Shinsekai yori Episode 25 Discussion

Sorayin said:
The pacing was completely and utterly fucked, 2nd only to Maoyuu Maou Yuusha. There were no likable characters at all, the story kept changing focus and attempted to be dramatic and the art was rather inconsistent in quality.

I really can only praise it on it's soundtrack and first ED.

Shit tier at best.

kuity said:

your are taste is shit tier at best.

kuity said:

you are shit tier at best.

katsucats said:
It is regrettable that they couldn't somehow develop Yakomaru, give a more compelling motive to the Queerats, and show the plight of the villagers in war during the course of the story, rather than attach a lengthy exposition that seem more like afterthought. The time spent on finding and misusing an ancient weapon could have been used more wisely to come up with a more elaborate plan against the fiend, and make the showdown more epic. The ending felt as if nothing has changed, that none of the villagers seem to have learned anything from the events, despite the narrative discussing the possibility of a better future. The revelation regarding "homo" and "hetero" was a farce, since the words mean "same" and "different" in Latin respectively, and has no relation to humankind except when describing sexuality.

symbv said:
- Perhaps if the novel was written from the point of view by Yakomaru we will see a lot more about him and his thinking.

symbv said:
- The villagers most likely learned something, perhaps a lot of things, from the events, but perhaps draw the wrong lessons. It is up to Saki and Satoru to move the direction of future on a course that will prevent similar cases from coming up while keep the balance with better human-queerat relationship.

symbv said:
- Sorry but Homo indeed means Human in Latin. Homo does not mean "same". You made a mistake here. Homos meaning "same" is Greek in origin. So is Hetero.

katsucats said:
The show had plenty of interesting things to say about Yakomaru, but why include them if you aren't going to incorporate it into the plot, and exploit the moral ambiguity angle to force the audience to think?

katsucats said:
Yakomaru clearly has a reasonable belief system to justify his actions (e.g. his actions were not out of sheer chaos), but he was never anything but the token evil guy -- this is a huge opportunity missed. And the series developers must have realized that when they included the exposition in the aftermath.

katsucats said:
None of the core themes of the show were solved by the end of the show. The Queerats' autonomy were promptly laughed off by their human counterparts. There's no indication that "erasing" children who do not manage their Cantus will stop. There's no indication that death feedback will be reconsidered or some other plan set into place to prevent fiends in the future. Satoru never did remember Shun in the end. It's as if the whole events in the show were a dream that never happened. I don't see why it should fall on Saki and Satoru to dictate the direction of humanity, which would prove extremely difficult given that none of the other villagers are even aware of the circumstances that led to the events.

katsucats said:

Fine, if you say so, but the fact remains that Hetero has nothing to do with the human origin in scientific naming.

symbv said:
I believe the story has done quite lot to incorporate Yakomaru into the plot and from what I see many watchers indeed got prompted to think about what Yakomaru had to say about human identity and relationship between two branches of human species.

symbv said:
Not sure about you, but many do not seem to see him as a token evil guy after finishing the series. And this is the same whether it is in this thread or the Japanese forums I read.

symbv said:
> None of the core themes of the show were solved by the end of the show.
And this is one thing that makes this show and the novel great. As I said earlier in this thread, one theme this show explores is the sacrifice and trade-off that may be necessary if you think about the future based on the cards that are dealt to you. For the humans there, they cannot do much about death feedback. The fear of akki and goma is still very strong. And some of what you said is not really right - Satoru actually remembers Shun at the end. As for why it falls on Saki and Satoru to decide the future (NOT the direction of humanity, as their villages is just one of the many villages around the world) it makes sense as they are deemed the heroes and capable of leading. You said "which would prove extremely difficult given that none of the other villagers are even aware of the circumstances that led to the events" , and this is precisely the point - Saki and Satoru know the circumstances and it is up to them to inform the villagers without getting them into making silly decision. They becoming leaders will certainly help to achieve that.

symbv said:
The point is the connection with "homo" may have been an attempt to hint at a human origin. A kind of word game, so to speak.

katsucats said:
Ah, but after finishing the series includes finishing the post-story exposition which was all of the last episode. Explaining a bunch of things about character motivations which could have been included during the actual events of conflict is just lazy, in my opinion. The show does present Yakomaru's beliefs, but it never shows us how we should proceed besides ignorance. None of the characters ever had internal conflict given Yakomaru's beliefs, and the only time they reflected on them was way after the fact -- and it wasn't even Yakomaru's beliefs themselves that prompted this reflection (as if his being was somehow justified because he is a human relative, and wouldn't be if he wasn't).

katsucats said:
I would agree that sacrifice is a theme of the show, but disagree that by itself that determines greatness. I would have liked to see the characters coming towards more insight regarding how better to approach these sacrifices with the show's conclusion. The characters developed as beings over the course of the show, but they did not seem to have matured: they gained the conviction of adults, but without real specific thoughts to back it up. Perhaps this could be contrived as commentary in its own right, but it does not fare well for a literary work. I want to see the characters wrestle with the show's themes instead of just noticing them in passing.

katsucats said:
I get the word game, but it's corny and unnecessary. It could have arrived at the same conclusion without pretentious explanations. This isn't a big deal, just a pet peeve of mine.

katsucats said:
Yakomaru's presence is essential to the plot, but his philosophy is not shown to directly clash with the human philosophy in ways that should provide meaningful commentary about how the two groups wrestle with their differences. The characters in the anime treat Yakomaru as the token evil guy, which does not give it a chance to play around with deeper themes.

katsucats said:
Ah, but after finishing the series includes finishing the post-story exposition which was all of the last episode. Explaining a bunch of things about character motivations which could have been included during the actual events of conflict is just lazy, in my opinion. The show does present Yakomaru's beliefs, but it never shows us how we should proceed besides ignorance. None of the characters ever had internal conflict given Yakomaru's beliefs, and the only time they reflected on them was way after the fact -- and it wasn't even Yakomaru's beliefs themselves that prompted this reflection (as if his being was somehow justified because he is a human relative, and wouldn't be if he wasn't).

katsucats said:
I would agree that sacrifice is a theme of the show, but disagree that by itself that determines greatness. I would have liked to see the characters coming towards more insight regarding how better to approach these sacrifices with the show's conclusion. The characters developed as beings over the course of the show, but they did not seem to have matured: they gained the conviction of adults, but without real specific thoughts to back it up. Perhaps this could be contrived as commentary in its own right, but it does not fare well for a literary work. I want to see the characters wrestle with the show's themes instead of just noticing them in passing.

katsucats said:
I get the word game, but it's corny and unnecessary. It could have arrived at the same conclusion without pretentious explanations. This isn't a big deal, just a pet peeve of mine.

symbv said:
I think at least Saki displays internal conflict after hearing Yakomaru and knowing his species' origin. And I do not think it should be up to the characters in the world to ponder the questions for us the watchers. They need to deal with the aftermath and the future, while, as I said earlier, the story itself has provided quite a bit of stimulus for us to think about the questions. The story does not show how we should proceed because there is no good answer. We will need to think by ourselves and draw our conclusion over how to proceed if we are in a position of human, or in a position of queerats, given the existing conditions and circumstances, and this is what I think the novel has done very well. And I just want to stress again that, from what I read so far among many western and Japanese watchers, most do not see Yakomaru as a token evil guy. You seem to be one of the minority who think he is till portrayed as a token evil guy by the end of the series.

symbv said:
Actually I would say that it is better that the novel to ask us the thought-provoking questions instead of having the characters coming towards insight. What you said seems that you are looking for answer, an answer of how they should proceed with the future. I think the ending has kept open whether the future is going to be smooth or tough, and it is precisely because there is no easy answer. We as the readers/watchers are facing the same challenge as Saki and Satoru now face. I can see you also want to see the struggles but I don't really think they are necessary, as, to me at least, we know that they would need to wrestle with all those issues.

symbv said:
But at least it is not the farce you first said it is, right?

AirStyles said:
I don't think spoon-feeding the viewer is necessary. As the show is made to engage your thoughts.

AirStyles said:
Yakomaru's actions through out the show has been questioned by both Saki and Satoru (both provide contrasting opinion in most cases).

AirStyles said:
+ Both Yakomaru and Kiroumaru's action have been extremely logical on a revolution standpoint.

We do not need a back story where Yakomaru is traumatize by the truth by capturing a flase minoshiro and suddenly decide on coup' d'etat.

AirStyles said:
We're looking at conditioned human beings 1000 years in the future, with 400+ years(over 12 generations) of societal/genetic/trait conditioning.

AirStyles said:
I thought that it's common knowledge nowadays that scientist often have the weirdest sense of humor.

katsucats said:
You keep saying "by the end of the series", but the main events in the series end at the beginning of the last episode.

katsucats said:
I am not looking for an answer to the future, I am looking for how the characters came up with an answer to their future. Developing character insight into their world is not the same as spoon-feeding the audience; in fact, the expositions in the last episode are exactly what you are criticizing. Precisely because there are no easy answers, it must be known that the characters themselves understand this.

katsucats said:
It's a farce because "Hetero" was never used this way in this context. It's an attempt to sound intelligent without being intelligent.

symbv said:
If they had used homo the wrong way as you first said (homo does not mean human in Latin and homo is used to describe human only in terms of sexuality), then perhaps it is a farce; otherwise I see it as what Airstyles said, weird sense of humor from scientists it is. And I think the scientist who named it is now laughing in his grave as finally someone cracks the hint he put it.

katsucats said:
Homo does mean "human" in Latin, but it means "same" in Greek (as opposed to Hetero, which is the Greek root for "opposing"). The show misidentifies the Latin Homo for the Greek Homo.

katsucats said:
It is regrettable that they couldn't somehow develop Yakomaru,

give a more compelling motive to the Queerats,

The time spent on finding and misusing an ancient weapon could have been used more wisely to come up with a more elaborate plan against the fiend, and make the showdown more epic.

The ending felt as if nothing has changed, that none of the villagers seem to have learned anything from the events, despite the narrative discussing the possibility of a better future.

None of the core themes of the show were solved by the end of the show. The Queerats' autonomy were promptly laughed off by their human counterparts. There's no indication that "erasing" children who do not manage their Cantus will stop. There's no indication that death feedback will be reconsidered or some other plan set into place to prevent fiends in the future. Satoru never did remember Shun in the end. It's as if the whole events in the show were a dream that never happened. I don't see why it should fall on Saki and Satoru to dictate the direction of humanity, which would prove extremely difficult given that none of the other villagers are even aware of the circumstances that led to the events.

Yakomaru was quite unambiguously the bad guy until postmortem, no time was spent considering the value of his actions.

logopolis said:
His name is Squealer. That's development, right there.

logopolis said:
They have a bunch of mass-murderers wiping out their cities whenever the murderers want! What more motive do you need? If some group of people wiped out cities in whatever country you lived in whenever they wanted, would you think your motives to do something about it not sufficiently compelling?

logopolis said:
It sounds like you believe the messiah to be both a fiend, and some sort of "bad guy", if you want an epic showdown. Both of which are false. Doesn't sound like you followed the themes of the story.

logopolis said:
Sounds like you just want something different. A fairytale, ending in consolation. Shinsekai yori is simply a different sort of story, it's one which pays strong attention to realism, which acknowledges that rebellions against mass-murdering powerful overclasses will sometimes fail.

logopolis said:
I don't know about you, but when intelligent slaves revolt against their mass-murdering masters, I automatically think of the slaves as the good guys, I don't need to learn that sentient creatures are "human" to think they have the right to life and freedom or anything. The show starts painting Squealer as the good guy the first time we see queerats automatically bowing and scraping in episode two-ish. Providing you're not judging by appearances.

logopolis said:
@katsucats: You seem to think that Shinsekai yori works to the rules of most stories. Look around you. You'll find hundreds of stories which make armed rebels into bad guys. None of them will end up with the rebel leader being stripped naked, laughed at when he claims humanity and put to eternal torture. Shinsekai yori is deliberately subversive.

You may know the basic rules of storytelling, but advanced storytelling is about knowing how to break those rules.

katsucats said:

And yet they are the antagonists, and the protagonists of the show were never shown to give credence nor wrestle with the Queerat perspective.

katsucats said:
The "Messiah" along with Squealer are the primary antagonists, the "bad guys" in our story and the source of conflict regardless of whether you identify with their plight. The entire second half of the show was devoted to this development. It sounds like you need to learn some basics in story telling.

katsucats said:
Sounds like you just want something different. A fairytale, ending in consolation. Shinsekai yori is simply a different sort of story, it's one which pays strong attention to realism, which acknowledges that rebellions against mass-murdering powerful overclasses will sometimes fail.

katsucats said:
I don't know about you, but when intelligent slaves revolt against their mass-murdering masters, I automatically think of the slaves as the good guys, I don't need to learn that sentient creatures are "human" to think they have the right to life and freedom or anything. The show starts painting Squealer as the good guy the first time we see queerats automatically bowing and scraping in episode two-ish. Providing you're not judging by appearances.

katsucats said:
The protagonist is still *sigh* Saki and Satoru, and Maria and Mamoru are still remembered with fond familiarity. Yakomaru is still the villain that killed Maria and Mamoru while raising their offspring to kill her own brethren. You could watch Shinsekai Yori with a radical interpretation, but it will only stretch so far.

AirStyles said:
Sorry, but I never knew a story about a war perspective have a good guy/bad guy.

We're witnessing Yakomaru's attempt at coup d'etat through the perspective of Saki.

AirStyles said:
So again, you're complaining about a story because... You hope it turn out differently. Deja Vu.

AirStyles said:
You're the one who's confusing.
The narratives is done against District 66 in most part of the story
Group 1 have "fought' District 66 a heck of a lot more times compared to Yakomaru.

Not all stories are not about who's right and wrong.

katsucats said:
Right. That's what makes a protagonist. Look up its definition.

katsucats said:

If by differently, you meant more depth, then yes. But with that kind of semantic stretching you could use that as a catch-all response to all criticism for why every anime should be perfect.

katsucats said:

The inclusion of the District 66 school board as a secondary antagonist does not change the fact that our Group 1 are protagonists, and Yakomaru is an antagonist. The protagonist/antagonist dichotomy is not the same thing as a good/bad guy dichotomy.

You don't have to intellectually self-destruct in a spiral into absurdity just to defend anime that you like. You know, you could take a different approach that doesn't require contradicting blatant fact. Trust me, it's not worth it.

katsucats said:
Do you understand now, or are you going to keep playing the troll with a comprehension level of a third grader? Stop laughing and educate yourself. At the very least, stop responding to me. I prefer intelligent conversation, not fanboy spasms.

Vivokas said:
Loved this episode sadely we don't know what happend to maria and the other, does somebody know if the novel or the manga ends like this too? When i first watched this series i never thought it will end like this, but i'm happy i watch it.

mayukachan said:

The novel ends in the same way, people have told me. And the manga...it's not really relevant to the novel at all (or so I've heard)
I guess we can only assume what happened to Mamoru and Maria.

1. Queerats killed them and stole their child.
2. Queerats stole their child but let them escape.
3. ???

AirStyles said:
You do not understand story. You do not understand narratives.
You only want to see what you want to see, and anything that's different = bad.
You cannot accept things that are done differently to what you wish, because if it's not done to your liking, it's bad.

mayukachan said:

The novel ends in the same way, people have told me. And the manga...it's not really relevant to the novel at all (or so I've heard)

Kiniest said:


Did you think of the possibility that they forced the two to breed? Consider the apparent age of the child.

Spirai said:


Wait, there's a novel AND a manga? So there's actually a book with just words, titled Shinsekai Yori and then there's the manga (which apparently doesn't follow the novel or the anime at all)?