86 Episode 9 Discussion

theGodde said:
as for Shin's expression, the issue is it can be interpreted a variety of ways. Before I went and asked on here, I thought he was either thinking "what is that?" or "my goodness I can't believe they're using that". All we can surmise from that is that the use of the arms was surprising, not necessarily unfamiliar. I thought about this a fair bit too much during the episode lmao.

Now you seem to have missed my point with the setting stuff (mainly because I rambled for 2-3 paragraphs about something and then made a completely different conclusion as I was basically reasoning as I was writing). My point was that they needed to make it more clear that this was also something new to the 86. It was a little too ambiguous for a piece of technology that very nearly decided the outcome of a battle.

As for the telepathy gear (yes I will keep calling it that -fight me), I was not criticising it at all, although it may have seemed that way. Wait... what did I actually say about it? Looking back I was originally going there with it and then I had this like 10 minute philosophy moment about how media representation of technology changes with time.
But yeah my main point was that the telepathy gear is a concept people don't understand so you have creative liberties with it. What you shouldn't have creative liberties with is... physics. Which is why I hate the spider mechs. [At least humanoid mechas are somewhat feasible because their legs are capable of supporting their body weight. Spider mechs have these tiny spindly legs - and because of physics (again, it's a little inconvenient all this logic and reasoning eh) weight increases greater than size increases, and I can assure you no futuristic skinny leg motor would be able to withstand the torque from the sheer weight of that big body and massive recoilless rifle.]

and yes I do have big problems with the mecha genre, which is why I'm not a massive fan of it (although sometimes I can appreciate the aesthetic - like with some of the better gundam entries and eva/pacific rim). I think this is a reason why a lot of people don't enjoy mecha anymore. It's because mecha anime keeps trying to tell more grounded and realistic stories that don't really sit well with the big boi human robots. (at least that's my take. I'm probably wrong though because behavioural science actually requires statistics and logical reasoning)

theGodde said:
it's something the LN has an excuse for, since like you said it was originally written as a standalone. It could have been rewritten to expand the story and better flow with sequels, but that's not entirely necessary and I'm more than willing to let that pass with no consequences.

However the anime doesn't have that excuse. It shouldn't follow the LN to a T. The LN isn't perfect, and the adaptation arguably should be its own thing, able to stand on its own two feet even when the LN is taken out of the picture. If you see a glaring flaw in your source material (like criminally underwritten characters) then why not put in some time to fix this up. So far I haven't really seen anyone comment "this episode they added something that wasn't in the LN and I think it really improved the story" at all. Because the anime is following the LN so rigidly, it doesn't really get the chance to be its own thing. And that's a real shame to me because without the background of the LN this adaptation feels lifeless. It feels like a series of cool events that are being ticked off the LN checklist as they happen. And it's difficult to explain where in the direction this could be improved (I'll give it a rewatch once the series finishes and see if I can pinpoint what is making me feel this).

theGodde said:
-by far my favourite depiction of child soldiers is Gundam Frame: Iron Blooded Orphans. They feel like their childhoods have been stolen. You can really feel the cost of war on their lives. And that is what I was expecting with the 86. Just growing up in a concentration camp should change you enough that you stop acting like normal teenagers. These guys are holocaust survivors that then volunteered to go die on a battlefield. What kind of person lives like that and acts like a normal teenager?

theGodde said:
As for the military guy, I can't read Japanese and the auto-translators are shit, so his twitter really doesn't give me much other than tell me he exists. What I'll say is that I can see his handiwork in plenty of places. The fact that the 86's mechs use recoilless rifles rather than conventional cannons is a really cool small detail that just increases the realism for me. The way the HE-VT mortars worked was also really realistic and satisfying to see accurately portrayed (which is why I keep bringing them up). But I don't know much about the guy. I don't know how much he actually contributed. I really don't know enough to say that this guy had a hand in the characters at all. For all we know, he could have just been a creative consultant on the military technology.
Which should mean that any issues with the tech and world building deserve even more criticism - since you can't argue that "it's just anime" since they literally brought in a military guy to get this stuff right.

theGodde said:
I'll probably end it here because I am an armchair expert on soviet warfare since ...

theGodde said:
While I think we are making ground, I am actually starting to forget most of the problems I originally had with 86 because I've spent more time arguing on these forums then actually watching the show, and when I rewatch it I'll come back with them and we'll probably go back to ground zero.

UTMAN said:


Noo, you can hate your own race aswell. It's called invidiual racism. Which I also told you in my previous post.

Also you said OP explored racism better than 86, which is factually not true. This is what we were talking about from the very beginning.

aightbet said:


I see, I do apologise if my comment was too harsh, looking back it does look so to me. Sorry about that.


I will write a fairly lengthy piece of text explaining my perspective about the character of Lena, because I feel like her character is greatly misunderstood by many.

So, with the development of Lena being in mind, when Lena was first shown to us, it was clear that she played the role of being an idealistic and overtly naive character in an anime about war and discrimination. This was the character trope the writer of this story had essentially given Lena to perform, and she performed this role magnificently. Her idealism of what her country stands for and should accomplish was almost obnoxious and felt incredibly childish, and her advocacy for the 86 almost felt like it was merely a show of disgusting pity to the 86 people with regards to what her country was ACTUALLY doing to the 86. Of course at first glance, these aspects of Lena made it so that it was difficult for the audience to really like or connect with her as she was so disconnected with the reality of the 86's situation, and this is something the spearhead squadron themselves also felt.

Now a key aspect of Lena's character in the beginning I want to highlight is how trustful she is of what she sees, or is told. Lena at first was seen to be unable to have adequate critical thinking behind the information she learns about whether by her own eyes or ears. Her naivety is reflected by how she is very quick to believe or take things as fact the moment she learns about them, and this is namely seen in two separate occasions. The first one is when Lena interacts with Shourei (Shin's brother) when she was young, and the second is her blind trust of her government's word on reinstating the citizenship of the 86 after 5 full years of military service.

The first point I want to explore is of Shourei's reason of fighting which was shown in episode 3 of the anime when Lena was speaking with Kaie. Lena, who was rescued by Shourei when her father took her to the battlefield had learned of why Shourei fights. And what Shourei says to Lena is "We are members of the Republic. We were born here and grew up here. It's a citizen's duty to protect his country. I'm proud to do it. That's why we fight". Lena, after learning this is seemingly misguided by Shourei's reasoning of fighting and applies this 'fight principle' to all members of the 86. In essence this was one of the first signs where we saw Lena's naiveness and innocence working in full course. This is despite the context that Lena already knows of the 86 which is that they are forcefully conscripted into military service, her blind trust and closed view of her own thoughts, values, and ideals blinded her into honestly believing that the 86 actually fight for such a virtuous cause, and depicts her incapability to critically think behind why the 86 are actually fighting given the context she already knows.

The second case of Lena's obnoxious virtuousness and naivety can be seen in her blind trust of the Republic's word that the reinstatement of the 86's citizenship is guaranteed after the 5 years of military service they are forced to do. And yet again, we see that her lack of critical thinking given the context that she knows that the 86 are not even referred to as humans by the educators, policy makers, high ranking generals, and population of the Republic. How would the 86 actually be given 'human rights' and citizenship when said people have literally been taken as an example of beings that have 'failed to evolve'? This shows yet again Lena's innocence and naivety concerning her ideals.

The anime topples each of these cases by putting Lena in situations where she is under immense pressure by the 86, and forced to change her justifications and beliefs in order to conform with the realities of her own country and this 'blood-less' war, and most of all opens up her previously tunnel vision virtuousness and lip service advocacy into something much more respectable and meaningful. It is also in these situations where we, the audience, see Lena's growth by how she actively reshapes her fundamental ideals and turning into a character that does not remain only idealistic but also has an ounce of realist principles and is capable of dealing with these changes and events accordingly.

To keep this short, I will continue using the two cases of Lena's display of her naivety previously to show how Lena develops as a character.

If you remember in the manner Lena talked to the spearhead squadron until episode 3, one can argue that Lena herself, despite her strong views of acknowledging the 86 as humans and citizens of the Republic, has herself been impacted by the indoctrination of the Republic's views on those who are of not pure-blooded Albas. This is something that was interesting because it serves as a direct juxtaposition between Lena's beliefs and actions. So how were her conversational mannerisms ironic when engaging with the 86? It was simple, Lena did not even think about asking the real names of the people she is talking to. No, instead however, she unconsciously chose to continue using the spearhead squadron's member's codenames instead. This was yet again remarkable when you consider the fact that Lena asked for the name of the cat who lives with the squadron but not even have the thought of asking the real names of the very people she is conversing with.

Referring to people with codenames instead of their actual names serves as a way to dehumanise a person by taking their very identity away, and is a prime example of Lena's unconscious mannerisms she may had picked up on during her time working as a handler, and not directly handed real names of the processors she is commanding, OR may also be a result of the Alba-centric education she had been given as well as surrounded by people sharing the Alba supremacist viewpoint. Either way though, this unbeknownst way of identification of hers served as the piece that made Lena's idealism ironic and collapses onto itself when she is exposed to the very harsh, but true words of Theo's exposition of holes in her virtue signalling mind and lip service advocacy. During Theo's outburst is when we, the audience, can see for ourselves that Lena's two ideals that, (1) the 86 fight to protect the Republic and (2) 86 should be treated as human beings, come crumbling down as Lena is in denial of her own actions as she realises how her fundamental idealistic principles failed to resonate with the spearhead squadron despite her projecting of virtuousness in an almost disgustingly pitiful way was not only insulting, but also ironic.

After Theo's outburst, Lena comes to understand this and realise her shortcomings. We can also see for ourselves that Lena makes great efforts into truthfully understanding the 86, and to not continue being blinded by her idealisms that have stemmed since her childhood. We see that she truly wants to become a better person, she understands her mistakes and decides to grow on this by asking for the real names of the spearhead squadron's member's.

The first case showed an aspect of how Lena developed as a character from her perspective of morals and ethics, and now comes the development of Lena from realist fundamentals within the second case.

As explained previously, the second case of Lena ironically trusting what her government says about granting citizenship to the 86 once their 5 year military service is over despite fully knowing that the country themselves have never once referred to the 86 as actual human beings serves as an ideal that is broken when the spearhead squadron finally expose what the spearhead squadron's role actually is within the war. Which is of course, the final execution ground to the most elite of the 86 soldiers who have continuously survived and are coming dangerously close to their 5 year term limit. This case represents the final breaking point of Lena's ideals of her country, military, people, and government that comes shattering down when she finally understands that her previous protests to her superior by rank, uncle, to add new soldiers to the now diminishing spearhead squadron had been completely futile, and served as the key to opening her locked close-sighted view. This is also the time when Lena can finally think critically, something that I mentioned early in this text to be a key attribute she lacked in previous to the event of the second case. It is here when we finally see Lena transition to someone who no longer just listens and follows orders, but to become radical, and to finally disobey the authority that had been holding her back in helping the 86 all this time. This was the final wake-up call for Lena, and what a wake-up it was, with her blackmailing her best friend (well currently not best friends I guess at this point in time) to sharing vision between the handler and 86 soldier and to take control of the artillery launch. Over the course of 9 episodes we saw a slow, but progressing change in Lena's mindset, and method of showing advocacy and support to the 86 by becoming much more radical, and particularly frightening.

Just taking these two cases alone we have seen an incredible change of old Lena and present Lena. We can see that the Lena at present is much more fitting to being a leader. She is able to think critically, think radically, use underhanded means to take charge of a situation and act according to her beliefs. We have seen her transition into an arguably cutesy, shallow, ultra-idealistic, ironic, and follower-type character into a character now with great depth, radical ability, leadership skills, and sacrificing some of her ideals in favour of seeing the broader picture. The real picture.

You made the comment that "She's basically the same. Always trying to help, with good intentions in mind." And I have to say, you are correct. She is still the same, but that is a good thing. Her character from the very beginning was set to supporting and advocating for the 86, to help with whatever that is needed to keep the 86 alive. But rather than focusing on how Lena develops with regards to her emotions regarding the 86, to truly evaluate Lena's character development you need to take into account HOW her mindset changes, how she comes to terms with her flawed idealism, how she becomes a leader, how she comes to better understand the 86, how she transitioned into merely performing lip service to the 86 becoming a radical with her means of supporting the 86, how she is now able to think critically as compared to conforming to her ideals and naivety. I believe this is the way to see Lena's development, which is why I believe Lena is a very well written character.

Thank you for listening to my TED Talk.

Anyways, regarding your Naruto thing. No, I don't think Naruto is shit at all, only MAL elitists would probably say such a thing. However, I personally would not give it a 10/10. That being said, this doesn't mean you are obviously wrong for giving it a 10. If you loved the show, you loved the show man.

Angel_crush1 said:


There's a forum in this series that titled of "im sorry,what" that is were the answer your looking for

superjordan2001 said:


I think I like shounen more if I am able to distinguish according to quality. (Hunter x Hunter 10? Acceptable. Bleach 10? Hmmmm.)

Merve2Love said:
That Brother x Brother thing didn't hit as hard for me....

I mean...we've got nothing.
Not any real motivations, backstorys, we don't really know anything about these two.

All we got is basically the elder Brother loves Shin....but he snapped at him, this one time, almost killing him. He's sorry for that. Now his brain was stolen. Shin want's to put him to rest.

UTMAN said:


It's not really nothing.

Well the most important stuff is:
Shin and his brother lived in district 1. They got deported. Their parents went to fight the Legion to protect them, but they all died. Now dealing with this fact and the realization that it's now his turn to go to the battlefied to protect Shin, Rei (his brother) just snapped under the pressure and basically choked Shin to death while putting all the blame on him. This is the last/ and only memory Shin has his brother. While Rei deeply regretting what he did.

When the Legion kills a person and makes them into Black Sheep/Shepherds, the last thing in the mind of the killed person is strenghtened. And the last thought of Rei was his obsession of Shin and trying to protect him. So him being a Shephard is 100% focused on this task.

Also there is a misunderstandtment by Shin that his brother still blaims him for everything after his death, and basically when he kills Rei, his brother finally forgives him and the two reconcile for a split second, causing to Shin remember his trapped memories of his brother.

But I respect your opinion on the matter.

Merve2Love said:


You basically repeated what I said...well....with more words xD

Just saying we don't know a full and good story. We know that he wanted to kill Shin and that he blaims him for....something...we don't really know the ins and outs of that story. We got bits of what COULD make up a Story.

-> Which made it so much less intriguing to watch the climax of it all

Neion4ty7 said:


is that supposed to be an insult? Ill come right back at you with your 10 for naruto and fucking bleach. Hell if its shounen 300 eps at least to get anywhere you give it a 10, typical shounensperg. Like you gave sangatsu no lion an 8 while the aformentioned shounen drivel is 10s. the only one that deserves it is hunter x hunter.

You have watched over 100 eps of fucking boruto for christ sakes. Thats all i need to know to confirm my suspicion that any subtle exposition, symbolization or characterization is completely lost to you.

UTMAN said:


Well kinda. You said there is no motivation, backstory etc.

I just added it for you. What you take is up to you. :)

theGodde said:
No matter how many important people praise it, this will not eliminate its flaws - and based on the MAL review, a fair majority of people dislike this anime. It has 3-4 star reviews literally on the front page.

theGodde said:
the thing about development is that it's more about quality time rather than information quantity. We got around 2 separate backstory scenes, each not exceeding around 5 minutes. We barely know anything about Shin's bro other than the straight facts that you regurgitated before.

I agree that he didn't get enough development compared to the amount of importance he played in this latest episode.

UTMAN said:


Hmmm I kinda can see your point. But if Shin had prior knowledge of those hands, he would have engaged close-combat a bit more carefully in my opinion. So that's why I thought it's more of a surprise coming from information that he did not have.

Also I still don't think it's necessary to reveal information there at that moment. Once again One Piece example. Shabody - Luffy vs Sentomaru. That's where Luffy is defeated by a Haki user and the concept of Haki came a lot later on. It can give you some sort of mystery to the story. But I can see that some people might be irritated of this kind of story telling.

Idk about telepathy. Telepathy is thought sharing/sending. You don't need to speak out loud in order to speak with each other. You can do it inside your minds. In the Para-raid's cause you speak out loud, you hear yourself speaking and that sense is shared with the other replicants. So I guess we can call it an artifical telepathy I guess. It doesn't really matter what's the base concept as long as we can accept the fact that it's okay to have this technology I guess.

Well I kinda find human-shape mechas unrealistic as well. But it's not to a point that it would hinder my enjoyement of it I guess? Also if you remember about the spired mech's legs, it was heavily emphasiszed in ep1 and in ep 9 that Shin keeps breaking them. So the physics is there.

UTMAN said:


I kinda can agree with you here. Since the anime was written when the LN was already serialised. However there are a lot of liberties that the anime did regarding the adaptation. It does a lot of anime original scenes that you would not know if you didn't read the LN or was not told.
- The classroom scene in ep2
- Lecca and Daiya's death in ep 6
- Today's epiosode when Lena runs after them.

Also there are a lot of scenes and symbolism is added to the anime. Like the red flowers at the end of ep9, or when Lena writes the names of the 86. In the LN we just see Shin's perspective. The anime decided to add her to a Graveyard and portray you the harsh irony that every deceased ALba having a memorial, while 86-s don't even have a grave.

So there are some liberties taken, but they mostly for Lena or Shin's case. So I agree with you that aside from those 2, they don't have much character developement.

Also this is not something the anime can win. Because if it takes too much liberty, the LN readers will get angry. Some of them are already mad about the classroom scene. So you either get trashed by anime onlys, or LN readers.

I believe this all comes down to our difference that I read the LN while you don't. The anime is much more enjoyable when you read the LN next to it because in the LN there are more narration and you kinda can get a more full picture. Also the anime doesn't really tell you directly what's happening. It just puts it there and you need to find it and understand it. And if you don't know what to look it might be difficult. I personally rewatch every episode multiple times and read subredits that analyze each episode and people who are much smarter than me usually point out some of these hidden elemets which makes the anime even more enjoyable for me. Because of this I can see the dedication of the anime studio that took on the project.

UTMAN said:


I have not seen that anime, so i can't really make comments regarding to it.
This element is also represented in 86. Epiosde 3 lake scene, where the girls hear a slight noise and instantly pull their guns. Also theim being accustomed to death. Also the way they act is explained by them:

https://imgur.com/a/9LEe3UX

Also Raiden's comment about walking up to a gallow and choosing how they take the steps along the way. You can either be al gloomy and melancholic or try to enjoy the remaining time you left. Also keep in mind these are 4-5 year veterans. Idk if in that the people in IBO Gundam are newbies or veterans. If they were newly recruits who has to face these environment I would agree with you for acting too up-beat. Also this is just one squad on the whole front. There might be 86 who just can't accept this holocaust fate.

UTMAN said:
I guess, the anime could have shown us his favourite color, food, flower etc etc sure... but I don't think it's that necessary.


I would agree with you more if the enemy would have been a human Rei, or if the Shephard is 100% Rei.

However Shin's brother died and everything died with him, except his obsession/deep regret of Shin. That's the Shephard Rei's main driving force, everything else is irrelevant for the machine counterpart. And this obsession/deep regret was nicely explored by those 2 flashback imo.
So for me he serves an okay first antagonist for the anime.

But I guess some more info about Shin's brother when he was alive would not have hurt.

ulon said:


Oh god, are there still people who care about reviews? If a lot of people didn't like the show, it would have a score <6, with high percentages of drop (see the stats and their distribution).

It is already common on MAL that good shows have negative reviews as the most voted, since the only ones that give them relevance are the haters and their bots

kuu0haku said:
@theGodde About impact of war not being shown, maybe you got fooled by how bright the anime looks but there were so many indicators that at least showed how used to fighting and death the 86 had become. Right from the first episode, we have shin shooting a processor and Raiden asking him about his brother's voice, like shooting a teammate was an ad on tv or something. Or the scene where the female processors were playing in the water and upon a slight disturbance they all draw their weapons simultaneously.

And mostly the post death scene of kaie, after a single night thay all return to their cheerful selves and play/ have fun, I don't know about you but I can't see that as anything normal, the person you played cards with last night ends up dying and you just recover from that in a single nightand don't forget their age as well, teenaged children act that way... If that doesn't show how broken they were other scenes may show you as well.

At the time Daiya and another person died, Kurena is shown to be the other person's roommate, and what's her reaction? She makes a saddened face and invites others to a darts game, also Shin and Raiden talk about them dying like someone inviting them to go for a drink or something, all of that shows their numbness to death, isn't that what you wanted? Showing impact of war on them? In the most recent case, they talk about haruto dying and missing their death mission as a sad thing and he dies the previous day, also they were all about to go to their deaths with the 100% mortality mission with the brightest smiles they ever had, that's not showing you enough about their war torn mentality? And those are just the scenes I remember being odd and twisted.

Which soldier would have a happy face while being shot in the head or fall in love with the person who shoots every gravely injured person in the head? Don't those show how twisted their circumstances are? You talk as if iron blooded orphans shows the fakeness of happiness but 86 does that as well just that in 86 their happiness is genuine since they wholeheartedly live each day as if it's their last, if you look at what the characters say and act like, you can see how twisted they are compared to normal soldiers, and I'm not even comparing them to normal teenagers at this point... I'm not going to say you have to be emotional about those scenes (since that's very much subjective) but the information about impact of war was always there if you wanted to look for it.

theGodde said:
while all this is true, that's all there is to it. I see a series of actions but we're not really shown any depth as to why they are acting this way. Their motivations are not deconstructed and it just feels kinda jarring. People acting happy when all their friends are dying is not realistic, even if they've made some kind of vow to remain happy no matter what happens. That's just not how people work. They aren't so much twisted compared to normal soldiers, they just straight up don't make any sense. I don't get the feeling these are veterans that are numb to war, I am instead communicated the feeling that these are kids who have poor characterisation.

Whether or not the LN handles this better I cannot answer. Perhaps it adds some extra context that fleshes out this surface level stuff, but even if it does, that does not redeem the anime itself. It's not as if the LN and the anime are the same story. They're not. They are two separate adaptations of the same story. You can't use the LN as an excuse to justify the anime. It has to be able to stand up on its own two feet - which in my opinion as someone who has never read the LN - it doesn't

theGodde said:
whenever I go to check out a show I want to watch, I always check the negative reviews because I feel like it's necessary to get both sides of the story before jumping in. My friends find some really shit anime entertaining, and I have learnt from experience that I need to see both the fans and the haters opinions if I want to get a full view of the series. I usually also press the *helpful* button for reviews that had an effect on whether or not I decide to watch a series. This may make me seem to you to be a *bot* that supports the haters.

by far my favourite review section on MAL is FLCL, because you either understand the show and what it's trying to say - and give it a 9-10/10, or you don't understand it and feel like you just watched the animated equivalent of an acid trip, give it a 1-4/10, and then rage about how dumb the series is because some people like to *pretend* that it's smart but they know the *real truth*.

To me reviews accurately illustrate what kind of show it is. I'm watching Rurouni Kenshin now and I'm so glad I read the reviews first. I had hyped it way too much and the reviews lowered my expectations enough that when I got into watching it I knew there would be awful slapstick comedy and was able to wait it out to get to the incredible action and story.

So I doubt this show has been review bombed by bots. And I also doubt the mods have removed the 10 star reviews. I suspect that people like me are giving the negative reviews more weight because they are showing me a perspective on the series that 10 star reviews always leave out. This in turn is meaning that the negative reviews rise further in popularity and outshine the top reviews

Reinaria said:
actual genuine reviews come after the whole anime is finished,monkey reviews come after watching 4 episodes those are just haters who can't see anything they will watch the shows just to find out flaws and will not pay attention as to why it's that way .and why would you believe a reviewer? you got your own internet and device,if you don't have time ofc you can but those are the things mainly seasonal watchers do.'' negative reviews outshine the top reviews.''okay out of 200k members on mal only 2k find the reviews helpful so you can say they are just haters brainwashed by the reviews.

theGodde said:
what does "engaged in close combat a bit more carefully mean?" I don't know if you've noticed, but the direction during the mech fights is pretty average, just giving you enough continuity to follow what the mechs are doing while all the other shots are just "cinematic" shots of random vehicles and things involved in the battle. You wouldn't be able to tell at all how carefully shin is taking it if I'm honest.
Like I said before, all we needed was one line. ONE LINE of a character going "what's that?" and it'd be 100% clear to the entire audience what the arms are and you wouldn't have to over-analyse it like we are to come to a conclusion.

as for information drip, it's a little more complex because Sci-Fi and Fantasy (One Piece) have different requirements for how much information you need to reveal. Especially since sci-fi is often a lot about that technology. It can tend to play a major part in the combat (such as the mechs) and so the audience needs to understand how they work and what their limits are to be able to feel the full suspense.

But as for Shin breaking the legs, this doesn't excuse it at all. Every single joint needs a motor driving it, so why is the republic wasting vital resources creating mechs that are weaker and more fragile by design when it is actually easier to make mechs that are more stable and less fragile (like the legion ones that have massive legs). This is like shin shooting himself in the foot, and then because he complains about how his foot hurts, that justifies the decision to shoot himself in the foot.

theGodde said:
a lot of liberties is not 3 scenes. Sure you might have missed more but that's beside my point. A good writer understands the source material well and why it does the things it does. They break down the source material and then create a new story that adheres to the original one in all the ways that matter, while changing and improving it so it flows better as an animated series.
What the showrunners have done is basically what M-Night Shamalan did with the Last Airbender Film but in a less extreme way. They decided that by following the LN to a T that's the best way to respect the source material. And therefore adapted every single plot point, every single element of 86 without pausing to consider if all of it was necessary. The trap of television is that you do have the time to relate every single detail - unlike with movies where you have to condense everything into 2/3 hours, and therefore you have to start to cut things out and blend things together for the adaptation to work. I am against 100% faithful adaptations because then it begs the question, why adapt it at all? If the story doesn't evolve or change during the transition to other media, all you are getting is a LN with sound and visuals. And then what's the point? Just go read the LN if you want the LN experience.

The anime should have been completely retimed and restructured so you don't have to read the LN to fully understand what's going on and you don't have to browse forums to get little details the show should have already given to you. This experience pushes anime onlys away from the series, which is really really dumb IMO. The reason why the anime is under so much scrutiny is because they set a precedent by adapting everything point-for-point in the first few episodes. If from the very start they had of adapted it by understanding the source material and creating something that parallels it rather than mirror it then sure a few LN readers would have grumbled *hurr durr the LN was better*. But overall it would have been a better and more entertaining show.

theGodde said:
That scene you imgur-ed I do remember clearly - because it felt fake and dumb. When it comes to exposition, it needs to be delivered clearly. But when it comes to human emotion, that needs to be delivered very carefully and nuanced. No one says "if you can't laugh anymore, you lose" in the middle of a party. That's because the way it's framed, the statement isn't aimed at the person he's talking to, it's aimed at the audience. He's telling the audience "if we don't laugh, then the Alba have won". No one presents an argument in the middle of a party. They should have kept it at that first line and it would have felt more natural. But the reason I say that is because right now I'm currently writing a dialogue scene in my own story, and I've spent many years analysing how to write good dialogue and watching video essays and things like that. All these quotes at the end of the day mean nothing if these kids don't sell to you that they're fighting in a war. Look at Saving Private Ryan. When they're not fighting, those guys are really chill and laid back, trying to enjoy every day. But you can always see the broken nature of a killer underneath them. And this element of depth is what is missing from 86. Yes, it makes sense that spearhead would try to be happy. But they should try to be happy DESPITE the war. Despite their scarred and damaged lives. I just don't feel the impact of war on their personalities and lives at all, which is a massive crime for a war story.
You can get the best possible soldier in the world, but he probably knows nothing about writing stories. Having a military guy advise on the story doesn't mean they'll get the characters right. And it especially is not a get out of jail free card for their poor characterisation.

theGodde said:
Like I mentioned before, it's more about quality time than actual information. He's barely a presence in the story....

Neion4ty7 said:
certain people have way too much free time lmao. Writing whole essays for a single episode, not realizing they aren't going to change anyones mind here.

I'm guilt of wasting my time trying to explain things to speedwatchers but I have now realized the futility of it all. I suggest the simple enjoyers give up on the unenlightened, buy a juggernaut model kit to fund a second season and have fun building that and the little fido and lena(gotta paint these two though) it comes with like me. If you haven't caught up with the LNs go do that.

Neion4ty7 said:
certain people have way too much free time lmao. Writing whole essays for a single episode, not realizing they aren't going to change anyones mind here.

I'm guilty of wasting my time trying to explain things to speedwatchers but I have now realized the futility of it all. I suggest the simple enjoyers give up on the unenlightened, buy a juggernaut model kit to fund a second season and have fun building that and the little fido and lena(gotta paint these two though) it comes with like me. If you haven't caught up with the LNs go do that.

theGodde said:
I'm going to do this response differently because I had a long think about stuff, and finally realised the one massive problem I have with this show. So instead I'm going to address that because in comparison most of what we've been talking about are nitpicks.

This all begins with the handlers goofing off scene that you mentioned in the third imgur pic (since I remember that scene vividly because it made me cringe). "Showing" your handlers walking around and saying "oh wasn't it great how we made our units charge to their deaths. It was so entertaining to watch those 86 pigs die!" is most definitely very strong demonstration of how incompetent they are. So strong that their responses not only sound like the main villains out of a braindead action shounen, but it also ruins one of the only times we see characters that stand in for the republic. These guys are one of the few background characters that get lines and personality. Whenever you give a faceless character lines and personality, it is always to be used as a stand in for a wider organisation. By having these characters being comically incompetent and evil, you are reflecting back onto the republic and suggesting it is comically incompetent and evil. It doesn't even matter if you can rationalise these people's viewpoints, because they don't represent people within the story, they represent the general attitude of the republic. For a show that's trying to be nuanced; trying to explore the themes of racism and genocide; trying hard to portray it in a realistic way; this is a massive oversight and one of the main reasons a lot of people dropped it after the first few episodes. I remember the early comments on episode 1 and 2 on MAL. Aside from the LN fans lavishing it in praise, most of the other comments were on how much they hated the republic because it was comically evil and incompetent. And I don't think it has recovered from this perception - even in my mind to this day.

now before you but in and go "well it is meant to be incompetent and kind of evil", I will counterpoint that by saying that in order for the entire moral dilemma of the 86 to make sense, the Republic needs to have a valid point. It's not enough that the 86 have fleshed out motivations and complex racial struggles if the true enemy of the show (not the legion because it's underdeveloped and boring), the Republic, don't have a strong reason for doing the things they're doing. By making the republic officers dumb evil dudes that are incompetent, it reduces the validity of any argument the Republic could make as a whole, since whatever justification they used - the result is an abysmal joke.

The thematic heart of the show - the moral dilemma of "How should you live when the world wants you dead?" took all the precedence over the looming question of "why does the world want you dead in the first place?" Which is fine for a one-off short story in a competition, but not for an edgy long running anime about racism.
Instead of criticising, let's take a moment to imagine what 86 would have been like if they had of done this. Imagine if the story invented a complex and completely relatable reason for why the 86 have to die - this would strengthen the theme of the show. You are going to die. You can't escape it. How should you live the remainder of your life?

I remember you saying that the LN focuses more on Shin over Lena compared to the anime, and I think that if the anime had of focused on Shin, then the theme about life facing inevitable death would have been more of a focus, and in so doing, would have thematically grounded the show, and given you a fulfilling message about our own lives and our own inevitable death. But instead I was trapped thinking about how none of this bullshit would be happening in the first place if the Republic wasn't so incompetent. Because the entire situation feels so forced and manufactured (because racism and moral ambiguity shouldn't be combined because then we would be placed in the mindset of a racist, and goodness knows if we learned to think and relate to them we might accidentally become them instead of... you know... maybe being more understanding of people with radically damaged worldviews), it robs the actual message of the show from the impact it arguably should have had.

My grandparents are racist. They're really, really racist. They still think of indigenous Australians as primal, uncultured cave dwellers and often use them as an insult to my siblings when we were kids to prove to us how messy we were eating or something like that. And that's awful. But at the same time they are genuinely really nice and caring people. This is why I hate it when racist people are portrayed as one dimensional evil guys - because I know racists and it's a lot more complex than that. Loie Theroux, a famous documentarist, spent a few weeks living with some Neo Nazis and it was very fascinating to pull apart their ideology and uncover the real, human motivations behind it.

The issue with this reductive view of the Republic is that it actually gives you a way out from confronting the main theme. If we're all going to die how should we live the remainder of our lives? Well 86 tells you - it wasn't even fair or logical that you are forced to die in the first place. Just blame whoever put you in this situation and don't come to terms with or accept the grim reality of life. Because ultimately no matter what you do, it was some dumb guy in a chair's fault for signing a piece of paper that enslaved your entire race and forced you to die.

UTMAN said:
First of all I want to make this clear, that the anime's main plot is not about how a racist ideology can overtake a country and get to a path where they deem all other race of human "pigs" or in other words sub-human. If Asato Asato ever decides to write a prequel regarding this I would be more than happy, but the story focuses on a society where this ideology has already won.

In ep 1 and 2, about people complaining that the republic is comically evil and incompent just proves my point in my previous post that people who just watch this anime and don't think more into it are too fast to jump into conclusions.
There are multiple people in the Republic and in this 9 episodes you met a lot of represantatives.
- There is Lena - Alba who is against all of this, and actively tries to do against this
- There is Lena's uncle - Who knows that this is wrong, however he decides that his duty to do his job as a military officer is more important. Basically the "i was just following orders" dude.
- There is Anette - Who knows that this is wrong, but gave up due to social pressure and decided to look away
- There are the Soilders - they represent the Republic's goverment's ideals
- There are the common alba /student from ep 2 - They are just ignorant. Not necessary racist/evil. They either know what's happening, or don't. They don't give a flying flamingo until it's directly affects them.

UTMAN said:
Also you need to keep in mind that the story is happening after 8-9 years of the racist law introductions. There were people against it at the start. Raiden explained it. Alba Priest who took in Shin and his brother and refused to gave up his land, and there was a granny who hid Raiden from prosecution.

UTMAN said:
Also you raised an important question: "why does the world want you dead in the first place?" So basically your main issue is that you don't know why these racist laws took place. Why does the Republic does all this?
Well you need to look into real world history to find this out. The answer I can give to you is easy: Blame game.
Just as the Germans after ww1, started to blame the jewist west and the jews for the loss of WW1 and their struggle between the 2 WW-s, the Alba once lost their main force they started to shift the blame. The colorata who are former residents of the Giad empire (maker of the legion) is the reason why we are in war, losing and suffering.
And just as the US put the Japanese into interment camps, and Germany started to introduce anti-semite laws and concentration camps, a similar theme happened here.
And after 1-2 years after you started these forced conscriptions and misstreatments, you can't really go back and be like "oh sorry, i guess we were wrong?" So basically this is why they have to die. After 2 years the legion will turn off (in the heads of the republic) and after that there will be nothing to hold the 86-ers back. So when that happens the 86-ers can do whatever they want, also they are armed to teeth, also if for some chance other countries still alive and see what the Repuclic had done, it's going to be a problem.

UTMAN said:
"Which is fine for a one-off short story in a competition, but not for an edgy long running anime about racism."
The theme of racism is mostly LN1 material. 2nd cour will deal with different stuff. So fear not, this theme will be not that heavily represented in the 2nd cour.
If you looked at the Shin and his friends left the Republic and the 2nd cour (LN 2-3) will follow them rather than Lena. And it's not happening in the Republic.

theGodde said:
now you make some interesting points but you miss where I highlighted why we needed this backstory. Literally reread one of my old paragaphs
"now before you butt in and go "well it is meant to be incompetent and kind of evil", I will counterpoint that by saying that in order for the entire moral dilemma of the 86 to make sense, the Republic needs to have a valid point. It's not enough that the 86 have fleshed out motivations and complex racial struggles if the true enemy of the show, the Republic, don't have a strong reason for doing the things they're doing. By making the republic officers dumb evil dudes that are incompetent, it reduces the validity of any argument the Republic could make as a whole, since whatever justification they used - the result is an abysmal joke."

The fact is, this ideology exists and has to be introduced to the reader for them to even understand what on earth is going on in the Republic. I literally anticipated you would say this and rebutted your point. To add some extra explanation to this, all the people you have named (other than the soldiers) are victims of the ideology that we never really get explained. These are not people making the decisions, but have been forced into making these decisions or affected by them, due the society they live in. The only people we see really DOING the persecuting are a bunch of comically racist and inept soldiers. They are the ONLY representation of this ideology in the entire show.

theGodde said:
8 years is not a long time. Everyone who matters was alive to see it happen. Literally Germany started its shift in around 1933, and the war finished by 1945. So there were people who had followed along from the start with full knowledge of the entire escapade. 8 years is not an entire generation leap. Everyone who was old enough to understand what was going on then should still be raw and hurting from what happened. We should still be able to see the scars this shift took on the society. People should be missing loved ones. Friends, family - like Anette, which will in turn affect the general vibe of the community. You can't live in peace and happiness with the direct knowledge of the bodies it was buried on. That's the job for the next generation :)
But this doesn't mean we necessarily need more people to come out and talk at us. Like we were talking about before with "show don't tell", there are many visual clues throughout the series that tell you what kind of society this is. For one - the colour palette. The Republic is shown to us all nice and saturated. The colour grading really makes the republic feel peaceful and at ease. Very similar to the tone of our regular society. If you take a look at literally any WW2 Germany-based film, the colour palette is one of the first visual clues that unconsciously tell us that something is wrong. Before you see the bodies, you feel like something is amiss because the series communicates this with "show not tell". 86 Does not. The world of the republic feels jarring when compared to the events that led to its current form.

theGodde said:
I'm sorry but no. I should not have to do REAL WORLD HISTORY RESEARCH to understand AN ESSENTIAL ASPECT OF THE STORIES THEMES AND IDEAS. Fact is, I already know about a lot of these things because I'm a WW2 history buff, but most people don't - and shouldn't have to - to understand the show. I know what this show is going for, and all the real world history that it *could* be tied to. But the fact is that 86 doesn't actually include enough of its own past history to give us a proper setting and explain how on earth things managed to end up this way. Like I mentioned before - the question of why do they even have to die in the first place - is really important to the story because if there's a way out then you can't actually understand the main point of the series. It turns from a really fascinating take on acceptance of death and how it affects your life into "blame the dumb Alba who put them in this unfair situation". This is a really toxic thing to take away because the only substitute for the higher power of the Alba is God himself. Saying that God is evil and we should just blame him instead of dealing with the reality of death is just a bad and stupid way to live your life. And of course everyone knows that so no one is going to take any of the cool and interesting themes and ideas of the show away with them when they finish.

theGodde said:
Well suffice to say I'm not exactly miffed that they're ignoring some of the core themes of the first LN and just going off in an entirely new direction. However this does bring me hope that they will fix the abysmal characterisation in this show. Lena was great to understand the world, but she really didn't have much of a unique personality apart from an insane drive to do the right thing. Shin was essentially just an edgy boi with oni-chan issues. However he has far more potential to be an interesting character than Lena because he's got such a rich history of suffering and persecution (probably shouldn't have used rich there lmao kinda gives the wrong impression). So I guess I'll just sit back and wait to see how it stacks up. It should be better considering the series is now written with the intention of being a series, which should dramatically improve the flow and overall consistency of 86. However that may not be the case. We'll see.

theGodde said:
now as for the other racist stuff, that's fascinating and kind of distressing at the same time. I see people over on the Western-English side of the world laughing at these kinds of pathetic people who will do anything to justify their own morals so they don't have to accept that they might be wrong about things. But for you guys it's not a joke, it's a genuine reality and that is pretty scary when you think about it.

theGodde said:

If you can't think of a logical explanation to stop the blame falling onto the Alba, that's fine but it is definitely not impossible. Not even necessarily hard. give me a week to consider all the possibilities and I could easily come up with 100 different explanations.

Roho119 said:
There are a lot of people who don't understand why Lena is running. I think it's the production crew's fault. The production team should have expressed enough to help viewers understand why Lena ran.

Viewers who didn't understand this would have been confused and couldn't concentrate on the highlights. That is, they would not have been able to enjoy fully the most important scene of 86 anime

Some people say the translator is wrong, but this is not related to subtitles.Even if the translator translated "Don't leave me behind," viewers would have been equally confused.

I wonder if the production crew considered what viewers would think while they were watching the anime.

kuu0haku said:


I'm pretty curious about this, if you really can give atleast one way alba can't be blamed for genociding 86, I'll be quite happy to consider it as a huge flaw. Because no matter how you humanise the decision of the govt and its people, I can't see them being excused for mass genocide of over millions of people or even human experimentation.

Well you can ignore my curiosity as well but since you told that you could tell a good way they can't be blamed, I just jumped into your discussion.

Roho119 said:
There are a lot of people who don't understand why Lena is running. I think it's the production crew's fault. The production team should have expressed enough to help viewers understand why Lena ran.

Viewers who didn't understand this would have been confused and couldn't concentrate on the highlights. That is, they would not have been able to enjoy fully the most important scene of 86 anime

Some people say the translator is wrong, but this is not related to subtitles.Even if the translator translated "Don't leave me behind," viewers would have been equally confused.

I wonder if the production crew considered what viewers would think while they were watching the anime.

Roho119 said:
There are a lot of people who don't understand why Lena is running. I think it's the production crew's fault. The production team should have expressed enough to help viewers understand why Lena ran.

Viewers who didn't understand this would have been confused and couldn't concentrate on the highlights. That is, they would not have been able to enjoy fully the most important scene of 86 anime

Some people say the translator is wrong, but this is not related to subtitles.Even if the translator translated "Don't leave me behind," viewers would have been equally confused.

I wonder if the production crew considered what viewers would think while they were watching the anime.

Pranavk27 said:

I don't think you require much critical thinking cause you can clearly see those who are dead labeled as "destroyed".And they themselves said that they are outside of 86 district and then Para-RAID got disconnected. And if you follow dialogues and screen map it is obvious that they are moving forward and going out of range so Lena must be running to stay connected.

kuu0haku said:
@theGodde Even if it's the first reason you gave, it doesn't forgive the alba for the atrocities they committed in the 9 years of war, because they were in the wrong for pushing the 86 to genocide, and they made it even worse with human experimentation... you can't bring a third person in there and explain to them that 'we pushed the 86 to genocide and experimented on them because they were from the enemy state'. You can't expect the third person to go and say - 'that makes sense, you can't be completely blamed for the genocide of hundreds of thousands of people for that reason.' Here the blame still falls on the alba for pushing the 86 to genocide, so this can't be the solution.

kuu0haku said:
As for the second reasoning, you're forgetting the background of the world, ie legion is waging a war and 86 are on frontlines, 86 won't exist in the world of 20 or 30 years to the future, so that really doesn't make sense, in order to make 86ers exist 20 years in the future we should change what 86 is from the beginning, like there is no war with legion at all or the war is not a threat at all, which would not even make the republic exile the other colorata as 86 so yeah, it's quite an improbable situation. Here, the premise itself is not possible, so this can't be the used as a reason as well...

kuu0haku said:
@theGodde

Currently the biggest plothole is that the 86 can just rebel and slap up the entire capitol for revenge.

theGodde said:


Idk im pretty sure the anime stated that there is no point in rebelling, as they just die either to the minefields or the artillery,(like have you seen how powerfull those are in ep 9 ) of the gran mur or get destroyed by the legion because they run out of supply for their mechs that come from the republic. I give you that the anime hasnt realy established how big the gran mur is (here is a depiction from the manga adaptation:https://cdn.bakihanma.com/file/Zolyvmanga/86/Chapter+11/003.jpg) but I dont see how they can "just" rebel, as I dont see how they can even get thru that wal in their shit mechs if they can even reach itl.