Devilman Crybaby FINALE, self-sacrifice, beach episodes, and more! | This Week In Anime Podcast #14

We've got a special podcast this week since we're finishing up Devilman Crybaby! And of course we continue with our top anime of Winter 2018: The Ancient Magus Bride, Darling in the Franxx, and Violet Evergarden! Discussion timestamps below: 1:45 The Ancient Magus’ Bride Episode 20 “You can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs” discussion Chise continues to sacrifice herself and shortens her life even further by taking on the dragon’s curse—is this theme of self-sacrifice just a part of Chise’s good nature as it would appear on the surface? Or is it, as Preetam suggests, out of desperation to drown out a deep sense of unworthiness from the psychological trauma in her past? 11:03 Darling in the Franxx Episode 7 “Shooting star moratorium” discussion YES, it’s the beach episode! Other than seeing a more human side of the characters (revealing swimsuits are essential for this of course), we continue to get more clues as into the world of Darling in the Franxx. 17:58 Violet Evergarden Episode 7 “[BLANK]” discussion Violet continues to put herself in her clients’ shoes to learn what it means to be human and begins to realize what it means to “be on fire”…and then BAM she gets hit by the revelation that Gilbert—her reason for living—is dead. This is the turning point of the series! 23:26 Devilman Crybaby FINALE: Episode 9 "Go to hell, you mortals" & Episode 10 "Crybaby" discussion We are left completely speechless… But we manage to muster some sort of stream of coherent thoughts and discuss human nature, and the lack of silver lining in this anime—except for that brilliant motorcycle outro scene in ep 9. We argue that Ep 9 was the high point of the series, and Ep 10 moves too fast for us to really enjoy the end but we applaud the irony of Ryo / Satan creating his own hell in the end. P.S. We decided to do a more in-depth analysis of Devilman Crybaby in the future because we really, REALLY think that this show deserves much more careful attention and interpretation! There is so much commentary on the nature of humans and the consequences of conflict that it’s impossible for us to unpack everything in a single podcast!