An Angel Passing By: Haibane Renmei Simulwatch - ep 05 29/12

Episode 5

"A dream is beautiful because it remains a dream"

The expectant mother dreaming of escape from this dreamlike town where everyone is happily content in their existence living within their limitations (the biker gang with the more rowdy Haibane may have other ideas). The story of genesis that Rakka comes up with is very in keeping with her general demeanour being very quaint and sweet, with no conflict or negative forces in sight such as, for example, The Silmarillion is to The Hobbit and LOTR.

One of a few more interesting points around this was how she found various depictions of the beginning of the world having similarities within, which could be reflected in the themes and structures of most major religions - A common source? A shared instinctive coping mechanism for existential crises? Or the more sceptical view of a human construct for exercising control of the masses? All the usual theological discussions humanity eternally deals with that I don't have the acumen for. I now forget the second point I was going to make thanks to the constant distractions and chore allocations from family as usual heh.

Kuu maintains an air of mystery hidden behind his childish behaviour with a foreboding goodbye to the shopkeeper and "greeting" to a cat?? Probably overthinking him just learning greetings and goodbyes but he's certainly portrayed as having hidden depths.

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So new trapped humans are born the traditional way in this floaty world then and presumably therefore grow old and die as well? There are bad boy/biker boy/skater boy influences amongst the Haibane too, so much so that they're banned and segregated away if trying to cavort and spoil the well behaved ones. The skater boy's wings were hidden away -is he pretending to be human for whatever reason? Haibane can suffer ill health if he is worried about Reki smoking. Abandoned warehouse is co-ed, so then Kuu must be considered closer to the younger feathers in Old Home to have a place there still? I have now forgotten how many interruptions I've had whilst typing this, and with that any other points I may have had to make so shall shut it for now.
 
Episode 6
For whom the bell tolls.
Kuu has flown the nest after the hints in the last episode that she might be going somewhere. Although it was mentioned that the Haibane aren't supposed to mention it to anyone, which does seem harsh. I'm guessing she fulfilled whatever it was she needed to, to move on. It seems she needed to accept something about herself and helping Rakka seems to have been the final piece of the puzzle.
Reki seems to have gone through it more than once and is the oldest resident of Old Home, so I wonder what she's needs and why it's taking so long, especially as until Rakka showed up Kuu was the shortest in terms of length of stay.
Also I keep going back and forth as to whether they physically grow as it was mentioned that Kuu giving Rakka her jacket meant she'd given up on getting bigger, obviously Kuu knew she wouldn't need it for different reasons.
People have mentioned the music, I'm loving the ED. Here's the full version:
 
Episode 6
  • Rakka is looking for a suitable room and eventually, with Kuu's help, decides on her cocoon room, which feels like home.
  • Kuu leaves the nest, after her cup has filled up. Maybe she found some kind of inner peace. At first, she wanted to be like everyone else but with Rakka's arrival, she has found herself.
  • I guess you can't take doughnuts with you when your day of flight comes.
 
Episode 6

The biggest mystery for me has been answered - Kuu was a girl all along!! I had been so confused, assuming a female gender initially given her older contemporaries, but eventually settling incorrectly on her just being a boy. Well that clears up Old Home definitely not being co-ed.

The episode starts off with Kuu being cryptic and unsurprisingly thereafter flies the nest. An eventual day of flight for the Haibane is confirmed, and amongst them only poor Rakka is not clued in. The crows make an appearance, as they seem to at any events of significance (including bullying Kana heh). Glad to see the series is now touching on some of the mysteries, especially given that we're about half way through now.


D1tchd1gger said:
I'm guessing she fulfilled whatever it was she needed to, to move on. It seems she needed to accept something about herself and helping Rakka seems to have been the final piece of the puzzle.
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Birdie Num Num said:
Kuu leaves the nest, after her cup has filled up. Maybe she found some kind of inner peace. At first, she wanted to be like everyone else but with Rakka's arrival, she has found herself.
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Completely agree and the town continues to feel like limbo. I was reminded of other fascinating shows like Lost and Death Parade. Makes me feel for Reki and whatever inner demons she is yet, or struggling, to exorcise under her caring and maternal nature.
D1tchd1gger said:
Also I keep going back and forth as to whether they physically grow as it was mentioned that Kuu giving Rakka her jacket meant she'd given up on getting bigger, obviously Kuu knew she wouldn't need it for different reasons.
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Likewise, Rakka being born significantly older than the youngest feathers and the Haibane retaining their language and procedural memories could be for them potentially remaining static though wasn't there something earlier that implied that both Reki and Nemu has grown (or was it more about them having become more emotionally mature?). Even with the pregnant lady, with there actually being progress in her pregnancy (versus for example the static nature of that of the lady in the recent Maboroshi movie), we haven't had a clear indication of the humans growing and aging, though we don't have much info on them in general. I just remembered a point from the last episode from the library and how it was stocked by used books that were brought to the humans, making it seem that the Haibane aren't they only ones living in hand-me-downs.
 
Episode 7

Poor Rakka is really struggling with Kuu's departure a month on. The rest seemingly adapt more effortlessly, presumably as they are well versed in, and accepting of the fact that their Haibane forms are transient. Even the cafe owner (who also mixed up Kuu's gender!) is aware of this. Unless the Haibane is "sin-bound", as Reki states of herself being born with incomplete memory of her dream with black feathers, and as a result expected to be trapped in the town indefinitely?

Reki seems to have been ostracized due to this, except by her kind senpai, though eventually this notion seemed to have become a self-fulfilling prophecy with her acting out in her youth. Though, who doesn't act out in their youth and at present she seems to be most caring and kind just like her senpai was, as Rakka reminds her. Rakka's blackening feathers may be the "illness" in the episode title, whilst to Reki it's a punishment inflicted though for Rakka she feels it's surely in error. Or is Rakka's continued despondence viewed by the powers that be to be unbecoming of a Haibane and therefore warranting punishment?

Some other bits to note would be that the Haibane do grow physically, as Reki and Nemu are depicted in their child forms; the village is designed as a safe haven specifically for the Haibane, making the humans very much like NPCs; lastly why is tactless skater-lover boy so keen to hide his Haibane features, given their lofty-ish status, and who is exactly is he hiding from - himself from self-hatred, the humans or those in charge?? Hope we see a bit more of the rep and Toga folk soon, who've been missing since the initial tease.
 
Episode 7
Rakka is still suffering a month on from Kuu's flight. Seems everything reminds her of her friend, although it's probably not healthy to keep going to Kuu's bedroom. I had to rewind to double check, but the frog Rakka knocks over is the one with her name on it! Also seems the rest of them have just let her be! You would have thought someone would have had a word before it came to a head!
After Reki does try to reassure Rakka that she not sick, she tells her of the part of the dream she had in the cocoon that she remembers. Sounds like, if this some sort of pergatory, she might have been murdered!? Although no idea why she would be cursed.
Rakka last line is still to be fully answered: What are the Haibane?
 
D1tchd1gger said:
Sounds like, if this some sort of pergatory, she might have been murdered!? Although no idea why she would be cursed.
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That's a very interesting thought on its own, but also in relation to if this is an afterlife or purgatory then whether how, and at what age they may have died would affect them becoming our being chosen to become Haibane.
D1tchd1gger said:
On further rumination on this, does she blame herself for Kuu's flight and thus wishes she hadn't turned up to ruin things (in her own mind)? I remembered Kuu saying Rakka helped her "fill her cup" from the previous episode.
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I agree and definitely read this as her guilt at taking Kuu's place in the Old Home family, which is an additional reason she is struggling more than the others to reconcile with her departure.
 
Episode 7
  • Rakka is still dealing with Kuu's departure, a month has passed, cleaning her now vacant room to stay connected to her.
  • Rakka starts to develop black spots on her feathers. Are the feathers linked to her state of mind?
  • Reki was born with black spotted feathers, Sin Bound, and doesn't fully remember her dream in her cocoon.
  • Haibane do grow up.
  • What are the Haibane?
 
Episode 8
Rakka seems a bit brighter at the start, but still is questioning what the Haibane are and Reki answer doesn't seem to help much being pretty vague. Later on she seems to have a meltdown when offered free stuff and the tailor telling her that the Haibane have to be all smilies and then an over bearing tourist(? She doesn't seem to have seen a Haibane before?) sends her into panic mode.

Then after running away when she's decrying her existence the crows turn up to take her to a well where she finds a dead crow, unfortunately it's a very old well and she falls to the bottom from the final few rungs of the ladder when they give way. This seems to knock her out briefly and she remembers more of her dream including the part where the crow tried to save, this in turn seems to bring back memories of her real life in which she equally decried her existence leading to me speculating she may have committed suicide!

Back in Old Home the other Haibane set out to find her...
 
Episode 8

The tone of the show has markedly changed with the depictions of depression nearing Evangelion levels in their earnestness (the almost identical end credits scene was just the start of the similarities with Eva then). The honest portrayal makes it crystal clear how the joy seems to have been sucked out out of Rakka's life, now no longer just a concern for Kuu alone, but rather their own collective fates and indeterminate purpose. Poor Rakka has only just started her life as a Haibane and one significant event has already precipitated her feeling like a failure whose existence should be erased. Not easy to watch and as someone who has been through similar, Reki is really trying unsuccessfully to support her, but really, try is all anyone can do for someone going through such crises.

The kids visit to buywinter clothes is a cute but short-lived respite - is this why Reki chooses to look after kids? So that the time and energy required for this distraction leaves no space for her throughts to wander back into existential crises that perhaps drove her previous actions in her youth?

The crows remain an enigma entwined with the Haibane. With some Haibane's feathers turning black, could it be those that do not ascend become the overseer crows?? This is further implied by Rakka calling the dead crow on the well someone she must have known who turned into the crow to come and support her. I was thinking earlier that the one in her pre-birth dream was like a manifestation of Reki supporting her as she fell. That fall into the well then made it look like the dead crow was the remains of Rakka herself after the fall, a fulfillment of her desire to be erased. After Rakka falls into the well, the scene of the shimmering water surface is the same as right at the start of the opening credits through which Rakka is then seem descending into the town.

A hard but nonetheless fascinating episode.


D1tchd1gger said:
Rakka seems a bit brighter at the start
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Gosh, whilst she appeared to be compensating as one does, it looked the opposite to me with the bags under her eyes - I thought she looked forlorn and sleep-deprived, hence my impression above.
D1tchd1gger said:
this in turn seems to bring back memories of her real life in which she equally decried her existence leading to me speculating she may have committed suicide!
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Very interesting point, which may sadly fit!
 
D1tchd1gger said:
I think I was just trying to remember what happened early on and compared to the rest she was fairly composed. I mean when they went into Kuu's room she didn't start crying which was progress from previous episodes.
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That's true and I felt that it was partially down to her trying to put on a brave face, but probably more related to a loss of affect and the blunting of emotions experienced in depression.
 
Episode 9

Rakka's insight into her cocoon dream seems to be helping her overcome her guilt over her previous nihilistic emotions and actions (like you had surmised @D1tchd1gger ), as a result of which a supportive loved one suffered. Her admission of this got Haibane-communicator-dude very interested and he posed a most interesting riddle on bearing sin as the human condition. The contrast of the Haibane bearing sin, whilst having the appearance of angels that are meant to bear no sin, is interesting, or is that the destination?

Poor Reki seems envious that Rakka appears to have made progress, being yet another Haibane leaving her behind. Perhaps it is this very fact of being left behind that Reki has been unable to reconcile with, and which therefore keeps her sin-bound?

Rakka's physical reaction to the wall seems to be treated more like an illness (or communicable disease!), than a violation of rules.
 
Episode 9
Rakka is rescued by the Toga, but they leave her outside the well, maybe to get the Haibane Renmei communicator? But in the meantime she wonders off and finds the wall and hears Kuu. The wall is cold, which seeing it's winter shouldn't be a surprise, but maybe it's unnaturally colder than it should be! The Communicator finds her and after telling her off for touching the wall helps by giving her his cane. As they walk back through the wood Rakka and The Communicator talk and Rakka finally gets some advice and answers which seems like she should have gotten a lot earlier.
The Communicator comes out with the circular riddle:

To recognise ones own sin is to have no sin.

If you know you've sinned then you're a sinner, but at least you know you've done wrong so you can avoid doing it again?

They reach the end of the woods and The Communicator leaves, but Reki and the gang soon show up. Reki pulls a sick stunt, but surely that will wreck the scooter! They get Rakka home, the others say she's cold, but she says she feels fine, early onset of hypothermia? Although when Rakka talks of feeling light Reki seems to think it's a sign Rakka might be nearing her Day of Flight?

Reki goes to take a nap and talks to her statuses! She seems to abandonment issues! Oh, and we find out she's been there 7 years.
 
Episode 8
  • Rakka continues to dye her wings to hide her black feathers. She looks tired and worn out emotionally. (wobbly vision)
  • The gang take a memento each from Kuu's room.
  • Evil effects are stronger during winter.
  • Rakka sees herself as a failure, is that due to wings or a feeling she came into the world with?
  • That woman getting in her face really irritated me. I felt Rakka's stress and the world distorted.
  • Rakka decides to follow the crows, and ventures into the Western Woods. The POV shot did not hold well.
  • Then she finds a well. Maybe the one from The Ring.
  • Climbing down and getting stuck, she finds the remains of a crow. Her dream is remembered and the crow is someone Rakka knew and but doesn't know how.
  • Reki wears dark wing protectors while the others wear white ones.
 
Episode 10
We get a bit of Reki's past. Her birth from the cocoon, Nemu being the one to find her, Kuramori trying to help her out by asking The Communicator for medicine, Nemu and her not getting along at first, but then making up when they have to look after Kuramori when she makes herself ill picking herbs for Reki's medicine.

Cut to the present and Reki is wants answers from The Communicator and we get a lot of information about what is holding back the Haibane and that they still do move on in some way if they don't get a Day of Flight. Also Reki had intervened in some way for Hyouko previously.

Rakka seems to recover very quickly and is possibly more chipper than she's been all season, which I found a little odd, especially as she then has to go to the temple to serve punishment for touching the wall. Turns out she has to clean inside of The Wall and pick up "Light Leaves" which are used to make their halos.

The Abandoned Factory Haibane give Reki a gift for Rakka from Hyouko as an apology for the spilled soup. Reki tells Nemu not to worry about her anymore which puzzles Nemu.

It seems that the drama with Rakka is possibly over and the show is now shifting focus onto Reki more. Will she be able to solve the sin riddle or will she suffer whatever fate a Haibane suffers when they don't get their Day of Flight before their time as a Haibane expires?
 
Episode 9
  • For someone who wished not to exist, Rakka doesn't want to die.
  • Saved by Toga by playing charades in the well.
  • Rakka comes to the wall and hears Kuu lauging.
  • The communicator guy comes to collect Rakka and gives her his cane for support. According to him, the wall recognises who can leave and having wings and a halo means you have no sin in this world.
  • Rakka feels unworthy to be here so a riddle is given, One who recognises their own sin has no sin.
  • Reki does the Akira bike skid.
  • Rakka feels fine but she is numb and ice cold.
  • Reki knows what is going to happen to Rakka after she touches the wall.
  • Reki believes that Rakka's day of flight is coming. Has the wall approved Rakka?
 
Episodes 10 & 11

Watched 10 a few days back but kept forgetting to comment on it so decided to do together with 11 as I suspect I'll get bits of the next episode mixed in. I really enjoyed the first part of Reki's backstory and how she eventually bonded with Nemu.

1000027189.jpgSo sweet

Haibane dude tells Reki not to be envious of Rakka, whilst warning Rakka that Reki is holding herself back and going down a less happy fate than achieving a day of flight, which he wants for all Haibane. It's also very sweet how Nemu is reported to be holding herself back on Reki's account, something Haibane dude tries to guilt Reki into action with. Rakka's 180° recovery has landed her with not just a cleaning job at the temple's haunted tunnels, but also the emotional burden of cheerleading her loving big sister along to leave forever - no pressure.

Reki brings out the tsundere just for Hyohka and after whatever went down her ex-bff can't stand her guts and goody-goody nature. Now I want part 2 of the Reki backstory! At the end of it all Reki seems to have resigned herself to failing whatever test is required to achieve a day of flight and is ready to paint it all black.

D1tchd1gger said:
Reki pulls a sick stunt, but surely that will wreck the scooter!
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Birdie Num Num said:
Reki does the Akira bike skid.
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Reki did it again! I'm enjoying these Akira bike stunts even when the animation quality is not the draw of this show.
D1tchd1gger said:
Reki goes to take a nap and talks to her statuses! She seems to abandonment issues!
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I loved how she shares her cig with the statue, even considerate to inanimate friends!
Birdie Num Num said:
Reki wears dark wing protectors while the others wear white ones.
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Good catch, I'd missed this until episode 11! Let's hope that black is just her favourite colour and this wasn't a way for the others to remind her of being sin-bound.
 
Episode 10
  • On a cold winters day, Reki was born.. hatched?.. came into this world.
  • From day one, she was alone.
  • Reki understands what Rakka is going through because she was the same, cutting her wings and having an older Haibane be by her side.
  • Rakka's fever isn't going down so Reki decides to do another bike slide, and visits the temple.
  • The fever is punishment for touching the wall.
  • Haibane have a time limit and something happens if they don't have their day of flight before then.
  • Everyone has ordeals they need to come to terms with.
  • Rakka receives a punishment for touching the wall, and that's going inside the wall(?) to collect light leaves and clear up the tags.
  • Reki gave Hyohko the bird.
 
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