Ending discussion [SPOILERS!]

[Palstek]

Hello :)

this thread will contain spoilers, you have been warned! :D

So I just finished the last episode but I'm not really sure if I would call this a satisfying ending. Ray and Zack barely getting out alive in the end is fine and all, but there are some points that bother me:

1.) Even though Ray goes through months of therapy after the events, her wish to die doesn't go change at all.. I hoped for some more character development and maybe a final plot twist ;) but just Zack showing up out of nowhere and basically picking her up to (what most likely happens) just kill her is.. how to put it.. a too easy and sudden way to end it.. I wish there was more to see :)

2.) Zacks escape from prison: In the end he was sentenced to death for murder and sitting in a death cell awating his execution.. seriously.. how did he get out of a high security prison? Dense as he is on top of that! He wouldn't have managed to get out of the floors without Ray in the first place.. how should he be able to manage that? Thats a big plot hole tbh.. and one that makes the ending very hard to swallow.

There are some other minor points but there are the things I'd like to discuss here :) I'd also like to know if there might be more to see in the future.. I really liked the game and enjoyed playing it, just the endiing bugs me quite a bit ^^


Best regards,

Pal

[WhenSarahSmiles]

Going to throw in my two cents here.

I don't believe Zack was there in literal form. Just before Rachel went to sleep that night, the nurse told her that going to sleep would give her sweet dreams, this is just before she tells Rachel that Zack was on death row. I'm going to take a stab in the dark and say he'd been on death row a while, and she was only telling Rachel then because he was due to die that day.

So, she goes to sleep. And she dreams of him / sees his invisible winged angel form (which was mention by the Priest in his last words), with his grim-reaper scythe rebuilt, now that he's in the afterlife.

I think he appeared in the window, with scythe, as her angel of death. He's come to take her to the afterlife. I think she killed herself, with Zack's blade, as her means of fulfilling their promise since it's impossible for them to do so otherwise. She has this massive thing against suicide in the beginning, but that's because she thinks it will upset her God. By the end of the game, she does not feel she has a God. I think perhaps, by that point, the reason she did not kill herself is because she promised Zack he had to do it. So, in the end, she used the knife Zack gave to her to end her life because he couldn't do it personally anymore.

In the end, they both become angels because they both die, thus fulfilling their promise to each other, so it's a really bittersweet ending.

[ShikiX | Horo]

I would like to throw in something here too in the order to maybe get the enlightment I seek to come to a closure because this whole thing was just utterly confusing to me. ( Talking about the anime )

Throughout the whole thing I betted my two cents on all this being Rachels conciousness handling something very bad. Which I thought was true through the whole anime. It was supported by a lot of facts especially after I saw that Zack couldn't possibly be human after all what happened to him. I mean all the "floor bosses" in general gave me that feeling especially the priest who used actual magic. But then all of a sudden after leaving the building it was real? My theory was trashed and I was left with a big middle finger in my face. I didn't understand anything anymore. Because now nothing made sense. But the real big blunder was the ending itself.

No matter how I look at it it wont make sense to me.
If I think Rachel somehow snuggled in the knife and taken here what "WHenSarahSmiles" says right above me in her comment, that still leaves the question as to HOW the wall got broken. Even if Rachel imagines Zack while suiciding and he is her angel of death blah blah how comes the Wall was broken in? And the glass was splintered inside so a force from outside had to break it in. And to both points now how comes the knife is not stained in blood? Only the wall is.
Then if we say it was the real Zack, how comes this dense idiot managed to break out of a high security prision for serial killers after he got sensed to death just casually picked up his BROKEN SCYTHE and magically fixed it again and then got all the way to her hospital to her room, ofc knowing where she would be lol, somehow break in and take her out? Let's remember this dude cant read, nor could he progress any floor on his own because he literally is just stupid but we ought to believe he was capable of doing all that?

And where does the blood on the window come from? If it's Zacks blood because he crushed the window/wall, why did he bleed in the first place? If he did it with his Sycthe he wouldnt take damage himself. If he did it with his hands, you dont wanna make me believe he broke iron/steel sticks and a wall and a window with his bare fists..
If its Rachels blood im back to my point above. Why is the wall broken then?

Like.. could anyone please enlighten me? I am sick of all the people saying the ending is leading up to imagination. I want a closure to this but I dont get it at all.

[please do not the cat]

So I thought I'd give my take on what happened and this will also be in response to ShikiX and WhenSarahSmiles.

I think they both died in the end after jumping from the window. It can't be a hallucination or dream of Ray because the anime shows police cars coming in and the window was broken from outside because of the glass being in the room. So personally, I don't think WhenSarahSmile's theory is plausible because even if Ray was having a dream and she saw an illusion of Zack and broke the window to suicide, the knife would have blood on it OR if she just jumped out the window, the shattered glass would be outside and not inside her room.

During the priest's discussion with Danny at the end, he stated they are all human (or were) so I think he must have had some sort of connections to orchestrate this entire thing and probably somewhere left a replacement scythe for Zack and was able to get him out the prison.

What I believe though, is before Zack went to prison or death row he was put in counselling as he was initially questioned about everything and they thought they might be able to get something out of him by doing the same thing to him as they are with Ray because really he was quite wounded after exiting with a few bullet shots so maybe he was left with high watch in the hospital or somethin. So then during this time the police were investigating the matter and when the counsellor of Ray told her Zack was to be sentenced to death, THAT was the day Zack made an escape, before he actually ends up in prison.

Now, about how he knew where Ray was...in the last episode of the anime, the counsellor of Ray apologised that she was late to Ray's counselling session because she had gone overtime with another patient. I know this might be farfetched but could this patient be Zack? If it is Zack, it would explain how he knows where Ray is. So maybe they told the counsellor to counsel both Zack and Ray to be able to get information from both of them and make conclusions as to what their state is and help them. When Ray is sleeping, she hears a female scream (which I assume is the counsellor!). So maybe Zack somewhat hit her or she saw him run out with the scythe to which he broke Ray's window. (he definitely didnt kill her though cause his scythe didnt have blood on it) Also they wouldn't have included that in the dialogue script if it did nothing to continue the plot so I really do believe Zack was at the same facility as Ray.

Or if he really did break from prison, the blood on the window sill is from police firing at him or his old wounds opening up.

Either way, I think this was a really beautiful and bittersweet way to end this series, both keeping their oath and Zack using the scythe as they fall down to kill them both (Zack would kill himself as well as in the building when he thought Ray died, the priest told him to run for it and he said whats the point escaping without Ray)

because really...they both don't have any future to look forward or any lives if they decide to keep living, the police would eventually find out Ray killed her parents and Zack would be arrested for killing people he killed previously.

I wrote this late at night so sorry if there are any contradictions or typos hehe

[ShikiX | Horo]

@Ramp
I appreciate your insight on this matter and I am actually super happy that someone still read this whole thing and responded properly to it.

Now that it even was clearly mentioned that they are in fact humans, it is even more bizzare for all these events to occur the way they are tho.

I do really like the theory about the counsellor alot but even tho it makes perfect sense especially because she herself mentioned that Zack was senced to death. How else would she have known about that info first hand.

Even the scream and the situation fit together perfectly as you said BUT it still doesn't quite explains how Zack knows where Ray was though. Technically he couldn't even know for sure wether she was in that building or not. Because for that information to leak, the councellor herself would have to have told Zack that she is in fact also watching over Ray. And that is something I just don't wanna stretch over a theory. Because it literally would only work when this exact mentioning happened you see. In the last moment before the ending plays out as you said she does mention Zack towards Rachel, but not vice versa. It's never shown nor hinted at that she told Zack about her looking over Rachel too.

At the same time tho I do think its still very badly executed. I mean even tho I like theorizing about stuff, it shouldnt leave the watcher dropped like hot coal like that.

Maybe its because its already a whole month ago I watched the show but the fact that they are humans really throws me off super hard right now. Like if they are just plain humans in this building, what the sh** happened there then? Because if only the priest himself was a higher being, then what about the floor bosses?

Technically they didnt use magic, only skill and technology I see that but for them to be alive afterwards or survive so much in general its just to much. Especially zack.
I dont care if he has the most overpowered PLOT armor ever cuz he is the protagonist but no freaking human being could survive any of the stuff zack did. Especially not multiple electric waves from a literal killing chair.

[please do not the cat]

@ShikiX

Yeah you make a good point about how he would have not known where she was and the point of them being human. Actually I did a lot of reading of other people's opinions and further research and found out there's a manga that's by the creator I think? it's called Satsuriku no Tenshi: Episode.0. I read somewhere that it tells the tale of how the facility came to be so maybe that will answer the supernatural events that happened.

Some people I read said that the priest just used the hallucination incense maybe not only when Rachel came to his floor but throughout the entire series itself so maybe everyone was just hallucinating but I don't know to be honest lol!

There was also a magazine that discussed the final episode of the anime and they stated "The two of them disappear to their very own world. There is no one who knows where they have gone..."
https://apriumjam.tumblr.com/post/179991191542/an-excerpt-from-the-december-2018-pash-magazine

and from reading what a lot of people have said (from reddit, myanimelist, discord, and other sites) it seems the creator said he doesn't know where they have gone but that actually confirms they lived through the jump and police. Im still kind of looking for this but from what I have seen that is what a lot of people have been saying.

At the end of the day, I'm not sure if the anime wanted to have the same ending as the game... the light novel apparently ended with them successfully escaping and disappearing and so did the game, so maybe the anime wanted to have the same ending as well as they pretty much adapted faithfully from the game.

I'm starting to think Ray's last words to Zack when she says to kill her is more like to run away with her instead of actually killing her because of her character change but yeah.

Hopefully the episode 0 manga reveals more for us!!!

Sorry for writing so much and thanks for reading all of it haha this series could have been so good (it's already really good imo) if they had some episodes to flesh out the background of all the other characters.

I guess for now i'll play the game and read the manga because apparently it tells Eddie and Cathy's backstories.

[ShikiX | Horo]

@Ramp

Yeah the hallucinating thing was also the idea that came to my mind first as I was watching it since it made absolutely perfect sense but the problem is that the things played out to real. The wounds on Zack weren't hallucinations. So the weapons couldn't. So the people who shot them couldn't. Etc etc.

And something I just remembered as well which was bugging me extremely is about Rachel's house. I mean I guess you could give it to hallucinating I probably?. The idea that the last floor is her own was amazing. I really liked that but in the end it just didn't make any sense for her whole house to be there. Especially cuz it's in the middle of the city on top of other floors???

The basic idea of all this being Dante's inferno that Rachel gotta admit to her sin came to my mind in the first episode already and I felt right about it when the last floor was in fact hers but it still somehow lacked the sense I think.

I was sure myself that the anime wanted to be more mysterious or dramatic than the game itself since I compared the endings multiple times with each other.

I was also planning on playing the game on steam and if there is more merchandise in terms of novels or manga I would appreciate it if you could share it with me.

If there is really a hint on how the facility came together I need to know it. This could be an explanation that solves my problems with this anime haha

PS.: Lol for the creator himself to say he doesn't know where they have gone is somewhat hilarious on its own xD. Like he was writing the whole thing and suddenly his characters were gone. XD

[please do not the cat]

@ShikiX

Yeah it really doesn't make sense how several floors of her house were there lol.

I actually didn't know of Dante's inferno so that's interesting. I'm up to date with the Episode 0 manga but other than providing backstory of Danny and Cathy, Gray also stated why he was starting this experiment but right now it's still ongoing and so I guess they havent shown how the facility came to be.

If you don't mind me spoiling the manga I will be doing that below:


Gray states that humans are able to destroy anything in this world and as such he would think that no god exists. But he realised that there are still humans that believe in god and have religious faith. So he wanted to start this experiment by gathering 'angels of death', people who have no restraint or resistance to killing others which would be Zack, Cathy, Danny, and Eddie. All he wants to learn is if this belief is an "ugly thing or a beautiful thing".

So what he wanted to do was to put himself in the position of 'God' and see how events turn out.

From what it seems, Gray was able to manipulate lots of people to become his faithful followers in the real world and he was also able to manipulate Danny who actually tried to resist him at first. He was even seen to use that incense drug on Danny.

So for now, it seems he's just a regular human (who is missing pupils lol) and so not sure yet how it ends up in the facility.

As for the novel, Baka-Tsuki has it currently as a teaser project and haven't actually dedicated any translators yet and it doesn't seem anyone else is translating the novel.

And yeah the creator I don't know what he was thinking when he made that ending lol, guess he/she didn't plan further than Zack and Ray escaping haha.

So I guess we will have to wait for now >_>

[ShikiX | Horo]

Yeah at first I was new to the Dante's Inferno idea myself but a friend mentioned it to me. It actually also fits perfectly that Rachel has to go upwards too. If you read a bit into it its almost literally the exact same thing. A person grinding her way up threw different instances of hell to admit and realize her own sin at the top. Pretty interesting in my opinion especially in comparison.

But yeah I guess in the end we pretty much worked over what we know so far and are bound to wait for any more input through any sources for now.

Thank you for the chat I really enjoyed it and it gave me a little more insight on things :)

[please do not the cat]

https://hikarinekochan101.tumblr.com/post/179445508333/official-satsuriku-no-tenshi-artwork-but-check

So I ended up finding just some artwork which is apparently official, look at what the last line says O_O not sure how they would be caught then disappear lmao but yeah. Not sure what its suggesting, so many things contradict and its hard to decide whether theres supernatural stuff involved or not as they just "disappear under the full moon" :/

But it was nice chatting about it and im glad I brought some insight over it!

[ShikiX | Horo]

Even though it's still just some cover up for lazy ending writing I like it haha. At least it officially says " Nobody knows where they have gone ". Inclining that they survived. Cuz if they just jump out of the window their corpses would have been at the ground.

Still pretty weird. I would have loved this anime with a better ending q.q

[Cherry_Switchblade]

I just watched the last episode (I'm a little late to the party) and I'm trying to make sense of the ending.

I have been pondering something in the intro that puzzles me. At the 5 second mark of the intro we see the silhouette from the waist down of what appears to a female swinging from a noose.

Did Rachel kill herself by hanging herself? It's hard to say the clothing matches Ray but who else would it be?

Any ideas?

[Cherry_Switchblade]

Publicado originalmente por WhenSarahSmiles:

Going to throw in my two cents here.

I don't believe Zack was there in literal form. Just before Rachel went to sleep that night, the nurse told her that going to sleep would give her sweet dreams, this is just before she tells Rachel that Zack was on death row. I'm going to take a stab in the dark and say he'd been on death row a while, and she was only telling Rachel then because he was due to die that day.

So, she goes to sleep. And she dreams of him / sees his invisible winged angel form (which was mention by the Priest in his last words), with his grim-reaper scythe rebuilt, now that he's in the afterlife.

I think he appeared in the window, with scythe, as her angel of death. He's come to take her to the afterlife. I think she killed herself, with Zack's blade, as her means of fulfilling their promise since it's impossible for them to do so otherwise. She has this massive thing against suicide in the beginning, but that's because she thinks it will upset her God. By the end of the game, she does not feel she has a God. I think perhaps, by that point, the reason she did not kill herself is because she promised Zack he had to do it. So, in the end, she used the knife Zack gave to her to end her life because he couldn't do it personally anymore.

In the end, they both become angels because they both die, thus fulfilling their promise to each other, so it's a really bittersweet ending.

I'm wondering if your theory explains the silhouette of the girl swinging from the noose in the intro I mentioned!

I really like your theory of her using the knife. But I feel she could have been dreaming about the knife as well because it's unlikely she would be getting psychiatric help in an institution and they hadn't discovered she had a knife

[ShikiX | Horo]

Yes I agreed with Sin-Gin the fact that the knife was there ist highly unlikely in an Institution like this. I mean come on it's a psychiatry. If a little girl is able to get a knife in there then this whole building would be a joke lol

[Cherry_Switchblade]

Publicado originalmente por ShikiX | Horo:

Yes I agreed with Sin-Gin the fact that the knife was there ist highly unlikely in an Institution like this. I mean come on it's a psychiatry. If a little girl is able to get a knife in there then this whole building would be a joke lol

I would love to hear your interpretation of the female swinging from a noose during intro.
You have a lot of great insight throughout this thread and have obviously spent some time researching others ideas as well as developing your own.

I think it must mean something. As strange and mysterious as this show is... everything seems to have a purpose. I cannot accept they would just say "hey... and we should have a random girl he has hung herself for no reason in the intro".

BTW... do you watch Violet Evergarden? I have just watched the first 2 episodes so far and I like it so far. Violet reminds me of Rachel a little bit.

[please do not the cat]

Sin-Gin I think that woman hanging on the noose is Danny's mother cause he says his mother commit suicide so it could just be alluding to that.