English Dub Review: Angels of Death “Kill Me… Please”

Run for your life.

Overview:

Rachel wakes up with amnesia, only to find out that serial killers are after her.

Our Take:

I met this episode with mostly bewilderment. Not because I had no idea what was going on, but because everything seemed so strangely rushed.

Rachel wakes up in a strange facility with different floors- each floor has a Floor Master, that is designed to weed out and kill her. Unfortunately, she has no idea who she is or where she came from, only that she has to run for her life. With Zack, a bandaged, scythe-toting serial killer with a hammy laugh on her trail, this is all the more serious. She doesn’t have any knowledge of the layout of the place and she isn’t armed, so it takes all her wits and a stroke of good luck to stay alive. In the end, she manages to escape- to another floor at least. It seems as if Rachel is ascending from one hell to another. She’s offered a chance to escape, but the environment seems intent on keeping her there.

Angels of Death was original an RPG-Maker game, and it shows in the way the show gives its clues. It feels very much like the player avatar reading descriptions of things they found, or being jumpscared. That was a nice nod to the original format.

I discussed this with a friend who was more familiar with the original game, and she pointed out that the original had you warm up to Danny before he turned on you. You were to believe that he was lost, just like Rachel, so his identity as a Floor Master came as a complete surprise. But here it’s so obvious that there’s something off with him that it’s an insult to our intelligence. Even taken into account that Rachel is scared and in an unfamiliar environment, she wouldn’t be wholeheartedly trusting of someone who acts like that. I’m not sure if this is to rush the intro, but it just resulted in lost believability instead. It really seems that the episode was trying really hard to end on the ‘please kill me’ titular line, and throwing all pacing to the wind. Instead of informative or thrilling, it felt really rushed and sloppy. Unfortunate.

Altogether, it’s a slow and disappointing start. While I’m not dismissing the show as a whole just yet, I’m also very apprehensive, considering anime adaptations of RPGmaker-type games have never been particularly good. Looking at you, Corpse Party and Ao Oni.