(L) Owari no Seraph

[Stark700]

Official OP theme song:

[erneiz_hyde]

So uh, just want to clarify something here. There ARE adults that survived the initial attack? The part that everyone above a certain age died was actually a lie?

[XFire]

Originally Posted by erneiz_hyde

So uh, just want to clarify something here. There ARE adults that survived the initial attack? The part that everyone above a certain age died was actually a lie?

I don't think so, no.

[Irenesharda]

Originally Posted by erneiz_hyde

So uh, just want to clarify something here. There ARE adults that survived the initial attack? The part that everyone above a certain age died was actually a lie?

Well, not exactly a lie since 9/10ths of humanity is dead. However, the virus obviously didn't work for very long, or else there's something else that humanity cooked up to combat the virus. It's only been 8 years, which isn't long enough for everyone to have a natural biological resistance to the pathogen, however, they might have made some kind of vaccine. I mean, this entire school is made up of kids over the age of 13, so there has to be something going on. Also, of course that's not counting the teachers, Guren, and the adult members of the military.

[PreSage]

Originally Posted by Irenesharda

Well, not exactly a lie since 9/10ths of humanity is dead. However, the virus obviously didn't work for very long, or else there's something else that humanity cooked up to combat the virus. It's only been 8 years, which isn't long enough for everyone to have a natural biological resistance to the pathogen, however, they might have made some kind of vaccine. I mean, this entire school is made up of kids over the age of 13, so there has to be something going on. Also, of course that's not counting the teachers, Guren, and the adult members of the military.

There could always be someone or some small number of people who are naturally immune to the virus by random chance of probability, which is a realistic thing...just don't know how realistic or scientific this series takes things in the virus aspect.

Or the military group was actually preparing for this way before hand and had themselves vaccinated or something, which I suspect may be more the case here. Add to that is the fact that they have seemingly advance anti-vampire weapons and research already established. I don't quite buy the idea that they can have all this organized and in place within a short span of 8 years. I'm suspecting this mysterious military group has been there for a while already...and Guren's world domination comment seems to suggest something like that as well.

[Irenesharda]

Originally Posted by PreSage

There could always be someone or some small number of people who are naturally immune to the virus by random chance of probability, which is a realistic thing...just don't know how realistic or scientific this series takes things in the virus aspect.

Or the military group was actually preparing for this way before hand and had themselves vaccinated or something, which I suspect may be more the case here. Add to that is the fact that they have seemingly advance anti-vampire weapons and research already established. I don't quite buy the idea that they can have all this organized and in place within a short span of 8 years. I'm suspecting this mysterious military group has been there for a while already...and Guren's world domination comment seems to suggest something like that as well.

I'm going on the theory like you that they were already prepared. I mean in 8 years they were able to reestablish order somewhat, create small towns, organize a professional military, create anti-vampire weapons and mass-produce them for the whole military, and also survive a deadly bioweapon and create a vaccine against it? That's a lot to do, seemingly unprepared and taken off guard.

And for such a specifically designed bioweapon, for there to be 700 million people with a natural immunity to it is a little out there.

[zeando]

no one wants to talk about this?



that looked pretty effective for an anti-vampire weapon

[larethian]

I'm surprised that this ep didn't receive as much flak as I thought it would. There was flak, but not as much as I thought. Some of Kagami's glaring facepalm weak points are showing in this ep. Or it could be me judging it harshly trying to find some stuff to counteract and balance the awesomeness of other areas. Since Kagami's LN series have always been niche and have cult followings; nice to see a new perspective of a wider range of audience.
If only Itsuten and DYD also have Kagami supervising the anime. Especially the former

EDIT: And no one commented on the pony-tail redhead?? Gasp!

[tsunade666]

Sorry lare. I don't have much knowledge on this series to comment it or I have much free time from work to even see it on details (I watched it while I'm travelling) so I can't see those glaring problems(still no news on alice lare? its been months already)

episode alone. I'm satisfied with it and I'm also fine with it.

Though is that vampire guy still alive? the one where he shoots the head. Is it because its only a normal bullet and you need an anti-vampire spell to kill it?

what about Mika? his friend? from the OP. It looks like his alive? turn into vampire or still human?

is the cute loli in the op the primogenitor? I bet she is.

You need a cute loli true ancestor or shinsou to balance the mayhem in the story.

As for the lieutenant. Did he just leave the MC for 4 years alone or did he just introduce it to the military and leave it there. Let it train itself.

That's pretty irresponsible if the guy would be the key to the destruction of vampire.

If it where me. I would mold it into perfect weapon to kill and really? friends? is kagami being infected by kishimoto syndrome? I was taken back when he talk about teamwork.

Though logically it helps when one is taking down a stronger opponent.

One need teamwork and can easily adapt into the situation but its still too cliche to hear it from him.

[PreSage]

Originally Posted by Irenesharda

And for such a specifically designed bioweapon, for there to be 700 million people with a natural immunity to it is a little out there.

That's 700 million including the children population who are unaffected, I would think. My non-scientific guess is that most of them are children, and that these were not captured by the vampires. If this is 700 million adults then yeah it's not natural immunity. But I agree this is probably not it.

Hmm, a suspicion just came to me...based on what the white-haired vampire said and what Guren said...maybe the virus was intentionally released by the military? I initially suspected it was the vampire's doing but now I'm beginning to suspect there's more human-related actions than not.

The kidnapped children were led to believe there is no more humanity and these kids in the military are led to believe they are fighting a just cause with the military. That will be an interesting double whammer that will surely send Yu in for a loop if it's true.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by larethian

I'm surprised that this ep didn't receive as much flak as I thought it would.

Aside from what some of us have wrote about the standard-seaming school setting, what flaw did you see in this episode? I'm genuinely curious.

There are some unanswered questions still out there, but given how it's only Episode 2, I'm going to give the anime some more episodes to, well, answer them.

If I come to find those answers unbelievable - or if the anime just hand-waves these questions entirely - I'll probably make some criticisms then. But I'll give the show the benefit of the doubt for now at least.

[Irisiel]

Originally Posted by larethian

I'm surprised that this ep didn't receive as much flak as I thought it would.

Well, if you insist. *cracks knuckles*

Okay, so if the adulticidal virus was from the vampires, I'm seeing this conversation to have happened at some point before the series:

Vampstein: "...And then all adults have died and we have pliable children to sate our hunger without any pesky anti-vamp military!"

Vampinister: "And then the children die out before they're able to produce children, and we slowly starve to death."

Vampstein: "But lots of children have entered puberty by 13!"

Vamperson: "Yes, because they have unlimited access to food, water, shelter and safety. There's no way in hell that children regularly tapped for blood will be fertile and producing living offspring before 13. Remember the middle ages, people!"

Vampstein: "I just used my genius to genetically modify a virus and we're using it, damnit!" *stomps feet*

Vamplord: *rubs temples* "Just let him do it."

Vamperson & Vampinister: "But-!"

Vamplord: "I am not go through another of his tantrums! Just let him do it!"

Vamperson & Vampinister: *Facepalms.*

If the military did it, well...

Bioweaponist: "...And then the vampires starve to death and humanity will prevail, also all our political enemies will be dead so world domination wohoo!"

Soldier: "But if the vampires are starving and outnumbering us because we killed most of humanity-"

Bioweaponist: "Details, schmetails. That's your job to take care of!"

General: "Sounds good enough. Lets do it!"

Soldier: "But-"

General: "Do you have any idea how much money we sunk into Bioweaponist's research? Either you pay that back or we're using it!"

Soldier: *Sighs*

Just, this virus thing doesn't seem that well thought out.

And that's not getting into the "most of our kids are captured by vampires and we're fighting a war, yet we're gonna furnish a bland-as-they-come high school and send our vulnerable kids there without enough trained vampire slayers to make it safe."

Well, I'm going to watch at least the third episode for now to see if the fujoshibait is good enough to continue watching, or if there is an explanation that would cover the above weak points.

[Irenesharda]

Originally Posted by PreSage

That's 700 million including the children population who are unaffected, I would think. My non-scientific guess is that most of them are children, and that these were not captured by the vampires. If this is 700 million adults then yeah it's not natural immunity. But I agree this is probably not it.

Hmm, a suspicion just came to me...based on what the white-haired vampire said and what Guren said...maybe the virus was intentionally released by the military? I initially suspected it was the vampire's doing but now I'm beginning to suspect there's more human-related actions than not.

The kidnapped children were led to believe there is no more humanity and these kids in the military are led to believe they are fighting a just cause with the military. That will be an interesting double whammer that will surely send Yu in for a loop if it's true.

It would be an interesting twist, but incredibly stupid on the military's part. Why would you create and release a virus that could potentially kill all of humanity? You would destroy most of Earth's work force, the people who would be making all the military's supplies. You would also be killing or endangering any potential new recruits that the army needs to keep going. And 13 year olds and younger don't make good soldiers. You have to wait at minimum of 3 years to get any fresh people and that would be suicide for any military fighting an active war.

Now it's possible they created the virus to destroy the vampires, which is again still stupid since viruses are renowned for mutating when you least expect it and being very hard to control. They messed up big time if they couldn't even get the target host right.

But I'm still thinking it was the vampires, the way they marched right into town that night and took control and gathered all the children looked like they were going according to plan and they knew what would happen and we're prepared to take over.

[Irisiel]

Originally Posted by Irenesharda

But I'm still thinking it was the vampires, they way they marched right into town that night and took control and gathered all the children looked like they were going according to plan and they knew what would happen and we're prepared to take over.

I'm with you that the vampires creating the virus seem the most logical, however, even then, it runs into the "infertile cattle" problem that I outlined above. Basically, this virus will starve either side, either literally (the vampires) or metaphorically (humanity, as you pointed out).

At this point, the only thing I can think of is a third faction: Aliens who want to make Earth their home and decides to kill off the worst of the competition (humanity and vampires), or something that can't catch any type of virus, evolved, mutated or not (but then, would Earth be a suitable habitat for such a lifeform?).

Which is why I'm of the mind of "don't think about it and see if the fanservice is enjoyable".

[Triple_R]

If the virus is strictly a vampire-plot...

It might make sense if it's a desperate 'kill or be killed' situation. Perhaps there was a human anti-vampire force that was proving increasingly effective at killing vampires, and the vampires felt that if they didn't strike back in a huge way it would only be a matter of time before humans completely wiped them out. So release a virus that wipes out 90% of humans, and leaves only human kids and teenagers alive to service vampire food needs. As for "infertile cattle"... maybe they were planning to use cloning to get around that?


If the virus is at least partly a human-plot...

Maybe eliminating 9/10ths of the human population is the point in and of itself. In other words, we're dealing with an Alex Jones-esque Illuminati conspiracy. The vampires are just a convenient vehicle through which to "eliminate the excess population" while simultaneously keeping the hands of the human elites seeming clean.

The idea of an elite group who wants to drastically reduce the population isn't that strange. It's a major motivation for Batman villain Ra's al Ghul. The idea is that the world is overpopulated, and drastically reducing the world population would be good for the world and/or humanity (environmental concerns could also be a factor; far less humans = far less pollution, could be another motivating factor).

[GDB]

The main caveat though is... wtf is up with those Horsemen? I think Guren said something about a Trumpet of John or Trumpet of the Apocalypse or something. Maybe this is just the rapture.

[HayashiTakara]

Originally Posted by larethian

I'm surprised that this ep didn't receive as much flak as I thought it would. There was flak, but not as much as I thought. Some of Kagami's glaring facepalm weak points are showing in this ep. Or it could be me judging it harshly trying to find some stuff to counteract and balance the awesomeness of other areas. Since Kagami's LN series have always been niche and have cult followings; nice to see a new perspective of a wider range of audience.
If only Itsuten and DYD also have Kagami supervising the anime. Especially the former

EDIT: And no one commented on the pony-tail redhead?? Gasp!

Well I was giving shit about how, it was because of "friends" that made Yu "lose" to the vampire at the end and if it wasn't for them, he'd kick that vampires ass all over the school grounds.

[kuromitsu]

Originally Posted by HayashiTakara

Well I was giving shit about how, it was because of "friends" that made Yu "lose" to the vampire at the end and if it wasn't for them, he'd kick that vampires ass all over the school grounds.

But... he wouldn't because his weapon is not enough to kill vampires. Guren said as much.

[Irisiel]

By the way, is it just me, or is it that neither side seem to value the few children that are left? In the first episode, a vampire could carelessly toy with a kill several children without any hesitation about repercussions. In the second episode, humanity sends children to a high school building that isn't fortified or staffed by vampire slayers, and what happens? Children are the causalities of a vampire attack.

So it doesn't matter if the children die to either side, it seems.

Oh oh! The third faction are scientists! And the "Japan" we're seeing is just a petri dish for them as they observe how humanity would react to an apocalyptic event containing mythic predators of humanity?

Still doesn't explain the undervaluing of children though...

[DragoonKain3]

FFFF YEAH! When killing humans, lots of censorship in first episode. But when he was slicing up that vampire, lots of blood and I can almost feel the pain when he sliced off her arm (and reattaching it was awesomely animated). The way the vampire died by being stabbed by Guren was amazing too; nice and stylish and gives off the feeling he really killed something that is not of this world.

So I'm not sure why the 180 from last episode, but my biggest beef from the first episode is gone. My second beef was how the heck is there even a high school when people over 13 die, but I thought that was a moment of brilliance as MC was brought up on Vampire propaganda. Since we were only in his POV last episode, me feeling that there being human survivors as something that feels wrong based on what we know so far, mirrors exactly how the MC felt upon meeting Guren for the first time.

So if the source didn't start off with the high school bit first before revealing 1/10 of humanity survived, I'd say that was a very wise move on the director's part.