Review: Death Parade “Death Reverse”

I was not expecting this at all.

So, when I said I wasn’t expecting this, it wasn’t one of those moments where it was a throw away moment and you move on. “Death Reverse” actually pulled a Fast 6, and made “Death Seven Darts” better. It doesn’t add anything with Takashi or Machiko, but it adds a lot to the Quindecim facility. Namely, we get our first looks at Nona, Ginti, and the Black-Haired Woman. We also get a nice look behind the scenes of how Quindecim actually works.

Remember the hanging bodies behind the bar? Well, it turns out to be mannequins. Somehow, the Black-Haired Woman and Nona were observing the entire proceedings, yet Takashi nor Machiko noticed them. Then again, it’s hard to notice when two people are floating around through a bunch of mannequins.

What makes things interesting here is what went down after the game was over. the Black-Haired Woman put doubt into Decim’s head, and made both Decim and Nona doubt whether the right decision was made. In the end, Machiko was sent to the abyss, and Takashi was sent back to be reincarnated. It’s great to see that even souls in the afterlife can second guess themselves and lack omnipotence. That is rather refreshing.

Unfortunately, there isn’t much to go on this week. “Death Reverse” adds to “Death Seven Darts,” but on it’s own merit, it’s not really a great episode. I think that if these two episodes were presented as something like one two-part episode, it would make more sense. There was definitely something here that had potential, but it seemed pretty lacking. I think that if there was more of a revelation to Machiko and Takashi, it would have been even heavier. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen. I think this was a miss this week, overall.