Kami nomi/TWGOK - Anime Spoilers & Speculation (for manga readers only)

[moridin84]

Originally Posted by jvcscasio

Here: http://www.mangadata.com/manga/The-W...Knows/116.005/
scroll down, there will be the image. It was released before the great reveal...

All I can say is... that SOB!

It 100 percent tells you but it's not blatant enough to be proof that she wasn't a goddess.

Originally Posted by n120cky

No what I'm saying is they narrow down the six goddess with only shown 7 girls in OP, you know the tension of finding who the goddess is prety much entertaining, Keima is a deductive person by nature instead of his gal game fan trait, I found it pretty rare and what most likely unique about Keima on how he deal with detective job.

He figured out who the goddesses were in about two chapters. It will probably be revealed next episode.

[Traece]

Originally Posted by moridin84

He figured out who the goddesses were in about two chapters. It will probably be revealed next episode.

Was it even two chapters?

People seem to forget rather easily how this all happened. There was never a mystery as to what girls the goddesses could reside in. Literally the first thing Keima does is make sure that the goddesses aren't located in girls outside his normal high school life. Even from a viewer's perspective, what would be the point in putting the goddess in a once-off character who would never appear again except for circumstances like these, over characters who have had some development as his classmates to varying degrees?

The only true mystery was the identity of the final goddess.

[novalysis]

Originally Posted by Traece

Reiko wasn't particularly special. It was strange and unique, but really had no relevance on the primary plot. From the very start it was the mystery of Hell and Keima's role in it pushing into the Weiss plot and the Goddesses. Keima has always been seeking answers to deep questions about why he's in his situation. Any information Reiko passed didn't really pertain to these questions.

Reiko did illustrate Noma's point that romantic love was not the only method for filling gaps. That was one of it's biggest significance. The other was the explanation of the end goal of Weiss possession. It was also the first arc that defied the formula of using romantic love to fill the gaps.

Perhaps it did not exactly addressed what Keima was asking, but I think it addressed quite alot of questions readers may have had regarding Weiss possession. It might have been a little too conveniently placed though, coming as it did right on the heels of the Tenri arc.

First off there's really no point in discussing the uniqueness of Yui. Beyond body switching, I might add, that capture was very much standard. Technically the formula of "getting to know them, loooove~" was still present. It was just flipped and rearranged in an unexpected manner. At the end of the day the majority of us wish it had been animated so discussing it further is out of the question.

I don't think anyone has done a poll yet, but I imagine that Yui would rank near the top, if a poll was asked on reader's favorite pre-goddess arc. Most manga readers who complain usually label a single girl anyway, and Yui, I've observed came from the top. It was IMO, one of the most unique arcs that still kept to the standard formula, even if it didn't follow the usual script.

The unique thing about the Yui arc, IMO, was that Keima was initially stripped of the one thing he always had in all the other arcs: the initiative. This crops up in the Akari arc. It's always amusing to see Keima struggle when that initiative is lost.

One would argue that Tsukiyo was never really coming close to having been a failure. In fact, Yui would have been the example to use there. Tsukiyo was about as far along in failure as Kanon was. Keima wasn't really flying by the seat of his pants, and the mechanism of failure was something he took advantage of to seek an easier conclusion. Again, Tsukiyo is quite relevant to the plot and again a character that should have been included at some point prior to season 3 (and she's also one of my personal favorites). No point in talking about it really.

No, Hinoki was the closest to failure. What the Tsukiyo arc illustrated was that what happen to Kanon isn't just one-off, or a case of early installment weirdness.

I do think though, that it was a deliberate choice for Yui and Hinoki to be close run affairs, and Akari to No sell everything Keima tried. The last three arcs really started setting the tone for the goddess arc, and even, I think making failure in the goddess arc seem to be a possibility in the eyes of some readers.

Hinoki Kasuga was the interesting one. The whole giant thing was a bit weird. Honestly, everything about that arc was just strange and inconceivable. The only really unique thing here was that it was an issue of sisterhood, and not so much an issue of love. Admittedly that's a new feature that had yet to appear, but it has absolutely zero relevance for the goddesses arc and beyond. Maybe some people liked that arc, but at the end of the day I don't recall much relevance at all to make it worthy of animation.

No. Not absolutely zero. The ending was the first time we saw Vintage meddling, and the first time we were teased that something was happening behind the scenes. I group Reiko and Hinoki together because of the ineffectiveness of romantic love. Actually, those arcs were very good at "showing" that using romantic love wasn't a one size fit all approach.

Also, it created the sense of "scale". Having an entire squad of Spirit hunters trying to seal Hinoki prefigured the ending of the goddess arc. I think without that prior large scale battles, some manga readers may have cried Deus Ex Machina at the ending of the goddess arc.

Akari is kind of an interesting one. She was really a rather minor character in retrospect. Her "arc" wasn't really that long and didn't have a vast amount of content. That one is hard to call.

Akari's "capture" being skipped jeopardizes exactly none of this. The majority of the allusion made by her character is done by this arc. It's during the events of the goddess arc that she appears in the background and does things. Not before.

She was implied to be involved at the end of the Hinoki arc. As to whether she was watching before hand - well , who knows?

However, I have a niggling feeling that they are going to set up Akari was the anti-thesis of Lune more actively in this adaptation.

The main plot relevance for Akari was leading the cavalry at the end of the goddess arc. Without some set-up, that kind of plot development could have crossed into Deus Ex Machina territory. It didn't.

I'm very confused by this paragraph. A lot of Keima's visible character growth comes from Kanon's predicament. In the events up to this arc he remains largely distant from the girls he's saved and seeks out his normal life. It's not until this arc that he starts to admit to the presence of this burden and the responsibilities he has. There may have been slight growth and some small revelations, but nothing so substantial that viewers would cry foul on the upcoming events with Ayumi. Besides, even in retrospect Keima has always been very extreme with Ayumi. You'll recall that his methods with her the first time were pretty insane.

Everything in TGWOK has always been over the top anyway.

Again though, his only close call that wasn't animated is Tsukiyo and even that's moderately debatable. Kanon was the original near-failure, and she was in the first season. Not to mention she's just been stabbed. The issue of failure has always been present. Missing out on those characters doesn't make it any less clear. In the next episode I believe Keima is to have his monologue about exactly this subject, so yet more reason why this shouldn't be an issue.

We'll see. In TGWOK's case, the anime does pull of monologues very well - partly because it's told through a manga. Had TGWOK been a LN though...
In the end, a lot of these issues are really blowing things a bit out of proportion.

The thing to understand is that a lot of things revolve around this arc of TWGOK/

The goddess arc is where TGWOK peaks. There was some speculation if I recall that Wakaki intended to end TGWOK with the goddess arc originally.

Edit: Watching the opening again, is it just me or is Yui slightly more boyish in this than in the manga? I'm not sure if I look forward to all of the trouble she causes. The teasing and the harassment that she provides is frightening!

I wonder whether Yui is a running commentary on Wakaki's views on gender and a satire on gender identity.

Here's a dreadful idea. A comedy Shoujo romance, revolving around female Keima and male Yui.

[Traece]

You'll have to forgive my bluntness ahead of time, as it's 7 AM my time and I've grown tired in more ways than one.

Spoiler for Hey, spoiler tags; because walls of text are detrimental to Asuki society.:

Originally Posted by novalysis

Reiko did illustrate Noma's point that romantic love was not the only method for filling gaps. That was one of it's biggest significance. The other was the explanation of the end goal of Weiss possession. It was also the first arc that defied the formula of using romantic love to fill the gaps.

You're right. It illustrated the idea that not only love wins the day.

Which was really relevant in the main plot, also know as the Goddess Arc.

*something about Yui*

*Something about Yui should have been included but wasn't*
Incidentally, Yui's arc was interesting because of the pacing switch. If you consider the author's notes and his personal feelings that he expresses throughout the series about his life and about writing TWGOK, it's pretty clear that Yui was the platform for Ayumi. Personally, I think the pacing switch with Ayumi was far better written because of those experiences.

I don't think anyone has done a poll yet, but I imagine that Yui would rank near the top,

Polls are done all the time. In fact, I believe they were mentioned in the manga itself? Not one single time have I ever heard of Yui coming out on top. Elsie, Haqua, Ayumi, Kanon, and Shion have for as long as I remember topped the polls. Yui is an interesting character, but if she's one of the more popular ones this is a completely new to me. The general population doesn't typically favor her kind of character either, so I can't really imagine why that would be the case. That's not to say that she's not an interesting character, but she's not what people would normally view as waifu material.

The unique thing about the Yui arc, IMO, was that Keima was initially stripped of the one thing he always had in all the other arcs: the initiative. This crops up in the Akari arc. It's always amusing to see Keima struggle when that initiative is lost.

As I said before, I agree. Yui was somewhat of a testbed for this in my opinion. The author has been trying new things and improving himself throughout the series. As far as I can remember he's not been shy about that.

No, Hinoki was the closest to failure. What the Tsukiyo arc illustrated was that what happen to Kanon isn't just one-off, or a case of early installment weirdness.

No one would assume it was a one-off. I suspect the "this is the cause of the loose soul?!" dialogue was put in place specifically for that purpose, and the fact that almost every subsequent capture would be affected by the loose souls. Yeah, the majority of them had supernatural elements associated from that point on.

I do think though, that it was a deliberate choice for Yui and Hinoki to be close run affairs, and Akari to No sell everything Keima tried. The last three arcs really started setting the tone for the goddess arc, and even, I think making failure in the goddess arc seem to be a possibility in the eyes of some readers.

Failure has still always been a looming option since Kanon's first appearance.

The issue has always been whether or not the author has the guts to have an actual failure occur. The answer to that is pretty clear at this point, and in my opinion it always has been. That's not necessarily a bad thing though.

No. Not absolutely zero. The ending was the first time we saw Vintage meddling, and the first time we were teased that something was happening behind the scenes. I group Reiko and Hinoki together because of the ineffectiveness of romantic love. Actually, those arcs were very good at "showing" that using romantic love wasn't a one size fit all approach.

I don't recall whether or not Vintage was directly involved, and frankly I'm in no mood to verify this. If they were directly involved, it was likely a very minor involvement that could have been done elsewhere. Of course if they didn't actually interfere with the sisters in the slightest then I cry foul and maintain my comment about how that arc was irrelevant. But hey, if for some reason I forgot that Vintage was completely and solely responsible for all kinds of horrible bad stuff, then by all means there was some relevance to it. Except only to allude to the factions of the goddesses arc which to be frank isn't worth including for the purposes of the anime.

Also, it created the sense of "scale". Having an entire squad of Spirit hunters trying to seal Hinoki prefigured the ending of the goddess arc. I think without that prior large scale battles, some manga readers may have cried Deus Ex Machina at the ending of the goddess arc.

If they had then they would be scolded for ignoring the large quantity of on-screen hell denizens that are shown in this arc, and even arcs prior. If they have short enough memories that they forgot that there's entire schools, divisions, and sub-divisions of them, that's not a problem that the studio or author need to be concerned about. There was always a large sense of scale present, and scenes like that only served to provide very slight reminders. Considering the goddesses arc is, as I said, full of these reminders...

However, I have a niggling feeling that they are going to set up Akari was the anti-thesis of Lune more actively in this adaptation.

This would draw too much attention to the background. Akari and the sensei aren't supposed to be on the foreground. I doubt they would make a mistake like that, but it's not impossible. Personally, I think Haqua is actually the person setup for that role.

Everything in TGWOK has always been over the top anyway.

I actually consider TWGOK to be pretty tame by comparison. It's really at its most "over-the-top" when the author is trying a new idea, like with Yui. Beyond that it's not really that out there.

We'll see. In TGWOK's case, the anime does pull of monologues very well - partly because it's told through a manga. Had TGWOK been a LN though...

Being a LN doesn't doom it to death. One of my all-time favorite series is an adaptation of a LN and did it beautifully. TWGOK would make great material for a LN, and frankly I think it's interchangeable between the both mediums with very little issue. TWGOK isn't exactly action-packed and demanding on description. There's a lot of dialogue there. That's part of why it's easy to animate, and allows for some nice artistic freedom with handling those scenes. Part of the fun of a lot of dialogue (think Bakemonogatari here, for one example) is that the studio has to figure out how to keep the viewer entertained while they listen.

Here's a dreadful idea. A comedy Shoujo romance, revolving around female Keima and male Yui.

So basically a longer version of Yui's actual arc?

I suppose if I had to make a comment about all of this, it's that hindsight is a very troublesome feature of humanity. One of the harder things to do is alienate yourself from information you've already acquired, because it's not always clear when you're using that hindsight. As much as those captures are seemingly great and interesting, if you take them apart and look at the anatomy of TWGOK they're not necessary (I should start using * to reference a footnote that says "except Tsukiko and Yui") to the overall story. There are small elements of them that have some relevance and have some slight bearing on the story, but in some of the cases of the skipped material it's not even the characters themselves that are of relevance insomuch as what's happening while they're the focus of the manga. A lot of these bits and pieces that are seemingly important can truly be fit in with ease in other ways, even a single line of dialogue.

[AmrodAegnor]

I wonder, if we'll get to see the concert of Chihiro's band this season? Probably yes, but I really hope we do, it's my favorite part in the manga so far.

I'll probably cry buckets when watching it.

[Ken Sanders]

I think it might fit, you know. Think about it, each of these chapters are connected; some of the story of one chapter or two ends up in the same room or place in the span of 5 minutes.

While we read it as a manga, as the original source, it'll take at least 2-3 minutes to finish but it's a different story if it was animated; the whole scenes of 9 chapters are connected. Even the animated chapter 117 will only take less than 5 minutes or so.

The anime has 25 minutes free slot; the op and ed will take 3-5 minutes, some unnecessary parts of the manga will cut out to fit the remaining time.

But on the future episodes, they might extend it to add some flavors to the important events in the manga such as the date of Yui, conversation with Tsukiyo & Luna, Shiori, Haqua's torture scene( well, maybe), and the rest of the important parts.

I'm sure they won't let us down.

[Kyouka]

um so i guess they switched everything during the last 3 mins of episode 1 lol

[MeoTwister5]

Does anyone remember when the last part of the preview occurred? The one where Shiori blushes.

[XLNC]

Originally Posted by MeoTwister5

Does anyone remember when the last part of the preview occurred? The one where Shiori blushes.

Chapter 128. The one with Simone and Cashiragi.

[MeoTwister5]

Oh yeah her... uh... fanfiction of sorts using YuixKeima as... uh... inspiration.

[n120cky]

I love how they referenced the current manga arc (back to past) in this 2nd episode, Keima said said the one who write the scenario is pretty lame, wait until he know who prepare this scenario . . .

[Rungelunge]

titles of the first 5 episodes

Spoiler for titles: