Hello everyone!!
It’s me Mel!
Hope you are all safe, washing your hands regularly and respecting the social distanciation.
Today, I’m sharing with you another OWLS post.
OWLS stands for Otaku Warrior for Liberty and Self-respect, we are a group of bloggers and vlogger who want to promote the acceptance of everyone regardless of their gender, sexuality, ethnicity, religion or disabilities. Each month we are exploring a given topic throughout pop culture.
This month topic is: HOPE
We are in the midst of a pandemic which has led people to live in fear and anxiety over the coronavirus. For this month, rather than seeing the dark side of the situation we are living in, we will be exploring anime and other pop culture mediums that bring hope for humanity and why they have such a positive impact on us.
Once again I was wondering which series I will cover for the tour, at one point I even came to doubt that I will participate in the tour.
Luckily I found one series that I think portrayed pretty well what happens when you have hope, when hope helps you to continue what you are doing, helping you to never give up.
This series is The Promised Neverland.
The Promised Neverland is a manga series written by Kaiu Shirai and illustrated byPosuka Demizu; the series had its debut in August 2016 chapters in the Weekly Shounen Jump magazine and is published as tankōbon volume by Sheisha. The series is published by Viz Media in North America. In January 2019, the studio Cloverwork, produced the anime adaption that counts so far one season.
** This post will contain spoilers for those of you who only watched the anime or is not updated the manga **
Emma thought she was living a happy life with her “family” and “Mother”, she had a lot of younger siblings and enjoyed taking care of them, playing with them, each day she also had to pass exams that would rank them. She was one of the best and her Mother loved her for that, not only she was smart, but she also had great physical skills. She really thought she was living an awesome life, until she learnt the truth.
The truth of being livestock for demons, they were born and raised in order to be given as food for the demon. Once she knew the truth, Emma and the other oldest kid put a plan together in order to escape what wasn’t their home, the Grace Field House, anymore but a farm.
Some of the kids managed to get out and once outside it wasn’t easy, they were chased by the demon, they needed to get into a safe place, they needed to find a way to get to the Neverland, a place where humans were living free of demons.
During their journey to find a way to live in a peaceful world without fear of being eaten by the demons, more than one time the escapees from Grace Field wonder if they could make it, but Emma with her optimisme became their symbols of hope, hope for better days. Emma never gives up even when they are in a situation that looks like they will not make it, she also managed to rally to her ideal people who thought the only way to be able to live peacefully was to kill all the demons.
That was Norman’s plan, he wanted to kill the Queen of the demon in order to be able to live freely, but Emma managed to make him see that it was possible to coexist with them, not only she show Norman there was hope, but she also gain the respect of those who was following Norman, Emma also became their symbol of hope, that little light of optimist in a dark sea of pessimism. They believed in her and trusted her decision, they were ready to follow her.
Emma didn’t only give hope to the kid raised as livestock, she also gave hope to the one they were calling mother, despite everything they had done to the children, Emma still wanted them to be happy, at one point they were like them after all, the mothers were also products from the farm.
Emma truly believed what she was doing was right, with a new Promise, she had hope they could live free from the fear of being eaten, she was hoping to be able to live in a peaceful world alongside the demon.
“Just because our positions are different, we fight, denigrate and hate each other. But if we take away our positions… if we could think that way..maybe we wouldn’t have to hate each other.”
This was my post for the April owls, don’t forget to read Naja’s post that went up on the 20th and keep an eye out for Carla’s post due for the 27th. You can find the full schedule here.
Stay safe everyone!!
~ Thank you for Reading ~
Mel's Universe 
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