Shin Sekai Yori - Episode 25 [End] Discussion / Poll

[Dawnstorm]

Originally Posted by kuromitsu

I think the question is the same, either way... Did you do this to satisfy your lust for power? Did you want power to satisfy your lust for it? He's not considering other options because he can't really come up with anything.

Yep.

Squealer denies that his actions were a result of foolish pride, but also rejects Kiroumaru's idea of bakenezumi living to serve their colony and their queen. So what else is there that can drive someone to ruthlessly sacrifice hundreds, if not thousands of his own kind, never mind all those innocent humans? What else, other than the pure, shameless ambition that Kiroumaru spoke of? (Although tbh I think both Satoru and Saki are made a bit too naive in this scene to emphasize what Squealer has to say.)

Power is a strange thing, isn't it? Those who have it talk about honour, which is almost always a system that benefits those who already have it.

Look at the scene when Saki and Satoru talk about mole rats, bakenezumi and humans (I think it's that scene; normally I'd check). We see mole rats feeding, then a huge one comes waltzing over a little one and eats. We see Saki and Satoru talk inside the building, then they come out and sit on the stairs, and we see the huge mole rat eat, while the little one is... immobile beneath the huge one.

Kiroumaru is the honourable rat. He's the one proud to be a bakenezumi. He's also taller. Culturally, his tribe uses drugs to be more fierce in combat. He's disappointed it takes him too long to win. If you're the top rat, you don't need to want power. It's easy to be a proud bakenezumi. Your fallen foes are the proof of your honour.

Spuealer? A minor colony, a not-so-violent rat. And yet he goes up the ladder. Why? Because he wants power? He didn't need be head servant (I think that's the position he had when we start out the series?), but he managed to be that, anyway. So obviously he's ambitious. But in a fair fight he stands no chance. Not really. Have we ever seen him overpower someone?

Squealer is in a strange position. If he accepts the things as they are, he accepts that he, a small, weak rat, is near the bottom of the order. Most of his troops were taller, and - I suspect - better fighters. So it's either the bottom of the social ladder, right above foreign-colony slaves (of which they probably don't have that many), or manipulate yourself up the ladder.

Kiroumaru, a traditionalist, is really like the fat one who waltzed over the small one. Honour suits him. Squealer is one of the small ones, but an alert one who knows how not to be under the big one.

The question whether he wants power or not is not the same thing if you're a small rat. And then he discovers human documents that talk about equality. That must be a pretty novel idea; he doesn't have to manipulate his way to the top to matter. He could have been a mushroom farmer, or something, and live a life in dignity.

Oh, but the humans don't measure up, do they? They call themselvels gods, and do as they like. Saki saved his life from his own queen. How does that feel? A child from another species orders your queen around? That's humiliating on so many levels: (a) a stupid mishap can cost him his life; that's how much he's worth; (b) and the queen who takes his life isn't even worth as much as the least powerful among the gods.

Think of that event as a seed fallen on fertile ground. Queens must go. Humans must go. People like Kiroumaru must go. It's the only way people like Squealer can ever have something like dignity.

I think that Squealer thinks he's acting out of necessity. A smart, proud, but weak rat in cut-throat environment who hears about equality. Sure he wants power. It's the only way he can see. But he didn't want power more than Kiroumaru. Actually, I'd think in a different environment he might not have gone into politics at all.

Basically, I think that Kiroumaru is a honourable traditionalist, because he's the top rat; Squealer is a scheming little rat, who doesn't want to be the immobile bottom rat.

As long as you have power, you can feel like a good person for not kicking downward, when you could. That's the secret behind Satoru's "Didn't we treat you well?" (to Mr. Fanatic Rat in ep20). It's not just naive; it's an internalisation of power structures: the powerful get to be kind. It's humiliating to Squealer. Not even Saki seems to get it. (I got the feeling from the narration that even older Saki hasn't quite grasped that, but I have too little to go on, and don't remember well enough, so I'm willing to give her the benefit of the doubt.)

It's worse because they have a strong taboo against killing humans, to the point where there are aversion mechanics coded into their biology. So yes, bakenezumi are bakenezumi, nobody killed them for fun, but it was necessary. But to kill humans - that's an entirely different matter. If they accept that bakenezumi are humans, they will die the death of shame.

I get that. It's why things aren't going to change quickly, if at all. Which is why Squealer did what he did. I suppose total annihilation of a tribe being only an option for the "worst of crimes" wasn't reassuring.

[TimeSkip]

Wonderful series.

I'm interested in what's going to happen if Saki's child doesn't have cantus or has weak cantus.

Will Saki break the rule and save her child?

After all, this tragedy is partially her fault for breaking the rule and not telling the truth about Maria.


ps. SSY sale < 1000 copies. This is a tragedy too.

[4Tran]

There's one point I forgot to add. Shinsekai Yori is a Greek tragedy with Squealer evoking the figure of Prometheus. I don't think that this is a coincidence, and I applaud the original writer for not throwing this in our faces.

Originally Posted by TimeSkip

After all, this tragedy is partially her fault for breaking the rule and not telling the truth about Maria.

Part of the point of the show is that following the rules was what led to ruin. And a lot of that stems from people fighting against overly draconian rules. If the rules had lent themselves to more restraint, Mamoru would never have been forced to run away, his friends would never have had to help him, and maybe Squealer would never have had the need to rebel.

Originally Posted by TimeSkip

ps. SSY sale < 1000 copies. This is a tragedy too.

I think that to change Shinsekai Yori to the point where it can have good sales would be to lose much of what makes it good as well.

[roon]

Wow, lots of messages since I last visited the thread! Glad to see so many people enjoyed the ending and the show itself.

Unmarking spoilers now that subs are out...

Originally Posted by kuromitsu

Seriously, the music and the flashbacks were just too much. ;_____; I'm not entirely happy with the lines they said (especially Shun, it was so weird, like he was taking her to the other side or something), but just seeing them as innocent kids again... ;__;

God, when her parents were on screen I was already getting teary-eyed, but REIKO. ;_; Shun's line (and that entire sequence itself, really) gave me the same vibe, but actually vaguely reminded me of something that would be appropriate if Saki was on her deathbed like the last scene in Titanic. Completely random connection, I know

Originally Posted by Gohan78

Taneda Risa also did a good performance but the best seiyuu award for this series certainly goes to the two Queerat leaders, Namikawa Daisuke and Hirata Hiroaki.

Agreed that Namikawa Daisuke and Hirata Hiroaki were the best. Hirata in particular didn't have a lot of actual screentime proper, but his performance is one I'll never forget. Same with Namikawa as Squealer. His real voice did leak out here and there in this episode, but it didn't affect all of the emotion his words delivered. Really excellent performances in this series. I hope to see Taneda Risa in even more from now on.

Originally Posted by TimeSkip

After all, this tragedy is partially her fault for breaking the rule and not telling the truth about Maria.

"There are things more important than rules."

It was the rules that led to this incident in the first place, not necessarily just breaking them as that happened far along into the situation. I'd like to think that by the time Saki's child is born, the world they're living in is a little different and not nearly as dark as the one Saki and Satoru grew up in.

Originally Posted by TimeSkip

ps. SSY sale < 1000 copies. This is a tragedy too.

Agreed with ^4Tran. However, now that it's over and lots of people are talking about it, hopefully sales pick up... Still, that A-1 Pictures didn't even fix art quality is enough that I'm not super interested in purchasing it immediately. I'm sure many feel the same.

[Solace]

Originally Posted by roon

"There are things more important than rules."

It was the rules that led to this incident in the first place, not necessarily just breaking them as that happened far along into the situation. I'd like to think that by the time Saki's child is born, the world they're living in is a little different and not nearly as dark as the one Saki and Satoru grew up in.

There's a relevance to the last skip being ten years later. Satoru is playing with baby cats....where did we see this before? Yup, the village leader. Saki is now the head of the town.

Anyway, as I wrap my brain around the whole series, I'm left pretty pleased with it overall. It was full of great moments, and the story is very imaginative while also provoking some deep questions about humans. Definitely the hallmark of great science fiction. There are issues with production and pacing, and I'm sure the novel covers more, better, which is usually the case. There are also some core "duh" moments, where I questioned what the characters were doing. However when I put myself in their shoes, it mostly goes away. And like a lot of science fiction, the science behind things kinda gets murky and sometimes it felt more like a plot device than anything else.

Still, all that said, this ended very well and it's a shame more people aren't interested in it. It's rare that I'm pleased enough with an ending to not desire a sequel.

Squealers court scene, quite frankly, is one of the best moments of science fiction I have ever seen.

[Tougarashi]

Originally Posted by kuromitsu

But in any case, I love the "We are humans!" line. There's so much in it, and in a way this is the "climax" of the story.

It was, wasn't it.

(By the way, I love reading these interpretations.)

I like when he said that too. Without him saying that Saki would not try dig more about queerats DNA. At least letting the future leader of the village know that they were actually killing humans is the least thing he could do before he faced his death.

The climax of the story for me came when Kiroumaru ran towards the kid. Shun was quite ruthless to say "Kinoumaru is the key". I think Kiroumaru death would do good to the viewers who had doubts about him in the earlier parts of the story. He didn't came all the way just to revenge after all. He wished to reclaim the dignity of the queen as we witness from his last wish.

In a sense, Saki is alot better than Tomiko. I remembered Tomiko saying "I will make sure Yokomaru will face a slow and painful dead".

[GoldenLand]

I've just finished watching the ep, and I must say, I'm really, really impressed with it. It's surpassed my expectations by a long way, and I was already expecting something very good. This might be the best episode of any of this season's anime.

I was rather surprised to find that the Bakenezumi = PK-less humans theory was correct. I thought I'd read spoilers saying that the matter had been left ambiguous but that the author had said something in an interview about having wanted to write a series about a non-human species evolving to gain human-like intelligence, so I thought that ruled out the genetically modified humans idea.

Interesting that in the end, Yakomaru had understandable goals which were similar to Kiroumaru's, it just being the case that Kiroumaru had different priorities and methods. And the humans, too...Really, out of the leaders of the factions there were no totally blameless good guys in this series, and they were deep in shades of grey. (Many of the individual humans and Bakenezumi were totally blameless, though.)

I really loved Saki in this episode, and the way she was grappling with the issues and realising how complicated the situation is. Took her a long time to go and put Yakomaru out of his misery, though...He may have killed a lot of people and lobotomised his queen, but nobody deserves what happened to him.

And on to less serious matters, Saki and Satoru were really adorable in that scene at the end!

[vansonbee]

Originally Posted by Mikuo_Chan

UTW says in their site :
]An inconsistency you will notice in this episode is that the Fiend is now referred to as a girl (the Fiend was male in the novels). We’ll of course fix the previous episodes accordingly for the batch.

Good Service~

Best Hero Sacrificial Death Scene award goes to Kiroumaru! Charge out there with that turban, almost fool me thinking he is a human ninja. BELIEVE IT!

Yakomaru chat with Saki/Satoru seem truthful to me. Am I overestimating Yakomaru motivation for this war? Maybe, just maybe, his simple goal was protect the colony and live (reminds me of ants).

Now here are my questions:
1) What the moral of the series?

2) Will Saki master the technique to stay young?

3) The biggest and disgusting twist was the queerat decedents of the former mutated non-powered humans?

Man, if I was those guys back in the day and was certainly transform into a giant looking retarded rat and going home to my lovely family of rats? OH man, now that's a bigger horror than this war...

[GoldenLand]

One I think I noticed in this ep was Squealer's line about "Either way, we are like bubbles on the surface of a pond". Presumably, this is the inspiration for some of the lyrics in Wareta Ringo? If so, that ending song was even better than it looked at first. They really should have kept it...

(Once we knew about Maria, that she was dead and wouldn't be playing any more of a role in the series, the second ending became pretty creepy. Bad choice.)

[ahelo]

This episode blurred the lines of good and evil to an extent where nothing seems right anymore and it really fits perfectly to what SSY has been doing for the past 25 episodes.

Some very interesting aspects of the finale:

Once Maria's child was killed, there was a shot of Squealer looking down at her, feeling sadness. I think it shows how even though he used her as a machine, he treated her as his child. Also, it's very poetic that in the end of the war, a queerat grieves over a human (Squealer and the kid) and a human grieves for a queerat (Saki to Kiroumaru).

The big reveal in this episode (one that was probably inferred by everyone already) was that queerats are indeed human beings. While I like the reveal, the fact is it never really mattered. Humans were treating queerats (as Squealer says) worse than slaves and they even annihilate entire colonies if they wish too. They kill them with no mercy. I'm pretty sure Saki and Satoru we're fully aware that the quuerats were also intelligent beings yet they can kill them without having any guilt. It really goes to show how screwed up everything has become.

No side was correct and the series never really pretended that there was a side to side on. Shin Sekai Yori, for me, was the best series airing for the past 6 months. Wonderfully paced, visually amazing and intelligently produced, SSY might just be the anime of the year for me.

[sonagi]

First of all, KUDOS to a revelatory series based on an intriguing storyline, and amazing plot.

SSY will ultimately rank among my most memorable anime series.

That said, some minor gripes:

I feel like the final denouement of the Akki extraction was a little hurried. I still think they overstated the significance of Shun (they pretty much devoted a whole episode to him).

Otherwise, this last episode really did surprise me. Not only did they manage to include the important details, but they were able to instill the message of hope, and partial redemption until the very last scene.

At the same time, I think the real star of this episode was of course, Squealer. For the first time, we identify with his humanity. He's not an animal, nor a monster ... but someone who believed that desperate times call for desperate measures.

Now my only other issue with the anime was the last scene: "The power of imagination is what changes everything". They referenced this somewhere earlier in the series, but I wish they re-emphasized Saki's wish that she no longer lose her loved ones (remember, she and Satoru were the only survivors left from Group 1).

I also feel that the anime series kind of glossed over the story's actual ending, to the point where viewers might actually miss the take-home message. The question is can humans ever change? Saki leaves it up to the audience/reader/future to decide the outcome of humanity and whether or not, we are capable of learning from our mistakes, and evolving through our history. The answer she seeks is that, "Yes, humans can change, and therefore, there is hope for the future, and humankind", etc. I think there was like a 5-second shot where we read the fine print from her scroll (by the way, which is going to be buried in a time capsule, and sealed in a minoshiro for the benefit of future generations).

I thought that was the most powerful statement of all, and food for thought ... but the anime ending was sort of misleading in taking viewers back to Saki's childhood.

Regardless, what a great series overall ... now I'm sad because I don't know when I'll ever run across another anime that will live up to SSY!!!

[Cosmic Eagle]

And thus why I keep saying the juryoku users had it coming for a long time now. I absolutely cannot sympathize with any named juryoku human not Saki and her circle to put it very very likely. The sheer hubris in wiping out the original human strain then mutating the remnants...it makes the blood boil every time that scene of old bitch Tomiko promising eternal agony on Squealer when her kind have far far more blood on their hands. Human blood.

But when all that is said and done, it is true that the human capacity for cruelty is a black, black abyss with change being like a fantasy. I really wonder if the crowd would have reacted any different had the masses know of the crimes of their leaders and their predecessors. Most probably not, after such devastation...

[Belial13]

This goes straight up in my top 5 of all time

A great great show, to bad it isn't more popular

[brocko]

Tomiko went down long before Squealer's trial even occurred. That wasn't her running the courtroom.

It's important to keep in mind that the current generation of people are only following doctrines and traditions that have been passed down to them from previous generations. They uphold the status quo and do what they do because they were brought up that way. That it was for the best and that history tells them so. They have absolutely no idea that Queerats were in fact once a part of the human race and how atrocious their treatment of them really is, because they weren't suppose to have that knowledge in the first place. The ones who do and are actually responsible for the racial out-casting through genetic alterations would've been long gone by now. Who knows how many generations and years ago that would've been. I don't feel that it's totally fair to lay the blame on the current crop of people, when they just simply don't know any better due to how their society has been structured and designed by previous generations.

[NoemiChan]

Episode 22 The Ending

So sad Kiroumaru has to die in the end... He reminds me how a samurai willing to die for his lord. Truly, a magnificent "human".

So she died in the end... Poor girl.. She died not as a human but a querrat... She never got the chance to experience what it is to be a human... What a tragedy.. She died a virgin...

Squealer almost had the eternal punishment. I may have done the same thing as Saki did... It's time for the "creature" to rest in peace.. as hero and a traitor...

Ok, Saki and Satoru in the end... The last scenes actually left me scratching my head... Yeah, really... I never imagined that it's the end of a series I came to love and hate every time it's discuss *laughs

Overall, it's a "good" anime... a controversial one... from artistic criticism, to premarital issues, to homosexual talks, then gone "revolutionary".. *laugh.

It's not that great but it deserves a lot of applause.. Thank you for having this animated... Its really worth it.... *deletes folder.

Way better than Psycho Pass.. LOlss

[Justice Knight]

wait....how did the Fiend died at the start? It seems like heart attack to me fater Kiroumaru died.

[NoemiChan]

Originally Posted by Justice Knight

wait....how did the Fiend died at the start? It seems like heart attack to me fater Kiroumaru died.

Spoiler for Seriously>:

Death Feedback. She sees herself as a Squeerat so she was affected. It was too much for her age (young body/mind) to handle...

[GoldenLand]

Originally Posted by GenjiChan

Spoiler for Seriously>:

Death Feedback. She sees herself as a Squeerat so she was affected. It was too much for her age (young body/mind) to handle...

I don't think it had anything to do with her age. She would still have died from death feedback even if she had been an adult.

[4Tran]

Originally Posted by vansonbee

3) The biggest and disgusting twist was the queerat decedents of the former mutated non-powered humans?

Man, if I was those guys back in the day and was certainly transform into a giant looking retarded rat and going home to my lovely family of rats? OH man, now that's a bigger horror than this war...

The greatest twist, if you can call it that, is that it seemingly paints the viewer as a villager, but finally reveals that the viewer is actually a queerat.

[Kirarakim]

Originally Posted by 4Tran

The greatest twist, if you can call it that, is that it seemingly paints the viewer as a villager, but finally reveals that the viewer is actually a queerat.

Actually we are both and neither. The story tells us that some of the human population developed PK and some did not. The ones that did not were turned into the monster rats.

Well if this story is our future we don't know which group we would become. Heck we don't even know if we would get this far because other groups were destroyed even earlier.