The moment that I am starting to think that Devil’s Line makes surprisingly so much sense, Tsukasa goes out and does something extremely stupid. Honestly, this show is such a weird experience.
Japanese Original Episode Title: チェイサー
Tsukasa has been taken hostage by Sniper-chan, and at the same time, Anzai is being counseled by a doctor from ONLO about his fear of accepting the devil inside of him. Tsukasa starts talking about oni with Sniper-chan and tries to reason with her that they are only humans after all. They manage to escape the police and find her subordinate, while going into hiding in a nearby hotel. Meanwhile, Johannes starts lecturing Anzai that his behavior is quite immature and that he needs to communicate more with Tsukasa if he wants their relationship to work out. Tsukasa’s captors let her go and try to escape but before they warn her about a spy in the police force, named Ushio that she needs to be careful of. When the police come to rescue her, the very guy that she had to be cautious of, comes to kill her. She stuns him and manages to flee but she is being hunted down. She calls the bar where everyone is staying in order to get Anzai to help her. Anzai along with Johannes come to the rescue but they are almost too late as Tsukasa is being shot and falls out the window.
Tsukasa is such an idiot: It’s not uncommon to see really stupid female protagonists in this kind of show, but surprisingly, Tsukasa’s stupidity works in favor of the story. She is naive, stupid, and daydreams about all kinds of things and she is too dumb to sense the danger around her, which is highlighted greatly in this episode. She helps and cares about the girl who took her hostage, she calls Anzai for help but the things she said will only freak him out more, and in the end, she is even lecturing the guy that is trying to kill her. He said it as well: ‘You either have nerves of steel, or you’re just plain stupid’.
Johannes is awesome: I will not stop arguing about this. He is probably the best anime character I have seen lately. He has so much sense and reason when he talks that I just want to find the creator of Devil’s Line and congratulate him. When he was talking with Anzai and was lecturing him about how he has to deal with his bloodlust and himself in order to have a healthy relationship, Anzai tries to be all alpha and says to him: ‘What are you blabbering about?’ and Johannes replies: ‘Japanese.’ DAMN, THAT BURN ANZAI. And the fact that he is a foreigner as well makes this even better. Plus, let’s not forget that he has amazing humor: ‘You are the doctor who told me to deal with bloodlust by jerking off.’ This guy is an absolute treat.
Inferiority Complex: It is mentioned in the episode that Anzai may have an inferiority complex about how ugly he can be when his devil side takes over. Inferiority complex is the lack of self-worth, a doubt and uncertainty about oneself, and feelings of not measuring up to standards. It is often subconscious and is thought to drive afflicted individuals to overcompensate, resulting either in spectacular achievement or extremely asocial behavior.
The plot of this story is sometimes ridiculous but overall I believe it is kind of well thought out. I find rather interesting the fact that the main characters are not left to discover solutions for their situations by themselves as most anime of the same genre do. A doctor and Johannes counsel and help Anzai deal with his problem and tell him that you know what? This is your problem, this is the situation, and this is what you need to do, deal with it. Tsukasa also gets feedback from various peers in order to make her relationship work out which I think in general is very refreshing to watch.
Another example is when Kikuhara is trying to find out where Sniper-chan is. He is working logically and methodically by checking the nearby CCTVs and calling the taxi lines to see if anyone has picked up people that might have looked like them. What I am trying to say is that it makes sense. We are not just seeing the police finding them, we actually get to see the process, something that at least I didn’t expect to see in the show.
Seeing the preview for the following episode, Tsukasa and Anzai are going to enter a very steamy territory. I don’t know what to expect to be honest because apparently the manga is quite erotic in this kind of scenes but I highly doubt that we will have something of equal quality in the anime.
NEXT TIME: Offline
The summer anime season is over. We had a few refreshing titles that kept us company through the hot months, but fall is bringing so many new titles and a few sequels we’ve been waiting for a long time.
