A Painfully Honest Review of Platinum End

[@rimurutempest4945]

Man, looking back, Death Note really did their female characters dirty, that FBI agent cracked the case on who Kira is all by herself and she was just unlucky and encountered Light right outside the Police Station.

[@andrewowens4421]

That's true. I would have liked to see her be a regular along with L. She was so interesting and then she was so dead.

[@sarafontanini7051]

Yeah Death Note at least makes up for the sexism by having a genuinely good story and characters this however has none of that. it has like ONE interesting idea with the protag but not much else.

[@checker297]

@@sarafontanini7051 i mean the fact that her death immediately set off red flags in L's mind, essentially solved the case for L. He was only killed because deus ex machina. It would have be a somber moment where light gets caught and L ponders a world where light was his friend.

[@paulgibbon5991]

I did actually like that bit--someone who could easily have been the protagonist of a mundane detective series, who did everything right but who didn't realise the villain had supernatural abilities.

[@Galvanizerr]

I think it's worth noting however that Naomi was lucky herself to begin with due to her conveniently being the lover of someone who was tailing Light, who happen to be kira, in the first place and then her lover giving her the information she needed (right before Raye's death) to solve the case herself. So, to me anyway, her getting unlucky later kinda evens it out.

[@rafaelfernandez6626]

This entire story feels like the writer came up with a really neat and interesting ending and then wrote the story backwards from there.

[@TheJhonson4000]

Haha funny, when I remember correctly, there was an interview about Death Note, where Ohba said this is more or less how he write a story :D

[@ChangedMyNameFinally69]

And he inserted his homophobia and sexism into it as well.

[@Hello-hello-hello456]

But shouldn't that mean that the ending is nicely foreshadowed and fits better in the story? This ending feels like it came Outta nowhere. If you know your ending from the start and still can't build the story up towards it properly, then you have failed as a writer.

[@skelepuns8781]

A 'platinum end' if you will

[@qoenntrell]

Known as the induction method. It's not a bad way to write a story mind you. But I did feel the same with this story.

[@lucianobradley5996]

Fun Fact: In an early chapter of Bakuman, the protagonists storyboard a manga that is fairly similar to Platinum End. It was an action story about invisible angels with spears that can instantly kill humans. Eventually, they scrap the idea because it was stupid.

[@jonathonwild7350]

That's golden

[@karekakeka4143]

I also noticed this when reading Bakuman recently

[@KingOfMumbles485...]

And this wasnt?

[@ellielza9465]

I remember watching this anime when it came out and realising it was in Bakuman, which I specifically remember because my thought was "How on earth do they expect this to get popular it sounds so bad" haha

[@jondoe7036]

Of all the premises introduced in Bakuman they could have picked up for an actual series too... We could have gotten a full manga/anime for something like PCP, Money and Intelligence, Detective Trap, even Otter, but nope, instead here's an attempt to polish up something used as an example of an inherently bad idea.

[@bloodlily1203]

Geoff: Now, you may want me to back up my claims that Oba's a misogynist-- Me, remembering the scene from Bakuman where the main dude tells a girl offering to give him writing advice on women to piss off: No, no, I believe you.

[@stridergeny5906]

The point of a manga author is to get serialized so of course he's gonna consider his own perspective as a guy of what his dream girl would be like because that's the people that are gonna read it, most people who read manga are guys so that's the demographic he has to target, don't blame him blame the game.

[@nolanburke3669]

@@stridergeny5906 how about blaming both him and the "game" 😁

[@damien678]

@@stridergeny5906 "most people who read manga are guys" source? or is that just an assumption? because I'm doing a lil google search right now, and your claim is already just wrong. I just came across a page on statistica that even claims a study in may 2020 did a survery of about 1000 japanese students and found 77% of girls read shojo or josei manga, which was apparently a higher number than boys (which makes sense because those manga categories are aimed towards females) but dude, even if your assumption was true, that doesn't mean misogyny is what a general male audience actually wants to see, even in japan. both my boyfriend and I have an incredibly hard time overlooking misogyny in media, and it's barely tolerable to me a lot of the time. you'd have a better chance at me really loving a work if the author actually knew how to write women, and if it wasn't made evident in their work just how badly they view women

[@stridergeny5906]

@@damien678 You actually just proved my point with that statistic, You pointed at shoujo manga which is manga directed at girls has more female fans and shonen directed at boys has more male fans, that's literally what I said when saying that you should know your audience. Also you are so ignorant and blind if you don't see that japanese men overwhelmingly prefer subservient women, it's a fact and there is nothing wrong with it. Look at any video on KZbin about japanese men's ideal women.

[@damien678]

@@stridergeny5906 You didn't say shonen manga, genius. You just said most readers of manga are male. Also, there's a bunch of shonen jump mangas that have a bigger female reader base. like haikyuu!! with 66.8% women, gin tama with 63.8%, katekyo hitman reborn with 62.4%, etc. And these are taken from a volume of weekly shonen jump itself, in 2012 apparently. And, seriously, manga like Haikyuu!! is so clearly targeted towards women, and it's absolutely shonen I can also personally attest that most of the people I saw at my school going to the library's manga collection were girls, and that a majority of the people I see passionately engaging in manga fandoms being women. I'm aware there's a lot of dude fans, but there's also staggering amounts of female fans that typically keep quiet unless amongst themselves.

[@EKAnimations]

I think the part in Bakuman that really did make me go: The author does not know how to write women, was the one chapter were they LITERALLY TALK ABOUT WRITING WOMEN and the consensus they reach is "Don't put much thought into it. Just make a love interest who is your dream girl"

[@KhayJayArt]

I feel like someone in real life told him that he needed to improve on writing women and he got salty.

[@CivilChev]

How would you write a female character? I agree that its egregious for him to say to just make it a generic love interest but what would you do differently? How does one write a female character?

[@CoolMagmar]

@@CivilChev Writing female characters isn't hard, just write a character with likes and dislikes and a motivation, that doesn't have to involve all the time another character and you're probably good to go. If you have one, pick your own mother as an example, if you wrote her as a character you thing all her personality can be just "She loves her kid"? Don't you think this is too shallow and that she has many facets and many parts of herself that don't revolve around you? And like not all characters need to be deep, but even making a small silly list of their likes and dislikes makes wonders even for small characters to shiny, a good example is most characters in Attack on Titan in the first seasons, with the exception of the main trio, they were incredible shallow but just thanks to them show their likes and dislikes made them have a fanbase and be more than just set dressing.

[@michaelbenson5677]

@@CivilChev Write a character without determining their gender, then make a random gender selection. Once that is locked in, consider how their gender would affect the core characterization that is already present.

[@CivilChev]

@@CoolMagmar But what's the difference between a male character with likes and dislikes and a motivation than a female character?

[@ashleightompkins3200]

If the writer does have it out for women, then that explains a LOT about the tension between L and Light.

[@kaitlynmorgan8097]

If i remember correctly one of the main characters in bakuman said that the female character was becoming a voice actor cuz it was her natural disposition as a girl not cuz she admires the craft and talent. I saw this as a screenshot on Twitter from the manga so i may be wrong, but looking at Oba's tracks record from writing women in death note😬

[@PredictableEnigma]

@@kaitlynmorgan8097 It's because she's "so shy and thinks this career will build her confidence" but also because she wants to be in her crush's anime when they grow up. Yeah he really only likes women as an accessory 😩

[@theuncannydag]

A lot has been said by now that blatantly misogynistic writing just makes every man in the story look fruity, specifically about shounen manga lol

[@ryenguy]

it never fails to make me laugh when a piece of work is so misogynistic that it ends up reading as really homoerotic. can't really fault people from pairing your protagonist with anyone else except the shallow female lead when you're the one who wrote her like that. lol

[@ayal92]

@@kaitlynmorgan8097 He basically says that smart girls are the ones who blindly follow gender roles. The ambitious girl with good grades is portrayed as stupid and annoying.

[@paulinapaola]

So Hajime is a caricature of an incel whose problems don't get fixed by looksmaxxing, and who simps over Poliman Chad, and only gets "cured" when he feels love for a woman? Wow. That's... layered.

[@mathisblair2798]

Hajime was an ugly/poor amd often abused child. Who's looksmaxxing and realizing that looks arent the only key to happiness/fulfillment. He simps over poliman because he literally has NOTHING prior in his life to emulate at ALL. Was brilliant story writing. You WANT that lesson shown. ... Did you watch the show? Hajime has never been loved by anyone in his fucking life.... And love, saves him in the end... Hajime finally gets to be a part of life instead of an unwanted outcast. He feels love for the first time and then... He chooses to save others with his last moment. Solidifying his humanity

[@iwannaseehowlongyoucanmakethis]

@@mathisblair2798 i would buy it if the scene immediately after it doesn't suck ass. The tonal dissonance sucks out all impact that scene could've had. I mean, come on, his sword fell from his fingers and just so happens to land right through the nurse bitch's heart? You know, the woman with wings faster than light and can obviously see it coming?

[@mathisblair2798]

@@iwannaseehowlongyoucanmakethis Manga pages or LN maybe clear s this up. But as per the scene I had assumed that Hajime had chucked the sword at her before deflecting it as it was the attempt to cut the 3rd syringe that failed but he gave that sword some momentum downward before lifting his arm. That being said; the rebukes don't mean much. Especially for anyone that compares stuff like attack on titan to it in a positive light. I've seen what "the kids watch" and its garbage half the time so if platinum end sails past some people's heads, Thats fine with me. For me...I mean Ive seen every episode of Jojo's Bizzare Adventure twice... And platinum end felt like clashes between stand users, a bit over the top and even dramatic at times... But that's what I liked about it. Kinda seemed like "fuck conventions" we'll do as we please. Which I'm USED to with JoJo and other anime. I retain my stance as well as my room mate that Platinum End is a solid pick compared a lot of average filler out there. I was never distracted from the Story's over arcing theme, nor disappointed with the characters. I think saki and mirai are good examples of childhood innocence and morality. I liked all of the characters. And I'll never not give props to the ending. That was DARING to do that, because you can see the ending threw lots of people off. Many can't handle a non conclusive ending. No neat wrapping of a ribbon on this one.

[@kneau]

@@mathisblair2798 the show does have a conclusive ending.

[@waynetan4485]

bruh his first appearance just made me think jojo character hurdur wtf is wrong with me

[@drosera88]

A lot of people argue "Batman had a no kill policy too but everyone likes him!" True, but Batman wasn't a bitch who sat on the sidelines and let people die.

[@becuaseimbored3481]

*When he had good writers

[@jondoe7036]

I mean I don't. Haven't really liked Batman since I watched the Adam West show as an eight year old, Nolan's Dark Knight flat out made me hate the character for a while and currently I'm sitting somewhere along the lines of mixed to completely indifferent. And I do think his no kill policy gets dumb too.

[@Lord_necromancer]

Um... Yes he does lol arguably Batman is worse because he waits for someone to kill a bunch of people, goes and beats that guy up so he can convince himself he's a good guy, and then goes home to wait for that guy to go kill more people so he can beat them up again lol I would honestly have more respect for Batman if he just sat it out and was like look I'm not going to deal with it, because the Batman we have gets within punching distance of actually saving people's lives, and then stops lol

[@ryanchase9332]

@@Lord_necromancer Agreed. Batman's philosophy would work... if Arkham Asylum didn't have a revolving door and his entire rogue's gallery didn't escape every other day.

[@darksword0928]

@@ryanchase9332 at that point it's more the government/jutice system fault for putting them in the same prison that they repeatedly escaped from and completely fail to actually handle the problem

[@brimstone6665]

The tl;dr is literally god is dying and gets a bunch of suicidal people to compete on who's going to be god NEXT and....the winner kills himself. Wow. How did nobody see that coming.

[@sobervision1049]

Well the candidate was meant to fuse with the current God which means that Nakaumi wouldn't have been an entity on his own. He killed himself in the process of fusing which was meant to pretty much destroy his ideals and emotions for the sake of being a truly higher power.

[@handsomeboi3767]

That the plot of Marai nikki

[@nicbentulan]

IT’S A TRAP! THIS WHOLE THING IS A SETUP!! THIS IS ALL PART OF OHBA'S PLAN TO FRAME ME! ISN’T IT A LITTLE ODD THAT THEY HAVE SUCH GREAT SERIES LIKE DN & BAKUMAN BUT NOT PLATINUM END?? THIS PROVES IT’S A TRAP!! IT’S A TRAP! THIS WHOLE THING IS A SETUP!! THIS IS ALL PART OF OBATA'S PLAN TO FRAME ME! ISN’T IT A LITTLE ODD THAT THEY HAVE SUCH HOT CHARACTERS LIKE GEVANNI IN DN AND MIYUKI AZUKI IN BAKUMAN BUT NO ONE REALLY IN PLATINUM END?? THIS PROVES IT’S A TRAP!!

[@nicbentulan]

@@handsomeboi3767 huh? Yukiteru was suicidal?

[@handsomeboi3767]

@@nicbentulan well its mostly the plot of it

[@bronsonkim6652]

"It's also a bit rich coming from a writer who has never been able to write women for shit and also clearly hates them." fucking hilariously accurate line

[@bronsonkim6652]

@Greg Bus "Men have dreams that women can never understand!"

[@attilamert6973]

​@@bronsonkim6652I mean thats a pretty correct statement tho

[@jondoe7036]

@@attilamert6973 Riiight... It's definitely not that men who think like that can't be bothered to try understand women themselves and just end up presuming women couldn't possibly understand them back...

[@attilamert6973]

@@jondoe7036 Idk man, some dreams men have... you just won't understand. That's just how it is.

[@jondoe7036]

@@attilamert6973Such as...?

[@dr.deadpool5959]

Like MoistCritikal said “Why are the characters High School teens?” Them being teens serves no purpose to the story and how tf did they graduate they probably missed three months of school

[@Replica_Rabbit]

Love Arrow

[@mothersbasement]

We need more anime starring adults

[@JellyFilledEmpanada]

@@mothersbasement more adults as adults* we don't need more 40 year old men running around in 10 year old bodies in another world

[@belairtheboss7883]

@AxelTheGhost Or...worse case scenario, they're a Loli🤷🏽‍♀️

[@MusicoftheDamned]

@@JellyFilledEmpanada ...This sounds oddly specific, even for Japan. Should I ask and gain another bit of cursed knowledge? Or should I remain blissfully ignorant of another isekai with heavily fucked implications about its author? Decision decisions....

[@nathanbraun2067]

It's hilarious that the authors of death note ripped off mirai nikki, a show called a death note ripoff back in the day, and did it worse

[@irecordwithaphone1856]

LMAO true

[@t-vann48]

Idk they definitely did it bad... but I dont think it's worse than Future Diary. Platinum End was largely a boring trainwreck, but Future Diary was entirely a boring trainwreck. Platinum End had some interesting ideas with bad execution. Future Diary had 1 interesting idea with bad execution.

[@nicbentulan]

IT’S A TRAP! THIS WHOLE THING IS A SETUP!! THIS IS ALL PART OF OHBA'S PLAN TO FRAME ME! ISN’T IT A LITTLE ODD THAT THEY HAVE SUCH GREAT SERIES LIKE DN & BAKUMAN BUT NOT PLATINUM END?? THIS PROVES IT’S A TRAP!! IT’S A TRAP! THIS WHOLE THING IS A SETUP!! THIS IS ALL PART OF OBATA'S PLAN TO FRAME ME! ISN’T IT A LITTLE ODD THAT THEY HAVE SUCH HOT CHARACTERS LIKE GEVANNI IN DN AND MIYUKI AZUKI IN BAKUMAN BUT NO ONE REALLY IN PLATINUM END?? THIS PROVES IT’S A TRAP!!

[@nicbentulan]

HELL!!!! You'd think that if the DN writers did their own take of Future Diary that it would be epic. MAAAANNNNN.

[@theelitistjerkmetalhead8047]

The main character is even named Mirai, it's practically a slap in the face.

[@theloudshadow1556]

Everyone's reaction to this anime/Manga: "NEW DEATH NOTE. LET'S F****** GOOO!!!!"🥳 After episode 3: "Let's... Let's just go." 😭

[@kyarabarrion4523]

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

[@nicbentulan]

No 555 likes for you I made it 556. Also IT’S A TRAP! THIS WHOLE THING IS A SETUP!! THIS IS ALL PART OF OHBA'S PLAN TO FRAME ME! ISN’T IT A LITTLE ODD THAT THEY HAVE SUCH GREAT SERIES LIKE DN & BAKUMAN BUT NOT PLATINUM END?? THIS PROVES IT’S A TRAP!!

[@DjokerFan]

@@nicbentulan did u revise the dialogues of DN?

[@nicbentulan]

@@DjokerFan Yes! but the dub dialogues not the (subtitles of the) Japanese dialogues

[@DjokerFan]

@@nicbentulan oh thats great! Also can u suggest me mindwrecking anime like Death note since it was my first anime and i don't know much them..

[@MessatsuGoshoryu02]

When the middle schooler turned into god and said "Well, I guess this is the... Platinum End lmao" before yeeting himself and erasing all life I got the true message behind this literary masterpiece

[@LynnHermione]

People writing edgy "pacifist in war" stories should REALLY read Animorphs. One of the characters is the nature loving veterinarian moral center girl... and the psychological and moral decay that comes from being a guerilla fighter against an alien empire at (x)teen years old makes her basically a hypocrite, and called that in canon. She is happy voting no on morally dubious missions bc she KNOWS enough of the team will vote yes and the bad but necessary thing will be done regardless, and at one point asks her friend to kill a guy for her.

[@razorflossrazor2937]

Say what you will about that series but good god does it do PTSD and the horror of war well. I was not ready for half that shit at the tender age of 12.

[@daughter-of-loki1062]

And here I thought the most interesting thing about animorphs was the wacky covers

[@tonhaogamergranudo]

I really need to re-read that series. It's really kind of underrated imo, mainly because of the episodic nature of it's plot sometimes and the book covers seeming silly. But many times throughout it, you can see how harsh this war really is, how it changed these unwilling child soldiers, and by the end, how it wrecked their lives for good.

[@ezachleewright2309]

I couldn't read those books when I was young, the Yeerks scared me too much

[@razorflossrazor2937]

@@ezachleewright2309 for good damn reason The yeeks are terrifying. Hell if I remember right by the end one of characters couldn't be near anything worm like or they freak the fuck out.

[@IamEL1979]

The Bakuman chapter reads to me as "Women who are academically intelligent and take pride in that fact make me feel emasculated so she's actually really dumb because she isn't acting in a way that favours my ego."

[@MaxonerousX]

Also the woman Takagi is saying is less intelligent because she cares too much about academics later becomes an important recurring character whose only plots are romantically pursuing intelligent men

[@Fallofthenights]

Meanwhile leauge's more popular and better manga written by WOMEN who are beloved, fullmetal alchemist, beastars, demon slayer, dungeon meshi, norgami, blue exsorist, and probably more I'm forgeting, Fmab personly is one of my favorites and the character Hawkeye who is a women.

[@raphvaldes9368]

Do ya'll remember that one chapter in Bakuman where the protagonists try to break into the traditional shounen battle genre with an angel themed story, and the editor reads it and says "wtf this is dogshit. why are u doin this?" ? yeah me neither.

[@MistralMan]

And, like, it’s really similar to the one good manga they make at the end of the series

[@robinauseer499]

Even when I read Death Note as a youngster, I just knew something about how Misa Misa was written bugged me big time. Hobbies? Light. Interests? Light. Goals? Light. Reasons to live? Light. Etc. etc. It bugged me SO MUCH; I never really liked her. Hearing the misogyny explained made everything make SO MUCH SENSE.

[@johnmachenzie1613]

People like Misa Misa exists in real life and happens more often than you think. Misa Misa was there to show how manipulative and asshole light is taking advantage of clearly vulnerable women

[@robinauseer499]

@@johnmachenzie1613 I agree that many people irl are like Misa Misa. It's unhealthy, but common. I will preface this by saying that it has been a long time since I've consumed anything Death Note, so my memory is probably quite bad, but I suppose my beef was specifically about how Misa Misa, Saki, and the other love interests across the different series are the same: Their entire lives pretty much revolve around their men; they rarely have motivations/ambitions outside of them.

[@kyla8386]

I dropped death note after her character was introduced, it was so offensive and cringey

[@nourdjaoui3214]

@@kyla8386 you're missing out on alot

[@almalone3282]

I saw Misa Misa as more of a peek into the life of a cult follower look into interviews with former cult members most of them acted like Misa Misa in some shape or form

[@bbh6212]

That ending is so oppressingly nihilistic. It's almost pointless, really. It is reflective of this whole anime, in a way. It is an interesting philosophical concept, but terrible as a story telling device.

[@Snzn_7]

I actually really like it. I see people clowning on its portrayal of suicidal depressed people and their predicaments as just a "trashy garbage melo drama". But having some background psychology they portray it better than most shows. Since depressed people in most shows are quick to recover when the story beats goes to a more positive direction. Some dilemmas presented in Platinum End too a lot of people are but a trivial inconvinience. And that is true if you are a normal health person. But those trivial things are viewed more heavily by actual depressed people. The ideals of said depressed people are also not gonna do quivk 180s because again they have problems. Most suicidal and depressed people have a hard time in coping and adapting to situations that is why they feel lonely and feell they are being left behind. Just take a hikkikomori for an example. They are self aware that secluding themselves wont do them any good but, they have a hard time convincing themselves to touch grass because they are dealing with their own issues.

[@Jai137]

Honestly, if your god candidates are people who wanted to kill themselves, what other ending would you get except that God would just kill himself Having said that, what makes this worse is that the new God candidate didn’t just kill himself, but he destroyed the whole world in the process. Like a suicide bomber. I hear Geoff’s arguments on how it might have meaning, but I don’t see it.

[@Amitlu]

I also dislike the nihilism angle. But then the whole story seems to be annoyingly inevitable anyway considering the candidates were all 'suicidal' once. And as soon as the rest chose to put their own happiness first, humanity was doomed.

[@exaltedreverse4463]

@@Amitlu What is nihilism angle?

[@brandonlyon730]

@@Snzn_7 Personally I saw it as the author wasting my time, if you’re just going to make a story pointless then I don’t care what kind of message the author is telling I’m just pissed off I wasted my time watching a show that ends up becoming pointless in the end and in such a dumb way as well.

[@fallen_cookie]

The concept with using suicidal people could have worked so well,.... If he actually bothered to depict depression in any meaningful shape or form

[@frankwest5388]

It is also like really stupid according to the stated in universe logic The goal was to look for people that want to change the world. While most suicidal people definitely have issues, they are also not the kind of people you would assume have the desire for real meaningful change. If anything those are people that have given up on the world and don’t believe it could be better. Like give it to a politician or someone who is already trying to improve the world

[@AeonKnigh432]

You could have explored how each candidate has a different thing that drove them to that point, and have each person be fixated on that one problem and not considering the full scope, thus creating conflict. Maybe even have some arguments where certain characters are almost elitist about it, saying that the reasons of others were dumb or invalid. That way, you could actually give a reason why the person who gets picked in the end is the best choice, because they're able to learn from others and reflect and help. Or have a similar ending to the current one, emphasizing how someone who's already given up on life once would be likely to do so again (not something I agree with but it seems to be what the show is presenting), and that the game was inherently flawed by its very nature. I don't know, just do SOMETHING with it other than somehow managing to glorify suicide victims.

[@black-nails]

@@frankwest5388 that's a very simplistic way of thinking of suicidality and the world. A lot of people in power etc aren't there in order to change the world, but to uphold the status quo. Suicidality can be a result of giving up on yourself after not having energy to do anything or go on, which doesn't mean that they think the world cannot change or that there's nothing to fix, just that they don't have any power/ energy and don't want to keep themselves alive because of exhaustion (if it's depression that got them to that point). While people in such states would have a lot of typical mental distortions, even given power over things, there's also a whole sub section of suicidal people that have "passive suicidal ideation" and might not even look or act really depressed etc. There's just a lot that writers could've explored, none of it is black and white

[@frankwest5388]

@@black-nails I don’t deny that. It’s just that Jeff has said that the suicide survivors were chosen as the god candidates because as people that almost killed themselves, they have the most incentive to change the world. I said that this doesn’t hold up as a logical line

[@pinkfakecheez]

Exactly, as someone who's dealt with feeling swiss idol and who has a family history of sui and depression it feels extremely exploitative to target your manga towards su1cidal people and then conclude "well it's all a crapshoot anyway, you may as well become an hero (literally) because the smartest most powerful beings in the universe want to off themselves and so should you. Never mind the people who'll find you, they'll be traumatized but it's good that they are bc that will make them want to permanently go offline too and that's good. Anyway here's gratuitous shock art of multiple people doing the thing, but all life is sacred and mustn't be treated as some cheap thing yadda yadda anyway ciao!!!"

[@lightbrand_]

Finally I hear someone talk about how weird the portrayal of women was in specifically bakuman. Even as a teenager first reading the story, glasses dude’s girlfriend and eventual wife’s writing made me feel uncomfortable, their relationship felt really forced and unnatural. And the main character’s crush also was written in a weird way, literally having no personality whatsoever and being made into an end goal which is just really weird… I find it super odd that despite the many people that have talked about bakuman it’s the first time I even hear about this actually being a flaw, because it definitely is

[@Apocalymon]

The voice actress was a bland character & I felt the author's wife could've done better. Also the female author mangaka, was gimped

[@lightbrand_]

@@the_observer9786 it's bad because it's not saying anything in the narrative, there are a metric ton of anime, movies, games, etc that portray things that may or will make you uncomfortable. The difference is that those that do it right do it with a purpose, preferably a tasteful one. The goal may be to scare you, to make you think about a topic, or else. The issue with bakuman is that it doesn't do that, it just writes female characters as existing mostly for the male characters, which is weird and not how women are in real life... It honestly feels stupid that I even need to explain it. Point is, it makes people uncomfortable and that's bad in this case because the only thing it's saying is that ohba has outdated views on women, next time do a little thinking before making snarky remarks

[@-DA-ONE-]

@Brambles sorry bro but manga and real life are different that's why people are watching it every girls in manga don't need to act like all gutted badass girl because mainly boys watch this shit and they don't care about politics 🤣

[@lightbrand_]

@@-DA-ONE- wow, talk about a clown, look i could write paragraph after paragraph explaining to you why reality =/= realism, why this is not about politics at all but simply about good character writing and that female characters don't need to be badass warriors to be well written, that you thinking it's mainly boys that watch anime says a lot about you and how you should get outside of your social bubble, and that even tho there are more dudes watching anime that is by no means a reason to pretend women don't. But frankly I'm almost certain that you would not listen or care because unfortunately going from your comment I feel like I'm talking to a teenager that still needs to learn to think more critically about the things that he likes, realize that just because he likes them doesn't mean that its faults are excusable and honestly, that needs to talk to more women

[@-DA-ONE-]

@@lightbrand_ lmao teenager he said😂

[@redskared8093]

Ohba's women hating is something anime had to deal with forever. Of note, that thing you mentioned from Bakuman where Takagi says "women looking to be subservient to a guy are the smart ones" is actually changed in the anime to the still kind of odd but infinitely better "being able to be super well liked by everyone without being manipulative or really standing out is smarter than just being able to study"

[@nicbentulan]

IT’S A TRAP! THIS WHOLE THING IS A SETUP!! THIS IS ALL PART OF OBATA'S PLAN TO FRAME ME! ISN’T IT A LITTLE ODD THAT THEY HAVE SUCH HOT CHARACTERS LIKE GEVANNI IN DN AND MIYUKI AZUKI IN BAKUMAN BUT NO ONE REALLY IN PLATINUM END?? THIS PROVES IT’S A TRAP!!

[@MrGksarathy]

True, but he seems especially egregious, and his woman-hating seems to come straight from the '70s.

[@TywinLannister666]

Basically TLDR; he views the "perfect" woman as a "Christian Conservative Traditional Wife". To a tee. Its ridiculous how fucking pervasive that retarded-ass line of logic is in 2022.

[@KhayJayArt]

@@nicbentulanlol deal with it 🤣

[@nicbentulan]

@@KhayJayArt IT’S A TRAP! THIS WHOLE THING IS A SETUP!! THIS IS ALL PART OF OHBA'S PLAN TO FRAME ME! ISN’T IT A LITTLE ODD THAT THEY HAVE SUCH GREAT SERIES LIKE DN & BAKUMAN BUT NOT PLATINUM END?? THIS PROVES IT’S A TRAP!!

[@brianpack5479]

Ah, yes, Bakuman. The show where the idea of romance is "you're not allowed to even talk to me until your manga gets an anime adaptation, so wait for me."

[@airplanes_aren.t_real]

I've always hated when characters in "romance" stories do the "wait for me" thing Like they expect the other character to not look for any potential partners in favor of someone who will probably change so much during that waiting period that they become a different person entirely It also kinda feels like they own the other person, like they are in a relationship but only have the "you can't date anyone else or you're cheating" aspects without the "loving your partner" aspects that make cheating undesirable Some stories have been going for a "let's check up in 5 years and see if we like each other" approach which I have problems with but it's probably better than the first one

[@paulgibbon5991]

In fairness to that particular plotline (fairness the author may not actually deserve), it's called out in-story as being a rather silly grand romantic gesture, the characters and those around them regularly question if they should really stick to the promise or just get together and be happy, and there is another, more grounded romance subplot going on alongside it.

[@fordesponja]

It's a romantic idelization intended for an emotional impact, which can be powerful in that moment and also make their teen audience take very toxic ideas. Yeah, it's a very shitty condescending trope. The one I hate the most is the Imouto Sareba Li, I really like this cute quirky gifted girl who adores the very ground I walk into but I'm a jerk to her and push her away because I'm not as realized author as her and I don't want to be less than her in our relationship, oh sorry, "I'm not up to her". Like, fuck you dude, go post that shit to an incel forum.

[@GracieLizzy]

Not just that, but also "and also I'll be the seiyuu for your female lead, so even if you make it as manga artist and get a adaptation and I either don't make it as a seiyuu or do but don't end up on your show, or do end up on your show but not as the female lead then... ah well thems the breaks!"

[@musgodness]

@@airplanes_aren.t_real hi! Can you elaborate on the problems you have with the 5 year plan? Sounds interesting

[@bruh-we8gs]

Besides the women hating there was one scene in the manga that just RIPPED MY HEAD out of the little immersion I had left. Where they start talking about being gay and gay marriage? And the takeaway from the argument was "well if youre mean to people that hate gay people, youre just as bad because you arent being nice to them and accepting that its okay to hate gay people because people think differently!" I almost threw my fucking head through a window

[@lechungus1832]

Not everywhere is like america where that disgusting shit is accepted.

[@oscarorozcoorejel]

So the guy who wrote the closeted gay relationship with light and L said homophobe rights? Yeah makes sense

[@TheMightofDab]

I guess it's some take on the intolerance paradox

[@Sqwivig]

Lmao the fucking intolerance paradox 🤣😂

[@denniswilliams6519]

"How dare you not be tolerant of other people's intolerance!"

[@princessdyn]

Naomi was so heads and shoulders above her fiancé Ray Penbar in terms of detective skills it was painful. She basically solved Kira in one episode. The funniest part is the dialogue where Ray told her she will be a good little housewife after their wedding and she meekly went along with it. A real Naomi would laugh at the absurdity of his request after her years training and working as a kick ass FBI agent. Does she no longer enjoy her career? Did she forget what made her want to fight crime in the first place?

[@mishimaro5423]

The sad thing is, Japan is still very much entrenched in old values, like a good wife does not try to overshadow the husband. Hell, the current Empress of Japan was a former a diplomat, who suffered years of criticisms because she wanted to use more of her skills in her role as the the Princess Consort, instead of being passive.

[@ichigokage]

God just how Naomi was treated has me still so pissed. Raye didn’t do much of anything. Yet Naomi sussed out Light. The LA BB novel was so damn good. I wish we could see that animated.

[@duncanlutz3698]

There is also this ye olde timey sexism in Japan where women are expected to pick a career OR a family: they can't have both. To be a wife and not dedicate all your time towards serving your husband/kids means utterly failing at being a ~~slave~~ wife. And we can't have that! So whenever a women gets married, there is this implication she'll "know her place" and quit working.

[@ChangedMyNameFinally69]

What's funny is that Ray is American so I doubt he'd view it that way

[@mishimaro5423]

@@ChangedMyNameFinally69 Apparently his mother is Japanese. So depending on how much his mother is a "yamato nadeshiko" (the embodiment of an ideal Japanese woman), it's not too far out there that he would have such expectation on his future wife.

[@KaiseaWings]

Good to know the creative team haven't really improved on their inability to write female characters, nearly two decades later. At least in Death Note it was kinda _subtle_ ... like we had Naomi for an episode. Still forever mad that a grown woman would ever fall for Light's bullshit because what kinda _teenager_ gets to verify her credentials for a serial killer case *she deserved better-*

[@frannava7175]

Go read her novel then

[@Memelord-md5hs]

@@frannava7175 shouldn't have to read her novel for a good female character to actually have a good story where she isn't just shafted by the writer cause he Hates competent non submissive women

[@sarafontanini7051]

@@Memelord-md5hs OHba: HWAT'S THIS!? A competent, intelligent female charcter in MY story!? A briefcase full of fuck you should put a stop to this!

[@KaiseaWings]

@@Memelord-md5hs Exactly. The novel is fanfiction. Official fanfic but still fanfic, fix-it-fic for the original author's shortcomings. I'm fond of Death Note. I bought the Manga twice (after I ditched it and regretted it.) But it's something that's always rubbed me the wrong way. Halle is okay but like, still got accosted in her bathroom by a super genius just so we don't get _too_ comfy. To clarify, I love and respect fanfiction. It's just absolutely not the point.

[@frannava7175]

@@Memelord-md5hs what lol u would say even if he didn't have any female characters hih

[@Paego_]

I dropped this anime after the main character got red arrowed by main girl, and instead of that being an interesting plot point, they did nothing but wait the 33 days for it to pass. Literally nothing happened in that month, I actually laughed when it happened.

[@MrSecretSentai]

yeah i was reading the manga when that happened i believe it was the cliff hanger for the first volume I was like "Oh thats interesting cant wait to see what that means" and they did nothing with that in the next volume

[@naruske97]

Ikr! It was incredible in the worst way posible ,I was confused af

[@strife2746]

I do agree on that, another build-up with very little climax. But what did you yourself expect to see thereon after? What were you hoping would happen?

[@Paego_]

@@strife2746 there's potential for a lot of things. Maybe girl (I do not remember their names) would show some of her character in how she deals with having a lovesick puppy following her around. Maybe insight from guy how it feels to be shot with a red arrow and how it effects the mind. That way we have insight in how the victims of red arrows are effected in a more in depth level. Or just put in the ability to remove a red arrow if you were the one to shot it! Easy fix!!! Something other than a full month of empty days where nothing happens to the point we skip over it, just for the plot to immediately start up, like it was waiting for Guy to be in the clear. The way they handled it really took me out of the scene and actually made me laugh

[@sydneys207]

"As hot and steamy as a raw carrot". I--... That is a phrase, alright.

[@wildhunter939]

Genius level insult in my opinion

[@BrokenSIMGlasses]

timestamp pls

[@Kyotosomo]

Death Note and Bakuman are two of my favorite anime of all time so I had extremely high hopes for Platinum End fully expecting it to be another timeless classic...boy was that not the case.

[@Ferretlord87]

Same. I've watched both shows at least 3 times throughout how ever many years. Very sadge for Platinum End, I even had extra hype because it gave me vibes of the last manga made from Bakuman as well.

[@RKNancy]

What the heck man? Creating timeless series isn't that easy. You expected too much. However, Platinum end wasn't even a entertaining watch to pass time.

[@fitrifaris2592]

I don't think Platinum End is bad, more like intentionally bad just to see of people would defend as misunderstood masterpiece just because of the mangaka who created this trash

[@bubblytortilla]

Platinum end is certainly an anime

[@graphite7898]

Mistook Bakuman as Bakugan for a moment lmao

[@Estraneo]

As someone who checked out of Platinum End two volumes into the manga when I realized I just... couldn't anymore with whatever Ohba's damage when it comes to women is, I am genuinely intrigued by the nature of its ending. Not intrigued enough to make it through the rest of it, but enough that I appreciate hearing about it secondhand.

[@jamesjoe1690]

Mysogyny ruins any story for me, can't handle the cringe factor. Like Jeff said it doesn't detract from all the good stuff in a story but neither does the good detract from the bad.

[@ezachleewright2309]

Now i understand why the female characters in Death Note were usually annoying.

[@frannava7175]

What bad about ohba female characters

[@PeeperSnail]

@@frannava7175 Annoying, flat or character-less plot devices. Those are your only three choices for women in Oba's works.

[@LeDracodon]

Until today, I thought Misa was a character with flaws not just how obba sees women.

[@Drilling4mana]

Foreign characters in the Monogatari series: - Dramaturgy - Episode - Guillotine Cutter - Kiss-Shot Acerola Orion Heart-Under-Blade MY GOD HE'S RIGHT

[@crushermach3263]

This **could** relate to how Japanese names are chosen. Nearly every one has a clear and defined meaning. This is as opposed to Western naming where the majority of them feel like they're only names because of tradition.

[@somedragonbastard]

@@crushermach3263 most do have meaning but people only started caring again kinda recently

[@noukan42]

@@crushermach3263 not true at all, most of them have meaning(my own is very obvious for example because of Oscar Wilde) , it's just that often those meaning are in Latin, Greek or Hebrew, and most people don't know those languages anymore.

[@jakelibiran8411]

Let’s not forget ‘Deathtopia Virtuoso Suicide-Master’. That is a real name in the series.

[@crushermach3263]

@@noukan42 Oh, I know. What I mean is except for the odd name here or there you'd have to look at some kind of specialized name etymology website to know its meaning. With Japanese it's pretty clear most of the time even without those resources.

[@sugarcoatedslaughterhouse4937]

It’s always nice to hear from an anime reviewer who genuinely reads into the issues that come with certain authors’ outlooks. You can’t always separate art from the artist, especially when the artist puts so much of their own…. uh… hot takes? Into their work. Ohba’s work has been formative to how I view and interact with art, Death Note was absolutely huge for me when I first read it, and has never stopped influencing my art. That said, his misogyny is inseparable from his work, and addressing it is necessary. Keep up the great work, Jeff!

[@npcimknot958]

Eh.. free speech.

[@iusethisnameformygoogleacc1013]

TBH, I don't think this is even the kind of thing where separating the art from the artist is even applicable. This wasn't ad hominem attacking the work for who Ohba is in his spare time, it was a criticism of elements present in the work and the author's entire oeuvre. Like...I don't hate Lovecraft because he would scream at interracial crowds on the street, but I do hate the absolutely insane levels of racism levelled at everyone from African Americans to Italians which is present in everything he wrote.

[@12thLevelSithLord]

@@npcimknot958 Free speech has fuck all to do with criticism of art, my dude. He's obviously free to have his beliefs and put them into his work. That doesn't make them free from criticism.

[@nevergonnagiveyouup1180]

@@npcimknot958 our free speech to criticize it as well.

[@somedragonbastard]

​@@npcimknot958 free speech protects you from the government not from anime youtubers

[@ZANcomix]

Thank you for calling out Ohba's blatant misogyny. And his generally shitty character writing. Fucking. FINALLY.

[@nicbentulan]

Guess there was no trap after all? I was thinking like IT’S A TRAP! THIS WHOLE THING IS A SETUP!! THIS IS ALL PART OF OHBA'S PLAN TO FRAME ME! ISN’T IT A LITTLE ODD THAT THEY HAVE SUCH GREAT SERIES LIKE DN & BAKUMAN BUT NOT PLATINUM END?? THIS PROVES IT’S A TRAP!! But I guess no trap really huh? Or what?

[@KhayJayArt]

@@nicbentulan even Death Note and Bakuman had misogynistic writing.

[@nicbentulan]

@@KhayJayArt What about the art? IT’S A TRAP! THIS WHOLE THING IS A SETUP!! THIS IS ALL PART OF OBATA'S PLAN TO FRAME ME! ISN’T IT A LITTLE ODD THAT THEY HAVE SUCH HOT CHARACTERS LIKE GEVANNI IN DN AND MIYUKI AZUKI IN BAKUMAN BUT NO ONE REALLY IN PLATINUM END?? THIS PROVES IT’S A TRAP!!

[@Hello-hello-hello456]

Yeah, and death note's writing is over-dramatic if you ask me...not to mention how the female characters are used only as plot devices and never treated as actual characters...yuck

[@samuraijosh1595]

@@KhayJayArt DN didn't feature misogyny. Calm it down.

[@xanaviii]

Your explanation of the problem with Mirai's pacifism was perfect. His pacifism itself is not a problem--the extreme contrast to the situations he was presented was. His refusal to kill someone actually let's other people die...and inaction when you have the power to do so, is often argued to be tantamount to being complicit in killing someone. So by not killing someone, he's actually still killing people...meaning he's ultimately tarnishing his own happiness anyways. At least killing Metropoliman would be a one and done. Not killing him, meant an indefinite number and definitely more guilt.

[@poseidonson13]

It's also telling that Mirai believe he would feel guilt over killing Metropoliman, but gives 0 f*cks when Hajime dies protecting him. Apparently death only makes you unhappy if you pull the trigger!

[@SomeRandomJackAss]

The only good way to write a character like that is by basically ripping off Batman, tbh.

[@solidt9626]

I disagree that not killing someone who's about to kill people would be the same as killing them yourself. That person who's going to kill people is still making the choice to do it, not the person who doesn't have the strength of character to act in defense of others.

[@PhenomsServant4]

@@SomeRandomJackAss You know funny enough I remember in the Injustice comics Superman even calls Batman out on his how his refusal to kill Joker resulted in so many unneccesary deaths that couldve been saved and Batman not only agrees with him but admits he thinks about it all the time.

[@PresidentJackBauer]

@@solidt9626 this is in so many stories it's infuriating. They put accountability on the hero for not saving everyone or in saying cases, like Dragonball or Spider-Man, act as if their mere existence brings about tragedy. Like the villains don't have any agency and wouldn't be doing what they were doing if the protagonist didn't exist. Most of the time, the villain doesn't even know about the protagonist until they show up to stop them.

[@galesturms]

The fact they cut out the very strange argument about gay people from the anime is the cherry on top. Went from a fun trash show that devolves every episode to unbearably ugly and lame.

[@Kidassassin109]

What? What was the argument about? Im so confused

[@kingdarious9244]

Wait what argument?

[@aobasuzukaze1032]

@@Kidassassin109 it's less about argument but as a self insert for the author to be homophobic as fuck iirc

[@mig6789]

@@Kidassassin109 The author doesn't like gay people, so he inserts an argument in the manga where his "side" wins to reassure himself. Pretty pathetic

[@MusicoftheDamned]

@@aobasuzukaze1032 That's super ironic given how gay Light comes off in _Death Note_ without any real in-story comments about it, and I say this as someone who doesn't "ship". Then again, maybe that fits with Light being the villain (protagonist).

[@JoaoVitor-ge4le]

as someone who met way too many people who tried to base their entire personalities on L from death note, i can at least appreciate how the shut-in, antissocial genius is not being shown as a hot boy, because real people who act like that are the absolute opposite of hot, and i can say that from personal experience.

[@attilamert6973]

L is still a lil cutie tho

[@guggelguggel7491]

Allegedly L wasnt even meant to be hot, so its probably a course correction

[@boardcertifiable]

​@attilamert6973 if you find Momo hot I suppose. :/

[@youtube-kit9450]

@@guggelguggel7491 Iirc L was supposed to be off putting and creepy, but because he basically drew him still as a bishie with eyeliner and scraggled hair, it didn't work out at all. Makes sense he wouldn't notice he made a male character attractive considering how he views homosexuality or homophobia.

[@MahoganyBlack]

“Their love affair is as hot and steamy as a raw carrot”. That’s one hell of a quote 🤣👏

[@Ramsey276one]

Almost dropped my phone XD

[@chazjohannsen]

Saki would get better action from a raw carrot than from what Mirai could offer.

[@Hawkatana]

I forget where I read it, but there was a manga by Ohba where he wrote a character explaining why homophobia apparently doesn't exist because... (checks notes) it exists on a societal level, meaning it's okay for individuals to hate gay people where another character has to explicitly say how smart she apparently is in what I can only describe as some Ben Garrison-tier wall-of-text shit? Yeah, the guy's WEIRD sometimes.

[@oddsamurai1]

That manga you're talking about is Platinum End lol but I think it was removed from the anime so at least the director knew this shit was Ohba talking out of his ass and not worth including.

[@lhumanoideerrantdesinterne8598]

Wait what ?! I'm not surprised at Ohba being homophobic but that "argument" is wild. I didn't get far into Platinum End, but does anyone know the chapter this comes from ? I want to read it out of morbid curiosity.

[@oddsamurai1]

@@lhumanoideerrantdesinterne8598 I went to skim through this cringe again just so you can see it by yourself, it's chapter 45

[@lhumanoideerrantdesinterne8598]

@@oddsamurai1 Thanks. Claiming that gay people aren't oppressed on a societal level is... bold but the blank stare followed by "she's got a point" as a reaction are what makes it so juicy.

[@dontpickonme]

@@oddsamurai1 I checked it out, seems like Ohba (or the character, but let's be honest, she's an Ohba woman, so no) makes the argument that the only type of oppression is systemic oppression, and gay people aren't subject to systemic oppression, then concludes that argument with "legalize gay marriage, then call me homophobic." So, just to state it plainly, the argument seems to be: gays aren't discriminated against, they can't even get married.

[@YikYakTikTak]

The series has a massive conceptualization vs execution problem. The ideas and themes it poses are intriguing, but the execution of them are so poor that it makes those ideas MORE confusing. It supports, detracts, validates and invalidates so improperly that, by the end, it felt like it ended right where it began. It genuinely felt, to me at least, that little was accomplished by the stories end.

[@issoulescondes3913]

The authors : Let's make a manga where we conceptually fight nihilism Also the authors : Let's make nihilism win

[@bthsr7113]

@@issoulescondes3913 Yeah, I feel the ending is just not as deep as Jeff sees it.

[@massgunner4152]

​@@issoulescondes3913is like the epilogue of mirai nikki but the author of thar actually had the decency leaving it in the open wether Deus ex machina actually gives up on looking for a succesor or not.

[@FerraticaTheBard]

"I wouldn't call it bad writing." You're right, it's not - it's something much worse than bad writing: boring writing.

[@carbodude5414]

I like how even the female characters with actual careers have to be in a lower position to their husbands/lovers in this mangaka's works because he's just _that_ insecure over the idea of women being the breadwinners

[@nielsjensen4185]

It has less to do with how insecure he is and more to do with how insecure ideological Conservatism as a cultural phenomenon is. Everyone in ideological Conservatism see themselves as superior or inferior to others. Since men have a larger role in ideological Conservatism women are seen as inferior to men. Therefore a man should be more economically stable than a woman when in a relationship else his role is now inferior to her's and her's is superior to him. Asia is generally ideologically Conservative and the only place more ideologically Conservatism than Japan is China. Even the Left-wing party in Japan is objectively just barely within the center of the Left-Right spectrum to the Right side.

[@SomeRandomJackAss]

@@nielsjensen4185 That's a delicate way of saying "JAPAN".

[@nielsjensen4185]

@@SomeRandomJackAss Nom you can find a similar dynamic in cultures and sub-cultures with an ideologically Conservative belief. The main part of the US 'home-wife' culture can be found within ideologically Conservative cultures. Any religious country has this as well due to how monotheistic religions are centred around a male-coded diety, which gives the males of that society an inherent greater value. Etc. Making this a Japan-only thing would be extremely bigoted.

[@SomeRandomJackAss]

@@nielsjensen4185 I'm not saying it's a Japan-only thing. I'm just saying that your explanation of why it's in this story is because it's a prevalent worldview in Japan, the country the series creator is from.

[@nielsjensen4185]

@@SomeRandomJackAss While you're correct in that you never said it you still expressed that was what I meant. And in order to find the causal origin of a social behaviour you have to perspectivise it to the history of the area it originates in then you see if there are similarities with other social spheres or if this is a unique thing to the area or if similar things can be found within other cultures. If there are similarities you then go into what those similarities are and then you further investigate those. You're doing the same categorical error as so many other people do in order to justify believing in something they suddenly realise subconsciously is really bad that I'm making a rash determination based on a single instance rather than having to look at the similarities of what creates those systems in order to find the causal origin. Yes, it's common in Japan. That's pretty evident from anyone who accepts reality. How come it's prevalent? THat should be the real question. And once you ask that you start looking if there are any similarities with other cultures. And there is, this worldview in most of Asia with the exception of SK and the younger generation. Okay, how come this belief is less prevalent amongst younger generations. Are there any similar events that can be used for comparison? Yes, there is. The same thing happened in the Western world in the 70s. What happened there? Women got a larger degree of economic freedom and were now more equal to men instead of having to settle. This would be implied to make them inferior to the superior men. Then you go all the way back along the chain to see if this is also applicable to what's seen in Japan. You check if there are other possible causal issues to this superior/inferior dichotomy. You see there's none, and then you reach a conclusion that sounds incredibly hastily thought out to people who would really like you to be wrong since if you're correct then they would "be the baddies" and no one is the baddies of their personal narrative.

[@JohnHill]

you killed it, there really isn't anyone who says the things i like to hear as much as you do in terms of anime commentary.

[@Skimmy404]

He is in his mother's basement. It's the best place to contemplate bad anime and manga. Keep it going, Mr. Basement

[@eligreene9246]

Yeah I agree with you. I didn't like how it all started in the first episode.

[@eligoldman9200]

Couldn’t agree more. He’s really doing a fantastic job.

[@Hello-hello-hello456]

I've really grown to like his content, too

[@rootbourne4454]

He’s always very level headed and rational in his criticisms and doesn’t buy into sensationalized outrage clickbait like many other KZbinrs like him!

[@DetectiveOlivaw]

The ending of this sounds… wild. I feel like your interpretation of it would be vastly more charitable than mine, because alien god-entities wanting to kill themselves as the punchline to a whole story about suicidal people being chosen for a competition to try and save the world, only for their chosen god to commit suicide himself because he can’t take the omniscience and inaction, is… a choice! Heck it’s a whole series of choices!

[@sarafontanini7051]

a choice I shan't be making in my own writing because I'm not a nihilisitc asshole

[@Redheart709]

as soon as i read the ending i was already pissed off from all the previous stuff before it (during the final confrontation between mirai and author self insert, it kept pausing the debate to show that literally every member of the audience agrees with the author self insert guy bc he's so correct about literally everything) and i finally get to the ending and im like wow so it all meant nothing and was pointless

[@DetectiveOlivaw]

@@sarafontanini7051 I’m not even sure it’s empty nihilism! Geoff makes a very compelling case for his interpretation. But I just can’t get over a story about overcoming suicide and the sanctity of life ending with several different layers of God wanting desperately to kill themselves! And I gotta trust my gut on this one

[@SomeRandomJackAss]

@@DetectiveOlivaw Read Karmen by Guillem March for a better story about how suicide isn't the answer. I know it isn't weeb shit, but if anything comparing it to this just goes to show how "Japan just does everything better" isn't even remotely true.

[@eliasmg9144]

The show really pulled off an infinity war and failed

[@faves633]

"The kind of raw chemistry you can only get from the man who wrote Misa Misa" Love you for pointing this out. I re-watch Death Note sometimes- and then have to relive all my repressed memories of that abortion of a character. She's the adult version of the annoying kid constantly featured in children's productions.

[@attilamert6973]

Misa Misa is meant to be written like that tho

[@Gloomdrake]

​@@attilamert6973 that doesn't make her any more tolerable

[@MrGksarathy]

For me, Takada is the bigger offender because at least Oba tried to tell a story with Misa Misa's immaturity.

[@jondoe7036]

To me Misa's one of those characters I mostly just feel bad for due to how the story (and Light) treats her.

[@youtube-kit9450]

Eh. Imo, Misa Misa was supposed to be the vapid insane Kira fangirl we see literally for real serial killers (seriously, real life is insane). Imo, Misa Misa only becomes problematic because Ohba can't write women well for shit so it's clear she's probably that way because he's a rampant misogynist.

[@cantrip7]

Platinum End is baffling to me. Been hate watching it with friends. How can you make a wonderful thriller like DN and end up committing all the sins of its too-edgy imitators? Also, why does the author seemingly hate every character that isn't a sexy adolescent?

[@murderman8578]

Why not hate

[@casteanpreswyn7528]

I mean, the answer is obvious, right?

[@1WEareBUFO1]

Yes , i think we all know the answer

[@Snzn_7]

Too edgy. Platinum End is like the direct opposite of edgy.

[@marocat4749]

Not fun enough? Like future diary honestly, its trashy, but its fun (and has actual good female character, i mean yuno is a charactr to remember, and trrst woman actually has a whole arc for herself that makes sense why she settles domestic down and empowers her. And the cult girl, is too hort in th original but actually interesting and likable and a character ith agency or lack of due trauma Sriously why did he adopt all that elements from edgy but fun serie an is trying to be deep? Even code geass needed to be incredible fun to work.

[@BuzzabeelYT]

The red arrow had a lot of potential. Is Mirai’s love for Saki even real? They waited out the time limit, but he was still forced to feel love for her for 33 days. Mirai was perfectly fine with it because he already had a crush on her, but a protag who was NOT fine with being backstabbed by their crush could’ve carried the whole show with what was real about how he felt and what wasn’t. The entire genre could’ve turned to horror very fast.

[@Hello-hello-hello456]

Wow, what you described in one paragraph was infinitely better than the entire show. They could have gone with this angle, but that requires some nuance which the story can't handle.

[@blackharmonics4518]

@@Hello-hello-hello456 Yeah and it probably needs a well written female character to actually deliver this. Most of the female characters here were just... puppets.

[@Hello-hello-hello456]

@@blackharmonics4518 Exactly. And for that to ever happen, the author needs to...NOT see women as one-dimensional in real life 😂

[@blackharmonics4518]

@@Hello-hello-hello456 Yep. We should train him. 😂

[@fearanger1]

Oh good it's another "Everything still sucks and nobody's making it better so let's just reset everything and hope for the better" story, a reach so nihilistically self-centered that even if it comes from a good place, it immediately invalidates the fact that people do dedicate themselves to actually improving things for other people, no matter how small that may be in the grand scheme of things. Also the fact that it comes around bc a suicidal teenager was chosen to become god by a bunch of other suicidal people and the new god literally couldn't handle the weight of it all is... somewhat fucked, to be blatantly honest.

[@cadethumann8605]

Then again, considering how messed up our societies have been (like the U.S. having nothing but pathetic presidents after another regardless of party and all of these political tensions), maybe we do deserve to collapse and start anew. That's what happened to Rome, where it fell until new societies formed.

[@fearanger1]

@@cadethumann8605 I'm moreso talking about assholes who think the state of the world is so bad we should just nuke everything and start over from there. But if we're talking about scrapping the system and state entirely? Maybe, as long as aforementioned assholes aren't the ones making changes from then on.

[@m_e_nere]

@@cadethumann8605 collapse of a society is not the way to make things better. Have you heard of reform?

[@cadethumann8605]

@@m_e_nere Please forgive my irritation and impulsiveness. Sometimes (or a lot of times perhaps), when I'm frustrated of current events and I happen across various sorts of conspiracy theories (ex. the theory that the U.S. will end like Rome), I have negative fantasies (thankfully, none involve anything tangible like plotting a murder). Deep down, I want the world to improve peacefully.

[@cadethumann8605]

@@m_e_nere I also confess that, in a way, I sometimes post my frustrations to get attention. Not in the trolling way for shallow amusement but to find someone outside the crazy political sphere to hopefully talk sense to me. I am a sad, strange little man. And I need no pity.

[@johnwebb2736]

Funny enough, that episode where the female FBI agent died was the moment where I dropped the show for a while. I was so excited to see her become a major character, search for Kira to avenge her husband and how Kira would deal with her, knowing that she was totally on to him, or Light might even feel guilty for killing her husband solely to protect himself and start to question himself... But no, Kira manaqges to figure out her true name and kills her right before she can speak to L, and no one seems to even mention her after she dies and is never found. Also, in the following episode, L immediately picks up on where she left off so her death was even more pointless, just to rub salt on the wound.

[@erihtea0719]

Great point with how she’s almost never mentioned after she died. At least L knew she wasn’t the type to commit suicide. If anything, it only showed how cruel and manipulative Light could truly be.

[@shonbera5246]

​@erihtea0719 it also displayed that Light's cause was no longer about "justice" per say, but more so he will also kill anyone who's trying to pursue him.

[@jondoe7036]

I mean L doesn't quite pick up where Naomi left off, as due to Naomi's death it took till the Yotsuba arc for L to learn that Kira can kill with means other than heart attacks (as Light had made a point of it to not use other means of death frequently and visibly enough to let people know he could do that), which Naomi managed to deduce thanks to her conclusion that the buss hijack scenario was a setup by Kira for figuring out her fiancee's name and she was the only one to know both Kira and her fiancee were on that bus.

[@runnerupoftheoldworld]

The 'Light easily getting Misora's real name by manipulating her' reminds me of how Death note's female characters are almost always portrayed as emotional. Halle Lidner, one of the SPK members is an a exception, but in death note 13, her emotional strength stat is set as lower than Gevanni's, who was in my opinion the most emotional of the SPK.

[@nirman423]

The whole symbiotic/parasitic god-human relationship is a definitely interesting idea but it's more well handled in Small Gods by Sir Terry Pratchett.

[@Hello-hello-hello456]

Yes! Platinum end has some concepts that sound cool on paper, but the actual execution makes me cry

[@Inlelendri]

Exactly, and in Hogfather, too, the nature of belief. If I may quote: HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.

[@patroka]

I AM SO GLAD SOMEONE CALLED OUT THE BEGINNING OF THE BAKUMAN MANGA LIKE THAT, I found that really shocking when I stumbled on it a few years ago, and I'd never seen anyone properly address it.

[@MikaKahdarmon]

@Tin Watchman Read the pages from 21:29 to 21:44 , they’re from Bakuman. Maybe you see the problem.

[@paulgibbon5991]

For me, it was just so random and so little to do with how any of the characters concerned act afterwards, that it never really registered as part of the story.

[@zerofox641]

Ya I loved that manga when I was in middle school/high school. But rereading it as an adult those soapbox moments are really out of place and weird. Like there was NO NEED to just go off on some rant about how women need to stay in their place and “she’s only smart bc she got them hood genes” I still love Bakuman but good god someone please go give Ohba a hug bc the guy clearly needs some love, and therapy

[@paulgibbon5991]

@@zerofox641 The funny thing was, a supporting character in Bakuman was a shut-in who gets painfully confronted with the fact that he doesn't know how to relate to women who aren't being paid to be nice to him and whose manga takes a turn for the weird and sexist after he realises that....so there's clearly a degree of self-awareness there.

[@JT5555]

@@MikaKahdarmon the saddest part is that those aren't even just the ideals of the guy the wrote it: it's *VERY* common in japan for women to be seen as weak and submissive so that kind of talk is likely nothing new.

[@barzombi7043]

Honestly, while I absolutely love that you tried to defend the end of... Well, Platinum End, the only thing I could do during the end of the manga was laugh like a madman. Like... They elect as God the only guy who's still suicidal after all this, and he commits God-suicide. How surprising. Couldn't have seen this coming. No Sir. I just couldn't stop laughing.

[@android19willpwn]

in a way, it highlights how it's really easy to get lost up your own ass in philosophical debate and reason yourself blind to things that are glaringly, obviously true to anyone who hasn't just spent the last hour in highly abstracted discussion and practical relativism. Especially when you've got one particular horse in the race that you're really committed to preserving and are willing to start compromising on everything else to preserve.

[@Antoine893]

To be fair, it was one of the options they considered for a while: commit suicide and let God die. Nobody really cared what happened to the god position, Mirai just wanted everyone to be happy, Yoneda wanted to know stuff and Nakaumi wanted to help Yoneda (he was still shot with the red arrow when he became god). I don't even think anybody though that god dying would mean all form of life would be wiped out.

[@thuranz2773]

@@Antoine893 Angels probably should've provided them with the terms and conditions. Also, maybe instead of selecting suicidal candidates, they should've selected people who are actively trying to make the world a better place as humans. That would've made for a better starting premise.

[@hendeyjagger7489]

@@thuranz2773 They chose those people because they have less will of life and that makes them easier to absorb

[@youtube-kit9450]

ngl, them choosing the suicidal dude as god and the dude does fuck all but ponder for 6 years and then just kill himself was such complete mood whiplash that I thought I had drunk too much, and the second time I heard it, I nearly pissed myself laughing.

[@c-puff]

Can we all just agree that the best "no kill" protagonist anime ever had was Vash the Stampede? We're all in agreement of that, right?

[@GoldenPincers]

Himura Kenshin is up there, as well (after Trust & Betrayal, ofc)

[@ptero93]

Edward elric

[@crimsonao7714]

Yes

[@tentales10]

@@GoldenPincers One lives a life of Love and Peace, makes that promise and breaks it once. the other has a Major League body count, makes that same promise and keeps it. You be the judge.

[@luckyowo7641]

Thorfinn after prologue too

[@SalinaMoonfall]

The duality of its philosophy is painful, on one hand, yes it does present some interesting and thought-provoking ideas on life, mortality, and so on... On the other, it's ending far too easily can be summed up as "You made a kid with a suicidal mindset god...and it went about as well as one might expect".

[@ButterflyScarlet]

Honestly I just do not understand how no one saw this coming? And also apparently therapy and mental health services don't exist in Japan I guess??? You isolated an already suicidal and murderous child, forced them to be witness to the atrocities and horrors of the entire world for 6 years, and expected what exactly? The entire anime ends with every important character dead, the 'surviving' ones wishing for death, and this is supposed to be profound...why?

[@nessbot7572]

@@ButterflyScarlet To be fair there is a lot more stigma towards mental illness and the idea of getting therapy in Japan than there is in, say, America. This is partially why the suicide rate in Japan is so high since issues that could be solved with help early on often aren't. That still doesn't make the story any less dumb, mind you, if someone's WHOLE FAMILY dies that seems like a pretty good reason for them to get some kind of help, and it's not like mental health services don't exist in Japan at all??

[@kylenayolfa4562]

I got my sister into death Note and Fullmetal alchemist brotherhood. She asked about platinum's end since she heard the death note creators made it. I told her simply " imagine a show where a majority of the cast is Misa Misa" She thinks me for wasting my time too stop her from watching it

[@Ellisepha]

In my opinion, what i noticed about both Death Note and Platinum End is that the author writes about a symptom of society, as if it were the disease itself. In DN it's crime. DN criminals are always ugly and shitty people, who do crime because they get a power trip from it or think they're above the people they threaten, rob or kill. On the other hand, the story wants to tell us that these same people simply stop doing this as soon as Kira becomes a phenomenom. In reality, crime is not that simple. Humans are complex in their emotions, thinking and acting. Poverty plays a role in it. Culture plays a role in it. Laws also play a role in it. Does Kira judge every person according to their country's criminal law? Or does he just go after what he was taught is right? Is Kira free of bias? Light is still not an omnipotent god who can see everything everyone everywhere is doing all the time. His only way of finding out about crime is through news reports. Also not all countries give out the full name of a criminal (at least in my country, they only give the Initial of the first name). What about people who were wrongfully convicted? The police force is not without fail, how can he know for sure that someone who's been sitting in jail for 10 years because they allegedly murdered someone is actually guilty? And what about people in power and rich people, who use loopholes to cheat the system and hurt other people doing that? Not to mention that the death penalty does not actually lower crime rates. People who plan on committing crime always think that they will not be caught, no matter if the punishment is lifelong jailtime or death. So the idea that Kira's existence lowers the amount of crime commited, when his persecution is not 100% accurate, does not work all around the globe, and does nothing to address the *actual* causes of crime, is not realistic even for a supernatural thriller story. And the same can be said about Platonum End and Suicide. People don't just commit suicide because they want to, there's lots of different factors to it, partially the same as for crime. Poverty, social status, culture, personal relationships, there's so many things that are involved. I mean, the beginning of the main character's story already showed it. So the fact that at the end, the god candidates are okay with the acceptance of suicide and NewGod's own subsequent suicide... it kinda rubs me the wrong way. Watching this video made me realize that the writer seems to not see heavy subjects such as these as nuanced, but just a part of life. A part, which he sees as a problem, yes, but doesn't really explore. This only get supported by the Bakuman manga sites you showed. I am all for flawed characters and I would be on board with Platinum End's story, if only there was a bit more social commentary put into it. A bit more thought about *why* these things which are problems for society, exist, and how to find a solution to it. And then also show why a teenager with a god complex may not find them. Edit: Holy fuck I took time to actually read those Bakuman pages at around 21:00 minutes. That pretty much confirms all my weird feelings I got from the writing. Ouba seems to realize that there is a societal hirarchy and wants to write stories about societal problems. However, since he believes and supports said hirarchy, it cannot be the cause for said problems. So he just... never explores its roots. Oh my fucking god. And that from the writer behind Death fucking Note! Imagine how much even better his stories could be if he tried to analize his own bias! Wow I don't even know what to say about this!!!

[@rockCity777]

Welcome to understanding the political ideology of 'conservatism'.

[@BushidoBrownSama]

the criminals don't know how they are killed only that crimes put them in the crosshairs, a painful seemingly supernatural death dramatically changes the risk reward equation that goes into crimes

[@cadethumann8605]

In fairness about Death Note, the protagonist is not framed as morally right and is even shown to be immature deep down. He is a narcissist who convinces himself he is doing right when in actuality, he is not above the law. Not only does he kill innocent people for either being after him or being in the way, he is even shown killing "criminals" who have reformed (i.e. those two characters who assisted the task force hunting down Higuchi, the corrupted businessman. Plus, Light killed off the rest of those businessmen even though they wanted nothing to do with Higuchi's wrongdoings). In fact, Near gives a speech as to why Light is not morally just (its more detailed in the manga itself).

[@cadethumann8605]

BTW, OP, I just want to say that I do like your analysis regardless. Talking about the complexities of what makes up criminals and how it is not black and white does paint a picture as to why it would be problematic to attempt a culling. One thing I am curious about in regards to a what if, is what it would be like if someone like Kira were to instead target politicians and governments. Let's say Kira is frustrated with political systems, so he starts killing politicians. What would the consequences be? Power vacuums? Anarchy? Sometimes, stories about absolute power makes me wonder about possibilities and aftermaths.

[@Legacy0901]

That was always a problem I had with Death Note, there are a lot of ideas that are accepted at face value that come from such an immature perspective that it can be hard to take seriously at times. It's like being lectured about societies ills by a 14 year old who has incredibly limited life experience, where they know they are unsatisfied with the state of the world and draw a misinformed conclusion based purely on speculation about the outside world that comes from their shallow personal experiences

[@TheRealGuywithoutaMustache]

A part of me is glad that I never watched this anime, glad I actually listened to the criticism

[@genyakozlov1316]

Don't be a sheep.

[@polcumaku3546]

@@genyakozlov1316 how dare you talk back to our lord

[@tmck4138]

I watched up until metro man brought everyone to the stadium and tried to kill everyone. It’s not that good lol

[@exshadowkick5564]

It's garbage. Happy you didn't waste a bunch of hours from your life like how I did. I stg I seen soft core hentai that's better than this, "anime".

[@bravestant3921]

Watch it, it’s so bad it’s good. I never finished it, but each episode was worst than the last, and you could never see how stupid this anime is coming.

[@tyronechillifoot5573]

The manga kingdom has a lot a good dialogue for a action military strategy manga because you feel the tension were each political choice is made the weight of an entire civilization is placed onto it each plan feels like a do or die situation

[@bthsr7113]

If that's true, I'm glad. So many stories waste their potential to focus on what feels trivial by comparison.

[@marocat4749]

Ot it explores the philosophies of characters while its related to whats happening. But also its about how why they thingk their ideoplogy is better.I mean sometimes they have philosophial debates, but then as like in meetings and courtly opportunities aproviate. Or anime before battle monologues. But yes een i it has monologuing, its surrounding event, not the othr way round. And the politics and stategie are a really well done compromise, with realism but also anime fights to a degree, but a good grounding.

[@KarolOfGutovo]

K, you convinced me.

[@sarpius4710]

To be completely honest, I find the wars in the Kingdom absolutely boring, and the only reason I put up with them, is that the result of these wars furthers the political part of the story, which is phenomenal in every sense.

[@tyronechillifoot5573]

@@sarpius4710 nah the wars are the most interesting display of how the dialogue plays out

[@jksanrio]

This manga was written to be the opposite of death: - Protag who went power crazy vs protag who just wants peace - Grim reapers vs angels - Ending where things went back to the way things were vs ending where everything changed - killing done remotely vs killing directly done hands on - Poorly written female characters vs poorly…. Oh wait, that one stayed the same.

[@Ginger_Hrn]

- Best Performing vs Worst Performing. Yeah the manga/anime was almost complete opposite of death note

[@Hello-hello-hello456]

Almost seems like Ohba was insecure that he'd write something too similar to DN, so he chose to make everything the complete opposite

[@JohnHill]

The bit about the misogyny was very well written 😂

[@artingevondyan1613]

it was very cringe and inaccurate. As bad as this show seems the female characters Oba has made in the past were more interesting than your Typical Western female fantasy characters

[@Riboflav1n]

I literally thought this was Jonah hill for 3 seconds

[@nolanburke3669]

Agreed and I'm noticing that most people who unironically say that they like the show are ignoring it

[@verymelonman12]

Yeah, I knew Ohba had issues writing women but now it just seems like he's content being a massive misogynist. Platinum End really is the point where that and his other issues are exposed since he choose to write outside his wheelhouse.

[@seventeenseventythirteen7465]

I really liked the show despite all its flaws but I guess I wasn't paying enough attention to all that and holy yikes that was bad. Yeah I'll say the show has its obvious flaws but it's good for dumb fun edgy battle royal but with more Death Note diet philosophy. Also, Metropolyman's death was probably my favorite death scene ever. It's the most satisfyingly awesome shit watching him beg and die like that in slow motion. Just torn to bits by that big ass gun fired by a dying cancer patient. It's probably the panicle of dumb edgy fun in anime. Although yeah the misogyny is super bad, worse than I thought.

[@AriesArchives6045]

You know, if you just treat the the ending as it's own thing and pretend rest of the story doesn't exist, you'd have quite the manga one-shot on your hands.

[@lorenzocassaro3054]

Nah, it looks like something straight out of Im14andthisisdeep

[@AlphaOmega1237]

I'd argue that the ending makes all the edginess ESPECIALLY pointless mainly because of how the world ended. It was entirely preventable and easily foreseeable even within the overly convoluted and nonsensical setup it received. That convoluted and nonsensical setup just makes it worse, and that's not even mentioning how the last second twist just further reinforces the idea that the end of the world was meaningless as it didn't even help the overgods achieve their goal either. That final twist was just unnecessary. The theme is broken because world didn't end because of forces beyond all control. It ended because no one (including the angels and previous God) realized that letting the most suicidal kid in the world become the one entity holding it all together was an unfathomably stupid idea and everyone involved was too selfish to take up the mantle to protect the people they loved from complete annihilation. For this theme to work, the tragedy should not be easily preventable and probably shouldn't be so grandiose as the end of the world. These things cheapen the message.

[@mattsherlock9636]

How about the this, new God dies, the competition starts up again, and the lesson is not our world is meaningless but that as much as we may think we want to omniscient we really don't. The responsibility of all of that knowledge and power is too much anyone person to have or handle. And so the cycle begins again, and again, because it turns out this happens every couple of years.

[@solidt9626]

But what if the ending is the message? That ppl these days are too selfish to take up the mantle of "God", so much so that they'd allow a suicidal 13 yr old to take their place, even when the choice to prevent this end was so simple, and everyone involved could tell what was gonna happen, yet they would still rather push that responsibility onto a child who can't clean his own room.

[@AlphaOmega1237]

@@solidt9626 People are selfish. Woo, great message. Totally makes you think. I haven't heard that one practically a million times before. Something I'd like to clarify is that this sarcastic quip is meant for Platinum End instead of you personally. This story is such a train wreck from start to finish. I thoroughly disagree with the idea that this show handles its themes well. They're built on a foundation of contrived BS, and the story actively hampers its own themes at every opportunity.

[@AlphaOmega1237]

@@mattsherlock9636 I think that would just cause people to realize that the position is a death sentence and refuse to take part completely. Might be an interesting place to take the story.

[@mattsherlock9636]

@@AlphaOmega1237 I said any "one" person. Maybe if the next group think "maybe we can rule together" it could be different. after dealing with the selfish ones who refuse to consider sharing their power.

[@-datrandomdude-6979]

Kazuchika Kise wasn't the only director on it, he was only directing the second half. The first half was done by Hideya Takahashi, who directed Keijo!!! and is one of the two director of Jojo Part 5.

[@mothersbasement]

Thanks for the correction!

[@ptr4410]

Even he cant save that atrocity

[@PredictableEnigma]

Thanks that explains a lot

[@GinHindew110]

Just a clarification, Talk no Jutsu is specifically about making someone change their personal posture solely via talking, anything else is just regular talk

[@sarafontanini7051]

yeah talk no jutsu is basically just the protag solving the problem via a conversation, even when it makes no sense, feels anticlimatic and ignores what happened earlier.

[@carsfan1995]

So people attempting to talk in the comments section?

[@joyc.e.7511]

@@sarafontanini7051 Yeah, I can usually get behind talking problems out (especially if physical fighting won't solve anything), but some instances of talk no jutsu are incredibly nonsensical.

[@flow185]

@@sarafontanini7051 basically Undertale's ACT thing but in anime

[@nolanburke3669]

That or killing them by talking

[@tehawsumninja]

Oh man, I sure do love "Misogynist Loner Tells You Not to Commit Suicide by Making All the Main Characters People Who Committed Suicide and Giving Them Super Powers and Saying They Should Be God and Only Covering that Suicide is Bad and a Product of Our Society and We Should Change That Actually Only 2 Chapters Before the End" the manga

[@tyrant-den884]

Seriously: if Mirai was a Light Yagami/Seventh Doctor style plots within plots super genius _too make sure no one dies,_ that could have been really cool.

[@Nadia1989]

You got me at Seventh Doctor.

[@sarafontanini7051]

yeah that would've been way better, but then we wouldn;t have all our edgy death scenes and apaprently that's way more important than showing our hero is actually, yknow, comeptent and able to save the day

[@cosmicandy4620]

kinda wanna write that now but I don't think I am good enough to do a good job...

[@tyrant-den884]

@@cosmicandy4620 then you'll have to re-write it a lot.

[@cosmicandy4620]

@@tyrant-den884 I know. In fact, I would probably have to re-write 90% of it to even be decent, let alone good... I'm probably gonna just steal the good ideas from this for a orginal story

[@sdbzfan1]

The fact that a human who tried to kill himself becomes god kills himself because he realizes he wasn't the only person suffering and infact even more people suffer every moment and were in the same or similar place as him, thereby causing ragnarok, is something I will carry with me for as long as I live

[@starburst98]

It's funny, mirai nikki managed to kill everyone but also have the happiest ending of any death game thing I have seen. All the villains end up stopped and the heros gain recognition. The big cherry on top is that yuki and yuno are now both gods and they get to be together for the next billion years.

[@si-level]

mirai nikki is actually really great the more you read battle royale god candidate type manga

[@anti-special7059]

But the Yuno that survived wasn't a God right?

[@starburst98]

@@anti-special7059 it is explained in the manga, 3rd world yuno was still in love with yuki but she was much healthier mentally so she let him live his own life even it it meant she would be sad, but she was then given the knowledge and power of 1st world yuno, who is the one that broke the spacetime to break out yuki. So she has the knowledge of past yuno but the mindset of 3rd yuno, so she is able to love yuki the most. And since yuki has god powers of 2nd world he was allowed to keep them, so they both become the gods of 3rd world with the current deus simply giving them his position.

[@anti-special7059]

@@starburst98 yeah right. I watched it long ago. I forgot that she got the knowledge and memories of first world yuno lol

[@yandhi_6382]

Mirai is still the best BR anime Ive watched and I cant decide between Btoom or Darwins Game which I like better

[@Argusthecat]

I think what annoys me most about this show is that, like you said, a lot of the philosophy is really cool. Pacifism is worth striving for, accomplishment isn't the same as the person accomplishing, and the people who most try to accumulate power probably shouldn't have it. But, like... catgirl skinsuit ruins it for me?

[@Argusthecat]

Okay, I forgot to wait until the end. Holy shit, that got so much worse.

[@Kefkaesque13]

Yeah, I'm going to have to heartily disagree regarding the value of the series' ending. While the concept could potentially have served as an interesting short story if published standalone, the swerve into "cosmic depression" at the end of this longer series just makes me view everything that preceded it as having been utterly pointless. To me, it's not Homer rolling down a hill into a gymnast dismount, it's Homer roiling down a hill only for the planet to then blow up as soon as he comes to a stop.

[@Shadewaltz]

I always hate this kind of ending, it doesn't actually say anything profound. No, the six years of "real" happiness doesn't make up for suddenly, arbitrarily, for no fucking reason, no longer existing. Add to that that it's the shitty boring kind of cosmic horror that I just have to roll my eyes at.

[@sarafontanini7051]

yeah I gotta agree. ending the story with "rocks fall, everyone dies" isn't profound. at bEST its nihilistic. And as an optimist and someone who is in no way suicidal, I kinda have to call bullshit on a story that ends with "basically the only solution is for everyone to die". Fuck you, Oba. Fuck you with all of my fucks.

[@TheMidnightKarneval]

the reason it falls flat is because it's the basic premise people mistakenly take Nietzsche being for. The whole point of Nietzsche was that he saw the direction modernity was heading towards philosophically and came up with his ideology to argue AGAINST nihilism. It's like reading a philosophy thesis from someone that has only ever read memes about philosophy. It's dull, uninspired, and reads like and edgy 13 year old wrote it. The ending detracts from the story and makes it pointless to have watched.

[@Amy-yq4lk]

As much as a part of me always admires the kind of ballsiness it takes to just wipe out all life at the end, I would be very annoyed if it happened after a series that long. I went ahead and read the last chapter on it's own, and I liked it alright, but 50+ chapters to lead up to it? There's a VERY specific type of person who'll enjoy that, and even the one I know is probably not slogging through all the other bullshit to get there.

[@DolusVulpes]

I think the problem is that Platinum End already sort of feels like its trying trying be two very different shows at the same time, with the action survival game stuff and the philosophical mindgames being directly at odds with each other. Then along comes the ending, which feels like a third show has been stapled onto the very end, and the fact that third show is tonally more in line with Evangelion or Junji Ito's cosmic horror means that its addition is only more to the detriment of a show that already feels like it's having an identity crisis.

[@DarthJoshReturns]

I'm surprised you didn't mention the scene in the manga where the Influencer goes on a homophobic rant, justifies her homophobia by claiming "well, at least I don't murder people like Metropoliman," and the agent agrees with her.

[@DavidRichardson153]

Platinum End had what I thought was a slightly interesting opening premise, even if it felt like a knock-off of Death Note with a scoop or two of Future Diary and the like. That said, it was by the 4th episode that I was done with giving the series a chance. It certainly had potential, but it felt largely squandered.

[@Snzn_7]

Then you basically just saw the shell of Platinum End since you dropped it early on. Its the type of story that you thought you knew what the story about then the later half starts showing you the real deal. But since it is a polarizing show anyways you still might not like what the story is actually about.

[@DavidRichardson153]

@@Snzn_7 What I was seeing as far as underlying themes and messages went weren't bad, but how they were being conveyed just left me more confused than anything. Maybe the manga is better, but the anime just left me too bewildered. I have nothing against thought-provoking messages and themes in any media, but if you are not able to convey it sufficiently, then it ultimately does not matter if the show is polarizing or not. To me, it fell just short of being conveyed sufficiently, and while I tried to give it the benefit of the doubt and keep going, it just couldn't pass muster for me. It was just a mess to me - maybe an interesting mess, but the messiness was greater than the interest. Who knows, maybe later on, I'll come back and give it one more chance, but right now, it ain't happening.

[@checker297]

@@Snzn_7 I dropped the show on ep2. It was fucking shit. Any deeper meaning would be like finding deep meaning in a flat earther video. The rules setup at the start made any dialogue etc pointless. It would be like if in death note, light fully understood all the rules that applied to the book from the beginning and got the shinigami eyes for free from the start, plus ryuk actively helped him. It would have turned death note ep 1-25 into an absolute bomb.

[@InternetAddict069]

Thats why i read the manga At least the art was fcking A+

[@Scarleto]

My favourite part is where Yuri Temari instagram baddie goes on a rant in ch 45. "Gay men are hard to take, I'm tired of hearing about you talk about this other guy because it sounds super gay." "Bro, homophobic much?" "UH I'M INTERESTED IN MEN OKAY I'M NOT DISCRIMINATING AGAINST ANYBODY JUST CUS I LIKE MEN. Sheesh there's so much hysteria about discrimination this, bigotry that, UHG. Stop calling me a bigot Just Cus I Like Men (but not gay ones)! The next God should end that. Discrimination is SYSTEMIC ONLY like slavery or genocide or forcing me to accept any marriage proposal from anyone even if I don't like them, not me for having personal preferences. But yeah gay men are hard to take. Anyway if you're so mad why don't you legalize gay marriage, then maybe you can come for me." Then it ends with the guy she got all 'you sound gay shut up' on saying she has a point, as though the entire thing wasn't steeped in whataboutism, contradictions, and didn't begin with her shutting down a conversation because a guy was worrying about another guy ergo gay, ergo stop. It's so out of nowhere and makes zero sense LMAO Like damn someone sure is tired of getting called out, huh Ohba?

[@KarmaSpaz12]

The manga art is nice, but after hearing the analysis I'm glad I didn't pick this up. The poignant ending might work in a short story but not in something like this. I ended feeling bad for all the characters who disappeared on the wish of one person.

[@nicbentulan]

About the art: IT’S A TRAP! THIS WHOLE THING IS A SETUP!! THIS IS ALL PART OF OBATA'S PLAN TO FRAME ME! ISN’T IT A LITTLE ODD THAT THEY HAVE SUCH HOT CHARACTERS LIKE GEVANNI IN DN AND MIYUKI AZUKI IN BAKUMAN BUT NO ONE REALLY IN PLATINUM END?? THIS PROVES IT’S A TRAP!!

[@BIackstrength]

If you want a better version of Platinum End, you can try reading Alive - The Final Evolution (by the same artist as Noragami). It's surprising how similar some of their plot points are.

[@CakeoftheMews]

Honestly I'm just disappointed you didn't elaborate more on the lesbian serial killer because that sounds like it was so wonderfully and horrifically written, especially coming from someone who seems to hate women THAT much.

[@mothersbasement]

She's only around long enough to fawn over metropolitan, rape and murder a couple middle school girls, and then the tower blows up

[@agogobell28]

Good god, that’s worse than I thought.

[@kaitlynmorgan8097]

@@mothersbasement so she portrays harmful stereotypes that portrays gay people as dangerous predators. Huh

[@CakeoftheMews]

@@mothersbasement Ah. Yeah that sucks.

[@carsfan1995]

@@mothersbasement Sounds like classic homophobia.

[@sbondiw7943]

I was reading this back in the day and my opinion of the story was slowly dropping but the art was gorgeous. But then. The cat suit. The robot cat suit broke me. First of all, goodbye suspension of disbelief--you expect me to believe a devoted family man with a wife and young daughter designed a sexy cat suit for a teenage girl???? But also it was just so blatant fan service. Guys get anime-cool somewhat realistic clothing, female lead gets a costume that doesn't match her personality at all and turns her into a big joke. Shounen girls deserve better.

[@shupasopni]

Tbf that's unfortunately totally believable Plenty of Mangaka have families, and tons of those draw teenagers in fetish outfits in their manga.

[@dynamicworlds1]

@@shupasopni sometimes DON'T write what you know I guess...

[@yoman7873]

@@shupasopni Mangakas have to draw like that because a lot of mangas just don't sell without fan service. A lot of Mangakas have complained about it in the past as well. Japanese teenagers just aren't going to buy mangas that don't have atleast some level of fan service. It's changing nowadays with mangas like JJK getting popular even without fan service but it will take a lot of time for fanservice to end in Japanese comics.

[@luigivercotti6410]

@@yoman7873 Yeah, I mean, as a dude myself, no matter how woke I get, I can't just shut off the horn-drive, only schedule its operation. So that's why I don't think we'll ever be rid of fanservice in entertainment media, because, well, fanservice _is_ entertainment, being horny is just a part of everyone's humanity that we get to enjoy, sometimes, other times be embarrassed about it, and others still to be guilty and disgusted about it. That said, there's 2 vectors to make things better, I feel; One is being equal opportunity with the fanservice. If any guy has the right to indulge in it, then so should any girl, it only makes sense; I personally would be quite interested and curious to see what is the female mind's unbiased, authentic take on the whole subject, because I wager it would be, to me and most guys, utterly incomprehensible and yet deeply alluring as incomprehensible things often are. That would require equality in terms of prominence and opportunity on the side of the creators, which, yeah; Please, fma-b was so good you guys, I wanna see what other things we have might have missed until now! It would also require equality in terms of the audience, who provide the demand and incentive for any story. That, besides hoping it will follow once the creators' playing field is nice and level, I don't know enough to comment on. The other vector is to acknowledge that since fanservice _is_ entertainment, it, too, is subject to the fact that there's better, more high quality entertainment and worse, trashier entertainment. That's not to discredit trash, which I hold so dear, perhaps too dear, and whose inherently innovative qualities are another matter to contemplate; But there needs to be a balance, in which good quality fanservice, not judged only be technical drawing skill, but also by the overall refinement and dignity of presentation in the scence, the characters and even the wider plot; That such exist in abundance, normalising healthy behaviour and sating, for the most part, everyone in the audience. Depravity is an essential part of man, of course, and we'll not be rid of it, but believe me, depravity is notoriously stalwart and requires little sustenance to survive, so we don't have to rely on its power as a crutch for everything we create. If we afford that power moderation in its use, I am convinced that much more intense and powerful emotions than just being horny could be more handily conjured and celebrated freely among all.

[@12thLevelSithLord]

@@luigivercotti6410 Related to your second point, is the context of the fanservice. Nobody really cares if some dumb comedy show has piles of fanservice in it, that's fine. But if you're trying to sell me that you're telling a serious story with a grounded or dark or similar tone, don't randomly stop to aim the camera at some tits every 12 minutes, it kills the vibe.

[@MlGHTY1]

Mirai's logic: "everybody must find their happiness" Mass murderer: "I find happiness murdering thousands of innocent people" Mirai: "You go get them and find your happiness !" Me: His logic, is totally flawed, FACEPALM

[@Silentguy_78]

So what should the mass murderer do?

[@jasslang9636]

@@Silentguy_78 probably go to therapy, look into why they feel this way, find different things that excite them like violent media, do some empathy training or something idk that's what I can think of, but maybe they dont want to fit into society so I guess maybe not.

[@Silentguy_78]

@@jasslang9636 and what if they're incurable and the only thing that really excite them is murder?

[@jasslang9636]

​@@Silentguy_78 idk the only thing I can really think of is like murdering in VR or being sentenced to life in prison or death.

[@brandonlyon730]

@@Silentguy_78 Well frankly I wouldn’t care, if they don’t value other peoples lives and won’t care about ending them against there own wills when they did nothing wrong to them, then frankly they are terrible people and I don’t feel bad that a psychopath doesn’t get sick fun and should find happiness elsewhere or be put down like the rabid dog they are.

[@aguywithalotofopinions412]

L: Got any death notes? Light: Go fish. Got any real names? L: Go fish

[@BDeerhead]

I heard "skin-melting super AIDS" and then my brain went into a haze as I drowned in the word salad that immediately followed. God damn this story is all kinds of fucked up.

[@mothersbasement]

AIRBORNE skin-melting super AIDs

[@dionthorn]

I knew the monologues we're gonna be fire and you didn't disappoint.

[@jondoe7036]

20:25 Suppose "kinda sorta fixed that" is right. I loved how that book still had to make the point of downplaying Naomi for being a woman with that ridiculously dumb moment, where she manages to counter an assault by the masked perp and then as he flees Naomi decides to not even try giving him a chase, because she "would not be able to outrun a man". It's not like she's a fricking trained and highly physically fit FBI agent or anything...

[@jondoe7036]

@windrose5988 Yeah yeah... Not bothering to digress by asking the source for that supposed factoid, because thing is I'm not even bothered that she couldn't catch the perp, but that she didn't even try, when that's literally something she's been professionally trained to do; you'd think she'd atleast give enough of a chase to see if she can't figure out something about her assaulter's physicality or general direction he would flee in, instead of immediately downplaying herself by assuming she can't do anything as soon as he'd start running, because estrogen and ovaries be weak...

[@sunnyboyLars]

I think PE actually makes a pretty good case against anything it tries to suggest to us. First, the suicidal kid becomes god and he finds something interesting, causing the years fly by. But the moment he starts thinking about the big picture and how to do anything on a society level he starts yeeting himself again. Suggesting that all you need to not suicide is find something interesting and not to care about the big picture much. Making it a very personal choice. Second, the suicidal protagonist suddenly finds true happiness. And all it took were some death-defying adventures before setteling down with a girl. All you need apparently is some real adventure and a girl. The story keeps telling us some things and then prove the opposite to us. Honestly the entire moral of this story kinda sucks. It's not thought-provoking, it simply is stupid from beginning till the end.

[@dorothygale9648]

I feel like ending the world is insulting to anyone that was, is, or ever could be happy, and that Platinum End even shows this. People who live happy lives live on in the people they leave behind, paying their happiness forward to the next generation. Ending the whole world invalidates everything they did by removing not only their legacy, but any hope for the future. And while there are many people born into unhappy circumstances for reasons beyond their control, Mirai living on and being happy proves that everyone can find joy in life if given the chance. The answer isn't to take the future away from everyone, but to give everyone a chance to have a bright future.

[@toristeunebrink5705]

Yeah but then you’ve gotta remember that the one chosen to be god was just a young kid. That’s a big expectation to put on a kid even if he was merging with “the creature” and he didn’t have the mental maturity or capacity to look at the full picture like that. The pain and suffering of the world was too overwhelming for him and he didn’t spend time brooding over it he acted on impulse so it makes sense. While not very satisfying it fits his character

[@KarmaSpaz12]

I guess another way to look at it is that even with the best intentions of others, the wrong person can be lifted up and put in a situation they aren't prepared for if they have to go it alone from there. Even in the format of this reasonably intelligent and engaging review it still doesn't leave a good feeling.

[@Snzn_7]

@@KarmaSpaz12 most people clown at this series as bad writing. But objectively speaking it don't break any of its established rules and characters do still remain "in character" until the end. Some people even question if yhis is even made by the same authors who made Death Note and Bakuman. Like tge big confirmation that they did this, is the fact the Platinum End is another trademark unconventional manga piece like Death Note is. Its just that it presents itself differently than Death Note was. If you look at Bakuman, Platinum End was the amalgamtion of the no-nos the editors in bakuman discouraged the protagonosts to do if they want to make a hit manga. But the authors made Platinum End any ways because they wanted to. It actually has good writing, its more of people just simple liking the story they are presented it. Its like a dish that is cooked as how it is intended to be. But the costumers just don't like it so they order something in the menu instead.

[@dorothygale9648]

@@toristeunebrink5705 Which is why picking him was a mistake! In fact, I don't think any human would have been able to handle it. We're just not built to handle 'forever.' For a more comprehensive essay as to why, please watch Red's Trope Talk on Immortals.

[@solidt9626]

Hey, maybe that's what the ending was saying. Remember, they devoted a couple minutes to Mirai telling Saki how grateful he was for all the happiness he got to experience as they waited to be erased from existence. The audience is even shown the kind of life they lived while Nakaumi was busy thinking/learning. Afterwards, it's left to the viewers to recount how far 2 suicidal teens went from actually about to die, to a happy married couple, to having that all ripped away from them in an instant.

[@timothymclean]

I wonder how well stapling the third act of Platinum End onto Death Note's second act would work. I mean, obviously you'd need to change a _lot_ about both stories to avoid having the shinigami turn into angels and all the human characters into completely different people, but...could be a neat thought experiment.

[@lpfan4491]

"Hey, why is Light suddenly split between a pacifist and a super villain?" "Nanomachines, son."

[@timothymclean]

@@lpfan4491 I think he'd have to be matched to the rich guy with a god complex instead of the series protagonist or something. It would be a messy transition either way...

[@BuzzabeelYT]

I don’t think you’d have to change that much actually. Add the PE protags and antags to Mello and Near’s orphanage. The rich guy can still be rich because he was adopted into a high class family, etc. Give them all shinigami but introduce different variations of the death note, PE-style. The rules wouldn’t even need to change. Just apply them to the arrows and ignore PE’s rules. The PE ending could very easily be one of the note gang fusing with a shinigami. Everything still happens, but Light would have a very bad time. Seeing Light have a breakdown as everyone is erased/he realizes what’s happening before it happens to him would show how powerless the self-titled “god” really is. It could even be Near who fufills L’s legacy by somehow getting his hands on a book/arrow and fusing to become the “ultimate being”, and avenges him in the only way you can really break a person like Light. You can still get all the existentialism by having Near/whoever see all the deaths Light caused and tying it back to the many more deaths by suicide. Mirai still gets his happy ending and Light gets the ending he deserves. The end.

[@Klamason]

I never really thought about it, but the comment about Oba hating women has me looking back on Bakuman much sadder than I ever thought I would. And I freaking love that manga.

[@attilamert6973]

Its not really sexism tho

[@randdiamond8090]

@@attilamert6973that’s because disdaining women is so normalized. It doesn’t really raise alarms on most people. 😂

[@charlesmartiniii1405]

​@@randdiamond8090especially in anime. I love it but goddam lol.

[@mius.cereal]

@@randdiamond8090I love anime and manga but yeah I can see why men and young boys just become so desensitised to sexism and sexual assault since it’s just the butt of every joke in shounen and liking a loli 10 year old is just seen as a preference and not pedophilia and it’s even sadder when they’re so defensive about it when they’re called out by a well adjusted human being who finds it all very weird

[@sonicloyalfan]

sadly I can't say I even find the ending all that good. I've seen enough of the eternal being wants to die thing and I find it utterly lazy and unimaginative. it just ignores how vast and wonderous the universe is. people have dedicated multiple lifetimes to study that started with them looking at some cool rocks and wondering how it got that way. plus the universe isn't just infinite static it's changing constantly. there may even be an infinite multitude of universes who differ in fundamental laws that could produce truly, literally, inconceivable realities. the only way you could entertain the idea of getting bored of that is with a tragic lack of imagination.

[@plinfan6541]

The good old "Buhu, woe me and my eternal existence! How misrable my life is with infinite power, knowledge and ability to traverse the stars! Will somebody not end my pain?"

[@anonymous71207]

I feel like that was what was compelling about Dr. Manhattan's ending. Dude was like "this whole thing on Earth is total BS but dude I can create new life on Mars and it's fuckin sick so later earthlings."

[@michaelbenson5677]

I don't think you're grasping the prospect of eternity. The universe is finite - it appears to have definite boundaries, a definite beginning, and will either have a definite end (bounding cosmology) or reach a state of eternal unchanging stillness where not even the tiniest particles could interact with each-other in any way (heat-death). Even assuming that an eternal entity would explore everything, they would eventually run out of things to do. If that entity is anything like us, it would probably want to cease existing long before exhausting every possible source of novelty. Omniscience makes it so much worse because there cannot even be novelty in that context - it would be so extremely boring and it would never, ever end.

[@aaaah540]

Eventually, if you live long enough, you’ll reach the heat death of the universe. It’ll just be you in an empty void. There WILL be a point at which the universe will be reborn via quantum fluctuations, but that won’t be for another 10^10^10^2.08 years. Immortality really isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

[@sonicloyalfan]

@@michaelbenson5677 the universe may be finite. The verdict is far from settled on that. Cosmology is very fertile with hypothesis and what if's but not a lot of solid, "we are certain the universe is X." More over your assuming the immortal or immortals have no agency. Heat death is a good few trillion years off if not tens of trillions. It's unfathomable what possibilities open to someone who has been learning and advancing for that long. Right now there's a hypothesis that if you could arrange a certain number of neutron stars in a specific orbit their gravity could warp space-time such to create a pocket universe that would then expand. Who knows what other possibilities you could discover with a greater understanding of the universe. As for omnipotent entities. Such a thing would be a mind inherently inconceivable to us. Human phycology doesn't even apply to most other living things we're familiar with let alone something cosmically scaled. If there is a multiverse then the fading out of one would still leave infinite other universe's of who knows what. And if that one infinitesimal black specks really bothered it it could relight it. But again speculating, and this superimposing our biases and specific. Phycology, on how something in that state of exist would "think" is absurd. It's like thinking a black hole is depressed because it has a habit of binge eating.

[@julias.7534]

Bakuman is so weirdly fascinating with how much of this story was clearly written to no-homo Light and L's relationship when you think about it. Like, if you read the story as Takagi being in love with Mashiro the whole time, then everything from his own kind of lackluster romance with Kaya despite him admiring Mashiro's relationship to his disinterest in writing women, to how he heaps praise on Mashiro and HOW often Mashiro reminds him not to be weird about it, etc. It does nothing to solve the narrative's misogyny problem, nor how weird it is from a writing perspective to say that "they aren't gay despite spending all their time together and being really focused on their collective partnership and relationship because of that bc Mashiro has a honey he's waiting for and they have a strict no eye contact before marriage deal going on," but it adds flavor text that's amusing to me and me alone.

[@attilamert6973]

Bro what in the F are you talking about

[@mytyhekiller4]

you're just on crack or never had a best friend (or you want to project and see your thing everywhere)

[@mellow_mallow]

​@@attilamert6973it's about the flavor text

[@CursedCatTruffa]

I will never not be fascinated by shonen mangaka writing women so badly that their male leads read as gay, it's so funny

[@SamuelPulkkinen-jp8ev]

What frustrates me immensely about this story is the fact that the manga is so well drawn. Like, give me just half of that quality to make my own comic series and I would cry out of gratitude.

[@hermeshemp6271]

I think Mukaido would have been disappointed by Mirai because Mukaido only cared about his pregnant wife and daughter, wanted them to live and be safe. The ending of Platinum End does not honor Mukaido's wish.

[@sebastianlevenson9364]

I absolutely hated Platinum End, and I only bought the manga. I got it out of my house the second the series was done. The ONLY thing I want to say is Mukaido - his motives, his relationship with his family, was just great. He was the ONLY person I rooted for the entire story and he went out like an absolute badass. This story did not deserve him.

[@sparksdog8111]

I would have found it interesting if Mirai did kill more often and somewhat regularly, and Ohba were to explore the emotional and mental damage that can do to someone who has a strict rule against it rather than have him just struggle to kill period.

[@issoulescondes3913]

In Platinum End everytime Mirai is in a situation where if he kills he violates his moral system and if he doesn't thousands/millions will die there's plot armor to get him out of here except for the scene at the beginning.....in his imagination lmao that's all

[@theoneandonlymichaelmccormick]

Vash the Stampede still exists.

[@peach_total]

wait why didn’t they make the scientist guy god? seems like he would be more motivated to solve the problems of humanity (and get to figure out how everything works at the same time)

[@kpopfan246]

Right, how is letting a middle schoolers becoming a God was a good idea?

[@mmdrein]

not that it matters, but science guy refused to be god. the only outcome science guy was willing to accept was the death of every god candidate including himself. until they "power of friendship"d him into accepting nakaumi ofc.

[@DarkLordGanondorf190]

"And with his sister complex turned up to 18+" Had to pause for a bit to get the laughter out if my system I'm also always a fan of a synopsis that sounds like you're just pulling words out of a hat!

[@Inhaledcorn]

**pulls out a soapbox** **stands on it and pull it out a megaphone** IF YOU WANT A STORY THAT TACKLES DEPRESSION, EXETENTIAL CRISIS, SOCIETAL PROBLEMS THAT CREATES THE END OF THE WORLD, FFXIV: ENDWALKER IS RIGHT THERE. IT ALSO DOES KINGDOM HEARTS BETTER THAN KINGDOM HEARTS, IF YOU'RE INTO THAT SHIT.

[@victorhugocosta1127]

As a KH and a noob at FFXIV, you have me intrigued

[@Inhaledcorn]

@@victorhugocosta1127 Okay, so, Blasphemies, something you come across in Endwalker, are beings created from people going over the brink of despair. Yeah, basically Heartless by another name. Edit: And people seeing other people turn into monsters also tends to turn them into monsters.

[@14112ido]

I would've jumped to it, had it not used subscription system of monetization XD.

[@Inhaledcorn]

@@14112ido You can play through the entirety of A Realm Reborn and the first expansion, Heavensward, for free with no restriction on playtime.

[@Dualblades47]

I'd prefer to not have to play for 200 hours to get to the good bits of a story.

[@Malicious_Hero]

In the Death Note Light Novel those names of the victims, "Believe Bridesmaid, Quarter Queen, and Backyard Bottomslash" are in book used as names to "protect the victims family and friends" since the book is written as if it is actually talking about the case. They arent written as the real names of the victims.

[@theoneandonlymichaelmccormick]

Does that make them sound any less stupid? Like, was “John Doe” too boring?

[@Malicious_Hero]

@@theoneandonlymichaelmccormick Not at all, but they are also meant to be super weird and stupid because then there is absolutely no chance of them accidentally being real names. (They also needed to keep the BB, QQ, and BB initials since that was important to the plot)

[@theoneandonlymichaelmccormick]

@@Malicious_Hero Then why not have them be objects or normal nouns? “Hey, here are my good friends from witness protection, Bunsen Burner, Quail Quarter and Bed Bug.”

[@Piromysl359]

The upside is, that ending ensures that there will be no 2nd season.

[@wafflesthearttoad6916]

I swear the man character not wanting to kill someone is understandable. But DAMN WAS IT FRUSTRATING TO WATCH.

[@jkattack2640]

New favorite moba quote: "Three LA citizens named 'Believe Bridesmaid,' 'Quarter Queen,' and 'Backyard Bottom-Slash.' Those ARE NOT nicknames, that is simply what the guy who wrote monogatari thinks North American names sound like. And who am I to argue with the man who ruined toothbrushes?"

[@rottencandy2675]

hahaha

[@claytonrios1]

I never thought you'd cover this series. But I'm glad you did. This is a show that has such a bonkers ending that it must be seen and heard with the utmost clarity to be believed. Even then you'll just say "The Death Note people made this? How far they have fallen!"

[@Froggsroxx]

On the subject of the content warning at the beginning, I notice in a lot of anime that there is a very noticeable difference between how men and woman are hurt or killed: Men are usually killed quickly without much noise from the victim, and if they're in pain they rarely cry unless they are a "wimp character" who will then be crying and snoty. Woman on the other hand are almost always made to linger in pain, with a lot of focus on their face and body showing their suffering. I have to assume it's a weird (semi subconscious?) form of power and sexualization fantasy? I hate it and wish it would stop being done.

[@visoth7791]

Are you talking in general? Or for this specific series & the other works from the creators? Maybe its the genres we watch, but I struggle to think of examples of what you suggest.

[@Cri_Jackal]

Killing off a female character in dramatic fashion in just a traditional element of storytelling. Men are instinctually angered by the death of an innocent woman, it's an instinct evolved to preserve women within a group since they're the ones that produce children, men are, evolutionarily speaking, expendable. In a social species, losing a female member quite literally means losing out on potentially dozens of new members to bolster the group, members which would increase the chances of survival for the entire group. That instinct goes downstream into our stories, where the death of a female character is the easiest way to get an emotional reaction out of a mostly male audience. It has nothing to do with any power fantasy, this stuff is ancient and predates written history. Edit: and to clarify, I've watched tons of people react to games and anime over the years, and it's a consistent pattern that women have an equal reaction to both male and female character deaths, where as most men react more strongly to female character deaths, even gay men.

[@mikorinie]

@@Cri_Jackal That's genuinely fascinating, honestly thanks so much for saying that and bringing that up, because it adds alot to the conversation that is violence against women in media

[@murderman8578]

@@mikorinie Bruh who cares if it's Good it's good Bad and its bad

[@Cri_Jackal]

@@mikorinie People seem to consistently forget the humans are subject to the same rules as every other animal on the planet, human morality be damned. We, and everything we create, is a product of our evolution, nothing exists in a vacuum.

[@darkaaaaaaa]

One way to interpret Platium End's ending is suicide should not be normalized and people cannot solve bigger problems, when they can't find their own motivation for life.