Hell's Paradise Season 2

Episode 6

The night is always darkest just before dawn but sometimes you have to wonder when the dawn is actually going to come. The recent narrative beats that Hell's Paradise has been playing with sort of skewed a bit into the obvious lately. Now that the show has established the cast and the factions, the narrative has been noticeably more straightforward. Our cast knows what the goal is and they understand the risks of the worst case scenario, but the story wouldn't be interesting if they weren't constantly running into the worst case scenario. The fact is that everybody is split up, going up against one specific member of the Tensen, but the episode primarily focuses on Gabimaru's group, and I have to be honest, I'm not really sure how they're going to get out of this situation given the way the episode ends.

It's a little funny that the Tensen can just determine so much about a person based off of their name using those talismans, but I guess they need that information if they're going to make sure that everybody goes up against their potential worst matchups. Gabimaru is definitely one of the biggest threats to the Tensen because not only is he an incredibly skilled warrior, but he was also able to pick up on the utilization of Tao very quickly. The fact that he was able to create a counter measure against opponents who have infinitely more Tao than he does in just two days is incredible and I like the fact that the minute the Tensen recognize that, they immediately lock in.

Even though Gabimaru and Yuzuriha were starting to gain the upper hand, it's kind of clear it was going to be short-lived because I know the Tensen all have a super morbid, horrifying final form based on what I saw in season one. However, because Gabimaru is such a bad elemental matchup to Ran, he can't just spam his fire and multiple attacks to wear them down like last time. If he does that, he's dead. If he gets a direct hit, he's dead. If they try to run away, they're dead. The only reason why they're not dead immediately is because the Tensen are trying to preserve their bodies for the sake of the final ritual in order to create the elixir of life. That irony was not lost on me about how our main cast being so capable inadvertently set them up to be the final ingredient for the very thing that they are trying to get.

The rest of the episode just sort of hints at other things that could be established later on. I wouldn't be surprised if next week's episode just focuses on another fight entirely. There is also that third faction that just recently appeared on the island who could very much show up and prove to be a thorn in everybody's side. But maybe that can give Gabimaru and crew an opportunity to escape. Now that the show has run through some of those more predictable plot beats spent several episodes establishing everybody, I'm hoping that things will get a little bit less predictable moving forward. There are a lot of things that can be done right now and that gets me a bit excited.

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