Kekkai Sensen / Blood Blockade Battlefront

It's been getting a decent amount of fanart, which is actually really impressive for a series with little waifu potential or fujoshi bait

Nej is best waifu. It had to be said.

Nej was a cutie. Would happily buy burgers for.

I actually respect the way the show used the antagonists for that episode. More or less regular people not unwilling to exploit others when they can, look out for themselves, one guy typically polite until driven to desperation while amnesiac other okay with being roped in since it probably feels easier to beat on other world beings.

Still deserved a good beating.

Was a little awkward that one of the antagonists in the episode about racism had... the character design that he did, though.

Okay, I can see how that might be problematic if there are no other black background characters in the show, but I didn't see that guy's characterization as being racially charged at all.

He was thuggish, money-grubbing, none too bright, and looked pretty much exactly like an extra from Tintin in the Congo. Not a brilliant idea at any point in the show, but in the racism episode? Whoops.

edited 12th May '15 3:05:28 AM by Iaculus

He doesn't seem any worse than the generic obnoxious anime jackass. Show me two other examples from the same artist of the same racial profile, and I'd probably agree with you. But I hesitate to call this single instance of a black man being cast as a villain of the episode racist in itself.

I don't think it was a "racism episode". The two guys were portrayed as jerks taking advantage of somebody because they were in a tough spot, not because they were motivated by bigotry.

Honestly, your statement that black people should never be portrayed negatively is far more offensive than anything done in the show so far.

edited 12th May '15 5:09:51 PM by HighVelocityPointyThings

He wasn't saying they should be portrayed negatively. He was saying they shouldn't be portrayed as a negative stereotype.

This amounts to the same thing as anything the character does can become the stereotype.

Moreover, the character isn't being portrayed as thuggish. a ne'er-do-well that borrowed money from the wrong people but not a particularly bad person. Being put under threat of having you're kneecaps broken tends to make people tense.

He tried to beat a child to death for getting in his way (translation: getting run over by him) at the wrong time. Sure, he was in a stressful situation, but that's a pretty spectacularly shitty thing to do.

Started and caught up today, and dang I have not fallen so in love with a new fandom this hard in a long time. It feels very nostalgic, the music and New York remind me of Baccano, while the whole otherworld thing feels more vaguely like SMT while lacking the morality-questioning parts.

On topic of the one ep6 antagonist... it may be a more upsetting case that it was the first case of a 'normal' human civilian acting as a villain. He was the first to fly off the handle for running someone over (of all things), between he and his partner, and not listening to the apologetic cries of a creature that sounds like a child, beating them until they turned red, and that they literally lost their memory. It would've only been all the worse if Nej actually died, yeah? Still, how far it reached was plenty awful. So what I think is it's more of the unfortunate case of not being preceded by other human antagonists, as if black people aren't already falsely facing negative racial profiling problems today without a fictional one being portrayed as someone excessively violent and mindlessly refusing to listen to reason.

Also—please be careful with the wording. Being in a tight spot / stressed is no reason to defend them from beating someone, period. Watching it was painful, it doesn't matter that Nej isn't human.

Gott im Himmel, the blood breed is creepy

Black and the King of Despair seem to be different people in the same body, though with some awareness of each other

Next episode looks like it should introduce the rest of the people in the ED

...Seriously Zap? Did you really think that you could win after Raus flat out leveled a half dozen guys without breaking a sweat?

Also, here's to hoping Leo made a mint on his bet.

I feel that we're missing a chunk of what happened from when the Blood Breed revealed itself (knocking Klaus to the side of the cage) to before Zapp tried to attack Klaus again (arena is empty, the Libra trio are outside).

Ya know, given how White and Black, being anime-original, seem to be deliberately written as a comparison to Leonardo and Michella, I have to wonder whether themes like selfishness/selflessness in sibling relations will eventually come into fore for the finale. Especially given how Michella's sacrifice (of her sight) seems to be spontaenous and selfless, will we see a mirror of this with regards to White and her brother?

The stuff we've been teased of so far with each chapter (like the nod to Twins, and this episode's Blood Breed masquerading in another body), and now with the revelation of White's heart problem, makes it more likely, at least to me.

Regarding the Blood Breed, I think it was just that he was uber-fast, not that the ring being shown as empty meant a timeskip.

I definitely agree that there are parallels being drawn between Black/White and Leo/Michella, but I think those are at least in part deliberately being invoked by Black in order to cozy up to Leo for the sake of orchestrating maximum ZETSUBOU (or at least I assume he's aiming for despair, given what he calls himself).

Heck, given that White is the one with the weak heart, I'd bet the "stronger" sibling between the two is actually Black and that he's spinning it the other way on purpose. We weren't told which of the siblings in Twins White identified with, after all. In my opinion, there probably will be a mirror between the sibling pairs, in the sense that Black as a brother will be the opposite of Leo - a villainous dickhead rather than a selfless older brother.

Eh it seems more likely that Black is sharing a body with Despair, as the two are both featured as separated individuals in the OP and ED.

Not to mention that very brief shot in the ED where Despair Black is next to White.

Her heart problem appears to be connected with Hellsalem's lot as well, as she's been there for three years, which is the same amount of time the gate to the Alterworld opened and caused Hellsalems lot. The talk about halloween and spirits seems to be connected to whatever Despair Blacks goal is. In fact the scenes from the first episode seem to be from those events because a brief shot of a sign that says Halloween can be found in the background as they fight the undead monsters.

edited 18th May '15 12:01:27 PM by OmegaRadiance

Is Black/Despair one of those Elder 13 Blood Breeds? And what is White? Did she or did she not appear in that photo?

I've heard that the 13 Kings and the 13 Blood Breeds may not be the same thing, though I wouldn't be surprised if it is the case that one or two of the Kings would still be Blood Breeds.

Plus while Leo's always looked on Femt or Aligura he never really shows the same eyewrenching strain the 13 Elder Blood Breeds and their thousands of lesser ones caused him.

Also due to spoilers I know that even when she's blind Leo's sis is a badass.

Is there a plot to this series? Cos 7 episodes in and I still don't see any, unless you count the thing with the Monochrome Twins.

It's based on a manga that I think is very episodic. The anime added the Black/White as an original subplot, so I'm guessing that's their best attempt at providing an overarching plot.

Raju: Total Badass. Especially when he forces Zapp to insult himself.

As I thought King of Despair was someone that Black shares his body with, and can turn his red eyes on and off too.

Considering he was speaking in the flashback, even if we didn't hear the words, I have a suspicious feeling that he did was Leo's sis did and had Despair take him instead of making his sis make a choice. To contrast him more with Leo. Though I didn't expect White to be in league with Despair and keeps it from her brother.

Sykosis: Just read the summaries of the volunes out so far, and you can see that the manga is very episodic — often the only thing that ties each storyline is the appearance of a Blood Breed, and that's it.

Yeah, I guess so. So whose among the two is Leo's closest foil in this case?

Also, LOL Zapp. Man, that lifestyle can't be healthy.

You'd think I'd stop being surprised by how good this show is by now, but nope so awesome

Kekkai Sensen Episode 8

• so, Black and White's real names are William and Mary?
• the fact that Zapp, who appears to be the series' Butt-Monkey, gets laid a lot, still surprises me. I guess he's not a total loser.

Is Dog vs Monkey/Ape a thing in Japan/Asia? Cos this is the third or fourth anime I've seen where two characters, one with a dog motif and the other with a monkey/ape motif don't get along (or used to not get along).