Darling in the FranXX Episode 24 Discussion

Ryu1908 said:
I probably would find this ending satisfying if the series wasn't so fucking awful, because I realli like endings that show the main characters getting older, having kids and all that stuff. However, this show had no build up for any of this, nor did it earn such a comfy ending, even the way the Parasites were saved from the whole fast-aging thing was cheap, Ikuno suddenly became Einstein and found an unexplained way of curing that somehow. I guess they realized Ikuno was worthless during the whole series and tried to have her do something in the end, even if it's forced.

The worst part is that the interesting plot elements that were introduced in that weird point where the series started to get good (episodes 7-13) didn't matter. What was the point of that Zorome episode that introduced a subplot about an old lady that feels familiar to him? What was the point of dedicating an episode to Ichigo saving Goro and possibly starting to like him if they would revert her development to loving Hiro later for the sake of adding contrived drama into the story? What was the point of making Futoshi seemingly accept that Kokoro likes Mitsuru if they're going to make him go back to crying over Kokoro being with Mitsuru for the sake of drama? What was the point of introducing the fast-aging thing about the Parasites if the show does nothing with it in the end?

God, I hate Darling in the FranXX.

CodeBlazeFate said:
God, I agree 100%. Hands down, the best part of the show, where they actually tried to give characters...character, and actually do something interesting with the worldbuilding, was the part that legitimately didn't matter in the slightest minus the Zero-Two stuff. Every episode outside of 7, 10, 11, and 13, were just awful, and that's at the best of times. The final arc is just the worst, partially because they just discard what made those few episodes decent.

Ryu1908 said:

I can only hope the manga does it differently, as in diverging completely from the anime after it adapts the first half of the anime, which was flawed, but promising. I liked most of the changes the manga made to the story so far, at least, even if it's still the same story for the most part.

Inferno_Blaze said:
The final few episodes confused me, but the show was still enjoyable earlier and in the middle.

Like Engi, I watched the dub since I was behind(not all of it for Darling since I didn't care to wait and see the final few episodes), and I also really liked the dub.

7/10 because of the earlier episodes. Good watch, but too bad the show's final few episodes were horrible and had to put random enemies.
The finale was alright though, but I really don't care about Hiro and Zero Two's relationship

tearofmankind said:
I have seen some really shitty endings but this one takes the cake. Not only it was disappointing but it contradicted the whole plot point of 02/Hiro relationship and whole "what is human?" theme.

So 02 wanted to became human to be accepted by her "darling". And the main plot point of the story was that Hiro accepted her because being human is not about the appearance and so on. What is more, after some events Hiro also became a klaxos thanks to his relationship and he accepted it.

Then boom they are reborn as humans, great conclusion. Well played

What about the whole Papa story? What about the old lady that Zorome met? What about the big blue hand that attacked them in EP15? Fuck this all, we need to go space.

This was troll ending and should be seen as one.

CodeBlazeFate said:
This is gonna be a long one

I may have misinterpreted "liking darling has nothing to do with eva" to just "darling has nothing to do with eva", though both are wrong for different reasons (especially if part of why someone likes darling is because of some of the superficial and/or structural similarities with Eva). Apologies on that front at least.

The premise is similar, at least in theory. Angsty, not quite there mentally, teenagers pilot mechs involving synchronicity and some sort of symbolic aspect in order to take down weird creatures the pilots can barely comprehend that terrorize the earth's surface, while said pilots grow and/or deteriorate as people while people question the scheming government that is dealing with its own internal problems that affect the characters in the second half. Plus, the Eva pilots are literally defending a city that goes underground in the case of a major threat. VIRM's gimmick is almost entirely the same, sans the scale of their plans and the fact that they want everyone to be one with them instead of just being one in general. I specifically said that the character designs are similar. Regardless of the differing shade, it's still a main character with short, blue-hair that even has a similar haircut. I didn't mention anything beyond that.

Did you not pay attention when I specifically highlighted Tokyo-3 as the main setting and the plantation as the main setting? Both of those are underground cities (the former at will and the latter by design) and that Tokyo-3 and these plantation cities are similar? Aesthetically, they are similar, and they serve similar purposes, even if FranXX ventures out into new territories more. They might not be as similar as I described but they do bear at least a few striking similarities.

Yea, the Kalaxos are what really accelerated his spiral into madness, but losing his wife was what left him empty before that in the first place. He just managed to get something twisted to fill the void where Gendo was empty and bitter, feeling like Yui was all he had. The two did still focus on this whole idea of channeling a mechanized version of the creatures to combat them, even if the FranXX crew did so late into the game as opposed to Gendo and everyone doing it relatively early.

Both are major plot points though that pretty much direct the course of much of the final portions of both series (including the End of Eva film). Glad we agree on the fact that the whole APE/PAPA & NERV/SEELE was similar but we really can't understate just what happened, even if noticing the similarities isn't the real issue at hand.

Not once did I say that the symbolism between both shows was similar in regards to their mechs. I simply said they both had them. I agree that the symbolism that both shows go for is largely distinct from one another, hence why I didn't make that claim in the first place.

The arc structures of both series are pretty similar, and you can even surmise the first episodes of FranXX and TTGL in largely the same way, with a nervous and fixated kid having everything change when a hot girl busts in and he is inspired by someone with a commanding presence, before they all fight off one example of the major threat meant is meant to introduce us to what these characters will be fighting on the surface world for the duration of that arc. Arc 1 of both shows involve those main characters really getting to know everyone and especially each other more as they fight off increasingly powerful versions of this beast threat before the MC loses the person closest to him (temporarily in FranXX's case as opposed to permanently) before regaining the strength to continue the fight. Arc 2 is essentially adjusting to a new life after a pivotal battle before aliens show up and become the new main threat the main character, his crew, and previous assholes who now join the main crew must fight while his gf is in space trying not to be completely destroyed. Glad we agree on episode 19, though yea, the stuff they added was even worse than what previous episodes set up to be revealed.

It does kinda happen, since yea, while people do sometimes exaggerate the similarities to saying "this show is a carbon copy", the show does really try to ape without any real idea of how to make it work.

The shows are similar structurally, I said. They have different thought processes, but you can't look at the arc structures and even their introductions or major plot points and say that they aren't at least noticeable similarities between these shows. Honestly, I don't even think the romance works, as the relationship is oddly toxic, especially towards the second quarter of the show until episode 16 has Zero Two become just a regular nice girl & perfect girlfriend instead of this unhinged, abusive "monster" she was in episodes 10-15 or the mischievous, mysterious, slightly cold, yet still loving girl she was introduced as. I'd say that the ideas of world-building and character exploration they tried in episode 7, 10, and 11 were the best part, showing that with a more solid foundation and better foresight, this show really could have worked as a compelling distopian mecha action series about kids finding identity through bonding and having relationships...instead of the utter mess we were left with that started out messy and only got worse sometime after it began cleaning up.

CodeBlazeFate said:
I see. Does it make the characters and world-building not utter garbs?

Heavens_Kairyu said:
BTW, I think the Franxx manga is hot garbage and it especially makes Hiro look like a mary sue. It’d be cool if you could report back after checking it out, for the other guy too, but it just mainly compresses the events and removes some worldbuilding and characterisation.

Ryu1908 said:

It has adapted the first six episodes of the anime so far, the characters and worldbuilding are the same as the anime up until that point, although there are some changes made to the storyline.

For example, in the adaptation of episodes 3 and 4, instead of letting Zero Two pilot with Mitsuru for reasons that don't really make much sense outside of being a cheap way of showing what was already obvious from the start, Hiro actually pilots with Zero Two. He remembered when Naomi told him that he keeps running away from everything, even his partner, so he decided to stop doing that and man the fuck up, and since Hiro was the only one that piloted with Zero Two without getting injured, they let him do it instead of taking the risk of having Mitsuru becoming injured. Nine Alpha also appears much earlier in the manga and he's actually contributed more to the story in a few chapters than he did in most of the anime, which I wasn't expecting.

Ryu1908 said:


Hiro was kind of a Gary Stu in the anime as well if you take a look at how eveyone seemed to like him, even though he was being an inconsiderate dick to his friends for most of the series. The one time when someone calls him out on his selfishness, it's during a moment when Hiro is actually right in being "selfish" and we're obviously supposed to agree with him, since the characters who were also arguing with him end up joining him to space after a few minutes.

Heavens_Kairyu said:
I'm quite annoyed at the Mitsuru change; it prevents us from seeing Hiro at his lowest, having no faith in his own abilities and being intimidated by Mitsuru. Plus it omits the part where it seems like Hiro might start liking Zero two and dislikes his decision despite it being the most morally correct.

It also makes no sense that Hachi forbid him from riding the Franxx before, if the ban is lifted when they remember that he was able to pilot with Zero two without being injured. It also makes him look like more of a Gary stu.

Heavens_Kairyu said:
I can see what you mean, but initially only Ichigo and Goro were on his side, with the rest being either neutral or actively showing they dislike him. It was only after he saved their ass that they started to be friendlier towards him, except Mitsuru.

I feel like towards the end they liked him because he was showing them how to live without fighting and things like that, rather than them being particularly intimate, since Hiro mostly talks with Goro, Ichigo and Mitsuru out of the P13 members, but he's just with Zero two all the time anyway. I do think they messed up some of the relationships towards the end, since it looked like Hiro was closer to Mitsuru than Goro, for example.

Heavens_Kairyu said:
Yeah this does look like it’ll be long. We’ll mostly likely not change our stances significantly but it’s nice to hear a lot of what someone who disliked this thought.

I don’t think people tend to like shows because of their structure, it’s more likely that people like the characters, the plot or the themes. Eva’s plot is a bit different and much better, and the 2 shows are quite different on the other 2 aspects.

You’re omitting the nuance of both shows’ piloting systems and world to make them seem more similar than they are, if you decide to strip things down to that degree you can make many things sounds similar. To start with, Hiro was angsty for 6 episodes while Shinji was like that for pretty much the whole show, and even the reason behind their angst is vastly different and also leads to different reactions from each of them; Shinji doesn’t want to pilot while Hiro does. Plus, surely you understand how ridiculously broad a description like “said pilots grow and/or deteriorate as people“ is. You’d probably be pressed to find a show where the villains’ scheme doesn’t affect the main characters in the second half of a show, plus the main characters in Eva remained oblivious to pretty much all of the scheming from the higher ups. In Eva it’s Misato who starts uncovering the mysteries by asking questions and witnessing certain things, while Hiro was the one who started growing more and more suspicious of Papa by noticing how he oppressed them and tried to purge emotions. DITF’s approach could’ve been better, but they fucked it up mostly by making Papa be aliens. That’s kinda how most of this show goes.

The cities in DITF are aesthetically similar to Eva’s purely because a lot of tall buildings together look mostly the same regardless of the show. Eva’s Tokyo-3 is much more lived in and characters live a normal life there except when an Angel attacks. In DITF most people are in the happiness machine, they are weak and their immune systems suck due to how strictly quarantined everything is too: they don’t live anything similar to a normal life. Franxx does make references to the NERV base and Tokyo 3 though. Rei and Ichigo don’t look much alike to me, but I agree on Miku and Asuka.

Fair enough on the Franxx point. I feel like Franxx is more of a lunatic by how he smiled after being bit.

I can’t find it in my post right now, but before the wings thing I said that I didn’t know if you thought that, but went ahead and said it. I wasn’t trying to accuse you of that.

So why do you think Eva and Franxx have similar structures? I assume you mean their narrative structure but I can only really agree up to episode 6. Franxx kinda flip-flops between main and side character focus from episode 7 onwards while Eva keeps giving it's main characters the focus for pretty much the rest of the show. Even the monster of the week episodes in Eva are episodes 8/9-14, while it is just episodes 9 and 10 in Franxx. Even that one episode with Goro inside the Franxx is presented and resolved in different ways in Eva and DITF, despite their superficial similarities. Goro also has a different conflict compared to Shinji, but episode 9 sucks a lot and could be removed from the show, while Eva episode 16 is great. Franxx’s conflicts and solutions are not similar to Eva’s, and especially after episodes 6 they’re mostly presented differently too. You also get differences like Hiro resolving one of his character flaws in episode 15, while Shinji and Asuka only get into even deeper shit in episode 15. Another reason I don’t think Franxx is too similar to Eva is because I’ve seen the former 5 times and after trying to watch RahXephon and getting annoyed at how it tried to be like Eva in some parts, I think I’d feel it if a show wanted to ape Eva.

I can see more similarities with TTGL though, but even then the structural similarities only become bigger in the second half, and only if you ignore the episodes where things take place. For instance the fact they both go to space is similar, but TTGL spent more time there, though they might’ve killed off the side characters at the same episode, I forgot. Simon overcame his insecurities and rose to his duty in episode 11 as opposed to Hiro’s episode 15, but he was overcoming indecisiveness. These events also happen in completely different ways. In the first episodes, even though Yoko is the one that brings change to Simon, Kamina is the one to quickly assume a leadership position and the one that motivates Simon to change for the better, it isn’t really Yoko.

You know, Franxx and TTGL might be the most similar structurally in the pre-aliens episodes, they’re both around the same points in the show unlike the previous stuff, and we see characters generally acting in a similar way; that similarity goes away in episode 18 or so though.

I thought the happiness machines and the world inside the plantation was pretty cool.

I very strongly disagree about the romance, I thought it was great. To start with, I appreciated how Hiro didn’t mind-and kinda liked-Zero two’s open displays of affection. This is different from a lot of male characters out there so it was refreshing; the 2 also started feeling like a couple after episode 6 and that was also a nice change of pace from the usual. Hiro fell in love with Zero two because she made it easy for him and they were pretty similar in all the right ways. Zero two seemed to think Hiro was darling and might have been trying to jog his memory, since episode 13 has many parallels with earlier episodes. Stuff happens and her saurification percentage or whatever is increasing from episode 9 or 10 onwards, not coincidentally that's when she starts being colder towards Hiro. From what we see with Hiro and Mitsuru, saurification is linked to emotions, moving on and accepting something that troubles you seems to decrease saurification, while stress seems to increase it. They might have wanted to expand on this in the latter half but in case you didn’t know Nishigori planned the first 15 episodes and thought the rest of the show would flow naturally from then onwards, so the writers probably forgot or something. (Before you gleefully use this bit of info do know they did plan episodes 1-15, 13 in particular was the one the director wanted to make the most apparently).

Anyway, in episode 12 it seems like Zero two fully gives up on the idea of Hiro being her darling but decides to keep using him as her fodder since he helps her kill Klaxos, and she thinks that will let her meet her darling. When Hiro starts to oppose her killing out of concern for her health she decides to kill him because he isn’t useful to her anymore, then she realizes he is indeed darling and stops. However, Zero two also grew to like the current Hiro, the problem Hiro had in episodes 11-13 was that she cared more about the darling she met long ago, so she was nice to Hiro as long as he was useful in helping her kill Klaxos, something we especially see in episode 11 where she is cold to him but after killing the Klaxo she says they’ll be together till death. The evidence there is that she genuinely grew to like Hiro is the she was hurt by him not kissing her in episode 12, plus she grabbed her chest in pain after calling him fodder, and even went around the house breaking the mirrors that showed her appearance after doing that. We also see her pained face before strangling Hiro in episode 13, which seals the fact that she genuinely cared about current Hiro. But since she cared more about darling, and Hiro was in her way, she had to kill him. Zero two’s character progression makes sense and it’s quite nice. Their romance is great IMO, and this is just talking about episodes 11-13 for the most part.

Also, IMO this show tries to be more about child soldiers finding a purpose outside of war and about going against pre-established relationships, I don’t think the quest for identity was a big part, if any at all unless you can remind me of some things I might’ve forgotten.

I think Franxx’s main merit is episodes 1-6,8,10-16 and 22. Hiro and Zero two really carry the show for me and seeing them and their relationship is great, part of that is because of the stuff I wrote about them above.

BTW, I think the Franxx manga is hot garbage and it especially makes Hiro look like a mary sue. It’d be cool if you could report back after checking it out, for the other guy too, but it just mainly compresses the events and removes some worldbuilding and characterisation.

Sorry I take quite a while to reply.

Ryu1908 said:

It has adapted the first six episodes of the anime so far, the characters and worldbuilding are the same as the anime up until that point, although there are some changes made to the storyline.

For example, in the adaptation of episodes 3 and 4, instead of letting Zero Two pilot with Mitsuru for reasons that don't really make much sense outside of being a cheap way of showing what was already obvious from the start, Hiro actually pilots with Zero Two. He remembered when Naomi told him that he keeps running away from everything, even his partner, so he decided to stop doing that and man the fuck up, and since Hiro was the only one that piloted with Zero Two without getting injured, they let him do it instead of taking the risk of having Mitsuru becoming injured. Nine Alpha also appears much earlier in the manga and he's actually contributed more to the story in a few chapters than he did in most of the anime, which I wasn't expecting.


Hiro was kind of a Gary Stu in the anime as well if you take a look at how eveyone seemed to like him, even though he was being an inconsiderate dick to his friends for most of the series. The one time when someone calls him out on his selfishness, it's during a moment when Hiro is actually right in being "selfish" and we're obviously supposed to agree with him, since the characters who were also arguing with him end up joining him to space after a few minutes.

Stark700 said:
THIS IS AN ANIME ONLY DISCUSSION POST. DO NOT DISCUSS THE MANGA BEYOND THIS EPISODE.
----------------------------------------
The finale aired like weeks ago but MAL just came back so...

Looks like the rebuilding process began in the present timeline.

Mitsuru and Kokoro's child is also born. That look on Mitsuru's face when he sees his kid the first time though...
The fight in space felt like an amalagation of every emotional event in the series coming together. Zero Two's physical and emotional pain can be felt out there. Zero Two in her giant mech takes over the fight battle scenes as she charges right into the enemy. Very Triggr-ish top the over stuff.

Looks like the series went with a happy ending as expected....

Meh, I was hoping the show would have a less predictable ending.

CodeBlazeFate said:
The possibility is there and some people did like it because of its similarities to Eva, tho yea, the structure isn't as likely to be a positive talking point for FranXX.

There's a reason I didn't mention any similarities between Shinji and Hero, mainly that there are none beyond the superficial "main male pilot lead" status. Also, I can't name that many shows that have that specific first episode idea in mind. You're omitting the rest of the concept I laid out to specifically hit that one part. If you break each part down individually, you can say these sound like so many things (from any Gundam to what have you), but if you combine all of that together for this one concept, that narrows things down dramatically to...honestly, just Eva as far as I can tell. Even Gurren Lagann doesn't have that wholesale, what with Simon only being angsty in episodes 9 and 10, the show not focusing on the mental states of its characters, and how you'd be hard-pressed to call a lot of them mentally ill in any way. Technically Hiro does get over being angsty after a while, but that is definitely still part of the core premise of at least the early episodes.

I'll grant you that. Honestly, if you give Ichigo's hair a lighter shade of blue and slightly rearrange her hairstyle to be more symmetrical, I'd have a hard time telling the difference between the two beyond what they wear and what art style they have. Tho yea, Miku and Asuka look even more blatantly similar.

Yea he definitely fell off the deep end in somewhat of a different way than Gendo did...in that one became...that while the other basically shut himself off from love and kindness.

I don't mean they have similar structures, mainly cuz they really don't (so while I agree with the vast majority of that paragraph, it's ultimately wasted). More so that they have more specific similarities, from certain motivations to certain plot points to, again, the core premise, and stuff like PAPA/APE SEELE/NERV. I probably should have made it clearer that the structural thing only meant to Gurren Lagann.

Yea, TTGL's second arc had more time to do its stuff, but that doesn't change how the events that play out in both shows are similar in several ways, especially in concept. The first arcs are definitely less similar structurally than the second ones but said similarities are still at least noteworthy. What I mean about the Kamina Yoko stuff is that Kamina is the cool and interesting fan favorite one Simon admires much like Zero Two while Yoko was the hot girl that bust in and helped beat the first example of the first arc's threat with Simon, much like Zero Two. They do happen in different ways when you get down to the specifics, but the fact that these things happen at all is noteworthy since they really kinda don't happen in most shows.

There were some things about the world that are cool in a vacuum, mainly those things you mentioned, but they were not capitalized upon, so even the pieces of world-building that weren't broken were still downright wasted.

They were similar in all the right ways, but I mean that the way the relationship came off, especially when Zero Two became colder, made the relationship even less endearing. That also made the payoff of the perfect relationship in episodes 16-21 even more baffling and unearned. The thing is, it was so sudden. Usually, there would still be some slight buildup in a logical regard like that early on, so that instead of feeling like they hit a switch on Zero Two, it genuinely feels like natural progression (or regression in this case). If we saw a hint in the first arc that she wanted to become human at any cost, this could have worked, instead of only relying people's warnings to Hiro and a scene in episode 8 where Zero Two wants to know more about people and what's it's like to be human in a positive context before she became what she became. She really didn't try at all to jog his memory, nor did she suspect he was her original darling. She was just content with him as a darling and a lover for those first 8 episodes, and we didn't see signs that she wasn't (and the scene of saying if Hiro died, they would both acknowledge he didn't amount to much doesn't count, as not only does that not reinforce that point, but it's something Hiro, in particular, went over). The idea that he was the original darling never even crossed her mind until episode 13. I definitely felt like even though there were already some frightening foresight issues in the very early episodes, the first 15 episodes were more well-thought-out than the last 9, though not by much. The relationship never feels like there is any natural progression and always feels like it just jerks the wheel on what direction to go in. Some actual private insight into how Zero Two felt about Hiro that correlated with what happened in the middle episodes would have gone a long way for that first shift as well as the third shift in episode 23 (you can't work with the second switch at all since the only way it to make sense that her relationship with everyone was better than ever would be for her to actually really warm up to and forgive all of them slowly rather than in an instant). Even in those examples, you brought up, the room stuff had less to do with her relationship with Hero and more with how unstable she was about becoming human and not being a monster, the face when strangling him didn't feel pained, and I don't remember her grabbing her chest in any emotional pain.

I didn't really mention anything about FranXX characters searching for an identity. They already had one, which made them different from every other squad. If you got that from "character exploration", I meant how the show explores its characters, their worldviews, and their personalities in episode 10 in particular with Zorome. 7, 10, maybe 11, 13, and 16 are really the only episodes I can have really anything nice to say towards.

I will probably never read the FranXX manga regardless.

lol characterization...implying there was enough to remove in the first place, especially in those early episodes

Ryu1908 said:

I get where you're coming from, but I think Hiro was at his lowest in pretty much the whole story up until that point, I mean, he was contemplating suicide because he failed to connect with Naomi and got her sent away as a result, in the first time he to to pilot a FranXX he just passed out and the second time with Ichigo went wrong, he couldn't be any more invulnerable and insecure with all of that. I was more annoyed at the way this was handled in the anime because it was obvious that Hiro was the only pilot compatible with Zero Two, he came out unharmed when her previous partner was severely injured and this made the episode pointless in retrospect. Episode 4 repeats the same set-up except Hiro and Zero Two just disobey Hachi's orders and suffer no consequences for it, so when I finished episode 4, I was left wondering why didn't they just do that in episode 3, or why Hachi was against Hiro piloting Strelizia to begin with when he knows very well that Hiro is the only one who can pilot it without getting injured.

The manga to me took a pointless episode and a passable one, adapted them into one better paced story while maintaining that moment's purpose in the story and ended up better as a result.


It's more because of the way they write a character showing dislike or opposition towards Hiro, the character that's not getting along with Hiro is always painted in a more negative light and made unlikeable instead of being just someone who disagrees with him. Zorome was just being an egotistical asshole, Mitsuru was being a drama queen over a broken promise from years ago, and later Goro was calling him "selfish" for trying to save Zero Two, which is also friends with S13 at that point, for some reason it's like they suddenly don't care about her anymore because the plot demands some drama. A Gary Stu character doesn't necessarily need to be universally loved in order to be a Gary Stu, the writers can make whoever dislikes him unlikeable and/or unreasonable for the sake of making the audience root for him.

Heavens_Kairyu said:
I can see why you'd like it more with faster pace then. To me episode 3 also made 4 much more enjoyable. And you're right about Hiro being worse off before, but I felt like we actually saw him more miserable in this episode with the way he lowered his gaze and averted his eyes. In episode 1 he felt contemplative ot an extent, like the situation wasn't happeneing to him, I guess the thing in episode 3 hit him harder because it was an obstacle to his motivation, in episode 1 he had already given up. Hachi not letting Hiro ride Strelizia seemed like military regulations, they made enough sense but it was obviously a plot device. I like how it also showed they didn't care about letting the kids die though.


Zorome didn't feel like he was especially painted as a bad guy other than shooting the ball at Hiro. He even got away with it and the battle was only a draw because of Ichigo, and he also became less cocky because of his own battle experience unrelated to Hiro. The show is more to blame with Mitsuru, but he was intentionally aggressive to Hiro, he just wanted to rub in that he was better but eventually the show just shows he just couldn't let go of the promise and he's not painted as being in the wrong for that. I always felt like episodes 3 and 4 made the characters act more like assholes to create more tension than would otherwise be there.

Goro's stance made some sense, Hiro just walked in, said he was leaving and left while everyone was struggling to find a reliable way to survive. No one else knew what Zero two was fighting either.

By the way, what did you think about the transition to the endings? I loved those most of the time and the songs were pretty good too.

Ryu1908 said:

Maybe what happened in episode 3 hit him harder, but due to how episode 4 went, it felt like he just gave up too quickly. He probably could actually pilot if he just went "nah fuck off mate I'll ride my oni waifu" and stormed out of the room with Zero Two, the situation itself wasn't as bad as the other stuff he went through before. That's pretty much my issue with that part, Hachi prohibiting Hiro from riding was just a plot device, so much so that when Hiro and Zero Two flat out disobeyed him and got in the robot despite being chased by soldiers, they never got punished for that in any way. Not to mention that their reasoning for letting Mitsuru pilot are at odds with their reasoning for keeping Zero Two away from the others, she kills her partners and all, but Hiro came out of Strelizia unharmed and that seemed to be a first, so it would make more sense to let the guy who didn't get injured do it instead of another pilot who will get injured and possibly incapable of fighting until he's recovered. The fact that Hachi didn't care about the kids dying was a good detail, though, it kinda foreshadows how apathetic the adults are in general, which we get to experience more when they go to the city and interact with more adults a few episodes later.

Yeah, you're right, Zorome and Mitsuru acted like assholes probably to create more tension. Although I still thought Goro was kind of a dick, even if he was worried about Hiro and everyone else, Zero Two's body was getting damaged and he seemed pretty okay with letting it be. Also, didn't the aliens say they were going to return with a bigger army? That should have been the priority in this case, it wouldn't be of much use if they managed to find a reliable way to survive and rebuild the Earth, only for the planet to get attacked by the aliens and destroyed again, but it's like Goro and everyone else forgot about that for some reason. I don't dislike drama, conflicts between the main characters or anything like that, but this one felt really forced, the way they easily changed their minds and joined Hiro later also didn't help much, with how things were going I thought Hiro would go to space alone at first due to his disagreement with Goro, then he'd get into a tight spot and later Goro and the others would arrive to help him.

I agree about the transition to the endings, they felt pretty seamless with the song starting a few moments before the actual endings started.

deg said:
its not a masterpiece 10/10 material but its greatly enjoyable watch

Heavens_Kairyu said:
But even if you disregard Hiro's affection for Zero two, the episode 3 situation forces him to decide fast or his friends will die, plus this might not be the only chance he has to pilot with Zero two. However in episode 4 he had all the time in the world to ponder his decision, plus Zero two showing to him how much she cared about piloting with him and how he perceived her. If you factor this, and that the situation in episode 4 meant Hiro would never get another chance to pilot with Zero two, it makes sense that he decided to try and see if they could pilot together with her this time. The situation in episode 3 was certainly worse in that his friends (or "friends" mostly) would die. Also, them being fine with Hiro and Zero two being a pair after he proves himself makes more sense than not letting him pilot with her, so I'm fine with that.

What do you mean keeping Zero two away from the others? They don't care about feeding Zero two with endless stamen as long as it keeps Strelizia's maiden mode. They simply didn't care about Mitsuru dying or whatever. Plus why would they care about him being injured if he couldn't pilot anyway, regardless of it partly being Ikuno's fault.

It's more of a problem with Zorome rather than Mitsuru, Mitsuru is consistently annoyed with Hiro while Zorome turns around pretty quickly, though it isn't really broken in terms of characterization for either of them, since Zorome drew the battle. I liked how they also made him less cocky after the battle where they nearly die.

It also works the other way around though, since destroying VIRM takes so much time they needed to be self-sufficient with their resources regardless of the VIRM threat. Even if they destroyed VIRM, if they couldn't find a way to reliably produce food and water most of the people would die anyway. It's not like Goro's fears were unfounded, it was a similar situation to episode 16, but they had to put their minds into solving both of their issues since they were equally important, and the VIRM attack would probably take longer than their starvation. Even though they didn't know where VIRM is, given how vast space is, it'd be more likely for them to take longer to come, and they ended up being 2+ years away.

I wanted Hiro to go alone with the nines, that was the weakest part of the episode for me, but 22 was like a jewel amidst the garbage of the last few episodes.

The torikago transition is probably the best one but I'd be hard pressed to actually rank them.

Heavens_Kairyu said:
People who say Darling is an Eva clone should be gassed

Ryu1908 said:

Wait, episode 4 had the same setup as far as I can remember, Hiro's friends were overpowered by the monster of the week and they were going to die if he didn't get in the Strelizia to save their asses, not to mention that was actually his last chance to pilot with Zero Two since they were taking her away, he didn't really have that much time to think about it there either. What bugged me is that Hachi and the adults seem to be going out of their way to make the dumbest decisions in that situation: They were only willing to let Hiro pilot after proving himself to them, but they were also taking Zero Two away without ever giving Hiro a chance to prove himself, even though he is the one stamen who piloted with Zero Two and didn't get injured in the process. What if Hiro never ran after Zero Two? How would APE carry on the whole "Strelizia assuming control of the Star Entity" plan later since it's implied that Hiro was needed for that to work properly? How were they even planning on letting Hiro prove himself to them if they kept denying every chance he had?

What I meant by keeping Zero Two away from the others was that they were taking Zero Two away from S13 after the incident with Mitsuru, she was called back by the authorities because of that. Hey guys, what about letting the dude who previously piloted with Zero Two and came out unharmed do it in order to confirm that it's fine if he pilots with her before returning her to the frontlines? No? Alright then.

I can justify Zorome's quick turn as him underestimating how big of a threat the Klaxosaurs actually are until he fought them himself, wouldn't really make much sense if he kept being a cocky prick when both him and his partner nearly died in their first proper fight against Klaxosaurs. Of course, the show doesn't bother to develop Zorome's character further than that, which is a shame because I did find him to be pretty fun and likeable whenever he got some screen time.

What I got from the whole situation in episode 22 is that VIRM was on their way to invade the Earth, but Zero Two was the only thing keeping them from advancing further, just a few days after the first battle with VIRM, which means they would likely arrive on the Earth way sooner than we think. Hiro wanting to go to space to help Zero Two and defeat VIRM there, away from the Earth where they could cause some serious damage, makes more sense to me than Goro wanting him to not only let Zero Two get murdered by VIRM, but also produce resources on a planet that was under the threat of being invaded and having its resources destroyed anytime soon. Also, it's not like S13 are the only remaining people on the Earth, they could go to space and fight VIRM, since they're the ones who are capable of doing it, while everyone else keeps working on the dying Earth situation there, which is what they ended up doing anyway, so I really just thought Goro wasn't thinking ahead when he got angry at Hiro. You do have a point about them not knowing where Zero Two and VIRM is, but it seems that was never a problem since they happened to head towards the exact location, even though the only thing they had to guide them is Hiro's vision of VIRM killing Zero Two... Somewhere in space.

MikominMM said:


HEY NOW, Don't you think you're going a little bit too far?

bisikerim said:
How is it possible that this thread was created in August 6 even though the forums came back just today?

Dark_Lord9 said:
WTH @Stark700 how did you post this thread on Aug 6 when the forum was restored on Aug 8 ?

Phendrus said:

I'm particularly glad that Hiro and Zero Two's story ended the way it did. I've really gotten sick of shows/video games that end their romances tragically, particularly when most of them do a terrible job of writing it. The vast majority of main-character romances in action/romance hybrids I've seen end either tragically or inconclusively, so it was nice to finally see one with a "happily ever after." Sure, I would have preferred it if Zero Two and Hiro survived with their memories intact and went home to see their friends, but I suppose this ending gives them the perk of having real childhoods and eventually being able to procreate.

Heavens_Kairyu said:
You really shouldn't take it too seriously, but people who say that while not even being right for the most part and pretending to be smart annoys me, look at every review, every fucking person says it. It's like the "Episode 7 is a copy of A new hope" except Eva and Franxx share less structural similarities.

Ariavartan said:


Was it really a happy ending? I have seen enough people considering it a tragedy especially on /a/ and very few who consider it a happy ending. I think it was a bit inconclusive. Maybe an extended epilogue OVA would fix my complains but for now I kind of consider this a case of esoteric happy ending.