This show punches you in the chest when you're not ready, then does it again thirteen times in a row. Maeda builds characters you think exist for one reason, then reveals the actual weight they've been carrying the entire time. By the finale, you're not watching a show about the afterlife, you're watching people say goodbye, and that goodbye costs something real.

Otonashi wakes up in an afterlife that takes the form of a high school, with no memory of his life except his last name. This strange place between life and death shelters people who died unwanted deaths. Resenting God for how their lives went, some residents have formed the Afterlife Battlefront, also called the SSS, a rebel group led by Yuri Nakamura. Their enemy is Kanade Tachibana, the student council president they call Angel, whose purpose they see as wiping out everyone in this world. Yuri hands Otonashi a gun, and after Angel nearly kills him, he joins the fight to put off his next life. As he tries to recover his past and understand this world, Otonashi starts to doubt the rightness of the group's cause and reaches out to learn Angel's side. The mix of action, comedy, drama and supernatural elements frames a question he must face: once he remembers how he died, will he keep fighting or let himself fade away?