Hell's Paradise

Episode 13

OK, so none of us genuinely thought that this was going to be the end, and if I'm being honest, I thought the show was going to continue for another season without any breaks. But then again, with Jujutsu Kaisen season two right around the corner, it makes sense that we would break things up for the sake of preserving quality.

But was this a good enough place to end this first batch of episodes? For the most part, yes, as it signifies a turning point in the series and culminates with arguably our cast's first significant victory thus far. The majority of this episode was an extension of the fighting from last week, but this time with assistance in the form of Shion and Nurugai. Personally, Shion was the only character I was fine with already having mastered Tao so thoroughly because it's evident that he uses it to appear like Daredevil or something. But I liked how this episode shows no one is invincible in the series. While Shion may be the most skilled in Tao, he still lacks the same level of technical knowledge as everyone else, and I appreciate how he required assistance to deliver the final blow. I must say, the fight choreography was sublime from beginning to end.

Speaking of helping, almost everyone served a role in this episode from both emotional and practical standpoints. Everyone got to show off their skills in some way, shape, or form, and even Senta was useful as he was standing on death's door. That's how you do a character's death in this series, because I felt worse for him here than I did in the previous episode when they made it seem like he died immediately. I also liked that we got glimpses into different sides of Yuzuriha in this episode and that she's much more layered than her earlier episodes implied. She ran the gamut of being resourceful, practical, selfish, insightful, and caring within the span of twenty minutes.

But now, where do we go from here? Aside from the fact that two groups need to converge at some point, there are numerous unanswered questions and unresolved issues will undoubtedly drive the next season. The fact that there technically is no elixir of life makes everyone wonder how the criminals are going to be excused for their crimes, should they even make it out of this alive. We still need to learn more about the Tensen since it seems that every time they come up, we gain new insights about them and are confronted with additional questions. What other benefits and adverse side effects will develop from the use of Tao? And finally, what's going to happen to Gabimaru in all of this? I think the show is faking us out a little bit by giving the implication that his wife isn't real and having that coincidentally line up with the fact that he's losing his memory as a side effect from over-exerting himself. I think the show could have played up that mystery a little bit better by not making it painfully obvious that there's a large chunk of Tao missing from his head. But it doesn't change that now that Gabimaru has regressed, how will he approach the situation compared to how he did it before when he had something human to fight for? I'm very excited to see what developments come next, but we'll have to wait a little bit to see them unfold.

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Hell's Paradise is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.