Blade of the Immortal Chapter 204 Discussion

Neiru2013 said:
Really pissed off at this chapter. I anticipated Anotsu would die, but this is the worst possible way it could've happened, imo. Anotsu showed remorse for what he did to Rin's family, saved her life at least a couple of times, and has been nothing but relentlessly helpful/nice to her since. Doesn't excuse the past, but for a while it looked like mutual growth and healing to me. Guess not. If there isn't some major remorseful or conflicted reflection about this in upcoming chapters it will drop BotI at least 1 rank on my favorites list since it ruins what the series meant to me.

Rin already killed her parents' murderers back in the beginning (creepy mask guy and creepy heads guy). She definitely had her reasons for wanting revenge on Anotsu too, but there were significant countervailing factors to this by the end of the story that made it moot to me. Things got progressively more gray and Rin started questioning what she was trying to accomplish. She was introspective, and I admired her for that, but now her actions demonstrated that it was all for nothing. She still subscribes to the culture of blind revenge, and that is exactly the kind of pettiness I can not respect.

Throughout the story Rin was realizing that the world is much more gray and complicated than this, that it doesn't revolve around her tragedy, and that her reckless perpetuation of the cycle of violence has consequences for lives she did not intend. Pursuing archaic duties to the dead by killing more people did not bring her peace because real healing takes place within. Sometimes you just have to learn to live with the past, which is what her contact with Anotsu was helping her to do until she reverted back to her chapter 1 self in 204.

What she did to Anotsu was utterly pointless. She didn't need to do anything. Anotsu was no longer a threat to her. She could've just stood by Manji, maybe even hurl her usual insults, and let Anotsu get on the ship. He was probably going to die on his own anyway. He didn't want to live and I don't mind that he died. I mind how he died.

If he died from bloodloss, if he was killed by some random guy trying to collect a reward, even if he fell off a cliff, it would've been better than what happened. Ideally he could've died on the ship next to Makie while looking up at the sky. I could maybe even be okay with the senseless Manji/Anotsu fight if that happened. But Rin killing him irreversibly taints the soul of the story for me. Thank gods at least Manji didn't do it. I like Manji.

Neiru2013 said:
Really pissed off at this chapter. I anticipated Anotsu would die, but this is the worst possible way it could've happened, imo. Anotsu showed remorse for what he did to Rin's family, saved her life at least a couple of times, and has been nothing but relentlessly helpful/nice to her since. Doesn't excuse the past, but for a while it looked like mutual growth and healing to me. Guess not. If there isn't some major remorseful or conflicted reflection about this in upcoming chapters it will drop BotI at least 1 rank on my favorites list since it ruins what the series meant to me.

Rin already killed her parents' murderers back in the beginning (creepy mask guy and creepy heads guy). She definitely had her reasons for wanting revenge on Anotsu too, but there were significant countervailing factors to this by the end of the story that made it moot to me. Things got progressively more gray and Rin started questioning what she was trying to accomplish. She was introspective, and I admired her for that, but now her actions demonstrated that it was all for nothing. She still subscribes to the culture of blind revenge, and that is exactly the kind of pettiness I can not respect.

Throughout the story Rin was realizing that the world is much more gray and complicated than this, that it doesn't revolve around her tragedy, and that her reckless perpetuation of the cycle of violence has consequences for lives she did not intend. Pursuing archaic duties to the dead by killing more people did not bring her peace because real healing takes place within. Sometimes you just have to learn to live with the past, which is what her contact with Anotsu was helping her to do until she reverted back to her chapter 1 self in 204.

What she did to Anotsu was utterly pointless. She didn't need to do anything. Anotsu was no longer a threat to her. She could've just stood by Manji, maybe even hurl her usual insults, and let Anotsu get on the ship. He was probably going to die on his own anyway. He didn't want to live and I don't mind that he died. I mind how he died.

If he died from bloodloss, if he was killed by some random guy trying to collect a reward, even if he fell off a cliff, it would've been better than what happened. Ideally he could've died on the ship next to Makie while looking up at the sky. I could maybe even be okay with the senseless Manji/Anotsu fight if that happened. But Rin killing him irreversibly taints the soul of the story for me. Thank gods at least Manji didn't do it. I like Manji.