Hello.

Welcome to our We Bear yet in exploration and education and anime. I'm your anime idiot, patrick dugan.

I'm an anime expert, dana hollander.

And I'm brenda mccullough. Your anime smooth skin.

A smooth skin. You got some caps for me?

We don't take kindly to your kind down here, but we'll take those caps.

Don't know what's going on.

It's for the best anyway.

It's the only kind of ghouls I know from Fallout.

Okay. I heard caps and I figured but.

Yeah, anyway and it was a reference Brendan made that I immediately latched onto, of course, rather than the intro going, ha, I wonder what that mean. And the only one on the not.

From the 70s or 80s got to reference something for someone else sometimes. I'll get you in another of them.

Thanks, Brendan.

We'll all take there. Anyway, here's a hint. Just reference another anime. I won't know it, but I also.

Might not know it.

Yeah, fair.

So, yeah, what's up for today?

How are you? I'm doing great. So we're going to have a little bit of spookiness today, a little bit of Halloween in July, and we're going to watch the first three episodes. Halloween of Tokyo Ghoul.

That's a show I heard the night.

Like I said last time, this is one of those shows that I started and never finished, despite enjoying it for some reason. And I think I'll talk about why after we watch it. But Brendan, do you have any experience with it?

I know of it. I've seen a lot of fan art and characters and stuff. It seems to be a very popular show. So going to convention stuff, you'll see a lot of cosplay.

It was very popular when it came out.

Yeah, I think it's about zombies and or ghouls and that's about all I got.

Great.

I think it came out during, like, the Walking Dead flood, so it's kind of like more zombies and I didn't give it a shot.

Yeah, the anime came out 2014. The mango was 2012.

Okay. Yeah. That'd be like peak Walking Dead.

Yeah. So this is more recent than I thought. I think I'm thinking of something else. When I thought this was popular when I was in like, 8th grade in 2008. So that's not the case because it did not exist yet.

No, you were thinking of budapest shambles. I don't know another word for ghoul.

Budapest ghosts.

That'd probably be the better. Yeah.

Anyway, probably would have been better.

Budapest banshee. alliteration banshee is an Irish spirit.

It serves a specific purpose. Sorry, I know.

Let's not get into the monster cryptid lore folklore thing.

I mean, the boyfriend handbook.

Yes.

Dreaming with his big eyes. Anyway, we're getting real derail.

Yeah. So shall we get spooked?

Ooh, get that good summer wean tea.

Yeah.

Shall we put this into our brain?

Ooh, spooky, blood and murder.

How do we bring the podcast back in? Let's just scream.

Don't reveal our work for us before.

Just call me off guard.

Creative process. Oh, did you get.

Anyway, he going to hunch. He going to munch into your face.

I have said anyway at least like five times in the last seven minutes.

This is earlier than we normally do.

It's too early for zombie.

Yeah, but let's get started. Let's talk about these episodes.

Let's talk about these ghouls. These very attractive animations are trying to get us to fuck things we shouldn't fuck.

Monster movies taught me that.

Yeah.

You ever seen the Shape of Water?

No.

I still have.

Oh, my god, his butt. Okay.

That'S a different episode.

Creature anime.

We'll find it.

Before I started watching it, I was, like, really excited because I remember liking it a lot. I remember being, like, really haunted by it. So I was like, oh, here we go. I'm excited to get into that mood. So we open on a shot of what I believe is Tokyo.

Potential character. Tokyo.

Tokyo. And we hear a police radio. And they're talking about an intruder alert. And we're shown an aquarium in what I think is an apartment and a sexy lady tossing some bloody people around. That sounds like my Friday night, honey.

Time to park.

And then we hear on the police radio that the suspect is thought to be a ghoul. So we find out right off the bat that this world knows about ghouls. They know about the existence of these things.

It's not a secret, or at least.

Not a good so we cut back to the apartment, and the sexy lady is having her way with these men. And by that I mean she's eating.

Them meat, having your way into their organs.

Delicious. And then some dude comes in and he calls her the binge eater. He says, like, what a mess you've made. No wonder they call you the binge eater. And he's there to fight her. He's been told to take her alive, but that doesn't mean that he won't torture her first. And he's like, I'm going to cut off your limbs, you dumb girl. And she is not afraid because she's got her own tricks of her sleeve.

Although she's not wearing sleeves.

Yeah, I was going to say, I don't even have sleeves. And then he, like, lunges at her. And then there's some crazy spiky shit that comes out of her. And she kind of distracts him by using it to break the aquarium's glass. And she takes his instrument of torture.

They just seem like pliers.

That's what I put down. I put pliers with a question mark.

Yeah.

Yeah. They keep getting treated like these super duper elite weaponry and yeah, it's like bolt cutters.

Yeah. Those view takers are like, what is this strange? I'm like, they're just pliers, man. Have you ever stripped wires?

I've seen them.

Come on.

Yeah, so she takes them and tosses them off the building. And then we get the title screen but no opening, which I was exceedingly disappointed by. I love the opening.

It is a bop. We can address that here where we normally fucking good.

I think it's so good. But that's just me.

I realized I've never seen the show, but I've heard the opening plenty of times from, like, different people covering it or playing it in, like, a party or something. Like, I've heard the opening a lot, and it's, like, solid.

I watched a whole video about the symbolism in the opening and stuff. I love it. Yeah, but so then after the title screen, it's just like a normal, like, fall day. Looks really pretty. There's some yellow leaves. Lovely. And there's a news broadcast reporting a bunch of unidentified men that were found in Tokyo and there was ghoul saliva on them. So this is a ghoul crime.

It's ghoulish.

Ghoul song. So this is all going on in, like, a cute little cafe. And there's a blonde boy laughing at his friend because he wants to take a girl to a bookstore for their first date. And the boy he's laughing at is Kinecki Ken, the main character. And this blonde boy is named He Day. And they are very good friends. And then He Day is like, take her anywhere else. Why take her to a bookstore? And he's like, oh, I could take her to, like, a hamburger place. And he's like, don't do that. Worse. And he's like, okay, well, where would you take her? And he was like, I would take her somewhere, like, I know that she's interested in. And he was like, where have you taken girls on dates before? And he's like, because they're both bad with girls.

Sorry, I can't watch a show about virgin.

Turn it off. If I can tell that these tire virgins I'm out.

I'm out.

I'm dipping.

You only watch Jojo jojo fucks.

And they're also all very tall and very muscular. So they're just dudes guys being dudes, hanging out, teasing each other. And He Day kind of looks around the cafe and he's like, is she here yet? Is it that waitress? And then the waitress comes over to get He Day's order. And he very shamelessly. Is just like, are you single?

Well, he also, like, calls her over. She's taking orders from another table. And he's, excuse me, waitress. And, like, calls her over to then not even, like, flirt, just really?

I didn't know how else?

Give me your number. It's like, whoa, terrible. There's absolutely no subtle detail. Charm.

Yeah. So after that awkward moment chokea, the waitress gets away. The girl comes in. She has purple hair and red glasses. She sure stands out.

Seems like a main character.

She looks like someone we've seen before, at least. Anyway, hide leaves and wishes Kinecki luck. And he kind of kinecki keeps eyeing her. And she takes out a book. And it is a book that he recognizes. Wow. A talking point. They make eye contact.

He's reading.

Yeah. So then we cut to Heday, who's on the street, and he's like, wow, you got so lucky. And Kinecki is on the other end saying, yeah, I can't believe we like the same author. And on the street that He Day is on, it looks like it's a crime scene. Kinecki says, yeah, we're going to go to the bookstore on Sunday, which is sweet. And then after he day rides off on his bike, we get some ghoul info from the police. A little bit of information. They don't do one big info dump in this episode. They kind of do a couple like a couple of smaller ones. So in this one, we hear that ghouls can eat one human body and be able to sustain themselves for one month. But lately there have been these cases of binge eating where ghouls have just eaten a bunch of people at once.

They're getting bored.

Yeah. And then one of the police policemen is like, yeah, if only they'd go after the bad guys.

If only someone got power hungry and started killing off who they saw as bad people, that would be great.

That's never gone wrong before. And then it's date time. They're at a restaurant, and they're talking about books. nerds. nerds. And then Kinecki chokes on his food or something, so he starts coughing. And then the girl whose name is reese, he says, her last name tahiti, but I already know her name is reese, and I can't remember what her last name is. She leans across the table to make sure that he's okay, and then he gets just like a real big what's the word I'm looking for? He can see her titties. He gets a good view of her titties because she's, like, leaning over.

Yeah.

And he's like in his head, he's like, I feel better now. I have a complaint. I watched the first two episodes dubbed, and I liked almost every actor except konecki. He just sounded, like, really pouty all the time.

There were moments in later episodes where he was at his emotional scene, and it sounded good, but then when it was just like everyday sort of talk, like mundane dialogue. Yeah, he sounded kind of it was just weiner.

Yeah. I don't know.

But I mean, he's a Wienery character.

Yeah, he's a big baby.

He's a big baby cry. He does. He's a big cry baby. I forgot about that. Yeah. And then kanaki remarks on the fact that she's not eating, and she's like, oh, I'm actually on a diet. And then she goes to the bathroom to powder her nose.

In La. That means cocaine.

Well, they're not in La. What does it mean in Tokyo?

Wasabi.

Let me just snort some of that.

Good. Really? Just get that one going.

And then got to ride that green dragon.

And then we cut to the evening. The date is over. And they're saying goodbye to each other. And then reese looks kind of nervous and Kinecki's like, oh, you're okay? And she's like, yeah, I'm just kind of worried because all of those binge eating attacks have been in my neighborhood, so I'm scared. Can you walk me home? But it was cuter than that.

I need a small, weak man.

Yeah, just remember, you don't have to be the fastest. You just don't have to be the slowest.

Good point. And the ghouls are always fastest, faster than the slowest person. And then they're walking home. They're walking to her apartment or whatever, and there's just more flirty banter. They're talking more about books and a little bit about he day. And then Kinecki talks about his dead parents, which is so romantic. And then he says, oh, I haven't told anybody this except he day. And she's like, oh, thank you for telling me. Thanks for trusting me.

And then they run in, finding out my dates, and orphan gets me real hot in orphan?

You're an orphan? I'm an orphan. That was a Hamilton reference, but didn't go far. And then they run into Toka. She's in the neighborhood for some reason, and her and Re say acknowledge each other. And then they stop. And Kinecki says that he'd really like to see rise again because he thinks they had a nice time. And then reese says that she's had her eye on him too. And she goes up to him and leans on his chest and she says, I want you as much as you want me. And she bites his shoulder.

Hunch bunch.

Her eyes go black and red and she bites his shoulder because she's a ghoul. Of course she said she was on his foot. And that diet is of human flesh.

I believe that's what Whole 30 is, but I'm not sure.

I don't know what that one is.

I think that's funny.

Anyway, whole 30 is a diet, Brandon, okay?

The diet industry is a sham.

I don't pay attention to it.

Yes, that's fine.

She bites.

She does that. And he's like, oh, no way. No fucking way. Oh, my God, this is happening. Not in a hot way.

First time.

He's very disturbed and she says she wants to rip his organs out. Nothing gets her hotter than when she can rip out a guy's organs. Who's defenseless. To which I say, hot.

Tea? Shame here.

No. So a chase scene ensues. She has some wacky tentacle stuff coming out of her back. It's just like bright red and kind of propelling her forward. And he is booking it from her because he obviously doesn't want to get eaten. And this is where the English voice actor for Kinecki, like, his stuff works because he's horrified.

He's in his prime in these terror filled moments.

And so they're at a construction site, and konecki is backed up against a wall and reese is closing in. But fortunately, some steel beams get cut loose and they fall on both of them. And reese oh, before that, reese stabbed konecki and said, like, oh, you died. But I don't know if that's actually true. But reese's dead now. Rip.

I think he's just like passing out from like blood loss and stuff.

Yeah. So then konecki is in a dream state and he hears doctors around him talking about how he needs a transplant, how his abdominal area is just like all fucked up and he's like, swimming away. He's like in a he's in a body of water and he's swimming away. And then reese comes up behind him and drags him back down. And he wakes up and one of his eyes is a ghoul eye because.

The doctors were also talking in that dream state about how the transplants are coming from her.

Yay.

Well, she's not using these anymore. Might as well throw them at him.

If she was an organ donor, fair game. He also had no kin to sign off his transplant, which sucks.

Convenient.

Yeah. So then he's shown trying to eat, but he can't do it. He says like, I just can't. Like, this tastes awful to me. And then the doctor comes to talk to him and he says, the nurses say you haven't been eating anything, but you seem fine. And Kinecki says, no matter what I do, it just tastes like garbage to me. And the doctor says that it's probably psychological trauma because he's been through a big thing. He's probably just readjusting and then he's out. He says he feels totally different. He says he feels like whatever happened with reese was a dream. It didn't feel real. He gets home and finds that he day has brought him a bag of a bunch of food that he likes, which is very nice. He day's a good friend and he doesn't want to eat it because he knows that he won't like it. And then he's watching a newscast where it's like a press conference talking to some people about ghouls. So we get more ghoul information here. Ghouls don't eat human food because it's not nutritious for them. In fact, it could be detrimental to their health. So because of that, it tastes terrible to them. So Kanecki is like, having a moment. He's having a revelation. He goes and tries to eat the food that he day brought for him. And everything he eats, he just vomits it up because it tastes so terrible. And this is the part that I.

Including his favorite hamburgers.

This is the part that I remember so vividly because just the first time I watched it, I remember thinking, like, I was so sad. I was like, how terrifying must that be to suddenly be this monstrosity. And like that single tear rolling down his cheek. And he just says, this can't be happening. It just it gets me. I don't know why, but yeah, I know.

It's like a big moment the whole time. I was just like, you can shut the door. You're letting the cold out of the fridge. He's so immensely distracted. I'm like, yeah, he's transforming. Yeah, whatever. That fridge has been open. Closed the fridge way too long. Close the fridge.

He's incompetent.

I know you're a monster, but don't be a monster.

So He Day has been calling him, but he's not answering. And He Day is with some dude that says, oh, he's not answering your phone calls. You should just fucking cut ties with him. Fuck that guy. And He Day is like, no, get.

Out of the hospital.

I'm not going to do that.

My boy just went through life or death situation. I'll give him more than a few days.

Yeah. And He Day leaves Kinecki a message about the author that he likes is having a book signing, so he should go to it. So Kinecki decides to try. He goes out. He's wearing a hoodie because for some reason, he thinks that'll help. But he misses it. He missed the book signing. shucks.

Not darn.

And then as he's walking home, his stomach growls and he is hungry. And he just fucking loses his mind. His mind is going absolutely apesit. He wants flesh.

Sees all real bad. hasty morsels wants food everywhere.

It's a buffet. He runs home and looks in the mirror and he sees his ghoul eye and re say behind him. And he punches his reflection because he's like, fuck that bitch. No. And that's when he remembers the doctors saying the thing about the organs, how they're going to be coming from resay. And he remembers also that ghouls can't be hurt by knives. I forget. I don't know where we hear that. But he tries to stab himself and it doesn't work. The boy's a ghoul now. dang it. And so Beans, he's out on the town, hungry for flesh. He smells something tasty and follows his nose. It is not Fruit loops.

He can't say it. What are you doing here? Are you eating a body?

It's another ghoul.

I have to get my face.

It's another ghoul feeding. And he introduces himself and he says, I haven't eaten in a really long time, so I can't really share. But like, do you want this? And then he's cut off by a guy that just comes and fucking kills him.

Kicks his head off.

His head off and says that these are his feeding grounds. And he thinks that konecki is there to hunt. And Kinecki is like, I'm not super not. I'm so sorry. Please make and he's holding him by the throat. And he compares the situation to walking in on his girl fucking somebody else. And the guy being like, I didn't do it. Which I think is a bit much.

He kills someone. I think this guy's a bit extra.

Yeah. And then toka swoops in and she says, these aren't your feeding grounds, dude. Get the fuck out of here. And she's played by the same woman that plays cl, phantom hive and Black Butler in the English dub. And I can't unhear it. It's all she sounds like to me.

Both shows have eyepatches.

Yeah. So Toka and this guy are kind of just insulting each other, and then they fight, and she runs at him. And then he says, Is that all you have Toka? And she says, Wait for it. And then just, like, a bunch of cuts show up on his legs. And I was like, that's raw as fuck. I love you.

Also, another Hamilton reference.

Oh, yeah. So she offers konecki a hand. She offers him the arm of the corpse because she's like, you're obviously hungry. You have to eat. And he doesn't want to take it. And then the theme song starts playing, and konecki is having a breakdown. And he's like, no, I'm human. If I eat that, I won't be human anymore. But I'm human. I'm human. I swear I can't do this. And that's when she realizes that he was the one that was with resay when she died. And he like, this is another minute and moment where I think this might be why I like the theme song so much too. It's just like, the music going along with Kinecki's breakdown is like magic. I love it.

It's so good.

And he says he doesn't want to hurt anyone. He's like, I could never hurt a fly, and now I have to kill people to eat. I can't do this. And she just gets tired of this, and she runs up to him and puts some flesh in his mouth. And that's the end of episode one. A lot of information. Yeah, a lot of stuff happens. His life has forever changed.

And then we did a brief little scene at the end of the credits. Did you guys sit through that?

No.

Yeah, it was interesting.

It was just, like, a quick summary of, like, hey, remember that Ghoul that was killed right away that offered kanoki what's his name?

Konecki.

What? konecki, the guy that offered Kinecki food to get here's his life. He's a yoga instructor. He would do this, and then he went to this, and then he couldn't eat for a while, and then he went crazy and ate. Someone did it, but I thought it was, like, a cool little, like, summary of, like, hey, that wasn't just like, here's what that character was. So you're not wondering?

Yeah. Interesting.

And I think every episode has a little scene after the credits, a little Marvel movie esque.

I didn't sit through any of them. I'm a bad anime expert.

So then we get episode two, and togo force feeds a konecki part of the corpse, and he tries to make himself puke, and he's trying to reach his hand downs through, but he can't. So she just starts to beat him up a little bit because that's what you do when someone's going through a traumatic experience. Just throw them around an alleyway and asking if she's a monster. What is he kind of saying? Like, if you hate being a goal so much, then, like, what am I? Or what are you? Sort of thing. And she says, basically saying, at least you've got to be human. I've always been a goal, and it's always fucking sucked ass. So you got to enjoy eating cake and being, like, care free and stuff for a while. But we never had that. Most schools don't. And then she throws the severed head of the guy that was killed earlier at him, and he starts freaking out again. Kind of remembering like, yeah, there's a body in this alleyway still.

Oh, shit. We are at a murder scene.

There's so much blood, it just became the paint. And then we get the opening, and there's the first real opening, but it's the music again. And yes, solid bop.

Solid fucking it's.

So get a lot of my Chemical Romance eyes from it.

Hell, yeah.

Then we get Kinecki scene of Kinecki in his room kind of looking at a package. And then we get a flashback to them back in the alleyway with toga. And she says, he's not a goal and he's not a human. Like, she can tell who is and who isn't a goal. He's like, you sure is not a human with that eye, so I don't know what you are. And then this old man shows up in this, like, butler outfit, and he says, Come on, let's take him in. And she's like, what are you talking about? We can't take him in? And he says, it's our policy to help fill the ghouls in their time of need. So he's kind of like a gold caretaker, sort of wise old figurehead character. And he brings him into this coffee shop he runs. And we find out the coffee shop is named the same thing as the organization Otangu.

I didn't write it down. Something like that.

Say Otangu. Turns out it was the coffee shop they were in earlier in the first episode. But it's that this is the group that was dividing up territory after riza was killed. So find out this old guy is a ghoul and that kanaki is really scared to try his coffee because all the human food he's had so far has made him throw up. And he's disgusted. But once he tries it, he finds out he's able to drink it because for some reason, ghouls can drink coffee.

Sure.

I hope swanky and pretentious the only.

Reason I hope they explain it later in the series. They don't explain the episodes we watched. And it'd be really dumb if they're just like, yeah, they can only drink coffee. And that's the only humid. It's like why?

I mean, I'll be real with you. I think that's it. I think it's just a thing that doesn't just because they barely need to be questioned.

I question it.

All right.

If they don't explain it, then thank you. If they don't explain it, that will annoy me. So after he drinks the coffee, he starts crying again because that's what he does best. And the old man says he gives Kinecki like an envelope. And he's saying this will help you with your cravings. Like if you start having a craving again, open this up and come back when he needs more. So the old man is trying to help him out. And he tells toga after Connecting lease, he tells toga that he had his organs replaced with rez. And that's why he's like becoming a ghoul and that it was a big news story. So that's why he caught his attention. And this isn't something that normally happens. So and then back home, connectees started getting a craving again. And he's hallucinating and seeing reza again because he's got his organs in her. And that's what happens if you're an organ donor. Imagine that'd be so much more traumatic. Organ donor. Yeah, you see hallucine, hallucinations of a past life.

I got that info for you if you want.

Please go ahead.

There's no reason.

God damn it.

They can drink they can drink coffee and water, but they can't digest human food because it's like bad for their body. But someone says on this reddit thing, says, my guess, there's something in coffee beans that enable allows ghouls to digest it.

That bothers me.

They can eat it because they can eat it.

That's what I mean. Why is this the only thing, the Internet, whatever.

I don't know.

They spend so much time focusing on that they can't eat human food. But that coffee is good.

It's something that connects some ghouls to humans. I don't know.

It just bothers me. Anyway, Kinecki goes home and he's about to open the package because he's getting the cravings and he's freaking out trying to resist it. And that's when the head of his friend he day. I didn't write it down for most of the episode. I didn't realize it was nameless. And when he gets the next patches, he's able to kind of snap himself out of it. And he decides the next day he's going to go out and try and get some fresh air. And now he's wearing his eyepatch because he can't control when his ghoul eye is activated. So he's just wearing it just to be safe. We see his friend, his special eye, my friend. We see his friends behind him in the distance. And we see him just running up to him. But we see him like you hear him the whole time as he's running. It's just like as he's running on. I really enjoyed that. And he hugs Kinecki and wraps his arm around him. He's like, oh, whatever. You've been like, I've been trying to get in contact with you. And we. Get, like, a flashback of them as kids and, you know, them meeting and, you know, been childhood friends for a long time, since childhood. conveniently. And his friend said he weird how that works. His friend said he's got he's out on an errand, and he's got to run over to nishi. nishi, goddamn. I wrote all these names down, but I can't read them for the life of me. nishio, if you spelled it, I could.

I didn't write it down.

It doesn't matter. Niche.

Just call him Niche.

Niche. He's an upperclassman, and he's got to run an errand for him. So he's like, yeah, you can tag along. It'll be real quick. So when he goes there, he's like, oh, yeah, just grab some data or whatever for a class. Turns out they're all in college. My default mentality is all anime is high school, so it's good to find out they're in college and not just, like, 14, living by himself again.

Oh, thank God.

He's like, yeah, I'll just grab some data from Niche, and we'll be good to go. And as they walk in, he's with a girl, and the girl gets all embarrassed and runs out. And while they're walking, his friend saying, like, oh, yeah, you look kind of sick. You should eat more. Kind of showing that his friend is pretty perceptive and can notice things. foreshadowing ish. So they walk in on nishi. The girl freaks out and runs out, and he's like, oh, God damn it. You shouldn't knock. You can't just come into my territory and not tell not expect me to know about it. It's kind of like, where have we heard that before? And niece, she turns around, and, oh, it's the guy from the other night who tried to kill ko nicki. Weird awkward.

Am I right?

And basically, they lock eyes and just like, oh, it's you. And they kind of remember each other, but they don't do it in front of their friend. So he's like, oh, yeah, that data. I got it's at my house. It's not here at school, so we got to go to my house and get it. And Konaki's friends like, oh, yeah, we'll just get it, and don't worry about it. We can hang out some other time. konaki is like, no, I'll go. I'll go along too. It'll be good to get out of here and see some more of the town I haven't seen for a while. And konaki starts wondering if there's more ghouls around him lately or if he's just noticing it now. Because when they're in that office, he notices that nishi had a bunch of coffee all over the place. So it's kind of like people who drink coffee are ghouls. They don't just drink coffee because they're college students and need to work along hours.

They must be monsters.

Must be.

That's the only explanation I have for people who drink black coffee.

I don't drink coffee at all.

Look who's cool.

I'm sorry. I don't like black coffee.

So as they're going to Nishi's house, they get some food on the way. They get the little I forget the names. Note the little fish cakes with like red bean paste in it. They're in all the animals.

I forget what they're called. Yeah, I want one though.

They look tasty. So they all start eating it.

So tasty.

And Kinecki is like, oh, I can't eat this. It's like human food. It's going to gross me out. And it's like, but what about nishi? nishi just bite into it. It's like, oh, that's pretty good. It's like, he can eat it. Why can he eat it? And they keep walking. And as they turn a corner into like an overpass or like an alleyway or like a tunnel or something. And those are like underground parking structure. All yes. They turn a corner and nissi just straight up pawns. He day, like down the alley and just into the darkness. And he's like, all right, enough of him. And nishi just turns and attacks kanaki and says it's like, oh, you were going to eat him, weren't you? You're friends for so long. You're going to take his trust and betray him at the last second. That always makes it more, like tasty. That makes the meal so much more scrumptious. That's what you're going to do. Why isn't it?

Why isn't it?

It starts like wailing into Kinecki. And Kineck is just like, no, he's my friend. I wouldn't have done that to him. We're childhood friends. And he should just punches kineti through the chest, like fucking kung pao style. It just blows a hold of his chest. And he's like, oh, yeah, he's still functioning after that. And as he approaches he day, he reaches into his mouth and pulls out the food he ate from Roy. And he's like, oh, god, disgusting. I couldn't have kept and by pulls.

Out the food he ate, you mean he vomits?

I thought he literally reached into his mouth and pulled it out.

Yeah, he does reach into.

I thought he threw up on him because in the English dub I mean, it's not that important. In the English dub, he does it. And then he says, like, oh, look, I ruined your meal. So I thought that he like, barfed on he day.

I took that as like he was stepping on hide. And he day starts bleeding from being kicked. So I thought it was that it'd be a lot grosser to throw up on them.

Yeah.

So Niche is kicking he day and kind of taunting kanaki, toying with him because he knows he's much more powerful. As we get, Nishi's weird blue tentacle thing comes, like, wrapping around his leg. And it's about to kill Heday. So he's got the same thing reze had, but it's blue and on his leg. Yeah. And before he does nasty, more childhood flashbacks of like, the very first time they met, and it was like, oh, boy, I'm heating. I'm going to be your friend. I don't know anyone else. And that old stick. And when we come back from the flashback, through the power of friendship and zombies, kinecki is able to form his own tentacle. bullshit, like, explodes out of his back, and he attacks Niche and just lays into him and just starts, like, pummeling them into the ceiling. And it's just stabbing him with his tentacles over and over again through his entire torso. And we just see Niche getting, like, launched into, like they're like, bars on a window, like jail bars or like a sewer grade or something. But he just gets lodged into it and stuck there. You see the skin peeling off of his face, and he just gets fucked up. And I don't know if he dies from this. I think we hear about him later. He doesn't. Okay. But we just see his body dangling there and just blood everywhere. So it's just kind of like it wouldn't be surprising if he did die.

Those tentacle things, I don't know what it means, but they're called cognay.

Yeah, I ended up writing that in.

There called I don't know Why.

Yeah, kaganae. And apparently all the ghouls have this. And after he fights them, he starts trying to resist the urge to eat. He day himself. He's, like, struggling with himself again. And he's running around. You see all the blood in the entire parking structure. And toga shows up before he can really get the munch on. And she says, I like this because she says, I don't care if you eat your friend, but I'm really going to guilt trip you here for a solid, like, five minutes to try and stop you from eating your friends. Well, if you didn't care, you wouldn't have said anything. And as he's trying to resist eating, he's getting more aggressive. And he's like, I'll fight you for him. Don't you come near him. And she's like, oh, you want to go scrub? You want to lay down? Okay.

And we need a beating.

You got to learn your place, son. And we see her, like, kagana kind of coming out too, and she's kind of going into her goal mode. And then I forget his name all the time, connects up. His first name is Ken main character. I've said it like, 14 times, and now I forget it for some reason. How to pronounce it.

You say it differently every time.

Too I know. It's not good. This is why I give people nicknames. connecti wakes up, and the old man's like, coffee shop, and he's fine. Any of his scratches are cleaned up, and he's not, like, feral anymore. He doesn't have the craving. And the old man, like, talks to him for a bit and shows like, oh, yeah, he's bandaged up in this other room. He's resting right now, so he's safe don't worry about him. He's owner. He's like, how did you calm me down? What did you do? So I can know how to do it before old guys just basically like, blood is the only thing man, hate to tell you, but blood is the only thing that calms down ghoul. So we put some blood in your mouth while you're asleep. It's weird, but go with it. Sure. And Kennequi starts crying again because it's what he does best. Just niagara Falls. He's useless. He's wondering, like, I'm a half breed. I'm not human. I'm not ghoul. I'm not either. What do I do? And the old man's like, no, you're a half breed, so you technically belong in both worlds. You can fit into either as long as you control your urges and stuff. So as they're talking, we get a shot of toga in her room, and she's all bandaged up, and there's a butterfly in there. For some reason.

The window must have been open.

Yeah. Okay. He's talking about how toby helped him and dragged him and hida back and stuff. So they leave, and we see hida was awake the whole time. He was listening to their whole conversation about his best friend being a ghoul. And then we get a cut to two guys on top of building looking over the rainy city. They're talking about the binge eater and Jason, which is the guy we saw earlier because he's wearing a Jason mask. And they said there are two S rated subjects in the area, and shit is going down in this area. And then we see one of the guys is, like, an older, kind of crazy, scientist looking guy, and he smells the pliers. He goes running over and finds the pliers from the first episode that were tossed aside, and it looked like he was able to smell them or sense them somehow. He didn't see it. And it seems like they're kind of the anti ghoul squad. And that's it. And we get the ending. And then after the credits, we get a little scene of Kenecky, or is nishi talking, saying, like, the human food he ate earlier tastes like horseshit. And then we get a shot of Kentucky telling everyone. We're like, Why? Do you know what horseshit tastes like? And you see what spring to everyone else be like, nishi eats horseshit. Pass it on. And everyone starts teasing. Yeah. So it was a little fun little scene instead of, like, an info dump.

So they changed the mood after all this murder?

Yeah. After all this blood.

That's what the aftercredit scenes are for.

Yeah, just the little palette cleanser, more depressing stuff.

More light hearted murder.

So getting to the depressing stuff, we have episode three. We see a mysterious man shaking down a doctor for another what's it he says pliers.

They're pliers.

Yeah, pliers. So, yeah, he gives more pliers to them. It's the guy we saw in that first scene in episode one.

Jesus.

Mysterious stranger. And we see behind a curtain in the doctor's room, there's a woman and a child hiding, trying not to get eight. Don't tell them. Back at the cafe. Back at the cafe. yoshimura, who's the butler dude? I will now call Alfred throughout the rest.

Perfect.

Wait, do we actually ever learn the name or was I just not paying attention?

You had my attention.

Okay, well, I had my subtitles on, so they had the character's name basically for every line of dialogue, which was very helpful because I forgot their name.

Interesting. Does that make kinecki, Batman? This is just fucking the Black Butler episode.

It's always Black Butler. This is why you liked it so much.

All anime is Black Butler is that man. Okay, so he's teaching him how to make coffee. He agrees to, like, help work at the cafe to be among the ghouls and sort of get the hang of this. And Alfred warns him that being in the cafe is tricky because it is open to humans. So you got to not just let your ghoul flag fly while you're there and keep it under wraps because you never know when a human is going to be in there because they got to deal with them in real life.

To be fair.

Tday is in the cafe. He's thanking toka okay. Thanks her for saving them or finding them in the back alley when they were attacked. Wink, wink. Nothing bad happened. Just some friendly mugging. Am I right?

Friendly muggy. Hey, give me your water. I'll hug the shit out of you.

So she plays it off. And Toka tells Kinecki that he can't let he day know that he's a ghoul or she will be forced to kill him on the spot because can't let that info get out.

But he already knows dun dun dun drama.

So the woman in the doctor's office, rioco, comes in looking for Alfred because they need help. They need someone to take care of them since the doctor is being shaken down by mystery man. I had his name because I had.

The subtitles on yamori.

Yamori?

Yeah.

I can't remember if that was established beforehand.

Yeah, the doctor calls him yamori, but then the inspector guys from the last episode just called him Jason because he wore the Jason hockey mask. Got you.

Okay. Yeah. Because some characters will get to it. They just give us the name when they're supposed to be a mystery. So I'm like, I don't know what is what. So I'm playing it safe for plot reasons. It's rioco, and I believe her daughter named where he yeah. hinami. They are going to be staying at the cafe for a little bit. And Toko warns Kanecki to beware the people with briefcases, the doves as they're known, which are the Ghoul squad.

Ghoul Squad.

The aforementioned ghoul squad.

That sounds like a scoobydoo movie. There's the ghoul school. That's different.

Ghoul Squad is the sequel to the very bad movie Monster Squad.

How dare you? It is a bad movie.

I have not seen it. Anyway, so we go to the government headquarters as they're being briefed to all these investigators about the extra activity in District 20, and we see a hot, chuck young detective that we saw on the roof with crazy man earlier. This is aman, and the crazy man is matto. They are partners, and they are out on the hunt for ghouls.

And those subtitles really help with the character names.

So basically, they're out assigned to the 20th Ward to investigate these pliers that were found and all the binge eating murdery stuff. So konecki tries eating again with Alfred, and Alfred teaches him how to fake it. Basically, just swallow it whole, pretend you're chewing, and throw it up later before you get sick from digesting it. bulimia great habits to teach. Now he can sort of hang out with heat a and pretend to be a normal person again.

Hello, fellow human. I am also human. How do you do?

I would like to eat your human food.

I need sugar water.

Yeah. Because Alfred gives him some quote unquote sugar cubes to put in his coffee that will help his appetite. And when Kanecki asks what they are, he's like, don't worry about it. You.

Don'T know. You don't want to know.

So based on the credits, it's horseshit. So in turn, for all this help, alfred assigns him to go food shopping. And Kinecki is freaking out, like, oh, I can't murdered. I can't be a killing boy. Yeah, but alfred's like, hey, shut up and just go it's not that.

Calm down, nerd.

So he goes with someone named yomo, who's another ghoul, and they go out to a rural mountainside cliff road. They pull up to another car, and konecki, of course, leans against the guardrail got it. And falls over. And he's going ghoul.

It really is.

He stops his fall, but he sees a body at the bottom of the cliff. So the way they can get human bodies without killing people is finding people who have killed themselves on this cliff and will eat those bodies. So just some super sweet pleasant, just.

Not grim at all lovely.

It makes more sense than all the vampire stories of, like, we drink cow blood, but if you have a weird niche diet of just humans, I don't know if cow is a substitute.

Yeah, it's still some icky stuff.

Oh, it's icky, that's for sure.

Anyways, so basically throughout this, we get several shots of the detectives basically shaking down ghouls. It's basically the same every time, so I'll just say it happened several times. They say, hey, what are these pliers? Let me beat you up and hurt you, fucking idiot.

I don't know.

For being a ghoul.

Yeah.

So going back to the cafe, Alfred says, hey, you should get a mask. So toko take him to Utah, who will make you a mask.

It's that kind of secret society wink.

Scandalous.

We're swingers here, kid.

All ghouls are swingers.

We can only humans. And also, please put your keys in the switch. So they go to a mask shop where Utah my favorite character, hanging out under a sheet, just waiting to spook someone who comes in love.

It just the single scene and just the scenery in his shop. I'm just like, I already love this character. Like, he's already the best character in this show so far.

This would also be my favorite part of being a Ghoul, getting a customized mask.

Hell yeah. I'm in it for the accessories.

Make me a ghoul. I want the cool stuff.

You get these crazy powers and you are super strong, and you can defy death. Yeah. Costume.

Tell me about that mask, though.

What's the cosplay situation here?

Yeah, Utah is asking him all these questions, trying to figure out his personality to make him a mask. And while they're chatting, he's also talking about Toko, trying to figure out her deal. And Utah is like, yeah, she loves humans. She's trying really hard to fit in, but she can't get too close. So that's why she's kind of standoffish, because it sucks being a ghoul. strangely weird. On their way back, Kinecki and Toko are talking about hinami and sort of how she's also having a rough time because she's just a little Babuy kid. She's got to eat these people. So Kinecki goes to check in on her and she's monching away on a person. And just seeing a little kid do it makes him freak the fuck out. Even though this is like the 15th corpse he's seen this in this past two days.

Well, it's not even a full corpse. It's just a slice of red blue. Yeah, but once again, like you said, it's like you've seen this plenty of times. You've eaten meat already.

Yeah. It's not like you lived vegan until you became a guest burger.

Yeah.

So he freaks out, leaves, and was like, hey, that's not cool. I do that too, now. So he brings back a cup of coffee and they start chatting and learns that they like the same author. So he's helping her learn some words that she doesn't know and decides that since she can't go to school and she's learning just from reading, he will take it up to teach her some new words every day. And it's a cute little moment, little ghoulish friendship.

Honestly, with this moment, like, I wasn't freaked out with her eating a piece of, like, bloody meat that was probably human, but it was more like she's too young to be drinking coffee.

I had the same thought.

If they could drink water. Why don't you just bring her water?

Yeah, just crazy.

Water it down. Make a decalf. Don't get her hook.

That young frappuccino has milk. Milk would probably kill milk.

Disgusting.

Human milk.

Food. I hate milk.

Oh, God. What if they just use human milk anyway?

Hey, there's a whole new line of dairy products on the market now.

Stop it.

We call it ape milk swarm.

No.

We see another dove attack. They followed the people they were attacking earlier to attack more people and get more info on the pliers. And then last shot, we see a mysterious stranger walk into the cafe and that's where it ends. But I got his name because we had subtitles. This is Sukiyama, who he's played by.

J. Michael tatum in the English dub who plays Sebastian in the English dub of Black Butler tiein. He's one of my favorites. I love him. I think he does such a good job with whatever voice he does. He always has the same he's like he's ida and kyo ya. Like, he always plays those characters, but he also like he's so like, oh, my God, I love his voice.

He can put on the chart when he needs to.

Yes, exactly. Anyway, how are we feeling?

That's our show.

That's the show.

Are we there yet?

I enjoyed my time with this. I think my favorite aspect was just their sort of world building of this ghoul society. Because I do like like that the human world is aware of ghouls and they're like, hey, this is just something we have to deal with. Let's just hope we aren't murdered rather than most monster shows going like, it's a secret underbelly. Humans have no idea these ghouls are even there. And then we just get the same trophy, like, oh, we have to hide this from everyone, rather than just don't tell your friend you are a ghoul. They know there are ghouls. They just don't know you are a ghoul.

Yeah. The difference of, like, hiding it from personal relatives and friends and stuff versus hiding it from all of society, they can all of those monsters out there. Yeah, it's a little refreshing because it.

Would have just turned the detective investigation into, like, a regular police procedural of who's doing these grisly murders. Weird. It's a serial killer. But yeah, it's nice that they don't do that. It's nice that we get to see that there's, like, beyond just the murderous people. We see the civilized ghoul society that are trying to fit in and just live normal lives.

Yeah.

But yeah, I don't know if I would continue because this isn't my typical show and I don't think they've set up enough future plot to keep me hooked because I don't really care about the mysterious stranger with yamori that keeps popping up. I don't really like the police aspect of it. If it was just like, konecki and this, like, cafe trying to fit into society, I would like that more sort of that, like, found family sort of angle. But I feel like it's going to get more hyper violent and policy and just dirty crime anime that isn't really.

My thing for sure versus a clean crime anime.

You know, all those clean crimes heists.

Where you can't leave DNA evidence, everyone.

Wears gloves I was kind of surprised to see it was only or at least the season or the series of it was only twelve episodes because I've heard it's popular and I thought it was still going on. I thought it was like a long running series but I guess there's just more spin off seasons or series with different titles. Like, I think there's Tokyo goal, Alpha.

There's Tokyo goal. Re and Tokyo goal something else. Yeah, but how do you feel about this?

I think I'm in the same boat as dugan. I see where it's going. It's not bad, but I don't know if I'm interested. Like you said, I'd be more interested in the world building of the ghoul society that's trying to hide from it versus like there's murder afoot and there's Jason. It's like, yeah, they're probably going to fight him in like episode ten. The battle is probably going to drag on in episode eleven and it's all resolved by twelve and the friends he day ends up hiding, ends up telling everyone like, yeah, I know his secret. And they're like, we got to kill him. It's like we can't. And then he ends up being a member of the secret society anyway, but he's like the one cool human. It might be because I just watched all the Gifted, which is about X Men and mutants and it's a very similar comparison so I think I can just see where the plot is going and it's like, it's fine, but I don't think I'll keep up with it.

So I kind of want to finish watching the first season now just because I don't know, I like it, so I'm interested in seeing how it finishes because I never did. But here's the thing about the other two seasons I have heard nothing but absolutely terrible things about them saying that's.

Another reason I'm not interested.

Yeah, I don't read manga, but I don't know this is a world I'm super interested in and alternative to. The other two seasons, I've heard nothing but amazing things about the manga. So I don't know, I probably wouldn't end up reading it. But it's one that I'd be interested in trying just because, I don't know, I'm into it. I think it seems interesting and I don't know, I like Crime and mysteries and blood. Yes, blood.

Blood. That's interesting. It might be kind of like we would talk about with one piece where the anime needs to fill time so it kind of goes off and does its own things. Whereas the manga is all canon and the quotes true story. But if you want to keep reading it, it's on. Shown in Jump, which is only $3 a month with the online pass hashtag not sponsored, but we could be. I use it. It's a very convenient service.

You get all the but, yeah, that theme song, though. I would watch the rest of this just to hear the theme song every day, which I can do anyway.

I was going to say, you don't.

Have to love it so much.

It's a good bop. I don't think we've had a really.

Good if I didn't make that clear. That's Tokyo ghoul.

Yay.

Glad to have some context.

So, next week, I hope this will be a tonal shift.

Hopefully less blood. I swear to God, if there's this much blood in the next season remember.

Last week about how a bunch of characters can't swim? Well, now we're watching a show where characters can only swim. We're watching a suggestion from Will parsons Free iwatobi Swim Club.

Ooh, get those boys.

Those boys, though.

We're back to our beautiful boy roots.

We're blessed.

Hashtag blessed.

So, yeah, we'll be watching the first three episodes, and if you have a show you would like us to watch, you could reach out and let us know. Arwibariat@gmail.com and on Twitter and Instagram at rwibariat. You can find me on Twitter and Instagram at Mrpatrick dugan.

You can find me on Instagram at queen. Period weebu and on Twitter at queen underscore Weebu and Queen underscore Weebu art.

You can find me at Twitter at aBTS brendan. It stands for Almost Bare to Silence, which is a video game podcast. I have also rate us on whatever platform you listen to. If you can rate us, it will help get the word out on the show. I would say itunes, but it's trash, so don't worry about that one.

Well, you can still do that.

That one's also pretty important still. But, yeah, that does really help. I know you hear it from every little podcast, but it really helps other people find our show. And we want to spread the anime gospel to weebs all over the world.

We want to make everyone a weeb.

We're having a weeb crusade through podcasting.

Ha. And thank you to camille ruley for our artwork. And thank you to Louis zong for our theme song stories off the album Beats. You can find all of louie's music at Louisong bandcamp.com. Thank you, and we hope you'll join us next week as we learn to live with anime.

Look up unraveled. It's the theme song. It's no good.