Death Parade

A Japanese TV original, this moody series depicts a postmortem existence—usually resembling an empty saloon—in which newly deceased humans arrive sans memories of their deaths, to be judged by “arbiters,” powerful immortals who determine the destiny of human souls. Some souls are reincarnated and others are discarded—based on their true natures, which are revealed under stress when the simple recreational games they are made to play become nightmarish. A stoic arbiter called Decim, disguised as a bartender, presides over these trials. Despite his stolid demeanor, Decim agonizes over rendering correct judgments, and he has made the unheard-of decision to take a mildly goth-like human girl (a soul he found himself unable to determine) as an assistant. As different casualties—a pop idol and an adoring fan, newlyweds, a vigilante detective, a reality-show star—enter to be judged, a larger backstory emerges involving the arbiters and their ethics (or lack thereof). Striking, poetic, and sometimes violent imagery accompanies the provocative themes here, and if the logic is never quite as clear as one might hope, the effect is nevertheless transfixing. Presenting all 12 episodes from 2015 in a dual-language Blu-ray/DVD Combo set, rated TV-MA, extras include episode commentaries, a behind-the-scenes featurette, and “Death Billiards”—the one-off cartoon that became the basis for the series. Highly recommended. (C. Cassady)