Shin Sekai Yori - 06

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There is definitely something odd about this episode, and it didn't resonate with me.

I don't know if it's the quick recovery of Satoru's powers or the awkward progression of the episode, but it just didn't feel right when it came down to watching the episode. A part of me was looking forward to see how the story would progress after the children had been stripped of their Cantus, so from just that point I was disappointed by how things turned out. The bigger disappointment however was the progression of the episode.

You could almost feel Shin Sekai Yori trying to portray a sense of urgency but it was just flat. There was more urgency in the previous chapter and here it ended up feeling like a monster of the week x3 crammed into a single episode. Had it been handled a little differently - maybe slowed down or cut out a few of the monster encounters or just left the kids without any Cantus - there could have been more intensity and urgency which the episode felt like it was going for.

One thing that was developed in this episode, was Satoru's descent into madness. Probably the better outcome of the episode was this particular development in his character, because it plays into the beautiful chaos occurring in Shin Sekai Yori so well. There is a lot going on that children wouldn't be able to handle, let alone reason with, so this aspect of the episode was a great literary addition. It captured the primal instincts of man, which is a theme the series has been exploiting since episode 1 and in this particular case it brought back memories of my time reading Lord of the Flies. Speaking of beautiful chaos, that LSD trip early on in the episode was certainly memorable, though it felt a little disconnected with the sole purpose of being an artistic touch spilt over from the previous episode.

Not a strong performance this episode for Shin Sekai Yori. It's a pity after the last two episodes that we got an episode that felt this awkward and uninteresting.