C&C - Hunter x Hunter - "Deadline × To × Live" [3/9]

[veemonjosh]

Opening theme: "Departure!" by Masatoshi Ono [VERSION 5]
Ending theme: "Hyōri Ittai" by Yuzu [VERSION 1]

Episode 133
"Deadline × To × Live"
Chapters adapted: 309-311​

This time:
Ikalgo forces Welfin to send a message to the King, offering to exchange Komugi for Knuckle and Meleoron. It is then that the sharpest thorn makes itself known.

Notes:

• Reminder that tonight is DST, so Hunter x Hunter will technically be on at 3:30am ET this week. I won’t blame you if you decide not to stay up to watch it live, I probably won’t.
• Also, a reminder: Don’t spoil anything about the conclusion of this arc.
• The chapters which this episode covers can be found in volumes 29 and 30 of the manga release.
• Episodes 1-99 are currently available across five Bluray/DVD sets from Viz Media.
• The second Hunter x Hunter movie, ”The Last Mission”, will be releasing on Bluray and DVD on March 12th (this Tuesday!). The first movie, “Phantom Rouge”, is currently available.

 

[PapaGreg]

Oh god sad backstory time

 

[Hypeathon]

"I know who Gyro is... he's in all our hearts, just not the Ants' hearts."

"Don't make me angry Wolfrun! You won't like me when I'm angry."

But I do, you cutie, patootie, tiny, red, four-armed... Chimera Ant.

 

[PapaGreg]

Not even being chibi can save you from being nightmare fuel.

 

[Hypeathon]

\

AAAAAAAAAAHH!!!! BLOOOOOD!!! IT'S MY BLOOOOOOOOD!!!

 

[Yojimbo]

So it was radiation poisoning that will kill them, after all?

 

[Lawren22]

So it was radiation poisoning that will kill them, after all?

Hmm you came close to guessing with that they will die from poison( especially simce the show calls it poison and not radiation) from Morel's pipe theory. You are pretty perceptive tbh.

 

[Radical]

Episode 133 was sweet,

Ikalgo/Palm's sweet clever plan to have Welfin be a messanger to exchange Knuckle/Meleoron to save them.

Ikalgo mentioning Welfin's past, Gyro, and his real name Zaiqahal was sweet/interesting.

Poor Ikalgo not remembering his human name was sad.

Next to Welfin's great character development, Bloster will redeem as well to know his past human life.The other Chimera Ants to redeem/reform was sweet.

Welfin freeing the four other poor women was sweet.

Chibi Menthuthuyoupi is pretty cute though.

Welfin to fight Chibi Menthuthuyoupi for answers was cool, Chibi Menthuthuyoupi with the nose bleed was sick/creepy.

Mereum getting his memories back was interesting.

Poor Menthuthuyoupi's death from Welfin's awesomeness, farewell Menthuthuyoupi next to Neferpitou, you'll be missed.Sucks that their fight was off-screen.

Palm/Ikalgo hiding Komugi in a safer place in a crate protecting her was sweet, Palm being a better cooler female character and more likable, love Palm.

Mereum/Shaiapouf will find out about Neferpitou's death next to Menthuthuyoupi's death, nice cliffhanger.

 

[Light Lucario]

I thought that this episode was pretty good. I was not expecting more of a connection between Ikalgo and Welfin after their first encounter. Being friends in their past lives was a nice touch, although it's sad that Ikalgo apparently can't remember his human name, and helped to convince Welfin to follow through with the mission. I thought that meeting Youpi would be a huge setup back for their plan, but since Ikalgo already planted the idea that the Chimera Ants are their enemies, that made Welfin much more willing and able to fight back.

Admittedly, I am disappointed that Youpi was killed off screen. It's mainly because they spent so much time on his fight with Knuckle earlier. It might have been disappointing even without that as a factor, but I wish we got to see a bit more of the fight. It might have been too one-sided given that he was already in a weakened state. At least the scenes with Ikalgo and Palm were important with setting up the rest of the arc and it does make Welfin much more important than I would have expected him to be when they first focused on his subplot. Killing one of the Royal Guards, even in a weakened state, is pretty huge.

Based on what Palm said and the blood that Pouf was coughing up, it seems like they're heavily implying that they're going to die from either radiation poisoning or the smoke from the explosion was toxic enough to give all three of them permanent damage. If that is the case, then I'm okay with that as the way to kill them off. They could probably defeat Pouf at this point if Welfin was able to kill Youpi, but there's still no way anyone could defeat or kill Mereum at this point. He is just far too overpowered for that to be an option anymore and they obviously can't have him live. He's too much of a threat to the entire world to just be left governing over this one area. They kind of wrote themselves into a corner here, so having some internal damage cause his death seems like the best way to kill him off at this point.

It could also help to make Mereum's revival less of a cheap cop out if it was just for a limited time frame. He could still kill a lot of people within a few hours, but it does reduce the damage he could have done if he still had a regular lifespan. Plus, this might also make Pouf's death more satisfying. Instead of dying to protect Mereum or accepting his death as a punishment for his actions, he can die knowing that he couldn't really help Mereum at all, which is exactly the kind of death he deserves. I just wonder what Mereum's reaction will be once he remembers Komugi. He was getting closer after seeing that game piece and he might be able to force Pouf into telling the truth, but knowing that he only has a few hours to live, I just wonder how he'll react to remembering Komugi. Overall, it was a pretty good episode.

 

[PapaGreg]

I thought that this episode was pretty good. I was not expecting more of a connection between Ikalgo and Welfin after their first encounter. Being friends in their past lives was a nice touch, although it's sad that Ikalgo apparently can't remember his human name, and helped to convince Welfin to follow through with the mission. I thought that meeting Youpi would be a huge setup back for their plan, but since Ikalgo already planted the idea that the Chimera Ants are their enemies, that made Welfin much more willing and able to fight back.

Admittedly, I am disappointed that Youpi was killed off screen. It's mainly because they spent so much time on his fight with Knuckle earlier. It might have been disappointing even without that as a factor, but I wish we got to see a bit more of the fight. It might have been too one-sided given that he was already in a weakened state. At least the scenes with Ikalgo and Palm were important with setting up the rest of the arc and it does make Welfin much more important than I would have expected him to be when they first focused on his subplot. Killing one of the Royal Guards, even in a weakened state, is pretty huge.

Based on what Palm said and the blood that Pouf was coughing up, it seems like they're heavily implying that they're going to die from either radiation poisoning or the smoke from the explosion was toxic enough to give all three of them permanent damage. If that is the case, then I'm okay with that as the way to kill them off. They could probably defeat Pouf at this point if Welfin was able to kill Youpi, but there's still no way anyone could defeat or kill Mereum at this point. He is just far too overpowered for that to be an option anymore and they obviously can't have him live. He's too much of a threat to the entire world to just be left governing over this one area. They kind of wrote themselves into a corner here, so having some internal damage cause his death seems like the best way to kill him off at this point.

It could also help to make Mereum's revival less of a cheap cop out if it was just for a limited time frame. He could still kill a lot of people within a few hours, but it does reduce the damage he could have done if he still had a regular lifespan. Plus, this might also make Pouf's death more satisfying. Instead of dying to protect Mereum or accepting his death as a punishment for his actions, he can die knowing that he couldn't really help Mereum at all, which is exactly the kind of death he deserves. I just wonder what Mereum's reaction will be once he remembers Komugi. He was getting closer after seeing that game piece and he might be able to force Pouf into telling the truth, but knowing that he only has a few hours to live, I just wonder how he'll react to remembering Komugi. Overall, it was a pretty good episode.

Welfin didnt kill Youpi, Youpi just succumbed to the radiation poisoning

Sent from my SM-J727T using Tapatalk

 

[Light Lucario]

Welfin didnt kill Youpi, Youpi just succumbed to the radiation poisoning

Sent from my SM-J727T using Tapatalk

Ah, that makes more sense. That would also explain why he was coughing and blood was coming out of his nose. I just thought that Welfin did something with his ability at first. It's possible that trying to fight or using what power he had left made the radiation poison go through his system faster since both Mereum and Pouf are still alive.

 

[Daikun]

I just thought that Welfin did something with his Quirk at first.

Wrong show.

 

[Yojimbo]

Hmm you came close to guessing with that they will die from poison( especially simce the show calls it poison and not radiation) from Morel's pipe theory. You are pretty perceptive tbh.

Thanks! 16 years of speculating on this forum, lol. It's fun to watch these anime not knowing anything going in and somehow stopping myself from googling. Boruto's probably the hardest though. But I wonder if the HunterxHunter creator was being cheeky, because technically the best way to get rid of a lot of bugs is to poison them.

 

[Light Lucario]

Wrong show.

It took me way too long to realize what you meant. I must have had My Hero Academia in mind when I typed out that sentence.

Thanks! 16 years of speculating on this forum, lol. It's fun to watch these anime not knowing anything going in and somehow stopping myself from googling. Boruto's probably the hardest though. But I wonder if the HunterxHunter creator was being cheeky, because technically the best way to get rid of a lot of bugs is to poison them.

A part of me still kind of wonders if he was tired of writing the arc or he just wanted to move on after spending years on it. The past few episodes haven't really felt rushed per say, but compared to the incredibly slow pace ever since the first attack on the palace happened, the faster pace is quite noticeable and it's like he just wanted to wrap things up as quickly as possible without rushing through it at the same time.

 

[Yojimbo]

A part of me still kind of wonders if he was tired of writing the arc or he just wanted to move on after spending years on it. The past few episodes haven't really felt rushed per say, but compared to the incredibly slow pace ever since the first attack on the palace happened, the faster pace is quite noticeable and it's like he just wanted to wrap things up as quickly as possible without rushing through it at the same time.

True, we didn't get 5 episodes of Gon beating Pitou into a greasy smear. It was just 1.

 

[Lawren22]

He spent 10 years doing the Chimera ant arc so him waiting to get it over with isnt out of the question but I doubt that's the reason for the ending. Yorknew city was an arc that was written without many hiatuses and it still has the no big fight and plot suddenly feeling like its speeding vibe that this arc has. YYH as much as I love it was a series full of fights and big epic moments I think Togashi wanted to do something different with HxH ( and every arc in hxh is different Yorknew for example was a dark crime thriller while Greed Island was a " light" card game/videogame/ training arc story) instead of more of the same and interviews from him that I read off reddit deffinaly points to that. I think he would've went with this ending regardless of how many years it took to do the arc. If he wanted it done fast he would've have just had Meruem die from the explosion and have Pouf and Youpi just die trying to save or something.

 

[Light Lucario]

True, we didn't get 5 episodes of Gon beating Pitou into a greasy smear. It was just 1.

Given the direction they went with Gon vs. Pitou, I don't think it was rushed to make it just a one episode deal. I was hoping for more of a traditional fight after all that buildup, but I don't think that the emotional impact of Gon's decision or the intensity of Pitou being crushed to death would have worked for more than one episode.

He spent 10 years doing the Chimera ant arc so him waiting to get it over with isnt out of the question but I doubt that's the reason for the ending. Yorknew city was an arc that was written without many hiatuses and it still has the no big fight and plot suddenly feeling like its speeding vibe that this arc has. YYH as much as I love it was a series full of fights and big epic moments I think Togashi wanted to do something different with HxH ( and every arc in hxh is different Yorknew for example was a dark crime thriller while Greed Island was a " light" card game/videogame/ training arc story) instead of more of the same and interviews from him that I read off reddit deffinaly points to that. I think he would've went with this ending regardless of how many years it took to do the arc. If he wanted it done fast he would've have just had Meruem die from the explosion and have Pouf and Youpi just die trying to save or something.

It took him ten years to finish the Chimera Ant arc? Wow. That is a long time for just one arc. I know that the manga frequently goes into hiatuses, but I didn't expect one arc to take that long. I feel bad for the manga fans having to wait so long for a completed arc, but I also feel bad for Togashi, especially with knowing how incredibly difficult the manga industry is for the authors involved and I've heard that he's had back problems too.

That is a good point about the York New City arc. I still remember being surprised when they said the conclusion was about to air when it still felt like we were in the middle of more setup. Granted, this stretch does feel more like a buildup to a conclusion by comparison, mainly because they do need to kill off all of the big threats instead of leaving them for later like with the Spiders, but it still feels like he suddenly switched into speeding up the pace for a conclusion. I'm still unsure how I'll feel about this arc as a whole once we get to the finale.

 

[Lawren22]

For the current arc of the manga he usually only writes 10 chapters per year ,last year he apologized about the state of the manga said he wants to finish it eventually and did 20 chapters instead(not in the same run but same year).

I actually had similar feelings about Yorknew City when I first watched it the ending had felt jarring epsacally since unlike this arc it felt like they were actually teasing a big battle till the very end. I feel like it comes of better on rewatch/ read thought. For Chimera Ant I didn't feel that way though for the most part I think the ending( by that I mean all 3 of the next final episodes)is really good i'd even call it beautiful and it really fitd though there are a couple things I have mixed feelings on though. I cant promise you'll like it thought as I've seen some people not for understandable reasons but the majority of people I know both online and in real life do usually really like it even those that had some problems with the arc say it made it worth it.