Tower of God Episode 6

Tower of God Episode 6

Position Selection

There was a lot of interesting information in Tower of God episode 6. In fact, there was so much that I guarantee I’m not going to be able to touch on all of it. But, the main topics of discussion today are going to be the team positions, the tests for those positions, and the huge revelation regarding Anaak.

So to get right into it, Lero Ro tells us that when you climb the tower, you do so in teams of five. Now, I thought this was interesting because everything up to this point has been done in teams of three. So the shift to five-person teams is a bit strange, but alright.

Then, within each team there are five different roles, and from what he said, it seems like each team only gets one person per role. This means you can’t have a team of three Fishermen and two Spear Bearers for maximum damage per second. And, that fact is going to break up quite a few of the current three-man teams.

The five roles for those climbing the tower from the anime series Tower of God
The five roles for those climbing the tower

The five roles pictured above are Fisherman, Spear Bearer, Light Bearer, Scout, and Wave Controller. Each role specializes in a certain aspect, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they can’t do anything else.

Fishermen are the close-quarters fighters who use swords and the like (I don’t know why they’re called Fishermen). Spear Bearers are long-range fighters who primarily use spears — Rak. Light bearers gather and distribute information to their team — Khun. Scouts are scouts as the name implies. And Wave Controllers are basically the support/leaders who use Shinsu — Bam.

This separation into roles is also interesting because not every character’s role is immediately clear. I would have thought Bam was a Fisherman.

Position Tests

Continuing on with that last point about not all of the characters having obvious roles, Lero Ro also refers to these roles as being “assigned.” So it’s possible that the reason some of these roles don’t match up with what we know about the characters is that they were (somewhat) arbitrarily assigned.

But, I don’t think that’s the case.

Going farther back to my point about a character holding one role doesn’t mean they can’t be proficient at the skills of another, we can get a better understanding of how roles are assigned. Basically every character has the capacity to fulfill every role at some level, but they’re much more proficient at one or two than the rest.

Bam is a perfect example of this. We know that he fights with a sword, specifically the sword originally owned by a Fisherman, and yet he’s a Wave Controller. Why is this? Well, just because Bam can use a sword doesn’t mean that’s what he’s best at. We’ve also seen that he has the capability to use massive amounts of Shinsu.

Bam making a pact with the floor 2 Shinsu from the anime series Tower of God
Bam making a pact with the floor 2 Shinsu

We can also see this combination of different roles in action during the Fishermen test, in which Anaak throws a spear and uses Shinsu. That test is also the only one in which those taking the test were competing to defeat one another. The Spear Bearer test was the next closest to that but simply involved hitting a target.

Then, while we don’t see the test for the Scout, the Light Bearer and Wave Controller tests are very different. The Light Bearers are simply looking up information on the other test-takers, and the Wave Controllers learn how to form a pact with the Shinsu of the floor (which is basically a tailed beast).

Anaak 2.0

Despite the massive amount of information which was dumped on us in this episode, I actually thought a lot of it was presented in a good way — which is rare when there’s that much. But there was one thing which felt a bit off, and that’s the revelation about Anaak’s identity.

To be clear, I don’t have an issue with that development existing in the series. My issue is with how it was presented. It felt rushed, which messed with the pacing of this episode, and I think it could also end up messing with the pacing of the next episode as well.

You see, normally something that major wouldn’t be dropped on us towards the end of an episode, but then also leave enough time to briefly explain it. The episode could have ended on a cliffhanger with Endorsi saying that she now understands who Anaak is, but it didn’t.

Anaak defeated by Endorsi from the anime series Tower of God
Anaak defeated by Endorsi

Instead, after Endorsi claims she knows who Anaak is, she straight up tells us that this Anaak is actually the daughter of the original Anaak who died. I think that bit of information could have been saved for the next episode, but whatever. Then, the episode goes on to give us a brief explanation of the original Anaak, and this just makes everything worse.

Why would you not leave that for the next episode? I’m sure we’re going to see more of it then, so what was the point of explaining the (almost) cliffhanger now? I get that the new cliffhanger is the mystery of why Anaak was killed by the other Princesses of Jahad, but we really seemed to have glossed over Anaak’s identity to get there.

Khun sets up the cliffhanger that Anaak is listed as a dead ranker (someone who climbed the tower to completion). Then Endorsi recognizes Anaak’s identity. And then we’re pushed off the cliff instead of left hanging for no reason.

Conclusion

What are your thoughts on Tower of God episode 6? Do you like the role system? And who do you think will be the final two members of Bam’s party (if we’ve even seen them yet)? Also, how did you feel about the pacing at the end of the episode? Let me know your thoughts in the comments.

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My review of the next episode is available here.

2 Replies to “Tower of God Episode 6”

  1. Hey,

    as I said in the discord, i really enjoy your thoughts on the series. I can totally see where you are coming from with the pacing being a bit wonky. They compress the story a lot (like “6 chapters per episode” adaption rate). They focus very much on the plot, so the stuff thats not making it in is mostly world-building and character interactions without any direct relevance to the plot. But while it is not necessary, it takes away a bit of the charme of the series and makes some things harder to understand.

    Good blog! ~ ES

    1. Thanks for your comment.

      As I mentioned in Discord as well, I really think this series would be better off if they slowed down the pacing and actually covered a lot of the world building which is being skipped. World building and characters matter a lot more to me than the plot does, which may seem strange to a lot of people. But the way I see it, a plot is really good when it fits into the world building of a series and the characters interact with the events of that plot in meaningful ways based on how they too have been built.

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