Mirai Nikki – Episode 26

This is the last episode of Mirai Nikki. I’ve sort of put off watching it because Mirai Nikki’s a really good show and I’ll be sad when it’s over.  Sorry about that.  Last episode ended with Yuno in a pretty dominant position: she had beaten down Minene, had sealed Yukiteru in a pocket dimension, and was standing over her timeclone with a knife and a determined expression.  What can possibly stop her now?  Murumuru might.  Last episode in order to defeat Minene, Yuno had removed Murumuru’s power seals.  One imagines that perhaps her power was sealed for a reason?  Maybe she’ll go into an indiscriminate rage, Yuno will die, and Yukiteru will become the God of the previous world?  Let’s see how they end things in episode 26 of Mirai Nikki.

…thirty minutes pass…

Mirai Nikki – Episode 25

Last episode on Mirai Nikki, Yukiteru and Minene had chased Yuno and Murumuru into the past, where Yuno had taken Yukiteru’s past-parents as hostages.  Yuno seems to be acting as the final villain of the series, which is sort of a sad ending for her.  I’m crossing my fingers though, there’s still time for them to talk things out and cooperate!  They need to realize what a uniquely powerful position they are in as time-travelers from the future, and team up to rule the world.  Why are they even still fighting?  Maybe Yukiteru wants to save Yuno’s time-clone, but I think he had better give it up.  The survival game can only have one winner, after all, either his time-clone or Yuno’s will have to die.  Unless they can change the rules?  Maybe episode 25 of Mirai Nikki will show them breaking into the mayor’s office and tampering with the prototype diaries so that everybody can win and the Earth is a utopia forever hooray!  We’ll see.

…thirty minutes pass…

Mirai Nikki – Episode 24

Last episode on Mirai Nikki, some wacky stuff went down.  Trying to give a meaningful recap would probably take more space than I usually spend on one of these posts in its entirety, so suffice it to say that Yukiteru is freaking out because Yuno went back in time and murdered an earlier version of herself, and the world is scheduled to end tomorrow unless one of them kills the other.  You’d think after 23 episodes Yukiteru would be used to Yuno killing people, but whatever.  I guess maybe betraying your time-clone is especially shocking, because if you were going to be able to cooperate with anyone, you would expect it to be yourself?  Let’s see how the two of them handle the impending apocalypse in episode 24 of Mirai Nikki.

…thirty minutes pass…

Mirai Nikki – Episode 23

Last episode on Mirai Nikki, the survival game was nearing its end – a good thing, too, because so was the world.  All the diary holders save Yukiteru and Yuno were killed, and even the interloper Akise Aru was fatally wounded.  But before he dies, he seems to have something to tell Yukiteru about Yuno.  What could it be?  What evidence does he have that she’ll betray him, after all this time, after all the sunk costs he’s expended following her lead, what would he believe?  Let’s find out in episode 23 of Mirai Nikki.

…thirty minutes pass…

Mirai Nikki – Episode 22

Last episode things seemed to finally be spinning toward a conclusion in Mirai Nikki.  Only three diary holders remain: Yukiteru, Yuno, and Eighth, who is being held captive by Akise Aru.  But there are still a couple loose ends that need clearing up.  We still don’t know what Yuno’s deal is, and why she had her own corpse buried in her backyard.  We still don’t know what Akise Aru has been plotting.  And Akise Aru thinks Deus has been misleading the diary holders, and surely he would not think a thing if it were not true.  So let’s resolve hopefully at least one of these issues in episode 22 of Mirai Nikki, before Deus dies and the world collapses into nothingness.

…thirty minutes pass…

Mirai Nikki – Episode 21

Last episode on Mirai Nikki, Yukiteru and Yuno were closing in on the mayor with assault weaponry and cheerful attitudes.  Yukiteru’s come a long way from the goody-two-shoes that risked his own life to protect Tsubaki who he had just met and got betrayed in return.  Now he’s willing to place his friends and allies in mortal danger to serve as a diversion in order to get what he wants.  Remember when Yukiteru was crying as Yuno was threatening his friends, because they were the first real friends he’d ever had?  And now he himself is putting them in danger.  We’ll see if it ends up being worth it in episode 21 of Mirai Nikki.

…thirty minutes pass…

Mirai Nikki – Episode 20

Last episode on Mirai Nikki, our heroes were about to shoot Eleventh in the head when our old friend Akise Aru showed up.  Although, it seems as though Eleventh’s diary had predicted Akise would show up and save him?  So it’s not clear in what sense our heroes were “about” to shoot him.  They were in fact about to be stopped by Akise, as was foretold.  I guess it depends on whose perspective you’re looking at the situation from.  From Yuno’s perspective, she certainly expected to shoot him, she even told him “GG” to mock him, so she would say she was about to shoot him.  From Eleventh’s perspective, he expected not to be shot, and did not consider himself in actual danger of being shot. He would say she wasn’t about to shoot him.  Deus, the God of Space-Time, presumably, can see all outcomes and knows what’s about to happen, and so he would say that Yuno was not about to shoot him, because from his omniscient perspective, things can only be about to happen right before they actually do happen.  I, as a viewer of the show, did not know that Eleventh’s diary had predicted Akise would show up until he said so.  However, as a savvy consumer of entertainment, I suspected they wouldn’t let him go down quite that easily.  So I did not actually expect her to shoot him, and yet I still say she was about to.  What accounts for this?

Anyway, probably most people do not find issues of modality in linguistic descriptions of events as interesting as I do, so the point I was driving at is that Akise Aru had big news – apparently one of the bodies found in Yuno’s house was the body of one Gasai Yuno!  Which suggests that this Yuno is an imposter, which I have argued may not be such a big deal.  But we’ll have to see what sort of explanation she puts forward in episode 20 of Mirai Nikki.

…thirty minutes pass…

Mirai Nikki – Episode 19

Last episode on Mirai Nikki, Yukiteru was attacked by a bunch of goons, apparently acting under the instructions of one of the other diary holders.  After they killed his father, he flipped out and killed them.  Now, as the saying goes, it’s personal.  Let’s watch Yukiteru finally go on the attack in episode 19 of Mirai Nikki.

…thirty minutes pass…

Mirai Nikki – Episode 18

Last episode on Mirai Nikki, Yukiteru defeated Seventh and escaped the crumbling tower, only to discover that while he was busy playing his silly survival game, his mother had been murdered.  I wonder how he’ll react in episode 18 of Mirai Nikki?

…thirty minutes pass…

Mirai Nikki – Episode 17

Last episode on Mirai Nikki (which was two weeks ago: blame inconsistent fansubber schedules, or perhaps the release of Crusader Kings 2), Yukiteru was trapped in a building that was being blown up by enemy diary users.  The floor was collapsing out from under him, and he was presented with a choice: grab for his father’s hand, and risk being betrayed by someone who acts like he loves him but actually only cares about money, or grab for Yuno’s hand, and risk being betrayed by someone who actually loves him but is super crazy.  The unstated third choice is for him to grab for no one’s hand, and deal with his problems on his own, but that’s not the sort of thing Yukiteru does.  The main theme of Mirai Nikki is about Yukiteru relying on others and getting burned for it.  Once Yukiteru awakens to a proper existentialist sense of despair and abandonment, there will be nowhere for his character to go.  But maybe I’m wrong!  Maybe, against all odds, he will take responsibility for his own life in episode 17 of Mirai Nikki.

…thirty minutes pass…