Forum - View topicEP. REVIEW: Death Parade
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Suiseiten
Posts: 25 |
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Then again, it's easy on the outside to judge without not knowing all the circumstances. Such as, spoiler[Matchiko's "affair".] It could have been spoiler[to protect her husband's feelings after he caused basically three deaths.] On the other hand, the event could have been more like spoiler[she meant it in the sense of she loved the man he was and not the jealous, bitter man that he turned into.] Of course, there's a chance that event truly happened, but it was during their courting and ended after the proposal. Ultimately, I think that spoiler[the new assistant/ nameless woman] will provide a more human touch with Decim's mechanical decision making style. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 11365 |
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It seems like the disposition of your eternal soul comes down to Fate and nothing more. If you were generally good but got paired up with a saint you're doomed, if you're generally bad but got paired up with a Hitler, you're golden. Plus the arbiters can make mistakes, so even the above isn't guaranteed. It all depends on if you were fated to die at a moment that paired you with someone you were better or worse than, and whether the arbiter could even distinguish your foibles or strengths to determine which you were.
There's also the part about whether reincarnation is preferred over oblivion, or if the Void even is oblivion or instead a conscious awareness of eternal darkness, aka hell. I'm liking this so far (I very much liked what they did in the second episode), but I have a feeling it's going to bug me in the same way that Hell Girl did with its damning people for being victims of intolerable circumstances. |
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Zac
ANN Executive Editor
 Posts: 7912 Location: Anime News Network Technodrome |
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Did they establish that one person HAS to go to the void and one person HAS to be reincarnated? That seems like its own episode, where they have two people who get judged as going to the same place.
I mean, for a show that seems maybe light on enough story material for a whole season, I dunno why you'd give that nugget up as minor exposition or otherwise written off in the background. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 11365 |
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Iirc that was given in the Mirai short (but maybe it wasn't), which doesn't necessarily hold for the series I guess, but the de facto evidence for me is that he didn't send them both to the Void (or both to reincarnate, if that's worse). They seemed like equally crappy people to me, if you bought her final outburst (which I didn't), what with her saying she was just after his money and having affairs, and him being a jealous schmuck who killed them both and and in the end tries to stab her with the darts and begs to be allowed to hit her. Actually, she still comes out as the less crappy person for me.
I guess we'll see.
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Roxas4ever
 Posts: 152 |
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I was actually super pleased that they recapped the first episode and allowed the couple's story to be completed. I was confused and annoyed after the first episode, since Machiko's outburst felt so false to me, and it didn't seem fair that her husband, who wasn't exactly a great person himself, was the one who was given another chance. The second episode showed us that their judgments were, in fact, a mistake, and gave the premise of the show an interesting twist: that the judge doesn't always get it right. I assume the nameless woman will be helping Decim decipher people's intentions in the future, which makes the show play more as a puzzle-based mystery than just a dark, episodic drama. I'm looking forward to seeing where Madhouse will take this.
Zac brings up an interesting point. It seems unlikely that every time two people die at the same moment, one of them will deserve "heaven" and the other will deserve "hell". I'd like to see an episode where two individuals are sent to the same place. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 11365 |
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Well, upon reviewing Death Billiards, it seems they didn't unequivocally state that it's one up-one down there either. So who knows. I don't think they'd need an episode to confirm it, but they definitely would need one to deny it.
What is stated is that this is not the normal way people are judged. Apparently the powers that be are overwhelmed if they have to judge two people at the same time. Given that people world-wide die at the rate of about 2 per second though, it would seem that the odds are pretty high that two people would die at exactly the same time, if their deaths are not controlled by Fate or some other entity (how finely is time divided, and how long does it take to die, i.e., does the division between life and death take less time than the smallest unit?). This place should be overrun with pairs of dead people.
My wild mass guessing brain is starting to imagine that the bar is not about the dead at all, but some sort of training ground (to become a judge in the normal system of processing of dead souls?) or learning process for the staff. Maybe there are lots of these bars, and going to the Void means being sent to staff one of them to learn more about human behavior, or maybe it's where you're sent in preparation for your next incarnation so you can do better. In that case, mistakes by the staff wouldn't matter so much or seem so irrevocably unfair. Not that I really think this is where they're going with this, but just my what-if mind idling while waiting for the next episode. 
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sunflower
 Posts: 1080 |
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I don't think they did, and am expecting a show where that becomes an issue. I'd also expect the fallibility of the judges to come into play more as well. I thought the couple's story in the first was pretty predictable (coming from someone who watched years of Twilight Zone, etc the twists were telegraphed from miles away). But the way the story was told was excellent and there's enough mystery in the details and background that I still find the anime intriguing. |
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CG
 Posts: 47 Location: Philippines |
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Just some perspective: in Buddhism to be sent to the void is actually a good thing - Samsara, the endless cycle of rebirth, is characterized by suffering. Reaching nibbana means becoming nothing. So in that sense I'm not clear if the show has its priorities right: in the first episode I think Machiko got the better end of the stick, but episode 2 made me doubt if the show thinks that too. Ultimately though, I think the decision was wrong for Machiko as she should have been reincarnated too: to achieve nibbana (at least for Buddhists), one must let go of all attachment, and she definitely showed attachment when she lashed out on the guy. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 11365 |
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^But we don't know if they're using a Buddhist model or not. I do remember one of the characters describing the Void as eternal darkness, but I don't know if that's just their way of saying oblivion, i.e., you just no longer exist, which would be a release from suffering, or if you're conscious of being cast into eternal darkness, which would be hell.
In other words, we don't really know yet which of these is the short straw. We do know that the reincarnation elevator has a nice face over it, and the Void elevator has an evil face, but that could be a trick too, or just a reminder not to judge good or bad by appearances . |
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CrowLia
 Posts: 5505 Location: Mexico |
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I thought Ep 2 made it clear that the Void was the short straw/bad end. Firstly because the soul ceases to exist, it's not a Buddhist model in which the soul is released from the cycle of reincarnation and elevated to a heavenly plane. Secondly, Decim is scolded for not noticing that Michiko was lying to protect her husband's feelings, and thus she didn't deserve the Void/punishment, while the husband was a distrustful man who lost his shit with the smallest insinuation and got them both killed
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shi666san
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I have to say that episode 3 has got to be my favorite episode thus far. It's good to see that there isn't a need for one person getting the void while the other gets reincarnated. Both Shigeru and Mai deserved getting reincarnated, so it's great that they both got a "good end".
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Izanagi009
 Posts: 464 Location: Pittsburgh, PA, USA |
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Yeah, that episode proves that the show is capable of both dark and somber moments as well as the more comforting and heart-warming moments that can happen as life nears it's end. I honestly expected the show to be more angry in tone with groups of despicable people forced to wager their lives like the first episode. The fact that they can do an emotional 180 means that the writing is beyond par for this show. |
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Izanagi009
Posts: 464 Location: Pittsburgh, PA, USA |
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In the long run, Death Parade may not have the genius that was required but in the current anime scene, this is a nice change of pace for Seinen: a bit calmer, emotional and human than some of the more dramatic Seinen like Psycho Pass. For what it's worth, I'm enjoying the ride through the Quinndecim and the emotions that spawn from it. |
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Dop.L
Posts: 714 Location: London |
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When they got to the lifts, that's the first thing I looked for. They got what they deserved, and in this case what they both deserved was another chance. A great episode which showed that they can change up the formula depending on the characters. |
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PRaysonW
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There's an interesting number of references to Roman/Greek mythology in this show. For one thing, Quindecim, the name of the bar, literally means 'fifteen' in Latin, and they very clearly mention in episode 2 that they are going to the 'fifteenth floor'.
Beyond that, Nona, the girl who seems to run this entire thing, shares her name with one of the three Fates. In mythology, Nona spins the thread of life. Interestingly, one of the other Fates is named Decima and she is the one who measures the thread of life. I'm not saying that this show is about Roman mythology, of course, but, combined with Decim's bit about the thread of human lives in episode 3, it's pretty clear we have at the very least a fan on the writing team. |
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