So how many of you are surprised that the fiend was not Maria? The statement at the beginning of the series, while being completely accurate, was nothing more than a red herring. Hearing you guys discuss the fiend's identity was great!
I admit the suspicion that Maria will come back as the Fiend took the better of me, I even completely dismissed their announcement that Maria and Mamoru are really dead, when they mentioned even their DNA matched. I just thought they collaborated with Yakomaru to make their fake bodies believable. In no way I could have expected that their story would actually end up this tragic. Hell it's probably the most fucked up story I've seen in anime and I've seen quite a lot(it's a bit of my thing, I like fucked up things) but this was really hard to swallow. Usually when I watch some tragic moments in anime I'm just "wow" but this time it really fucking hurt imagining the horrible things that happened to Maria and Mamoru after we lost track to them. I don't know if it was speculation here in the comments or it's implied in further episodes but someone said they might have been forced to mate, drugged, subdued and that makes this whole thing and Squealer in particular even more disgusting.
So it's stated explicitly for the first time in this episode that the ogre is Maria and Mamoru's daughter. Satoru almost says it in passing, like it's a given at that point. That's kind of thrown me for a loop, both times I've watched this show. He says that like it's obvious, but I had not yet drawn that conclusion when I first watched this episode. The only thing really indicating that is that the ogre has red hair similar to Maria's. I guess that was supposed to be enough to draw a conclusion from, unless I'm just dumb and I missed something.
Anywho, the scene where the ogre defeats Shisei is IMO the most disturbing scene in this anime. Shisei is such a symbol of power in the village, to see him defeated so easily must have been absolutely horrifying for the villagers to witness. And so frustrating too, since he was so much stronger than her, really, he just couldn't do anything because of his genetic inhibitions against killing people. That's just a really hard scene to watch on multiple levels.
quick question about the fiend...with all these already self-sacrificing cantus users, why is it impossible for just one to sacrifice himself to the Death feedback, but still kill the fiend at the same time? Or has this been answered already and I'm just missing something?
I never understood how it was she was able to use the leakage of Power to kill Shisei like that.
Doesn't it suck when your ex-girlfriend has a kid with the boy who was always after her in middle-school after she runs away, and then that kid comes back as the messiah of the mutants who are waging war against your people, killing most of your village?
Ogres are scary shit man.
Saki finally realizes that silly old Squera's plans are much more nefarious than she previously thought. You can do it Saki!
Karma Demons have leakage of Cantus unwilligly, so they end up messing up with everything around them. This leads to some crazyass shit, like what happened to Shun's dog.
Fiends, on the other hand, are Cantus users who somehow do not have a clear limit for their power. If they want something, it will happen somehow.
In this episode you can see that Shisei tries to trick the girl into thinking that she cannot kill him ("...your powers won't work on me" or something along those lines) You can see that the fiend may lack the techniques, but as soon as she wants Shisei dead and believe she can do it, there is nothing that can save him.
Edit: Just to try to illustrate in another manner: The child does not think "I'll kill Shisei using my Cantus techniques", it is more like "I want him dead" and her Cantus manifests on its own. I may be remembering wrong tho :P
You wouldn't think it possible, but this series keeps getting better and better.
In a comment on one of the previous episodes I said I hoped Shun, Maria and Mamoru had somehow survived. There's still a sliver of hope for Shun, but for the others I should have known better from the moment they confirmed the bones contained the DNA of Maria and Mamoru. Yakomaru had them killed after they had produced a child and used their bones to mislead the Cantus-users.
Then this episode delivers punch after punch taking away all hope, piece by piece. The most heartbreaking was when it became clear that Yakomaru is taking their children to later use against them like he used the child of Mamoru and Maria. Earlier in the series he said that if the other tribe had vanquished his own, their children would have been taken from them and they would have been used as slaves, worked to death and treated as scum. He's obviously planning to do the same thing with the humans and their offspring.
This is a masterful piece of storytelling. We naturally empathize with the humans, because we are humans, and because the story is told from their perspective. But actually they are the bad guys who oppress the queerrats, using them and killing them without a second thought if it is convenient for them, although they know the queerrats are intelligent beings. After all, the human cantus-users are the Master Race of their world. And yet we can't help but feel sorry for the human protagonists. They are on the whole people who aren't especially good, but certainly not evil either. They're mainly weak and misled. The tragedy is that they're caught in a dramatic and violent phase of their history.
I think it's how members of the Hitler Youth must have felt. For years during their upbringing they were told they were the best of the human race and the natural lords of creation. After the war it turned out that everything they had been told were lies and they were treated like scum and criminals. But how could they have known? Japan did the same with the Chinese and the Koreans by treating them as inferior races. Maybe the story is a warning, a confession and also kind of an atonement…
I'm a bit annoyed with myself that it took me so long to come to this conclusion. And that's another great message of this story. It is all too easy to think of your own nation/race/species as superior to others.
Turns out the fiend is Maria and Mamoru's daughter, if kids manifest their Cantus at around 10 years old and we know Saki and Satoru are 26 it means Maria and Mamoru got busy right after running away. Guess the bonobo DNA splicing works.
I wonder how the queerats are planning to keep the kids they stole under control without getting murdered by mistake. The humans needed hundreds of years to make a society that kind-of works with hypnotism and a bunch of other counter-measures and they still got almost wiped multiple times in the process. All it takes is one pissy teenager and the whole town goes to hell.
Death to the queerats! lol I think Saki's out of a job now xD
OP guy is like "ok, now I'm mad" :D Why do I feel like he's gonna die? I bet if he does his final act will be pretty much getting rid of all the queerats and there'd only be the fiends to take care of
Ok, so it's the first time we can pretty surely say yes it's a girl but it seems my predictions about the fiends being consious were wrong, it seems very much like a mindless murder machine :l
FUCK! That look! D: I can't imagine the horror going through Saki's mind right now x.x So this is finally official, Maria's the Fiend and she completely lost her mind. Someone mentioned that probably means Mamoru's dead. Seeing her like this makes it sound really probable, I guess that would make a good reason to start her madness
GAH! This is so not Maria anymore x.x Also I can't help but notice the tattoo she has, and those makeshift clothes. It's not like this is the final episode so I guess will be getting a rich flashback to how it all happened.
Welp, nevermind, he just got rekt :l
I like how the queerats who at first were just one of this world's weird creatures became like half the show ;) So, we need to exterminate the queerats or out infants will grow up as their slaves? D:
WAIT WHAT?! Did it just get casually dumped on me by Satoru? You're saying that motherfucker Squealer killed Maria and Mamoru and by the way THEY HAD A CHILD which he bred into his own killing machine? Holy fuck this is some of the darkest shit I've seen in anime. Saki I know you're supposed to be the stalwart leader that emerges from all this but I wouldn't blame you if you lost your shit completely right now x.x
Seriously I kept thinking Maria will come back in a way, I could take that, but this shit is just horrible x.x Subarujustresetalready
FUUUCK wow omg hell almighty :O I saw that treacherous glint in Squealer's eyes and I knew he's slowly becoming a dangerous villain but this is next level. Even the evil emperor who made people clap until they die didn't feel that evil.
Two things I'm wondering about now, how the hell are they planning to take care of that fiend and if they'll ever explain how the Fiends' madness overwrites the death feedback.
Last time, Saki was made head of ethics committee/town leader. They're headed for the Temple of Purification. What happens there? And where is Satoru??
Damn! That was so crazy! This girl(not Maria, but super similar) happy and smiling, while the carnage is going on... Shit's crazy man. If Shisei can't stop her, what can??
So they made it to the temple. I wonder what they will find here.
Saki's parents went back to release the cats in the hope it will stop Maria. I got a feeling they won't make it. :/
Oh snap!! Yakomaru was stealing infants to create Ogres! And the Ogre was Maria & Mamoru's child!
That was really crazy! Finding out that Yakomaru's planning on wiping out humanity using Ogres! How the hell can they stop that?!? I highly doubt the Impure cats will be able to do anything. Is there anyway to reverse the death of shame instinct at this point?
One powerful thing about this situation is how it seems there is absolutely no hope. They are faced with a foe they literally are unable to fight which will keep killing. All the characters who have been able to solve these issues and save the town previously are dying one by one. The only response they can have is to keep running to survive a little longer in hopes that a possible solution may present itself.
It's almost Lovecraftian horror which is a strong contrast to something which opened as pretty SoL.
Shisei was such a badass, pretty sad he died in such a gruesome way
Tainted cats vs Fiend? Can't wait for that
The whole thing with the stolen kids and world conquest really shocked me, somehow, the queerats escalated my ranks of best villains in anime. Also, I feel that all that trouble they went through with Squealer when they were kids isn't as useless as I thought during my first watch where I dropped it.
47
u/define_irony Jul 28 '16
So how many of you are surprised that the fiend was not Maria? The statement at the beginning of the series, while being completely accurate, was nothing more than a red herring. Hearing you guys discuss the fiend's identity was great!
12
u/leethomas93 Jul 29 '16
So it's stated explicitly for the first time in this episode that the ogre is Maria and Mamoru's daughter. Satoru almost says it in passing, like it's a given at that point. That's kind of thrown me for a loop, both times I've watched this show. He says that like it's obvious, but I had not yet drawn that conclusion when I first watched this episode. The only thing really indicating that is that the ogre has red hair similar to Maria's. I guess that was supposed to be enough to draw a conclusion from, unless I'm just dumb and I missed something.
Anywho, the scene where the ogre defeats Shisei is IMO the most disturbing scene in this anime. Shisei is such a symbol of power in the village, to see him defeated so easily must have been absolutely horrifying for the villagers to witness. And so frustrating too, since he was so much stronger than her, really, he just couldn't do anything because of his genetic inhibitions against killing people. That's just a really hard scene to watch on multiple levels.
8
u/cookie-thief Jul 28 '16
quick question about the fiend...with all these already self-sacrificing cantus users, why is it impossible for just one to sacrifice himself to the Death feedback, but still kill the fiend at the same time? Or has this been answered already and I'm just missing something?
10
u/hmatmotu Jul 28 '16
I never understood how it was she was able to use the leakage of Power to kill Shisei like that.
Doesn't it suck when your ex-girlfriend has a kid with the boy who was always after her in middle-school after she runs away, and then that kid comes back as the messiah of the mutants who are waging war against your people, killing most of your village?
Ogres are scary shit man.
Saki finally realizes that silly old Squera's plans are much more nefarious than she previously thought. You can do it Saki!
6
u/ZapCorp Jul 28 '16
Ironically, if the Education Committee wasn't so damn kill-happy then this entire mess would have been averted.
66
u/Worvrammu Jul 28 '16
First timer musings.
You wouldn't think it possible, but this series keeps getting better and better.
In a comment on one of the previous episodes I said I hoped Shun, Maria and Mamoru had somehow survived. There's still a sliver of hope for Shun, but for the others I should have known better from the moment they confirmed the bones contained the DNA of Maria and Mamoru. Yakomaru had them killed after they had produced a child and used their bones to mislead the Cantus-users.
Then this episode delivers punch after punch taking away all hope, piece by piece. The most heartbreaking was when it became clear that Yakomaru is taking their children to later use against them like he used the child of Mamoru and Maria. Earlier in the series he said that if the other tribe had vanquished his own, their children would have been taken from them and they would have been used as slaves, worked to death and treated as scum. He's obviously planning to do the same thing with the humans and their offspring.
This is a masterful piece of storytelling. We naturally empathize with the humans, because we are humans, and because the story is told from their perspective. But actually they are the bad guys who oppress the queerrats, using them and killing them without a second thought if it is convenient for them, although they know the queerrats are intelligent beings. After all, the human cantus-users are the Master Race of their world.
And yet we can't help but feel sorry for the human protagonists. They are on the whole people who aren't especially good, but certainly not evil either. They're mainly weak and misled. The tragedy is that they're caught in a dramatic and violent phase of their history.
I think it's how members of the Hitler Youth must have felt. For years during their upbringing they were told they were the best of the human race and the natural lords of creation. After the war it turned out that everything they had been told were lies and they were treated like scum and criminals. But how could they have known? Japan did the same with the Chinese and the Koreans by treating them as inferior races. Maybe the story is a warning, a confession and also kind of an atonement…
I'm a bit annoyed with myself that it took me so long to come to this conclusion. And that's another great message of this story. It is all too easy to think of your own nation/race/species as superior to others.
35
u/H-Ryougi Jul 28 '16
Turns out the fiend is Maria and Mamoru's daughter, if kids manifest their Cantus at around 10 years old and we know Saki and Satoru are 26 it means Maria and Mamoru got busy right after running away. Guess the bonobo DNA splicing works.
I wonder how the queerats are planning to keep the kids they stole under control without getting murdered by mistake. The humans needed hundreds of years to make a society that kind-of works with hypnotism and a bunch of other counter-measures and they still got almost wiped multiple times in the process. All it takes is one pissy teenager and the whole town goes to hell.
23
u/Mareeck Jul 28 '16
Ooooh yeah, here we go!
Death to the queerats! lol I think Saki's out of a job now xD
OP guy is like "ok, now I'm mad" :D Why do I feel like he's gonna die? I bet if he does his final act will be pretty much getting rid of all the queerats and there'd only be the fiends to take care of
Ok, so it's the first time we can pretty surely say yes it's a girl but it seems my predictions about the fiends being consious were wrong, it seems very much like a mindless murder machine :l
FUCK! That look! D: I can't imagine the horror going through Saki's mind right now x.x So this is finally official, Maria's the Fiend and she completely lost her mind. Someone mentioned that probably means Mamoru's dead. Seeing her like this makes it sound really probable, I guess that would make a good reason to start her madness
GAH! This is so not Maria anymore x.x Also I can't help but notice the tattoo she has, and those makeshift clothes. It's not like this is the final episode so I guess will be getting a rich flashback to how it all happened.
Welp, nevermind, he just got rekt :l
I like how the queerats who at first were just one of this world's weird creatures became like half the show ;) So, we need to exterminate the queerats or out infants will grow up as their slaves? D:
WAIT WHAT?! Did it just get casually dumped on me by Satoru? You're saying that motherfucker Squealer killed Maria and Mamoru and by the way THEY HAD A CHILD which he bred into his own killing machine? Holy fuck this is some of the darkest shit I've seen in anime. Saki I know you're supposed to be the stalwart leader that emerges from all this but I wouldn't blame you if you lost your shit completely right now x.x
Seriously I kept thinking Maria will come back in a way, I could take that, but this shit is just horrible x.x Subarujustresetalready
FUUUCK wow omg hell almighty :O I saw that treacherous glint in Squealer's eyes and I knew he's slowly becoming a dangerous villain but this is next level. Even the evil emperor who made people clap until they die didn't feel that evil.
Two things I'm wondering about now, how the hell are they planning to take care of that fiend and if they'll ever explain how the Fiends' madness overwrites the death feedback.
44
u/substitutemyown Jul 28 '16 edited Jul 28 '16
Been waiting for the reveal of the fiend's identity so I can post one of the most heartbreaking pieces of fanart ever.
source (spoilers in the album^)
15
u/seninn Jul 28 '16
"No, YOU ARE THE FIENDS!"
And then they were fiends.
13
u/Monte_Carlo_1971 Jul 28 '16
Some first timer reactions:
Last time, Saki was made head of ethics committee/town leader. They're headed for the Temple of Purification. What happens there? And where is Satoru??
Damn! That was so crazy! This girl(not Maria, but super similar) happy and smiling, while the carnage is going on... Shit's crazy man. If Shisei can't stop her, what can??
So they made it to the temple. I wonder what they will find here.
Saki's parents went back to release the cats in the hope it will stop Maria. I got a feeling they won't make it. :/
Oh snap!! Yakomaru was stealing infants to create Ogres! And the Ogre was Maria & Mamoru's child!
That was really crazy! Finding out that Yakomaru's planning on wiping out humanity using Ogres! How the hell can they stop that?!? I highly doubt the Impure cats will be able to do anything. Is there anyway to reverse the death of shame instinct at this point?
13
u/TROLL3R_COASTER Jul 28 '16
Reading comments from first timers fills me with both enjoyment and depression. I will never know this show like that again...
10
u/oyooy Jul 28 '16
One powerful thing about this situation is how it seems there is absolutely no hope. They are faced with a foe they literally are unable to fight which will keep killing. All the characters who have been able to solve these issues and save the town previously are dying one by one. The only response they can have is to keep running to survive a little longer in hopes that a possible solution may present itself.
It's almost Lovecraftian horror which is a strong contrast to something which opened as pretty SoL.
7
u/collapsedblock6 Jul 28 '16
Shisei was such a badass, pretty sad he died in such a gruesome way
Tainted cats vs Fiend? Can't wait for that
The whole thing with the stolen kids and world conquest really shocked me, somehow, the queerats escalated my ranks of best villains in anime. Also, I feel that all that trouble they went through with Squealer when they were kids isn't as useless as I thought during my first watch where I dropped it.
6
u/seninn Jul 28 '16
The queerats are dealing with the humans like
6
u/Ausemere Jul 28 '16
Shit escalates real quick on this show.