86 Part 2 Episode 3 Discussion

Syureria said:
Shin and his friends decide to enroll in a special military academy. Shin, who had survived the harsh battlefield as a Spearhead squadron, showed his fighting skills even in the military school and shocked the surroundings. Getting a reprimand from the instructor, rather than having to enjoy peaceful days, Shin would rather go to the battlefield. Somehow many robot carcasses make me nostalgic, is that you?

I hope that the masou military academy scene continues, it's still too early for the battlefield besides, I also want to see Milize. I don't know why Enoki mushrooms are not very popular, is the taste too bad? Look at Frederica's face, xD. It's still the episodeb3 and a corpse has appeared even though it's just. The god of death just joining the battlefield

Osmandes1r8123 said:
This just getting more exciting I can't wait for every to know what's gonna happen,so I've decided to read the manga

theGodde said:

Talk about a fake out death. I remember everyone lost their minds when Fido bit the dust. Now that scene has been retroactively ruined. Why did Fido need to be revived? There was no need other than fan service. He never really fulfilled a direct role in the story. And he's not even present in the rest of the episode.

theGodde said:
that statement "it's almost like he's the reaper" makes no sense. Have they heard of a soldier who went by the name "reaper"? I've seen no indication that's true. In which case what has Shin's actions (and suspected actions) done to suggest he is in any way deserving of the title "reaper"? It felt like the most bizarre and ham fisted tie in to the first season I've ever seen. Like hold that statement until after Shin actually joins the battlefield as the reaper.

Talk about a fake out death. I remember everyone lost their minds when Fido bit the dust. Now that scene has been retroactively ruined. Why did Fido need to be revived? There was no need other than fan service. He never really fulfilled a direct role in the story. And he's not even present in the rest of the episode.

And now we've reached another timeskip. Eugene's death is also one of the most predictable and uninspired deaths in the entire series so far. The setup was incredibly obvious. But who knows maybe it will be redeemed by tying strongly into the main plot. As it stands I feel like it was a lazy and uninspired thing to do with his character. It's uneconomical storytelling to build up a character solely to be killed off. There were so many other things he could have added to the story that could have made his death actually meaningful beyond being a source of conflict between Shin and the redhead guy.

animejas said:


I actually agree with the Fido thing, Fido didn't serve much in season 1 but I admired the actual scene that he was involved with so much back then but bringing the machine back felt like that whole scene was a bit wasted. Sure it served as a great little recollection of what the members of 86 went through together with the good and bad times, but the machine and character involved there feels like a waste now with being revived.

Also agree with Eugene's character to some degree but he was just a plot device that was sacrificed in battle, but other series do this too like Attack on Titan where you get to know someone for a short bit just to sacrifice them for the nature of the world and a reminder of how cruel it can still be. His character is just a plot device which does make him uninteresting and kind of wasted potential which I agree with, but to some degree the series does introduce some characters to kill them off for impact sake.

This whole episode didn't really click with me barring the brutality of the actual scene with Eugene's death as well as the gravestone scene and these little details further make progress to why the series struggles for me a bit with this volume adapted and some of the future ones too.

w3b0shi said:
Dude's using a blade in a battlefield dominated by guns, stoic on the surface but goes on a mad rampage killing enemies left and right, has a headless skeleton painted on his tank. You mean to say these synonyms can't be used to describe his as a "Reaper"?

w3b0shi said:
What's wrong with Fido's "fake out death" anyway? The point is that if you truly cared for a certain character, why wouldn't you be happy for that character to be actually alive? With that said the fact that it frustrates you to see Fido alive again for some reason implies you didn't care for him to begin with.

w3b0shi said:
And why are you solely focusing on Eugene's death having no meaning besides just a predictable, dramatic attempt to kill someone? Why are you forgetting about Nina and how she would react to Shin, and how Shin will react to her? Eugene's death is a parallel to the events at the first season, only this time Shin is sending off people that has a future ahead of them. That's not including the change where him being a "Reaper" seemingly feels like a job/duty now that his wish to put his brother to rest is over with. It's not as if the story itself isn't aware that Eugene is a walking death flag; in the LN he died right in the first chapter of the second volume, and his death serves more in the purpose of fleshing out Shin's "Reaper" persona, how years of doing this is starting to affect him, as well as reinforcing the theme about war this series is about.

But who knows maybe it will be redeemed by tying strongly into the main plot.

w3b0shi said:
If you haven't caught on to it yet, 86 is mostly character drama, and Eugene's death is not simply just about him putting on a stark reminder that people in war can die at any time. If you can't see past beyond that and how it ties in to the 86's, particularly Shin's obvious growing suicidal tendencies and existentialism, then of course this series won't click with you if you didn't understand what it's about in the first place.

theGodde said:
I don't think thematic messaging invalidates criticism of story. None of what you've said changes the fact that he was a sacrificial pawn whose death wasn't as impactful as it could have been if he had been developed for just an episode or two longer. Why couldn't he have been better developed and then died to produce the exact same thematic messaging and character progression for Shin?

w3b0shi said:
Can't you even remember how they handled Kaie and Daiya's death? They're literally minor characters just like Eugene, yet Daiya's death for example is still a major part of the inner turmoil Anju is going through -- just seeing how the second episode rubs that to our face even though we barely know Daiya is already depressing in itself.

w3b0shi said:
He isn't even developed in the LN either when he died. How much and how do you want to develop him eitherway? Would knowing which sport he's good at, what's his favorite color change anything? Why shouldn't the story spend more time on other things instead that are also critical to what it wants to tell? Isn't characterizing him as one of Shin's few closer friends, a nice guy with a bright future, enough to serve the purpose of highlighting how that ties in to Shin's character development? Or are you just the type of person who wouldn't feel a tinge of sadness over someone's death unless you've know them for years? You're not supposed to cry a river over his death because that's not exactly what the point is. Not every death in a story has to have impact as soon as it happens.

theGodde said:
don't bring up the season 1 deaths as examples of good writing
I have even more issues with S1 than I do with S2.
A good character death should accomplish different things depending on its intended purpose within the narrative. Say a character completes their arc and fulfils their purpose within the story, then their death is a means of saying farewell to that character while using it as a source of motivation for the surviving characters to progress the plot. In this case the focus should be less about the character themselves and more on the surviving cast who are affected - spending time to show how the death impacted all the characters. This is not the case with any of the deaths mentioned in 86, but I'm still mentioning it here because this is what people assume all character deaths should be like.
A different type of character death would be a character whose life has been cut short. They might have been just about to fulfil their goal but died before they could, and so the main focus of this kind of death is a sense of unfairness. The feeling of lost potential, that this person have done so much more. This type of character death is often looked down upon by most people because it's consistently used poorly by writers. Either it's too obvious (too many red flags), or there wasn't enough development before their death, or there wasn't a significant impact in the narrative to justify the death.
Now if we consider the deaths in Season 1 that you mentioned. First of all, Kaie's death was awfully executed in the anime. We saw it from Lena's perspective on a tactical map rather than seeing her die in person. There are two reasons characters are killed off in 86 - to build upon the themes and reveal more about the world (such as Kujo's death in the first episode revealing more about Shin's character and spearhead as a whole, also building upon the nature of war), and characters who die in order to progress the plot/characters (such as Daiya's death progressing Anju's character). What did Kaie's death achieve? Her role up until her death was simply to spout exposition and be the voice of reason. She possessed no unique or interesting characters traits, and her death served only to force Lena to learn that her actions have consequences - which could have been done in a multitude of different ways that didn't require the offscreen death of an underdeveloped character.

I've literally been saying this the entire time. How many times do I have to repeat "if his death has consequences within the story then this won't be an issue" before you take the hint. Did you only read the latest post and ignore the first one?

theGodde said:
you need to learn to read better. These guys were still at officer school when they said that line. They should have absolutely no knowledge of Shin or who he was before now, and the show has given us no indication that he did anything at officer school to earn the name reaper

matias067 said:
that was the most predictable deathflag!
4/5.