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atlantic-maria · 5 years

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toka🐇

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atlantic-maria · 5 years

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Kaneki’s Dream Scenery

Over a year ago, I created a meta where I proposed the final chapter of Tokyo Ghoul was a dream (https://superryunosukeyuki.tumblr.com/post/181279417006/re-179-was-simply-kaneki-dreaming). I found evidence for this based on information given in the final chapter that either didn’t add up or contradicted information previously given.

However, upon rereading the series I’ve found a new piece of evidence. In Kaneki’s dream scenarios throughout the series, whenever he himself is present the background is completely blank. It is either a pure white, or it shifts to a grey or black depending on the mood of the scene. The only times this changes is when Kaneki is remembering something.

Kaneki’s Dream of Rize

The first time Kaneki’s mind entered a dream state was after being tortured by Yakumo Omoro (aka Yamori) in the original series. The pain Kaneki experienced brought him to such mental lows that he hallucinated seeing Rize Kamishiro.

Notice the backgrounds. They are either completely white, or shift to a darker tone. In this chapter (62) there are a number of flashbacks Kaneki goes through, but whenever these two are just talking alone this background is shown. This is further evidenced in the following chapter. After Yamori kills a mother and child (Kei and Koto) in front of Kaneki to further break him, his hallucination of Rize reappears. When she reappears, this blank background reappears as well.

Kaneki’s Dream of Hide

Later, during Kaneki’s fight with Kishou Arima in Tokyo Ghoul :re he has several of his limbs cut off. When he is about to give up however, he suddenly has a hallucination of Hide. At the beginning of this vision the background is pure black, but once Hide appears it shifts to the pure white background that Kaneki experienced in his earlier vision of Rize. In all of Hide’s panels it shows that same blank background.

Kaneki’s Dream in :re 179

Now, the majority of chapter 179 is merely exposition as character endings are stated in info boxes. However, when Kaneki himself appears on the screen.

It’s the same blank white background he had in his dream sequences. Also, during his conversation with Hide the background shifts between pure white, pure black, or in-between as with his previous dream sequences.

Furthermore, when their conversation is finished not only are they surrounded by a pure white background, but their forms appear scratchy (further hinting that the scene isn’t real).

Finally, when Kaneki (along with Touka and Ichika) are walking out to the hill where the final scene of the chapter is, it looks as if the they are walking on a white canvas.

With this imagery, Ishida-sensei hid the truth (that the final chapter was merely an illusion in Kaneki’s mind) in plain sight.

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atlantic-maria · 5 years

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Trauma and Non-duality in Tokyo Ghoul: Part II

Amon has been one of my favorite characters ever since he did seven thousand pushups to get rid of his boner for Akira. He’s principled, stalwart, highly empathetic, and–most importantly–one of the few characters to transcend the rivalry between ghouls and humans.

But how did he get there? What really makes him tick?

In the previous post, I suggested that Kaneki was unable to accept his role as ambassador between ghouls and humans because of his extensive childhood trauma. In order to protect himself, he saw the world in binary terms of black and white, good and evil, active and passive, with no room for shades of grey in between.

Amon has a similarly traumatic background. Though the precise details are unknown, he lost his parents at an early age and went to live at a Catholic orphanage run by Fr. Donato Porpora. There seems to have followed a time of relative peace. Amon was able to grow up among other children, in the care of a (seemingly) benevolent foster-father. He would later recall those years fondly, describing the donuts that Porpora made for the children, the blankets he brought for them on cold nights, and the dog they adopted together.

But everything changed when Amon was twelve.

Amon caught Donato in the process of butchering one the children. It soon became apparent that his foster father was in fact a ghoul, and the orphanage was nothing more than a front for devouring young humans. However, rather than killing Amon to protect this secret, Donato forced the boy to become his accomplice.

Amon was not allowed to warn his foster siblings. At the very least, we can assume that he was silent as the boys die one by one. However, I would like to suggest that Amon’s involvement with Donato went even further. He may not have only been forced to watch his siblings die. He may have also been forced to take part in the butchering.

My theory is largely based upon this panel. When the CCG raided the orphanage, they found Amon in the basement–the basement where the children were butchered. He is also shown to be wearing face mask to protect against the horrible smell. One blogger even commented that Amon was wearing an altar boy uniform, which further implies that he acted as an assistant to the priest.

Even worse, there is evidence that Donato was grooming Amon for this role, long before the true nature of the orphanage was revealed. The manga heavily implies that Donato tricked Amon into eating human meat. Hypothetically, this would give the boy a sense of shame and guilt, making him easier to manipulate. The exact same technique is used by Dr. Kanou, who feeds Takizawa pieces of his family in order to make him feel truly irredeemable.

Butchering your siblings, eating human meat… uhhhhh, yeah, to put it lightly, Amon is gonna need some pretty intense counseling. But we all know the CCG sucks when it comes to child psychology, so they give this terrified, traumatized orphan a weapon and ship him off the the academy so that he can learn to use it properly. And of course, Amon being Amon, he finishes at the top of his class.

But hold on a moment.

Before Amon throws his graduate cap in the air, let’s consider the sort of person he’s been taught to be.

Much like Kaneki, he experienced significant childhood trauma. However, unlike Kaneki, the abuse began when Amon was older. He was already twelve when he discovered Donato’s secret. Kaneki, on the other hand, was subject to physical and emotional abuse beginning at the age of five or six. Though both were treated horribly, Amon had slightly more time to develop a sense of security and identity.

It is also important to note that Amon retained a sense of agency. While the CCG’s childcare program is notoriously awful, there can be some benefits to teaching self defense to trauma survivors. Despite all that he endured from Donato, Amon was able to reclaim his power and strength by training with a quinque, living among investigators, and learning to recognize ghouls. He still feels that his actions can have a positive effect upon the world, that he can save himself from danger.

That was never possible for Kaneki. As a child, neither fight nor flight was an option, so he decided to play along, trying to please his mother so that she wouldn’t hurt him. This made Kaneki very passive at the beginning of the story, though he gradually reclaims his sense of agency as the manga progresses.

Amon was twelve when the abuse began, while Kaneki was five or six. Amon was able to recover his sense of agency, while Kaneki never learned to defend himself. As a result, though their stories run parallel in many ways, I would like to suggest that Amon has a stronger emotional foundation that allows him to confront the true complexity of the war between ghouls and humans.

In Part III of this series, I hope to expound upon Amon’s journey further. But for now, it’s past midnight, and I have work in the morning. So stay tuned folks.

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The Identity of Dragon’s Nuclei

In the final arc of Tokyo Ghoul :re, after Kaneki devoured the Oggai and the core placed in Furuta’s body, he transformed into the colossal kakuja monster known as “Dragon.” Although he was eventually freed and its main body dissolved, nine oviducts remained.

Kimi Nishino theorized that there were other “nuclei” aside from Kaneki.

This theory seems to have been confirmed when Rize Kamishiro was confirmed to be the nucleus of the oviduct in the 19th ward. However, who are the nuclei of the other oviducts? While Kaneki was the nuclei of Dragon’s main body, some have theorized that he may have had an oviduct as well.

There is a special mention that one of the nine oviducts has entered a disintegration phase. Some viewers have theorized that this oviduct was the one Kaneki was in, and now that he is free it has started to dissolve. However, Kaneki’s location (while in Dragon) was revealed to have been in the 3rd ward.

However, we see during Kimi’s explanation of the oviducts that there is an oviduct in the third ward next to a large river.

However, the location Kaneki was dug out of was by a large building with no river in sight.

So, this means that Kaneki himself was not in this oviduct. So, the nuclei for the nine oviducts were Rize and eight other individuals. However, who were the other eight individuals? The answer may have been alluded to in the CCG lab infiltration arc.

re

After Kaneki and others from Goat break into the CCG laboratory in order to obtain rc suppressants for Akira Mado, they come across Koutaro Amon being held in a chamber.

After breaking out of this container, he morphs into a kakuja and battles Takizawa and Kurona. During this fight, contact with Amon’s kagune caused Takizawa’s kagune to explode.

Later, when Touka and the Quinx are attempting to remove Kaneki from Dragon, it’s body attempts to attack them. When Saiko retaliates, her kagune explodes similar to how Takizawa’s did.

This correlation suggests that Amon was intended to be a part of dragon (a nucleus). This is further supported by the presence of other pods in the room Amon was being held in.

In one scene there are shown to by three additional tubes titled “re,” and in another scene there an additional six tubes. 6+3=9, and there were nine oviducts after Kaneki was removed from Dragon. Additionally, earlier in the series it was revealed that “re” was another word for “king.” This may be a reference to the original One-Eyed King, who Furuta based Dragon off of. Furthermore, when Furuta is discussing the effects of the ghoulification poison in the final arc, Furuta clearly discusses the role of the oviducts.

So, this shows the formation of the oviducts was planned, and not an accident. Furthermore, the “re” containers shown in the lab prove the he specifically picked out nuclei for this purpose. But who are these nuclei? Like many of the plot threads introduced in the final arc, this was never answered. While we may not know of their exact identities, we may know of the actions of one of them.

Dragon Leader

It was brought to our attention in the final arc that one of the other oviducts had begun to disintegrate.

From what we’ve seen in the final arc, the only way for an oviduct to begin dissolving is for the oviduct’s nucleus to either be removed (as Kaneki was) or die (as Rize did). We established earlier in this thread that the nucleus of this oviduct couldn’t have been Kaneki, and so another nucleus must have either died or escaped.

In the final chapter, it’s mentioned that the “Dragon Orphans” that continue to roam Tokyo have approached a leader. This leader has a human appearance and “the intelligence of a five year old.” What is meant by this phrase is uncertain, as a five-year old’s mental level couldn’t make an effect leader (this phrase may actually be symbolic).

The Jaiminisbox translation provides both a clearer translation and imaging of this scene. The arrow above point to the aforementioned leader, who appears to have a kagune released, and on there right corner of the page there is a “3″ shown.

The special mention of the disintegrating oviduct hints that one of the nuclei escaped, and my working theory is that this escaped nucleus is the leader mentioned. If a 3rd part of Tokyo Ghoul is ever made, it will likely be this individual attempting to free the other nuclei from their oviducts.

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