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So on my Sims game I have a whole bunch of OTPs living together. Been doing this for a while just to keep my favourite girls in one place. Recently I've set aside basement space for specific types of OTPs... the ones that no longer can function in canon. As in, they have been super sunk and no reality or dream can make life better for these ships. However, the criteria for them is a lot more nuanced than simply a ship that cannot go on. I thought to define these sets of criteria, to truly express my despair at how far down these ships fell.

Initially half the OTPs were in this unfortunate club, but I began thinking about how the two characters were treated in canon and how they interacted, and one definitely has a lot more going for them than the other two. There are six OTPs in total living in the household. This is the order I put them in from absolutely canon, no doubts about it all the way to these two characters have canon ships with someone else.

1. YuuTouko from Bloom Into You
Bloom Into You is literally a romance story about these two as a couple, or blooming into a couple I should say. It does NOT get more canon than them!

2. KyouSaya from Puella Magi Magica Madoka
Though the status of their mortality is complicated, and I have yet to see the sequel, Magia Record if these two are even in them, as of Rebellion they're not explicitly canon, but as canon as one can get. Sayaka's little subplot with her dude crush is lightyears away at this point.

3. AyaSanae from Touhou Project
A rarepair! Not at all canon, but the nature of Touhou where romance doesn't exist and no one ever dies means literally zero ships will ever be canon or sunk, so these two can be a forever dream, never to come true, but never to be quashed either. Unless something in the status quo has changed, it is firmly on this tier.

4. Tenmiko from Danganronpa V3, Killing Harmony
And this is the ship I mentioned earlier, where I have firmly decided they do not belong in the basement of tears. Yes, one character is canonly dead so it's not as if this ship can ever sail, but they had lots of interaction in canon, and their development as characters depended on each other the most of any other. Plus it is canon in a one-sided sense, as Tenko had chased Himiko until her death. ):

5. Monochrome from RWBY
How are these guys not dead last!? I blame the MLP finale. Yes, Blake is with Yang, but as of season 6 as I have not seen 7 yet, Weiss is still a suitable bachelorette! The series is not over, and technically anything can happen. Also neither of them are dead or anything. I will elaborate on their status later on.

6. PinkieShy from My Little Pony, Friendship is Magic
Sigh.

Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy had the least amount of potential anyway, but it's still gives me a bit of a sad twang what happened to them. Not so much that they are in official relationships with other ponies/creatures even though they are, but rather that throughout the entire nine seasons of MLP, several movies and specials of EQG, and throughout all the comics as far as I'm aware, we never got a single episode focused especially on these two. No conflict of friendship they needed to get through, no obstacle from a third party the two of them had to get over, absolutely nothing. The closest I got was Buckball Season, where the two started their professional sports careers. No I did not see that coming whatsoever, but while it was a lovely episode, they shared it with RD and AJ, and the conflict was between the four of them. In subsequent episodes featuring Buckball, the two of them were always in the backdrop of a different plot, usually involving Rainbow Dash. Why bother putting them in this situation if every future Buckball episode just focuses on the already-an-athletic-member-of-the-cast anyway!? Gah.

There was one EQG short that focused on them, which was ironically a cheerleading short... whereas in Ponyland the two ARE the athletes and that one Buckball episode was Rainbow Dash coaching the cheerleaders... let's just say the EQG short was charming and cute but rather generic in execution. It got to the point that I was simply hoping anytime any of the ponies were paired together it would be them, just once. And not in a lazy, boring way either. Rainbow Roadtrip had the two of them sharing an activity and thus befriending the same villagers, but their subplot was by far the least interesting of them all in an already dull and slow-paced special. You COULDN'T EVEN MAKE MY TWO FAVOURITE PONIES INTERESTING, HOW, WHY. The two of them didn't really interact with one another, so yea. Plus every other member of the main six each had an individual subplot in the story so it felt like Ponks and Floots were like the leftovers they weren't sure what to do with.

But stuff like the Best Gift Ever special, where I was hoping the Secret Santa would yield interesting pairs instead of the same ones over and over again---NOPE! It's the same ones over and over again. They even did it in EQG too. Why is Rainbow Dash always getting Fluttershy? Yes we have had numerous episodes focusing on the two and they were childhood friends as well, so why do we need even MORE interaction for them? Especially this late in the series when the show is ending soon, you could explore OTHER pairs and other interactions but EVEN STILL you just go back to your usual? WHY?!?! You could have done Rainbow with Twilight or something, or Dash with Rarity, or even Dash with Pinkie. We also got Pinkie and Twilight as the pair (it was even MORE disappointing when most everyone just got each other, instead of everyone having to give presents to another pony, like what are the chances of that?) and Rarity got AJ as always. AJ only got Spike so we could have more Spike and Rarity interaction. The song in the end was cute and to be fair, Spike sought out Rarity because of his crush so that one is understandable, but the rest is aggravating.

They probably would have been rock bottom in the list anyway, but I was hoping for at least one episode involving them before the whole series ended. Their dynamic started out strong in Season One, which was a season that was a lot softer and wholesome than the following seasons. See, after season one they ditched their educational rating, so the episodes had more freedom to do whatever and wasn't so strict in terms of their target demographic. However what season one did and what I'm sure Lauren Faust emphasized, since she stepped down after this season and wasn't involved whatsoever beyond the second season, is to keep Pinkie grounded. What I mean is that, it seems like she knew that Pinkie had that potential to devolve into that LOLRANDOM type of character who would become more and more controversial and annoying over time, and in season one it seemed like the writers made sure not to let Pinkie fall into that territory. But without her influence and that child-friendly rating they were free to write Pinkie as they saw fit, and moulded her into the type of comedy they wanted to write as opposed to writing the comedy around Pinkie.

This leads to discrepancies, from Pinkie understanding Fluttershy's sensitivity in episode five all the way in season one, to becoming a one-dimensional gag in episode fourteen of season four, all to worsen Fluttershy's anxiety with her innocently insensitive remarks. We are supposed to laugh at Pinkie because she doesn't know better, but SHE DID KNOW BETTER. She did. I know I've ranted about Filli Vanilli to death at this point, and the episode's reputation is moreso the fans' complaints over the actual content, but as someone who loves both these characters I can't let go of it. Especially when the two of them lack much interaction at all, having one of them to be so negative (as well as the Putting Your Hoof Down incident in season two) leaves a lot to be desired. Who would actually ship them after those negative interactions? Nobody. A lot of the ship's popularity came early, when Pinkie sang and jumped across the gorge to encourage Fluttershy, when Fluttershy jump-hugged her out of worry in Appleloosa. There are however isolated scenes in the later seasons where their interactions have been largely positive. The most notable is the scene in The Mean Six, of season eight. Fluttershy is upset due to a misunderstanding with the animals through an anti-version of her running around, and Pinkie's first impulse is to hug and comfort her, and stop all gags and progress in the camping trip to console her. It's great and I love it, but alas it is just one scene in one season, when their last notable interaction was back in season six in Buckball Season.

Plus a lot of the more recent Pinkie episodes have had her largely separated from the rest of the group. The conflict isn't Pinkie vs. another pony of the main six, but Pinkie is causing the conflict and the rest of them have to fix it, or she goes off to Yakyakistan like always to solve her problem somehow. She doesn't do anything special or specific with any other character. The only reason we got some of that in the theatrical movie was because that movie was written by the earlier writers of the series, who stopped working on the show specifically to focus on the movie. Though Pinkie was still doing some odd and annoying things (We get that she loves to have fun, but she shouldn't be having fun and being goofy to the detriment of others or her own life, like when she leaped happily on the rope and almost fell to her death, but wasn't even phased when Twilight was rightfully angry with her after saving her) she was still in the right when it came down to the climax, but because of her actions previously we completely understand Twilight's frustrations and fury.

I suppose the last time it was Pinkie versus another specific pony from the Mane Six, it was the Pinkie vs. Rainbow Dash one about pies. Of course I can complain again that PinkieDash eps aren't new or interesting, but even so this episode wasn't like, overdone at this point. I did not mind another Pinkie and Rainbow Dash episode, but in the context of Pinkie episodes as a whole, where she doesn't seem to have many episodes later on with another specifically it's a little disappointing. Secrets and Pies was kind of an iffy episode anyway. At this point with its running theme I get that Pinkie is sensitive herself (which makes her insensitivity all the more annoying) but it still bothers me how often that flaw of hers comes up, and how often everyone else tries to avoid it. Maybe if they told her the truth more often she would not have this complex? I don't know.

As someone whose favourite pony is Pinkie Pie I sure do have a lot to criticize! Well why couldn't she have gone WITH someone to fix Cheese Sandwich in her final episode? And why did they paint Pinkie so dumb in the trivia episode? Yeah she may not have knowledge of everything, but I would imagine with Pinkie's ridiculous organization skills and photographic memory she'd know SOME things. Often these types of characters are wiser than they seem, as a sort of comedic contrast to their personality. I've seen that kind of wisdom come from Pinkie before, but nope! She dumb. Hurr. Especially when the other contestants were largely other ponies of average minds. Like Rainbow Dash is there, and she isn't notable in terms of her study habits, so what gives? I'm not even gonna start with Yakity-Sax.

It's sad when the later Pinkie episodes aren't that great when compared to her champion marathon through season four. Seriously ALL of her episodes in season four were absolute top-tier. Season five was okay, but it all died when the Yaks were introduced. I dunno if they're a symptom necessarily, or a causation, but the episodes did drop in quality when her episodes only involved Yaks or Maud. Yeah I liked the Maud episodes but those were because of Maud, not Pinkie.

But ANYWAY, about the other ships. I've already given my two cents on the Monos. Well, not necessarily. The reason they're also low isn't because Bumblebee is a thing, even if it is, it's because as the series went on with the White Fang conflict, it seemed like a no-brainer that the Schnee Dust Company and thus Weiss would enter the subplot one way or another, considering the White Fang and the SDC are opposites and enemies. But unfortunately, any nuance or subtlety that plot had was thrown out the window when Adam's character was reduced to that of a psychotic ex-boyfriend. It was like any passion he had in his movement, even if he was extreme, was thrown on the wayside for his absolute pursuit of Blake and everyone Blake loves, specifically Yang. It was a political story about discrimination and oppression, but instead of going for everything they set up for as early as the trailers themselves, it just became like a twisted love-triangle thing to advance romance. Like I wasn't expecting Blake or Weiss to get together, but I knew from their backstories they had this thematic conflict brewing and it would reach a climax one day, with great payoff, but instead we the audience are shocked to see Adam branded with the SDC logo, and then killed off, and Weiss not being a part of any of this. She never even met him! Even if what I expected to happen DID happen and Bumblebee sailed anyway, I'd be less upset. Maybe I'd be upset in the "but they had such great dynamic through their shared pasts!" argument, but at least the story I thought would come to fruition actually did, and if Bumblebee happens it happens.

And somehow these two ships are lower than the one where one is DEAD. Even if Himiko has in canon only ever shown interest in men, and even if she'd never see Tenko beyond a potential friend, when their friendship was finally turning a new leaf and then DEATH, they are still higher than those two. Y'know why? BECAUSE THEIR STORIES DID HAPPEN. THEY CAME TO A CONCLUSION AND WENT SOMEWHERE. Whereas Pinkie and Fluttershy never had an episode despite being TWO of the main characters in a show called FRIENDSHIP IS MAGIC in the span of over TWO HUNDRED EPISODES, and where Blake and Weiss had massive foreshadowing for some sort of racial and political plot from as EARLY AS THEIR TRAILERS which started in the first two seasons but then never went ANYWHERE, at least Tenko and Himiko's stories HAPPENED!!

And I love their tragic story. Their subplot and characters may be underappreciated by fans, but the writer did not shy away from their progress. Tenko was written to advance Himiko's character. This is true, because Tenko's story ended before the halfway mark, and Himiko went on to survive. But even so, what we did get of Tenko is someone who was genuinely in love with, and cared for the person that is Himiko. She started off with a very shallow and superficial crush that evolved over time to something beautiful. When she saw that Himiko was not the perfect mage girl she had dreamed of, she did her utmost to protect her and guide her along the right path, to help mould Himiko to that ideal. Himiko was suffering and needed someone to be there for her, and for most of the first two chapters it could not be Tenko, because Tenko still only saw Himiko as a shallow crush, but when it came time to defend Himiko when she became a suspect, and when Himiko fell into the cult at her weakest hour, Tenko was there to defend, to go undercover, to protect and assist. Himiko's escapism was met with Tenko's grounded philosophy, so even if the ship could never come true, even if Tenko lived, their stories were intertwined together. They could not exist without the other in the plot! Himiko would be dead if not for Tenko, and Tenko may have had no one to latch on as a morality pet without Himiko what with her overdone and one-note hatred of men.

I don't think I really need to bother with the other three, but I will say my current favourite OTPs are... the ones in the bottom 3. Alas! This is not unique to this ship either. I recall being similarly upset with KazuSayo from Negima. Every character in the class would have their pactio chapter one-day, where they enter a contract with the main character. It was something that always happened and usually did after some character discovered magic's existence, but not necessarily right after. Kazumi discovered it way long ago but only entered the contract in the final arc, but what I was waiting for was for Sayo's. Usually anyone with even an inkling of a crush on the main character got lots of spotlight and panel time for their pactio, and Sayo did have a minor one. I was waiting with eager anticipation for Sayo's chapter, so I'd see more Sayo and therefore Kazumi since they were best friends. They even teased it in like the first page or the front page of the magazine the manga was published in, but it NEVER HAPPENED because Negima suddenly ended. THE SALT I HAD was unfathomable. It's not as if it ended without a conclusion because it got cancelled somehow. The mangaka ended it himself as a protest for some law. A story he had been illustrating for like eight years suddenly over. He simply rushed out a conclusion and epilogue despite many story beats only starting or in the process of, and ended it.

I waited many years for that pactio. Sayo's knowledge of magic came quite shortly after her first appearance, what with magic being required for her to be seen, so I was not a happy camper to say the least. My investment on the actual plot and the more important characters was waning, especially since it had become a full-blown shounen manga, and the main character's power level had advanced so far that all of his students, even the most powerful ones with like one exception could not possibly catch up and could only play support. Only the male characters he meets or already knows with great passion for fighting could rival him, which made the story all the more boring and annoying. A story with such a varied cast of females reduced to that of support in a shounen manga was just not something I felt inclined to follow. My only reason for reading on was for the supposedly-inevitable and even teased Sayo pactio. But it never happened.

I am sad that that scenario happened not once, but twice again.

Current Mood: sore

I JUST GOT AN IDEA I MIGHT WRITE ABOUT

LIKE AN IDEA I REALLY REALLY LIKE

I HAVEN'T FELT LIKE THIS FOR YEARS

EVER SINCE I CAME UP WITH THE RWBY FIC IDEA IN 2013 AND SPAWNED A 300,000 WORD MONSTROSITY I MOSTLY REFUSE TO RELEASE TO THE WORLD

oh btw DANGANRONPA V3 SPOILERS OBVIOUSLY

so there's several different kinds of fics that run rampant in V3, mostly alternate scenario fics, the most popular being what if Kaede lived and wasn't a decoy protagonist !! which is great and all but not what I'm thinking of

another common one is pregame/prologue versions of the characters which at first I was mostly lukewarm about because the personalities of those before the ones I fell in love with never seemed particularly interesting to me UNLESS there was a TWIST !!! to who they were, that made V3 even MORE OF A TRAGEDY

some common ones I see are like, Kokichi was like a nice meek dude or whatever before he became lying incarnate, or X character is now a douchenozzle because they were so good in canon, like Kaito being a complete dick etc which does have some basis in canon because there were glimpses of a few characters pre-Danganronpa. in fact, my all time favourite fic in all of dangan ronpa is a pregame scenario depicting Korekiyo and Tenko before the game, which I wish was canon 'cause it's so juicy and ironic or whatever the word is compared to V3's chapter three. I link fic here because it so good

anyway I came across artwork of pregame Tenko and Himiko and their expressions gave me this idea. Since they are IN MY OPINIOn the closest thing V3 has to a yuri couple (I mean it's still one-sided so it's like, half-canon at most, but that's really as far as V3 has ever gotten unless Mikan's unhealthy delirious foreshadowing attraction to Junko counts (NO IT DOESN'T!!!) and Ibuki's random outbursts of girl-loving is just scratching the surface ANYWAY) what if pregame they were like the stereotypical yuri anime protagonists? THEIR DESIGNS FIT!

Think of animes like Strawberry Panic or Kannazuki no Miko! There's this ULTRA IMPOSSIBLY COOL SUPER TALENTED dark-haired tall expressionless beauty who is like rich and popular and all the boys and girls want to date her but she doesn't care and is always stone-faced because that is THE COOL THING. This is like, the absolute opposite of Tenko's personality, but her pregame design fits! She wears one of the more expensive school uniforms like she's ultra rich or something and doesn't have any of the goofy girly bows and ribbons and such all over her like in her normal design, so it could work! So basically she's carrying on life like the privileged noble she is, playing some crazy difficult instrument, being the fastest in all the relays in gym and acing all her tests or w/e I don't care, and then .... !!

Himiko, the AVERAGE JAPANESE HIGH SCHOOL GIRL, wearing her stereotypical SAILOR FUKU, transfers to the school! Now you may ask how average is the opposite of Himiko, but Himiko in-game is such an oddball in so many ways (especially in the Japanese version where she speaks like an elderly mage character in an RPG) that average works! So she's like genki but NOT THAT GENKI, and tries her best!!! but her best is usually average to above-average, and then she catches glimpse of the COOLEST GIRL ON THE BLOCK, Tenko! And at first she admires her and idolizes her but of course that feeling may evolve into MORE! But Tenko always brushes her off and ignores her like she ignores everyone else because she's too busy maintaining her coolness.

Oh and Angie can come too! BUT INSTEAD, THIS VERSION OF ANGIE is Himiko's bestest friend! Who always supports her and is her wingman! She's like the ultimate best friend, and I think if I were watching an anime like this I'd prefer Himiko to be shipped with Angie because she always cares and supports her unlike the aloof cool girl Himiko yearns for, but I DIGRESS! Also she is just normal ultra genki girl, or whatever.

Anyway I haven't figured out any concrete reason why any of these three would join Danganronpa but the first thing that popped in my head is maybe Tenko feels isolated, bored, and lonely, and is secretly super arrogant inside or whatever. HER INTELLECT AND ATHLETIC IS FAR SUPERIOR ABOVE EVERYONE ELSE so she thinks she can join Danganronpa and defeat them all, or if she doesn't her bored life can end and that's that. Maybe there's some complicated super hidden complexes and depression deep inside her idk, and then Himiko is like "NO SHE'S THROWING HER LIFE AWAY WE MUST CONVINCE HER NOT TO JOIN!!" and inadvertently ends up joining by accident with a worried Angie in tow I DON'T KNOW I HAVEN'T THOUGHT THIS FAR

The point is everything is flipped! And ironic! You see, in V3 Tenko is far less bright than potential pregame!Tenko, and her feelings are always out in the open. She's extremely gullible but very good natured and supportive/kind to others. The one-sided crush is flipped where Tenko now crushes on Himiko and does everything she can to befriend her or help her improve as a person. Himiko meanwhile has fallen into her own fantasies, has no real drive to do anything, and speaks/acts like a larper, a farcry from the average and normal girl of before. Angie switches from a super supportive best friend to a manipulative cult leader who leads Himiko down the wrong path and drives a wedge between her and Tenko. This makes the deaths in chapter three more hard-hitting, because Himiko pays no attention to Tenko and only realizes how good a friend she could have been too late, and though she still values Angie after her death, her reputation and influence on the others is now heavily damaged and down in the negatives.

It basically means Himiko's crush reciprocates but now Himiko doesn't, and doesn't even like her anymore, but when Himiko finally does appreciate her, Tenko is dead. Her best friend for the longest time now doesn't hesitate to suspect Himiko and throw her under the bus, and even endangers her life by upping the ante in her magic show with piranhas, all in the name of a fictional god fashioned for her fictional persona, far more toxic than a loyal, dear friend can be and now Angie's dead too! Also, in remembering her past/real life but retaining her current personality, Himiko might prefer fake persona Tenko to real!Tenko because real!Tenko always ignored her/never cared about her, which is all the more despair, but it's ultimately a moot point because they're dead anyway. IT GIVES LOTS OF CONFLICT TO THE STILL SURVIVING HIMIKO, struggling to figure out if it's a good idea to want Tenko back but not as herself, or if the fictional persona IS who Tenko is and she shouldn't feel guilty about it at all, or for Angie, being infuriated at what she turned into and everything Angie lost, but Angie is now dead so it doesn't matter. Her being an afterthought is also blood-boiling. This all makes Himiko more tired.

And that is ANOTHER thing, Himiko expressing herself and being more open is what her previous self could do easily, but she still gets tired very often, and this complicated thought process over her now deceased friends makes her all the more exhausted. And realizing that she remembers she could have been energetic/genki easily but it comes far more difficult to her now is incredibly confusing/even MORE tiring.

OH and what if, even though pregame!Angie supported Himiko's pursuits for uninterested super cool Tenko, she also realized Tenko might not be good for her, or isn't super realistic (because these stereotypical yuri anime couples were SUCH HEALTHY relationships!!!) , so sometimes she tries to distract Himiko from Tenko and to like, idk, her? MAYBE PREGAME ANGIE HAD A CRUSH ON HIMIKO, so Himiko now has MORE conflicted feelings, like, should she have just paid attention and hooked up with pregame Angie, or was it better to befriend and hook up with V3 Tenko!???? OR IS LIKING FICTIONAL TENKO WRONG BECAUSE SHE IS FICTIONAL? BUT NOW HIMIKO IS THE FICTIONAL HIMIKO, AND PREGAME ANGIE PROBABLY WOULDN'T HAVE LIKED FICTIONAL HIMIKO AND IT'S JUST ALL VERY CONFUSING AND DEPRESSING AND GAAHHHH

god this is one of those stories that would have like the Tenko/Himiko (onesided) tag that I'd avoid like the plague but I'd ALSO INCLUDE Himiko/Tenko (onesided) which makes sense in the context of this story but would be confusing as a descriptor, and then to boot Angie/Himiko (onesided) as an EXTRA whammy.

ALSO TEAM DANGANRONPA HAD THE GALL TO MAKE HIMIKO LIKE MEN AS WELL, WHEN PREGAME HIMIKO WAS FULL ON LESBIAN, AND SHE WAS STRAIGHT IN THE GAME, BUT REMEMBERING BOTH MAKES HER BI, WHICH IS FURTHER CONFUSION AND SADNESS FOR HIMIKO !!!! SO MUCH ENDLESS POTENTIAL FOR THIS STORY! SHE STRUGGLES WITH HER SEXUALITY BECAUSE SHE THOUGHT SHE EMBRACED HER FICTIONAL PERSONA, BUT THE MEMORY OF HER PREGAME!SELF RESURFACES ALL THESE GAY THOUGHTS AND SHE HAD A SELF-HATRED FOR PREGAME!HIMIKO BECAUSE SHE WAS STUPID ENOUGH TO SIGN UP FOR THIS KILLING GAME ALL FOR THIS GIRL WHO WASN'T GOOD FOR HER ANYWAY BUT SHE SHOULD HAVE APPRECIATED WHEN SHE WAS ACTUALLY GOOD ENOUGH FOR HER IN FICTION REALITY SHOW LAND!! WHICH IS THE HIMIKO SHE IDENTIFIES AS THE MOST, BUT THAT ONE MADE HER STRAIGHT! IT'S SUPER CONFUSING AND INFURIATING!!

How do I even start writing this. I am so lost.

EDIT: Oh you might be wondering why I don't just write YET ANOTHER PRISON AU, but you see, for V3, there was confusion about the academy name before the game came out. Since it was called "Gifted Academy for Inmates" or something like that, several people, including me, assumed it was set in an actual prison with a cast full of actual criminals. This was wrong of course, but this misconception has ALREADY spawned a few prison AUs in the fanon, so y'know, why do I need to do one when it's already out there? P: I am a LAZY person so I see no reason to write something that's already been done or is being done. In fact that RWBY fic may not have existed if I knew something called the mafia AU existed (and I would have read, but refused to on the basis the stories may have been too similar and I'd lose motivation on my own story, so yeah)

Y'know I praise DRV3 a lot.

SO LET'S DO THE OPPOSITE!

Spoilers of course. Of fucking course.

Instead of picking apart something that has been picked apart for ages, like saying DRV3's very divisive ending, Imma talk about the characters who I love so much. The cast of V3 is the strongest of any of the games to date, and I have said many words or at least, thought many words of why this is so. But no matter how good characters are, they are not perfect, so here are some of my gripes about certain characters and what could have been done better.

Let's start off with Himiko, a character I defend to the death for!!

SHE HAS SHIT TASTE. THE END.

Okay, well by that I mean, her vision of Atua is simply a handsome man. Now, that's pretty boring and non-relatable. I say this as Himiko is the most relatable character I've ever encountered so anything I cannot even BEGIN to fathom at all annoys me more than usual. This of course also combines with my obvious bias in my shipping preferences, but I guess she can swing two ways maybe. The point is how boring her tastes are, and sometimes nonsensical or to the level of the most typical teenage girl that it makes me want to gag. Like how some girls unironically like Twilight and its characters. Himiko's wonderful and insightful love hotel event reveals she fantasizes about getting it on with a humanized wolf.

._.

BUT NOT ONLY THAT, in chapter four in I guess an attempt to expand Himiko's ability as the comedic relief, she was one of the few enthralled by the incestual soap opera-like escapades the remaining Monokubs were partaking on during announcements, as if she were not only into any plot that even involves incest, but shitty cliche soap operas too. Himiko. You do realize in LITERALLY THE VERY LAST CHAPTER, which was like, oh I dunno, YESTERDAY, the man who MURDERED YOUR TWO BEST FRIENDS did so because of his INFATUATION with his SISTER. INCEST MURDERED YOUR FRIENDS. WHY DO YOU LIKE TWO SHITTY BEAR SIBLINGS GETTING IT ON AND HAVING DRAMATIC ABUSIVE PLOTS OR WHATEVER. WHAT EVEN ARE YOU!??!?!??

Then in chapter five's trial, in a string of dialogue and events that I also found amusing among many others, was when Exisal Kokichi was messing around with Himiko (who granted, is incredibly easy to troll) and mentioned that Himiko liked him. Of course Himiko denied this because Kokichi had been a complete douchenozzle ruining everything and dividing everyone in everything at this point, having essentially ended the lives of two people a trial prior and is the mastermind responsible for the killing game (or at least what everyone believes at this point) so he is LITERALLY the WORST.

Himiko denies it and then rebutes with a strong, "NUH-UH, I HATE YOU!" Which is very reasonable. A perfectly normal human being would have such an opinion. Heck, anyone in this situation would. Almost everyone, even. (I mean this as an in-universe thing, as a character Kokichi is absolutely fascinating and I can totally understand his widespread popularity as annoying as it is when he's overexposed all over the place) But then Kokichi counters with,

"But I like yooooou~" like a kid teasing another on the playground.

And then Himiko blushes.

IT WAS FUNNY, YES. I chuckled. I laughed. OH BOY I was amused. But thinking about it logically.... wtf Himiko? It makes me think that, should she actually pursue a relationship with like...ANYBODY, she would be easily taken advantage of because she's so lovestruck. She'd be that girl who would stay with their abusive partner because of denial that they were abusive or a terrible person. She'd pursue the asshole bad boy simply because they were hot. And stay with them. Because they are hot. Heck in the same trial she enjoys Monokuma's antics and starts even coming around to him, like maybe he really is cute and really is on their side HIMIKO THIS BEAR EXECUTED ALL YOUR FRIENDS AND PUT YOU IN THIS HORRIFIC ORDEAL IN THE FIRST PLACE.

Which of course wraps around to OF COURSE this character drank the kool-aid. OF COURSE SHE WAS THE FIRST ONE TO. She must have been the absolute easiest person to convert in the history of Angie's time as an oracle.

I will say though, that just because Himiko appears so weak throughout the game doesn't necessarily mean she's like, weaker than average to a considerable degree. Sure she's the shortest girl, weighs the least, isn't strong physically whatsoever due to her laziness, and because of her weak will is even more vulnerable, but what I mean is compared to the rest of the cast she stands out as the weakest. I only point this out because I feel using the abusive partner example might imply that people in that situation are in that because they themselves are weak and it's their fault for having fallen into that situation in the first place. Of course not. It's something that anybody can fall prey to, and Himiko being an example is not an outlier. These kids are all teenagers. They've barely emotionally matured yet a majority of them are like, demigods when it comes to mental fortitude or emotional maturity. Beyond even the average adult. Himiko is relatable because she is what all of us WOULD be in a killing game. We'd be anxious. We'd try to find a way to distract ourselves from the traumatizing events surrounding us. We'd close our emotions and try to guard ourselves mentally as well to keep ourselves alive. So we don't seem vulnerable, so we won't be the next victim.

I mean, I say we but I mostly mean myself. I dunno if most people will be like that. I am ASSUMING most people are like that, but maybe they're Kaedes instead who will take charge and make plans and get themselves killed in their ridiculously ambitious ploys. Who knows.

But yes. Himiko has shit taste. And you know, I haven't even spelled out the biggest reason she has the worst, most awful taste in the history of mankind.

Not liking Tenko. At least not immediately. At least not when she was flesh and soul, anyway. You know, the Tenko at her most Tenko. Living, I mean. Anyone who hates Tenko indeed has the worst, most awful taste in the history of mankind. I cannot relate. I cannot understand.

KIIBO.

I like that spelling of his name the best, btw.

But yes, Kiibo.

Often, when the opinionated threads come about and people throw around who the best cast of girls or boys in a game is, the boys of V3 stand out. They are apparently the best. And well, they are not wrong. Shuichi is a magnificent protagonist. Korekiyo is a fascinating, enthralling fountain of memes. I do not even have to say a word about Kokichi. Kaito is a solid Kamina. Ryoma was someone who I found myself wanting to learn so much about, with his unique backstory and his clinical depression. Gonta though simplified a little too much in the localization, was helpful in so many ways with noticing the clue words and the bugs, pointing out the strange constellations, being surprisingly more useful in the trials than one would expect, and having a tragic, pitiful end at the climax of chapter four. Rantaro was a plot device, but at least he has the excuse of having the least amount of screentime, and I guess he's eyecandy or whatever. (SHUICHI IS THE PRETTIEST BOY IN DANGANRONPA AND NO ONE CAN CONVINCE ME OTHERWISE)

Then there's Kiibo.

I do like Kiibo as a character. I like his personality, backstory. He also has some entertaining FTEs and one of the better Love Hotel segments. (I wager one of the best, actually) but in the context of the main plot.... he, like Rantaro, was ultimately a plot device. But again, Rantaro has the excuse of not living very long. Kiibo lasts the entire game.

...

Let me explain.

Kiibo doesn't really, at least during the main plot, form a cast herd with anybody. Like how you have Shuichi, Kaito, Maki, or the three girls Tenko, Himiko, and Angie. I sometimes see him with Kokichi, Gonta, and Miu as a quartet, which makes sense because they are all connected in some way, but not to each other directly. More like, Kiibo hangs out with Miu, who is murdered by Gonta, who is always manipulated by Kokichi, who always insults Miu, who also always insults Kiibo. I guess you could call this quartet Kokichi's bitches or something. But there's no strong connection between like, Kiibo and Kokichi, or Kiibo and Gonta. Kiibo's only really close to Miu, and Miu insults and belittles literally everyone, which leads us to one of Kiibo's biggest problems.

He EXISTS TO BE BULLIED.

When I read Kiibo's artbook notes, I was rather disappointed by the direction the writer was going with him. Apparently, one of the BIGGEST ASPECTS of Kiibo, planned from the get-go or at least planned meticulously, was that he would be bullied. Like all the time. His personality would be that of one who is easily bullied, and he'd have the assertiveness of a doormat, and the strength of a senior citizen. He is easily offended because of ROBOPHOBIA, and anytime he does pull out anything of that would make use of his unique robot talent, it'd be incredibly mundane. Some of these I did find amusing yes, but when he had no emotional connection to any character nor any plot going on, nor was ever like a suspect of any trial, or anything at all, it was easy to forget Kiibo existed. Often I'd try to remember the cast of V3, and name them off, and then name fifteen, and I've be like.... "wait didn't I get all of them? Who am I missing... .OH RIGHT KIIBO." Every. Single. Time.

Because for five chapters Kiibo was a joke. He existed only for this running gag. There wasn't anything expanded on his relationship with Miu that made Miu's death more heartbreaking like say Maki with Kaito, Himiko with Tenko, or Shuichi with Kaede. When it finally came time for Kiibo to be useful, and I mean useful in a way that didn't just directly come from Miu messing with his internals and giving him more features, but something Kiibo choose to do himself, it was all for the plot device. With Kiibo exploding everything, we can explore and investigate the school! With Kiibo with these badass powers, he can blow up a hole for the survivors to escape! With Kiibo being the audience surrogate, we can explain away his passivity throughout the entire game! Like at what point did Kiibo have any actual agency? Only when it was time to wrap up and conclude the plot.

The reason why I am so convinced of this is that Kiibo is just thrown away once he was no longer useful to the plot. A robot character in a setting where characters dying it is not only possible, BUT COMMONPLACE? They have literally zero chance of surviving. He self-destructs like how any other robot character in some touching movie might do as a heroic sacrifice to allow the rest to live.... which would be sad and touching and all, if Kiibo was ever respected as a standalone character.

But he wasn't. He was made the butt-of-the-joke for the entirety of the game, No one had any emotional attachment to him, befriended him, helped him get over his robot insecurities outside of FTEs, and when it came time to sacrifice himself no one cried. Because the game gave us no reason to cry for him, because the robot that exploded wasn't even the real Kiibo, but the ~OUTSIDE WORLD~ and the real Kiibo had already been erased. And none of the three survivors were like "OH NO POOR KIIBO, or KIIBO SACRIFICED HIMSELF FOR US, no. No, it was the outside world that chose for them to live, at least that was Shuichi's hypothesis. When Kiibo did die near the end of the trial, there was an attempt to make us feel sad that he was about to be erased, but it was done almost like an afterthought. It went by very fast, and like some characters were sad, like Himiko. Y'know, the character Kiibo's artbook entry mentioned that he considered one of the worst because she did a lot of the bullying near the end after characters like Kokichi and Miu weren't in the picture. And I'm not saying Himiko SHOULDN'T be sad, oh she should, but just the manner this whole death scene was written just felt insulting to Kiibo's character.

Even the writers did not see him beyond just a robot, beyond just a buttmonkey, beyond just a plot device. The writers THEMSELVES were robophobic.

Speaking of Himiko, when the first two chapters hinted that she was a victim of bullying, it makes it that much more odd that she did most of the Kiibo bullying post-Kokichi. I thought maybe they were making some sort of POIGNANT MESSAGE that lots of people who are bullied can also bully others, but ... since it was never brought up or actually hinted at... that's just wishful thinking or putting too much thought into it. They just did it because Kiibo did not exist to be anything but what he was. And that's sad. I see some Kiibo fans who dislike Himiko strongly for her treatment of Kiibo in chapters four and five, but I mean... while true that wasn't so much an aspect of Himiko but how Kiibo himself was written in the story. To be bullied. Literally no one came to his defence. Ever. Either a character bullied him or they just stood to the side and let it happen. If Kiibo was upset about something like say, the hydraulic press not stopping when it's meant to when it detects a living organism, no one really comforts Kiibo or whatever. I don't remember if Shuichi said anything but it feels like he only really treated Kiibo beyond as just some robot in the FTEs and Love Hotel, and not really anywhere else.

Kiibo deserved better. Deserved WAY better.

Now we shall return to our regular schedule of Danganronpa girls. GIRLS ONLY. BOYS DROOL. Unlike the boy category, V3 girls usually aren't picked for best cast of girls in the franchise. Now I have come up with many reasons why this is, as in why this is such a common opinion. Some of them are shallow, like say how the SDR2 girls tend to have goofier less three-dimensional backstories if any at all, and most of them are usually quite kind or fun, or relatively likable without any crippling flaws or whatever. You sympathize with Peko's plight. Everyone wants to be Ibuki's friend. Sonia's country is amusing. Chiaki is the most perfect waifu ever, etc. Sure you got characters like Saionji sticking out, but she's the ONLY one. It's like every single flaw that should be balanced out amongst the characters was shoehorned into JUST Saionji. ._. But yeah, I find that the SDR2 girls are very likable, but not as interesting as the V3 girls. Sure Akane has oodles of flaws and grates on some people, but she gets like, Nidai to keep her going and has an interesting backstory of a thousand siblings...

V3 meanwhile, has the most likable most perfect waifu material being Kaede. A leader archetype who is kind and assertive and takes charge!! She also tries to kill someone. Sure it was of noble intentions, but she also tries to kill someone with a well-thought out complicated plan that requires setting up in front of others who trust her like Shuichi, and doing so without anyone noticing. That is some cold-blooded premeditated shit right there. It's stuff like that that makes Kaede more interesting, more three-dimensional. Why, a perfect waifu character? HAVE HER TRY TO MURDER!!

Then we have Kirumi, who many have criticized as having the most wasted potential. While I see their point, I think personally I enjoyed Kirumi's character because it ripped apart the perfect maid persona I'm not especially fond of. You see, there is this Touhou character named Sakuya, a perfect and elegant maid. She has oodles of fans, and I can't for the life of me figure out why beyond she is cool. She's COOL. But what flaws does she have? What makes her beyond just, the perfect and elegant maid? We have no detail of any backstory. She's human and not supernatural but has one of the most powerful abilities, STOPPING TIME. For some reason she can throw knives with expert aim... why? How did she learn this? REFERENCE TO JOJO is not an excuse. And she is eternally devoted to Remilia... because... because reasons. Well okay. At least with future servant-like characters who tend to be fifth boss characters they have slightly more explanation to them. Youmu inherited the job from her grandfather. Reisen escaped from the Lunarian army and has taken refuge at Eientei. Sanae is Suwako's descendant. The youkai are the mansion owner's pets. The youkai are devoted to Byakuren's religion. Miko the most supreme leader and master of politics has some dumb minions stolen from two families fighting one another in a war Miko herself orchestrated. You know, REASONS!

Though I am super digressing at this point. People can perfectly like a character for just being cool. I just don't do that kind of thing. I'm the type of person who sees Tenko for the very first time and thinks that's the worst designed DR character ever, then discover her role and personality in the game itself and love her to pieces. Design be damned. In fact, I love Tenko's design now. Not just because I happen to like Tenko, but literally she is designed like so due to her personality. Tenko dresses like so because that's who she is. And that's beautiful.

But still, seeing Kirumi I was intrigued just because, well, it's Sakuya again, but in a setting like DR ANYTHING could happen that could make her more interesting, and even if for most it was lost potential or disappointing, or ridiculous like the random political backstory that came up , the fact that Kirumi actually ran from her execution without any care to appearance or elegance or to serve others or TO BE PERFECT or anything, was just damn awesome and refreshing. She's doing something out of her own selfish desire. She claims it is for her nation and her people, but if she genuinely believes people would be lost without her and her life is valued much higher than thirteen others, then yes. That is selfish. That's BEYOND selfish. That' seeing oneself as far superior over the rest, and it's like Kaede, such a nice twist to her character.

Angie... I have nothing. I am sorry.

The problem with Angie is, unlike the other two examples of characters who seem to perfect or hyper-competent who are humanized with real, fatal flaws, Angie is instead... like, not human? She is happy all the time. She has NO sprites that aren't happy or at least not content in some way. No negative emotion exists. I suppose not being a culprit doesn't help, but plenty of victims in this game are very human! Ryoma is relatable and sad, Tenko I cannot even stop talking about, Miu well, lol. And Kokichi... Imma stop. These examples are super obvious. Angie tho? What is Angie? A plot device maybe? I hesitate to go that far. After each execution she watches she is the only one smiling. She is praying to Atua of course, but who can fucking smile after two of the most brutal executions in the DR franchise? Being hung and swung around a bunch while being stoned and then ultimately crushed? Climbing a thorny vine, up through motorized saws just to crash back into the earth in a sickening thud of shattered bones and organs? I can't even take Angie seriously if she's meant to be some sort of example of how the writer views religion or whatever. Like she's written in a way I cannot even understand or relate to. She's a cult leader in the most straightforward of manners. Her talent is quite interesting but has nothing relevant when it comes to her personality, which is 100% Atua and spirituality. No shred of anything else except maybe a hint that Angie is lonely or whatever in an FTE...

Nope, still got nothing.

Even Korekiyo, infamous seesaw wielder and eager participant of familial relations is more human than Angie. His motive at least, in some way can be understandable. He wants his sister to be happy. That's his motive at its core. Sure, he's absolutely insane in viewing death being merely an inconvenience so him murdering girls over and over again doesn't seem morally wrong to him, but he can be angry, and sad, and upset, and cornered, etc. It seems like underneath the mountain of issues that is Kork, there was once a human there. It's visible under the mask, under the tulpa. His passion for anthropology is legit too. It feels real. He talks about it all the time and is able to relate to whatever situation is at the moment to something in his field, but he's not like 100% anthropology. I can feel his passion in it, but he's again, not 100% anthropology. His outfit is absurd looking. He spends eons doing his hair, so he has to wake up at like 6 in the morning to prepare for the day. Korekiyo is my third favourite character of V3. This is DESPITE murdering my waifu. This is DESPITE his crazy weird unnerving disturbing incest twist. He is THAT interesting.

But nah, got nothing for Angie.

Miu... well, Miu is hit or miss. Heck most if not all the V3 girls are hit or miss. The ones I really like are hit. Like REAL hit. Hit to the extreme, so I always rate the V3 gals like, #1 when it comes to best V3 cast. Miu is very hit for me. I enjoy her stupid vulgar humour, and her ability to not offend me when she, like seconds after we discover a body, immediately insults them. She calls Ryoma fish shit moments after his body is obliterated by Piranha, and Tenko "Cunt-fu" right after they find her body. I'M NOT OFFENDED! That's my waifu you're talking bout, Miu! But I don't care! I dunno how they did it but they made Miu work. I applaud the localization for Miu. Now yes, Miu's motive for attempting to murder that got her killed in chapter four kind of sucks. But I dunno, it still feels in-character. No one in-universe actually likes Miu that much due to how unpleasant she is, and Kiibo is unique in that Miu is able to upgrade him and such, so I can't really categorize that has genuine friendship exactly. So Miu feeling the same way back to everyone else, and being so full of herself and her ability that the world would be far worst-off without her on the outside inventing makes sense. Of course she'd try to murder. It's like Kirumi without the twist and far more amusing.

But beyond just vulgar jokes, Miu is human too. Shocking I know. She's a coward essentially. And revealed through the Love Hotel has some abandonment issues as well. With the FTEs with Kaede, she actually insults people for attention because she has no friends, and just wants company. It's actually rather sad, but it gives Miu dimension, so even if she did go out kind of idiotically... well, I mean. Miu's an idiot. So....

Well, V3's comedic relief characters are ridiculously good. Even if the ONLY character being comedic relief was Miu or Kokichi, it'd still be better than the first two games. I don't recall laughing at anything Nagito ever did, and Miu is like Hiyoko done right. Even when these two are gone we still had Himiko who was a solid number three in the chuckle category so that the ending wasn't all bleak and despair. I don't recall the survivors or last few characters of 1 or 2 providing any solid laughs. Hagakure doesn't fucking count whatsoever, and shame on you for even thinking of him. I guess Genocide Jack was good. DR2's jesters died with Ibuki and Gundam.

Anyway, Maki Harukawa, the opposite of comedy.

Yes she's Shadow the Hedgehog in Anime girl form. Yes she's ultra edgy. Yes her character arc is super cliche. Yes, it revolves entirely around Kaito. Yes she got away with too much and wasn't called out for trying to get everyone killed in the chapter five trial like Asahina did in DR1 chapter four. Yes she might be the creator's waifu. Okay, getting all THAT out of the way, I don't actually mind Maki that much. I mean wow she does have flaws. Like oodles and oodles of them! She's certainly human. I give her that. But yes props for getting the ultimate assassin to actually assassinate someone and then get away scott-free! Truly her talent shines above all.

No I'm not being sarcastic. I genuinely believe since Monokuma had no way to view how the chapter five murder took place, that Maki easily could have been the blackened, and being the Ultimate Assassin she probably was, but Kaito was executed anyway because I dunno he was instilling too much hope into the cast, and could have also killed Kokichi or whatever. Heroic sacrifices y'all. That's all I have to say about Maki.

Finally, we have Tsumugi. Yeah all that stuff about Kiibo? Also Tsumugi. Except replace the running gag of being bullied with anime references and PLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIN. I heard they put real effort into researching cosplay and her FTEs are pretty bountiful with some relatable cosplay events or such, but otherwise I cannot really think of much to say except, exists and then is the mastermind yaaaaayyyy.

I must reluctantly end this here as I am starving and tired and it is 4am. GOTTA STOP SOMEWHERE. I wrote about most characters maybe.

Nighto!

Current Mood: hungry

Yadda yadda DRV3 spoilers, you get the drill.

HELLO BLOG!!

HELLO!

I AM HERE TODAY, ON THIS RAREST OF DAYS OF WHICH I AM HERE

TO TELL YOU ABOUT THE GREATEST VIDEO GAME CHARACTER IN EXISTENCE

I FEEL LIKE SHOEHORNING THIS CHARACTER AS MERELY ONE FROM A "VIDEO GAME" IS A MASSIVE DISSERVICE TO THEM

RATHER, I MOSTLY REFER TO HER AS MY WIFE

YES, THE WEEABOO TRADITION OF DECLARING A FICTIONAL CHARACTER YOUR SIGNIFICANT OTHER

BELIEVE IT OR NOT HOWEVER, I HAVE NEVER CALLED ANY PREVIOUS FAVOURITE CHARACTERS OF MINE MY WIFE OR WAIFU

THE CLOSEST WAS WEISS, WHO I DECLARED WAS MY HUSBANDO EVERY TIME I SAW BEAUTIFUL FANART OF HER IN NORMALLY TRADITIONAL MASCULINE CLOTHING, LIKE SUSPENDERS OR MEDIEVAL KNIGHT ARMOUR OR WHAT HAVE YOU

BUT THAT WAS ONLY A MERE FANTASY OF WEISS, IN CLOTHING SHE HAS NEVER CANONICALLY WORN AND THUS I, THROUGH THE IMAGINARY AND ARBITRARY RULES OF CHOOSING A WAIFU, CANNOT OFFICIALLY DECLARE HER AS MY HUSBANDO

I SAW A PRETTY GIRL COSPLAY AS HER, AND WANTED TO MARRY THEM. I VIEWED THEIR OTHER COSPLAYS, AND THOUGH THEY REMAINED PRETTY AND THEIR TALENT IN COSPLAY CRAFT UNRIVALED, I DID NOT FEEL THE SAME WAY

AND ALTHOUGH SHE MAY BE A VIOLENT, GULLIBLE, FASHION DISASTER OF A MISANDRIST, I CANNOT HELP BUT LOVE HER

Ye. You know who I'm talking about.

( Read more... )

Current Mood: indescribable

THAR BE DANGANRONPA V3 SPOILERS BELOW. YE BE WARNED.

-

An opinion I've noticed here and there about DR is which cast is the best. Some people love the SDR2 kids the best, others find V3 better, and the unpopular opinion tends to be the DR1 cast, who of course had the disadvantage of being first, and thus before the many improvements of the mechanics and story of the games. Trials are shorter, chapters shorter, cases usually simpler, and thus less depth for whatever character died next or who the culprit was or who developed throughout the game due to the various murdery events.

Anyway occasionally that splits into categories, like which rival was the best, which protag, which female lead, or say a group! Which protagonist trio was superior? Who was the best died for our sins character? Which cinnamon roll was least bland? Etc. I think I mentioned this in an earlier post, but which cast of girls was the best was one I tended to pay quite attention to for obvious reasons. My favourite characters have mostly been girls in DR, and I am not here to elaborate why. Anyway either someone is throwing about their opinion often and everywhere, or that one of the more popular opinions is that the strength of V3's cast lies mostly on the guys, not the girls. In fact the girls were much better in SDR2! Basically, the best husbandos came from V3 and the best waifus were from SDR2. I can kinda see that opinion in a way, though I don't necessarily agree with it.

I think largely it comes down to how many in a cast were comprised of JOKE characters. For instance in SDR2, a lot of the male characters were joke characters in some way and either weren't plot relevant or only stuck around to provide comedy relief. What they might bring to the story itself is pretty minimal, and they're harder to take seriously when they aren't well, serious. Characters like Hanamura, Kazuichi, Nidai, and Gundam were quite over the top characters no matter how much you enjoyed their vibrant personalities. Also in terms of conventionally attractive characters, not a lot to choose from on the male side either. You got the protag who tends to look generic and bland, and even if you did like Hajime's design you rarely got to see him outside of trials The Imposter, Hanamura, and Nidai all fall outside the range of being a cute anime boy, and while it's a stretch, it's not as if Kazuichi or Fuyuhiko are designed to be that boytoy yummy looking character all the fangirls can latch onto. Well, I mean maybe Fuyuhiko. Depends what you're looking for. Gundam can even be a bit too extreme for some people's tastes, and so you're left with well...Komaeda.

Hm. Yeah.

So not A LOT to choose from in terms of someone who has like, the most boring and standard taste in the world. Meanwhile there are many girls in that realm of conventionally attractive. Even our female lead, Chiaki, brings to the table quite a lot, from her cute design to her huge rack to lure in the guys and girls that are into that and her common interest with the player themselves, gaming... add to it her relevance to the plot and that's already one of many. Kazuichi often sings the praises of Sonia, who comes in looking like the typical Aryan beauty. Ibuki's here with her loud design that still looks pleasing to the eye along with her personality. Peko's attractive and looks like she can kill you. Akane comes in with the boobs, but she doesn't really win crowds in the depth or character department sadly. Mahiru looks a tad bland, but you could say design-wise she's like the equivalent of Hajime, and so our only minuses are the unpleasant and tiny Saionji. Oh and of course there's Mikan around to win crowds as well with her sympathy-bait traits. I could go on-and-on-and-on... I might be bringing up the design aspect a bit too much, but there are less joke characters in this crowd. Akane and her food? Sure. Maaaaybe Ibuki? She brings in a sense of emotional attachment and fun as well, though I could be biased. Saionji if you consider her screentime to be amusing in any way... I don't. But most of the females are fairly serious and are stuck with some sort of tragic backstory, tragic circumstance, or some other suspenseful, emotional attachment to the plot that's not meant to be laughed at.

V3 on the other hand we have very plot relevant characters in the guys, even in Rantaro when he was killed off first! Including Rantaro we also have Kokichi and Kaito as well influencing the plot. These three characters aren't jokes whatsoever and have conventional attractiveness to their designs, nothing wacky and crazy. Our musclehead Gonta is meant less to look over-the-top (he looks far more toned-down design-wise compared to previous beefcakes) and is this game's resident sympathy-sink instead. Kork may be batshit insane to the extreme, but he provided great intrigue while alive and before the ridiculous twist, while also maintaining the conventional design (albeit with the creepy add-ons) in the aesthetics department. I'd equal him with Gundam in that sense. Ryoma may have looked ridiculous but his personality was anything but, and he was quite loved by those who understood his struggles. Shuichi has long eyelashes and is our angsting little protag who shows up in the game where we get to see the protag's sprite lots! I'm pretty sure I just mentioned literally every male character here. Not a single one of them is a joke character.

Oh right Kiibo. Why do I always forget about him. Well TECHNICALLY he is neither male nor female, but in the interest of this discussion, he too is plot relevant (eventually) and tho was treated as a joke many times it was moreso other characters utterly disrespecting him in the interest of comedy as opposed to Kiibo himself that was the joke.

Meanwhile our female cast do not fare as strongly in this department. We could have had our wonderful female protagonist, but she died, she died! Really early on in fact, and though remains throughout the story as an emotional connection especially to Shuichi and his lingering development, wasn't relevant to the plot as much as Rantaro was. Everyone still loves Kaede tho. Then we have Kirumi who while of course looks pretty of course wasn't plot relevant, did not have an attachment to any particular character (bonds always make characters stronger than when they're alone!) and dies early. She's got an infamous execution at least... ? Angie's sort of a hatesink in the interest of developing a conflict that comes to its pique in chapter three, while Tenko, Himiko, and Miu all contribute to the story either emotionally or in Miu's case, through her talent, can easily be summarized as joke characters too. Joke characters with more depth than the joke ones from SDR2, who might only have gained depth in their FTEs if lucky, but compared to the rest are joke characters nonetheless. Maki is controversial. Oh and Tsumugi is boring with her one-trick reference bit, who does nothing until she's revealed to be the mastermind, but she's not really the real TOTAL mastermind controlling absolutely everything like Junko was, and her twist sort of comes out of nowhere instead of being foreshadowed leaving Tsumugi left as moreso a before-and-after character.. so yeah ....

Also aside from Maki, none of them are nearly as plot relevant as the males. Sadness.

STILL.

I think the reason why I prefer the V3 cast, including the females, or rather ESPECIALLY the females over the SDR2 cast is due to the depth. Like let's take both Miu and Kazuichi for instance, two characters with similar talents who serve as comedic relief and as a sort of pathetic jokey character in both games. I like Miu better. Why? Miu contributed quite a bit to the plot with her talent, but not only that her brand of comedy was always such a breath of fresh air in V3. The atmosphere is always dreary and sad and emo, then Miu comes out of nowhere with the most creative vulgar insult or slur ever, and how she reacts when others fight back is even better. She's consistently entertaining in her own unique way, which Kazuichi never really provided. His inventions weren't quite as dynamic, then again he is a mechanic not an inventor, and he mostly ran around being a coward, or accusing Hajime of things, or hitting on Sonia. Nothing that stood out. That Kazuichi survived and Miu didn't is kind of a shame in that sense, but DR is DR. The series doesn't discriminate when it comes to whoever dies or lives. Well okay, except to muscle people. Gain any sense of tone in your arms and death is guaranteed. ):

Or another example is how often people complain that a useless character lived, like Hagakure or Akane. They didn't contribute to the plot and their participation in trials did nothing to help advance the trial itself. Now V3 only has the luxury of three survivors, so by default Himiko is the traditional 'useless' survivor, yet when people complain about her longevity I get upset. Sure she's one of if not my absolute favourite of V3 so I'm biased, but it's not as if Himiko is useless entirely! She may be a bit of a joke character and not do much in trials, but just the sheer fact that she developed as a character made her far more useful than any of the other so-called 'useless' survivors ever were! Her contributions to the game were mainly emotional and I'm a sucker for emotional shit, so what can I say? Also with Danganronpa's tendency to shoo out the clowns, one of the survivors is always meant to be a comic relief character, but always one of the more subdued ones because God forbid we have Gundam's mannerisms ruin the suspense of chapter sx's many twists! Himiko is one of those, just like Akane or... well I dunno how Hagakure counts since he did seem over-the-top from the get-go, but his survival is a mystery to all to the point that he himself is entirely a joke with no substance whatsoever. Or at least that's what Danganronpa itself loves to imply, anyway. Who can disagree with that?

But in essence the V3 girls feel a lot more three dimensional due to heir flaws, but not only that they have flaws, but how those flaws are presented. A character like say... Mahiru is sort of plain, and her flaws are little harder to define, but they're there. She has the tendency to lecture, chastises how boys act a lot, and forgives Saionji's actions far too often for her own good. But while her flaws were understated and harder to see, so too were her virtues. What's great about Mahiru? She's not as insane as her other over-the-top classmates? She's nice? She's relatable? I don't know.

Now we have Tenko, who IS over-the-top with her flaws, and is sort of ridiculous. You might say, well that's an SDR2 character right there! But then Tenko brings with her pretty obvious virtues too. While she insults and belittles boys without holding back, she also compliments and encourages girls without holding back either! She starts off seemingly having a selfish and superficial crush on Himiko, but over time we learn she also wants to befriend Himiko first and worries for her psyche and well-being too! To the point that she'd go out of her way to defend her, or to secretly infiltrate a cult just to make sure she's okay, to even giving speeches to the girl to keep her spirits up! It's really heartwarming in a way. Tenko's kind of like a much more well-defined Mahiru. It magnifies the flaws all the more, from the nagging of boys to the ASSAULT of boys, but then it also magnifies the virtues. Mahiru for some reason is okay with Saionji getting away with shit. Why? Well she probably understands her or whatever and wants to improve her as a person, but we can't really see Mahiru's intents that well. We could easily believe Mahiru's a hypocrite who chastises a guy for being mean but is completely okay with Saionji doing it instead due to her innocent appearance.

Meanwhile, Tenko's so obvious about how she feels it's impossible to misinterpret her intents. Yeah. she hates men, but she clearly likes Himiko, and clearly wants Himiko to have a better view of life, and thus a more healthy way of living, leading to a flourishing lifestyle. This extends to how Tenko acts around say, other characters like Kaede or Shuichi, but those fall into FTE territory. Even without the FTEs, there are moments in the game where the writing seems to conveniently forget about Tenko's androphobia for the purposes of plot, like when Tenko throws Shuichi (thus touching him when she was repulsed doing so in the FTE) and subsequently reads Shuichi's true inner conflicts and gives him advice. Well that was random and good, all of a sudden! It's like Tenko's biggest flaw might only be there for comedic purposes or something.... but bad writing or not, it's refreshing because it leaves Tenko as less of a one-note character. In this sense, Tenko feels like she has dimension. She's extreme, but she almost seems more realistic somehow... I don't know how to describe it.

Another comparison is Kaede and Chiaki. Kaede starts off seemingly like an endgame Chiaki, there to encourage everyone while never doing wrong. While Chiaki starts off as someone you sort of overlook at first, not especially standing out (unless her design pops out to you) compared to the many other wacky characters in the cast. Chiaki eventually gains her position as female lead and ends up never doing anything wrong, rarely if any shows any visible flaws that couldn't be attributed to her status as a AI, and despite being executed as the culprit, due to Komaeda's bullshit luck is the least culpable of any culprit ever and fits more as a victim in a case than a culprit anyway. CHIAKI IS PERFECT! I still love her as a character but in terms of flaws and depth, Chiaki's not the person to go to. That's Kaede.

Starting off as perfect usually means one must be torn down, where their perfectly pristine outer shell is ripped apart to reveal the ugly pulsing innards inside. It's usually not to such an extreme extent, but one reason Kaede became so interesting was due to her mastermind murder plot. It wasn't the perfect plot by any means, and by the last trial you even find out it ultimately failed in every way, not only to kill the mastermind but to kill anyone at all, and yet Kaede died anyway. Though she dug the hole that got her killed, she was also the victim of misfortune as well. She made a stupid plan that didn't even work and it got her killed off anyway. That was her fatal flaw, her ultimate downfall, but for a character like Kaede so seemingly pure and good and nice to do something like that makes her so much more human than I would argue ANY of the female cast in SDR2. And that's saying something. Yet her greatest virtue paid off posthumously in Shuichi's development, being able to keep him going despite her death, and despite her sin. IT'S SO GREAT!

Basically what I'm getting at is yes, while the female cast of V3 might appear to only exist for comedic relief or to pad the story out as less relevant characters than the guys, they still fill out their roles admirably with more depth than the casts of the previous games did. That's why I like them. They're more human, more relatable, and thus it is all the more soul-crushing when they die. I think it's a testament when my favourite characters go from characters like Ibuki and Chiaki from SDR2 to characters like Tenko and Himiko from V3. Ibuki and Chiaki are great characters, good in alignment, cheer you up and encourage you to go on further; Ibuki's so independent she doesn't form a strong bond with any single student, but manages to be fun personified in every single event. Chiaki ultimately leads the protagonist to choose the best option in the end for his future, and basically helps us win the game. All well and good, right?

But alas, not many flaws or development are involved in their presence. Ibuki dies too early, but even if she didn't there weren't hints of a character arc starting like with Saionji. Chiaki lives for longer but she serves to fulfill the development of another character (Hajime) instead of her own, dying in an ultimate noble sacrifice. There's not a lot to go around individually with these two... They certainly are characters that cheered me up, and would be people I'd be friends with due to their pleasant and uplifting natures ...

Meanwhile we have the lazyass delusional Himiko and the obnoxious misandrist Tenko.

Both characters had detractors early on, Tenko moreso, but during the first half of the game several people grew tired of Himiko's repetitive lazy shtick and magic jokes. Defenders of both might even accuse the other of dragging their favourite down. I've heard Himiko fans tear down Tenko, who was breaching creepy stalker territory when it came to Himiko. I too was part of this crowd the first time I was exposed to the game. My first impressions of Tenko were not great to say the least, and more than once I had spoken out loud for Tenko to leave Himiko alone. There are too, Tenko fans who believed Himiko treated her horribly, often ignoring her or being rude to Tenko, and therefore declaring Himiko did not deserve Tenko in any way. Even if I was on the Himiko train early on, this perspective has a point too. Yes, I agree with both.

Because both characters were flawed, and it detracted from their relationship early on in the game. Had neither of them evolved, I never would have considered the two as a duo to be anything more than just a duo, maybe something similar to the Sonia and Kazuichi dynamic from SDR2. Characters who both didn't really change much over the course of the game nor were especially plot relevant, but Kazuichi's one-sided fling with Sonia was...amusing I guess? There wasn't really much to it beyond that. A joke.

Yet as we learned more of these characters, and as time went on within the game, things changed. Once the spotlight turned to Tenko and Himiko, their interactions switched from a comedic standpoint to a story standpoint. Conflict arose with Angie's cult, and Himiko's need to mentally wish the present situation away. Instead of going to Tenko for comfort like she might have wanted, obviously Himiko turned to the only source that was offering a reasonable solution to her problems: Angie. This of course leads Tenko to jealously, and her own delusions because it's not as if she were super best friends with Himiko at this point anyway, but sometimes even when two characters aren't moving in the right direction, a little shakeup may be the best way to right the path to friendship. I like the fact that despite Tenko's obvious desires, she takes the right steps at the right order to win Himiko over. Himiko needs a source of comfort, friendship, something to lift her mind from the horrors of the killing game; in short, Tenko thinks of what Himiko's needs and desires are before her own, no matter how vocal she often was of them.

Some people expressed disappointment with the direction of Tenko's character because when she was initially teased, a lot of people expected some sort of arc where she'd learn to like boys, and thus would have some bond with some particular boy, perhaps the protagonist and soon her misguided and discriminatory views would be whisked away. Or maybe they had expected some sort of tragic background that lead to Tenko's stubborn beliefs, but neither occurred, or at least were elaborated on as much as they could have been before her untimely end. There were small hints, like Tenko's single mention of her alcoholic father, or her moments with Shuichi, FTE or not, that slowly, gradually, turned her direction for the better when it came to her views on men. And yet, none of it lead to fruition due to her death. What could have been, really? We may never see how it could have played out, but I still think what we got was fascinating and maybe a little less predictable than most people hoped for following the trailers.

Like Chiaki, Tenko did ultimately serve the purpose of developing another character, but before she died and fulfilled this purpose, Tenko was also strongly her own character. I truly believe her biggest and most obvious flaw was meant for comedy most of all, considering at the times of strongest tension, Tenko's distaste of men was lowkey. Heck, the only scrum debate she had a role in had her on Shuichi's side, and her point of argument was to rely on Shuichi's words, a boy! Even if her loyalty was most pronounced with Himiko, when push came to shove, Tenko would show that side of her to anyone, and I mean anyone. Tenko reminds me of a shelter dog, an animal who is so ready to love, but her former master trained her incorrectly, or was well-meaning but inexperienced in the field of dog-ownership, causing unwanted habits to develop in the dog. Perhaps everything the dog did wrong with attributed with the colour red, like maybe the dog misbehaved and would always be put inside a red kennel and then left alone for hours on end, whereas the blue kennel was always used for travelling like going to the vet. Ignoring the fact that dogs probably can't see that well of a spectrum of colour, the dog might believe anything associated with red is bad, and would bite anything red. The red car, the red coke can, the red sofa, etc. I KNOW WHERE I AM GOING WITH THIS ANALOGY I SWEAR. Because the master would leave for so long while she is in the red kennel, she now believes the colour is responsible for taking the people she loves away.

Anyway that was longwinded, but Tenko is essentially that but with boys. BOYS ARE BAD, says her master, in an effort to keep her focus on her martial art and not to be distracted by the usual teenage girl distraction that could lead her away from the discipline of her art. But Tenko takes it to the extreme because instead of explaining exactly why boys are bad, he instead tries to associate it with something else that would make Tenko unhappy, like weakening her skills in Neo-Aikido, and so Tenko starts to believe men are terrible in every sense of the word if they can do such a monstrously powerful thing. Tenko's master kind of sucks by the way, in sort of an amusing way, but he's not the greatest influence on Tenko in the least, ha. Anyway just the very fact that I can elaborate so much of Tenko's character without mentioning Himiko is evidence enough that Tenko can be a character on her own and doesn't rely on another to exist. Himiko was a big part of her screentime and lines yes, but Tenko was MORE than that, and that made her so much more interesting. Often my favourite ships and friendships I'm attached to one of the characters and the other one I find okay but their bond itself is so strong and intriguing that I like the other character by proxy too, but never for that character alone! Tenko and Himiko break that pattern.

And yes sadly Tenko dies before all that potential can be explored, but in a game like this where dying is just second nature, you can't really complain. The fact that she leads Himiko on her own development path leaves behind a legacy too! So many other deaths the character just ends where they die, and they don't affect any survivors or the plot down the road. Peko still had lasting memory and influence on Fuyuhiko. Rantaro still had relevance to the plot five chapters after his death. Mikan's demise was foreshadowing to the twist of the very end as well, meaning her sudden character change was not just a random reveal of insanity like say Korekiyo's was, and so had so much more substance within the story. Saionji dying without having changed and none of the characters she was associated with surviving beyond chapter three was an utter waste. A dead end if you will, and so is Ishimaru, all the things he learned from Mondo coming to a stark end with his death. Ryoma and Kirumi were standalone characters in their own chapter leaving little of a mark on the plot or the remaining characters, making chapter two arguably filler-y in a way. I could go on and on, but I'm glad Tenko wasn't a part of the latter group.

Though if Tenko remained alive she could have chipped little by little away all of Himiko's anxieties and flaws, her death sent Himiko into overdrive, to the point that her last words motivated Himiko to such a point that she rushed on forward without a plan or thought process whatsoever on what to do. Himiko was forcing herself in chapter four to not be who she had been her entire life, so it's no wonder her character was wonky in chapter four. I've heard a few people mention she was flanderized in chapter four and that utterly confused me. How do you flanderize a character by making them change drastically and that change only existing on one chapter? That doesn't make sense? Did that person know what the term flanderization even meant? Well I digress, Himiko was running all over the place and screaming her lungs out trying to change so quickly that of course it felt unnatural, but also heartwarming how much effort Himiko was putting into it. Not only from a sense of encouragement, but a sense of guilt and regret from not acknowledging Tenko sooner. Himiko, unlike Tenko, is not someone whose intents and feelings are obvious from the get-go. Anything but! I feel looking into her actions tell a stronger story of Himiko's feelings more than just reading her dialogue.

I think by the time chapter three started Himiko had warmed up to Tenko, but was too lazy or unmotivated to vocalize such a thing. We could tell she thought better of Tenko by merely hanging out with her, and not complaining that Tenko was hovering around her like she had been in earlier chapters. What Tenko did, defending her no matter what in the second trial when Himiko was a suspect really gave her this feeling of support that she was trying to find in Angie's religion. But of course even if Himiko was willing to be around Tenko around this point, it's not as if Tenko wasn't overbearing or perhaps exhausting Himiko with her presence either. After all with Tenko being the extrovert she was and Himiko an introvert it was bound to happen, so she will still seek Angie out for support too. I really strongly relate to Himiko in so many ways, more than any character I can think that I've liked in a while. Like Tenko there were hints of Himiko's background that were never explored. With Tenko it was the potential father issues, but with Himiko it was bullying. She always had a strong opinion against bullying, and was picked on by both Kokichi and Miu for her appearance, a common thing to be bullied for, and Kokichi and Miu both having bully-like personalities as well. Himiko's pretty easy to pick on too. She stands out in more ways than one, so it made sense. Still, this was not an aspect of Himiko that was explored beyond the first chapter.

I mean, sometimes I feel like a quiet unassuming person who had always wanted a tight-knit group of friends and envied those who easily made them and was often surrounded by people, but still somehow chose to spend most of my time alone anyway, and was always afraid to speak up. Yet, I have this yearning of making others happy, seeing them smile, not only smile but smile because of me. At the same time, I sort of feel like an outcast, different from others, interests always being something else, not often having a topic to discuss with others that wasn't something specific the common person wouldn't be interested in. If I did bring it up, I'd be so excited to be talking about it it'd be the ONLY thing I'd ever talk about, and then I'd fear being disliked for being so eager in my singular topic and annoying the other party. That's why I just don't talk. The fear. I sometimes see Himiko like this, someone who has achieved that ability to make others smile, but also loses the boundary that keeps their interests at bay, often mentioning their singular interest at any time, no matter how appropriate it is. However this lack of barrier leaves her vulnerable, and she's easy pickins for teasing and insults, and ends up naive and gullible to more malicious people. This also leaves her emotionally vulnerable, so she seeks comfort in people, and probably has a horrible sense of judgment when it comes to people, but I guess since there's only fifteen other people that's not much to pick on anyway. Himiko is lucky both Angie and Tenko were the ones to gravitate to her first because though she needs support she's too lazy and introverted to ever initiate anyway.

And I just relate to that on such a level... Himiko needed these people to open her up, to overcome those obstacles and flaws so she could face reality and become a better person. It's not as if Himiko becomes perfect after Tenko's death. She still carries with her those flaws. She's still gullible and naive, but now she has the motivation and the desire, and is trying to BE better. I wish I had someone like Tenko in my life, but someone like her doesn't exist. I can only equate her to a dog that gives you unconditional love no matter what, or someone literally in love with you they could sit next to you and listen to you gush about your passions for hours on end, and instead of it being a favour to you, it's something they genuinely love to do. This person doesn't exist. It's such a selfish desire for a person like this to exist, someone warped to your own whims. People are people. People are different. They can't be melded to what you, or in this case, I, want. That is why in real life, in reality the best functioning couples are of the utmost ultimate compromise.

...anyway.. yes I've rambled on enough. I just can't get enough of V3's cast. I love them to bits. The ones I really love I especially love. The ones I don't are at least still interesting. Not a single character isn't interesting in this cast. They all served their purpose, whatever purpose they had. No one was wasted, and most certainly no one was useless.

TL;DR Ibuki is my best friend, Himiko is my child, and TENKO IS MY WIFE!!

Current Mood: drained

BEYOND THIS POINT LIES DANGANRONPA V3 SPOILERS

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED

So in my endless quest to consume all things DRV3, as that has been my entertainment for the past few weeks (and I just CAN'T GET ENOUGH OF IT) one opinion I've seen spouting about lately is say, which game's cast is the strongest or if the guys or the girls are better or otherwise some sort of ranking of the characters. Did I say sort? I'll throw my sort results on the side too just for funsies. And like, since I do sorts of pretty much anything.

BUT THIS IS NOT ABOUT THE SORT.

You see, I've been seeing an opinion popping up here and there. I've been seeing it quite often. An opinion that is wrong. SUCH WRONGNESS is this opinion that my post shall be devoted entirely to debunking such a blatantly wrong opinion. You are free to have a similar opinion. Just know that is it wrong.

People have the audacity to claim that the DRV3 boys are infinitely superior to the girls. And not just that! For some strange, utmost inconceivable reason, they claim that of the three casts of the three games so far, the girls or DRV3 are the weakest of them all, and the boys are the strongest! WHAT MADNESS. WHAT LIES. I will readily admit that due to the protagonist being male in every cast, and the wildcard character ALSO being male of every cast that the guys do have a STRONG ADVANTAGE over the girls when it comes to influence on the plot, screentime, and even ships. I mean, if the protag is male that means whenever there are FTEs that can occasionally enter romantic territory (and you get everyone's underwear to boot) or even OUTRIGHT RIDDING THE PURITY OF THE CHARACTERS THEMSELVES that is the love hotel in DRV3, guy ships, otherwise known as yaoi, shall too will always be more prevalent. This is a fact I cannot erase nor dispute.

Regardless that does not necessarily mean the men will always be far more developed or are more interesting or intriguing or whatever else reason people have for preferring characters than the women! Far from it! You see DRV3 is the strongest cast so far, and to me a large reason has to do with the female characters. You can even look at the sort see how many girls from DRV3 comprise of my top ten or top twenty characters. I love them THAT much. In fact I think they're far improved over past female characters in the franchise, which I largely chalk up to the creator not being as good as writing them as the male cast. After all, we've had characters who were nigh-impossibly perfect like Nanami who while did have a few flaws were not flaws that ever negatively affected her character or plot. Or Kirigiri whose character is as a cold, calculating detective character. She kinda warms up to Naegi? But she ultimately stays a cold, calculated detective character. There's not a great amount of depth to them beyond what they are on the surface. I say this especially when Nanami is one of my absolute favourites because a character does not have to be super deep with ridiculous backstories and character development that drastically changes them from one thing to another. Hell, my favourite Ibuki is not the most developed nor the most enthralling character from a backstory standpoint. That's one of her biggest criticisms. I still love her nonetheless, as does many others but I can understand why anyone wouldn't care for her as well.

But DRV3 is a major improvement over all of that. And yes while I do like a lot of the guys from DRV3 too, I still think a shining example of DRV3 is its female cast. SO WITHOUT FURTHER ADO, to illustrate my point I shall go through EACH CHARACTER in DRV3 by DEATH ORDER (thus the major, major, MAJOR spoilers) and elaborate on why I think this is so.

Starting off with Rantaro Amami! A character who seems very popular with the ladies... but for what reason? I suppose he is intriguing. He has great mystery due to his unknown backstory and talent, and his sketchy mannerisms from the get-go. His sprites also mimic a lot of Komaeda's sprites who was no doubt the favourite from SDR2. Still when it comes to his influence on the plot and what we actually learn from his character he's minimal at best. He contributes to the mysteries as much as Twogami did from SDR2, which isn't much beyond some posthumous stuff that in the end, at least for Rantaro, was more relevant to the reveal near the end of the game than about Rantaro himself. A shame really, but not much you can expect from the first victim. I admit to judging people pretty harshly who have Amami as their favourite character. My first instinct is just that they like how he looks. He is eyecandy, but there are plenty of valid reasons to like him beyond that. I however do not hold back on anyone who abandons the game just because Rantaro died. I read a post of someone complaining about this once that was infuriating. The dude did very little, had very little chance to, and somehow your entire worth of the game is solely on this one character? Someone with that kind of reaction definitely only liked him for what he was on the surface and had no interest in the game or story itself. It's even less understandable than people who dump the game after...

..Kaede Akamatsu being a false protagonist.

I fucking love Kaede! I was so, so, SO pumped that finally, FINALLY we had a female protag for a main title in the series! Yay! That means for once, all the gay subtext between protag and any of the same-gendered characters in the game whether that be from FTEs or even just through plot progression was now potentially all with TWO GIRLS instead of TWO GUYS! Imagine if the wildcard character was a girl this time! I was pining it being on Maki considering the promotional material being pretty suggestive between Kaede and Maki. I WAS SO PREPARED TO ROMANCE GIRLS WITH MY GIRL PROTAGONIST OH MY GOD. Then the game began and Kaede's wonderful personality was addictive as crack! She was the leader! She was optimistic! EVERYONE WILL BE FRIENDS AND WE WILL ALL ESCAPE TOGETHER! Shuichi, you must be more confident in yourself! Peppy Kaede! CHEERY KAEDE! YAAAAHHHHH!!

And then she turned out to be the first culprit. Fun times. Or not. The trial and subsequent execution of Kaede killed me. It killed me more than Nanami's two executions. It killed me more than when I discovered Ibuki's hanging corpse. I was absolutely gutted. Kaede is dead. Kaede is the murderer. JUST WHY!?!?

While there was a great loss of potential with the loss of the main protagonist in the end this move was absolutely ingenious when it came from a writing standpoint. I mean people do make a good point that if Shuichi was the initial protagonist but was swapped out for Kaede that would have been an even better twist, but alas we all can't have the most ideal things. Plus due to the personalities of the two characters it just had to be that Kaede would die and Shuichi not. If their personalities were different or heck, swapped, you could argue against this, but I don't know. Kaede's personality of being the go-getter, of being the one to encourage and to raise morale instead of starting off as a timid insecure boy like Shuichi gives her little room of development. I mean again, she doesn't NEED to develop but I was hoping for more character development for girls this time around as there appears to be so little so far in the franchise, at least in the main titles. The only thing I could think of for Kaede was that the contrast of her bubbly, idealistic personality compared to the grim and bloody reality that is the killing game would slowly knock her confidence and optimism down along the way, and maybe some other character like Kaito or whatever needs to pick her spirits back up whenever that happens, but unless the theme or the message of the game is that being naive and optimistic is bad and we have to pick our battles or face reality with certain expectations was what they were going for it's not really a good line of thought to carry. Despite the nature of Danganronpa, the message has always been to face death or grief with a head held high and to never give up, no matter what. Kaito's mere existence is example of that.

But what Kaede DOES subvert is the perfect female protagonist, or deuteragonist. While she succeeds at encouraging and opening up Shuichi, it doesn't mean that's her only purpose and that's all there is to her. She manipulated Shuichi's camera plan to catch the mastermind and turned it into a premeditated death trap... and it wasn't a guaranteed chance whoever they caught would be the mastermind. It could have been anyone milling about in the library and discovering that hidden door. Kaede's plan was reckless, maybe even stupid. She paid for it. And that's wonderful. Because that means Kaede isn't flawless. What she ended up doing wasn't all for naught either, however! Due to Monokuma's motive, where if nobody murders anyone within a set time limit then everyone will die, Kaede's recklessness also saved everybody else's life. Nobody else in this cast made a move to murder when everyone was about to die in like thirty minutes despite the fact that, as we continue on in this game the characters in this cast are much more varied on the morality scale than past casts. She didn't die for nothing.

I think the huge amount of unrest and controversy the protag switch caused would have more merit if Kaede was the victim instead, who would die with us learning little about her character. As is, we know a whole bunch about Kaede with what time we had with her, and we still got to play half the trial with her as well! It's not the female protagonist we wanted, but there certainly were worse ways of going about it. Because of all this, I love Kaede as a character and she deserves the placement in my top ten characters. I really like my flawed characters, and up to this point there weren't many of those as girls in the franchise especially one of Kaede's role.

Next we have chapter two, starting with the saddest most depressing victim in the Danganronpa franchise yet, Ryoma Hoshi, our resident nonstandard character design character who thank the heavens wasn't a pervert. We already got two of those, so it's good they went away with that trope. He's an inmate condemned for death for murdering a bunch of mafia members with his sick tennis moves after they killed his girlfriend and family (or something like that, my memory is not up to par) and thus has a pretty bleak outlook to life and little reason to continue living. Escaping isn't even that desirable of an option to him as he'd just go straight back to prison anyway. His backstory is sad. His existence is sad. ): I thought he'd be a potential survivor as developing a reason to live would be an excellent character arc for him, but then when he was given some confidence by Shuichi and co. and tried to find a reason to live in the motive videos... he found nothing. No one outside cared about him and he had no one to care for. Of course he was just a sitting duck just asking to be the next victim, and so it went and so it shall be. He thought he had nowhere to go, but really for a character he had a ways to go. Unfortunate he gave up when he did.

I love Ryoma! But sadly being the second victim outside of his unfortunate circumstances he would not have as much time nor influence to the story as he could have. I chalk it up to bad luck and Monokuma being a bitch, but let's move on. His killer on the other hand...

When Kirumi first showed up, I had two initial impressions: Sakuya Izayoi from Touhou and Peko Pekoyama from SDR2. I do like both those characters, but I also didn't at the same time. I generally don't like characters whose entire existence relies on another character to describe. Like for Peko, if Fuyuhiko wasn't there, what would she be? She'd have to be an entirely different character because Fuyuhiko IS Peko's entire character, as her backstory relies entirely on him and his family. I hate that. I hate it in Touhou and I hate in Danganronpa. The second trial of SDR2 was extremely sad and I was very empathetic when it came to Peko's demise, but when it came time to think about how much I cared about her character... it wasn't as strong as it could have been. Maybe if I had shipped Fuyuhiko/Peko it'd have been different, but I don't like ships where one character is entirely devoted to another. I don't like characters who are dependent and can't stand on their own if the other wasn't there or did not exist.

Sakuya on the other hand was this maid in Touhou who could do no wrong. She was the definition of cool and could stop time and throw knives like a certain Jojo character. She would never break her cold and calculated surface, if there even is anything beneath that surface. I was always frustrated by Sakuya and her popularity because there never seemed to be anything more to her. She was there to be cool. There were no flaws. She was literally called the perfect and elegant maid. That kind of character is just so boring and uninteresting to me. Also memes do not count as flaws. >:

So seeing Kirumi these were the kind of fears I had with her character. And she was basically sort of just that for almost all of chapter two... until it was revealed she was the culprit. She killed Ryoma. Her perfect and elegant shield was starting to collapse, and Kirumi's calm exterior broke until she was doing all she could to deflect blame or to keep herself alive. All of this just because she was one of the unfortunate few (or may even only) to get her own motive video. Bad luck screwed her over. Kirumi became interesting when she died because she did not go out how so many others do, accepting of their deaths admirably with courage. She didn't even go out like the first two initial culprits in the first two games did because she still did everything in her power to escape no matter what (even if that attempt to escape was part of her execution). Like the dialogue of the game said, it was ugly, it was feral, it was raw, but Kirumi did everything in her power to live. Her death was powerful as fuck and basically threw everything out the door that she was perfect or elegant. It was amazing. Props to both her Japanese AND her English VAs for having VERY convincing screams of determination and fury just before she was executed. It was a powerful and memorable moment. Even when I was laughing at how over-the-top her motive video was, it wasn't close to the impact of how Kirumi went out. Fuck yes I love my flawed female characters.

It is chilling she chose to drown Ryoma though. That does add to her cold and calculated factor. Ah well.

NOW IT IS THE CHAPTER THREE! Or chapter always known as weakest chapter of every game. I do not know what is up with these chapter threes and their super obvious culprits, but at least this time around that was done on purpose? Anyway I am jumping the gun with the culprit because first we must discuss the holiest of the holiest, the most divine and devoted that is the ANGIE YONAGA, EVERYBODY'S FAVOURITE CHARACTER AND A MAJOR ENSEMBLE DARKHORSE OF THE SERIES!!1!!!

Well, yeah okay.

I don't hate any character in DRV3. I love them all actually, but Angie is a character who seems to be a little bit of a hate sink. Not to the intensity that is say, Saionji or Ruruka but still, when most people discover Angie's body it's often not a huge fanfare. In fact, Angie dying was pretty obvious and something most people saw telegraphed the moment she took up the antagonistic role of CULT LEADER who splits up the cast causing conflict within! It's actually kind of difficult to comment on Angie's character. She doesn't change all that much, so there's little to no development, and what we learn from FTEs and.... Love Hotel scenes just elaborate on how bizarre her island's customs and her devotion to Atua is. She seems to have to shown up in this killing game already brainwashed, and we never really learn who she is beneath it all. I mean, there is something to suggest Angie is lonely beneath absolutely everything, but she's buried in so much of the cult, religious, devoted stuff that it's so difficult to unearth that aspect of Angie and so, we can't really say with much certainty how much we really got to know her before she died. A shame, really. She did serve her purpose as antagonist of chapter three quite well. I will give her that. All the more emotionally weaker characters fell for her cult to, STARTING with Himiko from way back in chapter two... I will continue that thought when we reach HImiko.

Speaking of Himiko though, there is Tenko. The Tenks. The Tenko of the last name that is too long for my taste. Chabashira? Oh yes.

I did not like Tenko first time I went through this game. I WILL BE HONEST. I DID NOT LIKE TENKO. FUNNY HOW THAT WORKS. Hahaha. But a large degree of my distaste for Tenko was due to my one-track-mind after Kaede died. You see the despair of Kaede dying was so great, that my focus fell very narrowly onto Himiko, the other character I liked best still left who I was absolutely convinced was going to die anyway because after Kaede's unexpected demise I had no favourite that ever lived and the protagonist dying was the last straw. I paid very little attention to anything else, which was why even the obvious culprit of chapter three came as as surprise to me. I was too busy wondering if Himiko was the next victim, or how she could have murdered the victims. That was my mindset throughout the ENTIRE GAME after Kaede died. That is what despair does, my friends.

Anyway the reason I liked Himiko so much aside from being eccentric and adorable was how relatable she was. In fact, I don't think I've found a character I've related MORE to than Himiko! So just like Himiko, I too had a negative impression of Tenko. I even compared her to Jaune of all characters at one point due to her forwardness. I was like "GODDAMNIT TENKO LEAVE HIMIKO ALONE" EVEN IF YOU'RE A GIRL YOU ARE NOT EXEMPT TO THIS KIND OF CRITICISM, that being far too forward with your crush and not taking no for an answer. (Of course I didn't realize Himiko actually never said no to Tenko hanging out with her once, either because she was too lazy to or some other reason. She certainly said no to some of Tenko's comments and questions to her at times, but never did she actively try to avoid Tenko... more like asking others to do it for her. Ha)

But just like Himiko... over time I realized how wonderful Tenko really was. I think her other major flaw, the degenerate male thing also makes Tenko easily unlikable for many as well. Her FTEs don't even reveal some tragic reasoning for this misandry. She's just a gullible idiot who listens to literally anything her master, a male mind you, says. It is hilarious though. There is that one line in that one trial where she mentions her alcoholic father, so maybe there's some tragic inkling there that we'll never explore because now Tenko is too dead to develop. Alas. Alas. Still! Underneath her many flaws, Tenko is one of the most sincere, earnest, honest, heartwarming characters out there. Unlike Jaune's crush on Weiss that was entirely to his selfish whims. Tenko actually goes about and tries to... IMPROVE HIMIKO AS A PERSON. She never put Himiko on some perfect flawless pedestal who could do no wrong. Tenko knew Himiko wasn't perfect, knew she was falling for Angie's cult and taking the easy way out and she wanted to keep Himiko out of it. She truly wanted to protect Himiko, learn more about Himiko, and her crush was more genuine than mere infatuation on Himiko's surface appearance or personality. Tenko's eagerness to help girls IS REAL AND IS GREAT! Even if her hatred of men is sort of silly and stupid, her desire to protect vulnerable girls is the greatest virtue of Tenko! Despite the disappointing reveal of Tenko's misandrist origins, a lot of her FTEs made me want to learn more about her. How she was even MORE of a spazz and emotive freak, maybe getting wildly angry or having manic attacks even before she began learning Aikido. That Aikido helped her become more stable of a person and how she always recommends it to others for self-improvement as well. Also she does slowly warm up to Shuichi so anything depicting Tenko still being an ass to Shuichi of all people annoys me greatly. She may not have had time to develop completely, but she definitely was changed compared to the Tenko of the beginning of the game!

Also she will never live it down how she died. How she was killed. Fucking Kork. Fucking Korey in the House. Fucking folklore cunt. Fucking tulpaman-- KOREKIYO SHINGUCCI, I MEAN SHINGUJI HAS TOO MANY NICKNAMES.

Actually I don't hate Korekiyo. Far from it, ha. His motive though. His motive is so over-the-top I can't even take it seriously. Others do and despise his fucking guts, and while there may be actual people like Korekiyo out there, I just cannot get over how absolutely absurd his reason to kill was. For his dead sister who now possesses him in the form of a split personality after a seance that he has incestuous desires towards? And he's almost killed one hundred friends, females he deems worthy to be friends of his sister's in the afterlife already? The fuck man. That reveal was wild. He's also purposely depicted as creepy as possible with an unhealthy fascination of humanity which is justified by his anthropology background and is an absolute joke character in the anthologies. He's great. He's my second favourite male of DRV3 and I don't even know why. This man should be considered vile and unforgivable.

BUT HE THREW AWAY HIS PERFECT MURDER FOR THE SEE-SAW TRICK, and will never live it down. The see-saw is too precious to abandon. RIP TENKO. RIP KOREKIYO.

How have I not mentioned the gorgeous girl genius with a golden brain, MIU IRUMA yet!? Quite possibly the most flawed female character in the entire series, unless just being straight up a despair bitch is considered one entire flaw, Miu still manages to be fascinating and wonderful and I STILL like her despite the claim the creator purposely wrote her to be unlikable! She singlehandedly demonetizes Youtube playthroughs with no remorse whatsoever and ruins every single moment possible with her endless uncensored innuendos, but simultaneously along with her comedic side is one of the most useful characters in the game as well. Perhaps not so in the trials (she is wrong during every scrum debate hahaha) but her expertise with the tech allows her to invent so many items that serve so many purposes throughout the plot. I think Himiko (I think it was her anyway) said it best, Miu was very smart but also very dumb. Aside from that Miu seems to have a similar sort of complex Mikan does where most of her self-worth is shot and she has a belief she can really only be useful to someone with her body... if her FTEs or Love Hotel mean anything, anyway. Also Miu is a victim, but she DID attempt to murder someone and showed surprising hindsight when it came to executing her murder plan, but just like that quote she overlooked quite a many things that led to her downfall as well. That slip of hand leading to the bridge being washed away by the river was not the most subtle of things, Miu. She was also my favourite from first impressions. When I first saw the cast and looked at screenshots and such, Miu was the girl that stood out most to me. I didn't have a strong impression of this cast at first as well. I was very whelmed when I looked at the designs. Heck Tenko was my least favourite design. I was wondering why she had over nine thousand hair accessories that made her head super busy looking. The green pinwheel was the worst offender.

How foolish you were, past Spotto of one year ago.

Anyway! SWEET PURE, PITIFUL GONTA.

I guess he does subvert the beefcake sacrifice of chapter four by being the beefcake culprit of chapter four. I mean he was trying to sacrifice everyone if that counts, starting with Miu, and Kokichi was quite the influence on top of the flashback light... still, he joins the ranks of Sakura and Nidai in dying in chapter four. Sad as it may be... and that's really all I have to say on Gonta. Aside from being a pure boy who wishes to be a gentleman there wasn't a lot compelling with Gonta. I AM SORRY FOR NOT BEING ABLE TO SAY MORE. Gonta was a pure boy who made the trial all the more tragic.

Kokichi Ouma cannot carry all the guys by himself, you know. The only way I can take a claim of a the guys being so much better than the girls seriously is if this guy carries all the weight. And he doesn't! I may like Kork. Gonta may have been a pure boy. Ryoma may have had a tragic existence, and Rantaro was eyecandy, but they were NOTHING compared to Kokichi. AND EVEN THEN, Kokichi cannot carry the entire male cast on his shoulders. OKAY!? Also his rampant popularity has rubbed me off the wrong way, even if I do love his character he is far too overexposed for me. His face is like on 80% of all things DRV3, whether it be fanfic, art, or stupid videos. He is everywhere. Kokichi does not need to be every amusing role that exists on the internet, guys. Seriously. Also Kokichi you are not being unique with your fascination over the male protagonist. Komaeda already got you beat several years ago. He got you beat on the whole KILL MYSELF DURING CHAPTER FIVE AND MINDFUCK THE REST OF THE CAST plan too, so don't you think you're special or anything, KOKICHI!!

Kokichi is still better than Komaeda.

Oh right. Anyway Kokichi is the wildcard character who is basically the embodiment of lies and carries lots of homoerotic subtext. Yay! He's also very short and has the wonderful voice-acting talent of Derek Stephen Prince, who blew his Fuyuhiko out of the water with his delivery of all of Kokichi's wonderful lines. I choose to believe his final words are the truth though, that he lied to himself this entire time, took the role of the villain on purpose for this insane gambit that ended his life all to stop the killing game because ultimately, Kokichi hates killing. He likes pulling pranks and fooling with people, but murder is not a straw he will cross...even if he instigated Miu and Gonta's death, but whatever. His motive video says that much anyway.

Kaito is a poor man's Kamina. Moving on.

Tsumugi is a fascinating masterm--FINE I'LL TALK ABOUT KAITO.

I think the Kamina archetype works best when they die early and heavily affect the main character from the get-go... alas, Kaede who is technically the Nia of this game, took that role. So instead Kaito is around to serve as Maki's motivation, which is fine and all. Really, it's fine. I think. Maybe. Yes he does help out Shuichi too, and his positive influence is great and all, but Kaito is really SHOUNEN PROTAGONIST THE CHARACTER, and I've never really been fond of that kind of character...especially in a genre like Danganronpa where logic and intelligence is the most powerful ally of the main character, to decipher the clues and work out how and who dun diddly decked the dead. Also there's this moment in chapter four people point out a lot, where he's willing to die to believe in Gonta, which is all motivational and heartwarming and all, but it's not like Kaito would be the only one to die if they didn't vote for Gonta... EVERYBODY would, so he was being rather selfish at the time, throwing his beliefs over the welfare of the people (KIND OF LIKE ANGIE, lol) and then he gets super annoyed and pissed with Shuichi for siding with logic and reasoning and all... (I am well aware Tenko said something similar about Himiko in chapter two's trial. The difference here is that I think Tenko is speaking more from her undying love for Himiko whereas Kaito is basing more of his stance on his unyielding belief as opposed to being in love with Gonta or something... also Tenko was defending Himiko at the beginning of the trial when not all evidence was presented whereas Kaito defended Gonta to the very end against all the facts. I'm not sure how Tenko would react if Himiko were a culprit, probably similarly, but I think it all comes down to where their intent lies.. Maybe Kaito's stubbornness would be more understanding if he and Gonta were close friends or something? But Kaito and Gonta didn't have many interactions, and Kaito is just basing it on Gonta being pure and such, not even allowing people to even discuss the mere possibility that Gonta could be the culprit, which we did get to do without great interference from Tenko on Himiko in trial two. I DUNNO MAYBE I JUST WANNA JUSTIFY MY SEEMING HYPOCRISY HERE) yeah he's flawed and I do like flawed characters, but maybe the game doesn't point out these flaws often enough or make it apparent enough. We get a lot of praise for Kaito especially when characters like Maki and Shuichi with all the screentime in the world are so positively influenced by him, but what of his flaws? Why not point them out? Aside from people calling him an idiot which is a trope Japanese media does a lot where idiot is more like a term to describe a... shounen protagonist who throws all reasoning aside to believe in themselves and do their best, there isn't a lot of time where the narrative paints Kaito in a negative light.

Well, I don't have any strong feelings either way, that's just the opinions I've heard. My impression of Kaito is that he's just the run-of-the-mill motivational dude who somehow is the entire reason Maki becomes a better person... okay. LET US MOVE ON.

So! Tsumugi Shirogane is a fascinating mastermind. She doesn't do anything else in this game unfortunately, and her character is almost non-existent since it's almost entirely tied to the big reveal at the end of the game so uhm... okay? You can have this one, fans of guy characters who loudly proclaim they are better than the girls! She's also probably lying a lot during the reveal so we cannot possibly determine what is true and what isn't and what exactly the ending even entails. The ending itself is pretty polarizing and I don't have too much to say on it. I wanna keep this discussion on the characters even if MAYBE that Tsumugi claims about writing their lines and characters is true. Maybe. Perhaps. Possibly. THE CAN OF WORMS SHALL BE CLOSED, OKAY?

Also she was the true murderer of Rantaro and executed Kaede for no real reason, if only to continue the killing game. WELP. This doesn't change how I feel about either characters though. Rantaro still died first (even if it's for a plot-relevant reason) and Kaede though technically wasn't the killer, it's the intent that matters. In some regions, attempted murder is charged as seriously as murder, y'know.

Kiibo or Keebo or Keeboy or K1B0 or Hope or Robonaegi or whatever is a character there to spout PC jokes and be the buttmonkey until he shoots up a school in chapter six. I wish what I said was exaggeration. He's still great though, but little development who doesn't do much until the end, and even though I feel sad about his sacrifice he wasn't especially compelling either way, even if he was the audience surrogate, or the camera, or that we played as him, or that he's the literal Ultimate Hope Robot or any of that. His strongest interactions were with Miu but her death didn't change him as a person, and his complex of being treated as a real human doesn't get anywhere sadly. I wish the cast wasn't all almost entirely robophobic outside of like Shuichi and maybe a few others like Miu. Kokichi may have been the most blatant bully about it, but characters like say TENKO AND HIMIKO also had little good things to say about Keebo. GODDAMNIT YOU GUYS YOU'RE MY FAVOURITES. ESPECIALLY YOU HIMIKO, STOP CALLING KEEBO AN APPLIANCE OR THAT HE SHOULD BLOW HIMSELF UP TO BE USEFUL, GAAAAH. They're very flawed, you see. I have yet to see a post-game fanfic that acknowledges Keebo's sacrifice ever bring up anything like Himiko being remorseful for how she spoke of Keebo. Are we choosing to ignore this?

But I digress, it's SURVIVOR TIME. Because I am biased Himiko will be last, and we'll start with Maki

Man I wish Maki had more interactions with characters beyond like Kaito...and Shuichi, but Shuichi is a given considering he is the protagonist and everybody interacts with him. Even Himiko got Angie as a friend too along with Tenko, Shuichi as well, being the given, and spent some time with Gonta even. But Maki's entire character is all thanks to Kaito. I think being the Ultimate Assassin trying to hide her talent and stubbornly guarding her lab door for as long as she did was good, but Kaito dragging her out to training and her giving in rather easily flies against all that stuff we established. She gave in TOO easily. From everything we know about her, I thought she'd be far more resistant against people trying to open her up. Yet it didn't take Kaito very long to drag her along with the training, and it didn't take Maki very long to grow attached to him. Again I hate to compare her to Himiko, but Himiko took EONS to get attached to Tenko, and only truly appreciated her after she died! Himiko doesn't get the sad tragic backstory that justifies being cold, detached, and antisocial, but Maki DOES. SO WHAT GIVES!?

I'll give her props for not being as flawless as Kirigiri and Nanami were, but eh... Maki isn't especially unique nor was she all that compelling. She was about as interesting as Kaito. IF ONLY SHE WAS THE WILDCARD CHARACTER WITH THE FASCINATION OVER OUR FEMALE PROTAGONIST, KAEDE. If only!

Speaking of protagonists, Shuichi! Yay Shuichi. My favourite Shuichi sprite is his happy sprite. Well he has more than one, but just the one where his eyes are open and his smile his wide. Well, his smile with his eyes closed is cute too. Happy Shuichi is adorable because his design screams a sad, negative, pessimistic, gloomy character, so seeing someone who looks like that so happy... is nice. I like it. I also like how his entire character arc led to him being so much more confident, that when it came time to go against the final evil dilemma the villain always throws on us his response to to kill ourselves. So intuitive, Shuichi. I know it's the proper response to end the killing games and to sacrifice ourselves so no one ever has to suffer what this cast has to again, but just that line of reasoning and how it turned out is kind of hilarious in hindsight. You have Kaede and Kaito being like YOU HAVE FRIENDS! YOU HAVE TO LIVE FOR THOSE THAT HAVE DIED! BELIEVE IN THE ME WHO BELIEVES IN YOU, and at the very end, at the climax, Shuichi is like, WE HAVE TO KILL OURSELVES!11! He would not have come to this conclusion not only if it weren't for his character development, but also if it weren't Shuichi's personality itself. Kaede I do not think would resort to convincing everyone to kill themselves to end the killing game. I don't see her ever resorting to that kind of tactic. I can see Shuichi doing it, though. Also if Love Hotel events are canon, Shuichi has more game than every other protagonist, and is the defacto bisexual protag of the bunch. And you thought Hinata had homerotic subtext! Ha! I do admit he seemed a little more dynamic when he wasn't the protag though, like how he DEDUCED the dust in the card reader on that hidden door in chapter one, and came up with this proactive plan with the cameras that he never did so ever again. I guess Kaede was there to encourage him and help him out, but after this chapter Shuichi just reacts to things as opposed to causing things because protagonists aren't allowed to move the plot, only react to it.

He does display many aspects of being very intelligent, and understanding things before even the audience does (he goes "wait, this isn't right..." and then doesn't reveal it to the player until the trial, but he figures it out himself loooong before the trial, making his ultimate talent very much earned indeed) so yeah. I found Shuichi one of the more interesting protagonists of the bunch... but still, I will always wonder what could have been with the lost potential that is Kaede... what could it have been? I'm sure Shuichi thinks so too.

HIMIKO YUMENO SURVIVED THE KILLING GAME. WHAT THE FLYING FUCK.

I am still over the hill about this. This will never not shock me, no matter how much time passes. Never in a million years could I have possibly expected her survival. HOW does she survive? She is a smol weak girl just screaming to be a victim, with a fascinating talent that could have led to one of the more entertaining executions, and instead she fucking lives. People tried to frame her more than once instead of kill her! "Let's see, this is a small child who is somehow a teenager, who has no energy for anything and is a bit slow and is thus very vulnerable. I KNOW! I'LL FRAME HER OF MURDER WITH MY OVERLY CONVOLUTED MURDER PLAN!11!!" She outright admits murder is too much effort and this is how people react to her. I swear! But one of the biggest reasons she did live was because of Tenko's sacrifice. The moment Himiko really could have died was to the ridiculous seesaw gambit Kork came up with, but Tenko took her place, not only giving her life, but taking Himiko's place as the victim of the endless meme. Godspeed Tenko. Godspeed.

Himiko of course then became the defacto... "useless" survivor. I do not like that term; that's just the one thrown around the most. I think the best way to describe it is the least relevant survivor. Someone like Hagakure from the first game or Akane from the second. I think she gets even more heat as the least relevant survivor because there were only three, so she took up the only feasible spot any other character could have taken that someone may have liked better if we assume Maki and Shuichi HAD to live. BUT NAY! YOU WILL NOT TAKE THIS ULTRA RARE OPPORTUNITY FROM ME, KNAVES! YOU WILL TAKE THIS FROM MY COLD, DEAD HANDS I TELL YOU! Because no matter how unbelievable it may be, I FINALLY have a favourite character who LIVED, and against ALL ODDS it was in the game with the least amount of survivors, taking the SINGLE spot any other character could have taken, and as useless and irrelevant you want to claim her to be, SHE DEVELOPED AS A CHARACTER, and became stronger due to the plot, and thus has earned her right to live on and be a survivor! SO FUCK YOU ALL! FUCK ALL OF YOU!! HA! HAHAHAHA! I HAVE SOMETHING ALIVE! AND YOU CAN'T TAKE IT FROM ME! IT IS CANON! HA! NOW YOU HAVE TO RESORT TO AU STORIES WITH ALTERNATE SURVIVORS OR IT'S ALL A SIMULATION! YOU CAN'T TAKE THIS CANON FROM ME, BASTARDS!

Okay. So Himiko.

Ah yes, the character I super relate to. She started off being a chunnibyou who claims magic is real and she is a master mage at that, despite her official talent being a magician instead, the stage kind with the tricks. She's also lazy as shit, so how she is the master of something that requires so much work is a mystery. She is an introvert who cannot be bothered to initiate any conversation, and if you do want to be her friend you have to always go to her first. Even if she doesn't like you she won't push you away because she is too lazy. She literally tells Shuichi she was too lazy to say no to him. This is how Tenko gets close to her. I also think she's pretty emotionally vulnerable and that's also why she never gets close to people because one can easily be hurt. The killing game affects her mentally quite a bit, and the only reason she keeps herself calm and collected is by resorting to Angie and becoming her friend, thus converting to the ways of Atua and escaping reality to deal with it all. Oh and she doesn't have energy in the first place to do much, which may explain her laziness, always excusing doing things with her lack of MP. She has trouble emoting and sleeps a lot. There are some headcanons out there that Himiko might be autistic and clinically depressed. I sort of agree with both, but unless they're outright confirmed it's only a mere headcanon, and we can't really intertwine such thoughts with her character completely. I will say Himiko seems far more okay with dying than most characters, with only Ryoma beating her for that...lovely title. It's less being suicidal and more giving up far more easily when it comes to Himiko. Again, I think she's very emotionally vulnerable which leads to that kind of mindset. She's also one of the more gullible characters what with falling for the cult and being pretty easily tricked or spooked in trials. Himiko is also terrible at not being suspicious. She either doesn't bother defending herself or flails around in a panic when suspected. It's great and entertaining. She also can't tell the difference between termites and rice. It is as Shuichi said, even if she didn't survive the killing game, how did she even survive life itself? Egads.

LUCKILY TENKO IS HERE, the ultra-supportive aikido master who to my utter disbelief, immediately sees Himiko and SOMEHOW this girl is the GIRL OF HER DREAMS. I don't understand Tenko's tastes whatosever. But whatever, she chose wisely. I mean yes, I like Himiko too, but because I relate to her and she's cute and such, also entertaining. Unlike Tenko though, when I first saw the cast Himiko was amongst the others as characters I was whelmed by. No real response. Tenko sees this witchy smol girl and immediately falls in love at first sight. UHM, OKAY? But really, how I describe this is like a dog who adopts you. They follow you home and love you forever. This is like a dog that adopts a cat, Himiko, who is very much cat-like being lazy, sleeping a lot, rather independent because she'd prefer to be alone and such, also black cats are associated with witches, so y'know. That's why Himiko does not like Tenko from the get-go... and also because Tenko is making some lewd comments and being somewhat inappropriate at times. Chapters one and two aren't particularly positive depictions of either characters. They are BOTH flawed, but one likes the other, and little do we know this infatuation will cause both characters to become so much better as people over time. Unfortunately Tenko's was cut short, but still.

See, due to the trauma of the killing game, Himiko needs comfort, but she isn't one to reach out. However, Angie is very open and wants more converts to her religion, for those to see the truth and believe in the almighty Atua. Angie's Atua and thus friendship is the comfort Himiko needs to emotionally survive people killing and dying all around her. It may not have been a healthy friendship, but it was a friendship, and I believe Angie despite what her intentions led to, had good intentions. She truly wanted to save Himiko and she truly wanted to be friends with her, and give her the comfort she needs. Angie just wants to do it her way, the only way she knows how. She does come up with the idea of the magical show meant to give smiles to the rest of students, so that's something that would have been very positive for Himiko if someone didn't throw Ryoma's body into the damn piranha tank. >_>

But unfortunately, relying on Angie long-term would not be healthy. It would be throwing away all your own decision-making and independence for the sake of Atua, and Tenko saw this. Himiko of course did not go to Tenko for comfort when the killing game was going on because Tenko did not offer friendship to Himiko, but rather her unwanted advances for some sort of romantic or sexual relationship with Himiko, which was the last thing she needed, or at least that is what Himiko was seeing from Tenko. Still, Tenko kept up her unwavering support which eventually went beyond lust or the need to protect Himiko as a vulnerable young lady, but Tenko revealed her true motives and wanted Himiko to have her own agency, and become a better person as well, to express her emotions and be herself, not cooped up locking herself away and relying on Atua for guidance for the rest of her life. Especially if Atua truly isn't some almighty god responsible for bringing salvation to people, and is just a big fat lie. (This is all interpretation of course, but Angie dying doesn't help)

When Angie died, Himiko lost this place of comfort, this friendship, and desperately wanted to connect with Angie one more time. When Tenko gives Himiko this advice, to live life facing forward, to survive, since Himiko was making comments of not wanting to go on after her only pillar of support that she assumed she had was gone, Himiko finally realized Tenko was the kind of support she did need, one that did not need to manipulate your thoughts into false ideas. She not only protected her, but Tenko was pushing Himiko in the right direction. For her to stand up for herself, to be her own biggest supporter and stop relying on outside things, to stop escaping from reality and gain the strength needed to face grim reality itself! Himiko was finally beginning to realize this, and how much Tenko was a positive influence on her.

But then Tenko died.

Just when Himiko believed she had a healthy pillar of support, it was ripped away from her. All the advice she was about to take meant nothing. It was only after the revelations of what a sick bastard Kork was, and after being accused once again, this time of murdering her own friends does she finally take Tenko's advice. For whatever reason people only credit Kokichi for Himiko unleashing her emotions, but even before his harsh words Shuichi was the one who reminded Himiko during the trial of what Tenko said. Tenko may be gone, but Shuichi, Kaito and even people like Kokichi are trying to push her forward, and so Himiko's character development began. She was to be optimistic, to live life as it should, to no longer be the lazy girl she once was. Even Gonta was there albeit for a brief single chapter to keep her spirits up. She had friends! If it weren't for Tenko's words and inadvertent sacrifice, she would never have realized this.

But even after vowing to take that advice Himiko stumbles out of the gate and has a difficult time trying to figure out what this "living life facing forward" meant. She still seems to be low-energy, so her attempts to be bombastic and optimistic drain the MP out of her, but at least this time Himiko is trying. Beyond chapter four Himiko takes up the mantle of comic relief after Miu and Gonta dies and Kokichi is out of commission until "Kokichi" shows up at the fifth trial. When we get to chapter six Himiko is the only character left beyond Keebo (who is too busy progressing the plot at this point) who provides any sort of comedic relief. I guess Tsumugi has her references but meh, never liked referential humour. Plus by the time Tsumugi reveals herself as the mastermind Himiko is the only one there to lighten the mood at all, which is A TALL ORDER to fill when this girl was fine with dying a few chapters ago! (She's fine with dying twice more after that, and the end of the game they literally are like "WE SHALL KILL OURSELVES, so I mean...")

But ultimately, the will of the outside world or Keebo himself, idk this ending man, spares Himiko's life along with the others, and she survives... and regardless of what parts of the killing game and her life were lies, can still continue Tenko's words and live life facing forward, whatever the future yields....nyeh.

FUCK YEAH, HIMIKO.

Now as for OTP, while yes Tenko has super ultra canon gay feelings for Himiko, I cannot say with any certainty if Himiko reciprocates romantically. I WANT to say yes of course, and there is the anecdotal evidence that could back this up, but there's also not enough to be conclusive either way. Someone claimed in the Japanese translation Himiko uses the word ai, or romantic love in Japanese to refer to Tenko in the final trial but I went back to the moment and she never says ai at all? The fact that the translation is just word for word the localization which never mentions love doesn't help, but maybe she brings it up sometime else. Tenko is regarded as just as important to Himiko as Kaede and Kaito were to Shuichi and Maki, so I CHOOSE TO BELIEVE, just like Shuichi chooses to believe Tsumugi's words were a lie off a mere hunch, THAT HIMIKO DOES LOVE HER BACK. I MAY NOT HAVE THE HARD EVIDENCE, BUT I CHOOSE TO BELIEVE!!

But yes, Danganronpa gave me an OTP. That hasn't happened. I always thought these characters were too flawed and messed up, especially the SDR2 characters to be shipped believably, at least for me. And even though Tenko and Himiko were flawed, their dynamic is such an integral part of both characters that is pleases me greatly that they were the token lesbians of this game. (It's always token lesbians because the protagonist is always male.... like in DR1 when it was Sakura and Aoi, but that one was less subtext and more friendship, and in SDR2 with Mahiru and Saionji, which is given more subtext like Ibuki's THE WORLD OF GIRL LOVE, IT'S SLIPPERY WHEN WET comment, but only DRV3 has the token lesbians not ONLY be canon at least one-sided, but was a greatly affected and started the character development of one half of the pair. YES. GOOD. ALMOST EVERYTHING I WANTED!!)

Anyway Tenmiko is a pure good ship that is objectively the best ship in Danganronpa. Anyone who says otherwise is wrong.

Current Mood: thoughtful

BEYOND THIS POINT LIES DANGANRONPA V3 SPOILERS

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED

-------------

I have found it.

Something I have been searching for since the beginning of my adolescence.

I have found it.

It exists.

It's as canon as it can ever be!

It's the closest its ever been.

Many times I would rant about something like Pinkie and Fluttershy not being as close as I hoped. The idea that an extrovert and an introvert could not only be friends, but beyond was a dream I thought not possible until recently. An extrovert that drives the introvert to improve themselves and the introvert teaching the extrovert how to treat and act to those of the same... a pipe dream you might say. It's also probably the most self-indulgent kind of ship I could ever yearn for, being an introvert who one day wishes to find the kind of friend like that (at least at first being able to TOLERATE the kind of person like that, and then slowly growing closer over time as we improve ourselves and complete one another) and so anything I find with such potential to be something like that I cling to with all the power I can wield.

Oftentimes I compared my frustrations with PinkieShy with a far darker and also probably less healthy relationship between two Danganronpa characters, Ibuki and Mikan. Unfortunately for those two, there are lots of extenuating circumstances that affect such a potential ship greatly. Let me be frank, I do not like unhealthy relationships. Any ship with any underlying toxic kind of atmosphere puts me off immediately. This is why I have a hard time shipping anything at all in Danganronpa because most if not all characters are fucked up beyond belief in one way or another. Mikan is one of those characters, and an especially extreme kind of example as well. No matter how much I love Ibuki I truly in my heart cannot see her having the ability to be one-half of Mikan, to be strong enough to support Mikan as she fights her infinite demons. Ibuki is not free of demons herself of course, but what backstory is provided for Ibuki is a farcry from how much we know of Mikan. It's simply not on equal standing. There's too much on the scale that weighs one over the other, one who needs so much more than the other and the other who has to give so much more than they can possibly provide.

Don't get me wrong though, all the art and AUs and headcanons of them are cute! But in the end for something to truly be an OTP, that is the kind of obstacle it must overcome. It's why I love Monochrome from RWBY so much. Their backstories are intertwined and the both of them can improve the other just by being together. It's such a thematically good ship (not to mention aesthetically pleasing) and should any ship among the main four come true, in terms of narrative and story purposes it makes the most sense and is the most rewarding for the story, as well as enriching for both characters. That kind of balance, that kind of give-and-take that makes a relationship work is what's ideal in my kind of ship. It may seem vanilla and boring on the surface, but maybe I just like boring and vanilla. Maybe I want that.

So it is of course to my surprise that Danganronpa's third installment, third maingame series provides just that.

When I first went through V3, I was shocked like the masses at the aftermath of chapter one. It took a long time for me to pick myself up and continue, to pay attention to the story and realize "Oh yeah, there are still fourteen other characters to care about". That's the kind of thing you recover from slowly as you trudge through the rest of the game. Still, I managed to develop another favourite despite how foolish that is, as all my favourites to this point had died horribly in this series. I knew the moment I grew attached. the moment I liked a character that character was doomed. They were dead. They would cease to be in a pile of pepto bismol and misery. And I would continue to doom characters over and over again no matter what, despite its affect on my heart.

But Himiko Yumeno, the next character I latched onto had a guardian angel. A character who basically made sure that Himiko would not suffer the same fate as all the others I had grown to love. And just like Himiko, I too found this guardian angel a bit too... forward. Annoying, so to say. Creepy even. Stalkery. Tenko Chabashira. My first reaction, my liveblog (and I've liveblogged every game so far somehow o_o) I commented about Himiko's weird, unhealthy psychopath friends. I was mostly referring to Angie when I brought that up, but Tenko was part of that description for a long time too. I was so convinced Himiko would bite the dust that I never really paid attention to the small details, only vaguely the big picture with tunnel vision strictly stuck on Himiko. She was dead, I was convinced. This next victim would be her. A small redheaded child will be laying on the ground in a pool of blood soon, or she'd be the next murderer and be executed in spectacular and elaborate fashion. I was convinced.

But Tenko, Tenko made sure that was not to be.

It wasn't until Tenko died that I, like Himiko, finally realized how much she mattered, how great she was. It would not be a lie to say that I strongly relate to Himiko. Himiko hits all three bullet points of being an excellent character Spotto would no doubt love. She was adorable, quotable, and relatable. Thankfully she wasn't particularly useful during trials or especially plot relevant near the end or else she'd be a mary-sue. She was hitting all the marks. But yes, these types of characters like Himiko traditionally were most in danger by the time chapter three rolled around. I was dreading Himiko's death. She was getting more and more relevant to the current chapter, and no doubt she'd croak and I had doomed her once more.

But Tenko. Tenko was there.

The moment Tenko introduced herself she launched into a foray of how much girls were great and men were terrible, evil beings that all had to die. A tad extreme. Well, okay not just a 'tad', but that kind of excessive hatred was a bit jarring and irritating over time. Then she had her little fussy obsession with Himiko. The slow, young sleepy girl was somehow the girl of Tenko's dreams. I still find that endlessly amusing and maybe even realistic. Normally when someone mentions the person of their dreams, it's an image of someone absolutely perfect, a person so beautiful and charismatic it wasn't possible for such a person to exist, yet Tenko's ideal girl was... Himiko. Yes, Himiko, a character Kokichi called ugly more than once (though he's quite the liar so who knows) and someone Miu insulted more than once (but Miu insults everyone, so.... both these characters' opinions MUST be taken with a grain of salt) yet Tenko sees Himiko as... perfect.

At first this seemed like a very superficial shallow kind of crush that Tenko had. Similar to Souda's one-sided love for Sonia in SDR2, I assumed like Souda, Tenko only cared for Himiko's very adorable appearance and very little else. And yes while it was rather apparent that she was smitten with Himiko's cute looks, over time Tenko began caring about Himiko beyond her surface. She tried to give Himiko drive. She tried to improve Himiko as a person. She could read Himiko, and realize that Himiko was hiding her emotions, was keeping herself locked within, and was coping with the killing game rather poorly, using escapism as a measure to ignore reality. When Tenko was concerned about these aspects of Himiko, it was clear then that Tenko had fallen for Himiko beyond just as a girl who was pretty, but for Himiko's virtues AND faults. Unlike so many other crushes portrayed in the media, Tenko's crush had actual substance. She wasn't just pining for Himiko for selfish reasons, but also FOR Himiko as well! She cared about Himiko as a person, and even though she held her on a pedestal for a good chunk of the beginning of the game, she eventually came to become the most supportive person possible to Himiko, the kind of person, the exact kind of friend you would want in a killing game.

And then she died.

Because it's Danganronpa and we can't have nice things.

Now this might seem like an all give and all take kind of relationship. It does seem pretty clearly that Tenko was ALL give to Himiko, and Himiko provided very little back. But I think what I really love about this ship is how both characters start off clearly flawed, one too lazy and too uncaring to bother doing anything, and one too overexcited and energetic to stop bothering others. Tenko did slowly improve over time in terms of her overly forward attitude. When she infiltrated the cult for instance, instead of just impulsively running up trying to drag Himiko out by force like her martial art of choice seems to encourage, she instead lays low and keeps watch to make sure Himiko is doing alright. It is only when it seems nothing else can be done that Tenko outright tries to shake Himiko out of her stupor, to get her to stop being brainwashed. This seems like a stark contrast to the sputtering Tenko of chapter one who can't keep her mouth shut about her fantasies with Himiko or her assumptions of how Himiko is feeling, and in return Himiko is now willingly hanging out with Tenko! And as much as Himiko is the character I love the most in this game, I can't help but be most intrigued with Tenko's backstory and how she came to be.

Tenko apparently used to be a very rowdy child, I think even angry. (I don't remember exactly, so this could be wrong) so she was tossed into a temple to calm this side of her personality down. Even though Tenko is still quite emotive, this is apparently the most stable she's ever been in her life, so that Aikido must be doing something. She then has one SINGLE line in the entire game, a throwaway line you might not even pay attention to in the trials (that was somewhat mistranslated from the original Japanese) about the ramblings of a drunk father. Of course not knowing Japanese I can't confirm this, but some people have said the localization for whatever reason changed Tenko's words of "my drunk father" to "a drunk father" leaving it ambiguous in the dub if she's just referring to drunken people in general or a personal experience. This line is so important because Tenko's FTEs don't really reveal much about her family life, and only reveal that her master is a troll and Tenko is a gullible idiot who does whatever master says even if he's clearly bullshitting. I mean it's an amusing explanation for her misandry but I find the stereotypical angsty version a little more sympathetic. If you combine them both it gives Tenko even more depth.

In contrast while Himiko's FTEs revealed a great deal about her own master and her superiority inferiority complex, it didn't really give much information as to why Himiko was... Himiko. Maybe there's something I'm missing. Still the game itself does well to give Himiko development, and since I had to pick apart random lines and Tenko's FTEs to find anything due to Tenko's tragically shortened life, it makes sense how everything went down.

If there's anything about this game and Danganronpa in general I do have a bit of a tiff with, it's how they deal with LGBT characters. Yes most characters DO die, but any time a character shows interest in the same gender they usually die, and the subject of their interest usually lives. And it's always up to interpretation whether or not the living character had interest in return, like an obviously gay character isn't allowed to live or something. While I am glad Tenmiko is like, at least half-canon I can't one hundred percent say it's ENTIRELY canon since Himiko's feelings in return, though are at least at friendship levels and SUPER REGRET levels I cannot with certainty say are at romantic levels. Sure Himiko has expressed interest in men, but she ALSO has the bisexual haircut! And she MIGHT reciprocate her feelings to Tenko! She always mentions Tenko, and if she does mention Angie Tenko's name is always first, and if Kaito or Kaede is brought up, Himiko brings up Tenko too when the other two are obvious lost loves of the other survivors. But I still can't find anything concrete to back it up. It's all just implied or interpretation. I would love nothing more than even a SIDE thing confirming how Himiko felt, but until that comes out or happens I just can't say for sure. ):

I was THIS close to a canon FxF pair too. LET MY TOKEN LESBIANS BE CANON! I say token because just like with SDR2 and Komaeda it seems like 75% of all artwork I find of V3 is Kokichixsomebody. Yes, I also like Kokichi but I don't like him enough to be 75% of my V3 content, especially when I'm so attached to these token lesbians. At least the official anthology that is approved by the creators has some nice Tenmiko content where even Himiko seems to like Tenko back, but it's not CANON TO THE SERIES so I still can't say with ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY!! Ah well, still the most official anything I've ever shipped has ever been, so that's something. And Danganronpa also provided me with IBUKI, the CANON BI/ACE/NOT!STRAIGHT AT LEAST character who also happens to be my favourite and that very fact makes me all the more overjoyed that Ibuki exists. There are more than a handful of confirmed LGBT characters in the Danganronpa franchise, so I'm happy they're fine with making them all canon and such.

BUT MAYBE STOP MAKING THEM ALL TRAGICALLY GAY. I mean there was Teruteru who was bi, but he expressed his sexual orientation very openly and inappropriately, and also died. Then Mahiru probably had that gay friend Sato but she also became a lesbian murderer... and then there was Mikan who loved Junko but because Junko is ultimate despair Mikan is clearly fucked in the head... and also became a murderer... and then there was Juzo with his one-sided crush on Munakata, but he did lots of shitty things and died a tragic and heroic third wheel whose feelings would never be returned not only because Munakata was officially with Chisa but because Munakata fucking stabbed him, and then we have Tenko... WHY. WHY DANGANRONPA. LET AT LEAST ONE LIVE!!!

This isn't even getting to like, Komaeda and Kokichi and their implied feelings. WHO KNOWS. THEY DIED ANYWAY, SO WHATEVER.

But if you CONFIRM IT on Himiko there will AT LEAST BE ONE, and I will be satisfied with ONE. That's how low my expectations are. I don't think Shuichi counts because all his non-straight interactions are in bonus side games and were never relevant to the plot, which kind of sucks. It's great it exists though and probably does mean he's bi, but it's not shown whatsoever in the main story that he has attraction to men at any point. Maybe Kaito? idk

It's still better than literally every other media I've consumed that's all about queerbaiting but not actually having a single queer character or maybe it's GUEST CHARACTER OF THE DAY WHO IS GAY, or IRRELEVANT MINOR CHARACTER IS GAY or whatever. Nooo, never an IMPORTANT character or anything... >_>

I dunno if the Ultra Despair Girls count because nothing is outright mentioned or whatever. It could still be interpreted as a beautiful friendship, and because of how hetero-normative society is, unless it's spelled OUTRIGHT for the audience and SMASHED into their faces, the majority will never adopt a common belief that so-and-so character is not straight. IMPOSSIBIRU they'd say. Straight is the DEFAULT, they'd think. Blah. BLAH TO THEM!

Anyway I dunno why I needed so much text to spell out Tenko is the dog to Himiko's cat and I love dog/cat ships. At least I finally ship something in Danganronpa. I finally have an OTP. An OTP I can be proud of. YAY!

Current Mood: uncomfortable

Yes. SDR2 Spoilers. blahblahblah.

In My Little Pony there is a ship I have that I have many mixed feelings towards. I ultimately ship it, but it has always frustrated me how despite their status as main characters and friends that they had very little interaction throughout the show and any that did surface would often be a negative one. That's right, Pinkie and Fluttershy, always be making one another cry or one another uncomfortable, insensitivity ruining things for the highly-sensitive despite that wonderful episode early on where it looked like Pinkie was rather protective and considerate of Fluttershy's feelings, that led to that season showcasing how much Pinkie cared, encouraging Fluttershy to leap over the chasm in Dragonshy through song when everyone else was annoyed at how much of a load she was. When Fluttershy became so concerned that Pinkie went missing she leap-hugged her out of nowhere which would have been out-of-character any other day, any other episode and these lovely small moments disappearing into the winds, as writers came and went and characterization developed so...~

In Danganronpa there is a ship I try to have but have far too many mixed feelings towards. I don't ultimately ship it despite trying so hard to, though my thoughts are turning towards maybe trying once more. Why do I mention it here in the middle of what seems like a My Little Pony rant? Why because I always compare this ship to PinkieShy due to the two characters being somewhat similar to them. If I do not ship this ship I pretty much have nothing to ship in DR, which is why I really want this to work, yet unlike Pinkie and Fluttershy these characters though also friends and in the same clique, mostly have negative interactions when they show up. Not something minor and forgivable like making one another cry either, but literal murder.

Yep.

Now before you bite my head off, the context is VERY important and in fact the murder itself isn't even the problematic portion that bothers me to the point of not shipping it. The circumstances that lead Mikan to murdering Ibuki is pretty longwinded and occasionally ridiculous, but the entire cast of SDR2 are all parts of the Remnants of Despair, a terrorist cultist group following the ways of Junko who is basically Satan Incarnate after falling to her manipulative wiles/brainwashing. SDR2's biggest twist (or one of anyway) is that it turns out it's all a simulation to try to rehabilitate the cast so they lose their memories of being Despair, and go through a fun school trip where they bond and have positive memories that can return them to the happy pure selves they were of before. When Ibuki was murdered, a Despair disease made up by the mastermind and antagonist mascot of the series, Monokuma, caused a few of the characters to act very differently from their normal selves. Ibuki was given the gullible disease and Mikan the remembering disease. Mikan regained her memories of being a depraved horrific monster who will spread Despair at any cost for the sake of Junko, her love, and so she picked out the most vulnerable character to off who happened to be Ibuki.

I have no problems with that.

But before Mikan was despair, she was already a very broken individual. She had a very horrific past and upbringing. People regularly bullied her and called her trash, they would physically abuse her like putting out cigarette butts onto her skin, or using her as a writing pad when none was around. They basically did not treat her as a human being, and it has been such a consistent part of her life that she has a very warped and unhealthy personality towards others. Her self-esteem is to the pits, and though she would cry if you insult her (See: Saionji) she also believes the only way she can be liked is to show off her body, take off her clothes, willingly make herself a fanservice magnet to others. She has this belief that her only worth is her physical appearance and that's the only way she can be of any value, so she does intricate things like trip very awkwardly, falling into incredibly provocative positions assuming everyone would like it. She's terrified of every little thing, super anxious and also the Super High-School Level Nurse, meaning she's incredibly talented in caring for others. It's implied she enjoys being a nurse because it's the only time she feels she has an advantage over others. The only time she is stronger than another person is if that person is very sick and weak.

Anyway Mikan is messed up.

Ibuki for a while seemed to encourage Mikan's self-destructive behaviour because she enjoys cute girls. She likes fanservice. That scene with all the girls showing up to the beach party seriously rocked her world. So many girls with large boobs! IT'S HER PARADISE! She was also one if Mikan's friends or at least they were both in the same clique in school. Now, I found Ibuki's behaviour though rather harmless in terms of intentions (after all despite Mikan's protests she truly is doing what she does on purpose technically) it preys upon Mikan's insecurities and only serves to validate Mikan's belief that her only worth and only ability to be of any use to someone is to show off her body, which is very unhealthy. So Ibuki would be enabling Mikan and therefore should they be in a relationship, it would never end well.

But the more I thought about it, the more this issue isn't as large as it seems. Ibuki acted the way she did because at the time these fanservice shots were happening, the class believed they had all just met. Ibuki has absolutely no idea of Mikan's ulterior motives when she does what she does, she can only react the way she would normally react. For whatever reason I assumed Ibuki would still react in this way as if they were good friends, which we have no indication of in the small Twilight Syndrome scenes that flashback to their friendship back in the school when they had memories. I mean it can't all be good considering they are all willingly friends with Saionji for some reason (and in fact, I theorize Saionji is ACTUALLY the reason this clique exists, as in she is the CENTER of the four/five girls. You probably think I'm crazy, but look at it like this. Mahiru has no reason to be friends with Ibuki or Mikan, nor does Mikan have reason to be friends with Ibuki, but they ALL have reasons to circle around Saionji. Saionji is the closest to Mahiru, so that's the easy one. Saionji is also the only one who enjoys Ibuki's unique brand of music that she prefers as opposed to the generic pop she's famous for, so that obviously draws Ibuki to the group. Saionji is also the only one who gives Mikan attention. After a while Mikan's shenanigans would tire others or drive them away because most people in Hope's Peak at least in their class aren't mindless perverts... wait, what about Hanamura? What a strange plothole.

....wait a second.

Danganronpa 3 fixed the plothole.

WAIT A SECOND.

WAIT A MOTHERFUCKING SECOND.

There's a relationship chart for Class 77 that came out for the Anime, mostly pointing out who's friends with who and such. Ibuki had no friends, but her only comment was that she found Hanamura gross. There was a scene in the Anime where she "accidentally" kicked Hanamura away when he went into horny horndog mode...

THIS IS EVIDENCE THAT IBUKI WOULD NOT STAND FOR SOMEONE TAKING ADVANTAGE OF MIKAN. AND THUS MIKAN WOULD BE DRAWN TO HER CLIQUE THAT INCLUDES SAIONJI FOR SOME REASON FOR MORE THAN JUST THE SAD DEPRESSING NEED FOR ATTENTION THAT SAIONJI PROVIDES, AS NEGATIVE AND HORRIBLE AS IT WOULD BE BECAUSE IBUKI FINDS THE RESIDENT PERVERT GROSS, AND ACTIVELY STOPS HIM HERSELF. OH MY GOD.

And considering Ibuki's greatest wish in a relationship is a beautiful wholesome platonic BAND MEMBER BEST FRIEND kind of thing, she admits it in her finale in Island Mode, check her wiki entry for more info that means Ibuki's lust isn't as corrupted as I believed and Ibuki MAY ACTUALLY BE one of the few people FITTING to ship with MIKAN!

OH MY GOD. I JUST REALIZED THIS. I WAS GOING TO RANT THAT THIS SHIP WAS LIKE PINKIESHY TO THE NEGATIVE EXTREME, BUT I JUST FOUND A JUSTIFICATION THAT MAKES IT SOAR PAST PINKIESHY IN THE LIKELIHOOD AND HEALTHINESS DEPARTMENT! I MEAN IT PROBABLY HELPS THAT BOTH IBUKI AND MIKAN ARE PART OF THE LGBT SPECTRUM IN CANON, BUT HOLY CRAP.

But that just makes my love for PinkieShy even sadder. These two similar characters (kinda) with far more fucked up pasts/circumstances/traumas in a much more unforgiving universe WHEREIN ONE MURDERED THE OTHER can potentially work better as a couple than two happy technicoloured G-rated ponies. What the fuck.

I'm so glad Buckball Season exists at least. It shows Fluttershy's development as a character and where she needs to go if shipping her with Pinkie is of any possibility, and highlights the fact that Pinkie goes through anxiety not unlike what Fluttershy often struggled with, which gives Pinkie a way to empathize with Fluttershy's plight, leading to less insensitive situations and maybe that impossible extrovert/introvert barrier can finally be crossed the more we spend with these characters. OH GREAT WRITERS OF MY LITTLE PONY, I IMPLORE THEE TO SOMEDAY GIFT US A TRUE PINKIE AND FLUTTERSHY EPISODE THAT FULLY EXPLORES THEIR FRIENDSHIP AND GIVES MORE AMMO TO SPREAD THEIR ADORABLE SHIPPING POTENTIAL WITH SO MANY OTHERS THAT DON'T COME AT THE EXPENSE OF SOMEHOW EXPLAINING AWAY OR IGNORING EPISODES LIKE PUTTING YOUR HOOF DOWN OR FILLI VANILLI. AMEN.

I mean I still shipped them, but I was well aware however their relationship may be there were a lot of unhealthy or unsavoury aspects to it. I LOVE THE POTENTIAL OF THIS SHIP, THE SHEER CUTENESS IT COULD BRING, but the personalities clashed in ways I did not want to believe. I wanted Pinkie to open Fluttershy up to the world, for Fluttershy to show Pinkie the little things in life. The fact that they're both pink and yellow feminine colours and there isn't some clear "this character is clearly the pants in the relationship!" kind of stereotype that wracks so many same-sex ships. Fluttershy STANDING up for Pinkie in Buckball Season was very surprising, but the kind of dynamic that really could work in the rare event Pinkie is vulnerable. And Pinkie would always do her best to cheer up and make Fluttershy comfortable when she needs it. I LOVE THIS SHIP SO MUCH, but I'm also so very conflicted with what interactions exist between them in canon.

...well at least I can ship Ibuki/Mikan in peace now. 8D I'm still fond of the hilariously dark silly images depicting Mikan in the process of murdering Ibuki though... hahahaha! I swear Ibuki is my favourite. I don't understand people who immediately hate Mikan because she murdered their waifu Ibuki because she DID after all revert back to her despair!state, and it wasn't as if Mikan was the only one in such a state initially, the whole cast (almost) and Ibuki too was as well! In fact I bet you if it was despair!Mikan trying to murder despair!Ibuki, Ibuki would welcome it since being murdered brought despair which was a good thing in their eyes. That's how fucked up that situation was, seriously.

By the way the big fanfic I was regularly posting here is NOT abandoned, I'm already beyond thirty chapters at this point. My head is coming up with more idea/scenarios as to where the story will go from here, so if anyone is still curious the story lives on!

Current Mood: sick
Crossposts: http://spotstar.livejournal.com/287301.html

The aforementioned Weiss rant to be precise!

Actually this will likely be a mishmash of pretty much any topic relating to characters I like. You see recently I've been marathoning a very silly, mindlessly fun cliche show for about a few weeks. No it's not a Nickelodeon sitcom, though I am still bummed that a supposed rift between the two lead actresses of Sam and Cat caused it to end prematurely. In fact the very last episode, Cat was arrested and Sam chose not to help bail her out for her own gain, so she could keep rooming with Cat's grandmother who acts like a mother Sam has never known, since her own mom is a pretty terrible mother. While a terrible ending for a series it's sort of fitting for how the show ended, via a feud between the lead actreses and for the last scene of the series to be a scene wherein a lead character does not help another. A broken friendship ended with a display of bad friendship, alas.

I do feel some sense of happiness that the actress for Cat, Ariana Grande, broke into the music scene because I've been watching these Dan Schneider shows for a few years now and Cat has always had the best voice. In the crossover episode between iCarly and Victorious for instance, there's a karaoke party at the end and I wanted everyone to shut up except Cat because her voice was so majestic. It's super awesome she's getting the recognition she deserves. Unfortunately I'm not too big on the R&B genre but one of her songs, Break Free, sounds pretty good regardless of my music tastes.

Anyway back to the point on hand, the cliche show I've been marathoning is actually by a company based in France called Marathon. That's right, I've been numbing my brain with constant Totally Spies episodes these past few days and even gave myself a headache when I watched a whole bunch of the newer episodes in a row due to for some reason the voice actresses' being far more squeaky than usual later on. Now I keep the volume fairly low but that causes me to be unable to hear certain characters like Jerry who has a rather soft-spoken voice. It's sad.

When I watched this nostalgic show back in my adolescence, despite the show representing all things stereotypically girly I truly was entertained by the episodes. I never had a favourite character at the time either, though it may have been Clover back then because if I have no favourite usually the most comedic takes the cake. It's sort of like why I love Venus the most in Sailor Moon, but with Crystal airing that can easily change. Having complained about the terrible romance and the flat male characters in RWBY recently, Totally Spies is a far more serious offender in this department and there are certain mini-arcs where I have to skip a few scenes so the girls would not always be obsessed with some sort of perfect flawless guy.

Yet, having marathoned so many episodes in a row, I don't seem to mind it quite as much as in RWBY. Most probably because the show truly is a whole bunch of mindless stereotypical fun and with the constant influx of cartoonish villains seeking revenge in every episode, it's sort of silly to have high expectations of such a show. On the other hand, RWBY being an internet webshow it has the freedom to do whatever it wants no matter how controversial it might be because of the lack of meddling TV producers what with being, well, a webshow. And yet the most recent episodes we have very safe and annoying cliche tropes that I would usually expect in some sort of mediocre cartoon for children on TV.

But I can only sigh in defeat as it does nothing out of the ordinary despite its unique platform and just hope it improves later on and all the issues I've had with it would dwindle eventually. However the biggest ongoing problem I have with RWBY is Weiss. She is no doubt my favourite character and still is, if only because I don't really like any other character more than her so far, so it seems no matter how strange I find Weiss being she's still better than everyone else. After season one ended, my expectation of Weiss' character was sort of like a female Vegeta. It is an animesque show so I thought expecting animesque writing would be reasonable, but unlike Vegeta who took many years to go from a murdering psychopath to a proud family man, Weiss seems to have drank some bad water between seasons one and two and is now as goofy and dorky as can be in season two.

What the hell happened?

An ongoing theme with the characters in RWBY is that a majority, if not all of them are massive dorks. This seems to represent a lot of the people writing the characters. I don't mind dorky characters, but if EVERYONE is a goofy dork no one is unique and it begins feeling very tiresome. This is why when Blake joined along with Ruby and Yang in parading around their room annoying Weiss after moving in, I was extremely surprised. I really expected Blake to be a serious character who had no time for such goofy nonsense, but at least Weiss' exasperation towards their behaviour gave a sense of fresh air. However by season two it seems their roles have reversed, with Blake being the serious one and Weiss having taken up the teambuilding silly mantle. Obviously one can always explain Weiss having gone from the bitchy lady screaming at Ruby for bumping into her luggage to someone standing on a chair calling out Blake for hiding her problems to be character development, but where is this said character development?

Aside from episode ten where Port gave her a rousing speech, every time Weiss acts far less confrontational it's more like this is what Weiss truly is rather than she became less confrontational. So rather, the oddity is why Weiss acted like how she did in the beginning at all. It was so refreshing to see someone with such a soft gentle-looking design actually be a ticking time bomb, but if that ticking time bomb is a facade over her true personality which no doubt is also a facade for something else considering her trailer, then who the hell is Weiss? As every episode goes on she feels less and less unique to me and more like every other character with their silly goofy behaviour. This is sort of the opposite of Yang who I expected to be very goofy and silly, but she seems more down to earth and even discouraged Weiss from puns after the episode four fight. Yang for some reason was extremely serious at the end of the fight, but why? She has no personal investment to the conflict like Blake does, and is the one who calms down Blake from going overboard about this issue entirely. In fact she said something equally as silly after the season one episode eight fight, so why the fuck is Yang acting like this too? Is she the only one allowed to make goofy quips at the end of major fights or something?

The inconsistency truly baffles me.

I almost think Weiss' behaviour is a direct response to some people disliking Weiss initially and they wanted to tone her down. Except they sort of went way overboard and now both Yang and Weiss, not being quite that extreme of a character as I expected instead mesh with the rest of the characters and now they all feel far less interesting than they could have been. The ideas that radiated around the fandom throughout all of this including the long hiatus gave them better character than the show has so far, which has also decided to devote seven episodes to fleshing out a side-character, so my expectations really can't be that high anymore. It's sort of a shame how fandom builds up expectations but the show itself falls flat so very severely.

As an example of Yang feeling inconsistent, she remarks earlier about how she's going to "turn heads" at the dance, and then shows up at the dance in a very conservative plain white dress that looks similar to Weiss'. She then dances with Blake for about a second then is shown observing the dance for the rest of it, so where the hell is that turning head part? She is not in anyway unique or flashy in the dance at all and again meshes with everyone else who all have very similar styles of dress as well. RWBY does a lot of telling but very little showing. The showing often contradicts with the telling as well, like how the creator mentioned that the world of Remnant is not prejudicial to say, the LGBT community but during the dance every guy was hooked up with a girl. If a world is super accepting of this issue then wouldn't people in that minority be very open about their orientation? The only other possible explanation is that they are an extreme minority like sadly a lot of ignorant people seem to think and so they had no representation at a dance. I also hardly think there wouldn't be prejudice considering the continuing issue of hating the faunus which is a very obvious analogy to racial problems in reality.

Another example of telling contradicting showing is Ozpin's speech in episode eight, where he talks about accepting and diversity and we see the crowds of the four schools that have gathered for the tournament, and very little if at all faunus are among the crowd. Either hiding one's faunus heritage like Blake does is super common and Velvet's super duper brave, or they aren't there at all. This doesn't even touch the skin colour issue. Obviously making huge crowds takes a long time and a lot of copy pasting is involved, considering a Ruby clone and many Jaune clones are in the crowds, but if you're going to say something and then not even give an example of it during that very speech, there's something seriously wrong with the directing. Whoever is responsible for the crowd scenes must communicate more with the writers and realize there is something seriously amiss with the scenes not matching the writing.

But y'know as stereotypical and cliche Totally Spies is, it does some things right. One of the episodes highly regarded as the best in season four of My Little Pony for instance, is Pinkie Pride. Now I do like my fair share of proud characters. Miko is probably one of the most prideful characters I've ever liked and I expected Weiss to have more dignity but she doesn't, so. But to me Pinkie is not an especially prideful character. An episode regarding pride feels more like a Rainbow Dash or even Rarity-type of episode to me instead. Pinkie feels like someone who would always go with the flow so long as it's fun and when Cheese Sandwich showed up probably would've loved him and joined along with him as opposed to feeling jealous and attacked by his presence. That is probably my biggest problem with the episode and why I do not regard it as one of the best unlike so many others. Sure it has a highly acclaimed guest star in Weird Al and has a wondrous amount of tunes, but because of that fact I simply couldn't enjoy the episode as most did.

Totally Spies on the other hand also had a similar episode, Alex Quits, where Alex well, quits because a super cool better-person came and made her feel like she was replaced. This time the issue isn't because of pride, but because Alex's character involves having low self-esteem. She is of the three most often bullied or considered the most uncool, and later on it is established despite her prowess in athletics, a rather clumsy person. So when she screws up and someone else appears much more capable, she quits. Now an episode similar like that for Pinkie Pride may have been more fitting. Pinkie, as evidenced from say, Party of One, goes ballistic when it feels like she is unneeded. She does seem like, despite her initial appearance, someone who is very fragile in terms of self-esteem. Instead of pride, the episode could've been something often only showcased with someone like Fluttershy (but her's is so damn obvious and in-your-face about Fluttershy's esteem issues) and would've fit Pinkie more than the pride thing. The ending was good though, in that she realizes her pride-that-came-out-of-nowhere was not fun at all and goes against everything she stands for, so she decides to leave Ponyville because she feels unneeded.

The episode could have also been about attention because Pinkie is a major attention whore, but pride seemed like the least fitting theme. Despite the issues this episode was one of, if not the best, key-discovering episodes, so whatever. (That speaks more for how much I disliked the key episodes more than anything though)

Anyway seeing as I am marathoning Totally Spies I guess it makes sense to actually talk about it instead of just using examples to explain other show's problems. Clover may have been my favourite when I first watched the show, but while watching through it again now Alex is my favourite. Hell, I subconsciously watched most of the Alex episodes first and when I started going through the episodes in order I was sort of bored because I watched all the "good episodes" already and then suddenly realized a majority of the good episodes were Alex episodes, ha. The whole boy-crazy thing doesn't bother me as much as it could have so long as the boy in question is a quirky character who enhances the comedic value of the episode as opposed to like, this David guy who showed up for several episodes in season two (or three? I forget) and was pretty much bland and picture-perfect and the girls were all fighting over him. That was annoying.

Another semi-annoying thing is Alex's voice, her new voice in particular. It isn't too bad and is fitting, to be honest, but she ends up with the highest voice and in the later seasons with everyone getting more screechy, her high voice is obviously the worst. I sort of miss Alex's first voice which was more unique and sort of charming, but her new voice is actually dub Sailor Mars which is somewhat amusing. Also Mandy's voice actress (who also happens to be Sam's) is Princess Morbucks from Powerpuff Girls. They have the EXACT same voice but I never realized this until it was pointed out. Mandy sounds EXACTLY the same as Princess Morbucks what the fuck. It feels so weird that I never realized this on my own.

But I think the biggest reason I watch the show is the female friendship. Ah how I love female friendships. It's why I got into RWBY, aside from the obvious Weiss. I was sort of expecting some goddamn girl friendships, but instead of being friends and hanging together at the dance like most girls would including when I hung out with MY friends at MY high school dances, they were all separate people who felt like they hung around with each other only for business and not friendship. It is such a shame that Sam and Cat, a very strong awesome female friendship, was a show ended on a real-life broken friendship. EVERYTHING REVOLVES AROUND GIRLS AND THEIR FRIENDSHIP! GIRLS AND FRIENDSHIP HOORAY

It's probably why I watch so many damn cartoons and shows for kids. There isn't much girl friendship in adult shows, where there's more romance and dark themes like...murder and drugs and sexual issues and blah. Ah well.

In fact, here is an example. I have numerous NUMEROUS pictures plastered all over my wall of various fandoms. In almost all the fandoms there is at least one picture of two characters or more hugging or being friendly with one another. Koishi jumping into her sister Satori's arms. Yuuna wrapping her arms around Ako. Pinkie and Fluttershy hugging and thanking one another like a greeting card. Miko and Byakuren, a duo I love for their love-hate (mostly hate) relationship, are leaning on one another, one asleep. Murasa and Nue holding both hands together in a colourful watercolour picture. Sayo clinging onto Kazumi's shoulders in shyness. Mokou embracing Keine with the most heartwarming smiles ever. Hell even the boys, there's Rei and Max feeding one another (this is much more yaoi than friendship lol) and a kid Korea giving a kid HK a peck on the cheek. Guess what the RWBY pictures are? Just pretty pictures of the four girls posing. THAT'S IT.

Yes there are numerous numerous NUMEROUS fanarts of friendship between the RWBY girls, but the ones I chose to plaster on my walls wasn't of that because it hadn't been showcased very often in show and and most high quality fanart tends to be of stuff off the show. There are a few fanarts of friendship among then I may put on the wall instead, just so my room would have some sort of complete theming (aside from the GTA V Achievement Hunter poster that implies they want to kill each other of course) but I don't feel like plastering RWBY on my walls anymore because of how disappointed I am in the show. (Even if I still want a goddamn Weiss plushie. That expression is perfect! D: )

Also I sort of want Ibuki on my wall but she'd probably either be alone or with her entire class. I'm still unsure/mad/annoyed/glad that <SPOILER REDACTED> so Ibuki can't really be with anyone. Oh well, she will forever (at least until something else comes around) adorn my phone's lock and home screens. (Mokou and Keine still claim my desktop/laptop wallpapers however) Ibuki is the best, least disappointing character I have ever liked, but sadly the flaws lie in other places such as <SPOILER REDACTED> and <SPOILER REDACTED>. Goddamnit Ibuki.

Maybe after I'm done with this marathon I'll check if any Totally Spies fandom still exists, especially since the sixth season aired last year. Then again I'll probably run into weird porn and strange fetishes instead. This show seems to attract these types of people. IT'S POKEMON X&Y HEX MANIAC SYNDROME ALL OVER AGAIN! WHAT HAVE THEY DONE TO YOU, HEX MANIAC!?!?

This has been Spotto, please don't look up Hex Maniac fanart.

Current Mood: nostalgic
Crossposts: http://spotstar.livejournal.com/276633.html

Whilst sleep deprived and wracked with indigestion, thoughts began swirling in my head.

I just realized the innate problems of including a minority character in media, in particular someone who may be LGBT. See more often than not, said character who is about to discover oneself runs into a plethora of problems, of bullying, of conflict, of "religious injustice" but depicting the drama of such issues in media while is a good way to spread awareness to those who do not experience such things, is not what most I believe, people who are actually gay or what have you even want to watch.

For a lot of people or at least me, media and storytelling is a place of fantasy. A place where things that are not true, are true. We see it as an escape from reality. Unless it's some sort of terrible satire about the realistic bastardization that is life, usually fiction is more idealistic than our side of the universe. So I would think and I DO think as I am one, watching a show where say two characters of the same sex who end up as a couple and run into ZERO PROBLEMS regarding their partner of choice would be most desired. That is what we want after all. A fantasy where who we are is not questioned and is the norm! But almost every single time this comes up in media it must involve some sort of internalized issue with society because even in fictionland there are the intolerable bastards that we try to avoid every single day in real life!

In other words in mainstream media, a story about a gay guy coming out is really intended for straight audiences. Because a homosexual is exotic and different and a movie or book can be used to illustrate their rough walks of life to those who never have to walk in their shoes. ("But Spotto! Minor character 1 and minor character 2 are a gay couple in that one show! WHAT MORE DO YOU WANT!?" Well, that is still for a straight audience because they're minor/side characters! Everybody has that gay friend or whatever, but god forbid YOU YOURSELF differentiate from the norm!) Why am I thinking about this? Well today is a new RWBY episode, presumably about a prom or ball or dance taking place in fantasy high school that is so generic that it has proms and balls like high schools of reality. I hate high school! I don't want to watch this shit! And now our female protagonists are presumably straight or possibly bi (but people are never bi in media, so unless they outright say this it's safe to say they're straight) asking guys out for dates. No, not Team JNPR who each have a partner of the opposite gender and such explorations of their potential relationships would actually be interesting, the main four girls.

Since they are all girls, we need some other dudes outside of the school to work with, otherwise we have teachers and taken guys. So let's introduce a whole team of dudes who don't get developed much except for that leader who showed up in season one and then suddenly pair them with the girls because THERE IS A PROM!!!! OH MY GOD! Since RWBY is such a hotspot for gay ships (what media form isn't? seriously what isn't!?) there is a sizable LGBT minority that wish to see some actually become canon. The issue is it isn't our story, so if we see absolutely zero gay ships welp, we'll just have to deal. We'll just have to deal like with every single thing we've ever watched or read. Or anything. However, the creator of RWBY has actually ended one of this animations with a yuri ship and has addressed the community's desire in an interview.

But he mentions how it'll take a long time to come to fruition because a character needs to discover themselves and realize they might be gay or they don't like being the gender they were assigned or something. Either this implies Ruby, the youngest character in the series, is going to be gay, or they're going to take their time and go through the whole annoying issue of intolerance and hatred that comes from the outside before said character will accept themselves. In other words it's another LGBT character written for a straight audience! (Obviously no writer is doing this consciously or intentionally, but we all like to write for ourselves and think of what we ourselves would enjoy, so not having a same-sex relationship in the forefront of a story is not an issue to a lot of people) RWBY is already a fantasy, but I suppose with the despicable treatment of faunus we can't expect people to be chill about liking someone of the same gender either.

So today's episode likely has Weiss in the middle of this stupid horrible love chain where Pyrrha (the coolest girl in the whole school, why does she BEGIN this triangle!? ALL THE BOYS AND EVEN SOME GIRLS SHOULD BE ASKING HER!) likes Jaune for some reason (WHY? I don't know! If the guy wasn't so oblivious and was more like a lovable goof, sure why not, but this dude is obscenely annoying and thickheaded!) who likes Weiss of all people (in what world does Jaune and Weiss seem compatible? Weiss is coldhearted and generally hates people it seems, and you want HER!? How about someone more fitting to your personality, Jaune? HOW ABOUT SOMEONE WHO HASN'T TURNED YOU DOWN MULTIPLE TIMES!?) and Weiss likes Neptune, a guy we just met this season and know nothing about aside from being a K-Pop star and being generally dorky like literally every other boy in this show. You barely know him. You took like ten episodes to be friends with Ruby. WHAT. IS. THIS. MADNESS!? Finally Neptune supposedly likes Yang...despite hitting on every girl he saw, including Weiss, but apparently will pick Yang. Now unless Yang adds more to this horrible dramafest of a goddamn cliche high school trope, it ends here.

Of course this is the same Yang who has mentioned the hot boys in her dorm in season one episode three, encouraged Jaune in season one episode four, season two episode three, and season two episode five to keep trying for Weiss, and doesn't seem to express her no-nonsense independent attitude nearly as often as she appeared to in the trailer, so I'm not entirely sure at all what to expect from Yang Xiao Long. How do you predict her? She has little development so far and also little consistency. I do want to like her. She's technically my second favourite, but like 90% of that is due to fandom. ~~GODDAMNIT YANG. DO SOMETHING. And please not a romance thing. Gah.~~ SHE DID SOMETHING! AND IT WAS EPIC! REJOICE!!! YANG XIAO LONG FOR PRESIDENT!

You can see my distress here.

Usually my compromise is no romance at all. My favourite characters in Negima were all uninvolved with the harem. (Aside from one, but she was sane/naive enough to fall for an older version of the protagonist, so while tragic at least she isn't crushing on a goddamn ten-year-old boy) Romance is entirely absent from Touhou and while rampant in fandom, due to the female population dangerously reaching 100% levels, it's all delicious, delicious yuri. And finally my last example is complete and utter spoilers, but I give up on keeping it tight-lipped. Most of you will never play Dangan Ronpa, and even if you do this one tidbit isn't going to ruin the story or anything, just a few characters if you're that testy with spoilers (which I MYSELF AM, but I give up) SO LOOK AWAY NOW IF YOU WISH TO BE UNSPOILED.

-IN WHAT WORLD DID I THINK SPOILING PEOPLE OF MY FAVOURITE CHARACTER IN SDR2 WAS A GREAT IDEA GODDAMN THIS HAS BEEN SNIPPED FOR YOUR OWN GOOD-

Sure I can fantasize about AUs all I want for any of that to work, but that's fandom stuff. That's why there's a ridiculous amount of shipping and gay fanfiction and all that crap because where else can we find a nice domestic story about two guys or two girls together struggling to make ends meet or something like that, without having stupid prejudice issues the real world already has constantly butting in? In fanfiction my favourite character will not be called a slur or punched in the face or looked down upon for their sexual orientation. In fanfiction my favourite character will not spend eight hundred chapters figuring out why they don't care for the opposite gender. IN FANFICTION ALL OF IT IS THE NORM AND NONE OF THAT EXISTS.

THAT IS WHY SHIPPING IS SO RAMPANT. THAT IS WHY SHIPPING IS PREDOMINANTLY SLASH OR YURI.

This has been Spotto. Fuck proms, fuck canon, fuck high school.

Current Mood: frustrated
Crossposts: http://spotstar.livejournal.com/275994.html

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Boulevard of Broken Dreams

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Basic! Basic taste, basic personality. Basic usage.

The dream.

more spoilery V3 rants? Yes please.

I love danganronpa

Yes, I DO like that character I had a terrible first impression of!

I am conflicted.

LOOK! A rant!

Representation in Media

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