Posted in: Anime, Crunchyroll, Review, TV | Tagged: anime, Crunchyroll, frieren, Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End, Review
Frieren: Beyond Journey's End S01E07 Review: Demons "Show & Tell"
This week's episode of Crunchyroll's Frieren: Beyond Journey's End, S01E07: "Like a Fairy Tale," was a "show & tell" of Demons' true nature.
This week's episode of Crunchyroll's Frieren: Beyond Journey's End S01E07: "Like a Fairy Tale" was a "show and tell" of Demons' true nature. Frieren, Fern, and Stark continue their journey to the north, where Heaven and Earth meet. The journey to find the souls of Frieren's late friends who adventured with her for years, especially the Hero Himmel. It is a very sweet story of adventure, friendship, and loss, as well as a reminder to live in the present, as we do not always have all the time we think we do to enjoy those around us.
Anyway, we follow our new party of heroes heading north and helping yet another village in their wake. After helping a traveler and being asked about her elven nature, Frieren confesses there are not mane elves left, and the last one she met in person had been about 400 years before. We also learn their race is slowly becoming extinct as they lack the feelings to connect and reproduce, which explains a lot about Frieren herself. After arriving at the village, the party is made aware there is a festival to celebrate the Hero Himmel and his friends who, 80 years before, had defeated the demons.
Once again, we see another snippet of the past in which Himmel explains the reason why he gets statues of them made: so Frieren is not alone in the future and reminds her that this adventure was real and they were not fairy tales. As we have seen throughout the episodes, Frieren barely reacted, but it was a very heartfelt moment that made much more sense in the future as we are experiencing now. I can understand why Frieren wants to see Himmel and get to know more of him now; he was such a good "boi," always taking into account Frieren and her quirks. It is not always you come across real friends that remain even when you are so emotionally disconnected even without meaning to. The more I get to know about their past, the more I wish we could follow it too.
Frieren, Fern, and Stark quickly head out to another town, where Frieren quickly goes into attack mode, noticing there are demons nearby living as humans. Frieren is arrested as she expresses her disdain toward them and states there is no reasoning with them. We learn pretty fast why Frieren feels this way: Demons have no way of connecting and empathizing with humans, using their words to trick humans into believing they do have feelings. It is pretty messed up how they manage to do so time and time again, and we see pretty much the same story repeating itself. Demons have no knowledge of what the words mom and dad mean, yet they use them as swords and shields, managing to make humans stop their killings and lure them into a false sense of connection. While I hate them, I love how brutal the portrayal is and how they manage to make their point.
Immediately we see Frieren was right, and the Demons have the win for the day – getting their lives spared after a heated confrontation in which once again got saved by the use of the word dad. As Frieren had warned, they only use those words because it stops humans from killing them. However, things take a turn as one of the Demons heads off Frieren herself, and she warns him not to get cocky since she is stronger than she looks. I love how this anime walks a fine balance between slice-of-life peaceful and just plain f*cked up. I am curious to see what Frieren will do to this over-confident douche and where things will head from here as Fern nor Stark, or us for that matter, have seen that side of her.