Dies Irae

Episode 11

Though Ren has been the central character since episode one, he's not been the exclusive focal point. Nowhere is that more evident than in this episode, where he doesn't appear at all in the current timeline; instead we focus on Shirou, Rea, and some of the bad guys, leaving us hanging about where the proposed alliance from the priest last episode will end up going, at least for another week. That wouldn't be a problem if the content from this episode made much sense. Once again, I can't shake the nagging impression that all these gaps would be filled in by familiarity with the source material, and some VN spoilers I've looked into do help to make sense of at least some of what we're seeing in the anime. Still, making a series that's nonsensical to anyone unfamiliar with the source material is bad planning.

The anime story does actually clarify a few points, though. Most importantly, it finally establishes that Rea is Riza's great-granddaughter, which means she's directly connected to the swastika-based plot, as evidenced by her stomach pains. It also reaffirms that Kasumi's father was a total bastard who had insidious intent on wooing Kasumi's mother for bloodline-related reasons. Shirou's déjà vu ability is also at Mercurius's will and Schreiber – the gaudily-eyepatched one who fought with Bey back in episode 0 – also finally makes an appearance, complete with his own giant skeletal thing.

Beyond that, things get almost incomprehensibly weird. The bombshell this episode drops is that Shirou was responsible for stabbing Kasumi's father to death to stop some experiment on Ren as a child. Where did that come from? Nothing of the sort has even been hinted at before this point. Presumably, Shirou sprouting up out of Rusalka (the redhead) Alien-style had something to do with her killing him, which raises the question of where Shirou's girlfriend Erii might be. (As a side note, the name that Bey calls Rusalka by, Malleus, is a reference to Malleus Maleficarum, a late 15th-century book that set the standard for witch persecutions in Europe. All of the villains in the series are apparently associated with items like these.) Equally out of nowhere is Rusalka's profession of love to Schreiber; this is presumably a ploy to save her own life, but we know too little of their relationship for such a manipulation to seem convincing. There's also Bey sprouting a girl out of his body who's supposedly his mother AND sister. We're probably not going to get any elaboration on that, since Bey gets offed quite easily by the newly-arrived Schreiber before the episode ends.

All of this is delivered through some fairly neat visuals and a strong mix of orchestral and pounding metal music, which makes me think once again that a better series could have been made from this content. As it stands, this anime hasn't done anywhere near enough work in forming a solid foundation for its world-building or connecting its puzzle pieces in a comprehensible way. For those intent on trying to weather out the rest of the series, I highly recommend checking out this Wiki page, where the character profiles will fill in some of the blanks for you.

Rating: C

Dies irae is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.