The Secret’s Out In ‘Kaiju No. 8’! So What’s In Store Now For Kafka?

Hibino Kafka’s secret has been revealed! In order to save the base and much of the surrounding area from a nuclear-level explosion, Kafka went into kaiju mode in front of everyone. Now all his teammates, including his Captain and former childhood friend Mina Ashiro, know his secret; so what’s next for Kaiju No. 8?

Our protagonist’s biggest secret, one he kept to ensure his freedom from potential testing and captivity at the hands of the Defence Force, has finally been revealed. This marks a huge moment for the anime as it builds towards the first season’s penultimate episode. With his secret out what will happen to Kafka?

We can find out in Episode 11, which will air right on schedule on Saturday, June 22 on Crunchyroll.

Let’s recap

In the last episode, Episode 10, we saw Hoshino continue his attack on the monster despite being outmatched and running out of stamina. Just as things looked dark for Hoshina, caught in the grasp of the behemoth, Captain Ashiro returned putting her full power into blasting Kaiju No. 10 from the face of the earth.

We see that in the relationship between Hoshina and Ashiro, both have their strengths, with Hoshino paving the way for his Captain to come in and finish the job. Just when we thought it was over, a huge pulsating blob made of combined wyvern kaiju appears above them, threatening to detonate and kill everyone in the vicinity. At this point Kafka runs forward, against Reno’s wishes, transforming into Kaiju No. 8 (with new and improved jet thrusters apparently).

He bounds towards the suspended bomb and pushes it high into the sky where it explodes at a safer distance, sparing everyone. He falls back to the ground where he shields officers from the resulting blast. When the dust clears though, Mina is standing behind him, gun trained on him, and says, “We’ll be taking you into custody.” Yeesh. No, “Thanks for saving us, that was awesome!” That’s cold.

What’s next for Kafka?

Kafka has a lot of questions to answer in the next episode which will now follow the manga’s Captured arc. We can expect lots of debate amongst the Defence Force’s upper echelons as to what to do with Kafka. We have seen this type of debate play out again and again in anime, from Eren Yaeger’s trial after emerging as a titan to Yuji Itadori’s fate after having consumed Sukuna’s finger.

Much like in the above anime, we can’t imagine that extermination will be Kafka’s fate, as that would likely make season one the show’s first and last season. Kafka now must prove himself—prove his humanity and his desire to do good if he is going to have a chance of standing by Mina’s side as he always promised.