Angels of Death

Episode 11

People find God in all sorts of places. The name “God” itself can mean as many different things as there are people. Gray, for instance, finds his God by looking within himself as he carries out His divine justice. Most recently, this manifests as him repeatedly causing a little girl to hallucinate, tricking her into thinking she's being haunted by ghosts, and making her feel like she's being burned alive on a cross. Now unlike Gray, I am not quick to judge, but I don't know how any of this was supposed to rehabilitate her even if she were a witch. I guess he deserves credit for not actually burning her at the stake, but I won't be in any hurry to join his congregation. Rachel, on the other hand, finds God in a knife, and that is something I can get down with.

Jokes aside, this is how Angels of Death resolves the confrontation between Gray and Rachel, and as strange as it is, it does make sense in context. Gray had already shaken Rachel's belief in God, but his own concept of God proves too abrasive and narcissistic for Rachel to adopt (ironic considering how much he chastised her for being selfish), so she instead turns to the closest person to her: Zack. As much as he would hate to admit it, Zack has been Rachel's guardian angel this whole time, suffering blow after blow in the name of protecting her. Naturally, Ray puts him on a pedestal, and given her oddly religious obsessions, she puts him on the highest pedestal possible. Is this the sign of a healthy relationship between two normal people? Nope! But within this creepshow murder basement, it's enough to give Rachel a lifeline and a purpose, and a prick from his knife gives her the jolt she needs to snap out of Gray's spell.

It's a couple of episodes overdue, but Rachel finally realizes that Gray has been manipulating her nonstop. To her credit, she holds him at knifepoint for the remainder of their time together. Gray gives her the medicine Zack needs, as well as a few words of warning about her new God. However, it's nothing we don't know already: Zack hates liars. But it turns out that Rachel has been lying to Zack about something, even though I'm not entirely sure about what. At the moment it appears to be a lie of omission, since she's clearly regained some of her memories—most specifically a violent memory about her parents—but hasn't told Zack anything about that. Given Zack's own colorful history with parental figures and serial killing though, I don't see what Ray could say that would upset him, even if she is “unclean.” Unless Ray or her family has something to do with this building and Zack's employment/imprisonment within it, which is a stretch but still very much within the realm of possibility. That could get hairy. It looks like we might get some answers about that next week, so fun times lie ahead.

In the meantime, the Zack & Ray show is back in full swing with the two of them united and in (mostly) good health. Ray at last relieves some of her guilt toward Zack by stitching his stomach back together, and their rapport is as odd and prickly as ever. To wit, Ray talks at length about sewing Zack back up, throwing in some boasts about her sewing skills in what I can only imagine to be a misguided attempt to assuage his fears, while Zack can only retort by saying he's not a “damn shirt.” The sewing itself becomes this bizarrely intimate moment as the strings swell in the soundtrack and light streams through the stained glass. The point is that these two are closer than ever, and Zack even divulges the story behind his burns without too much prodding, which would have been unthinkable earlier on. The cavalier way he tells this absurdly traumatic story, and the tiniest lilt in his voice as he mentioning biting a chunk of flesh off his attacker, fits well into the mode I've come to expect from the show. For all of its eccentricities and scenery-chewing characters, Angels of Death benefits a lot from its intersection of the deadpan with the horrific.

With the two of them getting along so well, it's only natural that the next arc should see their relationship unravel. Rachel is hiding something from Zack, but she won't be able to hide it from him forever. In fact, based on Rachel's reaction, she isn't even going to be able to hide it from him before the next episode's opening theme. The B1 floor looks to be modeled after her house, down to the grisly murder scene in the kitchen, which raises a couple of possibilities. One is that Rachel is an “angel” like Zack, Danny, and the others, and she was at one point in charge of the uppermost basement floor. That raises the question of why she ended up at the bottom, and why none of the other “angels” brought this up, but she definitely fits into that crowd. Another possibility is that they're actually in her house right now, and either she or her parents had something to do with creating the murder basement. This seems more unlikely, which is why I'm leaning toward it being the correct answer. Whatever the truth is, there should apparently be enough twists to fill 5 more episodes of content, so I'm not trying too hard to think one step ahead.

Overall, episode 11 finds itself in the limbo between Gray's arc, which overstayed its welcome, and the (presumably) final arc, which so far promises to be more interesting. Splitting Zack and Ray up hurt the show, but pitting them against each other has the potential to put the spark back into Angels of Death. Given how much Gray's arc dragged in places, I'm hoping that Angels of Death actually has enough content to fill the rest of its runtime. I'd hate to see pacing issues slowly cripple a show that I found very entertaining, interesting, and funny at the start. But we're going to need a lot more “oomph” if these angels want to fly, not stumble, to the finish line.

Rating: B-

Angels of Death is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

Steve is a longtime anime fan who can be found making bad posts about anime on his Twitter.