Overview:

This is quite a confusing one and will contain a bit of spoilers but not really at the same time as this is going to be more clarification about the events so its better understood unless you have read the VN. Its not really meant for an anime only watcher. Watching only the anime odds are you’ll see this as a terribly executed series with good fights throughout as you try to grasp what is going on. Another thing to note is that this is only a single route in anime form and nowhere near the entirety of the Dies Irae VN.

The first prologue episodes, episode 00, starts off where they are in the fall of Berlin. In this scene where the Longinus Dreizehn Orden (LDO) massacre everybody so that the souls can be devoured by Heydrich and his commanders. Heydrich leaves our world to not be seen again for quite a while with Mercurius and the 3 commanders. This first episode (prologue 00) as far as I have read was not supposed to be introduced or known about until about hallway through the VN, post the 2nd route on your third or fourth route. I can see why they would put it first, without it, things would be even more hectic knowing even less then what’s not given already. This could have been rectified by a different approach to adapting the source VN into anime format.

As for why they would devour their souls, it goes back to something that is covered in the anime and that is Heydrich is friends with Krafft and is introduced into sorcery and a curse of Déjà vu. There are 4 tiers to the power he has obtained. To make this as simple as possible the power the main characters have is only capable of growing stronger by collecting more souls. The more souls you have the higher level of ascension through the 4 tiers one cans become.

Their power Ewigkeit is what makes the LDO into what they are shown to be in the anime and was a cut scene. Yeah just another thing to make things that are confusing even more confusing. How they gained their powers is never explained. Without this power they would just be ordinary humans afaik. With the power though they are capable of quite incredible feats given they collect enough souls to make themselves strong enough. To obtain the power a Holy Relic is bound to the persons soul which can then be used as their weapon. To reiterate, the person binds a holy relic to their soul and needs to collect other souls to be capable of powering themselves up to higher levels in the 4-tier system they have with all LDO being minimum of 2nd tier. How a Holy Relic can be formed is went over in the anime. The first tier is very basic, and I don’t believe is able to solidify their Holy Relic into physical form. The second stage however can do so.

To briefly go over each tier, the first tier Assiah, the person the user will have slight powers such as invisible slashes (shown in anime) and the body becomes more resilient and can eventually be upgraded to a point where a power difference of a certain amount will nullify damage incoming unless the other fighter is on par or greater than their own.

Second level the Holy Relic can become physical and used outbound from the persons body in physical form, each person will have a varied and different version, does not state if 2 can be the same but I would assume not, there will probably always have a slight variation. Along with that the person can not be killed through regular means, meaning that if a person’s heart or lungs are slashed it does not kill them. They will also not age from the moment they obtain this tier physically, but the soul continues to age.

Third tier will allow for the user to create and make their true desire become a reality. This can either be an inward or outward desire. An outward desire will affect the things around them while and inward desire affects the person themselves and not outward surroundings.

The fourth tier is when the person Transends the third dimension and are not bound by it. Their own reality is what becomes over righting the existing reality laid down on the universe. An example of this would be one of the characters capable of bypassing a concept of speed so that no matter what he will always be faster than the opponent. The person is considered 4th dimensional and is a low tier god to put it simply. Dimensional scaling is way to complex to go over in this review so would encourage those who do not understand to research it. In this tier though that person’s reality is what reality becomes since they are not bound by the 3rd dimensions boundaries anymore. This tier of power however is not obtainable by anybody and is a birth given right.

That is just a brief overview of the powers at play in the series there is a lot more to it but it’s time to get back over to the main story. Ren is the main character who just got out of the hospital. Nearly immediately after he gets out he is chosen by the LDO, the ones who stayed in this world not leaving it, to be the opponent that they would fight. There is backstory given about Ren and his PTSD. The LDO’s goal is to open up the 8 swastikas inside of the city Suwahara. To open up these swastikas there has to be a condition met. One condition being fighting a battle at the designated spot. The other being mass sacrifice/massacre at said location. Once the 8 are opened up Heydrich can return at which point Rens role the LDO placed on him can be accomplished. The goal is to have Ren be the opponent to Hendrich.

Throughout the main 11 episodes we are more focused on the first 5 swastikas with flashbacks and characters thrown in left and right some staying others disappearing. It gives a lot of context, but the amount given is still abysmal due to this not being the first route. There is too much that would need to be known beforehand to properly understand and enjoy the route they animated.

In the OVAs are 6 episodes long and go over the remainder of the route where the remaining swastikas are opened, and the final fight begins between Ren and Heydrich.

Visuals/Music:

The animation has a good amount of detail and does a good job capturing the dark feel it set out to do. Some parts could use a bit of polished but overall its very good.

The sound affects at times are a bit out of place imo but that’s a minor complaint and things felt as they should have. The background music and the entire OST in general I found to be quote enjoyable throughout my time completing the series. They did a good job on both fronts, animation and music.

Final Thoughts:

The prologue while confusing, does give all the information needed to understand what is going to be happening in the series but without the anime animating the other routes that come before it, makes the viewer completely lost and uncomfortable hence the bad rating and reviews. If the first routes were animated first in chronological order of the way the routes are supposed to be played in the VN then everything would have made sense and the bad rating would have easily been bumped up to a 4. This had the potential and still does have the potential of greatness. If the company does decide to go back and animate the other routes to give proper context that would be the best course of action. Sadly, from the looks of it and its very bad reception that will not happen. Their first shot at it failed and the anime brand of Dies Irae is tarnished. It would be a very challenging and hard thing to come back from.

In all honesty I was lost throughout most of it trying to piece together what was happening and why. The overarching theme was clearly understood and shown but the details are what lacked. What helped the most was looking up the background of the prologue, once the prologue is understood the events thereafter become a lot clearer and greatly help the enjoyment factor while watching. The main thing that would help is playing the first 2 routes of the VN though, as that would give proper background to a lot of the characters, situations and ground rules of this universe. I have not read the VN… just an extended period looking through comments and reading the clarifications that people posted to help others better understand the series. Even now I think I understand it pretty well but would not feel confident to say I truly understand everything that went on lol.

For people that like this type of challenge, definitely go ahead and watch it. It’s not regrettable at all, the fights are done nicely along with some good characters and music, just very confusing if you are an anime only and never played through the VN. If you are a reader of the VN id think its safe to say you would find quite a bit of enjoyment from seeing one of the routes animated. Even if none of the rest does get animated it’s even more reason for people who have not read the VN to do so then come back and rewatch to have a proper appreciation of it.

Due to, as far as I can tell, the series just lacking in context, I do not think it deserves a 1 or 2. As stated above if the other routes are animated and this is put in its proper chronological gameplay order of the VN this would end up being very good, its just out of place currently.

`<code>Overall Rating: 3/5</code>`