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• Source Material: Manga
• Studio: Signal.MD
• Genre: Drama, Supernatural, Psychological, Shounen
• Synopsis: “After the death of his parents, a young Mirai Kakehashi is left in the care of his abusive relatives. Since then, he has become gloomy and depressed, leading him to attempt suicide on the evening of his middle school graduation. Mirai, however, is saved by a pure white girl named Nasse who introduces herself as a guardian angel wishing to give him happiness—by granting him supernatural powers and a chance to become the new God. In order to earn the position, he must defeat 12 other “God Candidates” within 999 days. Soon, Mirai begins a struggle to survive as a terrifying battle royale erupts between himself and the candidates looking to obtain the most power in the world.” -MAL Rewrite

First Impression:

The masterminds of Death Note, Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata, are back again with another dark thriller that may or may not leave us with a bad taste in our mouths at the end. I’ve been forever scarred by Death Note‘s ending and have yet to recover to this day. That being said, there’s a dark aesthetic to the writing that I just can’t get enough of and I’m glad there’s new material for me to lose my mind over! Let’s dive in!

First off, the overall composition of the show is phenomenal. Mirai being saved by his guardian angel, quite literally, was an impactful scene but that split second where the view changes from their immediate position to the view from the random office where you can make out the outline of Mirai and Nasse was an eerie transition that foreshadows a not-so-happy future for the duo (at least for Mirai). There’s a lot of symbolism throughout the show, more specifically the idea of an omnipresence, displayed by the rays of light. The death game that Mirai is pulled into has an end goal of creating a new God, what entails with the new title, no one quite knows but I guess we’ll figure it out as we go!

Mirai very quickly gains the powers of an angel with the ability to make people fall madly in love with him as well as the ability to fly. Visiting various location in the span of a few hours, we’re exposed to the vast distances that Mirai can travel with his new powers going from Japan, to the United States, and even Europe. The landmarks are easily recognizable and the background art is clean and crisp. Though, the initial views when he was still in Japan weren’t as defined as the other scenes, my guess is that there wasn’t a real landmark to reference for those which resulted in less detail. I’m hoping the show will keep the high quality background art and show more iconic architecture throughout Japan.

Different story, but the same crazy eyes! I missed these mind breaking moments when the characters realize the consequences of their actions and their pupils shrink to emphasize fear and despair. The distorted facial images and the way the eyes roll back are ominous and help reinforce the dark story that unfolds before our eyes. Death Note had a similar aesthetic along with a strong use of monochrome with accent of colors to emphasize movement and severity of an action (Light’s first killing spree for example which was essentially just him writing in a notebook and eating chips) which I’m hoping to see again here with Platinum End.

I’ve grown bored of the battle royale trope and I’m not too excited about it. Though knowing how mind boggling Death Note was, we can expect something similar here. The characters will be an important aspect to the show, are we going to sympathize with every enemy we meet or will we just root for Mirai the entire time? It’ll be interesting to see where the story takes us from here.

Recommendation:

YES

There’s no doubt that this show will be worth watching! While the story may seem a bit cliche, there’s a lot of potential in the way that it can be delivered. It’s worth giving a shot, especially if you like the darker stories like this.

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