#(but it's canonical in the AU that shuichi is...not on kyoko's level)

[funishment-time]

the most fitting alternate title for the Nice AU (UTDP/Summer Camp) is the Jin Kirigiri Tax Evasion Bad Father Arc, for many reasons

not the least of which is that it's implied class 77, 78, and the v3 class (fanon name: 79, but this is never confirmed) all were accepted at once, are graduating at once, and spent 3 years together

so this dude accepted his daughter, then accepted another unrelated boy who is clearly worse, both as SHSL detective, at the same time, in the same year.

he probably forgot which was his real kid, Honestly

[ultimate-snek]

korekiyo ? •o•

Mkay! Chaos, you might not want to look because there is untagged mentions of kiyo ships. People who are extremely invested in their Kiyo ships, please try to like. stay calm ig. tw for mentions of S*ster and s*xual preferences in people.

Characters mentions: Korekiyo, Gonta, Shuichi, Maki, Gundham, Celestia, Kyoko, Kiibo, Rantaro, Angie.

Sexuality headcanon: Demiromantic pansexual, definitely. We already know he has no problem with like, hooking up with people of any gender, but after his sister, there's no way he'll be able to fall in love with someone without knowing them on an intimate level first. though, he may feel he knows someone intimately just by watching them..

Gender headcanon: Demiboy, I would think, but with a preference for some of the more commonly assumed feminine pet names.

A ship for him? Out of canon characters, I guess Gonta, Shuichi Maki paired with him is kinda nice. I'm not super into it but I can tolerate it nicely and see the appeal.

BROTP: Him and Gundham, him and Celeste or Kyoko, and him with Kiibo. First two is because aesthetics- Gundham and Kork have several overlapping interests. He'd be very interested in Celestia and Kyoko, especially since they're smart and clever. Him and Kiibo would be good friends because Kiibo stores so much data and wants to learn about humans, and Korekiyo knows so much.

A NOTP: Okay please don't come after me but. The two most popular ships. Amaguji and Shinnaga. Personally I just. really don't like it. Partially from bad experiences. I can read and look at content of it but when I see people doing things like saying that they're real or canon or like, you have no taste/are stupid if you don't like the ship- even if I know it's a joke- or when people say it's like the best ship or completely perfect it makes me really uncomfortable. And Angie is a bit of a discomfort character from me, because of how I interpret her, and my initial impressions. I do like a few au versions of her, but not with kork. While the relationship has the potential to be good, I guess, it also has the potential to be EXTREMELY toxic and insidious. And I just don't really feel the attraction nor appeal (though the art is very nice) Also him x Tenko in most situations is a no no, unless it's a very certain au.

Random headcanon: He probably has like. texture preferences and aversions. His hands are super soft and stuff. Sometimes kiyo gets grossed out by a certain feeling of something he touched and sometimes he gets happy overloaded. He probably wanted to get tattoos based of myths when he was younger (probably wanted a snake tattoo) but freaked out after learning how it would be done. he ended up not doing it, I would think. this would be before his whole "pain is beautiful" thing. I would imagine him to have quite a damaging phobia of most kinds of medical equipment because of sis and the hospital, and needles injecting things into him just hit too close to home.

Overall opinion: I love him. my second favorite character ever. he is very funky and wonderful. i would like to keep him in a nice terrarium where he can be happy and pet his hair. he is boopable.

anyways those are all my thoughts and opinions on this. woooo this was nerve wracking

[creepercraftguy]

I decided I wanted to try one of those DR Ask meme’s, but I decided to do it a little differently and I’m just gonna answer all the questions.

This one is made by @muzumi-san but I didn’t repost theirs because I don’t want them to directly see my shitty opinions.

1. Favourite game?

Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair. It just had the best characters, best plot twists and best trials in my opinion.

2. Favourite Protagonist?

It depends. If it’s in terms of writing, Shuichi. Otherwise, it’s either Hajime, or Kaede.

3. Favourite antagonistic character?

Kokichi is my favorite in general of the three, but as an antagonist, I like Nagito more.

4. Favourite character?

Kokichi Ouma. I know, he’s a fan favorite and you’re probably sick of hearing him get talked about, but dude, he’s just great.

5. Best girl?

Mahiru Koizumi.

6. Best boy?

Gonta Gokuhara or Gundham Tanaka.

7. Favourite class trial from all the games?

For Game 1, it’s Case 2. I love the twists and use of the Red Herring aspect in regards to the locker room. For Game 2, Case 4 is my favourite, but Case 5 is the better one in terms of mystery. For Game 3, Case 4. The fact you have to rely on video game logic to solve the case is really neat.

8. Least favourite character?

Without a doubt, Yasuhiro Hagakure, for several reasons that I’ve stated previously.

9. Least favourite class trial?

Game 3, Case 3. That whole case was just bullshit after Bullshit.

10. What would be your Ultimate Title?

Ultimate Animator, like Mitarai, but you know...Better.

11. Favourite cast?

As I’ve already mentioned, Danganronpa 2. My least favorite member of that cast is Akane, but even her, and the more disliked characters like Teruteru and Hiyoko, I love all of them. They’re all great.

12. Favourite Danganronpa 3 character?

Seiko Kimura. She’s such a fun character who I think deserved better.

13. What’s your opinion on the Danganronpa 3 anime?

I fucking hate it. The only episodes of it that I actually consider to be good, are the first two episodes of Despair Arc, and the final episode. The characters and cast genuinely piss me off half the time, especially Juzo, Munakata and Ruruka, and the writing was just generally shit throughout the entire thing.

14. What do you think about Danganonpa 1 anime?

I actually think it’s alright. Video Game anime’s tend to not be as good as the games (unless it’s Persona 4′s animation, which was actually awesome) and the same goes for Danganronpa. The game is generally more enjoyable than the anime, but the anime wasn’t bad all things considered.

15. Your absolute OTP?

SAI-MAT-SU! SAI-MAT-SU! SHIP-THAT-GETS-SHIT-ON-TOO-MUCH! SAI-MAT-SU! SAI-MAT-SU!

16. Your absolute BROTP?

I guess Sakuraoi? I get why people ship them, but Sakura is one of the characters who canonically has a boyfriend, and I just think they make really good friends other than girlfriends. No disrespect for anyone who likes them together though.

17. Do you have an OT3? Which one?

I’m not crazy about my OT3′s, since they’re mostly two characters who are romantically involved, with a third wheel/wingman on the side, but yes, I do have at least one for each game. For the first game, it’s Chishimondo (Taka, Mondo and Chihiro) for the second game it’s Sonsoudam (Sonia, Gundham and Kazuichi) and the third game, it’s Tenhimiangie (Tenko, Himiko and Angie)

18. Favourite rare ship?

There’s a ship I like called Nagiseiko or Komamura, which is Nagito Komaeda x Seiko Kimura.

19. Who do you think is an underrated character?

There are quite a few, like Nekomaru and Mahiru for instance, but I absolutely have to say Mondo. He has arguably some of the best characterization among the DR1 cast, and he’s my favorite killer in the first game purely because of his backstory and motive, and how he reflects upon the second case’s whole theme, and yet nobody seemed to focus on that importance. God Speed, you wonderful JoJo reference.

20. Who do you think is an overrated character?

Please don’t hurt me when I say this, but absolutely Chiaki. Many can chew me out for liking Kokichi, who in himself is overrated, but for a deuteragonist, Chiaki really doesn’t do an awful lot until Chapter 4-5

21. Favourite voice actor?

In terms of performance, either Derek Stephen Prince (Fuyuhiko and Kokichi) or Marieve Herington (Celeste)

22. Favourite talent?

Ultimate Detective. Shuichi and Kyoko are both really cool.

23. Favourite mascot?

Monokuma, duh! Compared to Monomi and the Monokubs, neither of them have shit on him.

24. Favourite Monokub?

1000% Monodam. All of them suck, except for him. (And Monotaro’s fine for the most part, but Monodam will always be the best)

25. Least favourite mascot?

Mono-fucking-phanie.

26. Favourite execution?

Leon Kuwata’s, the 1000 Blows. As they say, you never forget your first.

27. Least favourite execution?

Mikan Tsumiki’s, Bye Bye Ouchies. For reasons I don’t think I even need to state.

28. Favourite unused execution?

I really like Kazuichi’s unused execution that involves the drill.

29. Which character should survived in your opinion?

If we’re talking characters I wanted to survive, then I would’ve loved to see Chihiro make it to the end of DR1. As much as I love the importance of his passing, I really wanted him to get out alive and unscathed.

30. Which character would’ve deserved to survive?

In each game, there’s at least one character I think should’ve deserved to make it out alive. For the first game, it’s absolutely Taka, for the second, Hiyoko, even though I’m not strong on her, and for the third game, Ryoma, for the same reason everyone else thinks he should’ve lived.

31. Is there a character you think who shouldn’t have survived but did?

Yasuhiro did basically nothing to contribute to the class trials, or the overall progress in figuring out the mysteries of the academy. He never pulled his weight, and for some reason, he still managed to live through the killing game.

32. Least favourite protagonist?

I love her, but Komaru. She just doesn’t reach the same level as the others.

33. Character with the best clothing?

Celeste absolutely nails the gothic lolita style and it fits really well with the type of character that she is.

34. Best character design?

Gundham and Celeste.

35. A character who should’ve got more character development?

Kirumi, without question. She’s arguably my least favorite in the V3 gang purely because of her lack of development. She deserved better writing than what she got.

36. Character who looks amazing but you don’t like?

I love Ruruka’s design, but I hate Ruruka’s character. The same goes for Sonosuke Izayoi, who looks badass but got no development.

37. Favourite minor character?

For the little screen time he got, I vibe with Taichi Fujisaki.

38. Favourite eyes?

What? Uh...no preference?

39. Smartest murder plan?

Gundham’s plan in the 4th case of the 2nd game. He used pretty much every aspect of the funhouse to pull his plan off, and I love it.

40. Favourite culprit?

Gundham Tanaka, for what I’ve just mentioned, plus his motivation, and overall character.

41. Person you’ve never expected to become a culprit but they became? (Doesn’t include Chiaki)

I guess Mondo, Peko and Kiyo from each of the games. They all exude the energy that they COULD kill someone, but the chances of them actually doing it don’t seem that high, and yet...

42. Honest opinion on Tsumugi Shirogane?

I thought she was boring character at first, even after she was revealed to be the mastermind, but I’ve come around since then and I respect her as a villain a lot more. Being the only villain in the game who’s not directly tied to Junko, that at least gives her a bit of uniqueness.

43. Describe Monaca Towa in 3 words!

Piss Baby UGH!

44. Describe Nagito Komaeda in 3 words!

Extremely Entertaining Character

45. Unpopular opinion?

I think Hifumi Yamada is a pretty decent character overall. His Free Time Events, while awkward, were quite enjoyable, and he conveys the strong message that appearances aren’t everything. He’s aware of how different he looks compared to everyone else, but to him, it’s what’s on the inside and what he can do that matters.

46. Unpopular headcanon?

I don’t really have many major headcanons, and I have none that I would consider unpopular. I guess I’ll say “The V3 cast have a group chat in a Non-Despair AU that they meme the shit out of.”

47. A headcanon you have about a character?

In the ask blog that I run, Mikan and Ibuki are an item, and after they become one, Mikan discards her bandages and dyes a highlight in her hair. I live for that, so I guess that’s my answer.

48. Favourite OST?

If we’re talking about a game soundtrack, then either Danganronpa 2′s, or Ultra Despair Girl. If we’re talking about my favourite song in the whole series though, then my favourite is the opening theme to Future Arc in DR3, Dead or Lie.

49. Favourite mini game?

I don’t really have one. I have minigames that I like, and Minigames that I hate (looking at you “Improved” Hangman’s Gambit) But I guess I like Scrum Debate in concept a lot.

50. Favourite game design?

V3 is the most aesthetically pleasing DR game.

51. Character you thought you were gonna dislike but loved in the end?

Maki was such a piece of shit in my opinion at the beginning of V3. Of course, the development she gets reprimands that amazingly. I WOULD say Tenko, but I hated Tenko when I finished V3, and it was only after a short time later that I really turned around on her.

52. Character you thought you would like but disliked in the end?

I guess Angie? She was pretty annoying even before I outright disliked her, but then the whole third chapter brainwashing thing happened and I’m like, “this bitch suck for real!”

53. Favourite game end?

Danganronpa 2′s, and I don’t wanna hear all the “Ugh, the anime bullshit, ugh!” From a writing perspective, the second game just had the most enjoyable ending.

54. Least favourite game end?

I guess Danganronpa 1′s but even that wasn’t too bad. I have incredibly mixed feelings about V3′s twist ending, but I’ve grown to accept that it happened and there’s not a lot I can do about it...

55. Favourite love hotel scene?

Kaede’s. J-Just Kaede’s...That scene gives me the right amount of serotonin that I can keep going with my day.

56. Best free time events?

Hard to say, but I really liked Taka’s. Most of the FTE’s in Danganronpa tend to be pretty nice (unless you’re Hiro), but for him, I loved learning about the circumstances behind his family, how it corrolates with why he acts the way he does, his spite against people who call themselves “geniuses” and why they suck, and everything about his character just hits right.

57. Character who should’ve lived longer?

Kirumi or Ryoma.

58. V3 Pregame! headcanon?

“They aren’t evil creatures with a pessimistic look on life!” Seriously, why the hell do people headcanon the pre-game V3 cast as evil and masochistic bastards. Sure, their look on life was very cynical and pessimistic, and some of them wanted to join V3 for the money or the fame, but that’s just basic human nature and desire. That doesn’t mean everyone in V3 was an inherently bad person before they joined Danganronpa. They aren’t the remnants of despair for fucks sake.

59. Favourite moment?

Shuichi’s final stand in V3 really showed his growth in character, and his refutation “WE’RE GONNA END DANGANRONPA!” gave me goosebumps.

60. Saddest moment?

Gundham’s Execution made me cry, and I almost shed tears in Peko’s final moments. My answer therefore, is those two.

61. Character who looks like the love child of ???

Shuichi has always looked like the love child of Makoto and Kyoko or Makoto and Mukuro. I don’t have any parental headcanons though, and prefer to think of Shuichi as his own character.

62. Describe Mikan Tsumiki in 3 words!

Needs Love Mending! She’s an emotionally broken girl who needs love to heal her fragile heart.

63. Describe Kyoko Kirigiri in 3 words!

The Best Deuteragonist. By that, I mean out of all the characters who are most relevant to the plot alongside the protagonist and antagonist (which includes Chiaki and I guess Kaito too) Kyoko is the best one in my opinion.

64. Which character seemed like they were gonna be a culprit but they wasn’t?

I honestly expected Sonia to kill someone several times in DR2, but she ended up making it to the end. I’m not disappointed though, and I’m glad she never ended up snapping.

65. Who did you never expected to die but they died?

Kaede, no doubt about it. C’mon, she was set up to be the protagonist and then she got executed falsely. Rantaro also surprised me honestly, as did Fake Togami in Game 2.

66. Describe the last trial from V3 in 3 words!

An Absolute Clusterfuck. Not the bad kind, mind you, but Jesus, that trial was long and confusing.

67. Which character would you never want to meet in real life?

There are several honestly, but I’m gonna narrow it down and say Junko. Anyone who meets her is doomed to have their life ruined.

68. Which character would you like to meet in real life?

I relate to most of the weeb and dorky characters, so I guess either Hifumi or Non-Evil Tsumugi.

69. Choose one character which you would take with you on a trip.

Mikan would be handy to have around in case I get injured while on a hike or something.

70. Character you would have a sleepover with?

I don’t feel any sort of attraction to her romantically, and I tend not to for fictional characters, but Kaede is someone I’d really want to hang out and be friends with.

71. Character you can relate to?

Makoto, and I know that’s the whole point of his character, but even though he’s kind of basic and lacking in any significant personality, I still like him a lot.

72. Character you can relate to but you dislike them?

I sympathize with Kiyo’s plight, and how he suffered a lot of emotional abuse from his sister, but with his final moments and how much bullshit came from it (particularly the implied incest subplot) I just couldn’t feel anything except eagerness when I watched him die.

73. Character who deserved better?

Than what they got, I guess Taka.

74. What do you think of Hiyoko Saionji?

If she had survived the game, she’d have been recognized as great a character as Fuyuhiko, since she would have had time to develop. Unfortunately, her lack of growth thanks to her death relegates her into just being “that bitch from Danganronpa” In general though, I don’t dislike her at all, I’m just not as strong on her as I am the rest of DR2′s cast, or DR’s cast in general.

75. Describe Gonta Gokuhara in 3 words!

The Best Boy.

76. Favourite research lab?

The research labs are a cool concept that I really wanted to see more of in things like Fangans. I think my favorite is either Shuichi’s or Kokichi’s.

77. What do you think of the fandom?

Honest to god, I feel more comfortable in the DR Fandom than I do any other Fandom I’m a part of. We have cringe, toxicity and the same old jokes, yes, but other Fandom’s I’m in, like Persona and My Hero Academia, have the same on a whole other level. I think the majority of the Danganronpa Fandom truly does genuinely care about the game series and I appreciate that.

78. Favourite random/unnecessary scene?

The Man’s Nut scene in Danganronpa 2 was god damn hilarious. I never ever really thought the Peeping Tom scenes in each game were wholly necessary and just existed as cheap fanservice, but the Man’s Nut scene is SO damn funny!

79. Which character has the cutest design?

Chihiro is the most adorable bean in the universe.

80. Hope or Despair?

I have no real preference, but I choose Hope because I like to think I’m not a bad person.

81. Could you be the Ultimate Lucky Student?

Probably not. I dunno.

82. Favourite chapter?

DR2 Chapter 4. The funhouse chapter hit differently.

83. Least favourite chapter?

DR2 Chapter 3 and DRV3 Chapter 3. The former primarily due to the Despair Disease and Nekomaru’s death at the hands of Akane’s stupidity, and the latter because of reasons I’ve already mentioned, particularly Angie’s Student Council.

84. Which character do you easily forget?

Pretty much half the Danganronpa 3 cast. Particularly Tengan, Izayoi, Gozu and Bandai.

85. Could you be a Dangan Protag? Why?

I’d love to be, but I’m not as quick-witted or inquisitive as the likes of Makoto, Hajime and Shuichi.

86. Favourite Anthology chapter?

I like a lot of them, but the one where they all make chocolate is really cute.

87. Describe Peko Pekoyama in 3 words!

She’s pretty cool. There’s not much to say about her. Even if she is the one who killed Mahiru, a character I love, she’s a lot more important to the plot than many realize, especially in regards to Fuyuhiko’s subplot.

88. Describe Mondo Oowada in 3 words!

Completely Underrated Marvel. Just refer to Question 19.

89. Least favourite Danganronpa 3 character?

Pretty much any of them that aren’t Seiko, Ryota, or Yukizome. I’m gonna say Juzo though, because of his whole bullshit that Junko used against him, and how the tragedy is primarily his fault.

90. Do you like Junko?

Not at first, but I like her a lot more as a villain now. She wasn’t that fun in the first game, but was better in the second.

91. What do you think of Monokuma?

As far as game mascots go, he’s alright, however, the more the series goes on, the less relevant he becomes. In V3, he serves no real importance, and the game may have been just as good without him, leaving us with just the Monokubs. I hate the Monokubs, but that’s primarily because their existence just takes Monokuma’s importance away. V3 would be so much better if we had one without the other, either way around.

92. Least favourite Monokub?

*Heavy breathing* Mono... *Heavy breathing* Fucking... *HEAVY BREATHING* PHANIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEE!

93. Did you like the Monokubs?

Not for the most part. Monophanie and Monokid suck, and I hate them both. Monosuke sucks for similar reasons, but he’s just kinda...boring...Up until the whole incest imagery in Chapter 4′s trial, Monotaro was actually ok, and had some really funny lines, and as I’ve mentioned, I love Monodam a whole lot, since he was the only one who had something close to a character arc.

94. Did you like the Warriors of Hope?

I guess? I do feel bad for most of them, but at the same time, they can be really annoying. They ARE just kids, so I get it, but still. Masaru, I really didn’t care for. He was arguably the most annoying, and Jataro, while I felt bad for him, wasn’t much better. Kotoko was pretty fun in the end, and Nagisa was a really well written character with a strong morality to him. Monaca is a pretty sinister villain too, but I don’t like her as much as Junko and Tsumugi.

95. What do you think of Gundham Tanaka?

HE IS EXCELLENT AND I LOVE HIM SO MUCH! Also, as I’m writing this, it’s his Bday, so happy Bday to Gundham Tanaka.

96. Who’s an overrated character you dislike?

I said Chiaki was overrated, but I don’t dislike her. I guess people like Kirumi too much considering how little development she gets overall.

97. Overrated ship which is your NOTP?

Komahina, do not test me on this. Everywhere I go, I see that ship that I know, from analyzing Nagito and Hajime’s relationship throughout the series, is incredibly toxic and would never realistically happen simply due to Nagito’s nature, and the way his FTE’s end means nothing to me.

98. Outfit you dislike?

Everyone’s always saying that Akane’s design sucks, and while I’m not too concerned on it overall, I do completely agree.

99. Your absolute NOTP?

Komahina again, and I guess JunkoMikan.

100. Opinion on all the Protagonists!

Makoto is relatable as hell, and I sympethise with him a lot. It’s quite fun to play as him in the first game, because he reacts more regularly to the characters in a way that most people probably would. I love Hajime’s reactions, and his backstory. I’m not too fond on most of the memes around him, like Organe Juice and the 91cm Titties, but in general, his reactions to things and the way he tends to call out his classmates is pretty entertaining. As I mentioned, Komaru, and I guess Toko, are my least favorite protagonist(s) but I still care about them both greatly. Komaru is as relatable as her brother, and UDG gives Toko the character development she so greatly needed in Game 1. Kaede is amazing, and is a character who gets too cussed out by people both in the game, and outside of it, and her death was super relevant, and an amazing twist I didn’t see coming. She’s just awesome in general. Shuichi, while Kaede’s death did upset me, he was an equally great protagonist, and I loved watching his growth throughout V3.

[elyvorg]

What would you think of a talentswap au? I know we all love kaito in all his wonderful spacey self, but ive seen some really interesting concepts for ultimate assassin kaito, as well as ultimate astronaut maki, ultimate detective kaede and ultimate pianist shuichi. Some very interesting things could be done with their histories and how they affect their present, especially if the changes are minimised. (Say, Shuichi's uncle being a pianist rather than a detective.)

I dont think the original character arcs could be pulled off as well, what with how the character's pasts affect how they react to the situations they're thrown in during the killing game (for example i doubt maki would have gone directly to murdering kokichi when she's convinced he's the mastermind if she hadn't been raised as an assassin) but i think there is some interesting potential in what would and wouldnt change about them

I know talentswap AUs are a pretty popular thing in this fandom, and I do enjoy looking at people's ideas in terms of the creative aesthetic redesigns of characters they can come up with. As a narrative thing, though, the concept just doesn't really do it for me.

I agree with your point that it can be an interesting exercise to imagine how a character we know might have diverged from the same starting point through slightly different circumstances in their life, and what would and wouldn't change about them. But I'm just not especially interested in the end result, because ultimately, whether by a little or by a lot, they going to end up as a different characters.

Obviously, as you can tell from my blog, I like thinking about AU scenarios. But, for me, they need to be plot AUs, not character AUs. I enjoy plot AUs because I like imagining how the characters I already know and love would react in interesting ways to new and different situations not seen in canon. I'm much less into AUs where the characters have been changed such that they only superficially resemble the ones that I'm a fan of.

For the most obvious example of this, let’s take Maki. The reasons I love her, the things that really make her Maki to me, are the trauma she suffered in being forced to be an assassin, the issues and self-loathing she has today because of that, and how amazing it is that she still manages to be a good person at heart despite everything. A Maki who was literally anything other than the Ultimate Assassin wouldn't have any of that, and then she's just... not really Maki any more. It's not just that she obviously wouldn't try to kill Kokichi; none of her story would be the same at all.

The same also goes for anyone else who's talent-swapped into being an Ultimate Assassin, because that level of trauma is going to significantly change anyone. To take another example, because this is a hypothetical I have actually thought about a bit, let's try to imagine an Ultimate Assassin Kaito.

With the caveat that I don't actively seek out every talent-swap out there, I've happened across an assassin-Kaito concept or two that basically looks like the same Kaito: he incidentally murders people for a job, but then he also still has sidekicks and looks after kids and is his usual optimistic Kaito-y self when he's not doing a murder. That's a cute idea; I understand the desire to keep Kaito recognisable, but I just... I don't think that would be possible. I don't think anyone, no matter how resilient, could still be like that after going through what Maki went through and being forced to kill so many people. Maki didn't end up the way she did because she was weak; far from it.

(And it's obviously even less possible that Kaito wasn't forced and traumatised into this just like Maki was, because he'd never choose to kill people for a living. Perhaps we could imagine that Kaito was at one of the cult-run orphanages (for minimal changes, maybe his grandparents weren't there after his parents died? oh nooo) and got scouted, and/or volunteered in order to protect someone else because he's exactly as selfless as Maki.)

After going through all that, especially since he started from the same point of someone fundamentally very selfless and caring, an assassin-Kaito's issues would end up very similar to canon-Maki's. He'd still care about other people beneath it all, but it'd be hard to notice that when he'd also hate himself and feel like he doesn't deserve to be around anyone, let alone help them, because who'd want advice from a killer?

The only really different part would be his outward personality. Kaito's general personality is nothing like what Maki's was pre-trauma, so he'd have ended up with something quite different from Maki's cold aloofness. Specifically, if you'll bear with me on the out-of-left-field example here, I think he might have ended up looking something like Axel from Kingdom Hearts. (I once hyperfixated on Axel, okay, so I've thought about this a lot.)

In short, Axel used to be a good kid, a bit of a cocky attention seeker but with a heart of gold, until he was forced into doing horrible things for an evil organisation against his will. He pretty much coped with that by accepting that he's A Bad Guy now, and owning it, carrying out his evil missions in a stylish, badass sort of way, like a twisted version of the cocky kid he used to be. This also conveniently gives him something he can focus on to avoid thinking about all the things he hates and never wanted about this. Given that Kaito was a vaguely similar kind of kid to what Axel used to be, it seems possible that he might cope in a similar way if put through the child-slave-assassin wringer.

But, while the end result would definitely be a very fun and fascinating character, my point is that it still wouldn't be Kaito as we know him at all. It'd be an entirely new character. He'd have Kaito's name and face and pre-assassin-training childhood, but those details would be the least interesting things about him.

(I would recommend checking out Axel's storyline to see a character along these lines, but honestly the required untangling of the Kingdom Hearts lore-spaghetti is not necessarily worth your while. That and all this stuff about his issues is pretty subtle and I only really noticed it at all because I happened to like him enough to hyperfixate for a while.)

Even putting aside the extreme example of an assassin talent, a lot of Danganronpa characters are as great as they are specifically because their personality and their talent make such a good combination. Take Shuichi, whose issues and character arc and potential as an interesting protagonist revolve around the fact that he's an Ultimate Detective who starts out weak. A pianist Shuichi would just be a somewhat anxious and insecure pianist, which wouldn't be especially interesting or important to the progression of a killing game. Meanwhile, a detective Kaede would be way more confident about her detectiveness than Shuichi and would probably look something like a more optimistic and trusting Kyoko; again, less interesting. [Edit: or would she?] To bring in some other combinations of these four, a detective Maki would look very similar to Kyoko, because she'd have similar trust issues from her orphanage days.

As for a detective Kaito, sure, we can imagine a Kaito who's the same kind of person but with a passion for solving mysteries (which he’s also actually good at) instead of space. He'd still do his sidekick thing, of course, because the only thing that'd make him lose that central part of himself is loads of childhood trauma. But then this Kaito is just genuinely every bit the hero everyone needs, solving the cases and supporting the others in one package... and, whoops, there goes all of his issues and character arc. At best, he'd still struggle a little with the Gonta situation in trial 4, but that struggle wouldn't be actually about Shuichi and so it wouldn't be nearly as fun. (A detective Kaito still wouldn't struggle as much to accept Gonta did it, either, because he'd be someone who's used to trusting the facts and logic alongside his instincts about people to intuit the truth.) And he’d still struggle a bit with dying if we gave him the virus, but so much less so, because at least he’d be obviously managing to be the hero he wants to be before the end.

An astronaut Maki would pretty much just be a regular astronaut who happened to be an orphan. She'd need to have taught herself to be good with communication and teamwork because that's necessary to be an astronaut, so she'd mostly just be a little bit like Kaito but extremely toned down. (Again, Maki without her assassin trauma kind of just becomes a fairly ordinary competent person and not really Maki as we know her.) Even then, it's a huge stretch that someone pragmatic and cautious like her would have been willing to risk losing everything just to take the astronaut exam as a teenager. And an astronaut Shuichi doesn't even seem possible; he'd have been way too insecure to apply to astronaut training early like Kaito did, no matter how badly he'd hypothetically love to go to space. Really, Kaito's reckless personality is a necessary part of having an Ultimate - as in, teenage - Astronaut. Pretty much all of these kids' talents are intrinsically tied in some way into who they are as a person and as a character in this story.

The only talent-swap within these particular four characters we're talking about that I think would work in terms of keeping them basically themselves is between Kaito and Kaede. That's because they were both written with the talents they have to help enhance the kind of people they are, and they're such similar people in the first place. Both of them are selfless and optimistic and all about working together and helping others; Kaede plays music to make people smile, while Kaito's astronaut training requires him to be someone who values communication and co-operation. I can just about see a talent-swap between these two making sense while still retaining everything important about who they are as people and keeping their stories roughly the same. You'd have a space-flavoured Kaede and a music-flavoured Kaito, but their personalities would still be very recognisably them.

(Though, still, I dunno if I'd have loved a pianist Kaito quite as much. There's just something about that space theme that helps get across how bombastically over-the-top he is in a way that a more down-to-earth talent simply can't quite match. Also, that execution.)

...The problem with this, though, is that the new music-Kaito and space-Kaede wouldn't be all that meaningfully interesting to explore compared to their original versions. Which I guess is kind of the unavoidable catch-22 I have with character AUs. Making big changes to a character can be an interesting thought experiment, but it ultimately results in them no longer being the characters I've grown to love any more, while changes that keep them still recognisably the same people are inherently going to be pretty superficial changes that aren’t worth exploring very much.

[spectralreplica]

So I loved your response on who would be most likely to witch out in the PMMM/DR v3 au, but id love to ask, what did they all wish for? (Bonus: Also did those wishes backfire?)

So, these are my thoughts for right now, but if I actually planned more of the “story” for this AU, some of them might change. For some of them I kind of cheated and came up with the power first, but in my defense it’s hard to come up with wishes without having planned more of the plot, since Kyubey tries so hard to get people to make spur of the moment wishes during times of stress.

Kokichi: I see him as totally paranoid (rightfully so) over how Kyubey’s trying to trick him but still obsessing for weeks over the perfect phrasing for a wish just in case, and then suddenly a witch traps him and DICE in a Labyrinth and he ends up contracting with a totally spontaneous wish. Something like “saving my friends” or “being strong enough to protect my family.” For maximum irony, he’d end up with powers that get stronger when fighting with/to protect others but keep trying to fight alone anyway due to not trusting other magicals and not wanting to put DICE in danger. He’d also tell people he wished for other things like, “to rule the world from the shadows,” or “an infinite supply of scarfs.” As for backfiring, he does save everyone that one time, but they’re in more danger since other magicals end up targeting them when Kokichi poaches from their territories, plus they’re in the line of fire if/when he witches out.

Kaito: Like in the game, Kaito is terminally ill and wishes for something along the lines of “being healthy enough to achieve his dreams,” but he totally lies and says he wished for something like “being strong enough to help others.” He gets the power to temporarily boost other people’s powers and/or make their bodies regenerate from wounds. He kind of avoids using the healing part at first because it’s a little suspicious with his alleged wish and then pretends it’s a thing he’s been practicing. It doesn’t really go bad for him, and I don’t think he’d regret making the wish, even when he finds out about the Soul Gems controlling your body thing. Maybe when he realizes there are no witches in space? But even then I think he’d be in denial…

Shuichi: Shuichi ends up involved in a really serious case and just can’t find the piece that ties it all together even though everyone is counting on him. At the height of his anxiety, Kyubey approaches him, and he wishes to find the truth. He basically gets super intuition/lie detection with a (mental) visual interface sort of like the DR trials (truth bullets plus the mini games). This creates drama with certain other magicals who are hiding something (cough, Kokichi and Kaito) and makes him doubt his skills since he’s relying on magic to cheat.

Maki: Still an orphan, still approached by a cult, but then approached by Kyubey. She wishes that the cult would never bother anyone at the orphanage again, and they all end up arrested, dead, or mysteriously vanished. She basically gets the power to make things/people “go away” to a pocket dimension only she can access, and this makes other people sort of forget those things/people exist while they’re inside. She sees her wish as a necessary sacrifice, like her becoming an assassin in canon, so she is Not Happy when Kyubey approaches some of the other orphans.

Kaede: Honestly not sure???? She doesn’t really have anything in her backstory that would be a catalyst for Kyubey to approach her, so I see it as more of a random chance, situation-based thing, like Madoka healing the cat. Maybe she was trapped in a Labyrinth and wished for the power to fight survive, or to save a friend? Just know it’s not related to her piano playing. That’s all practice, and she likes it that way.

(Joke answer: Kaede gets super mad at someone from a distance and wishes she could slap them across the face for being an idiot. She gets the power to telekinetically smack anything around from across the room.)

Himiko: Intrigued by the idea of real magic but not intrigued by the idea of having to fight witches. Ends up wishing for her mentor to be more popular. Not as mind-controlly as Kyoko’s wish; basically, people just find him really cool and talented and can’t look away from his shows, but they don’t like, form a cult? Sort of derails her own career as a magician (both because the audience likes her mentor more and because she has to sneak off and fight witches) and doesn’t really fix the problems in their relationship, but he doesn’t leave and never return. Anyway, she gets the power to make herself and anyone she touches more or less noticeable/popular. Really good for stealth or drawing aggro. Also for convincing people to do her favors.

Tenko: She recently moved to the city after living in a temple since she was a child, and is finding it hard to adjust. One night, when she’s out acting as a “hero of justice” like her Master taught her and preventing a suicide, she ends up trapped in a Labyrinth and saved by Himiko. She ends up really, really attached and sort of accompanies her on hunts for a while until something goes wrong, and she ends up wishing to protect Himiko. She ends up with sort of a sense when Himiko needs help and is really good at putting up shields/barriers.

Miu: Still in a bad car crash leading to a coma, butthe surgery doesn’t go as well. Kyubey approaches her in the hospital right after she’s been told she’s facing permanent brain damage. She almost wishes to put her brain back to normal but then decides, why stop there? She wishes to be a genius with a super-brain that can solve any problem, and ends up with super inspiration, mostly aimed at turning any materials around her into an invention that will help her. She can use magic to substitute for missing materials and speed up the development time, but this uses a lot of magic at once, and the finished product won’t work for anyone else. Freaks out when she learns her body is now essentially hardware, but then she realizes the possibilities for improving things… Then everyone else freaks out.

Gonta: Still a feral child who got lost in the woodsand was sort of raised by wolves (not reptites, sorry), but this affects his ability to learn language and social skills much, much more severely than in canon. Wishes for the ability to understand others, which makes him fluent in all languages and sort of an empath. Also, because he sees animals as sort of on the same level as humans, this extends to animal languages in addition to human ones. Being able to speak and mimic “good manners” improves others’ opinions of him and his intelligence, but being able to feel how his birth family really feels about him is so upsetting that he eventually ends up running away and staying with Miu and Kiibo.

Kiibo: Lives with Miu. Does not remember his wish, but he has powers, so he has to have made one? Probably human. I’m still sort of torn over his backstory, but I’m kind of leaning towards a Hijiri kind of situation, where he was created by someone else’s wish. Or magic (cough, Miu.)

Ryoma: Wishes to get revenge on the mafia that killed his family and girlfriend. Basically gets enhanced strength and a sort of sense of where all of the members are. I sort of went over how his wish ends up in the other post…

Korekiyo: Wished to cure his sister’s illness and got healing powers. Currently traveling the world to observe other magicals. Like the other cult members, offers to use his powers for a price (usually Grief Seeds or information).

Angie: Starts out living on an isolated island andacting as a priestess/oracle, but begins to doubt her own abilities/connection to her god because natural disasters are getting worse and more people are leaving. She sort of interprets Kyubey as a messenger from her god and wishes to know what’s really going on/get a better sense of her destiny. She gets the power to predict the future as long as she is personally involved. She has to actively focus on a question (What happens if I do this?) or a goal (I want to achieve this) and she’ll see the most probable path. This really elevates her sense of self-importance, and makes it much easier to make others see things her way. It doesn’t prevent a tsunami from destroying her home and making everyone leave, at which point she meets Tsumugi and Kirumi.

Tsumugi: Her life isn’t bad, but she doesn’t like herself that much and feels empty and unfulfilled until she comes across the existence of actual magical girls (well, one in particular). Like an anime come to life! Tsumugi wishes for the ability to become someone else (yes, I know this was Rena’s wish too…) and gets the power to transform into other people. If they’re a magical, she can also copy a limited, weaker version of their powers.

Rantaro: Wishes to find all of his sisters and gets the ability to track people. He has an inherent sense where each of his sisters is and their general emotional state, but he can also apply this power to other people if he focuses. It works from anywhere in the world and can be based on a photograph, but it works best when the person is close by (from a country away he knows they’re alive and northwest from him, from a building away he knows they’re sitting in a chair in the back corner of the back bedroom and feeling excited but a little nervous) and he’s met them in person. He quickly discovers that tracking a sister down once doesn’t mean she’ll stay “found” and go home. Some of them also want to travel, others have bad senses of direction and always get lost again, some find his new knowledge of where they are and how they feel super creepy and avoid him, and at least one became a magical girl already… He probably finds out about the witch thing first…….

Kirumi: Part of a family that’s been serving animportant, rich family (maybe Rantaro’s? for maximum irony?) for generations. She’s been trained to dedicate her whole life to serving others and has no real prospects outside of eventually becoming head maid and training her own children to replace her. Meets Angie and Tsumugi and is immediately drawn in by Angie’s message. Wishes for the ability to instantly transport herself and others and gets the ability to teleport to any location she’s seen (photos count). It gets harder the more people she takes along, the longer the distance, and the less detail she knows about her destination. She tells everyone—and herself—that she lives to serve and wished for a convenient power to better serve the group’s needs, but she secretly wanted to escape really badly for her own sake too.

[commentaryvorg]

Danganronpa V3 Commentary: Bonus 4.2 - UTDP (Still Mostly Kaito Edition)

This is postgame content, so people shouldn’t be reading this without having already finished the main game anyway. But just to be safe: while this is non-canon character stuff, I will sometimes be mentioning events that happened in the main story, so there will be spoilers for the main game.

Last time in the first half of my Kaito-centric Ultimate Talent Development Plan coverage, it was all about Kaito helping people! Kaito encouraged Shuichi to use his detective skills to help out his schoolmates, and Shuichi passed some of Kaito’s advice about relying on people onto Kyoko. After some incredibly stubborn persistence to even get her to open up in the first place, Kaito nudged Maki into letting Kaede play piano at her orphanage, and Maki also bonded a little with Chihiro over keeping secrets and projecting their issues onto a dead bird. Then, after a brief sports festival interlude, Kaito helped Mondo be more positive about his future, and I lengthily compared Mondo and Chihiro’s relationship to Kaito and Shuichi’s one in canon, because both had similar issues and dynamics going on.

There’s still a bunch more Kaito-related stuff to cover in this mode, so let’s start off this second half on a high note, shall we?

Ryoma (featuring Kaito’s issues)

Another of Kaito’s friendly events is with Ryoma, so you can bet I’m interested in it. Remember, Kaito’s fondness for tennis meant he looked up to Ryoma as a hero, and as a result, all of Kaito’s unreasonably high standards for heroes that usually only apply to himself also apply to Ryoma. Ryoma therefore provides a delightful look into Kaito’s hero issues that can’t really be found anywhere else in this AU, since Kaito hasn’t been dying, and nor has Shuichi been saving everyone’s lives in class trials without seeming to need Kaito’s help.

This scene also features Usami – yes, she’s also here in this mode, as is Monomi, though never at the same time. I don’t even know, just go with it.

Usami:  “I just came to talk to Ryoma! I’m everyone’s teacher… so if you ever wanna talk to me about something, please feel free!”

Ryoma:  “Thanks, but there’s nothing to talk about. Don’t bother with me. Go back to your students. It feels… wrong for such a cheery mascot like you to be around someone like me.”

Kaito:  “Really? I think talking about stuff will help. Come on, just talk to her.”

Of course Ryoma talking about things will help! And it’s… actually rather surprising to see Kaito doing something that amounts to trying to help Ryoma get stronger, by encouraging him to do this. Kaito is usually so hung up on Ryoma being weak in the first place that he can’t even get as far as suggesting some kind of help for him. So I can only assume that the reason he manages to do so in this instance is because Usami was the one to suggest it first, which made Kaito actually briefly see Ryoma as someone in need of support for once, because she was treating him that way, and agree with her.

Ryoma:  “Hmph… is being nosy your talent or something?”

In my Kaito-isn’t-into-tennis AU, I wrote Ryoma’s POV describing Kaito as “nosy” for reasons I couldn’t quite place, but it seems I was subconsciously remembering that he does so here, even though I didn’t recall the details of this scene back then. Kind of like how Maki considers anyone worrying about her to be “gross”, “nosy” may well be Ryoma’s way to refer to people who are going out of their way to help him, as a way to try and brush off their help because he doesn’t consider himself worth it.

(In that sense, yes, being nosy practically is Kaito’s talent. Or at least it is with everyone except Ryoma.)

Kaito:  “What did you say?”

Usami:  “Hey! Fighting’s a no-no!”

Kaito:  “We’re not gonna fight. There’s no use butting heads with him anyway. Because this guy’s a total sad sack now. He used to be an amazing athlete before.”

Being called nosy probably wouldn’t normally rile Kaito up, not when he considers it a good thing to be invested in other people’s wellbeing. But apparently something about it coming from Ryoma in particular gets to him and causes him to snap right back to his Ryoma-specific mindset of “he’s not worth helping because he’s supposed to be a hero but he’s weak”. Specifically, I think it might be because the “nosy” comment was essentially Ryoma brushing off Kaito’s attempt to offer help. That refusal to even try and get stronger is another kind of weakness – and a more meaningful kind, one that it makes more sense to be upset at someone about, because it’s a choice.

Not that that’s a thing that usually stops Kaito from trying to help someone, of course! He openly called Maki a coward for running away from her issues at first, but that didn’t change the fact that he knew she had the potential to be brave enough to face them, if he just pestered her stubbornly enough to convince her. It usually takes a lot for Kaito to conclude that someone really is beyond help and isn’t ever going to decide to change, as we saw with Kokichi in canon. But not when it’s Ryoma, apparently. Even though Usami got Kaito to temporarily see past Ryoma’s initial weakness and try to help, refusing that help even once and not wanting to change is even more weak of Ryoma, and is therefore again disgraceful for a hero and sent Kaito’s opinion of him right back to square one.

Which seems quite relevant to how Kaito was in canon, considering how much he refused any help with his own weaknesses. Particularly in trial 4, where it was very apparent that he was struggling to face the truth and should have reached out for support, and he was only making himself look even more obviously weak by not doing that.

This moment here with Ryoma, thanks to Usami letting Kaito get as far as offering help at all, is essentially illustrating to Kaito that if a hero does do the unacceptable and be weak in the first place, then refusing help for it when people can already see that he needs it only looks even weaker and even less heroic of him, and he should at least cut his losses and accept help. I would say that if only a moment like this with Ryoma had happened in canon then it might have served as a lesson of How Not To Be A Worse Hero (When You’re Already A Bad One) and taught Kaito to actually accept the support he needed. Buuuut I still very much doubt that, because Kaito here definitely seems to have fallen too far back into his general frustration of “heroes shouldn’t be weak at all!!!” to be using this as any kind of example.

Ryoma:  “You knew about me?”

Kaito:  “A little, yeah…”

Ryoma:  “So you get it now. The Ultimate Tennis Pro… I’m not that guy anymore. That’s in the past.”

Kaito:  “Yeah, I guess not… The Ryoma I knew was invincible and would go up against any opponent.”

Oh, Kaito, why am I so right about you. Throughout all of the lengthy rambles I’ve written about Kaito’s unhealthily unrealistic standards for heroes, including the fact that he also applies these standards to Ryoma, I had basically forgotten about this scene and didn’t use it to help me figure any of that stuff out. And yet here Kaito is, describing the Ryoma that he looked up to as invincible. Of course he saw him that way. Kaito’s writers have always known exactly what they’re doing and I love it.

Usami:  “K-Kaito… Is everything okay!? Please calm down!”

Kaito:  “My bad… I’m gonna go cool off.”

[Kaito leaves the room]

I like how Usami managed to notice, even though it wasn’t showing that much in his face based on his sprites, that Kaito was beginning to get really worked up about this. And credit to Kaito for actually acknowledging this when it’s pointed out, apologising for it (a more worthwhile apology than like 90% of the ones he ever gives) and leaving to calm down. Kaito can often react to things that upset him with a cycle of getting more and more riled up until he snaps in some way. At least in this case, he realised that he doesn’t want to end up lashing out as that doesn’t help anyone, and that the best thing for him to do is to just step away from the situation before he reaches that point. This is Kaito actually showing decent self-care! That’s rare.

…It’s probably only because Usami pointed it out to him. I said it’s ridiculous that she’s even here in this AU, but… Usami actually subtly did a lot for Kaito in this scene. Maybe he ought to talk to her. (You know, because Kaito is so good at talking to people about his issues.)

Usami:  “The air feels so tense… It’s all my fault…  I shouldn’t have said anything at all…”

No, Usami, you did a good. If you hadn’t been here and it’d just been Kaito and Ryoma, Kaito wouldn’t have even vaguely acknowledged the possibility of helping Ryoma and might have actually lashed out at him. This is a scene about Kaito’s issues with Ryoma, but it seems the writers included Usami in it for a reason.

The scene ends with Ryoma acknowledging that Usami cares about him, but also saying that he’s still not planning on actually talking to her and accepting her support. Damn it, Ryoma, you aren’t helping yourself either. He needs someone a lot more stubborn than Usami to really get through to him, but… yeah, there’s an issue with that, isn’t there.

There’s also a final year seasonal event that somewhat follows up on this. Ryoma heads to the gym to help Himiko set up for her Christmas magic show and finds Kaito already there.

Kaito:  “Oh…”

This is Kaito’s evasive face. This particular kind of reaction rather reminds me of Kaito’s reactions to Shuichi’s presence in early chapter 5. Which is only appropriate, since this is a similar situation of him awkwardly not really wanting to talk to someone who sets off his issues, but not wanting to admit why either.

Ryoma:  “Did Himiko get you to help her out, too?”

Kaito:  “Well, something like that. You too?”

Ryoma:  “Yeah. I may not be as fit as I was back in my glory days, but it should be enough…”

Kaito:  “How pathetic… An athlete at your level should say stuff like, ‘I’ll take on any challenge!’”

Heroes like Ryoma are meant to be full throttle, larger than life, all the time, with no half measures. That’s what Kaito’s like when he’s setting an example for his sidekicks and anyone else he’s trying to inspire; Ryoma’s supposed be like that too!!

It’s not even acceptable that Ryoma is saying he’s still strong enough to get the job done and is going to do his best. Simply admitting to any kind of weakness in the first place isn’t allowed and will definitely prevent anything else he says from ever being inspiring. (Won’t it?)

Ryoma:  “Hmph… Don’t bring up such an old story now. Those days are long past.”

Kaito:  “I don’t care about your past!”

Kaito, you extremely care about his past. Not about the past of him being a murderer that led to all his self-loathing, because he doesn’t have to let that define him and can move on from it and do better in future. That’s a lot like Maki’s situation, and obviously Kaito doesn’t care about her past in that sense, so I can believe he also wouldn’t do so analogously with Ryoma. But here they were actually talking about Ryoma’s past before the murders, when he used to be a superstar athlete. Kaito very obviously still cares about that past, because that’s why he can’t deal with Ryoma properly. If Kaito was capable of seeing Ryoma as nothing but the person he is today, then he’d be able to help like can usually help anyone.

Kaito:  “There are plenty of tennis players that look up to you. They’re trying to surpass your memory. One of them might become the next Ultimate Tennis Pro! So quit it with that mopey face you’ve got on all the time! When you see a tennis fan, can’t you just smile at him and say, ‘Tennis is pretty great, huh?’”

Kaito is kind of giving some reasonable advice here, but only on the level on which he looks up to Ryoma as his tennis hero. He’s managing to encourage Ryoma to be a little better at being that hero to people who look up to him, even if he’s not necessarily ever going to pick up a racket again. That’s something, but it’s not remotely what Ryoma really needs; it’s really more just what Kaito wanted from him.

Kaito:  “That’s all… I just wanted to say that to you before we graduate.”

Apparently this really has been bothering Kaito on and off for the past three years such that he would have regretted not getting to say it in the end. But still, “you should be a better hero” is not remotely addressing the real problem here, Kaito. Three years and Kaito was still too hung up on Ryoma being a disappointment of a hero to actually be able to figure out how to help.

Ryoma:  “Were you… just waiting for a chance to talk to me about tennis?”

Ryoma, perceptive as he is, does seem to have picked up that this whole speech Kaito just gave him was really more for Kaito’s own benefit. He just did it because he wanted Ryoma to become someone willing to talk to him, or at least others like him, about tennis.

Ryoma:  “Well, even if I agreed to… do you really think you’re qualified to talk to me about tennis? Well… you’d probably say that something like that didn’t matter.”

Kaito:  “Heh, so you do get it after all!”

Kaito has a point here, though. Someone shouldn’t have to also be a superstar with ridiculous anime tennis superpowers to be able to have a conversation about tennis with Ryoma, and if Ryoma’s trying to claim that just to avoid talking to people genuinely interested in tennis, then he’s only making excuses. (And I like how Ryoma’s perceptiveness lets him realise Kaito would say that to him before he even said it.)

Apparently Ryoma and Kaito do then end up chatting about tennis with each other as they set up the stage, which is at least some level of progress for both of them. Ryoma would probably have refused to talk about tennis if this’d been earlier on, but by now it seems he’s mellowed out enough – for reasons that have nothing to do with Kaito, of course – to be up for it if pushed. On Kaito’s end, though, this is still only him interacting with Ryoma as a fan of his and a fellow tennis enthusiast. He hasn’t stopped being incapable of properly seeing and helping with Ryoma’s real problems because of his own messed-up standards for heroes.

But even though Kaito still wasn’t able or even really willing to help him, we don’t have to worry about Ryoma in this universe. We can see this most clearly in one of Mahiru’s third year winter scenes in which she’s giving him some photos that he asked her to take as keepsakes of his time here…

Ryoma:  “I won’t let it end so easily. During the three years we spent in this academy… I found something I don’t want to let go of. Something I thought I’d never find again… And your pictures… have captured their smiles so clearly. These pictures will always remind me that the time I spent here was worth every second.”

…so, Ryoma’s going to be okay. He’s found his new reason to live.

Year 2 seasonal events

Year 2’s seasonal event is the school festival in which a lot of the students are doing shows or exhibits displaying their talents. Kaito isn’t doing anything like that himself and only helped set up the stage, but then he can check out one of the shows afterwards.

-      Can’t miss Kaede’s recital

Kaito’s POV wording for this option is great. It’s not just that he’s checking out Kaede’s show because eh why not – he actively doesn’t want to miss it!

Kaede:  “Huh…? You came by yourself, Kaito?”

Kaito:  “Yeah, my bad. Shuichi’s not here yet, but he’s on his way.”

Kaito, why are you apologising just because you didn’t bring Shuichi when she didn’t even ask you to? The fact that Kaito apparently on some level feels like this counts as doing something wrong suggests that he assumes Kaede doesn’t think much of him on his own and only ever cares about seeing him if he has Shuichi with him.

(I’d be surprised that he doesn’t know Kaede better than that, but… maybe what other people think of him is another inherent blind spot in Kaito’s intuition. I never quite thought about it in that way before, but that really does make a lot of sense and is kind of heartbreaking to think about. Oh, Kaito, you idiot.)

Kaede:  “I-I didn’t mean it like that! It’s just… I’m a little surprised you came to listen to classical music.”

But of course Kaede didn’t mean her comment in the way Kaito assumed! Instead, however, it seems that she similarly assumes that Kaito doesn’t think much of her on her own and would only ever come to her recital if he was tagging along with Shuichi, rather than for his own enjoyment.

Kaito:  “Hey, of course I’d come. You’re the one playing, so there’s no way I’d miss it.”

Obviously, though! Kaito respects and admires Kaede a lot, so of course he’d want to see her doing the thing she’s best at and loves so much! Classical music may not be personally Kaito’s area of interest, but that doesn’t mean he can’t appreciate Kaede’s passion for it and get excited about it anyway!

Kaito:  “I know you’re gonna do great! As far as I’m concerned, you’re the best pianist out there!

Everyone is supposed to think Kaede is the best pianist out there; that’s literally the point of her being the Ultimate Pianist. So I love how Kaito doesn’t care about that, and instead he makes a point that her being so great at this is his opinion of her.

While it’s less prominent in this AU, Hope’s Peak tends to do the rather unhealthy thing of putting people’s talents first and acting like that’s the only thing about them that matters. If Kaede is the Ultimate Pianist, then that means that her being so great at the piano is just the baseline expectation for someone with that title and not really anything special at all. But Kaito doesn’t see her as an Ultimate who’s already destined to be good at her thing – he sees her as a fully-rounded person first and foremost who just happens to have an amazing talent that deserves to be praised and admired rather than expected of her. And he does this despite spending all day every day surrounded by Ultimates and being one himself to the point that someone being talented at a particular thing should be difficult to see as anything special any more. He’s so good.

Kaito:  “Be confident and knock their socks off. I’ll be watching from the seats!”

Kaede:  “Hahaha, thanks. That’s so Kaito of you.”

I love Kaede using “Kaito” as an adjective, much like I’ve done many times throughout this commentary. His personality is so impactful and distinctive that sometimes there’s no better way to encapsulate it than that. And the fact that Kaede does this goes to show that she also appreciates Kaito’s outlook a lot, because she wouldn’t describe it in this way that expresses just how uniquely him it is if she didn’t.

Both Kaede and Kaito assume that the other doesn’t think much of them or see them as anything more than another close friend of Shuichi’s, but they’re so wrong! You should be better friends with each other as well, you two! You have so much in common other than just being Shuichi’s friend!

Kaito’s other two options for the festival aren’t especially noteworthy. He can talk to Ibuki before her concert and see that she’s already plenty hyped up about it without his help, or he can check out a fashion show featuring the class 1 girls and have “Junko” (really Mukuro) accuse him of being a perv when he’s genuinely just interested in the show. (Why wouldn’t he be interested? There’s nothing unnecessary in this world!)

However, Kaito’s appearances in other people’s events for this school festival are all quite noteworthy in one way or another.

One of these festival events is with Byakuya. This is not someone you’d expect Kaito to go out of his way to talk to, because he’s empatically neither someone Kaito respects for being invested in helping others, nor someone who might benefit from Kaito’s support. But apparently there is one reason Kaito is interested in him, and therefore approaches him after a speech he was giving at the festival…

Kaito:  “I’ve got a question for you! The Togami Corporation funds all kinds of stuff, right? What about space exploration?”

…Which is, of course, SPACE.

Byakuya:  “That is within our power. The Togami group, and myself, can move mountains. We are obligated to spread our grasp into space. A loser like you wouldn’t understand.”

Byakuya, you asshole, you are talking to the Ultimate Astronaut; if you actually cared about a Togami space program then he’d be an incredible asset to that. Evidently Byakuya does not actually care about space travel itself and is only interested in doing this as a way to make his name seem even more big and important.

Kaito:  “I’m no loser! I’m Kaito Momota, Luminary of the Stars!”

…At one point in the main commentary I mentioned that Kaito never actually responds to being called useless (which “loser” is pretty analogous to) in this overblown way. But that was because that kind of overblown response would have sounded like an obviously-desperate defence during the times when he actually was afraid he was useless. Here in this AU, though, Kaito has no such issues going on, so all that’s happening here is his genuine overblown confidence. Being called a loser just bounced right off him; he knows he’s not.

(Also look at how Kaito would rather inform Byakuya that he’s the Luminary of the Stars, even though him being the Ultimate Astronaut is pretty relevant to this conversation. His luminary title is so much more important to him.)

Kaito:  “But I see you understand how great outer space is.”

I am kind of surprised though that Kaito didn’t pick up on the fact that Byakuya doesn’t understand how great space is, at least not in any meaningful way.

Kaito:  “Alright! I’ll make you my sidekick!”

…Kaito? Clearly Byakuya is not a potential sidekick, what are you doing.

Kaito then apparently spends a while following Byakuya around and pestering him about space despite his protests. Given this, I can only assume that in this instance Kaito means a somewhat different kind of sidekick, one that only applies in the context of space travel. Obviously Kaito is the foremost authority on space around here, so he wants to teach Byakuya all about space exploration and how he can make the Togami corporation the best at space. Maybe Kaito does realise that Byakuya only “understands” how great space is in the sense that he superficially recognises it’s big and important, and so Kaito wants to teach him exactly why it’s so great so that Byakuya will definitely decide to throw all of his money at it.

Kaito, cut your losses, dude. You could do so, so much better than him for a space sidekick.

On a similar but much more interesting note, Kaito can also interact with Izuru Kamukura. (Yes, he’s in this mode like it’s no big deal. Hajime is also in this mode. They’re never both seen or mentioned in the same scene, so I guess we’re just running with two alternate universes here?)

Kaito:  “How about it? You wanna become my sidekick, too?”

And Kaito just casually offers this out of nowhere after they’ve done nothing but help set up the stage together.

Izuru:  “It wouldn’t make sense to have a sidekick who is better than you at everything, right?”

Oh, Izuru, you don’t get it at all. Kaito absolutely can have sidekicks that are better and more capable than him. The only thing required for them to be his sidekick is that there’s something standing in the way of them reaching their full potential, something that Kaito’s support can help with.

Kaito:  “Heh, Ultimate Hope? That’s nothin’! I’m Kaito Momota, Luminary of the Stars!”

Heh, there’s another instance of him seeing his luminary title as far more meaningful than any of these Ultimate talents, even the most Ultimate one of them all.

Izuru:  “I can analyze everything about a future you would follow.”

Kaito:  “Analyze? You’re just talking about predictions. My destiny’s too big to be predicted! Plus… I’ve got Shuichi and Maki Roll as my sidekicks. If we include their strengths, the possibilities are endless.”

Silly Izuru, assuming Kaito has limits, that there are things that might just be impossible for him. That’s not how Kaito works! And I love that Kaito brings his sidekicks into it, too; he believes in their potential so much! More than that, he believes that when people work together, they have unlimited potential that could never be predicted!

Izuru:  “As I predicted, you are an idiot. How boring…”

Kaito:  “That’s a bad habit. If you keep saying that, you’ll start to think everything’s boring. Are you okay with that?”

…See, Kaito gets it. He knew exactly what he was doing in this instance when he asked Izuru to be his sidekick. It doesn’t matter that Izuru is infinitely more talented than him – he still has weakness that he needs help with. After nothing but a brief session of helping each other with some manual labour, Kaito managed to pick up on that. His intuition is incredible.

This weakness of Izuru’s – to see everything as boring because he’s such a super-genius that he can predict every possible outcome – is, as far as I understand it, ultimately the reason he ended up contributing to the apocalypse in his canon storyline, because Junko convinced him it was the least boring thing he could do. But it didn’t necessarily have to be that way. If he’d only had the right help, he could have ended up using his talents to do far more productive things than ending the world.

If anyone could teach Izuru how to have more passion for life, to see the value and excitement in things even if he already knows everything about them, surely it would be Kaito? If anyone could let him realise that people are inherently unpredictable and he’s never going to always know everything that will happen, surely it would also be a beautifully reckless doofus like Kaito?

Plus, Izuru was supposedly implanted with every single talent imaginable, but only insofar as he’s one person. He evidently doesn’t have Kaito’s talent, because that’s all about teamwork and co-operation. Izuru is already a super-genius, but he could be so much better than he is. If Kaito could convince him that this interpersonal kind of talent is worthwhile to have as well, then he could teach him that, and Izuru would learn to value other people’s strengths no matter how predictable they are! There’s just so much Kaito could do for him.

Unfortunately, Izuru brushes Kaito off as boring again and ignores continued attempts to sidekick him, so we can only assume that Kaito eventually backed down and decided it wasn’t worth it because Izuru wasn’t willing to try and change. Which I’m only begrudgingly accepting because if Kaito did succeed in making Izuru listen to him then that’d be the beginning of a whole storyline that this side mode just doesn’t have the capacity for. Otherwise, I really do believe Izuru had the potential to change, and that Kaito would believe that too and not give up so easily.

Just… man, imagine Kaito being a part of actual Hope’s Peak canon and just casually averting the apocalypse because he saw Izuru’s weakness and did his usual Kaito thing and it worked.

At some other point during the festival, Nagito approaches Kaito and is disappointed to hear that the Ultimate Astronaut isn’t putting on any kind of show about space today.

Kaito:  “Oh, are you interested in space, too?”

Nagito:  “Of course I am! The vastness of space… that’s the only stage suitable for your talent, right!? There’s no mistake that you’ll be able to bring hope to the world from outer space!”

Kaito:  “Hmm… something feels off.”

Nagito:  “Off? What do you mean?”

Kaito:  “You’re not interested in space… Or me. That’s how it feels. Like it’d be weird for you to cheer me on…”

Kaito’s intuition is so good. He barely knows Nagito, but he can sense well enough just from a few sentences that Nagito doesn’t actually care about Kaito himself or his interests at all and is only obsessed with the “hope” that he thinks Kaito represents. (Not that Nagito’s concept of it is anything close to the actual meaning of the word “hope”, but let’s not go into that again.) Kaito hasn’t seen enough of Nagito to know for sure that this is the kind of creep he is (like I imagine Nagito’s classmates are probably fully aware by now), but even without that, he can instinctively pick up on it straight away.

Kaito would probably have a lot of very interesting things to say to Nagito if he was exposed to him more and got to know his deal better, especially if it’d been in the context of an actual killing game. …But really, Kaito’s already had to do more than enough giving a piece of his mind to a selfish asshole who keeps making the killing game about himself and his own bullshit philosophy, and there’s so much more to Kaito’s character than just being stuck doing that all the time. Let’s give him a break.

Nagito:  “Hmm… did I get too excited? I’m sorry if my blabbering made you uncomfortable… But it’s true that I want to cheer you on, Kaito…”

Kaito:  “Well, I guess you’re not lying… My bad.”

No, Kaito, not your bad, because you were right! Just because he really isn’t lying about “wanting to cheer you on” doesn’t necessarily mean he cares about you.

This shows something neat about how Kaito treats his hunches that never really came up in the main storyline. If Kaito’s hunch about someone is negative, then he won’t act on it without further proof. Despite how much faith he puts in his intuition, he’ll give someone the benefit of the doubt if they deny whatever negative thing he suspects about them. (We saw this kind of thing very briefly in trial 2 when he picked up that Kirumi was trying to save an “everyone” who wasn’t here but then stopped pushing the subject when she denied it, even though she was lying and he probably still suspected that.) After all, it’s just a hunch. Kaito doesn’t want to form firm negative opinions of someone based only on that, because that’s not fair. That’s just being a dick to someone for what’s really no good reason, especially if it then turns out he was wrong about them and they didn’t deserve it.

Of course, Kaito is quite happy to act upon unfounded positive hunches about people, because why shouldn’t he? There’s nothing wrong with being nice to someone for no reason! Maybe it’ll turn out he was wrong about them and they didn’t really deserve his kindness, but then, still, no-one was hurt; he was just being a bit too reckless by believing in them is all. Kaito is so often recklessly kind like that – yet we can see here that he also tries not to be recklessly unkind. He’s so good.

Elsewhere in the school festival, Mikan is working as a receptionist for the haunted house exhibit. In an attempt to attract more guests, she tries inviting passers-by… one of whom happens to be Kaito. As you can imagine, this does not go down well.

After his initial freakout over the idea, which rather startles poor Mikan, Kaito tries to calm down and talk himself into it.

Kaito:  “Wait, wait… I’m not scared. Everything in there is just fake, right?”

Obviously he doesn’t want to be seen as a coward, but this could also be partly because he feels bad for freaking out at Mikan when she was genuinely just trying to be a good receptionist for the exhibit and doesn’t want to disappoint her.

Mikan:  “Yes… they’re all just props for the festival. So it’d make me happy if you tried it… sorta…”

Kaito:  [looking ill] “Sorry… I still can’t.”

But I’m glad he realises that he’s not going to be able to handle this and backs out before actually forcing himself through the exhibit and fucking up his health a lot more. Sometimes these things just can’t be helped, and that’s okay, Kaito. Looking after yourself is more important than saving face or preventing someone from being mildly disappointed. (And don’t apologise for it, you moron.)

Since Kaito already did make himself feel a little ill just thinking about it, at least he happens to be with Mikan, so she’s able to take care of him.

What interests me the most about this scene, though, is just the fact that it’s here at all. I went over at great length in the main commentary how I’m absolutely convinced that Kaito’s phobia only existed as something that Tsumugi deliberately wrote into him so that she could weaken him when she wanted to. It didn’t make sense for Kaito to have that phobia for any other reason – it was in-universe bad writing that was justified in an out-universe sense because Tsumugi was a lazy writer.

But in this AU, Kaito is not a fictional character written by Tsumugi and nobody is trying to nerf him.  There’s no in-story reason for Kaito to have the phobia in this AU – the only reason is that “he had it in canon”, but the reason he had it in canon does not apply here. Every other one of his character traits is here in this AU not only because he had them in canon, but because they’re all a part of what make him Kaito. But I think it could be argued that his phobia is not a part of what makes him Kaito – it sure as hell isn’t connected to anything else about his character at all – and therefore that it doesn’t need to be here.

So it honestly would have been entirely plausible to me to see Kaito not have the phobia in this AU. They could have instead had a scene of Kaito excitedly going into the haunted house exhibit with absolutely no explanation as to why he’s okay with this, because why should there be an explanation for something he’s never had a problem with in this universe? It would have been a delightful subtle hint as to the reason behind his phobia in canon. I’d have loved that. Alas.

Instead, it seems the writers just decided to take the in-universe bad writing that gave Kaito his phobia originally and make it a part of the out-universe writing for Kaito in this AU. Which I guess is acceptable if we consider that Gonta is also here at all.

Gonta had by far the most obviously-fictional backstory – raised by a race of creatures from a videogame? – and so that shouldn’t be a thing in this universe where he’s not made from fake memories. However, they also can’t just briefly edit it so that in this universe his forest family really were wolves, because wolves don’t have a proper language. Apparently, if a human child is isolated from any kind of language for a prolonged amount of time at the ages Gonta would have been at, it severely fucks up their ability to grasp language at all and they become basically non-functional. This is not an issue with fictional-Gonta, because Reptites are sapient and have a language that he’d have learned instead, so his backstory is perfectly consistent with the person he is. But if some kind of sapient non-human creature is not able to be part of his backstory… Gonta’s entire character falls apart and does not make sense. So Gonta existing as the Gonta we know in any non-fantasy universe in which he wasn’t made from fake memories is bad writing.

The writers had Gonta exist in this AU anyway, of course, because obviously they didn’t want to deprive us of our lovely gentleman friend in this mode, and if that means there’s technically some bad writing here, then so be it. So I guess with Kaito as well, they used that same philosophy of keeping him exactly as he is in canon, even including the parts that make a lot less sense when he’s not made out of Flashback Lights for Tsumugi’s story. Hence Kaito’s phobia still being a thing even when it kind of actually shouldn’t be.

A few more miscellaneous scenes

Kaito’s last friendly event isn’t nearly as interesting to me as the rest of them and I’m not covering it in full, especially because it features Leon and Teruteru and I refuse to quote a single word that comes out of Teruteru’s mouth. But it’s still at least a little worth talking about. The gist of it is that Leon and Teruteru begin to discuss going after girls and are shallow and gross, but they’re vague enough about it at first that it somehow spurs Kaito to start talking about “a man’s passion” and sound like he might be agreeing with them.

Kaito:  “I never said I wanted to peep! I’m talking about chasing after unknown worlds!”

But he was never agreeing with them; they were actually having two entirely different conversations at once without realising it. When Kaito said “a man’s passion”, he was talking about going to space, obviously, what the hell did they think he meant?

Kaito:  “Listen up! I’ll teach you what a man’s passion really is!”

Kaito’s concept of manliness does not and never did have anything to do with gross sexualising misogyny, and if anyone thinks that is what being a man is supposed to be about, then he’s going to set them straight, dammit!

…Okay, admittedly that is probably not what Kaito’s about to do – presumably he’s just going to try and tell them how great space is, incidentally sidestepping the actual problem with how they were behaving. Danganronpa’s occasionally-shitty writing is thankfully not so shitty as to directly include Kaito in it (except for the literally four single lines in the main story in which he is still nowhere near as bad as these idiots and which are out-of-character outliers that should be ignored). However, it’s unfortunately still bad enough to not go and actually have the dudes who are shitty be called out by another guy for being like this. But if Danganronpa’s writing wasn’t Danganronpa’s writing, I really feel like this is the kind of thing Kaito would absolutely do.

While the writing isn’t letting Kaito properly acknowledge how gross those two are being, it is otherwise at least having him be very Kaito about this. Even if the other two were being legit and non-gross about it, Kaito would still rather talk about going to space than getting a girlfriend, obviously; space is way more exciting! (…Which, actually, means that this scene is some actual evidence supporting that that one line in one of his Salmon Team hangouts about crushes on girls is likely to be out of character for Kaito. And the one about reading dirty books, for that matter. Ha! Take that, clueless intern!)

Anyway, thankfully this is the last piece of Danganronpa shittiness that goes anywhere near Kaito that I am ever going to have to defend him from being seen as a part of. Let’s move onto something better.

The final year’s seasonal event is less of a specific school event; it takes place in winter close to graduation (the Japanese school year ends in March) and generally involves characters reflecting on their time here over the past three years. I’ve already covered a bunch of the ones I find interesting in conjunction with friendly events they’re connected to, but here’s a few of interest that are a bit more standalone.

Shuichi happens to come across Maki and Himiko on the morning of the winter closing ceremony. This is an unusual trio to see together in this universe and definitely has no particular out-universe reason behind it at all.

Shuichi and Maki are both feeling rather sentimental about the fact that graduation is coming up soon, but Himiko is having none of it.

Himiko:  “Ugh, don’t make that face! It’s not like we’re graduating today!”

Shuichi:  “H-Himiko?”

Himiko:  “Besides, we can still see each other after we graduate! I’ll invite you all to my magic show! My magic can still improve. The next time I show it to you, it’ll be even more amazing! See? Why don’t you guys try to think of the future in a more fun way? Look forward to it!”

Look at her go! She’s been spending enough time with Tenko over the past three years to have reached basically the same point in her development that she reaches in canon in terms of how upbeat and optimistic she’s able to be. This is just the kind of thing that can help cheer Shuichi and Maki up when they’re feeling down, and also exactly the kind of role she’d be playing in this trio in canon as they’re trying to get by and deal with their trauma in the outside world. Since this scene rather pointedly has these three together (when they’re otherwise not seen together in any other scene in this mode), it’s got to be a deliberate nod to the canon ending, so it serves to show us that this is the kind of thing Himiko would have been doing for them there, too. In this universe she’s not been specifically inspired by trying to fill Kaito’s shoes or anything, but she’s doing this anyway simply because she’s a performer and this is what her magic is all about.

Shuichi:  “Hey… Kaede played a performance at Maki’s orphanage, right? Why not have Himiko do a show at the orphanage too?”

Himiko:  “A show for orphans, huh? Yeah, that’s a good idea.”

Aww, that would be adorable! Both Kaede and Himiko perform to make people smile, and those kids definitely deserve to smile. Also it’s lovely to see confirmation that Kaede really did end up going to Maki’s orphanage and it went off without a hitch.

Himiko:  “I might even get an apprentice. How about it, Maki?”

Maki:  “…I can’t imagine you as a master. I think you’re moving too fast.”

Nah, Maki, I think Himiko would be great at that. She ended up greater than her own master despite seeming to be the apprentice on the surface, so I think that makes her plenty qualified to be a master herself and train her own apprentices now.

(Since Himiko’s master actually exists in this universe, I am Very Invested in her reuniting with him one day. She needs to help him realise that having messed up in front of her one time doesn’t mean he’s failed her because she still looks up to him and cares about him even if she’s become greater than him, and he was being an Idiot to ever feel like she’d be better off without him because they are not just master and apprentice but also friends.)

Meanwhile, for Kaito’s final year event, one of his choices is obviously the most correct and worthwhile, but I’ll save the best for last. If he instead chooses to go for a walk on his own, Kaito bumps into Kokichi and has a predictably infuriating conversation with him, most of which I’m not going to bother covering, but there’s one part of it that I find interesting enough to talk about.

Kaito:  “You haven’t changed a bit in these last 3 years…”

This seems at a glance just like a general way to express exasperation, but it is very like Kaito to focus on Kokichi not having changed. After all, Kaito’s watched his sidekicks grow and change so much and is generally invested in the idea of people changing as they meet and form friendships with others. But of course none of that happened to Kokichi over these three years, because, as ever, he refused to let himself change.

Kaito:  “You’re still like this at your age? Doesn’t it make your parents cry? Do you even visit?”

Some very good questions! What is going on with regards to Kokichi’s parents? Did he live with them? Does he visit? Are they in the picture at all?

All questions that like hell we’re ever going to get the answers to, of course, and I don’t have nearly enough basis to bother speculating. But I do love that Kaito has thought about this. He’s trying to make some sense of why Kokichi is this way, but he’s also thinking about what Kokichi being this way must be doing to the people out there who actually unconditionally care about him.

(At least, Kaito is automatically assuming that Kokichi’s parents care about him, even though them being assholes could potentially begin to explain a few things. Apparently Kaito considers parents being decent to be the norm, which is another indication that his own parents being assholes is not the answer to why they’re not around.)

Kokichi:  “Hey now, you don’t really ask the supreme leader of evil such normie questions. Also, if you wanna know my origin story, you’re gonna have to bet two lives for it.”

Kaito:  “Idiot, everyone’s only got one life and there’s no way I’d waste mine on your story!”

Kokichi:  “Aw maaan, how boring. If you’re not gonna bother learning the truth about me…”

Kokichi, of course, responds with some evasive insincere bullshit rather than actually be honest about himself for a second, and then acts like it’s Kaito’s fault for not caring enough to want to learn. It couldn’t possibly be that Kaito really does want to understand him better and Kokichi is just refusing to open up because of his trust issues, nope, not at all, nothing is ever Kokichi’s fault.

For the other obviously-not-correct option for his winter event, Kaito goes to the dining hall and comes across Hifumi, who just finished submitting some fan comics of his before the end of the year.

Hifumi:  “The crunch time for them was difficult for even my golden hand… But as you can see, I overcame it and triumphed! I’ve raised the bar for fanfic yet again!”

Kaito:  “In other words, you wanted to show your manliness, huh? Good for you!”

While I’m not entirely sure why he decided to bring it up now out of nowhere, Kaito’s concept of manliness is still not inherently gendered. He’s just talking about Hifumi giving it his all and wanting to show how good he is at what he does. It’s about being true to yourself!

Kaito:  “Alright! Then next you can make a manga about me, Kaito Momota, Luminary of the Stars!”

Hifumi:  “Huh? A manga about you, Mr. Momota?”

Kaito:  “It’s gonna be a legendary manga! If you make it about me, it’s gonna be a global hit! Cuz it’s gonna be filled with manga-style adventure before it even gets to the space part!”

What an absolute dork. What I can only assume he means by this is that he’s going to have Hifumi manga-ify the ridiculous make-believe games he played as a kid. Obviously that’s the kind of story that everyone’s going to be able to appreciate, children and adults alike, right? And in his narration at the end of this scene, he calls this his biography, because it’s all definitely true. Oh, Kaito.

Hifumi:  “Well, that aside, if I’m gonna make it… It’ll definitely be a global hit! You’ve got a good eye for talent, Mr. Momota!”

Kaito:  “Of course! I’m a hero with many sidekicks!”

Kaito is citing his status as a hero with sidekicks not as part of why his story will obviously be a global hit, but as a separate thing, in terms of why he’s good at spotting talent. Because he is! His hero-and-sidekick thing is all about seeing the potential in people and bringing it out of them, and he’s so good at it!

Reflections with the sidekicks

But anyway, speaking of Kaito’s sidekicks, let’s get back to the obviously correct option for his final year event.

The stars are especially pretty tonight… What will you do?

-      Take a walk with my sidekicks

Kaito’s POV is again being wonderfully Kaito – of course he’d notice that the stars are pretty. He definitely goes for walks on clear nights all the time just so that he can look up at them. Space.

(How many times do you want to bet he’s tripped over something and made a doofus of himself because he was too busy looking up at the stars to watch where he was actually going? A lot. The answer is a lot, I will accept nothing lower.)

Kaito:  “You can see the stars pretty well tonight, yeah? Before long, I’ll be up there with ‘em!”

Maki:  “The stars are pretty, but… is this really the only reason why you called me out this late?”

Shuichi:  “He does this a lot…”

See, he does do this all the time! And what better way to enjoy the beauty of the night sky than by sharing it with his sidekicks? This isn’t even a training session; they’re just hanging out under the stars.

Shuichi:  “But isn’t it kind of fun?”

Maki:  “…I never said this wasn’t fun.”

And Shuichi and Maki have come to appreciate Kaito’s impromptu starlight walks too! They are friends.

Kaito:  “So many things happened in the last three years after I met you guys! We did some school stuff, went to Sonia’s country during the break and solved a case!”

This is indeed another thing that happened. One of Shuichi’s friendly events is with Sonia, in which she tells him about an unsolved conspiracy causing problems among the nobles of her country that ultimately boils down to a lot of missing pets. Since that’s his area of expertise, Shuichi offers to look into it for her, and Sonia takes him up on that. This is more of him trying to help people out using his detective skills, like Kaito was encouraging him to do near the beginning!

And while Shuichi didn’t mention his friends at all during that conversation with Sonia, apparently Kaito later heard about it and invited himself and Maki along. He probably just wanted the three of them to have an adventure together, didn’t he.

Maki:  “Hm, I still don’t know why I had to tag along, though.”

Kaito:  “You were great at wiping out all those assassins! That’s my sidekick for you!”

Maki:  “Correction. I protected us from danger and Shuichi solved the case…”

It sure sounds like they did have quite the adventure, too. Maki used her assassin skills to protect her friends! She even seems to realise this! (Kaito’s wording doeees kinda imply that, while he’s trying to gloss over it, she might have straight-up killed those enemy assassins, though. That’s a shame if so, but it was probably the only way to keep her friends safe.)

Maki:  “If anything, I don’t know why you’re tagging along, Kaito.”

Shuichi:  “If Kaito hadn’t invited you, Maki, then Sonia and I could have been in big trouble.”

Kaito:  “Issuing orders to sidekicks is the most important job a hero has!”

Maki:  “Then your job was over before we even left the country.”

Kaito was helping, you guys. His decision to bring Maki was a good call, but then he also came with them for, uh, you know, moral support! …Which probably genuinely did help them, at least a little, because Kaito is the actual best at moral support. If Maki did kill those enemy assassins, they could potentially have been the first people she’s killed since enrolling in Hope’s Peak, which might have caused a setback in her growth that Kaito would definitely have helped talk her through.

Kaito:  “After graduation, when I’m in space, I’ll look for you guys from up above!”

Maki:  “Huh? You’d never find us.”

Shuichi:  “Ah, well, he might be able to see the approximate area…”

It’s lovely how Kaito says this even though it’s extremely unrealistic to think he could actually see them from there. He wants his sidekicks to be able to feel, even while he’s gone, that he’s watching over them from space!

(This is also a sentiment that very much applies in canon when he really is gone. He died up there in space, which means he’s still up there and watching over them from among the stars, isn’t he?)

Kaito:  “And then I’ll take you guys into space one day. After all, I need my sidekicks to help me out.”

Kaito pulls this out of absolutely nowhere despite how clearly unfeasible it is. And the idea that it’s because he’d need them to help him is obviously an excuse, because that’s not what the word “sidekick” actually means to him.

Kaito just… doesn’t want to be without them for such a prolonged amount of time. He’s so positive-minded that he’d always have thought of only the good things about going to space, so his comment just a moment ago might have been the first time it’s properly occured to him that going to space does have its downsides, because he’s going to have to say goodbye to Shuichi and Maki and leave them behind for months at a time. There’ll be video chats and such, but it won’t be the same. Kaito wants to keep being with them all the time not just for their sake but for his sake, because even if he still isn’t calling them this in this AU either, they’re his best friends and he loves them to bits.

So obviously that just means that they’ve got to come to space with him too, yep, that’s definitely plausible and definitely something they’d both want, and Kaito’s not going to think about anything else.

Shuichi:  “You need us to save you, Kaito?”

Maki:  “Well, yeah… We’re the only ones who would do it.”

Kaito:  “Hey, Shuichi, what do you mean ‘save me’!? Maki Roll, what do you mean, ‘the only ones’!? Geez, what sassy sidekicks. I gotta teach you guys some manners.”

They are the best sassy sidekicks and I love the way they’re making such affectionate jabs at him like that. He’s an idiot in some ways, but he’s their idiot and they wouldn’t have it any other way. And they really would be there for him if he actually genuinely needed help, even though they’re making it sound like a joke on the surface and Kaito is bound to be assuming that they don’t mean it as anything more than that, goddammit Kaito.

Shuichi:  “…How did we end up agreeing to go into space with Kaito?”

Maki:  “There’s no way it would go that smoothly. You really are all talk, Kaito.”

Kaito:  “Shut it! The impossible is possible, all you gotta do is make it so! It’s already been decided!”

Bad sidekicks, stop telling Kaito it’s impossible! And, okay, technically it isn’t completely impossible for Shuichi and Maki to potentially become astronauts and go to space with Kaito if they both trained hard enough. But that’d require them to put in far more effort than they’d be willing to do just to be able to keep Kaito company in space, considering that space isn’t their passion and they have their own lives they want to lead. Of course Kaito knows this – he just doesn’t want to think about leaving them behind, and so he’s trying to use his own line to tell himself that bringing them to space with him is something he’s totally allowed to imagine happening.

Kaito:  “Both of you gotta keep up your training!”

Shuichi:  “I don’t know if we’ll ever end up in space, but… I’ll keep on training.”

Maki:  “…If I feel like it.”

But regardless of how unrealistic the space part is, they will definitely be keeping up their training, even while Kaito’s up in space without them! Including Maki, despite that she’s acting all dismissive about it here. (She’s smiling when she says that.)

You made a promise for the future with your sidekicks…

Kaito, no, that is not what you did. They did not actually promise to come to space with you. (It’ll be okay, though! You’ll be friends with the other astronauts too, because that’s what astronauts do! And you’ll get plenty of time to see Shuichi and Maki in between missions when you’re back on Earth, and plenty of video chats from space!)

Since this scene is only available while you’re playing as Kaito, it has more of a focus on Kaito’s perspective. Of course Shuichi and Maki also each have a third year seasonal event with Kaito that I’m about to get to, and theirs focus more on their perspective, namely what Kaito’s done for them. Because that gets covered in their scenes, Kaito’s scene is free to be about what Shuichi and Maki mean to him, beyond the purely selfless sense of him being proud of how much they’ve grown – and they’re his best friends that he wants to keep hanging out with and having adventures with forever! This scene isn’t really about them as his sidekicks. They’re more to Kaito than just that, even if he still won’t actually use the word “friend”, the big doofus.

Let’s move onto Maki’s scene, then, and talk about what he’s done for her. (Both Maki and Shuichi’s scenes with Kaito are only one-on-one, so Shuichi’s not here for this.)

Kaito:  “It was a lot of work taking care of you guys these past three years. You didn’t even try to talk to people in the beginning.”

Maki:  “Yeah. If you hadn’t annoyed me so much with your constant pestering… I probably would have never been able to talk to Shuichi and the others so casually.”

Kaito helped her relearn how to be friends! Here is confirmation that he very much did employ copious amounts of stubborn pestering to get through to her, not that that aspect of how it happened was ever in question. Kaito is even actually more or less admitting that it was pretty hard work getting through to her – he refers to both her and Shuichi when he says that, but let’s face it, he definitely had to put in a lot more effort in Maki’s case at first.

Kaito:  “You’re being pretty frank today. It seems you finally understand how great I am!”

It is unusual for Maki to be openly admitting things like this – which is also a big sign of her progress! And it’s very like Kaito to respond to her genuine expression of how much he’s done for her by being over the top about it rather than just directly, earnestly accepting it. In this instance it’s definitely not that he’s having any issues that make him not truly believe he deserves such thanks. So I guess it’s instead just due to him feeling kind of awkward when it comes to heartfelt, down-to-earth things like this, and he’s more comfortable putting on the super-awesome-hero fiction for it. (More on this in Shuichi’s scene.)

Kaito:  “Or… are you sad because graduation is getting closer?”

Maki:  “…Yes.”

Kaito:  “…That’s a bit too frank.”

It does seem that Kaito’s also kind of awkward just thinking about generally sentimental things at all. After all, we saw in his scene that he doesn’t like thinking about the fact that he won’t be seeing his sidekicks every day any more once they graduate.

Maki:  “Well, there’s no point being sentimental. It’s not like we won’t ever see each other again.”

Looks like Maki could tell that Kaito’s also feeling more sentimental than he wants to be. At least Maki is capable of being pragmatic about it even while she’s feeling sad. (Kaito would of course be capable of being as optimistic about it as he can, but for his part he doesn’t even really like to think about the sad bits in the first place if he can avoid it.)

Kaito:  “Yeah… you’re right. It’ll be hard for me to see you on a daily basis after this, but… it’s not goodbye forever.”

Maki:  “What do you mean, it’ll be hard?”

Kaito:  “Hm? Well, because I’ll be up in space, obviously.”

Maki:  “Oh, yeah… You still want to go there.”

Obviously! Keep up, Maki Roll! Don’t tell me you ever thought for a second that he wasn’t serious about going there, or that he’d change his mind one day! I’m going to instead put this reaction down her just having not quite properly thought about what that means in terms of the future of their friendship, in that he’s not going to be able to be around as much. Kind of like how Kaito himself in his scene apparently hadn’t thought about it properly until now.

Maki’s looking distant and a little sad in her last line there, and it seems like Kaito picks up on that.

Kaito:  “But you’re my sidekick! If something happened to you, I’d fly back here, right away! I look out for my sidekicks! Cuz I’m a hero!”

Therefore obviously it’ll totally be possible for him to do this if Maki needed him to! Aborting a space mission on short notice in the middle of it and zooming back to Earth for personal reasons is definitely something an astronaut can do, right? This is adorably like the previous scene in which Kaito insisted they could totally come to space with him. He really does not want to think about the fact that going to space will unavoidably separate him from his sidekicks for months at a time.

While the last scene was more from Kaito’s perspective and was therefore about what he’d want – his sidekicks in space with him! – this one is reversed. This scene has been about what Kaito’s done for Maki, and her talking about that has made him focus on what she’d want. So of course he would selflessly abandon space and come right back to help her if something serious happened and she really did need him! …If only he could. His reluctance at the idea of being separated from his sidekicks is, just as you’d expect, also partly out of selflessness for their sake, in terms of him not being there to support them like the hero he’s supposed to be. Kaito can’t bear the thought of Maki needing him and him being uselessly stuck out in space, not able to help her.

(She’d be okay, though, Kaito! Maki’s got other friends too who’d be able to help her in person. And if she really did need Kaito in particular, video chats would be enough, because Kaito always helps the most with just words.)

Maki:  “Huh… that again? Well… I’ll be waiting, but I won’t be expecting much…”

Maki is of course fully aware of how unfeasible these claims of Kaito’s are, but it seems, based on her wistful smile at the end, that she at least understands and appreciates how much he genuinely wants to be able to do that for her if she ever needs it. He is a hero who looks out for his sidekicks, after all, and Maki knows this, no matter how ridiculous she might think that way of wording it is.

Last but not least, Shuichi’s scene begins with him waking up early on the day of the winter closing ceremony. (This is remarkable in and of itself, considering how emphatically not a morning person Shuichi was in canon. Perhaps that was partly for mental health reasons, though, and after three years of being friends with Kaito and Kaede and working on his issues, he’s got better at waking up in the mornings.)

Thinking about only having a short time left at this academy makes you sad… And from that comes restlessness. What will you do?

-      Exercise is perfect at a time like this

It’s lovely how Shuichi thinks of this entirely by himself as something that’ll improve his mood. Kaito really has taught him well!

So Shuichi heads to the school field and finds that Kaito had the same idea as him.

Kaito:  “Oh, hey there bro! Are you training too?”

Shuichi:  “Yeah! It’s good to sweat some things out!”

Kaito:  “Right on! That’s the spirit! It’s all thanks to your training with me!”

Of course it’s all thanks to his training with Kaito! Shuichi would never have even considered doing this kind of thing to help himself if Kaito hadn’t been his friend.

Shuichi:  “…You’re right. You befriended me, and encouraged me, and gave me advice… You’ve… helped me so much, Kaito…”

Kaito:  “Hey, hey. What’s all that about? Don’t dampen the mood, bro.”

…But Kaito still can’t quite just earnestly accept such heartfelt gratitude. This is kind of a reverse of last scene with Maki, in which he responded to her acknowledgement of how much he’d done by being kind of flippantly over-the-top about it. This time, he started with the over-the-top “well, it’s because I’m awesome!”, but Shuichi responding with an earnest “no, you really are, thank you so much,” still managed to wrong-foot him. And again, this isn’t the canon storyline where Kaito had heaps of issues and ended up with a gaping hole in his sense of self-worth, so it’s not because he doesn’t feel like he deserves any kind of thanks at all.

It seems bizarre to be using this word for Kaito, but… he might actually be kind of modest? Sure, he’ll act over-the-top about his achievements, but it’s like he only really thinks of that as a fiction for the sake of keeping up his usual luminary image, an image that people might buy into and play along with because it’s fun and it helps encourage them, but not because they really think he’s that ridiculously amazing. If someone takes his overblown words at face value and seems to genuinely feel that they’re true, then he’ll back up and try to brush it off, because nah, he’s all right, but there’s no way he could really be quite that awesome. (You are that awesome, Kaito. At least when it comes to supporting your sidekicks.)

Shuichi:  “Ah, sorry… I was just thinking about what we’ve built over the years…”

Friendship! You built the best adorablest friendship, is what you did. (Also what are you doing apologising for this, Shuichi; there is absolutely nothing wrong in telling Kaito how amazing he’s been even if he’s too much of an awkward dork to properly accept it.)

Shuichi:  “If I ever find myself in trouble, I can look back at my time with you for inspiration, Kaito.”

Just like he’s also able to do in canon even though Kaito’s not there any more!

Kaito:  “That’s true, but… Graduation won’t be the end for us!”

But thankfully, in this universe, Kaito is always going to be there. (Just maybe sometimes only over video chats, from space.) He doesn’t ever want their friendship to end!

Kaito:  “Listen up! Even if things get tough in the future…”

Shuichi:  “Don’t bear it all by yourself, right?”

Kaito:  “Oh… well if you get it, then it’s all good.”

Pfft, I like how Kaito seems almost miffed that Shuichi stole his line. But it definitely is okay so long as he understands that, and evidently Kaito has told him this enough times over the years that Shuichi has that well and truly ingrained in his mind by now and already knew exactly how Kaito was going to finish his sentence.

Kaito:  “When things are bad, me, Maki Roll, or Kaede will help you carry your burdens. As long as you understand that, you can get stronger.”

And it’s good to see that Kaito isn’t just focusing things on himself as the sole figure of support (after all, he wouldn’t have any reason to in this AU where he hasn’t been having massive issues). He’s happy to remind Shuichi that he has other friends as well who’ll be there to help him.

Shuichi:  “The same goes for you, Kaito. If there’s anything I can help you with, just say so.”

Shuichi is also so very good. Every time Kaito says something along those lines to Shuichi, I’m always burning with the desperate urge to tell him that goes for you too, Kaito, you selfless idiot, you deserve it – so it’s really lovely and cathartic to see Shuichi actually telling him that. He’s such a caring friend and really would be more than happy to do anything for Kaito if he ever needed it.

Kaito:  “Heh, now we’re talking. Of course you’d help me! I’m the hero and you’re my sidekick!”

…

*tilts head almost 180 degrees*

Who are you and what have you done with Kaito.

This is not how Kaito works. He seems to be actually acknowledging that helping the hero is one of the roles of a sidekick, but no it isn’t, not in Kaito’s definition!

Okay, so. When I was starting to think about writing these UTDP bonus posts, I had one hell of a hot take in mind for this line. That take was that the reason Kaito says this here is because in this AU, he’s not “fictional”.

As I explain in greater length in my post about Kaito’s entire character arc from my main blog, it seems reasonable to assume that Kaito’s childlike black-and-white view on heroes and sidekicks comes from the fact that he was in-universely written to be the perfect ideal hero to inspire Shuichi. It’s somewhat unrealistic to think that if Kaito had actually experienced growing up, he wouldn’t have gradually gained a more nuanced appreciation for fiction, as he started reading more complex stories containing more fallible heroes who were still capable of being inspiring not despite but because of that. So I was going to say that Kaito not being fictional in this AU and having actually grown up meant he’d been able to gain that greater understanding of what made a hero inspiring, which’d mean that Kaito’s usual double-standard about heroes simply doesn’t exist in this version of him, and therefore that he genuinely means it here when he says of course Shuichi can and should help him out too.

…Except that clearly doesn’t track with some of the other scenes in this AU, now, does it. Mostly I’m talking about the scenes with Ryoma, in which Kaito’s issues about heroes clearly still apply to Ryoma in the same way they did in canon. There’s also that one scene with Hifumi in which Kaito is quite happy to have his ridiculous childhood games made into a manga and doesn’t seem to be aware of the fact that mayyyybe a lot of people wouldn’t actually find them to be particularly compelling narratives.

And while the scene with Kaito’s phobia isn’t about the hero issue, the point I was trying to get at there is related to this. It doesn’t quite make sense that Kaito has his phobia if he’s not “fictional”, just like it maybe doesn’t quite make sense that he has this view of heroes either. But ultimately, when writing this AU, the writers just decided to keep the characters entirely as they were in V3 canon, even including the parts of them that don’t actually quite make sense if they’re not made out of Flashback Lights for Tsumugi’s story.

So never mind, scratch all that. I only brought it up because I found it an interesting concept to think about, but it’s definitely not what’s going on here. Kaito not being “fictional” in this AU is not actually why he’s willing to admit that of course Shuichi would help him out as his sidekick.

Instead, presumably the reason Kaito is saying this here is that… he doesn’t really mean it, the idiot. It is at least not quite as bad as in canon where he knows full well he already has problems and is consciously lying when he insists that he’d totally ask for help if he needed it. Here, it’s more just that he’s never expecting he will need help and so he’ll never have to actually think about whether or not this claim is really true. Ultimately, it’s easier for him to just casually claim this here, because the alternative is being all “oh but I won’t need your help!”, which’d just make him sound like he doesn’t even appreciate Shuichi’s willingness to be there for him.

I do like to believe, though, that whenever Kaito does run into some kind of trouble in future in this AU (and I say “when” not “if” because nobody can ever go through life without having at least some problems here and there), he’ll actually be able, with Shuichi and Maki’s prodding and reassurance, to admit it and ask for help. Without the stress of the killing game making Kaito tunnel-vision into the fact that he needs to keep supporting his sidekicks and that the only thing that matters is how much of a difference he can make to everyone’s survival, I think he’d be a lot less completely and utterly averse to acknowledging weakness. Plus, hopefully his astronaut training will drill it into him that part of good communication is telling your teammates when there’s something wrong with you, because holy crap is it only going to make things way worse not just for you but for everyone involved if you don’t, you moron. And the more Shuichi and Maki grow and the less obviously they need his help and support most of the time, the more Kaito will come to consciously see them not just as his sidekicks but as his friends, and friends can open up to each other about anything.

One way or another, Kaito is bound to eventually realise what an idiot he’s being and overcome these issues of his. He just needs to live for long enough to get that far.

Kaito:  “Alright then… wanna run for a while? Better hurry, or you’ll be eating my dust!”

Shuichi:  “Ah, hey! No fair, Kaito!”

Working up a good sweat, you chased Kaito all the way to homeroom.

Aaaaa look at them racing each other off into the sunrise. They are friends and they are going to live happily ever after. Kaito is going to go to space multiple times under normal circumstances and come back alive each time, and also one day learn not to be a hypocrite about asking people for support. Shuichi is going to start his own detective agency where he exclusively takes on jobs that involve helping people and continue to have confidence in his talent in between relying on his friends for help when he needs to.

And Maki… I refuse to accept that she’s just going to have to go back to killing people in this universe when she’s come so far; that is Not Okay. Either Hope’s Peak really is going to somehow absolve her of being an assassin as part of its “set for life” policy, or Kaito and Shuichi are going to do something about it. Maki may still try to claim that assassins are necessary and therefore that totally justifies her being an assassin – there’s no real evidence in this AU that she quite got over that part of her issues – but Kaito would be having none of that. So Shuichi’s first job as a full-fledged detective may have to be to find evidence of her assassin cult’s awful deeds and report it to some kind of authorities that can take it down and take custody of all the kids from the orphanages and give all the other child-slave assassins some goddamn therapy because the rest of them don’t have a Kaito. Then Maki can rid herself of her awful past forever and get a normal job, maybe as an actual child caregiver, where she never has to think about killing anyone ever again and can live a relatively happy life after everything she’s been through, because I say so.

I just love these three so so so much and want them to get to be happy and keep being adorable friends for the rest of their lives, because they’re the best and they deserve it. So I’m glad we have this AU where nothing particularly drastic goes wrong at all, everyone is fully real, and their adorable friendships are still there like in canon, so that there’s at least one world in which we can imagine that they really are going to be okay.

[serahne]

kyouko, sayaka and hinata

Okay, apparently it was in my drafts all this time ? I’m so sorry !

Kyoko Kirigri

What is your opinion of this character? If you like, explain why you like him/her. She is the one I blame to fall into Danganronpa as a serie, so I sort of love her, and sort of hate her. More seriously, she is everything I like in a character, especially a female character : she is smart, she is active, she is strong but she still have weaknesses that she tries her best to control. She has a great developement, through choices that are - sometimes - very very harsh for a teenager.

Is he/she important to the general plot? Uh, yeah. She is like, the most important character in dr1. You literally have a bad ending if you don’t decide to sacrifice the protagonist for her. She is the one saying 90% of the interesting stuff in the trials. She is the one who is directly linked to Hope’s Peak history, through her father.

Can you relate to this character at all? Does he/she grip you emotionally? She does, in a way. Through dr1, you can feel how lonely she is fighting her battle, and how everyone except Makoto is ready to turn on her so easily. You can also feel her conflicted feelings about his dad, and it’s done in a very clever way.

Do I relate to her ? In some ways. Like how I’m always reluctant to ask for help and would rather try and manage everything myself, even when the task is hard. I’m far from having the drive that she has, though.

Do you ship this character with any other character? Or, are you particularly intrigued by his/her relationship with any other character(s)? (romance-wise or platonic) I ship her with Naegi and that’s her canon relationship that I enjoy the most. I have other ships (Celes or Sonia) but they work more in AU and stuff. Platonically, I have a fondness for Komaeda and Kirigiri working together in FF. I’m also hella intrigued by her relationship with her dad during the year she spent in Hope’s Peak.

Is there anything about the character you would change? I’m still super mad that they made her die in dr3 to ‘prove her love’ and appease the fuckers who call her a bitch for not accepting her death in dr1, and pretty much made her useless until it was time for her to come back as Naegi’s trophy at the end.

If you were in the fandom with this character or knew this character in real life, how would you see yourself interacting with him/her? I’d probably be too embarassed to really talk to her first. She’d be the kind of girl that I get really flustered to talk with, and I would be scared to sound stupid. I might have an intellectual yeah right crush on her.

Does this character make the cut as one of your all time favorites (if you like) or least favorites? Oh yes, definitely.

Would you hype up this character (if you like) or warn about this character (if you dislike) to someone new to fandom? I… tend to let people find out about characters by themselves, just so I can get their unbiased opinion. Between the two, I would hyper her up, though.

Is this character popular with the fanbase? Mostly yes, I’d say. You have a few people who can’t stand her for… reasons that I don’t undersand but respect, but most of the fanbase have positive - if not very strong - feelings about her.

Sayaka Maizono

What is your opinion of this character? If you like, explain why you like him/her. I really like her ! I think that no matter what your opinion of her is, you have to admit that the twist with her character was done very well, and the first taste of what the Danganronpa serie could do best ! On a more subjective level, she is just the kind of character that I like : so perfect looking that most people won’t notice that something is off inside.

Is he/she important to the general plot? Uh, I’d say that she definitely sets the tone for the serie, though of course her actions don’t carry beyond the first chapter. She only is there for half a chapter, but her character is still used as the background of the trial ground in ndrv3 whereas Twogami and Amami are... fine, I guess, but a lot less in the serie’s DNA, in my opinion.

Can you relate to this character at all? Does he/she grip you emotionally? She does, in a way. She is so young, and with so much pressure on her shoulders. She is sixteen, and has the terrifying feeling that she has peaked and that there is nowhere for her to go but down... this is really sad. I can’t say I relate to her, though. We have really nothing in common, and it’s probably for the best !

Do you ship this character with any other character? Or, are you particularly intrigued by his/her relationship with any other character(s)? (romance-wise or platonic) Celes is my OTP for her because they are both very amibitious and deceptive in their own ways and they would complement nicely. Nae/zono is cute, Kiri/zono too. I like the idea of her, Kaede and Ibuki being friends since, you know, ~ music ~.

Is there anything about the character you would change? I would cut off this weird scene in dr3 where there is a joke about a magazine where she is undressed/wearing a bikini. Even ignoring the fact that she is sixteen, is this really what her character comes down to in dr3 ? All this angst for a stupid pervy joke with Teruteru as a guest star ?

If you were in the fandom with this character or knew this character in real life, how would you see yourself interacting with him/her? Hard to say. She is friendly on a superficial level, so we probably would have good relationships, but friends would be a strong word.

Does this character make the cut as one of your all time favorites (if you like) or least favorites? For the serie, sure ! She is in my top 3 in dr1, at least !

Would you hype up this character (if you like) or warn about this character (if you dislike) to someone new to fandom? Sayaka’s narrative force is the twist behind her character, so I would probably lead this person on to make them believe she is a stereotypical character.

Is this character popular with the fanbase? ... Good question. I’d say... yes, mostly. There is this weird ship war between her fans and Kirigiri’s fans, as if these two ladies weren’t too good for Naegi on the first place. Some people really can’t understand her actions and consider that she is a manipulative bitch, I suppose. Bleh.

Hajime Hinata

What is your opinion of this character? If you like, explain why you like him/her. He is my favorite character in the franchise, and I think it’s well deserved. He is just a great character all-together : he is full of contradictions, insecurities, his growth isn’t as easy/obvious as Naegi’s, he is also a bit grumpy and snarky and judgy and all that makes him very endearing when you spend all this time in his head.

Is he/she important to the general plot? Well, he is the protagonist of sdr2, and technically the reason AI Junko took over the Neo-World Program. Despite how centered around Komaeda the game is, I still think Hinata is the one really at the core of the game, and that’s done in a very interesting way.

Can you relate to this character at all? Does he/she grip you emotionally? Oh, he really grips me on an emotional level, yes, and it’s probably also because I relate to him - or, I guess I can understand him while looking at him from an older perspective. He feels trapped, put on rails that he feels he can’t change the destination of, he feels like he is missing something, that his life is passing him by and he can’t help but feel like being someone else would make everything better. It’s a mix of teenage ridiculousness and existential crisis that we all felt at some point, right ?

Do you ship this character with any other character? Or, are you particularly intrigued by his/her relationship with any other character(s)? (romance-wise or platonic) I’m not going to rant about Koma/hina again, but yes, I might *cough* ship them, just a bit. I’m fine with other relationships, romantic or not, like Sonia, Mahiru or Natsumi. I like his brOTP with Kazuichi and Fuyuhiko. I like to think about his relationship with Naegi, because I feel like it would be a lot more complicated than the canon let it on, too. And if we consider them different people, his ‘relationship’ with Kamukura is also very important !

Is there anything about the character you would change? The ‘man nuts’ scene is not only dumb but very OOC. Can we... not. Do this. Also the ending of dr3 shits all over his character’s growth, and his ‘god mode’ is a but insulting toward Hinata’s fans I think, but... whatever. It’s what fanfics are for.

If you were in the fandom with this character or knew this character in real life, how would you see yourself interacting with him/her? I hope we’d get along ? I feel like we would, at least a bit, haha.

Does this character make the cut as one of your all time favorites (if you like) or least favorites? Yeah, he is #1, baby.

Would you hype up this character (if you like) or warn about this character (if you dislike) to someone new to fandom? I mean ‘he is my favorite character in the serie’ is hyping up, I suppose ? As I aways said, I like the idea of people making their own ideas. If someone ends up not liking Hinata, then they have terrible taste, but I won’t drop dead because of it, you know ?

Is this character popular with the fanbase? Oh, he is. I’m not sure if he is the most popular protag ( the fandom is still on the Shuichi-hype train ) but I don’t think I really saw one really negative opinion of him ? Which is fine by me, haha.

[funishment-time]

in the Danganronpa fandom you can't really use Moral Purity Tests to determine which characters you are and are not allowed to Like. almost every character has done/said something really nasty or questionable Canonically, whether justified or not, even if they Atoned for it.

think:

cute normie Hina, one of my personal faves, was about to murder-suicide everyone over Sakura

Sakura herself, one of the most Honorable and Good figures in the whole series otherwise, was still a traitor

the Survivors openly protect and harbor a known serial killer, and in some AUs the Entire Class does

all of Mukuro Ikusaba, and though one might argue she's an abuse victim (me!), she still, uh, Messed Up Big Time to say the least

everything about Sayaka, Byakuya, Komaeda...

Makoto wanted Junko alive even after she ruined quite literally The Whole World on a societal and personal level. he also kept Hope's Peak going because Maybe It'll Be Different This Time

adorable Ibuki, in a pre-Remnant state, made fun of coochie-out Mikan, even calling Mahiru over to take pictures

pre-Remnant Kazuichi harassed and stalked Sonia

Tenko doesnt just hate men, she wants them to die. openly

Hifumi and Taka were willing to put everyone in danger over Alter Ego

(and Taka did make fun of Sayaka's death a little @ Makoto)

the Warriors of Hope were severely abused each and every one. that wasn't their Fault. but...they still committed something that would be classified as a Genocide

Shuichi's whole backstory

Kyoko keeps Makoto in the dark constantly, even when their lives are at stake

etc

i can't think of many characters who were Canonically Good(tm) or at least not Douchey. Chihiro, maybe? pre-Remnant Sonia? but anyway: you gotta think in Relative Terms with DR.

i don't really know why i'm bringing this up because you all seem to Get It, but in case someone out there is tying themselves in knots over liking a character who's severely fucked up...this isn't the fandom. it's a little like Game of Thrones that way.

also don't start arguments on this post, i'm saying like who you want, not XYZ character is Terrible For Real And You Should Die For It.

[commentaryvorg]

Danganronpa V3 Commentary: Bonus 4.1 - Ultimate Talent Development Plan (Mostly Kaito Edition)

This is postgame content, so people shouldn’t be reading this without having already finished the main game anyway. But just to be safe: while this is non-canon character stuff, I will sometimes be mentioning events that happened in the main story, so there will be spoilers for the main game.

First off, some of the usual preamble about how this mode even works. Functionally, it’s, of all things, a board game that serves as a companion for another bonus mode which is a dungeon crawler RPG. Characters don’t gain experience from battles in the RPG; instead, you level up characters in this mode, by playing through the board game as them. I could go on at great length about all the mechanics of this, because I got rather addicted to it at one point. (Apparently all you need to do to make me invested in the mechanics of an RPG is to put characters I already love into it, and then I will do everything in my power to figure out how to turn them into the awesomest fighters they can be. Kaito is the best tank and will take all of the hits to protect his glass-cannon sidekicks!) But we’re here for the story aspect, so I shall restrain myself.

Flavour-wise, each playthrough of the board game follows your chosen character as they live out three years at Hope’s Peak, in a non-despair AU in which the casts from DR1, DR2 and DRV3 are all in the same school year. (Well, it’s mostly non-despair – at the end of the three years, an army of Monokuma robots is unleashed under the school, and that’s the dungeon crawling part. But your heroes ultimately deal with that threat before it can cause any chaos outside.)

The board game is only a very abstract representation of this story. Each turn supposedly represents one month, but really most of the spaces on the board are just various ways to level up your various attributes and don’t have any real narrative. The only spaces that matter for our purposes here are Friendly Spaces, which will show you one of five scenes featuring your character, that I’ll refer to as “friendly events”, in which they interact with one or two other students. If you land on enough Friendly Spaces, which is easy enough to do if you’re aiming for it, you’ll see all five scenes with your character.

The other source of story here is seasonal events, which trigger automatically on a specific month in each of the three years. The character you’re playing as gets a choice of three possible things they can do for the event, each of which results in a scene with one or two other characters. Unfortunately, these choices are mutually exclusive, so to see all of a character’s scenes, you need to play as them through almost the entirety of the board game (because the last seasonal event is near the end of year 3) three times.

…But actually, that’s not all, not if you want to really see all the scenes for a single character. Friendly Space scenes are easy to see all of because they’ll appear when you’re playing as any of the characters featured in them. (Well, usually; one of Kaito’s doesn’t appear for him, but that seems to be just a programming oversight.) But the seasonal event scenes don’t work this way and only appear for the character who is given the choice of what to do. So any given character is also going to appear in a bunch of other characters’ seasonal events, and you’re only going to see those scenes by playing as those other characters. Worse, if you’re interested in a specific character’s scenes, there’s no way to even know which other characters’ seasonal events they appear in. So the only way to be sure that you’ve seen every single scene for a given character is to play through the board game three times each as *every single one of over fifty characters*. (Actually, the exact number is fifty-three, which… I think is genuinely just a coincidence. Heh.)

In short, thank god for the wiki. I do not envy but am immensely grateful to the people who went and did exactly that and got transcripts – with sprites, even – of every single one of these scenes. Thankfully, each character’s page for this mode on the wiki contains all of their own seasonal events and all of their appearances in other characters’ seasonal events, so you can see absolutely all of their scenes in one place. I am not using my Vita for this one. (I wouldn’t have wanted to anyway because the backlog function doesn’t work in this mode, but.)

While it makes things way more inconvenient in terms of actually seeing every scene, I do prefer the board game as a framing device for this AU’s story far more than the framing device for the Salmon Team AU. Salmon Team used the same interface of Shuichi walking around and talking to people that the main story had, which resulted in an impression that, in-story, everyone was just robotically standing in the same spot every day doing nothing until Shuichi came to talk to them. But this board game is abstract enough that we know none of the rolling dice and landing on spaces is really what’s happening in-story. The scenes we see give us a glimpse of the students’ school lives, but there’s clearly so much more happening offscreen that we don’t get to see. It feels like an organic and fully-realised story that the board game just happens to only give us a series of brief windows into.

Before beginning into the board game itself and seeing any of the actual scenes, you also get a single textbox from the character you’ve chosen to play as, as they get ready to enrol in Hope’s Peak.

Kaito:  “Alright! I’ll keep training while I’m here and after I graduate, I’ll go straight to space!”

Kaito’s words here raise a few questions, honestly. If he’s already started astronaut training, he should be focusing entirely on that and really should not also be attending high school. He questioned in the demo why he’d have bothered enrolling in some academy when he should just be working on getting to space as soon as possible; you’d think he’d feel the same even if it was Hope’s Peak! It seems like the writing is just desperately trying to have it be the case that Kaito is both already an astronaut trainee in order to justify his Ultimate status, and yet is also attending Hope’s Peak, even though dividing his focus like that really doesn’t seem like the right way for Hope’s Peak to nurture his talent.

However, we could get this to work by imagining that Kaito is exaggerating here about having already started his training. Perhaps what’s really going on is this: Kaito managed to impress the space program despite being way too young, so they made him a deal. They recommended him to Hope’s Peak as the Ultimate Astronaut, having acknowledged his incredible potential to be one, and if he graduates from there, then he gets to jump straight into astronaut training without also needing a college degree. After all, part of Hope’s Peak’s deal is supposed to be that you’re “set for life” if you graduate, which I can imagine would equate to getting privileges like that.

I wonder if these privileges also mean that Maki doesn’t have to be an assassin any more after she graduates. This is the one universe in which Maki has actually killed people and her assassin cult actually exists and she’s going to have to go back to killing people again once this is over, which makes me very sad. Unfortunately I really doubt the canon Hope’s Peak would have given a fuck about helping Maki out like that, and all of the scenes we see here remain very vague about what’s going to happen to Maki once she leaves. Buuuut maybe we can pretend that this AU version of Hope’s Peak is nicer and is going to abolish her assassin cult as its way of making her “set for life”? I just don’t want to imagine Maki having to go back to killing once she leaves here. I can’t imagine Kaito or Shuichi would stand for it either.

Meanwhile, in Shuichi’s little intro line, he isn’t wearing his hat, when he really should be if you think about it. Until he meets Kaito and Kaede and starts trying to be braver, he’s not going to take that thing off.

…So, if this introduction didn’t already make it obvious, I’m going to be focusing on scenes featuring at least one of our adorable training trio, with a particular focus on Kaito because what did you expect, it’s me.

Shuichi (featuring Kyoko)

Obviously one of the friendly events I’m here to talk about is one between Shuichi and Kaito!

Shuichi is already Kaito’s sidekick in this event, which is something we don’t really need to be shown coming about, not when we can easily fill in the gaps and imagine that it went roughly like it did in canon. Kaito saw Shuichi’s weakness and made it his business to help, just like Kaito always does.

…It is a little different from canon, because there isn’t the context of Shuichi needing to have his act together in case there’s another class trial, nor is there the subtle Kaito’s-issues context of him feeling like Shuichi has already been more of a hero than him and wanting to make himself a part of that in order to feel useful and not inferior. But this just goes to show that those reasons were never necessary and Kaito would have reached out to Shuichi regardless, because that’s genuinely just who he is.

Kaito:  “Why’re you looking so down now? I thought you’d been looking better than when you first got to this academy. If there’s something going on, then spit it out! It’s a hero’s job to help out his sidekick!”

Shuichi:  “It’s nothing, I just… I feel as though I haven’t used my detective skills lately.”

Kaito noticing Shuichi looking down and encouraging him to talk about whatever’s wrong is still so good. It seems Shuichi would normally have felt this wasn’t important enough to mention, but thanks to Kaito’s prodding, he’s been starting to learn that it’s okay to talk about even small-seeming problems, because Kaito will help him with anything.

(And Kaito is indeed actually right in his judgement that something was wrong, because this isn’t chapter 4 in which he’d become desperate enough to forcefully insist Shuichi needed his help when he really didn’t. No I am not going to stop mentioning the time Kaito did that in his chapter 4 FTE; it was delightful.)

Shuichi:  “I feel like… I should be doing something. I got my Ultimate talent by chance, so…”

Props to Shuichi for wanting to do something about this. Even though he feels he got his Ultimate title by chance, he’s not just going to wallow in the feeling that he doesn’t deserve it – he wants to work until he can feel like he does deserve it and can be proud of it! It’s definitely Kaito (and probably also Kaede; she’s his friend in this AU too, of course) who helped Shuichi feel this way, because this was very much not his outlook at the beginning.

Shuichi:  “But… a detective can’t work unless there’s a case to solve, or a request to fulfil.”

Kaito:  “No! Your talents are more than just that!”

Shuichi:  “Huh?”

Kaito:  “Hey, Shuichi… I’m an astronaut. Do you think I’m useless when I’m not in space?”

Shuichi:  “You’re not useless! You have good teamwork, and you always help people in need. Everyone really depends on you, Kaito.”

I really like Kaito’s approach to this. Of course he’s not useless when he’s not in space, because all of the skills he has that gave him his astronaut talent can also be applied in so many other ways! In terms of current achievements, Kaito is a far worse astronaut than Shuichi is a detective, because Shuichi has at least solved a good few cases, while Kaito’s never even been to space. But Kaito doesn’t let that get him down! There’s so much else he can do with his skills before he gets there!

Kaito:  “Then what about detectives? Are they useless without cases or requests?”

Shuichi:  “Well…”

So the same should go for Shuichi, right? Obviously!

Kaito:  “So I’ll be the hero and you be my sidekick!”

Shuichi:  “…Isn’t that what we’ve been doing?”

It’s… a little hard to translate the Kaito-ese here, and I don’t blame Shuichi for getting confused. But I think what he’s trying to get at is that he’ll cheer Shuichi on while Shuichi goes out there and lives up to his potential, because that’s what the hero-and-sidekick thing is really about.

Kaito:  “And when someone’s in trouble, you help ‘em out! Like, by giving them advice or something! It might be different from your usual detective work, but… Instead of rotting away like that, it’ll make you feel alive by helping out those around us.”

It’s adorable that Kaito’s basically encouraging Shuichi to be more like him, in the sense of trying to help people. After all, he knows that Shuichi’s a naturally compassionate person who does instinctively want to help others a lot. Their respective talents lend themselves to helping others in quite different ways – Shuichi isn’t necessarily going to be as great at giving advice as Kaito is – but that just means that there’s things that Shuichi can do for people that even Kaito can’t.

There actually is something of a running theme of Shuichi doing this kind of thing in some of his other scenes in this AU! The types of cases he took on at his uncle’s office were often about finding lost pets or missing people, so he’s really good at tracking things down, which can come in very handy when others have more practical problems than the kind Kaito helps people with. Just like in canon, Kaito is good at helping people with his words, while Shuichi is good at helping people with his actions.

This also comes up a little in another one of Shuichi’s friendly events, with Kyoko. Because, yes, she’s here too, meaning there’s just awkwardly two different Ultimate Detectives in the same school year somehow.

Shuichi:  “An apprentice like me doesn’t deserve to share the title of Ultimate Detective with you…”

Which, predictably, makes Shuichi feel rather inferior when comparing himself to Kyoko and her accomplishments.

Kyoko:  “Others accept that you are a detective, and have also come to rely on you, too. The other day, I saw you running all over the place with Ryoma and Peko… No doubt because they needed your insights as a detective, right?”

Shuichi:  “Ah, I was just looking for a missing cat around the academy… I’ve handled plenty of missing pet cases before, so I was able to help, but…”

This is indeed a thing that happened – there’s a scene between Ryoma and Peko (the former of whom is a big cat person and the latter of whom loves fluffy animals in general) in which they discuss a lost cat they’ve seen around school and ultimately decide to get Shuichi’s help to track it down and find its owner. That scene doesn’t actually get as far as featuring Shuichi in it, but this scene here with Kyoko confirms that he did indeed manage to help solve that “case”! It’s neat how there’s various events that are referred to in multiple scenes, to help things really feel like a cohesive story.

Kyoko:  “Do you think it’s meaningless for people to rely on you?”

Shuichi:  “…No, that’s wrong. It makes me… so happy to be helpful.”

Kyoko:  “Then I see no reason for you to compare yourself to me. Every detective is shaped by their motives, methodologies, and case histories.”

Kyoko has such a good point! She and Shuichi are very, very different types of detective and shouldn’t really be compared to each other. Kyoko is a homicide detective and takes a very objective, impersonal approach to things, whereas Shuichi handles more domestic cases that are about solving people’s problems and generally has more of a focus on helping people in the process. It’s possible that Kyoko brings up people relying on Shuichi because she actually kind of looks up to him for that, since that’s very much not something that her own type of detective work makes her suited for.

This idea gets explored a little more in another scene Shuichi has with Kyoko, as one of his seasonal events for the final year. (I’ll mostly be trying to do the seasonal events in chronological order as we go along, but there’s some final-year events, such as this one, that exist as kind of a follow-up to an earlier friendly event between two characters. So I’ll be doing those in conjunction with the relevant friendly event, even if it means we have to temporarily skip ahead to the end of the three years now and then.)

Shuichi bumps into Kyoko about to leave for some urgent business in such a hurry that she won’t even have time to tell her classmates she’s going to miss the closing ceremony, so Shuichi offers to let Makoto know for her.

Kyoko:  “If that’s the case… I’m sorry, but would you mind doing it?”

Shuichi:  “Ah, don’t worry about it! It’s alright to depend on others when you need to. I’ll give you advice someone gave me. Don’t try to do everything by yourself. Sometimes, asking for help is exactly what you need. Even if it’s something small.”

The way Kyoko apologises before asking Shuichi for something this small does suggest that she’s very much not used to relying on others at all. Kyoko is of course naturally very capable and independent and doesn’t often need help in the first place, but she can also be reluctant to rely on others even when it would benefit her to do so. Good thing Shuichi can help her a little with that, in part thanks to all of the advice Kaito’s given him!

Shuichi:  “Ah, but… I might be getting a little *too* much help from everyone…”

Kyoko is a detective who maybe doesn’t rely on others enough, while Shuichi is a detective who relies on others maybe a little too much. It’s a neat contrast.

Kyoko:  “I never meant to hold it in… That was never my intention. When you involve yourself in someone else’s business, you can easily misjudge them.”

Shuichi:  “I’m sure you’re right. There are certainly situations like that. But aren’t there times that make you think… you want to really trust someone? Even if you might get hurt?”

Kyoko at least tells herself that she tries to refrain from personal ties and relying on others in order to remain detached and impartial for her detective work. That is perhaps more important for a homicide detective than it would be for a domestic detective like Shuichi. Then again, in canon, Shuichi had to solve a bunch of murders, and he managed to do that despite also having an emotional side that willingly formed bonds and wanted to believe in people. You don’t have to throw away Kyoko Kirigiri in order to be the Ultimate Detective, Kyoko!

Also, Shuichi’s words about wanting to trust someone even if you might get hurt are definitely paraphrasing Kaito’s principles on that topic here and I love it. He’s had much less of an issue with that notion in this AU when there haven’t been any murders, but maybe instead it was the beginnings of their friendship with Maki that prompted Shuichi to ask Kaito how he could believe in people so easily.

Maki Roll (featuring Chihiro)

…And than brings us rather conveniently onto the next friendly event I wanted to cover, because of course Kaito also has a scene with Maki.

Maki is also already Kaito’s sidekick in this scene, but unlike with Shuichi, we can’t just assume this went basically how it did in canon. See, Kaito (and implicitly also Shuichi, though he’s not in this scene) knows about Maki’s talent, but nobody else does. Which is in fact a huge difference from canon that warrants some lengthy speculation about how Maki even ended up as Kaito’s sidekick in this universe at all.

In canon, it only happened because Kokichi found out Maki’s talent and told everyone. Kaito started properly reaching out to her and trying to make her his sidekick after that, and since she had nothing to lose because the worst had already happened and her secret was already out, she didn’t put up that much resistance. Kaito’s continued belief in her despite knowing her true talent let Maki realise that people knowing wasn’t the absolute end of the world like she’d been terrified it would be.

Here, though, without a class-wide bombshell revealing Maki’s identity, it’s very remarkable that Kaito even knows at all. Throughout chapter 2, Maki was so terrified of anyone finding out her secret, because she was absolutely convinced that it’d make everyone hate and fear and try to kill her and she’d end up forced to kill them in self-defence, which she did not remotely want to do. That fear might not be quite as intense outside of a killing game, nor without a whole room full of proof of her talent readily available for anyone to wander into, but it’d still be there. She’d still be reluctant to get close to anyone even under the guise of being the Ultimate Child Caregiver, not only out of a belief that she doesn’t deserve to have friends, but also out of a fear that letting someone get too close will increase the risk of them finding out her secret somehow even if she’s trying to hide it.

So obviously Kaito’s persistence and stubbornness would still have been a huge and necessary factor here. Although he didn’t know Maki’s talent and therefore just how weak she was and how badly she needed it, he must have seen her as a potential sidekick anyway. She was still cutting herself off from the rest of the class for reasons that Kaito’s instincts could tell weren’t malicious, meaning he probably figured that she was running away from something and needed help. So he’d have kept trying to talk to her and include her in things and invite her to train with him and Shuichi and generally be his incredibly stubborn self at her.

But… because Maki’s secret wasn’t already out, it must have taken way more stubbornness from Kaito here than it did in canon to finally get through to her. She’d have realised that he’s trying to figure out why she’s so closed off and get her to open up, but she would be utterly convinced that telling him the truth would only make him fear her and give up on her, and probably also warn everyone else about her talent and ruin everything.

There’s two possibilities I can think of for how Maki eventually gave in and opened up. One is that Kaito and Shuichi managed to figure it out themselves after enough attempts to talk to her, through a combination of Shuichi’s detective skills and Kaito’s intuition for people. Then they gently confronted her about it, with a very clear message of “we know this is why you’re scared, but it’s okay, we trust you, and you can trust us not to tell anyone, we only want to help you”. I’m not totally sold on this idea, though, because it would still leave Maki with the fear that she couldn’t actually trust them, not after they figured out her worst secret without her consent. (Also, hello Shuichi’s issues about accidentally figuring out truths that the subject of them hates having exposed.)

The more likely possibility, then, is that Maki did eventually tell Kaito herself, not out of openly trusting him and being comfortable with him knowing (because she would never believe that anyone could be okay with her being a killer until she’s already seen it happen), but more out of just trying to get him to finally leave her alone already. Surely knowing that she’s a killer will make even a stubborn idiot like him give up on her and realise she’s not worth getting close to, right? But that’s still remarkable, because people finding out her talent is still the worst and most terrifying scenario imaginable to Maki. So while she’d be telling herself on the surface that this is just to get rid of him, she would still have had to genuinely trust somewhere deep down that Kaito would at least respect her secret and not tell anyone else, even if he’d also totally never want to speak to her again.

I’m pretty sure that’s roughly how this must have gone down, and that’s really incredible. Maki would have had no obvious, undeniable way to realise she could trust Kaito, not like she had in canon from the simple fact that he continued to believe in her despite knowing that she’s an assassin. Imagine the absolute persistent supportiveness Kaito would have needed to display in order for Maki to start to instinctively feel that way anyway. And consider how huge it is for Maki that she did end up coming to trust Kaito enough, even if she wasn’t admitting it to herself, that she was able to briefly lift her otherwise-unbreakable barrier of no-one must ever know, if only in what she was telling herself was an attempt to push him away. Kaito is so good, and Maki absolutely needed someone as stubbornly, recklessly kind as him to begin to get through to her.

Kaito:  “Hey, Maki Roll! You better remember our promise for tonight!”

Maki:  “Are you talking about training? You made that promise, not me. And stop calling me Maki Roll.”

These opening lines put this scene very early on in Maki’s sidekickhood. Kaito has started calling her Maki Roll, which it only took him a few days to do in canon after she’d become his sidekick (and after he knew she was an assassin and therefore that giving her the most un-assassin-like nickname would be a good way to help her). But Maki has not yet given up telling him not to, which also only took a few days.

Plus, Maki is still acting like the only reason she’s going to training is because Kaito is nagging her to and is not yet openly accepting that she’s choosing to go for her own sake. In fact, the way they talk about the promise like it’s not already a regular arrangement suggests that tonight may be the first time Maki will ever come to training, or at most the second, if it happened for the first time last night and Kaito told her to come again tomorrow.

That moment in which Maki finally gave in and told Kaito about her talent must have been no more than a few days ago, then. Kaito would of course have responded by reassuring her that he still believes in her, and that rather than pushing him away, she should be accepting his help in growing stronger, for which she should obviously start coming to training with him and Shuichi.

Kaito:  “Alright, you remember! I’ll see you there!”

Despite Maki acting like she’s only doing this because he’s nagging her, and not even explicitly promising she’ll be there, of course Kaito knows that she will definitely be there. He called it a promise in the first place because he knows that she has already made the choice to try and get stronger. And he can tell that she must already trust him on some level to have even told him her secret in the first place.

Maki:  “…Is that why you came to talk to me?”

Kaito:  “Nah, I’ve got a message from Kaede. She wants to talk about the promise you made with her. I dunno what kind of promise it is, but… since when were you guys so close?”

Maki:  “We’re not close, and I wouldn’t call my arrangement with Kaede a promise, either. She offered to play piano for the kids at my orphanage. That’s all.”

This is actually a promise Kaede makes if you do Maki’s FTEs with Kaede in the main game! It’s lovely that they also put it into this AU and made it an actual thing that happens, because man was that never going to actually be able to happen in canon for multiple reasons.

Maki is probably right to say that she and Kaede aren’t that close. If she’s this early on in being Kaito’s sidekick, she definitely hasn’t really started to open up much with other people either. But it seems that despite that, Kaede has tried approaching Maki anyway and had similar conversations with her as she has in her canon FTEs, because Kaede is lovely and always trying to make friends even with more guarded people like Maki.

Maki:  “But… I left that orphanage years ago. Kaede thinks I was the Ultimate Child Caregiver at that orphanage before I came here, but…”

This is of course the assumption Kaede was running under in her FTEs with Maki when she offered to play piano for the kids then. (Not that Kaede hypothetically learning Maki’s real identity would change anything, once she learned Maki’s reasons for it – if anything, it’d only make Kaede even more determined to do something nice for Maki and those kids. Kaede is just as good as Kaito is.)

Kaito:  “Hey, there’s no reason you can’t go to the orphanage, right, Maki Roll? So just take Kaede there with you. For the kids living peacefully there you worked so hard for… Let them hear Kaede’s music.”

It’s lovely what Kaito’s doing here. Maki is telling herself that she barely deserves to be going back near that happy life at the orphanage any more now that she’s a horrible murderer, but Kaito’s trying to reassure her that hey, none of that means she can’t at least visit and do something nice for the kids she cares about so much!

…And, okay, so apparently we’re also at a point after Maki has opened up about exactly why she became an assassin, which took several days longer than her initial decision to try and change (and happened after she’d given up protesting the Maki Roll). It’s a little surprising that she reached that point so quickly, because subconsciously trusting Kaito not to betray her talent to everyone is a lot different from actually telling him why she’s an assassin and more or less admitting that she never wanted it. So… I am starting to get the sense that the writers here maaaay not have fully thought through what they were implying with this scene’s opening lines, because those definitely gave the sense that Maki had barely started training if she was reluctant to even admit she was coming.

Unless maybe things happened in a different order in this universe, such that Maki had already begrudgingly told Kaito a few stories about her orphanage during his persistent pestering for her to open up (just like she does with Kaede’s attempts to reach out to her). Which might mean that when she finally threw up her hands and told him she’s a goddamn assassin so leave her alone, it wouldn’t be as much of a leap for her to then admit, with some more questioning from Kaito, that the orphanage stories were still true and are actually quite related to her being an assassin. Maybe.

Kaito:  “Oh! I just had a great idea too! How about me and Shuichi tag along? Yeah! Let’s do it! If Shuichi’s with us, I bet Kaede will get all psyched up!”

Aww, Kaito. It is making me very happy imagining this gathering of these four being friends at Maki’s orphanage and making the kids smile. (I bet Kaito is also very good with kids. Especially if they’re aware he’s the Ultimate Astronaut, letting him jump right into his inspiring hero role and tell them all sorts of exciting things about SPACE.)

…Kaito’s comment about how Shuichi’s presence will psyche Kaede up does imply that he might have figured those two have a bit of an unspoken romantic thing for each other. But even if that’s the case, I like to imagine that Kaito wouldn’t make any overt moves to act on this and try and set them up together without one of them directly asking him for help. After all, Kaito’s only working on a hunch here, and if his hunch happens to be wrong, then trying to push his friends into a romance they don’t actually want would be a dick move. (More on a similar concept regarding Kaito’s hunches in another scene next post.)

Maki:  “You want to tag along… and bring Shuichi?”

Kaito:  “Yeah! If there are any problems, Shuichi and I will help out!”

This is the real reason Kaito invited himself and Shuichi along, though. He can sense that Maki is uneasy doing something that comes so close to her personal life and the truth about herself when she’s including someone who doesn’t know her secret. As such, Kaito’s offering to go along with Shuichi to be there for her and help her feel safer. Since it doesn’t make much sense for there to be logistical problems with Kaede playing the piano to the kids, Kaito is really talking about the possibility of there being problems with Maki’s talent remaining secret. He’s saying that he and Shuichi will be there to cover for her, and, if worst comes to worst and her talent ends up coming out anyway, talk Kaede through the revelation and assure her that Maki still deserves to be treated like a person. (Kaede would definitely understand, of course, but she’d need some explanations, and Maki might not be comfortable giving those on her own.)

Kaito:  “Do you not want Kaede and the others to find out about your real talent? But… I know you don’t wanna distance yourself from them like when you first got here, yeah?”

Maki:  “…Don’t make assumptions about me.”

He’s right, though, isn’t he, Maki? However, she’s still not quite willing to admit that yet herself, so this is still quite early days, one way or another.

Maki:  “But… I guess I’ll give the orphanage a call.”

Kaito:  “Alright! Then it’s decided!”

Maki’s going to do it! I really, really get the sense that without Kaito’s reassurance, she wouldn’t have actually acted upon this and would have left Kaede hanging. Kaede might well have been trying to prod Maki about it herself and getting only vague uncertainty since Maki wasn’t truly comfortable doing it. That could be why Kaede asked Kaito to talk to her about it, having noticed that he seems to be closer to Maki than she is.

Maki does have a friendly event with Kaede, too, but it turns out to be more about Chihiro, who’s also in the scene. Maki and Kaede happen across Chihiro crying, and he explains that he found an injured bird that died before he could take it to Gundham to maybe save it.

Maki points out that that’s not Chihiro’s fault and Gundham might not have been able to save it anyway.

Chihiro:  “You’re… right… But when I thought about how it probably wanted to fly more, I just started crying…”

Chihiro is projecting his weakness issues onto this poor little injured bird that probably wished it was stronger, but then it didn’t manage to get any stronger and died because it was too weak! Aww, Chihiro.

Maki:  “I don’t think you should be crying over that, though… But… I do think it’s fortunate it had someone to cry for it.”

Maki looks distant during that second part, because apparently she’s also somewhat projecting her issues onto this bird. She’s acknowledging that it’s sad when someone suffers alone without anyone knowing and being able to care about it. In a very, very indirect way, she’s saying that her past suffering matters, and that she deserves to have others know and feel sorry for her about what she’s been through. That’s a big deal coming from Maki!  (And I’m sure others do know about her suffering; if she’s admitting this, then she’s probably already told Kaito and Shuichi about some of the more awful parts of her assassin training by now.)

Chihiro wants to bury the bird, so both Kaede and Maki suggest they should take it to Gundham, who’d know about how best to do this sort of thing. Maki offers to come along, which Chihiro seems surprised about.

Kaede:  “You know, Chihiro… Maki may seem edgy on the outside, but she’s actually very sincere.”

Maki:  [pouting] “…You don’t need to come with us, Kaede.”

Kaede:  “Why!? I only said the truth!”

Maki is a good caregiver! And also embarrassed at Kaede earnestly telling near-strangers how caring she is. Kaede is good and I hope she and Maki continue to be friends; she’d be able to help Maki out a lot too, even without necessarily having to know her secret.

Maki:  “I can’t just leave a crybaby like you alone. That would leave a bad taste in my mouth…”

Maki mentioned during her FTEs that her best friend from the orphanage (who is no longer alive) was something of a crybaby who tried her best to be strong. Is Chihiro reminding Maki of her friend here? Because that’s adorable.

There’s a little more Maki and Chihiro in one of Maki’s third year winter events, not precisely as a follow-up to this but I might as well cover it here anyway. Maki happens across Chihiro in the dining hall, and after some conversation about Chihiro not having the strength to open a jar (but wanting to keep trying rather than having Maki do it for him), Chihiro comments that Maki must be like a reliable big sister to the kids she looks after.

Maki:  “I don’t think… I’m that reliable.”

Chihiro:  “Huh, why?”

Maki:  “I’m not good at taking care of people and I keep secrets. You can’t rely on someone like that.”

Makiiii, you are very good at taking care of people. And you only keep your secret to protect both yourself and other people, not out of any kind of malice or intent to deceive, so that doesn’t inherently make you unreliable. I guess in this universe Kaito never got the chance to give his speech about how having secrets is just human and doesn’t necessarily make someone a bad person.

Chihiro:  “You keep secrets?”

Maki:  “Nothing. Forget it.”

Chihiro:  “Um… Uhhh… Keeping secrets might be bad… But I don’t think it’s strange… Even I… have secrets.”

Turns out this is something Maki and Chihiro have in common! Chihiro isn’t keeping his secret for a malicious reason either, nor does it make him any less worth relying on because of it!

Chihiro:  “Maki… is there anyone you talked to about your secret? Or have you not told anyone?”

Maki:  “Well… I have told someone.”

The fact that Maki says that she told Kaito and Shuichi her secret makes it all the more likely that the reason they found out really is because she slowly grew to trust them enough to tell them. I don’t think she’d word it that way if they’d been the ones to figure it out first.

Chihiro:  “Okay, then you’re fine. It’s a bit of a relief to have someone to talk to.”

Maki:  “That’s true… I actually do feel a bit relieved.”

Chihiro is saying this because, in this AU, he’s entrusted Mondo with his secret and Mondo has been training him to get stronger, a lot like Kaito has with Maki! This is a big thing they have in common, and it’s lovely to have that brought up here and see them both agreeing that it’s nice not to have to bear their secret alone.

Honestly, if Chihiro had happened to be in Kaito’s class instead, he’d probably have admired Kaito’s strength and gone to him instead with his secret to ask for help getting stronger, and damn right Kaito would have immediately taken him on as a sidekick and it would have been adorable. But instead, Chihiro has Mondo, which in some ways is essentially the same thing and in some ways is rather different, as we’ll get into later in this post.

Year 1 seasonal events

The first year’s seasonal event is the summer sports festival. There aren’t too many here I want to cover, but I might as well group them together for it anyway.

Show ‘em what you got in the three-legged race! Maybe you should talk to someone before the race. But who?

-      My sidekick, of course!

One fun thing about the way the game does these seasonal events is that the narration and the choices are written in the POV of the character you’re playing as. Kaito is so into this and so eager to talk to his sidekick – obviously he wouldn’t pick anyone else! (He did keep saying back in Salmon Team that the sidekick totally wouldn’t pick anyone besides the hero – and that at least is something that goes both ways!)

Kaito:  “Alright, bro! It’s finally time to show off the results of all our training! Don’t hesitate! There’s no way we can lose after training through blood, sweat and tears!”

Shuichi:  “Blood, sweat and tears sounds like a little too much… But it’s true that this training will give us an edge in the festival. I feel like we can win!”

Of course their training will help! Not just in the sense that it’s made Shuichi physically fitter, but also just because it means Kaito and Shuichi are so very in-sync with each other. The three-legged race is an event that relies less on physical prowess and more just on extremely good teamwork, so it’s perfect for Kaito in general, and especially for him and Shuichi since they’re such close friends. I bet Kaito signed them both up the moment he heard there was going to be a three-legged race, probably before even asking if Shuichi was up for it (because he already knew he would be).

Kaito:  “I’ve already decided I’m gonna win at everything today. So as my sidekick, you better support me!”

Kaito is still pretending like the sidekick thing is even remotely about Shuichi making him look good when really it’s literally the opposite of that. Though I suppose events like this give him an excuse to actually make things seem this way for once, so that he can set a super-awesome example for his sidekick to strive for.

Despite acting like he definitely wouldn’t have chosen to talk to anyone but Shuichi, Kaito can also talk to his opponents, one of whom happens to be Fuyuhiko. (Another event implies that Fuyuhiko’s partner in this race is Kazuichi, which means we were so close to seeing Kaito and Kazuichi interact! They do not have a single interaction in this mode and I feel incredibly robbed.)

Kaito:  “Oh hey, Fuyuhiko. Never thought I’d be going up against you!”

Kaito starts with this, so it seems he’s aware of what Fuyuhiko’s like and knows that it appears to be unlike him to be at events like this. (This is, after all, a Fuyuhiko before his canon character development in which he warmed up to everyone.)

Fuyuhiko:  “What, am I not allowed to be here or something? Did you think I’d just ditch school events?”

Kaito:  “Nah, man! I’m glad you’re here! I always thought you were the type that’d show up to this stuff!”

Fuyuhiko:  “Geez… don’t act like you’ve got me figured out. I never wanted to do any of this lame shit.”

But Kaito does have Fuyuhiko figured out, doesn’t he! Despite what he said at first, which was based on how Fuyuhiko appears on the surface, Kaito can also see past that and tell that really Fuyuhiko does want to join in with this kind of thing with his schoolmates and is just very prickly about it. And by being so forward with the “Yeah, of course you’d do this!”, he’s also trying to get Fuyuhiko to realise that it’s really not so embarrassing to want this and he should be more open with it. Kaito is so good.

Kaito’s other opponents, and last options to talk to for this event, are Hiro and Hifumi. There’s nothing of substance in that conversation other than pointing out how hilariously ill-equipped they are for a three-legged race. And since Fuyuhiko and Kazuichi are not super in-sync with each other and liable to bicker, Kaito and Shuichi definitely destroyed the competition and showed everyone what an awesome team they are.

Kaito appears in a few other people’s sports festival events, but none of them are that noteworthy. He suggests Gonta should play more aggressively at basketball, protests that his face is not dumb-looking when Mahiru decides to take photos of the three-legged race, and encourages Peko to be enthusiastic in cheering on her friends.

Kaito:  “Shout whatever you think will help. That’ll become their strength out there!”

Words becoming other people’s strength is so very luminary of him and it’s lovely to see him passing that idea onto others.

Maki has a brief noteworthy bit during the sports festival, in an event you get as Kyoko, who is one of Maki’s opponents in the girls’ three-legged race.

Maki:  “Even though sports festivals are a pain… I don’t intend to hold back. There’s someone in my class who would nag me if I don’t do my best.”

Guess who she’s talking about! Sports festivals may be just for bragging rights and not really Maki’s thing, but Kaito has managed to instil her with at least a little of his philosophy that anything and everything is worth getting passionate about and giving your all.

The sports festival happens in June, while Japanese school years start in April. Which means that, man, Kaito really got to work fast on his prolonged stubborn pestering to get through to Maki if he’s already done so in the space of only a few months. …Or, since she only says “someone in my class” and not “a friend”, maybe this is before Maki has actually told him her secret (though she’d still be reluctant to admit he’s her friend for a little while after that). But even if she’s not his sidekick yet, clearly he’s still been pestering her plenty about doing her best and getting involved in things, because of course he has.

Meanwhile, Shuichi’s events for the sports festival involve him tracking down and apprehending Monokuma, who was causing chaos for the hell of it (yes, Monokuma is here in this non-despair AU as a separate autonomous character, somehow, just go with it). Shuichi’s using his detective skills to help people, just like Kaito was encouraging him to!

Mondo (featuring heroes and sidekicks)

Another of Kaito’s friendly events, and one which is followed up on with a third year seasonal event, is with Mondo. While I am endlessly sad that there are no interactions between Kaito and Kazuichi… perhaps that’s understandable, because Kaito would have full-on sidekicked the hell out of Kazuichi and it would have been a whole thing that this mode wouldn’t have room to do justice. But I do also like Mondo a lot, so maybe Kaito’s interactions with him here are the next best thing.

Mondo:  “…”

Kaito:  “What’s up? Is something bothering you?”

Given Kaito’s intuition, he’s probably right to assume that something’s bothering Mondo here. After all, Mondo definitely has a lot of issues that he hasn’t remotely sorted out yet.

Kaito:  “Alright, then I’ll tell you about the universe! It’ll make your problems look insignificant!”

While this could read as such, Kaito is not saying this in any kind of self-centred sense of “my space stuff is more important than your issues”. Rather, he’s trying to help Mondo realise his problems maybe aren’t quite as big and as scary as he’s making them out to be. “The universe is impossibly vast” isn’t necessarily just something Kaito says to geek out about space. Perhaps it’s also a way he’s found to help put his problems in perspective (you know, when he has them, which is definitely never and why are you asking where his parents are), so he’s trying to do that for Mondo, too.

Mondo:  “You talk about space and shit all the time, but… you ain’t even been there yet, right? And even so, you’ve still got such a confident look on your face.”

Kaito:  “Of course. I’m Kaito Momota, Luminary of the Stars! It’s already been decided that I’m gonna go to space! Right now is just before that happens!”

This is such a straightforwardly Kaito outlook. It doesn’t matter that he hasn’t been to space yet, he’s definitely going to, so he might as well carry himself like somebody who already has! He’s so good at having confidence in himself and what his future holds.

Mondo:  “It pisses me off, but… hearing you say something like that makes it sound possible. Space, huh? To have a dream like that, you gotta have some real balls, man.”

…And maybe that sort of outlook is the kind of thing that could help Mondo. Kaito presents himself the way he does not just to make himself look good, but more importantly to try and inspire others to have that same incredible confidence in themselves.

Kaito:  “Right!? I knew you’d get me, Mondo! Space is huge! It’s filled with the unknown! It’s a man’s passion to explore it, right!?”

Mondo:  “A man’s passion… Like the wind on ya when you’re riding your motorcycle at top speed? …Is it something like that?”

Kaito:  “That’s right! Just like that! It’s somewhere you’ll never reach if you live normally!”

Look at these manly dorks. Even though exploring space and riding a motorbike are two very different things, I like that Kaito agrees they basically both fall under the same principle – it’s about pushing the limits and doing whatever you’re most passionate about, no matter how out-there it is. Kaito’s concept of “a man’s passion” is somewhat different and more specific than just his general concept of manliness, and in his case, it’s all about that passion for SPACE. Still not inherently gendered, I might add.

(Mondo also has his own general concept of manliness, of course, and his is definitely very gendered, although there’s still a decent overlap with Kaito’s in terms of things like integrity and honour.)

Kaito:  “Hey, what’s your dream, Mondo? I bet yours is filled with fire and passion!”

Mondo:  “Nah, I… ain’t got something like that.”

Mondo does in fact have a dream – he wants to quit his bike gang and become a carpenter when he graduates. But it seems he’s embarrassed to admit that, perhaps because it doesn’t sound “fiery and passionate” enough next to Kaito’s dream of space.

Kaito:  “Really? Are you only looking at the past or something? You can’t move forward in life if you’re looking backwards, y’know?”

Some good advice and definitely something Mondo needs to hear! He is very stuck on the past and what happened to his brother, when he should be looking to the future and trying his best to move on from that.

(Also remember that Kaito lost his parents, and while that presumably wasn’t at all his fault like Daiya’s death kind of was Mondo’s fault, Kaito is still very much using his past pain to push him forwards rather than hold him back.)

Mondo:  “…”

Kaito:  “What? You don’t wanna tell me? Don’t compare your dream to mine, y’know? You’ll get scared by the size of the universe…”

Again, this is not Kaito doing a self-centred “my dream is better than yours”. In fact, it’s the opposite – he’s telling Mondo that he shouldn’t worry about comparing himself to others. Just because most people don’t have dreams as ridiculously huge and over-the-top as Kaito’s dream of space, that doesn’t make their own dream any less important if it’s something they’re equally passionate about! The example Kaito is trying to set as a luminary isn’t about inspiring everyone to literally share his goal of going to space, but rather to just be as passionate about their own goals as Kaito is about his!

Kaito:  “Then chase your dream with confidence! Don’t think your dream is too small or you’ll become small yourself!”

Mondo:  “Like hell I’d do something like that! I’m gonna be the best in the universe at my dream!”

Kaito:  “Heh, that’s what I like to hear!”

Exactly! Being a carpenter may be an ordinary job, but that doesn’t make it small and insignificant, not if it’s what Mondo’s really passionate about! And Kaito succeeded in getting Mondo to feel that way! He’s going to be the best carpenter ever!

Kaito is so good. Mondo has a lot of issues he needs to work out, and while Kaito didn’t really begin to get into any of them, he still managed to encourage Mondo to be more positive about his future. I always say that Kaito presents himself with so much overblown confidence to try and set an example for others to do the same, and here’s an instance of that very tangibly working on someone and helping them out.

As a brief interlude between the two Kaito and Mondo scenes, Mondo can end up serving Shuichi from the yakisoba stand he’s working at for the school festival in a second-year seasonal event.

Mondo:  “Thanks for coming, it’s on me!”

Shuichi:  “Hm? That’s… Are you sure?”

Mondo:  “Hey, don’t worry about it. Any buddy of that spaceman is a buddy of mine.”

Aww, Mondo really does appreciate Kaito’s encouragement! He didn’t need to make a thing of it in front of Shuichi at all – Kaito would never know or care that he hadn’t – but he did anyway. Mondo is a good guy. This kind of suggests that maybe he and Kaito have been hanging out offscreen a bit more than the one scene we saw – evidently not to full-on sidekick levels, but at least a little.

Mondo:  “He’s like a younger brother to me. Seriously, it’s on me, man.”

Shuichi:  “…So that’s what he is to you, huh? You’re both the same age, though.”

Yes, Mondo, that is definitely what he is to you. While he’s happy to show his appreciation for Kaito, Mondo doesn’t want to tarnish his tough-guy image (nobody must know how weak he really is!!!) enough to admit that really Kaito’s the one who’s helped him. Mondo is totally a born big brother figure, it’s definitely not like he was actually the little brother who adored and looked up to his big bro or anything.

Shuichi is right to be sceptical, not only because Kaito and Mondo are the same age, but also because he knows that Kaito is always the supportive figure and is highly unlikely to end up being treated like a younger brother by anyone.

Shuichi ends up insisting that he repays Mondo’s free yakisoba sometime and that he’ll bring Kaito along. The three of them hanging out would be adorable! It’s a shame we don’t get to see it.

Then, in one of Mondo’s third year winter events, he ends up bumping into Kaito on a nighttime walk. Most of the scene is just Kaito being very enthusiastic about space and confident about getting there one day.

Mondo:  “With that kinda confidence, I think you might actually make it up there…”

Kaito:  “Well of course! I’m the Ultimate Astronaut, y’know!? Everyone told me it was impossible… But the impossible is possible, all you gotta do is make it so!”

Ayyyy! Of course this is still a thing in this AU. Plus a very rare instance of Kaito referring to himself as the Ultimate Astronaut rather than the Luminary of the Stars, perhaps only because he’s literally talking about being an astronaut and going to space.

Kaito:  “You can always change your present and your future, as long as you don’t give up!”

Mondo:  “You’re right. I can’t change the past, but I can do something for the future.”

But Kaito also reiterates this advice from before, and it really does seem to have got through to Mondo and helped him move on from his brother’s death. This scene doesn’t add much, but it’s nice to underline what Kaito did for Mondo and show that it really did stick.

Kaito:  “Yeah, that’s the spirit! Do your best, even after you graduate, Mondo!”

Mondo:  “Don’t talk to me like that, I’m not one of your sidekicks…”

Heh, I like how this implies that they’ve had enough conversations for Kaito to have told Mondo plenty about his sidekicks, allowing Mondo to have figured out roughly what he really means by the word. Mondo isn’t exactly one of Kaito’s sidekicks, no, since Kaito hasn’t quite made it his personal business to help Mondo out in every single way he can… but since Kaito has helped Mondo out a little anyway, it’s not too far off from that.

It’s almost a shame we don’t get more insight into these conversations they had about Kaito’s sidekicks, because the sidekick thing is rather similar to what Mondo has been doing with Chihiro in this AU, in that Mondo’s been guiding Chihiro through physical training to help him get stronger. Mondo wouldn’t call it this, but Chihiro is effectively his sidekick in Kaito’s definition of the word!

So, even though scenes featuring only DR1 characters would otherwise not really belong in this V3 commentary, I am going to talk a little about the Mondo and Chihiro scenes here for the purposes of comparing their relationship to the one Kaito has with his sidekicks. When I say that, I mean specifically Kaito’s relationship with his sidekicks in canon, since in this AU he’s genuinely fine, but in canon he was not as strong as he was pretending to be, a lot like Mondo. And by “sidekicks” I of course mean particularly Shuichi, since he’s the one Kaito secretly looked up to and saw as already greater than himself, much like Mondo does with Chihiro. See? Similarities! But there are quite a few differences, too.

Mondo and Chihiro have two scenes together, the first a regular friendly event and the second as one of Mondo’s third year seasonal events. The first scene presumably happens not especially long after Chihiro has begun training, because it features him struggling to do even half the push-ups expected of him, while Mondo reassures him that he’s just got to keep working at it. The second scene has Chihiro remark that the exercise makes him feel refreshed, which Mondo points out is great progress when it used to make him feel sore all the time. Chihiro agrees that maybe he really has got at least a little stronger over the past three years, to the point that he’s starting to feel brave enough to tell everyone the truth about himself before they graduate.

Chihiro:  “Even though I can never be as strong as you, I’ve been doing my best… I feel like… I can tell everyone. And it’s all thanks to you, Mondo.”

Mondo:  “Hey, come on. I didn’t do anything special.”

Look at how Chihiro looks up Mondo as the perfect ideal of strength that he’ll never quite be able to reach and has no idea that Mondo has any kind of weakness. That sure is familiar.

Similarly familiar is the way Mondo feels like he barely did anything to help (because it was really all Chihiro’s own strength and hard work, right?). And yet, simply having Mondo there both as an example to strive for and as a friend so that he wasn’t doing this alone made a huge difference from Chihiro’s point of view. It only takes a nudge, but that nudge is vital! You did help him, Mondo!

Mondo:  “Besides, from the very beginning, you…”

Chihiro:  “Huh?”

Mondo:  “…Nah, nothing.”

Obviously, Mondo was about to say that he feels Chihiro has always been strong – stronger than him – but then backed out of admitting it. This is reminiscent of the part in chapter 3’s first training session in which Kaito almost admitted that Shuichi wasn’t weak like Maki was, but then caught himself and changed the subject. In Kaito’s case, though, I think he was only just starting to realise that he saw Shuichi this way and wouldn’t have known how to properly articulate it even if he’d actually tried to (because wouldn’t that mean that Shuichi was never really his sidekick and didn’t really need him at all? and NOPE nope abort let’s just not even think about that). But here with Mondo, I get the sense that he’s already been very consciously aware the whole time that Chihiro is much stronger than him and is simply unwilling to admit it to anyone but himself.

Both our pairs of training buddies have a delightful thing going on where they each look up to their friend for having a kind of strength that they lack and assume that the other is stronger than them because of it. In Kaito and Shuichi’s case, they’re both types of emotional strength: Shuichi’s ability to focus on finding the truth no matter how much it hurts, and Kaito’s ability to keep being positive and upbeat no matter how bad things get. Ultimately, they’re still basically both as strong as each other, just in different ways. But with Mondo and Chihiro, Mondo’s strength is entirely physical, while Chihiro’s strength is entirely emotional, so they’re not really comparable at all. Which means that when it comes to the more meaningful kind of strength, the emotional kind, Chihiro is just stronger than Mondo.

The problem is that Chihiro doesn’t seem to realise that emotional strength is equally if not more important than physical strength. Yet Mondo clearly does, since he knows Chihiro is stronger than him – so if only he’d tell Chihiro that! That’d have helped Chihiro realise what he really needed to be striving for, and that getting physically stronger, even if it’d help him feel more confident in himself, was not really the main point. (If Chihiro had been Kaito’s sidekick, Kaito would absolutely have made that point clear and let Chihiro know that simply by trying to change he’s already grown stronger than he was before.)

Mondo wouldn’t even have needed to mention his own emotional weakness while hypothetically telling Chihiro that emotional strength is more important, so he shouldn’t have had an inherent reason not to do so. Perhaps the issue could be that Mondo was afraid that talking to Chihiro about emotional strength would lead Chihiro to probe about Mondo’s emotional strength too and realise the truth about him.

It could also just be that Mondo wasn’t at all used to this whole having-a-“sidekick” thing. Therefore he felt that the only way he could really help was by helping Chihiro with the thing he is good at, aka physical strength, and he didn’t feel like he was qualified to talk about emotional strength at all. …Essentially what I’m trying to say here is that maybe Mondo didn’t want to talk through Chihiro’s emotional weaknesses while still refusing to admit to his own because he didn’t want to be a giant hypocrite. That’s very possible. After all, he doesn’t have Kaito’s double-standard of “but I’m the hero so it’s different for me because they need me to be strong already” that caused Kaito to not even realise his hypocrisy.

See, Mondo is hiding his weakness here simply out of weakness, that same kind of cowardice that Kaito pointed out in Maki before he convinced her to face her issues and try and change. Mondo’s just too scared to bring his weakness out into the open and have everyone know that he’s not the tough guy he claims to be and that his brother’s death was his fault.

Kaito also didn’t want to admit to his weakness out of fear of shattering the image others have of him, but that was for other people’s sake and not his own, because he was convinced that he wouldn’t be able to support Shuichi or Maki or the others any more if they knew the truth. Mondo also evidently doesn’t want Chihiro to know that he’s weak, but I feel like that’s more for his own sake, because Chihiro looking up to him so much lets him feel strong and helps him continue to hide from the weakness that he’s too scared to admit to. He seems relatively willing to admit to himself that really Chihiro would be fine without him, so it’s not that Mondo thinks revealing his weakness would cause Chihiro any problems.

Although, there is some level of selflessness in Mondo hiding his weakness – not in terms of Chihiro, but in terms of the members of his gang. They all look up to Mondo as their awesome leader who bested his big bro in a bike race (even if that ended tragically, that was Daiya’s fault for getting reckless because he was about to lose, wasn’t it?). So Mondo’s afraid that if they learn the truth and how weak he really is, the whole gang will fall apart. I’d like to believe that’s not actually the case and that his gang members are good enough bros that they’d understand and be supportive of him and still look up to him anyway even if they knew. But it’s hard to be sure of that without knowing much about what they’re like, so it’s possible that Mondo actually does have a more legitimate reason to be afraid of this than Kaito ever did.

Once Mondo and Chihiro are done training in their winter scene and Chihiro has left, Mondo has one last line to himself…

Mondo:  “I wonder… if I can change too. I don’t know if I’ll ever be as strong as you, Chihiro.”

Just admitting to that desire to change is the first step, Mondo! And with that alone, in some ways, Mondo has immediately got further than Kaito ever did in canon.

Admitting it to Chihiro would be a bigger help, though. After all, even Chihiro himself needed someone else to share his problems with in order to be able to change in the way that Mondo is admiring so much. It’s a shame that Mondo can’t even use that as inspiration to find the courage to do that himself, in order to start working on his weaknesses like he so clearly wants to do. You’d only need to tell one person to begin with, Mondo! And Chihiro would keep looking up to you for your physical strength anyway, because that’s a separate thing that you still undeniably have!

(Which was totally a different thing for Kaito, since Shuichi looked up to him for his emotional strength, so surely Kaito admitting that he’s emotionally weak would have ruined that entirely! It couldn’t possibly be that he’s still emotionally strong in some ways even if he’s weak in others and Shuichi would still have every reason to admire him – if he’s weak at all then that instantly means he’s a failure as a hero, right?)

If only Chihiro had ever learned about Mondo’s weakness one way or another, he would definitely have been able to help. Even if he wouldn’t have exactly known how to, he’s an absolute sweetheart who’d have done his best anyway to try and reassure and encourage Mondo that if even Chihiro can work to get stronger and admit his secret to everyone, surely Mondo can too!

It does seem like Mondo made some decent progress over his time at Hope’s Peak, based on this winter scene with Kaito and another one with Taka in which he openly talks about his plans to quit the gang and become a carpenter (Taka is adorably proud that he wants to put in the effort and contribute to society). That’s a little bit thanks to Kaito, but also a lot thanks to simply having friends like Chihiro and Taka and having had time to reflect on things. But if only he’d been brave enough to confess his weakness and what happened to his brother to at least just Chihiro, they could have talked about it more and Mondo could have made a lot more progress on the real root of his issues. Alas.