Angel Beats! 01 – Departure

Summary:

A boy by the name of Otonashi wakes up in the afterlife but has completely no memories from the time when he was alive, as he sits up he notices a girl pointing a sniper rifle at another girl in the distance. However the girl who was aiming the sniper rifle tells Otonashi that she needs his help in defeating the Tenshi of this world and that her name is Yuri, she tells Otonashi that unless he wants to be erased by God to join forces with her group called the SSS – Shinda Sekai Sensen (死んだ世界戦線) which is fighting against the Tenshi of the world that they currently occupy. It appears that Otonashi does not initially believe this information at first and decides to go and talk to Tenshi he asks her if she is an angel and she replies with no and that she’s the Student Council President, Otonashi thinks that he’s going crazy and decides to go and check in at the hospital in which Tenshi says that there are no hospitals in this world and people don’t get sick there she says that everyone’s dead Otonashi thinks that Tenshi is also apart of this prank on him but before he can pry any further Tenshi uses Hand Sonic and stabs Otonashi through the heart.

Otonashi wakes up in the nurses office and remembers what Tenshi had done to him and realises that there is no gaping hole in his chest, at first he thought it was all a dream but then notices his blood stained shirt. Otonashi tries to leave the nurses office but is stopped by one of Yuri’s followers stood in the doorway he asks Otonashi if it was him who had refused to enlist and asks him if he wants to die 100 times and then proceeds to attack him 100 times, Otonashi winds up laying in a pile of his own blood, after a few minutes he wakes up. Otonashi wonders how he can get out of this estranged world so he decides to go to the Principal’s office but as he attempts to enter he gets hit by a giant swinging mullet and flies out of the window, Otonashi winds up in a room filled with people. Yuri and her gang are trying to think up a new name for her estranged group. Eventually Otonashi wakes up and Yuri and her group decide to ask him what he thinks the group should be called Otonashi comes up with ‘Does Whatever the Hell They Want Battlefront’ however Otonashi tells them not to involve him. Yuri introduces Otonashi to the members of SSS and they are called; Hinata, Matsushita, Oyama, TK, Takamatsu, Fujimaki, Noda, Shiina, Iwasawa, and a few others who he will meet eventually. Yuri explains that there goal is to get rid of the Tenshi of this world, and that if Otonashi wants to come into the room he will need a password which is ‘No God, Bo Buddha, No Angels’.

Otonashi decides to join the SSS for the time being until he regains his memories, Yuri then goes on to explain to Otonashi about the afterlife such as the people he sees in the school in terms of a games Non-Player Characters (NPCs) who act like them but are not human. So later that night the SSS are preparing for ‘Operation Tornado’ which is a plan to steal meal tickets from NPCs, the girl band called Girls Dead Monster who are also in the SSS hold a concert in the cafeteria so that the other SSS members can prepare for a battle with Tenshi this will be Otonashi’s first attempt at trying to kill Tenshi. The plan seems to be going extremely well and as Tenshi gets close enough to the cafeteria some members of the SSS residing inside the cafeteria turn on some fans and the plan is a success. The next day everyone is in the cafeteria eating the meals they want from the free meal tickets they stole from the NPCs.

Preview: Guild

Personal Opinion:

To be honest the premiere episode of Angel Beats in my opinion was exciting and completely hilarious, this episode for me gave the viewers some of the back-story of the anime as well as trying to keep the content of the show light-hearted humour was completely original I didn’t think that this show would hold me this well in the very first episode but it did and I’m truly grateful this is well and truly different from Key’s usual anime but maybe that’s because of the collaboration with P.A. Works. What truly surprised me was that Key series are normally really sad and dramatic and always involve some form sarcastic male lead who is always in the mood to dish out the tsukkomi, however this series was approached from a completely different angle then its predecessors but I feel that if they approached it the same way as their other projects it probably wouldn’t be as good. I have a relatively good feeling that this series will get funnier as it progresses and will probably have me laughing more than any series that is airing this season, but I can expect some tear jerker moments in just like in Air, Kanon, or Clannad (all those made me cry).

So the male protagonist Otonashi (Kamiya Hiroshi) is somewhat shocked to find himself in the afterlife, and the thing I particularly like about this is Otonashi’s outbursts and extremely way to over the top reactions to being ‘killed’. So far there isn’t anything I can say about his personality but so far he seems like he’ll be the one to keep everyone happy even though he still hasn’t come to terms with being dead but that could be overturned in a couple more episodes like many Key anime’s are like that in the very first episode. Yuri (Sakurai Harumi) is the female protagonist she is the leader of the SSS and is set on destroying Tenshi, the interaction between Yuri and Otonashi is amazing especially because Yuri has a remarkable brash personality compared to Otonashi it makes them seem like they get a long pretty well or not depending on how things pan out over the episodes but personally I think they will get along just fine. The introduction of the other characters of the SSS was hilarious especially when Noda went to see Otonashi after he had declined the offer to join the SSS Noda decided that he had to die ‘100 times’ the thing I found funny was the way it was set out like it was a combo for a fighting game.

So plot wise if not for ‘Operation Tornado’ which was where they steal the NPCs meal tickets some people may have been put off due to the sheer amount of dialogue, rather than any action or drama unfolding in the premiere episode. Personally I thought that this approach was unique and it is better to get to the story of what the SSS were about and how everything will unfold is going to be worth the wait in my opinion. Although when Yuri was trying to think of a new name for Shinda Sekai Sensen, something that doesn’t sound like they are already dead made me giggle quite a lot some light-hearted humour is good when the episode his chocked packed with dialogue, not that I’m complaining about it. The band Girls Dead Monster which is fronted by Iwasawa (Sawashiro Miyuki) the songs are actually sung by ‘Marina’, there is also an English speaking seiyū in this named Micheal Ravis who voices TK. Tenshi (Hanazawa Kana) seems like a very quiet and ruthless character when asked if she is an angel, I think I will like gradually grow to like her plus there may be more than what we are told so I hope we will learn more about Tenshi in the next couple of episodes.

There is no opening or ending for the first episode so I suspect that it will be properly shown on the second episode of the anime; The opening song is entitled ‘My Soul, Your Beats!’ By Lia, the ending song is called ‘Brave Song’ By Aoi Tada.

Personal Enjoyment: 5/5