'Dorohedoro' Season 1 Ending Explained: Laying out the clues of a mystery that is still unsolved
Spoilers for 'Dorohedoro' Season 1
For all its chaos, tangential storylines and mind-bending action, one must never forget that 'Dorohedero' is a mystery — one that Season 1 leaves unsolved. However, it's worth looking back through the season for clues. Much like the end of each episode, we're going to review what we've learned about Caiman's (Wataru Takagi) mysterious circumstances — and exactly where he and Nokaido (Reina Kondo) stand at the end of Season 1.
The Cross Eyes Man
At some time in the past, during his rise to power, the ultra-powerful mushroom sorcerer En (Kenyu Horiuchi) came up against the powerful leader of the Cross Eyes gang. This man was so powerful that he pushed even En to his limits. En unleashed his powers, turning everyone in the city into mushrooms, but he believes he saw this mysterious leader disappear through a doorway, despite being beheaded. This is why En seeks a time-traveller — he wants to go back in time to make sure, once and for all, the man is dead.
The Alley
Some time later, Nokaido found a body in an alley, with a lizard head and crosses over its eyes, bringing it to the hospital. This lizard-headed man was Caiman, so named for a species of lizard he resembles. Caiman, for his part, remembers nothing of his previous life — but towards the end of the season, he knows that "something evil" had been growing larger and larger inside him, until he woke up to his new life in the Hole, with no memories and a strange man in his mouth.
Risu
Caiman cannot communicate with the man in his mouth, but we learn that his person is a copy, of sorts, of a man with cross-eyes named Risu (Songdo), whose head was found in a locked box. Once resurrected, we find that Risu worked for the cross-eyes gang, before he was killed by a mysterious figure who looks a lot like the man who faced En six years ago. Risu is also best friends with a mysterious man named Akaiwa whose face is never shown, but who gets headaches and disappears — Akaiwa is somehow connected to Risu's murder.
Who is responsible?
So far, the only lead there is as to who transformed Caiman is Ebiyu (Miyu Tomita), whose magic power is revealed to be the ability to transform people into lizards. She is the one person whom the Risu-ghost inside Caiman's mouth recognizes. He does not tell her "You are not the one," as he does for all other sorcerers, but instead says, "You got in my way!" — implying that she had something to do with Risu's death herself.
Nokaido
While Nokaido may not have had much to do with the mystery surrounding Caiman's death, she has grown to be his closest friend, and it's worth looking at what happened to her story. Thanks to a forced contract signed with En, she has a link to him, as his partner. This gives him the ability to control her — and, theoretically, gives her the ability to control him — but she has removed the contract from inside her body. It will still regenerate, but only if she sees En again — and she and Caiman ended the season having run far, far away from the sorcerer's world.
It's also worth noting that she has not confirmed that she has time-traveling powers, nor have we seen her demonstrate it, only that she has a power that she wants to hide from En. It was En who claims she had those powers, and she has never been in a position to deny it. It may be a while before we find out what her magic actually does, as she promised never to use it again in order to remain friends with Caiman.
What we'll learn in Season 2 is still hidden in chaos — and that is 'Dorohedoro.'
All episodes of 'Dorohedero' Season 1 are now available on Netflix.
