- Genre : Josei, Horror, Mystery, Psychological Thriller
- Studio: J.C.Staff
Well well well…. Isn’t this fun. Angels of Death just managed to disprove most of my assumptions yet leave my base theory intact. I gotta say, we’re on something of a roll here. The last few episodes have been pleasantly ambiguous. Now that’s an expression I don’t use much…or ever. Still, I may have no idea what’s going on, but in the interesting, tell me more way, rather than in the, there are too many plot holes for an actual story to exist way.

In a slight role reversal, we spend most of the episode following Zack around the new floor after Rachel collapses. The first thing we are shown are two bodies macabrely stitched up with red string. We have been shown that Rachel is something of a seamstress throughout the series. First with that dead bird in episode one, then later with Zack. So she’s use to stitching living things and not just fabric. She also always uses that same red thread. The scene was obviously there to demonstratively dump an entire bucket of doubt onto Ray’s head, but what exactly is she being accused of.
The first assumption would be that she’s also a killer, but I’m not necessarily sure that that’s the case. There are other, more interesting possibilities.
The scene is obviously traumatic for Rachel, who conveniently faints just in time to have Danny appear out of nowhere and isolate her from Zack, leaving dashing mass murder mummy boy to try to find his way back to her for a change. Zack’s journey was fairly fun to watch, it really did look like a series of in game puzzles to solve. By himself, Zack is more interesting than Rachel, but he’s still a bit too straightforward to be an effective one man show. He gets much better with someone to bounce off of.

Thankfully the false prophet is also mysteriously there and ready with some super confusing exposition dump. Also Episode 12 clip show! This is my lucky day! (I watched this right after Harukana that also featured a clip show)
Grey is spouting some hard to follow lunacy about Gods and Angels and “the rules of this place”. It sounds like a pretty standard crazy bad guy speech but I did manage to get a few things from it. Mostly that unlike most of the characters so far, Grey himself seems much more preoccupied with Zack than with Rachel. She is not the special one, or at least not the only special one, as we have been lead to believe. It seems Zack also stands apart, maybe moreso than Rachel.
While Zack is trying to get away from the chatter and continuing to explore the floor. Rachel and Danny are locked in a room together where they can observe the action via surveillance cameras. I never noticed it quite this much before but Danny has a really nice voice. Really Nice! And one of the best and most unique creepy laughs I’ve heard in a long time. I looked up the actor (Takahiro Sakurai) and on my list of favourites he goes. Just look at that amazing body of work. Cough Miyuki Cough…

Anywho, back to the show.
There is something that Rachel is desperate to keep from Zack. Some dark secret about her past. Something that everyone else (i.e. Danny, Grey from previous conversation I’m going to bet Eddie and Cathy too) seems to know. Again shattering my earlier assumptions, Rachel does in fact remember at least some part of her past. Maybe she got some memories back as she was travelling with Zack or maybe she always remembered something. But this, combined with the fact that she has her own floor, is making her seem more and more like just another resident of this tower, rather than a special outsider.
She also referred to Zack as “pure”, the exact term used by Grey as well. This again seems to point to Zack being “the special” rather than Ray. Although there’s always the possibility that it’s them as a couple that’s the disruptive factor. Grey did say something that could be interpreted that way.
In the last act of the episode. An old newscast informs Zack, and us, that Rachel Gardner’s parents had been found brutally murdered. Overkilled in fact. And their bodies had been stitched together. At the time, a young Rachel (looking exactly as she does now), had also been found in the room, completely despondent but otherwise unharmed. It seems the parents had been dead for a week. There’s also a family portrait with Rachel’s name on it. Remember that, it’ll come in useful later.

Zack need to find a name plate to open a door, a mechanic we had already seen used on Cathy’s floor, and find a nice ornate one with Rachel’s name on it. I have to admit, I had forgotten that Zack can’t read, even though the show did specifically give us this information before. And in a very natural way at that. Good job show, that was very well done foreshadowing. Sorry to have wasted it.
Side note – when did we all agree that music boxes were undeniably creepy?
With the name plate in hand, I figured Zack was all set but since he can’t read, he has no clue if this is what he was looking for. But remember the family portrait! It had both a picture of Rachel and her name written under it. So Zack could compare the two to figure out the name plate was also Rachel’s. He didn’t seem particularly phased by it, mind you. Gotta love that Zack, just steady as he goes.
Yes Angels of Death is piling up yet more questions with precious few answers but there a definite structure here. Something to work with. I still want to know where it goes. I would also venture that these last 2 episodes have been the strongest so far. Hopefully the trend keeps up!
So for various reasons, I couldn’t turn off the subtitles this week, but I think it works out!
According to Anichart, Episodes 13-16 will be streaming exclusively on Amazon Prime beginning in 9 days…
http://anichart.net/Fall-2018
(scroll to the bottom for the ONA list).
booo
Ah, you found my comment then. Was it in the spam folder or did it show up later?
To be honest, I’m a little surprised there are supposed to 4 more episodes. This looks a lot like a semi-final to me. What sort of twist does the show still hold in store? Don’t tell me we really are getting a beach episode?
I’m not sure, but I don’t think Rachel kiiled her parents (I briefly considered a divorce drama, where she killed them and sewed them together so they’d stay forever, but that makes little sense with her trauma). There’s a clear parallel drawn with the bird from episode 1, so I think something happened that she was trying to “repair”. I briefly considered that Zack actually killed them, but that makes even less sense (this time with both their behaviours).
As for Sakurai Takahiro, I first looked him up when he was playing Shirokuma in Shirokuma Café, as he was the only name in the main cast that I didn’t recognise. Main role back then I recognised was the male lead in Otome Youkai Zakuro. Most notable role for me? Fakir in Princess Tutu. (I didn’t recognise him here.)
First episode I actually noticed him but he was wonderful this week. That’s the problem with with nutjobs…characters risk overshadowing performance
I’m obsessed with this series. It’s so crazy and out of wack. But finding out about Rachel was he best part of this series. I knew there was something wrong with her
Yes! She’s finally getting interesting
I completely agree with what you wrote about the last two episoded being the best of the series. I really liked this episode and it really got back a bit into the more creepy vibe of the first episode.
But….that said…erm…I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but have you seen Mell’s post? It might be that we won’t be getting any more episodes. Apparently the last 4 episodes will be brought out with a homevideo release. If that’s really true, that would really be one of the most disappointing things that I have read all month😢 Fingers crossed that it won’t be true 😊😊
I have a feeling they will be available somewhere….
Well, I hope so, because otherwise I would really be sad 😢
Who does that? And if that ends up being the case then I definitely won’t be coming back to this show, though it was a pretty low priority at this point.
Yeah, that was my reaction as well when I read that bit on Mel’s post. It would really be a shame, as it really is getting good now, and I really want to find out the conclusion to this. Else this really will have been a collossal waste of time 😢
But it gets better…. Also agreed. Who does that!?!
Live Chart says it’s going to be a Web-anime from now on, and episode 13 will drop in 2 weeks (well, more like 9 days by now). I’d be very surprised if these episodes didn’t just show up as usual, at least with Crunchyroll, since I think it’s more an issue of them not getting the TV slots they need (since I think it’s more an issue of TV slots – fall season starts and a new anime needs the slot). [As an example, Nanbaka’s entire second cour went internet and was still available on Crunchy as usual.]
Thank you for the information😊 Keeping my fingers crossed that they will stil show up, as after having invested so much time in the series and it really becoming pretty interesting now, it would be a shame if we didn’t get to see how it would end.
So slightly hopeful now. Thanks again! 😊
Phew…thanks Dawnstorm