- And T.K◊, short for Tachibana Kanade
- TK is Kanade's original heart. He died in the transplant that saved her life, which is why he's always dancing. He's always moving to his own beat.
Given all of that, TK was probably deaf when he was alive. He always saw people dancing, but his inability to hear the music prevented him from doing so himself, hence his constant dancing and song references, and his inability to speak English OR Japanese.
- Most people dies either violently or ambiguously.
- Both thinking and action are needed for the protagonists.
- Hinata was the one who came up with it in the novel, in awe of her power as I recall.
- Where is Hatsune, Otonashi's sister? She's not in the Afterlife Battlefront Building...
- Actually, her regret was that she never had the chance to thank the heart donor for the heart transplant that saved her life. It just so happened to be Otonashi
- Wait a second, Tenshi has been in the Afterlife far longer than Otonashi. That explanation wouldn't make sense.
- Possible explanation: In episode 13, it's revealed that neither Kanade nor Otonashi were supposed to be in the afterlife at all, because they lived fulfilled lives before they died, but Kanade's regret about not being able to thank the donor of her heart somehow screwed up her "transfer" into Heaven and she wound up in the Afterlife instead, while Otonashi's final memories about saving the people in the train wreck, which made his life complete, were somehow lost in transit (possibly because of his missing heart) and he wound up with out any place to go, and somehow ended up there as well. So Otonashi's soul could have been wandering for years before he found his way to the Afterlife, and time may not flow there the way it does here. And it's also possible that Otonashi wasn't her donor at all, as her theory that his memories were awakened because he heard his own heart inside of her were just that: a theory. And if you want to take a very broad look at things, it could be that God Himself pulled the strings so that things would happen the way they did, knowing that the SSS members would never find peace otherwise.
- Possible explanation: The Afterlife exists outside of time, which would make relative time of death irrelevant.
- Another possible explanation: Several of Otonashi's organs were donated, and he couldn't pass on until everyone who had received an organ from him died.
- Actually, her regret was that she never had the chance to thank the heart donor for the heart transplant that saved her life. It just so happened to be Otonashi
- NPCs are called NPCs because they act the same mostly.
- Guild is a bunch of l33t hackers because they can generate weapons out of dirt.
- episode 7, it's revealed that Angel has a passive skill called Overdrive, which essentially gives her more strength.
- Angel is an admin or even one of the game developers, due to her ability to develop skills.
- Naoi is a GM due to his position as Student Council President
- SSS could be a guild of some sort.
- All of the SSS are high level characters- except Otonashi.
- In the manga, Ooyama refers to himself as the team cleric, and casts "spells" on Hinata to protect him from Yuri's wrath
- He may or may not really have amnesia. His presence is meant to figure out what's gone wrong with the Afterlife from a human point of view, and possibly help the members of SSS to move on.
- This naturally has special significance when combined with the Haruhi theory.
- The first part has been Jossed.
- Well, the SSS do screw things up for Angel. Quite a bit, really. Heck, any day now and we get the proof that they're the reason she can't move one.
- The NPCs are not normal people; they're constructs of the afterlife world that allows the actual humans who were sent there to live out a high school life that they couldn't in their time alive. Without the NPCs, the only people would just be those with terrible childhoods, and everything would go to hell pretty fast.
- Similar to programming language, Guild and Angel are able to manipulate the rules of the world to create anything they want, and all of Angels moves and attacks have a very electronic theme and are even made of ones and zeroes. Meanwhile, Yuri's description of the Afterlife makes it sound like a game or computer program, since she refers to regular students as NPCs. However, there may be a number of reasons why somebody would create this Matrix-like construct. Perhaps all of the SSS members are in fact still alive, but implanted into the Afterlife with false memories as a way to help them deal with their insecurities and psychological problems. Episode 3 seems to imply that this is the case, since once Iwasawa comes to terms with her past, there's no more reason to keep her in the simulation. On the other hand, it may be some sort of experiment, with some or all of SSS being AI constructs. They're being pitted against a rival AI (Angel) to see who will prevail.
- Which is not that far-fetched, since Maeda Jun has dabbled with this format before. Little Busters!, anyone? It could easily be that finding peace is a major contributor to the healing process and that the people who vanish simply wake up.
- Supporting this, if you analyze all of the shown "deaths" carefully, you notice a pattern. Iwasawa and Yui were bedridden and were last seen under close medical care. Otonashi and Hinata's deaths are left very ambiguous. Hinata could have just been critically wounded in the car accident and Otonashi may have just fallen unconscious when the rescue crew arrived. Also, even though we see Yuri and Naoi's pasts, we never actually see their supposed deaths.
- It seems that one didn't have to die in childhood to end up in that afterlife; they just had to have a bad childhood, and die at some point. They could have died at age 80 and ended up in the afterlife as a teenager.
- Going by that theory
- All of the characters died peacefully at age 60-90 due to disease or old age, and the reason they went to the Angel Beats Purgatory or Limbo is that they have one thing in common: an unfulfilled childhood or teenage life. They wanted to re-experience their teenage years, including having a wonderful school life filled with friends, and they disappear and go to Heaven after finally having their wish fulfilled.
- All of the dilemmas the characters experienced are in their childhood or teengage years, and they lived throughout their whole lives carrying that burden, and in the Purgatory they finally fixed it.
- If you notice, again as the above theory shows, the characters' deaths are not being shown. This is because they were only bedridden, had a condition, suffered depression, and then survived and lived afterwards, after dying of old age. The above theory just inspired me this WMG.
...was just a normal, Korean girl who was an avid Starcraft player and died/fell into a coma after an excessive play session.Due to her obsession with Starcraft, she lacks the skill to socialize with others. This is the reason why she's always alone and nobody likes her.In her life, she was a huge fan of the Protoss. For this very reason, she styled her weaponry after the Protoss:
- Hand Sonic (Psy Blades)
- Distortion (Protoss Energy Shield)
- Delay (Zealot Charge)
- Harmonics (Hallucination)
- Howling (Psionic Storm, debatable)
- Absorb (mass Dark Archon warp, possibly)
- The lack of ability to socialize with one another is jossed by episode 6. [[supersecretspoiler: Where she says that she had friends, but they disappeared.]]
- Great, now she's a Gamer Girl too. Her popularity should increase by about 2-5% in the next few minuets.
- Yuri seemed rather put out that Hinata's team was the only one left, though.
- True, but she could have preferred that someone on one of the other teams disappeared.
- Possibly confirmed. Episode 10 after the credits, before the next episode preview, Tenshi is talking to Yuri about whatever that shadow was. Otonashi and Tenshi working together, without anyone knowing it, but Yuri working with Tenshi? Without anyone else knowing about it?
- I must correct you. This wasn't Angel, but Yusa. However, I don't blame you for confusing them.
- Then again, considering how seriously the damage caused by a head wound is played in Iwasawa's case... maybe those drugs screwed with his head so much that he can't remember?
- The manga adaptation of Angel Beats, which is a prequel, reveals that Hinata died in an accident. Jossed.
- Then again, considering how seriously the damage caused by a head wound is played in Iwasawa's case... maybe those drugs screwed with his head so much that he can't remember?
- But even when God Is Evil, Jesus Christ is portrayed as a good guy.
- Takeyama really doesn't strike me as Big Bad material.
- Call him Christ.
- Very likely, when she saves everyone from being eaten by the giant fish, the clone's eyes are red.
- Confirmed in Episode 8 that it was in fact Guard Skill: Harmonics that created the clone. Even worse is the clone can duplicate itself. Cloning issues occur
- He was a American-born teenage rapper who moved to Japan, and died before getting a chance for a career. The name he uses is the nickname he used while being alive. (Possible since he always seems to be dancing, snapping, and doing rhythm-related things.)
- She seems to be more skilled and pragmatic in combat than others. Perhaps after the robbery, she trained herself very hard and managed to hunt down and killed the robbers but dies in the process, cursing God in her dying breath that her revenge feels empty.
- Otonashi already made clear that Kanade will stay behind alone. And making people vanish indeed is akin to killing them, since nobody knows what will happen to them.
- Otonashi's future with Kanade is still unclear. His apology for leaving her alone was actually referring to him having to play The Mole inside the SSS.
- Chaa is a pretty good indicator; in the novel he reveals he had a wife, plus he knows quite a lot about guns. These are generally not traits you see in teenagers.
- And revealed in the manga that, yes, Chaa has a wife - because he eloped with her in high school. There's even a page where it shows that he was a part of a gang with her, which might explain the guns thing. Not everyone died while they were still in high school, but a lot of them did once they got out of it, so they're still high school age.
- Pretty much confirmed in episode 13, when Kanade says she survived thanks to Otonashi's donated heart. So she likely lived a long time, but she still had regrets not to be able to thank the person who gave her the heart to make it possible.
- "Long time" is a relative concept. Remember, she also says that she's never graduated high-school. It's entirely possible that by "long time" she meant that, say she only died at 17 when she "should have" died at 7. A little depressing, yes, but it's that kind of show.
- Jossed in part. It's confirmed that Naoi, Yuri, and Hinata indeed went to Heaven in episode 13.
- Dude's just an NPC programmed to run the Shadow NPC procedure when the flags are raised.
- "If you ignore"... Jossed. Besides, the ED does show that Otonashi disappears in the end. Though I think that the coder had the exact same thing happen - but Otonashi proves himself stronger.
- Not really. The other epilogue shows Otonashi stayed after all. The extra scene in Earth has an undefinned meaning, but is not certain he eventually 'passed away' anymore.
- It is possible that the extra scene on earth happens after Otonashi is obliterated. Gives it a happier ending, at least.
- Not really. The other epilogue shows Otonashi stayed after all. The extra scene in Earth has an undefinned meaning, but is not certain he eventually 'passed away' anymore.
Also with regards to Otonashi and Kanade's meaningful names, Otonashi (no sound) most likely refers to the fact that he has no heart and Kanade (to play an instrument) refers to the fact that she now has his heart. Otonashi's first name Yuzuru (to string an instrument) is an even further clue as it probably refers to Otonashi already stringing the instrument (his heart) which Kanade now has/plays. The title Angel Beats! is even a reference to this as it hints at Kanade having Otonashi's heart and can even be interpreted as the beating of and Angel's heart (if you go with the theory that Otonashi is in fact an Angel). Even the theme song 'My Soul, Your Beats' is a reference to this.
Referring the above, one might notice that the the commercial intro and outro sequences show a line of a heart beat reader (the name is unknown to this troper) with the title Angel beats. This can also be observed when looking at the Opening credits, one will see a random red line cross the screen, further supporting the whole heart motif. All of this including the names of Otonashi and Tenshi are a play on the words "heart strings". It may be also possible that Otonashi donated his heart before he died (however again this troper does not know as he cannot read kanji, romaji or any Japanese words.
- Unlikely, considering that all the real people in the afterlife are teenagers (even Chaa) and cannot age, so unless he used the program to modify himself into a middle-aged man, he'd still have the appearance of a young man. It's more likely that the NPC in the second computer room is the programmer after turning himself into an NPC.
- I have no clue about whether the novel/manga discusses Takamatsu more and renders this WMG moot, but when Otonashi asked about Takamatsu immediately after Yuri spoke of the computers (whether she referenced them directly I can't remember), it seemed to be strongly implied, through the fluid transition of her words, that Takamatsu was the one who created that mess long ago. I think she spoke of taking care of the shadow creatures, and why they were reacting that way, and then as Otonashi asked about Takamatsu, went quickly onto saying, with one of her little looks, "That guy after all this time managed to confront his pains and pass away," or something along those lines.
- Actually, Otanashi isn't the one that mentions him. Hinata informs Yuri that Takamatsu got to pass on even though he became an NPC. Yuri responds with a pleased "That's nice." Hinata comments on her lack of surprise to the news, so Yuri explains that the computers were designed to return the students to normal if their feelings were strong enough.
- Because there is no way that I can accept that the adorable little 'vision' wasn't real. I don't think my tear ducts can take it.
- That is unbelievably cruel of you. Would you really condemn Yui to another lifetime of paralysis so that she can get one marginally better than her last? It would be nice of her to fall in love with a reincarnated Hinata, but I'm not sure I'd want it to be in a way that would require her to live through this again...
- Not everyone would be able to "graduate" just by being a normal student.
- Possibly the new guy would be fitting to that role
- Or...
- One bit of evidence to support this theory was that she said that the police arrived 30 minutes after the burglars first broke in. It's possible that once the burglars realized that none of the siblings would be of any use, they killed Yuri, who lived just long enough to realize that the police were too late. Then again, Yuri appears as an older teenager in Battlefront, whereas she was a young girl (probably late elementary school or early middle school) in the flashback.
- Or...
- Hisako's, Shiori's, and Miyuki's routes
- Noda's, Shiina's, and Takamatsu's routes
- Yusa's, Takeyama's, and TK's routes
- Fujimaki's, Ooyama's, and Hideki's routes
- the last volume would be Yuri's, Ayato's, and Kanade's routes
There’s no actual question asked, so Im not sure why its a ‘riddle,’ but here’s the summary: A person travels to Hell, and they see a table of people tormented with spoons / chopsticks which are too long to reach one’s mouth, so they are essentially starving for all eternity. When that same someone travels to Heaven, they see the exact same eating utensils. The only difference is the people are feeding each other, rather than trying to feed themselves.
The school is kind of similar to this. When we meet the characters, we’re told of an epic battle to win the chance to see God. Except, none of that has actually anything to do with the school at all. The school gives spirits the chance to live out their ideal experience which they didn’t get in life. That’s it.
All the fighting, weapons manufacturing, etc. That’s all the characters’ invention. None of that needs to happen at all. As a result, the characters become their own worst enemies, because they chose to do all that.
- She ascended godhood and as such she's able to do as she wishes as the real world and the wired have become synchronous to one another. Tenshi and company are able to manifest powers in this world using Angel Player, a software capable of manipulating the Wired. Lain has taken special interest in these tragic lives and has invited them in her world.
- Dante had an unfulfilled childhood. His mother is killed by demons and his brother, Vergil, became corrupted by demons. He has since devoted his life to exterminating demons.
- The bandana covering his eyes is just a version of Angemon's visor.
- A.) The series was the culmination of Haruhi's original past life, as Yurippe, and Haruhi either is or is not God, as everyone assumes, in that perhaps Yuri was God all along and nobody—including her—realized it, or isn't, but because of a misunderstanding involving this purgatory all the characters are in, the espers etc of the Haruhi Suzumiya-verse believe her to be so. For all the pain and shaping up she and the others in Angel Beats! had to go through, this time she is able to have a more lighthearted life and act more like a Jerkass than The Determinator, becoming attracted to people who remind her of her old friends, such as Kyon (who's kind of like Otonashi) and Yuki (who's a lot like Kanade).
- A2.) The Haruhi'verse isn't a pure reincarnation, but a different timeline. Yuri in the Haruhi timeline decided to become God, but messed up somehow causing a reset. Maybe even ended up keeping/dragging said abilities into her next reincarnation. The SOS Brigade are those who stuck with her till the end. Kyon = Otanoshi and Kanade = Yuki are obvious. Ayato = Itsuki after some thinking about his hypnotism abilities and the Kyon/Itsuki ho-yay probably being vestigial/lingering memories of the previous reality. I suppose by process of elimination that makes Hinata = Mikiru.
- B.) The series was a Bad End of Haruhi's life, as while she sinks into some kind of depression, she one day awakens as Yuri, her world rewritten as unknowingly as always, and finds herself breaking again after her siblings die. But then, after she finds the strength to carry on, she dies and finds herself in the purgatory with all the characters in the series wind up in. She finds a new meaning in life (or rather, after-life), and Otonashi and Kanade in part were there to remind her of those she knew in the past (Kyon and Yuki), or they just strongly remind her of the friends she had cared about back then, and her resolve to get all her new friends through this is strengthens, until the series culminates and she begins life again as Haruhi Suzumiya (perhaps rewriting the histories of the friends she met in the world of Angel Beats!).
- C.) The series is yet another example of Haruhi warping the world, as Kyon and the others constantly try to prevent her from doing, into the entirety of Angel Beats! Perhaps this leads into a Bad End for her, as Otonashi and Kanade's relationship mirrors that of Kyon and Yuki's, or maybe Haruhi is actually a subconscious shipper. Who knows?
- C2.) Or, leading in from C., if Haruhi is Yuri, maybe Kyon and Yuki are Otonashi and Kanade, with Yuki/Kanade being the only one aware of what has happened, as with the "Groundhog Day" Loop she originally had to suffer through, leading her to fix everything after some time of deliberation. Itsuki's split into Hinata and/or Naoi? Mikuru=Naoi? Tsuruya-san=Yui? Kunikida=Ooyama? Asakura=Shiina and/or the male computer NPC? In the end, perhaps, everyone except Yuki wakes up the next day with no memory of what happened, and Yuki discovers an abnormality in the reincarnation of several characters from Angel Beats!.
- D.) The series is a Key game one of the characters of Haruhi Suzumiya is playing.
Obviously, their purgatory is a lot more flexible as it lets them phase in and out into the real world at whim as long as they are in the baseball field. Maybe each purgatory has its own rules.
- In the end, Yuri overthrows God and creates a new reality for her, then recreates Otonashi and Tenshi as Kyon and Yuki.
- Variation: All the people in the Afterlife is actually being prepared for reincarnation INCLUDING the NPCs, teachers, and Tenshi. The SSS all eventually accepts their death and move on and be reborn in the Suzumiya Haruhi timeline: Yurippe, Otonashi and Tenshi became Haruhi, Kyon and Yuki (like the above example), while Iwasawa became one of ENOZ and the other side-characters (whose names I don't remember) became Taniguchi and Kunikida. Oh, and Takeyama became the Computer club president or one of his glasses henchmen.
- Otonashi's story strangely resembles that of Okazaki's.
- When Otonashi finally moves on, his soul is seen as an orb of light rising into the heavens.
- Yuri is Haruhi Suzumiya Haruhi
- Angel is Agent Smith
- Angel is Yuki Nagato
- Angel is Mai Kawasumi
- Angel is Rei Ayanami
- Naoi is Shinji Ikari
- Which just makes fighting against Angel that more funny.
- Naoi is Lelouch Lamperouge
- ... in a past incarnation. The hypno-eye thing, obviously. Since we're given no glimpses into what's happening in reality during the story, who knows how much time had passed? Britannia could have taken control during that time, etc etc, once Naoi leaves, he's reborn as Lelouch.
- Naoi is Naoto Shirogane. They look very similar, they sound similar, they have somewhat similar personalities, and they both have serious gender issues. Plus, their names sort of sound alike.
- Otonashi is God
- Otonashi is a Time Lord
- Jossed, both of them.
- Whoa, whoa, wait. You mean to tell me that the show at some point said "Oh, and by the way, Otonashi is not a regenerating alien who travels through time and space in a TARDIS, also known as a Time Lord"?
- Otonashi is Yuichi Aizawa
- Otonashi is a Time Lord
- Hinata is also Yuichi Aizawa
- Hinata is also Tomoya Okazaki
- Yui is Makoto Sawatari
- TK is Joel Goodson
- Noda is Ikkaku Madarame... wait...
- Shiina is Yomi
- Shiina is Tomoyo Sakagami.
- ...Natsume. Will help explain his habit of suddenly turning all sappy in Episode 6.
- ...Itoshiki Sensei in Ironic Hell where Death Is Cheap after he had successfully made himself taller.
- ...Tieria stuck in a high school simulation-program created by a beserk Veda
- ...Orihara Izaya with severe Amnesiac Dissonance after being hit in the head by a vending machine.
- ...how about Michael, suffering severe brain damage after being sucked into space?
- Jossed with episode 7, although judging by his hair style in life, he may have been Ararararagi.
- Think about it. Team Rocket's always blasting off. There are Meowth, James, and Jesse. And of course they're blasted into the sky, where as the 2 unlucky SSS members aren't blasted quite as far.
- Because yeah.
- As per Rule Circle 9, they could also eventually stumble across Hakugyokurou. Hmm, someone needs to write that fanfic.
- What he says doesn't make any sense and he doesn't play by rules, and most imporantly, HE LOVES HIS LIFE!
Meanwhile, an unknown source anonymously contacts an extraction team, comprised of Yuri as the extractor, Hinata as the Point Man, Kanada as the Architect, and Yui as the Chemist. This anonymous person tells them to hire a large number of forgers to play roles in a mission, and orders them to perform an Inception on one 'Yuzuru Otanashi'
The events of the show is the mission itself, pulled off with barely a hitch. The NPCs are Otanawa's projections, complying with the story as a feedback loop from the SSS's telling him how they behave, and the shadows are when the projections finally catch on to the mental invasion. The inception itself occurs in episode 12, when Yuri goes intot he second computer lab and destroys the equipment barring love to bloom in this world; or more specifically Otanashi's heart.
The plan does go wrong in the end, when Otanashi begins feeling affectionate towards Kanade, but she exits the dream too, and they all leave the hotel room they had him in before he gets the chance to wake up. He hardly remembers the dream, but goes on newly invigorated, saving people while also searching for a strange white-haired girl, one he thought he saw in a half-remembered dream...
- Not knowing anything about him, the classmates gave him a Gratuitous English moniker based on his fluency with the language, then eventually shortened it so it sounds more like an actual name.
- Never mind, Jossed - turns out TK is what he calls himself, so no one else knows what it means.
- TK also happens to be Angel's initials if her name is read Japanese style.
- Actually TK is Tetsuya Komuro the "Japanese Michael Jackson" His nickname is also TK and most of the songs that TK references comes from TM Network which Tetsuya is the lead singer of.
- Jossed: The final episode gives a brief glimpse of reincarnations
- Jossed, barring the possibility that they've received Laser-Guided Amnesia AND very complex memory implants. Unless, of course, an aphasic stroke victim with more or less no motor control can commit suicide.
- That tail is far too mobile to just be a fasion statment, not to mention her ever present Cute Little Fangs. Possibly a Nekomata, based on the whole 'Yui-Nyan' nickname.
- Taking it further, Yui is not just "some sort of demon", she is The Demon/Akuma, opposite to Tenshi. Her very existence is an extreme opposite to Tenshi, where she is stoic and plain, Yui is noticeably stylized, and intentionally plays up the Kawaiiko stereotype. Where Tenshi's job is to help people pass on, Yui/Akuma intends to keep everyone in the Afterlife.
- Also, considering that Yui literally prevented Hinata from moving on in the baseball game, I'd say there's good reason to believe this.
- Jossed as of episode 10.
- That was Jossed
- When she died, she ended up in purgatory just like everyone else. She's still there. She put up a brave front for Otonashi but she's actually very bitter about her death.
- Alternatively, Shiina has a Superpowered Evil Side.
- Or the ones who vanish have a tendency to become this.
- All of these are Jossed in episode 11.
- Jossed in Episode 12.
- Jossed; while he's the last one remaining after everyone else goes to Heaven or is reincarnated, he's last seen three years after the events as a young child with Kanade.
- Unjossed; Another Epilogue has him staying behind as the new Student Council President.
- More Subverted, maybe: Barring the studio pulling an End of Evangelion, the series implies he will eventually move on. However, it looks like instead of being trapped as the original WMG suggests he stays behind for a while until an unknown event to make sure nobody else ends up like the Programmer (trapped), Tenshi (alone and sad because she can't move on until her goal is met, but is too afraid & socially inept to properly help others), or Yuri (Figuring out just enough to cause trouble and stick around, but not enough to move on). So true that he sticks around, but false in that he can move on whenever he wants. Just because he chooses to stay for the greater good doesn't stop him from hoping to see Tenshi again before he moves on, though.