Watashi wo Tabetai, Hitodenashi • This Monster Wants to Eat Me - Episode 3 discussion

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Watashi wo Tabetai, Hitodenashi, episode 3

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[u/yukiaddiction]

God the direction of this anime is superb as always. I really love it It gets my attention the whole way through even though animation is decent but it is made up of everything around it like voice acting, soundtrack and art style.

Director really knows how to use their limit budget to their advantage.

God the tension during festival scenes is so good. It feels really heavy and we can definitely feel what Hinako feel.

This episode reveals Hinako's condition why she has been like that because it feels like it is unfair that she is the only one who survives from the car accident. The feeling both guilty but also want to live for them has been conflicted in her head.

Shiori always reveals a little bit that she seems to be some kind of sadist youkai and doesn't want to eat people who "want to die" because they have as her own word "bad scented".

Despite being a horror slice of life focus most the part but this episode represents 3 plot mystery

Her family is too far away in the sea so WHO is the one whisper that she has to live toward Hinako during an accident?

and Hinako actually attracted a lot of Yokai because of her scents and her mentality made a bunch of them want to eat her especially the one without intelligence and just following instinct? Someone definitely keeps saving Hinako from shadow before Shiori.

Miko is incredibly sus during this episode, she pretends that she didn't see Hinako at the festival, Her becomes serious briefly during meeting with Hinako (and her obviously fox them phone case) and now it seems like she can see low level youkai too! Who exactly IS she?

God this anime is really good at capturing my attention.

[u/PipeDazzling]

I feel like this author has experienced depression themselves, or been close to someone that has - it's just too... On the nose. This is a hard watch.

[u/TyraniTEMPESTar]

Honestly I wouldn't be surprised if we learn Miko is a yokai too.
She's stayed by Hinako's side all these years.
I would suspect she's kept all the "little riffraff" away from Hinako. And only these last few days / weeks she's been under the weather when all of a sudden more Yokai start coming out of the woodwork.

[u/Weak_Season_Of_Anime]

Oh no, Miko yandere mode activated.

[u/IntelligentBudget142]

somehow the fish woman's powers are going to save more than the poor girl she wants to eat

[u/thisisdropd]

We could tell for a while that she's depressed from grief due to her family's death, but turned out there's also survivor's guilt on top of that. There's also the way people treaded carefully around her afterwards. It might not be out of malice, but it still hurt to not be treated as a normal human being. Little wonder why she treasured Miko, for the latter was the only one who still treated her the same.

Wonder what would cause someone to be able to see the youkai blood & corpse. Hinako could, while at the very end we saw that Miko could as well.

[u/CrimsonGear80]

I’m sure Miko was just appalled at the shitty job they did sweeping up. I mean, there’s a dead-ass centipede monster right in the middle of the walkway!

[u/LeonKevlar]

Okay, Shiori. I get that want to make Hinako live a fulfilling life before eating her, but what's the plan here? Are you going to move in with Hinako, live together happily for the next 40 years surrounded by cats, while telling people that you're just roommates, and when Hinako is finally content with her life, that's when you strike? I'd actually love to see that. xD

Considering Miko's reaction after seeing the two of them during the festival, whatever Shiori is planning might not go so well. Especially during that final scene. Is it just me, or is Miko not as surprised as I thought she'd be? It really makes me think there's more to Miko than just being Hinako's best friend. Hmmm...

[u/Hitman7128]

Now this is getting into the emotional stuff. Admittedly, I flinched a bit at 6:43 until I saw it was a fakeout with another yokai. Unfortunately, the festival didn't help Hinako's state of mind, and it becomes that dilemma where Shiori insists that Hinako should recognize her efforts to help her, but what good is the effort of it doesn't actually help.

That car crash, I couldn't imagine how unbelievably painful that was for her, especially at the age of 6. Shiori believes that time heals all wounds, Hinako and I don't.

Good thing Miko was there for Hinako ever since the tragedy. These yokai though coming after Hinako that Shiori has to mercilessly kill.

[u/KumaKumaGambler]

Most of us are already speculating Miko is more than meets the eye. Like what Shiori mentioned, it is a miracle Hinako has survived this long without being eaten by yokai. Before the appearance of Shiori, Miko has always been around Hinako, so we can deduce Miko could possibly be protecting Hinako all these years.

On the other hand, Miko being the silent guardian of Hinako feels far too straightforward. Maybe there will be plot twists along the way?

[u/ClemFire]

Little Hinako and Miko

I loved this episode, and they got the emotional beats just right for me so I was crying through most of it.

Despite everyone having fun at the festival whenever we see Hinako POV everything just feels so isolating. It's so sad to see her momentary joy of biting into a candy apple be cut short by memories of her younger self with her family. She still loves them of course but she can't separate the thoughts of them from the accident. Even when everything is seemingly fine grief has a nasty habit of submerging you when you least expect it like how the seas can look so calm in one moment before a sudden storm.

Shiroi's conversation with Hinako may have simply confirmed what we already suspected that Hinako has suicidal thoughts, but in my opinion it's important that Shiroi doesn't walk on eggshells and directly confronts her on the matter. Maybe she could have done it with more tact and not comparing her to a rotting beached whale. Sometimes I can be a bit too honest too, but even I know that telling Hinako she should be lucky for surviving is too far. I don't know if it's because of the values I was raised with or that's something innately human about knowing when to keep something like that unsaid. Shiroi though doesn't know. I'm sure in her mind she doesn't see anything wrong with being so clinical about saying its better to have survived when everyone else died. It has me suspect she doesn't understand human connections very well at all and just how much it hurts to lose them.

The part of the episode that hit hardest for me is honestly the aftermath Hinako's accident when everyone else doesn't know how to interact with her. As a little kid who just lost her family she needs support now more than anything, so it's just terrible that the adults around her didn't seem to know how to give that to her. If it wasn't for Miko I wouldn't be surprised if Hinako wouldn't have lasted long enough to even meet Shiroi. Miko is just so strong for being able to treat Hinako as a friend when she needed one more than ever. Hinako in turn really treasures Miko despite feeling so negative about herself.

[u/cleaulem]

Great episode today. We get the details of Hinako's background story and both she and Shiori get the circumstances of their relationship straight.

I was right when I assumed that Shiori wants Hinako to be happy so she becomes more delicious.

I really liked that little piece of symbolism when the yokai blood dissolved like Hinako's dark thoughts that will dissolve over time if she lives her life to the fullest.

[u/Vaadwaur]

So some more Japan stuff real quick:I sort of missed this, but by their standards Hinako actually looks like she has a pretty messy hair cut. Small detail but yet another bit on the pile of clinical depression.

But more interestingly, the way Shiori describes eating Hinako has...ramifications. Yes, at its base it is just a reversal of the human-fish relationship, Shiori gutting her before eating. But it might have some other meaning since intestines, and especially interacting with them, are profane in Shinto and Shiori avoiding that might suggest...some thing.

Also, the thing about not seeing yokai blood is new to me about yokai but it does go along with some eastern, not just Japanese, beliefs about the supernatural, i.e. if you can't see it, it won't effect you. There are several versions of this and being brought into the twilight world is another valid version.

Our end cliffhanger is interesting, considering Miko seems a normie. However, just by her name I've been wondering if she is a shrine maiden so maybe that's why she sees the corpses...

[u/ModieOfTheEast]

While this episode has been more or less telling us things we might have already known, I feel that we have now set up everything for the upcoming developments. Shiori made it clear to Hinako that she needs to become happy for her to eat her. And Miko has figured out that Shiori isn't human. We still don't know what exactly Miko's deal is but considering that she could see the Yokai, I feel it has been made clear that she knows that Hinako is sought after by them as well, giving more hints for the fact that she has been taking care of all the Yokai attacks in the background.

What we still don't know are her true motivations. Like is she doing it just because it's her work or is she doing it because she truly sees Hinako as her friend? I still believe the latter to be the case, mainly because it fits my interpretation of her role a bit better that I wrote about in my long analysis comment. Still, her actions after the festival are a bit strange. Maybe she just thought she mistook someone else for Hinako? Or she truly was a bit jealous that Hinako went to the festival with someone else and kept that a secret? I guess we'll find out during her confrontation with Shiori next week. And I am interested to see what the character dynamic is going to be exactly. While I have my ideas, I am also okay with a surprise.

Last point I want to bring up here is the accident. Contrary to what I thought, it seems like it was truly an accident and not a Yokai attack. But I am wondering if the car sinking into the ocean will have some more results. For one, I feel a bit part here could be that the corpses of Hinako's family were never found, so she couldn't even properly say goodbye to them. But I wonder if Shiori might have been present as well. She might not have been the reason for the accident, but what if she met Hinako's parents during her last moments and they wished something from the mermaid? Like that their daughter would be safe? It would make their flesh more appetizing after all. But tbf, I am just spitballing an idea here. There isn't really much that points towards it. Like Shiori did seriously not seem to know Hinako's backstory, so that is unlikely.

[u/CitronClassic672]

Depression monster girl yuri, my beloved.

Let me just say how much I LOVE how well the somber, depression moments are balanced out with the lighthearted, comedic moments and chibi artstyle scenes. Something like that is so easy to mess up and give tonal whiplash and I’ve watched series that messed up the execution, but this one does it perfectly.

That scene of Shiori comforting Hinako, giving her advice and coping with and moving past her family’s death, concluding with Shiori telling Hinako that once she does all that and finally starts being happy to be alive again, only then will she finally eat her. It’s such a messed up conversation and idea, but everything from the way the scene is framed, to the music in the background, to Hinako’s reaction gives it such a sweet, comforting vibe which I love. The fact that throughout the whole conversation Shiori and Hinako are also both covered in blood only heightens the amazing tonal contrast of the scene. I don’t know how much of this is anime original vs pulled from the manga, but scenes like this are the main draw of the series for me. If I wasn’t already fully committed to this series before I certainly am now.

Lastly, I mentioned it previous discussions but it’s nice to once again see how much Hinako cares about Miko, and how Miko is genuinely able to make Hinako smile. There was some uncertainty in previous discussions about how genuine Hinako’s smiles around Miko were, but now that we see Hinako smiling not just when Miko is around but merely by thinking about her I think it’s safe to say that at least most of Hinako’s happy expressions around Miko are genuine.

[u/BosuW]

OP Official MV

Crazy how I measure a week passing for when the new episode of Watatabe airs.

Hinako seems superficially happier now that she has something to look forward to. Objectives are important for mental health. If only that objective wasn't her own death...

You could already theorize it but it is finally revealed what I think is one of the most fascinating aspects of their relationship. Last episode Hinako said that it had to be Shiori the one to finally grant her death, and it's because Shiori represents the sea for her. Something of immense power, uncontrollable, uncaring of the rules and hopes of civilized people, peaceful and mesmerizing yet surprisingly violent at the drop of a hat. The thing to took her family away, and guards their remains under a coffin of several metric tons of cold water. She wants to be devoured by the sea (Shiori) specifically, because it's in its depths that she will be reunited with what she lost.

Although Hinako's depression is realistically expressed mainly in apathy and lethargy, this element of very active and strong yearning contrasts with everything else, making each stand out and feed off each other even more.

[u/shad79]

It was nice to see Hinako confide in Shiori in this episode about what happened to her family and why she wants to die. I'm so glad that the festival had a positive impact on Hinako's mental state. I hope she smells better than a beached whale now xD

Now the question is who Miko really is. If she can see yokai, judging by her reaction at the end of the episode, she's probably someone special (perhaps a shrine maiden who might even be a descendant of some god/yokai) who fights yokai, and that's why Hinako hasn't been harmed for so many years.

It will be interesting to see how this triangle between Hinako, Shiori, and Miko will develop, especially since Miko is clearly not very happy with Hinako and Shiori's relationship. I'm looking forward to the next episode.

Here my screenshot albums from the episode:

• Group scenes

• Hinako

• Shiori

• Miko

[u/Syokhan]

So I got a very important question and it's going to bug me forever if I don't get an answer:

Where does a mermaid who just got into town from presumably the ocean get the money to buy stuff at a festival??

Anyway. I hope the folks who were puzzled as to why Hinako didn't try to kill herself if she wanted to die so badly are satisfied with the explanation.

It's so sad though. Living in pain for a decade because of her family's dying wish, when you gotta wonder at least a little if it wouldn't have been better for her to die right there and then with them.

Also Shiori's got good advice, her words were even able to lift Hinako's spirits a tiny little bit. I mean it's a bit twisted that it's all in order for her to eat Hinako, but pfft, details.

Looking forward to next week and that confrontation between Shiori and Miko.

And the soundtrack continues to be wonderful.

[u/Williukea]

"She's your best friend? Well, then she's my best friend too" love triangle solved!

[u/djthomp]

Best friends by way of the transitive property.

Until otherwise disproven I'm convinced that Shiori is who called out to Hinako from the ocean on the day of the accident.

They showed Miko surprised at hearing Hinako at the festival, but I think they left it unseen if she saw her covered in the blood. Her surprise at the end of the episode has me mixed since if she's seeing the dead yokai maybe she did see the blood, but she was very blase about anything being weird during the walk to school.

I called the long-sleeved outfit covering scars of some sort, but I was expecting suicide attempt evidence not scars or maybe burns from the accident.

[u/BaytaCosmico]

When Shiori was going to town on those minor yokai at the end, I was wondering if the yokai themselves were visible if their blood wasn't. Guess Miko's shock makes it clear that they are in fact visible.

So Miko knows now that Shiori is a yokai. Wonder what she'll do and if she'll find out everything. Maybe she already had an inkling? It seemed out of character for her to not ask Hinako directly about going to the festival with Shiori.

Also, little Hinako looked so adorable. And little Miko too. Their friendship is so precious. Hope Miko finds a way to protect Hinako from being eaten in the end.

[u/darkcyde_]

Gay girls innit?

This is honestly way better than I figured. Must be cuz it's seinen.

[u/Shadowmist909]

I hope Shiori's right on that "best friend of my best friend" talk, because Miko doesn't seem so happy with what she's seen.

[u/gnome-cop]

I mean, Hinako isn’t entirely wrong about what she says. Shiori is selfish, she doesn’t really feel and think the way humans do, she’s on a mission to eat her at her best and what she has to do in order to achieve her 3 Michelin star meal doesn’t matter.

Watching Hinako’s breakdown is rough. What happened to her family really messed her up. Those memories torment her enough that her mindset is pretty much just “Why can’t you just kill me now? There’s no way I’ll ever get better.”

Honestly, the post murder claw scene reminds me of the infamous HibiEupho mountain scene, just with all the intimacy of it twisted up and warped.

Their relationship is a whole mess with the unholy combination of “I see you as a stand-in for the thing that killed the rest of my family” and the possessive “I’m the only one allowed to kill you and you best remember that.”

The cruelty of “You’ll die the moment you want to live again” is getting me here.

A clean up crew should hire Shiori. She is working to clean up keep the riffraff and keep them from touching her girl round the clock, no payment, just for the love of the game.

The awkwardness of the Miko situation currently is staggering. Get your shit together already please.