#HES NEVER EVEN DONE ANYTHING EGREGIOUSLY WRONG HES LITERALLY JUST SHY AND AWKWARD ABOUT HIS CRUSH ON EMILY OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

hcpefulmarshmallow · 5 years

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Hey not really meta but as tumblr's resident Komaeda expert (tm) what do you think his plan was with the laxatives? Walk up to the judges and be like "drink this it's for luck 🤥😁"??

Send Me A Topic To Write Meta On // always accepting.

This has been in my inbox for forever and I’m sorry anon, I just wanted a chance to rewatch the episode in question before I answered. Also, from now on, I refuse to be referred to as anything but the Resident Komaeda Expert™ so thank you lmao.

Also…this went on a bit. I’m not sorry for that.

There are 5 judges and 5 cups, and he does spike the cups (albeit with the wrong drug due to convoluted bullshit), so I can only assume he was going to slip them the laxative to delay the exams. Initially I thought his plan might involve a roulette type thing as a part of his exam in order to get the judges to drink with him or something, but that doesn’t really check out with only 5 cups. I guess maybe he was going to give them the drinks as a courtesy or something. It really isn’t clear, and doesn’t make sense anyway. Wouldn’t they have drinks already? Why would they take lukewarm water from a random student if not for his exam? Though to be honest, the whole plan was freaking weird from the start. I know he goes to life-threatening lengths in the killing game, but that was during a killing game. He’s a smart boy and a brilliant strategist, you’d think he could come up with something that didn’t put anyone in literal danger? Also the fact that his initial plan is a threat on the school, then his next is a laxative, and then a literal fucking bomb. That’s some weird escalation there.

There’s a lot of overwriting of Nagito in this situation. It gets very tiring. They really step it up a notch in terms of the miserable, pessimistic mood he takes on at times. In the game, there’s usually a reason for this - however small or seemingly insignificant. He will make a mistake, or witness something unlucky, and thus the self-denigration. There’s a reason and rhyme to the way he is. Contrast that with this example: the day of the exams, Nagito is on his way to enact his plan, when he literally runs into Seiko, knocking them both to the ground. They talk for a moment, before Seiko realises she’s late and runs off. Despite the collision (in which no one is hurt, mind you), the conversation goes fine. Seiko is a little awkward as always, but he does manage to make her smile. He has no reason to be upset. He doesn’t know their bags have been switched, or anything out of the ordinary has resulted from the exchange. Yet he still say something to the effect of “so much for that” in such an unhappy tone. It makes no sense. There’s no reason for him to go all it’s just my luck :/ on us except that Ko’s gotta Ko, I guess.

I also find it interesting that Seiko told Nagito to his face what the laxative was called (reactivator) and he still managed to confuse it with the other drug (reanimator). I watched the absolute trip that is the dub, so maybe there’s something in the original Japanese that explains this, but that just seems kinda dumb on his end.

The anime is full of moments like that where they break a character down to their most stereotyped form, or throw in some BS that doesn’t make sense and feels cheap and lazy, even with the plot device that is Nagito’s luck; but this episode is particularly egregious. Possibly because it so heavily features Nagito. And it’s just easier to write him as a one-dimensional hope hoe than to remember how much depth and nuance went into him originally.

Of course, Nagito isn’t the only one done wrong by this episode. I need to feel for Seiko, too. I liked her a lot, but this whole arc just didn’t do her justice. What happened to her wasn’t fair, and the story never seems to notice.

For a bombing incident, Hope’s Peak’s investigation and handling of the matter is weaksauce. The whole thing was Komaeda’s doing, yet he gets off with just a suspension, because his talent is too…valuable? I mean, I get that his luck is intense, but I don’t get why Seiko and Sonosuke were expelled for it, considering their involvement was sheer accident. I kind of get Ruruka, since she was the one who was cheating, and that’s a separate matter, and grounds for expulsion (presumably) anyway. And there’s something to be said for facilitation: Seiko provided the drug, Sonosuke was present during the exchange and did nothing. That might warrant a suspension too, particularly for Sonosuke, but Seiko was bullied into it. Shouldn’t that count for something? By this point, it wasn’t even the first time Seiko had been bullied into something by Ruruka. Ah, but why should I be surprised? We all know Hope’s Peak’s bullying policies are…….non-existent.

Basically what I get from this is: either the school didn’t know everyone’s exact level of involvement, or didn’t care. And considering how open Komaeda was about the way things went down afterwards, that seems very negligent to me.

Seiko is shy and jittery, the characteristics of someone who is either mega anxious, or used to being mistreated. Ruruka doesn’t treat her well at all. Sonosuke allows it. Most of the students at school use her for what they can take from her. She gets a moment of pure joy just hearing she genuinely helped Nagito out. That is an amazing foundation for a character - someone who wants to help but is just used by everyone in her life. And yes, I know it comes to something in the sequel portion of the anime, but I’m still mad about it nonetheless. Seiko deserved a better anime. So did Nagito. So did everyone.

And while I’m here and throwing shade!! I’ve already expressed my disdain for the exams. The way they force these kids’ identities and self worth to revolve around a talent the school deems worthy, then threatens to take it all away on live TV. The way there’s no workaround for these kids after two of them just lost people very close to them. But here’s another thing: just who do these panelists think they are, and why should we care about their opinions? According to the Hope’s Peak DR Wikia page, they’re a group of “dignitaries and experts” which, right off the bat, can go get bent. There’s no way that five people have enough expertise between them to judge if the wide variety of talents at Hope’s Peak truly is the best in the world. No way. And even if there was such a group of people, you’d think this panel would include, oh, say…their principal or the scout who initially found these people?? But Jin Kirigiri is nowhere in sight, nor is Kizakura, or any other former or current scout. Especially because the students’ place at the school is on the line. It’s just so stupid, and at this point, I don’t even know if it’s intentional or not.

I know this got way off-course for a while there, I just had a lot of thoughts while rewatching. Tl;dr: that’s the dumbest plan I’ve ever heard, but knowing the way this anime could be at times, I wouldn’t be surprised.

#Anonymous #answered #meta;#ɪ ᴡᴀs ᴊᴜsᴛ ɪɴ ᴛʜᴇ ᴍɪᴅᴅʟᴇ ᴏғ ᴀɴ ɪɴɴᴇʀ ᴍᴏɴᴏʟᴏɢᴜᴇ [mun speaks]#long post/

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