Anime Reaction/Rant: Death Parade

As to the fact that my sweet taste of no responsibilities is coming to an end, I marathoned the anime Death Parade. I have literally just finished it as I am writing this and at this moment, can not review it without rambiling or openly complaining about something in an extremely biased manner.

But you know what form of medium says that biased rambling is okay? Reactions/Rants! Yay! Enjoy!

Death Parade is an anime adaption of a short film. I have not seen the short film but most definitely will watch it pretty damn soon. Anyway, the film was called Death Billiards and features two men who arrive at a bar where the bartender and his assistant ask them to play a game of billiards. That's all I'll reveal for now since this is about Death Parade. Both are made by studio Madhouse and licensed in North America by Funimation. No dub, only sub.

A quick summary. The revolves around the people of the afterlife. They are called arbiters. They each run their own bar that helps them judge the worth of human souls. In an elevator, two people come who died at the same time. They have no recollection of dying. They are then tricked into playing a game of life or death (because they don't know they are dead) and the arbiters 'draw out the darkness in their souls' to determine if their souls are worthy to be reincarnated or if they are to be sent into the void. In the anime you mostly only see Decim's trials. (he looks like Ginko from Mushi-Shi) For some reason he has an assitant unlike the rest of the arbiters.

My first impression after finishing this anime was that it needed way more episodes. There wasn't enough screen time given to certain elements of the plot/character stories. The whole idea of the anime was to delve into it's themes and doing so by using the characters. For example, there is a girl who is in love with her favorite idol. She is then forced into the same routine as the other people that had come and play a game. The difference is that she stays afterwards. She isn't featured in the show much after the end of her game, but it is known that she did in fact stay.

She comes back in the spotlight for an important little tidbit that is supposed to help aid in the climax of the story. Another example of a character who needed more screen time was the flower man, who is supposedly as "close to God as there is" who you don't see until the 4th or 5th episode. His name you don't know until the 10th. It's implied that he is somewhat like the manager of the arbiters.

Also some of the explanations and character monolouges were confusing or rushed. Sort of as if they just squeezed it in. Which is what it felt like. Basically, they were trying to stuff too much into the last 2 episodes. Waaaaay too much. Maybe if they dropped more hints throughout the series, or again, gave more episodes. it would've been better.

Despite it's flaws I still did enjoyed this anime. Mostly because of the themes revolving around the show. Those being of the worth of a life, inevitability of death, regret, understanding others, and what it means to be human. A show that really emphasizes on the relationships between people and the decisions made. Well, a better way of saying it is like what happens after suicide. Not after just plan death, but after suicide. Would they regret it? Would they hate someone else? It's a psychological mystery, and those are two genres that I enjoy.

This pose right here is the greatest.
Love the opening song.

At the end, I'd reccomend this to people who enjoy physchology things. Not much action sorry about that. It was in need of more episodes or better pacing. Both really, but interesting watch if you feel like opening up those forbidden doors in your head. Yay!

I'm sorry... Decim looks SOO much
Ginko! There's fanart to prove it!!