Parasyte 08-09

Dinner from a bottle is a hard way to go

Embarrassing confession time: My first draft of this post had the following first sentence “This episode started off with making me wonder if I missed an episode, as Shinichi seems to be trying to apologize for something that happened between him and Satomi (and some other girl, likely Kana).” I didn’t realize there had been two episodes, and wrote the whole post without knowing it. So this Thanksgiving I’m thankful for seeing that I missed the 8^th episode before posting this article.

Changing Too Much

The trash can of big mistakes

Episode 8 was an awful lot of setup, and we didn’t really get into anything meaty until episode 9 (which is probably why I didn’t realize that I’d skipped a whole episode). And if Satomi thought that stuff would go swimmingly, she’s wrong because she starts thinking that maybe he’s a little different. I find this “self-reflection in the reactions of others” a bit interesting, in that one of the things Shinichi seems to have lost is the ability to self-analyze himself in the same way. When he’s asking Migi about how he’s acting, then he’s definitely lost that ability. But with more than one thing happening to make him look like a cold and unfeeling person, Satomi definitely thinks that Shinichi has changed (and jeez, it’s kinda obvious he’s not quite the same).

Kana’s definitely got the wrong idea

Meanwhile, Kana’s getting the entirely wrong idea. She’s mistaken her ability to sense Parasites for an ability to sense Shinichi, and it’s getting her face to face with people she shouldn’t be face to face with, like Shimada. And she is certainly trying to get between Shinichi and Satomi, even fooling him into making it seem like he cares for her more than he does. And Satomi’s mostly not worried about Kana, she’s more worried about Shinichi being different. There’s a girl with her eyes on the prize, and not worried about what Kana is doing. And just when he thinks he’s getting a chance to apologize and patch things up, they get interrupted.

But that’s not all. Satomi is right that he’s different: quicker to anger, much harder and edgier. He doesn’t have that soft and vulnerable feel to him any more at all. Plus, and Satomi doesn’t know this, he’s taken on the role of protector of the school, against a new persistent threat. But that doesn’t mean much to Satomi, who is seeing his new prickliness like his new hair is symbolic of his personality. He’s quick to explode, vehement in his epithets. He’s stronger, but gone is what felt like a solid core of inner strength that he had developed after coming to terms with Migi, the inner self that made him stand up to Mitsuo and his gang when they were beating up Nagai, that made him try to rescue Satomi, even though he knew he had no chance. He still wants to do the right thing, protect people, but he seems to have a very raw edge that is not becoming to the people that used to care for him.

Dad comes clean and tells Shinichi all the things he already knows

The New Threat

The humans are catching on, and for some reason I think that Yuuko here is really cute

That I talked about above is Shimada, who for some reason Yuuko has a crush on. But he’s a ‘normal’ Parasite: with the head taken over. However, much like Ryouko (who sent Shimada to observe Shinichi), he’s much more thoughtful about what he’s doing (and what he’s lying about). And in general we’re seeing that with the parasites now. The ones that have survived are the ones that are more able to blend in with society, the ones that have learned to be very selective about their victims. We even see a short scene between Ryouko and someone new, but who is obviously a parasite, talking about what the purpose of humanity and the parasites is. I think Ryouko is still a very interesting character, and it was good to see that she’s thinking more than just the seemingly usual ‘animal’ ways the parasites do. As she points out, if they mindlessly kill humans too much, eventually they will be hunted down by the humans.

A newfound confidence?

But back to Shimada, he’s going along in the school, wondering what’s going on with Shinichi (when did he come to the school by the way?) but like other head parasites he’s not really concerned with humans. And when he gets bullied by Mitsuo, Mitsuo’s lucky to stay alive. Even when Mitsuo brings a group, it’s not really a worry for Shimada, but it is for Shinichi, who doesn’t want anyone to die, even if it’s Mitsuo and his gang. And it’s a twist that Shinichi is now able to defend himself without Migi, and without the complications that using Migi would bring, something that Shimada wouldn’t do. His plan was just to behead all of them, which would take about 3 seconds. Lucky for them Shinichi steps in.

Yuuko makes a big mistake

The worst part is when Yuuko really steps in it. Accidentally seeing Shimada deform his head with no effect, and with Transparent Plot Girl Akiho bringing up that Shimada’s face looks kinda ‘fake’, she hems and haws about telling her police sketch artist brother about him. Rather, she gets the entirely idiotic idea to confront Shimada alone. This is seriously the biggest idiot ball scene this show has come up with. “Hmm, if this guy’s a murderer, then me telling him that I know he might be will work out fine. He’d never kill me to shut me up…” Maybe she doesn’t even get that far, but man, this is “Friday the 13^th let’s all go to the lake where there’s no contact and people have been disappearing” dumb. She even meets him alone, and doesn’t tell anyone about it. Of course he’s gonna kill her. I don’t even know what she had as a plan, because it doesn’t matter.

A nice start to a new story arc, while still working out details from the last one, like Shinichi’s dad telling him the truth about what he saw. That’s a big question: will Shinichi ever be able to tell his dad that he is partly like the thing that killed his wife? There are many ways that could go, and almost none of them are good. We’ve also got a lot more tension between Satomi and Shinichi, as he’s pushed to some kind of limit because of the stress of Shimada’s actions. And finally, Yuuko putting herself in mortal danger. This part was almost too stupid for the show, and if it had been anyone else among the main characters, I think it would have just been too out of character. But I guess you could believe that a high school girl is just dumb or naïve enough to think this would work.

About Highway

Proving that you don't have to be young to love anime, I enjoy all genres and styles of shows. If it's not hurting anyone else, you should never be ashamed of what you like!