Tonight was the premiere of the final episode of The Promise Neverland. I'm sad but also at peace with the ending.
So for anyone who has not started this series please stop reading this after this brief summary and switch your browser to Crunchyroll.
The one adored as the mother is not their real mother. The children that live together are not truly related by blood but by bond. The Gracefield House is where 38 orphaned children live their lives laughing and playing carelessly. Until, one day their life suddenly comes to an end...
Disclaimer I have not read the manga yet.
Norman, Emma, and Ray find out that the orphanage is really a human farm. It is a place where they produce children and allows them to live careless free lives and bliss until a certain age and then they get sent to "foster care." When in truth, they are sent to be harvested for demonic consumption. The entire time during the duration of the series Emma and Norman plot their entire family's escape while not allowing their mother to know. Though, unknown to them the mother already knows that they are aware of the truth, and later asks for help from Sister Krone who in return betrays the mother and helps the children. Prior to their decision to save everyone, the trio was in a constant battle of saving themselves and saving everyone. Ray wanted to save himself or just the trio entirely and Norman wanted whatever Emma wanted, and Emma wanted to save everyone.
So before we get to the resolution of the series. Sister Krone.
First, Sister Krone's appearance is disturbing to me. Why is her nose so big? And why is her hair portrayed as nappy and un-kept? Then she also has big lips and can run extremely fast. I don't know she seems portrayed as a stereotypical black animation. I'm just not a fan of it. But her character, in general, is very complex. She did what she had to do in order to survive. She was also an opportunist, she was willing to "destroy" Mother Isabelle in order to become a house mother and willing to help the children to protect herself. Her sole motivation was because she always wanted to be a mother. To expose Isabelle as an unfit mother for allowing the trio to find out about the truth, she would get a promotion in return. What prompted her to help the children was that she thought was getting a promotion because of Isabelle's recommendation but also because she was threatened by her to basically mind her business. In the end, she never got what she truly wanted... motherhood. In the finale when the flashback of Isabelle was presented is showed her pregnant. This can mean that prior to becoming a house mother, the women who train to be promoted are the biological mothers to the children of the plant. So the doll that Krone kept was probably her "baby." She may have been pregnant at some point and lost the child as to why she never got the chance to be a house mother or she simply was just unable to get pregnant. (If you have read the manga please leave a comment)
Now lets discuss Mother Isabelle.
Mother Isabelle also seems like a complex character to me as well. She was a mother. She did what she had to do in order to survive. That does not take away the fact that she did love her children. Although she did stop the children's many attempts to flee, she did love them. If they continued their scheme to escape they would have died sooner rather than living their lives to the fullest within the plant until it was their time to go. What she did to Norman was foul. But I don't think she was lying when she told him that she was grateful to have met and raised someone like him. I am sure that she keeps all the artifacts from the children who she has harvested not only because she wants to keep it a secret from the rest of them but because she cherishes them in remembrance. In the end, the truth about Isabelle was revealed. She is the biological mother of Ray. This makes sense from when he mentioned his memories date back to the beginning, from being inside of her womb to how he became her spy with no explanation. But the truth beyond that on how she became a house mother, she was caught by her own house mother when she was pondering by the same wall her children used to flee. She was then introduced to the Grandmother and proceeded from there. She loved her children, biological or not. She watched them escape even when she clearly had time to go after them beyond the wall or even just stop Emma from jumping to the other side of it. She just watched and did not interfere with them anymore. She even wished them good luck on their journey to safety and reassured Phil.
In the end we lost Norman the brain but everyone was able to escape because of his detailed and revised plan.
It has also been confirmed that there will definitely be a season 2. Emma has to come back for Phil and the others. So stay up baby boy.
