina’s Greatest Love Story Was Each Other

The Legend of Vox Machina‘s fourth season has come to a close and with its end, it’s given us a beginning: the beginning of the end, that is. Warning: Spoilers for The Legend of Vox Machina Season 4 ahead!

In the final moments of “Ascension,” The Whispered One (Andy Serkis), whom Vox Machina thought they had vanquished for good after a lengthy and intense battle, made a surprise return. Turns out being killed was exactly what he needed in order to fully ascend to Godhood, and even after the gang publicly pledged their allegiance in the name of trying to save the rest of Exandria, The Whispered One still rose with the intent on bringing destruction to the world, murdering Vax (Liam O’Brien) as one last blow. What does this means for the final season? Without giving too much away for fans who don’t already know the original overarching Vox Machina campaign storyline, it means our heroes are about to face their greatest challenge yet — and having been through a conniving vampire couple, five powerful dragons, and a group break-up (for starters), that’s saying a lot.

Yet as we’ve seen through almost the whole series so far, these kinds of hurdles are what makes our heroes stronger. Throughout 12 episodes of Season 4, abandonment issues, crises of faith, friendship break-ups, and grief all took center stage. And while all those things could have all culminated in a storytelling dump that felt tired, especially with half-hour episodes, the opposite occurred.

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Years ago, it was normal for a long-running broadcast series with 18-22 episodes a season to start out slow and come into its stride. Now, especially when it comes to streaming, the opposite is usually true: Shows hit their peak right out of the gate, and a combination of the wait between new seasons and the desperation to cram as much story in as possible causes later seasons to falter. (Looking at you, Game of Thrones and Stranger Things). But The Legend of Vox Machina achieved something wonderful in their fourth season: They managed to create their strongest batch of episodes yet, with storytelling and character development at an all-time high. That fans can say it’s held a steady streak across three seasons as a critically-acclaimed series (Rotten Tomatoes doesn’t lie) is a plus — and a triumph.

In the end, Vox Machina’s greatest love story wasn’t Vax and Keyleth (Marisha Ray), who proved they would go to the ends of the Earth for each other (and their friends). It wasn’t Vex (Laura Bailey) and Percy (Taliesin Jaffe), who finally married. It wasn’t Pike (Ashley Johnson) and Grog (Travis Willingham), who experienced crushing loss and then came together to heal after personal sacrifice. It wasn’t Scanlan (Sam Riegel) showing how he had spent his year apart cultivating a healthy relationship with his daughter, Kaylie (Aisling Franciosi). It wasn’t Taryon Darrington (Wayne Brady) learning that he didn’t need his father.

It was the group realizing how deeply they need each other to succeed.

Some of the strongest moments of the season, both visually and storytelling wise, were Vox Machina leaning on each other’s strengths: Keyleth’s aramante, the Battle of the Bards, the final battle with The Whispered One. They were also the basis for some of the season’s strongest emotional tethers. After completing her aramante, a majority of Keyleth’s journey was centered on finding a cure that would reverse Vax’s seemingly doomed fate. And while Vex will always love Percy, there’s nothing more intimate than the love of a sibling — she, too, was willing to do whatever it took to believe there could be a different outcome for her brother. This season proved that girls will do anything for the people they love (and let’s not forget that Grog would, too — he healed Pike with determination, and a hug, but also with love), and it also proved that love makes us do crazy things. Just look at Delilah’s (Grey DeLisle) admission that everything she did, however horrible, was to try to save her husband, Sylas.

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While it didn’t take long episode-wise for everyone to come back together after last season’s split, it was clear almost immediately that no one handled the fallout from that separation well (some simply hid it better than others). Their complicated feelings weren’t completely solved by the season’s end, but through the aforementioned challenges, they learned how much better they are together in the most beautiful of ways.

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When Pike is talking to The Whispered One about her choice to risk her life to save Grog, she tells him that “Grog would’ve done the same for me a thousand times over.” When Cassandra asks Percy if he’d risk the lives of everyone in Whitestone for one person, Percy’s response is “not one person. For Pike.” And even The Whispered One, in all his malice, told Keyleth “you saved your man in defiance of god’s destiny. Love is strong enough to conquer fate.” Perhaps most tellingly, when Pike chose her team over siding with The Whispered One for good, it was a show of accepting the loss and guilt she had spent the whole season trying to run from. She could heal, as long as she had her friends behind her.

Season 5 may not come as quickly as we hope it will, and the stakes will rise higher than ever before. But if the previous four seasons are any indication, the wait — and the payoff — will be worth it.

The Legend of Vox Machina, Seasons 1-4, Streaming Now, Prime Video