Article contributed by Madalena Daleziou
Made by studio CloverWorks and based on Posuka Demizu and Kaiu Shirai’s manga of the same name, The Promised Neverland is one of the most memorable anime of winter 2019. It is chilling and heart-warming all at once, with a unique style that makes it both distinct and horrifying. Season 1 was full of action and plot twists, so you might want to refresh your memory before Season 2, which is scheduled for January 2021. Here’s what we have so far:
It all begins calmly, almost unnervingly so: 11-year-old Emma is an orphan living in Grace Field House with her foster siblings, including her best friends, Norman and Ray, and their beloved ‘Mama’, Isabella. Everyone seems to be getting along, Isabella is a wonderful foster mother and, apart from a few chores and tests, the children are usually free to play in the forest. There is a mysterious fence, too short to provide protection, but the children don’t dwell too much on it.
Already, the viewer can suspect something more sinister is at hand: the children are dressed uniformly in white and each has a number tattooed on their neck. Every two months, one child is taken away to be adopted. Strangely, none of the children ever write to their foster siblings who are still in the orphanage. This saddens Emma, who never wants her life to change.
But things do change suddenly and traumatically when Connie, a 6-year-old girl, finds out it’s her turn to be adopted. Isabella takes her out from a gate which the children aren’t supposed to approach. But Emma and Norman see that Connie has forgotten to take her stuffed bunny and run to give it to her before she’s gone. What they see beyond the gate changes their lives forever: Connie has been murdered by demons, who are going to ship her body to be eaten. Worse of all, Isabella knows of this, and makes sure children are always shipped upon request. The place they called home isn’t really an orphanage: it’s a farm.
Emma and Norman run and return to the orphanage before Isabella. However, they drop Connie’s bunny, which lets Isabella know someone was at the gate. The two children start considering ways to escape. From the bits and pieces they overheard, they conclude that children who, like them, have full scores in their tests, are shipped later, at the age of twelve, as their brains will taste better to the demons then, while the rest are shipped at six. Norman remembers that one child is shipped every two months, giving them time to make an escape plan.
They go to the forest and beyond the fence for the first time. To their dismay, they find a huge chasm, but they resolve to make some rope out of tablecloths and find a way to cross. But the children don’t have as much freedom anymore: the anime has already become a huge mind game, in which Isabella anticipates their every step. She has a compass-like tracking device, which allows her to find them easily, making them realise that they have some kind of tracking mechanism in their bodies too.
Emma and Norman decide to tell their friend Ray what they know. He believes them right away, but, being more pragmatic, he thinks that only those fit to survive should escape with them. After a long fight with Emma, who refuses to let another sibling die, Norman sides with her, forcing Ray to compromise. But when they’re home, a new challenge awaits. Another adult, Sister Krone has been hired to help Isabella. The children immediately see her as a potential enemy.
While taking care of Carol, a new baby foster sibling, Emma finds the tracking device implanted behind her ear. She, Norman and Ray, consider ways to disable the mechanisms. At the same time, they train their younger siblings, teaching them to be quicker and more observant through games of tag. Krone, however, proves very competent and capable of finding the children easily. Jealous of Isabella, she wants to expose her mistake, so that she’s overthrown, leaving the ‘Mama’ position for Krone to claim. Isabella, from her part, suspects Emma and Norman, but is determined to see them shipped at the time determined for them, without revealing anything to her superiors. Yet, she doesn’t seem keen on observing them. Because of this they suspect she might have an informant among the children.
Emma, Norman, and Ray partially trust two more siblings, Gilda and Don, who can help them train the younger ones. Wanting to check if any of the two is the traitor, Norman talks to Don and Gilda separately and tells each that he hid the rope he acquired at a different place. Gilda is struggling as Krone pushes her for information but does not betray her friends. When Norman and Ray find the rope missing from under the former’s bed, where it was supposed to be, it seems like Don is the informant… Only for Norman to reveal he never really told Don the rope was under his bed. He had only told Ray that this was what he was going to tell Don.
Ray confesses he’s Isabella’s informant, but his position is more complicated. Ray never experienced infantile amnesia, which makes children forget their early years, so he found out about the shipping and the demons when he was very young. Because of this, he agreed to spy on his siblings for Isabella and in return, he has gained small favours and the promise not to be shipped immediately. However, even as a spy, he was still acting with his friends’ interest in mind: it was him, after all, that prompted Emma and Norman to take Connie’s bunny to her, indirectly leading them to the truth. Norman is willing to let Ray keep acting as Isabella’s informant, while secretly working towards their escape plan. Ray agrees on one condition: only the five older children will escape, as he still thinks Emma’s plan to escape with everyone is doomed. Reluctantly, Norman agrees, but they let Emma believe the plan to take the little ones with them still holds.
Meanwhile, the children discover a secret room. Don steals Isabella’s key, and gets in with Gilda without telling the others. Emma tells Norman and Ray about a discovery she has made: several books in the library formerly belonged to a man William Minerva. Each book has an owl logo with a circle around it. The children find that each circle contains a word in Morse code. Words like ‘farm’, make them realise the man is trying to convey a message, giving them hope of a possible human community in the outside world. Two of the books are more obscure: one does not have any word in Morse at all, while the second has the word ‘promise’. Will the second season give us more information about the man and the books?
At that point, Don and Gilda, having found the toys of their shipped siblings, have understood the whole truth and confront the three protagonists. Emma, Norman and Ray finally apologise for not having completely trusted them from the beginning and they all come closer and resolve to live outside the orphanage, no matter what they will encounter there.
Ray finds out that the next shipment is probably going to be him. Meanwhile, the other four are found by Krone while in the forest. Krone claims she knows they’re trying to escape and offers to help them. She reveals that she too grew up in a similar orphanage, and, being one of the most gifted girls, she was allowed to survive and train to become a ‘Mother’. This, however, doesn’t mean she’s free, as she can never leave the quarters assigned to her. A tracking device inside her ribcage is programmed to instantly kill her if she tries to escape. Krone has always wanted to become a mother and live what she considers the best possible life for her, but still offers to help the children escape, as she imagines this will expose Isabella as incompetent. A fragile alliance is formed, but when the children test her, asking about things they already know, they realise Krone knows more than she reveals. Ray purposely places information for Krone to find, and the latter is delighted to have discover what she perceives as Isabella’s second weakness.
Shortly after, Isabella gives Krone a note, letting her know she has been appointed as ‘Mama’ in another plantation. Disappointed that she missed the chance to overthrow Isabella, Krone meets her superior, ‘Grandma’ at the gate and tells her all about Isabella’s mistakes. To Krone’s surprise, Grandma knows already, but still trusts Isabella to keep everything under control. Realising that she never stood a chance, and that she is going to be eaten by a demon, Krone hopes that the children will manage to escape, survive, and destroy the world as it is.
Norman and Emma plan to investigate a wall encircling part of the forest, which they could potentially climb to escape, while Isabella tells Ray about Krone’s disposal and dismisses him too, telling him she no longer needs him as her spy. She locks him in her room, so that he can’t tell Emma and Norman she is going after them. Don rescues Ray, but they’re too late: Isabella finds the two children and talks to them frankly for the first time. She claims that she loves them, even though she has to ship them off, and suggests that they keep living ‘happily’ as before until then. Emma attacks Isabella to give Norman time to climb the wall, but Isabella breaks Emma’s leg, just as she tells her that Norman is to be shipped out the following day.
Emma and Ray try to come up with plans for Norman to flee and hide until everyone’s ready to join him. However, when Norman climbs the wall, he finds a big chasm and realises there’s no escape. He returns and tells his friends to give them a chance but refuses to save himself. All their attempts to save him fail, and Norman goes with a smile, last seen waiting in a room. His death is not shown on screen. Is this the last we see of him? Was he really so calm because he gave his friends a chance to live, or did he have more plans of his own? Perhaps the next season will give us some answers.
With Norman gone, Emma and Ray fall in despair. Isabella is willing to recommend Emma as a future ‘Mama’ to let her survive, but Emma blatantly refuses. Hours before Ray’s 12th birthday and shipment day, Emma reveals she had never given up on their plan. But Ray had a final plan of his own: start a fire to cause an evacuation, allowing everyone to escape while Isabella deals with the fire. Emma finds a flaw in the plan: Isabella might ignore the fire and keep watching the children, who she sees as merchandise. In response, Ray, pours oil on himself. In burning, he thinks he will take revenge on Isabella and the demons.
The fire starts, and Isabella finds a crying Emma begging her to save Ray from the flames. But, although Isabella’s tracking device tells her he is there, she can’t find him. Slowly, we find out that Norman left Emma with a message. Norman, having figured out that Ray was never planning to survive, had come up with a better plan: by burning sausages, clothes and hair, they replicate the smell of burning flesh. Emma also cuts off Ray’s ear, so that he still appears in Isabella’s tracker, giving everyone time to evacuate while she looks for him.
Ray finds most children ready to escape, as Emma had never really given up. She had only pretended she had, so that Isabella wouldn’t suspect her. In the process, she slowly recruited all children. She has decided to leave behind those aged four or younger, as no child is shipped before the age of six and swears to return for them in two years.
The children attach the ropes to the other side of the chasm and escape one by one, while Isabella is looking for them. Emma remains last and escapes just as Isabella approaches. Finally, Isabella’s own backstory is revealed. Like Emma, she lost her best friend to the ‘harvest’ but accepted her superior’s suggestion to become a ‘Mama’. The training had included giving birth to a child and giving it up to one of the farms. When Ray was younger, she had heard him murmur a tune that her best friend used to play, which she never stopped humming. When she asked Ray where he heard that song, he, in turn, asked why she gave birth to him, revealing he’s her biological son. Isabella replies that she did ‘to survive longer than anyone’. Back in the present, Isabella admits defeat, hopes that the children will succeed, and goes back to the younger ones, awaiting punishment from her superiors. But is this the last we’ve seen of her? Hopefully we’ll find out in Season 2.
Emma, Ray, and the others welcome their first morning of freedom: but what does the future hold for them? Is there a real human society out there, or simply more danger?
Season 1 of The Promised Neverland has introduced a scary, unforgettable premise, incredible mind-games, engaging characters and one of the most interesting anime villains I’ve seen. Isabella might be evil, but like Krone, she never stood a chance. Emma was strong-willed and kind enough to defy a ‘Mama’s’ fate, but the women’s backstories are still heart-breaking, adding layers to their villainy. A few details, including the characters’ facial expressions and elements such as Ray’s lack of childhood amnesia, which allows him to remember his birth, seem a bit far-fetched, but The Promised Neverland is still an amazing anime with unique ideas and style.
