ANIME REVIEW: DARLING IN THE FRANXX PART 2

Darling in the Franxx Part 2
Released By: Manga Entertainment
Rating: 12
Running Time: 300 mins
Release Date: 22/7/2019
Reviewed By: Sandra Scholes

Warning: This review comes with spoilers.

While part one showed us the characters and set up the story, here we get Hiro's back story of when he met Zero-Two when he was much younger. We see what life was like for them back at the Garden and is more of a reveal of who Zero-Two was before she teamed up with Hiro to become a pilot.

The Garden is a dystopian place disguised as being helpful toward humanity. The children are kept in the facility against their will, constantly being tested mentally and physically; they are injected but not told why. The injections as some of the children find out up their intelligence so they can score well in tests, making them more likely to be taken on as pilots. The children, even though they hate their lives in the Garden have hopes of leaving to become assets in the battle against the Klaxosaurs, but Hiro is fearful of some who get tested, leave and never come back.

Hiro decides to give himself a name and name all the other children he has made friends with while there, but the adults who test on them don't like him doing this as it gives them an identity as individuals rather than being a hive mind as they expect. Hiro's friend, Mitsuru wants to become a pilot with him, but he needs injections so he can pass the aptitude tests, or he will fail and, Hiro imagines, never return. As expected, Hiro wonders where they go if they never come back and it is never explained, though one can imagine.

The injections they get are called Elixir Injections that enable them to become the perfect Parasites who can pilot as one man teams, but it is his seeing Zero-Two in the Garden one day that sets fate in motion as he isn't supposed to see her or what experiments they are performing on her.

For an origin story, this is the sort of reveal that makes us realise our own humanity; as Zero-Two starts out life as a demon girl with red skin, claws and horns as well as a lower designation that makes her almost animalistic, (which many still see her as) despite the fact she has undergone changes to make her look more human, though her horns still remain. Funny how her designation of Zero-One also means oni or demon in Japanese. Hiro sees she is in pain when they experiment on her, and regardless of how she looks,  he breaks her out of the Garden, thinking he can find a better life outside. Hiro would be wrong as it isn't long before they are captured and dragged back to the Garden.

With Yuto Uemura, Haruka Tomatsu and Kana Ichinose as voice actors, the emotions and feelings generated in the anime leave us pondering on the moral implications of what the future would be like with this kind of forced incarceration, raising children to fight. The extra special part of the series is Hiro's darling changing to become human in order to be with him, but being with her can cause him consequences, as his friends and co-pilots remind him, if he stays with her for a long period of time, he can lose his humanity. Hiro sees the human in her, rather than the beast, but what this anime is trying to say is no matter how much Zero-Two wants to be seen as human, she will be the monster inside.



Bonus Material: None.

Summary: This is a mecha/sci-fi action anime that has you wondering about who to trust in a brave new world.