#I like living in a world where he's the one BSD character whose actions are actually easy to condemn

[flaresanimedump]

Nowadays in fandom I feel like I have to add an asterisk to every statement. Like: man I hate Fukuchi*!!

*In a normal way! If you like him that's totally cool! I am enjoying his presence in the manga because I happen to like the rest of the characters and a character I disliked was needed to keep me entertained! And be the villain in my fics! I am cool with him existing and people who like him! Liking him is not bad!

Anyway this post exists because I wanted to say Fukuchi's such a tool but then thought to myself his fans won't know I'm too old to viscerally hate characters who aren't also annoying

[masked-buffoon]

Chapter 1: Preying in the dark (Part 1)

Warnings: mentions of murder, murder attempt, mentions of parricide, heavy language

Disclaimers : I do not own any of the BSD characters, only my OC and a few other ones created for the purpose of this story.

Author notes: finally, here is the first part of the first chapter, the very first introduction to my story! If you can’t wait, feel free to read it on AO3 ;)

I was cold, I was hungry, I was tired, and I was purposelessly wandering in the streets of Yokohama, looking for some place to stay. Above me, the pale full moon shone darkly, making the night all the more sinister and the silence incredibly tended. There was a lingering feeling of danger in the air which made me shiver, but I could not pay too much attention to it. Whatever were to occur, there was no place I could run to, no refuge I could seek to hide, nowhere I could go to rest. I was alone, by myself, in thrall to the unknown and unsafe world without even a light to guide my steps. I was lost.

"You don't belong there, you scum. Get out of my house! Filthy garbage!"

The last words I had heard from the man whose blood ran into my vessels still echoed in my ears. They had been the very start of my demise, but also the beginning of my freedom. Although I was starving and exhausted by precariousness, I was free from that cage, from that place where I had spent my entire childhood. I had never known more than the four walls of my bedroom. My fifteen first years had been spent recluse, curled up under the blanket of a bed with a book on the pillow. Would it not have been for literature, I would have been completely oblivious to the world. I would have naively followed that older man, the other day, who had kindly offered to welcome me. I would have stupidly been caught stealing in a supermarket. I would have dumbly sold my body to a brothel in order to survive. Really, I was fortunate to have read this much. At the very least, I was aware of the ways of the world and knew that money ruled it, supreme, powerful, creating selfishness and making parents abandon their child out of greed. I sighed slightly and let myself slump down on the cold concrete ground. I had been walking around with an empty stomach for a week. Maybe was it time for me to give up and make my way to the slums. No one could make a living in the back alleys of Yokohama, unless one sold oneself or got involved in drugs.

Exactly seven days ago, I had been chased from my family. I had had a feeling, lately, that my time would come, that these people would throw me away at any time, and I had not been wrong. In broad daylight, at around ten in the morning, the doors of the mansion had closed forever behind my shaking back, and I had been abandoned like a dog its owners did not want anymore. Like any stray animal, I had first roamed around the house, hoping it was a bad joke, hoping perhaps they would not be as heartless as to ditch their older daughter with no further thoughts. I had prayed that there was still a trace of humanity left in those monsters playing my family, but unfortunately, it was in vain. They had sent the butler, who, because he was the only one to actually care about me, had scared me off with a firearm instead of shooting at me. Treated like a nuisance, I had had no choice but to run away and escape that madness. Why had it come to such extremities? I believed it was related to the fact I had hold a revolver toward the father, aiming at his chest, out of anger. In fact, this action had triggered these events, had unraveled the morbid plans the man had been plotting. What was one supposed to do upon hearing a man delightfully boasting about disinheriting his child and sending her in the streets to her death? It had gone on for ten whole minutes, during which he had explained his wife he simply could not kill me with his own hands because it would attract the police's attention and he did not want his reputation to be ruined. I had wondered if he had thought about ruining his reputation when he had called members of the Port Mafia to sign a contract, a month ago. I had kept listening to his disgusting words. His wife had never been the active one. She could never have stood against her husband, could never have done a thing for me and had only ever been good at wearing pretty kimonos and nodding at the man's gross statement. The younger me had believed she was simply scared and did not dare going against the fat man. The younger me had believed so strongly this mother loved me, and had been deceived. Had she loved me, she would have at least tried to see me in secret. There had been plenty of opportunities to sneak inside the room, to talk to me, to take me in her arms, to kiss me and comfort me, but I had never seen her. Never, ever. These gestures, she only gave to my younger, Ruriko-chan, whose smile had never failed to soothe my painful heart. I was not jealous, simply disappointed in the people who called themselves my family. As the man's loathsome laugh had echoed in the living room, I had calmly walked toward a drawer in the corridor and had grabbed a pocket revolver he had been hiding for years. Stating I had only known my room was, in fact, a false statement, for I had been allowed to come out a year ago, on my fourteenth birthday, when Ruriko-chan had pulled me out forcefully despite the parents' disapproval. How the matter had been solved, I was not sure about it. Maybe had she succeeded in convincing the mother. Since that day, I had explored the corridors of the mansion and had accidentally found the gun. With the weapon in my hand, I had made my way inside the living room, mind and eyes empty, and had mechanically pointed it toward the gruesome pig in front of me. Luckily for the panicking him, my aim had been poor and the bullet had barely missed his empty skull to land into the expensive vase behind him. I had been tempted to shoot another time, but the recoil provoked by my first try had propelled me on the floor and my arms had felt too tired to raise again.

"My vase!" He had yelled "You useless piece of sh*t!! Do you know how much that thing costs?!"

A sudden anger had overwhelmed me and I had leaned onto the nearest couch to stand up, before pointing the barrel toward my own head. I had wanted to know if I was more valuable than a furniture, which I thought was stupid as I recalled the scene. He had only huffed, waving his hand in a much disinterested manner, while his woman had jumped on me to take the weapon away from my hands.

"Yōko, you can't do that...!" She had seized the revolver "You can't do that, my daughter..."

"Don't call me that." I had slapped her hand away "Don't bother with your hypocrite words. I know what you were talking about a moment ago and, surely, I will not do you the pleasure of taking my own life. You disgust me, all of you."

Afterwards, I had locked myself in my room for three days. By the end of that short period of time, I had been abandoned, discarded in the streets. Which had brought me to the current situation.

Why did my parents loathe me so? It could seem out of the world to reject one's own offsprings. Even the most fierce animal would raise its kids. Then, why? The reason was the fact I was an ability user. Although many considered power to be a blessing, mine was a curse, which gnawed at my life, chewed on my health and weakened me by depriving me of sleep. My ability enabled me to read people's mind within a certain range. However, it was impossible for me to control it and thus restrain it, which was why I could constantly hear everyone's thoughts without being able to stop them. Because of that, the father, a businessman with many secrets, called me a freak, and the mother did nothing to arrange the situation, always darting her eyes away and avoiding troubles. How I had survived for fifteen years old with a constant headache and insomnia, which did not help my state, remained a mystery, mostly when the so-called parents, wealthy, so rich they threw money through the window by buying expensive antiques and trinkets, had refused to spend a yen in pain relievers or at least sleeping pills. It was a given that children were to respect their parents, who despite hardships, despite troubles of their own, had raised them. Mine had never even thought about feeding me, and had it not been for the butler, I would have starved, forgotten, aliterate and miserable in my room.

I had often thought, during the previous week, that if only I had successfully killed the man, I could have maybe improved my life. Once the selfish and greedy parasite would have been eliminated, perhaps the mother would have hugged me and cried how much she would have loved to do that sooner. Once the master of the house would have been dead, perhaps I would have been the happiest teenager in Yokohama, despite becoming a murderer. A murderer... It was nonsensical to me that people killing their fellows had to suffer greater punishment than those hurting others for years, just like what I had been through. Had I killed him, I would have been charged a criminal and would have ended up in prison for my entire life, for, underage, I could not receive death sentence. However, had his torture been discovered, he would have experimented a few years in jail before coming out freely as though nothing had never happened. That injustice, the unfair laws people had created, added to the torment my ability created and I found myself more restless than usual. Letting out a sigh, I stood up from the cold concrete I was sitting on and slowly dragged my feet toward the slums. I did not know what I was supposed to do at the moment, nor what I was able to accomplish in my state, but, surely, the shallows would provide a safer shelter than the cruel back alleys of the town.

Next >

[aspoonofsugar]

Hewwo! I read Chapter 83 of Bungou Stray dogs, and I have no words. I'm rather surprised by the identity of the mastermind and I wonder what's going to happen now. So I was wondering, with the reveal of the mastermind, what's your opinion on chapter 83? :)). Thank you and stay safe!

Hello anon!

I am very happy about the reveal! It actually makes the whole arc and especially the last couple of chapters even more enjoyable!

As a matter of fact, even if I liked the latest chapters, it seemed to me as if the arc was becoming a little bit too fragmented. By this I mean that the arc had been mostly driven by the conflict not only with the Decay of Angels, but also with the Hunting Dogs. However, the latest twists seemed to suggest the dogs would have become allies of the ADA. Even if I am not against it per se, I would have liked for it to happen after the conflict between the two organizations had been settled in a meaningful way. In particular, I want the arc to make full use of the Hunting Dogs thematically. I have discussed here some ideas about this group:

In short,  the HD are imperfect humans just like everybody else and they have  found a reason of living in their organization just like the members of  the ADA and of the mafia did.

This is also why they are so easily  manipulated. It is because in order to truly think about “right” and  “wrong” in a constructive way, they should let go of the labels they use  to read the world. However, they can’t because if they did they could  very well lose themselves.

In the end the HD are foils of the detectives just like the mafiosi, but they are so in a different way.

The  mafiosi are who the detectives could become if they were to completely  lose themselves in their most violent and darkest parts, while the HD are who the detectives could become if they were to embrace simplicistic  ideals over people. This is also why this arc has been particularly  hard on Kunikida since among the members of the ADA he is the one who  risks to do so the most.

In short, having the HD simply work with the ADA after all the time they spent after the protagonists and after they have almost killed them would have been a little cheap. To be more specific, it would not have led to any growth in the HD whose  modus operandi (follow the rules and Fukichi’s orders) would not have been challenged at all. Thanks to Fukichi being the mastermind, instead, all the themes introduced since the beginning of the arc are strengthened and all the characters can be challenged.

-Fukuzawa will be forced to face his old friend. What is more, this whole ordeal marks another step in Ranpo’s growth. As a matter of fact, as I have written here, the arc starts with Ranpo disagreeing with Fukuzawa. Facts proved him right. What is more, in chapter 80:

I  think that Ranpo’s behaviour in chapter 80 might tie to what is satetd  above. On one hand, in the past, Fukuzawa used to be the one protecting  and saving Ranpo. On the other hand we have seen Ranpo trying to save  Fukuzawa at all costs in Cannibalism. However, in that arc, Ranpo  ultimaley fails. What is more, his wish to save Fukuzawa in that  situation puts the whole Yokohama in danger adn goes against what Fukuzawa himself wants.

However, in chapter 80 we see Ranpo   successfully saving Fukuzawa and the other ADA’s members. He does so by taking action by himself with the help of a connection he himself made (Poe). At the beginning of the arc, he showed to have a better grasping  of the situation when compared to Fukuzawa and in chapter 80 he manages  to save his father-figure on his own. To me, it seems that Ranpo might  have already reached a point where he does not need Fukusawa’s guidance  anymore. However, he still chooses to depend on him, as seen when he  asks for Fukuzawa’s order as if Ranpo himself doesn’t perfectly know  what is better to do.

Despite all of this, once Ranpo takes Fukuzawa back, he immediately goes back to completely rely on him and on his judgement. If Ranpo had immediately used his analytical skills to deduce who Kamui is, he would have avoided finding himself in the current pinch. However, Ranpo preferred to follow Fukuzawa’s orders and to trust the person Fukuzawa trusted. This dependence led to the current situation.

-The Hunting Dogs will have to face their shortcomings. As I have written in the meta linked above:

The HD are proud because they see themselves as heroes of  justice. They are not stray dogs, but dogs selected and adopted by a  master (aka the governement) and this makes them better than others. At  least, this is probably what they force themselves to believe.

The ironic thing is of course that all of them are portrayed with attributes society would consider problematic.

Teruko  is sadistic and violent, while Jouno enjoys psychologically torturing people. Finally Tachihara is in the HD simply because he wants to find a  place to belong.

All in all, among the four subordinates, Tecchou  is the one who probably genuinely believes in justice, but his idea is  simplicistic and naive as it was explained in point one.

The Hunting Dogs are basically Stray Dogs who are made feel “special” by the government. They work for the government and for Fukichi who is the greatest hero of the world, so they are heroes as well, right? They wil soon have to face that their leader is not only the leader of a bunch of policemen, but also the leader of a terrorist group.

It will be especially interesting to see how Teruko and Tecchou will react. As a matter of fact both have shown to genuinely believe in “justice” even if they are cruel in their pursue of it. That said, there might be a difference between the two of them and the current twist might make it more obvious. As a matter of fact, among the dogs, Teruko is the one who believes in Fukichi the most. She is fond of him and is never shown to dislike anything about him (differently from the others who are annoyed by Fukichi’s behaviours). So I think that it will be especially challenging for her to face the truth. Tecchou is instead the person who, among the dogs, seems to me to embody justice the most, so I wonder how he will react when he discovers he has been helping terrorists all along.

When it comes to Jouno, he is the one who has always fitted the least among the HD to the point that I wonder if he knows about his boss’s real identity or not. Whatever the case his reaction is bound to be interesting.

Finally there is Tachihara who has already started to move past his role as a HD thanks to his experiences in the mafia:

Tachihara being able to break the book’s spell because of his ties with the members of the mafia is symbolic of how he has managed to develop more empathy for criminals because of his relationships with some of them. Tachihara is different from the other HD who do not see criminals as people because he got to personally know and to grow closer to some of them.

-This leads us to the fact that I expect the mafia to get involved pretty soon. After all, Tanizaki and Kenji are still under the mafia’s protection and the mafia is the shadow of the detective agency:

All in all, BSD is a story which deals with the concept of jungian shadow a lot. The abilities of the characters are nothing, but repressed parts of them and the the same can be said of the mafia as a group. This is why Dazai and Atsushi are both escaping from what the mafia represents for them. For Dazai the mafia is proof of his criminal past, while for Atsushi it is a reminder of who he could have become. The strong link between these two organizations is why they are often fighting, but also why they are so strong when they unite. It is because the ADA can’t let its shadow take over (so it can’t let itself be destroyed by the mafia and must criticize their violent methods), but at the same time the agency can’t ignore the mafia or that the people in there are similar to them under many aspects. Because of this, now that an alliance with the HD seems more difficult to realize, I wonder if we will soon see the mafia or not. In particular, it has been a while since we have seen Akutagawa, so I wonder if he will once again team up with Atsushi towards the end of the arc.

Finally, this reveal makes Fukichi himself much more interesting as a character. In a sense, it is as if he embodies the dychotomy explored in this arc between justice and terrorism, laws and anarchy. Apparently, the two enemy organizations represent these two opposite concepts. The HD are justice and enforcers of the law, while the DoA are terrorists who want to destroy all laws and to rewrite the world. However, the reveal shows that the leader of both organizations is the same person. So Fukichi comes to embody both concepts. He embodies “justice”, but also the that feeling that justice is deep down unfair. Hence why it is necessary to act outside of it. In a sense, it is as if Fukichi, as a person, is prisoner between two roles. On one hand there is the legendary general (Fukichi’s persona aka the image he projects of himself and what others see about him). On the other hand there is Kamui (Fukichi’s shadow aka his hidden desires to act outside the law and in an unheroic way). However, the person “Fukichi Ochi” is kind of lost between these two big characters:

Fukuzawa mentions how Fukichi was jealous because he had found his path in life before Fukichi himself. This means that his career as a soldier is not something which gives happiness to Fukichi. He probably feels that he lacks something and his current actions are very likely an attempt to fill this sense of void. At the same time, I would not be surprised if he has targeted the Agency because of the envy he feels for Fukuzawa who has become happy.

In conclusion, the fact that “Kamui” means God reminds me of this:

If the world is chaos and unjust, then I will become the God who fixes it. I wonder if Fukichi’s line of thought is similar to Fyodor’s. If that is the case, then it will become obvious why the symbol of justice has also become a terrorist. It would not just be a contradiction, but a natural evolution of an ideal which twists itself in its pursue of righteousness. After all, when ideals forget about people, they often become rigid ideologies and end up embodying what they were fighting. I wonder if something similar happened with Fukichi as well.

Thank you for the ask!

[parkchuuya]

Foreword: The interpretation better known as unpopular opinion by the blogger seeks to give the reader another point of view but mainly to share the blogger's thoughts. It does not necessarily mean to disregard other opinions from the experts. The blogger is just a casual fan who in many reasons can't put down a pen. It may or may not resonate with your own interpretation. If it doesn't, I apologize. Just scroll down. But if it does, welcome to the club.

Date Written: June 3, 2020

Atsushi and Akutagawa has always been ride or die for Dazai.

Dazai's kids are more rampaging than Odasaku's orphans. They just don't go well together. In fact, they would be willing to kill each other when lazily pushed. But these two no matter how much hatred they have, they could create a blast when they work together, so yes Dazai being a fan of "teamwork makes the dream work". But it was not that these two were made for each other to be a younger version of Double Black. In fact, their representation to their senior is much more than just a Shin Soukouku. They both reminded Dazai of his past and present and possibly future.

Back in his Port Mafia days, it's always been fight or die so Akutagawa had to be strong or stronger in order to live because that's Port Mafia. Imagine having the power to control the underground, you have to be strict and merciless and more authorative. Akutagawa's health is crucial that's why Dazai had to break his bones before anyone could kill him for good. This rather cruel treatment Akutagawa received from his mentor crafted a somewhat goal to him as his motive to fulfill the standards Dazai had set. It became his ultimate goal that later gone wrong and bloomed a feeling of anger and hatred. This became more intense when Dazai had gone MIA, abandoned his mission, and left Port Mafia. It's as if Akutagawa had lost all strands of hopes he was willing to build to get that approval and of course who wouldn't get hurt like that. He's ghosted.

But did he really not care about his eldest son?

I think Dazai purposely left that kind of impression to Akutagawa so he would hate him and continue to get stronger and one day prove to him how he gotten strong; and that he would match his soon-to-be partner in crime, Atsushi my baby. That's why whilst fighting his own demons, Dazai managed to escape before anyone could notice that he's sinking... and he wanted Akutagawa to apply all he has taught him since day 1 and one day, be able to finally realize what it meant to be "strong".

On the other hand, Dazai had to tame the beast and recruit him to become a member of Armed Detective Agency. While Akutagawa is in the dark side, Atsushi with his naive, innocent and pure posture needs to be on the lighter side since opposite attracts. Dazai knows Akutagawa will do everything to surpass his goals so he thought he should be fine in the Port Mafia- secretly hiding his intention of preparing the two as mini double black version for the bloody battle against Fyodor the rat Dostoyevsky. As a detective, Dazai's treatment to Atsushi is soft compared to Akutagawa who sufferred in a lot of killings. By murdering people, Akutagawa had somehow found a reason to live not for himself but also for his sister, Gin. Unlike Akutagawa, Atsushi was more vulnerable, more tender that if he's been told to kill himself, he would arguably, eventually rather do over a period of unfortunate time. So Dazai had to carefully mold him and build barriers to Atsushi's fragile vessel sans giving him the idea of being "privileged".

That does mean different treatment means biased?

I don't think that's the case.

Dazai Osamu and The Dark Era, Chapter 3

In the Dark Era, when Odasaku asked Dazai about his subordinate Akutagawa I was convinced that Dazai already  "approved" Akutagawa's strength because if not, then there's no need for him to passively invite him in Port  Mafia. There's no need to waste time of hard training without special treatment. And the question still lingered at the tip of my tongue waiting to recall of what we known as an excuse or "reason". I think Dazai saw Akutagawa in him. No emotion at all. Just a powerful stray dog running around the alley slums, doing everything to survive. He's filled with anger and revenge and that's what keeps driving him to hold on. Even if it's cruel, even if it's painful. Back to history, Dazai Osamu appreciated Ryunosuke Akutagawa and he looked up to him so bad that it affected him when the latter committed suicide. This drove the aspiring author to follow the footsteps of his idol. In BSD, their roles are reversed. It was Akutagawa who was longing for Dazai's appreciation and Akutagawa seems not a fan of his mentor's suicidal habits.

The rather odd truth I found by their relationship was simply assuming. The retrospect taught me to look again in another point of view. Akutagawa is Dazai's past self, emotions, feelings, even boredom. He reminds him of what was the smell of bloodlust and violence again before he realized it was too late. It seems he "hates" Akutagawa because he still could not forgive himself for what happened though no one was saying it's easy. But after the exasperating fight with The Guild, he pulled off his mentor status and finally after a long period of time, he delivered the words by himself in person, "You've gotten strong", a few words enough for Akutagawa to realized Atsushi was right all along and his view of the world was twisted and wrong. Dazai knows it was the only resolution to pave a way for Akutagawa's character development and it needs to be him as his superior.

I think the miscommunication between these two were  notably shown. It was like:

For Dazai: Action speaks louder than words; but

For Akutagawa: The pen is mightier than the sword.

Akutagawa's jealousy or should I say, envy as we follow the chapters and the episode was enormous that it blinded him from the very path he wanted to take. The paces became blurry and muddy it was like he stepped directly on a quicksand and he forgot what he should do at times of chaos that killing is not always the right solution. This is why Dazai could not reach him in the first season's ending song. He does not know when enough is enough and because they were both a shadow of darkness in the past, there was only one boat eligible for one person and Dazai chose to save no one nor himself. This could also explain at least for me, when Dazai touched Atsushi's head, Akutagawa cried in blood. The blood represents his anger saturated with confusion and betrayal. Why did it have to be Atsushi and not him. But this could also explain that the both of them were submerging and they needed someone whose heart is strong no ability could ever tear, someone whose soul is pure and innocent. Someone who understands both good and evil but proceeded with kindness. He did not choose between them. He simply sought salvation and by faith, he met Atsushi.

Changing the focus to Atsushi, who's been tortured in his childhood, tormented, and broken, he was way unfortunate than the both of them. For the sake of his mental health, Dazai had to guide him into the light even though it means staying with him in the present. He even let himself captured by the Port Mafia to obtain information regarding the 7 billion bounty put on Atsushi's head. If someone asks me, I think he's already melting the brick facade he built for himself and Atsushi was the only one who notices that he's trying to get better. Atsushi is the living proof of Odasaku's last words, to be on the side that saves the poor because his life will at least get better, that is... if you're trying to live. Why did he obey Odasaku aside from the fact that he was his only true friend? Wasn't it because he felt guilty or he's just sentimental? No. It's because... he actually wanted to taste how living actually is. And he did. Now, things are going to change. For him, for Akutagawa and also for Atsushi.

And for Dazai, he caught himself tangled by Atsushi's healing abilities. He reminds Dazai of the beauty of the world without violence. Atsushi's view might find argumentative but at least it's philisophical. Atsushi always find the right words whenever Dazai talks to him. A simple nod, and "yes" brought a slight suprise to him. It's Atsushi's nature that even knowing the good and evil, Atsushi wish to perceive good and kindness. And to this extent, the rotten past Dazai was trying to conceal felt a permission to be forgiven. It took only one touch in the forehead for him to approve of Atsushi and as he tried to get along with him, he is also learning and developing. Atsushi might open doors for Dazai and also for Akutagawa to completely move forward.

After the war shin sokoukou had gone through, Dazai showed us that these two when guide together, is like a perfect harmony that without realizing, compliment each others' strength and value thus also discrediting his contribution, for us to realize that one does not need any appreciation or recognition to realize your own worth.

You are worthy and it's something you should NEVER ask validation from nor apologize for.

That's all for today, I'm beat, notice me Chuuya senpai ;-;

Follow me on my anime amino account where I post all my bsd stuffs ;-;

http://aminoapps.com/p/y0iwdr

[avoresmith]

bungou stray dogs

okay, let me tell you about my current primary fandom which approximately .1% of my followers have any awareness of despite it having a...? okayish? popularity. it’s bigger in japan than here.

So you know Fate/Stay Night and in general the trending fondness for taking the stories of real life dead people, taking half a dozen bullet points from their wikipedia page and then making them in an anime character who has exactly four tiny things in common with the actual person? And then you do that like ad nauseam until everyone is trying to kill each other while the fans all want them fucking?

Okay that’s Bungou Stray Dogs but with (usually) dead literary authors from the last century-ish.

It’s dead author AU super powered detective/mafia fanfic from a lit nerd. 

AV, you say, that sounds amazing, but probably not good.

And you are damn fucking right.

So okay as an example of how this works, here is HP Lovecraft:

He turns into a tentacle monster.

And here is John Steinbeck:

He grows vines out of his body.

And here is F. Scott Fitzgerald:

His super power is being rich.

Simple, right? Take some dead dudes whose work you had to read in highschool, make them a pretty anime boy, give them a stupid power. Flawless.

I started with people my followers are more likely to have heard of but the primary characters are all inspired by Japanese authors, which to me actually made it much more interesting because it allowed me to enjoy them as characters first and foremost, and once I was at my saturation point of having too many shits to give about a manga that really doesn’t have the depth or complexity to hold all of my feelings, then I could go read the works that inspired the characters which... I will talk about on it’s own later but uh. I am enjoying it. And slightly resent being enriched by quality media when that is obviously not what I am about.

AV, you seem to be hinting that BSD isn’t qual--

NO. IT’S BAD.

I maintain a strong policy around here of admitting when we love things that aren’t good, in part because I think it’s a big weight off oen’s shoulders and mostly because I like complaining. For some people, loving bad things is a source of shame and discouragement. But I am like the dog who squeaks the toy enthusiastically and then pulls all the stuffing out.

So, should you read Bungou Stray Dogs?

Yes, absolutely, if for no reason other than so I will be a bit less alone in the world. It’s a fun romp has a lot of interesting character outlines without much substance which of course means fun making it up yourself. Look 95% of you got here via Overwatch let’s not pretend you don’t enjoy media that is basically just action figures sometimes. 

Under the cut I am going to rAMBLE A BIT about whatever I feel like because this is my blog and I don’t have to organized or concise. Spoilers ahead if you care about such things. (It’s not worth caring about, the spoilers are the only reason I tried this canon out at all).

I guess I should start with Dazai Osamu, despite not actually being the main character (and the frequency he appears in the manga tapers off a lot after the first few volumes) he is by faaaar the most popular character. I honestly attribute this to the fact that the work he is (mostly) inspired by, Dazai Osamu’s No Longer Human, is an actually fantastic, super intricate and well crafted character perspective piece. 

At his core he is a pretty recognizable trope: the cute prankster who is secretly really capable and smart and smiles and jokes to hide his dark past. He has a Suicide Shtick which people find (justifiably) Problematic, but the slapstick of it also mostly disappears after the early canon and you’re left with someone who very genuinely struggles to find a reason to live and treats all of his own emotions as Joke thus ensuring that no one takes him seriously and he has no actual friends in canon. Dazai does not get a character arc so much as a gradual character reveal, perhaps one day he will actually get to evolve within the current story but I kind of doubt it. Despite his popularity the canon isn’t very interested in having his current relationships pick at him or help him, and what we mostly see is a reveal of how far he has come from where he used to be, rather than engagement with who he is now to who he has the ability to become.

I do think this works okay, it’s part of the tragedy of such a character; that even when people are 100% aware he is full of shit no one is actually capable of engaging with that in direct enough way to impact him. It’s not say his relationships with the other protagonists are not important, but I think a lot about how much he has gotten himself into a life where he is around good people and doing good things yet is absolutely aloof.

Then again, writing engaging relationships isssn’t one of BSD’s strong points, so maybe his position within the protagonist team isn’t meant to be as melancholy as I take it.

Anyway, he’s garbage and he knows it and goes in the trash and I love him.

(Even if you don’t read BSD, you should read No Longer Human, which is fucking amazing)

Then there is Nakahara Chuuya.

Oh, Chuuya.

Chuuya is the character I am most invested in at the moment which is why I am writing a fanfic about him. However, his function in the manga is basically to be Dazai’s jilted ex, and BOY does he play that role to a T. I’m not going to try to tell you that he is an important character with a lot of nuanced canon cuz uh. He ain’t. But look do you like blackrom? Do you like boys who have an obvious complex history full of feelings and misunderstanding and who are fundamentally both sort of trying to do right by each other but are so goddDAMN bad at communication and understanding each other that eventually just start making petty bickering their primary dialog because it’s all they are consistently good at?

Do you like it when when two people who can’t stand each other still can effortlessly fall back on their old trust based dynamic?

Do you like it when they have like 10 inches in height difference and the short one can stomp the tall one?

Yeah you do everyone loves that shit that’s why it’s the most popular ship in the canon despite Chuuya not actually having anything going on outside of being Dazai’s bitter ex.

Oh he has cool gravity powers there’s that.

This is Kyouka!

She is the only girl who has any narrative importance, but while her introduction is sort of, so bad it sets my teeth on edge (hOW MANY PEOPLE HAS SHE KILLED? 35? YOU DON’T SAY? maybe a feW MORE TIMES FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK) she has a real great character arc and uh. Frankly probably should’ve been the protagonist? I have like, a whole rant to write about how there is no reason she can’t be and how the actual protagonist is functionally irrelevant for most of the manga but anyWAY. As it is I really enjoy her character growth and she has a lot of agency and is great. also cute AF which don’t hurt.

AV I thought you said Kyouka was the only important female cha-- YEAP but here is Yosano anyway. Because you are a good person and deserve to know Yosano exists.

She has a little more canon than Chuuya but without as much advantage of having a compelling relationship with another character. It’s unfortunate because she is gREAT but is sidelined badly. Anyway her power is that she can heal any injury but only if you’re at least halfway dead so she is always happy to help people get a bit closer to death.

Akutagawa is another character who probably should’ve been the protagonist and has a pretty good character arc. He is Dazai’s former student and is a little obsessed with earning Dazai’s attention and approval. (Dazai life is basically being a cat type surrounded by dogs who just want maybe a single pat on the head and instead getting startled and clawing them in the nose anyway--) 

Akutagawa is eXTREMELY EXTRA and very edgy and he’s the best I love him. He has a coat that is a dEMON and he uses it to stab people and CUT SPACE ITSELF!!! he is also smol and frail and coughs into his hands all the time probably because he has TB. But he is ready to fight and only knows one trick and that trick is murder.

His character growth is marked and consistent without sacrificing the character he starts off as, and despite his supposed singleminded fixation on Dazai you actually see him having more actual relationships with people than you do of most of the other characters. (The implication not so much being no one else has real relationships just not a lot of characters get enough focus to see it).

Also when you are in BSD you get to learn fun things like how the real life Dazai was actually a huge fanboy of real life Akutagawa and obsessed over him a little bit, so the relationship in BSD is sort of an inversion of that.

Kunikida is Dazai’s beautiful and tight assed current partner. He is a pURE BOY IDEALIST who keeps his Ideal Life carefully written down in his notebook and is absolutely unforgiving about any attempt to deter him from basically achieving a perfect existence, right down to being exactly on time for work and meticulously keeping a list of The Ideal Romantic Partner so he can rate potential candidates. Dazai, of course, fucks with his schedule as much as possible because that’s what he deserves.

Despite his genuinely pure and good intentions, Kunikida is definitely an aggressive asshole who has no sympathy for criminals and will throw you on the ground if you fuck with his schedule.

Among BSD’s maNy unfortunate no good very bad writerly decisions is that someone allowed Asagiri to indulge in his fetish for male characters with a sherlockian genius. So even tho we can’t get more than one female character who is actually consistently plot relevant we have at last FOUR genius men who are. FOUR!!!11! Four.

That’s not counting spinoff novels and the guy who is implied to be the brains behind the entire plot of the manga.

It makes me very angry.

BUT

This is Edogawa Ranpo and he is, despite all of this, great. He is the mOST GENIUSY GENIUS, as opposed to the OTHER lower key geniuses who can only do things like basically run the mafia at age 16 adn sldia;sdcnlsds--

OKAY BUT RANPO IS GREAT. He is a 26 yo egotistical/incredibly insecure fussy birb who is haunted by how much he notices about the world that no one else does and basically needs to a constant stream of asspats but also he REALLY LOVES, ASSPATS. Somehow he manages to come off as endearing? I guess because while he is a super genius he is genuinely bad at like. basically all mundane life tasks. I don’t know why I love Ranpo but I do, he’s good. 

AV, I notice you haven’t mentioned the protag--

BECAUSE HE’S BAD.

he’s just soooooo boring and takes up soooooooo much space that could go to the rest of the cast

/sighs gently

The protagonist is Atsushi. He actually has a character design I really enjoy and that is about the only positive thing I have to say about him for the first uh. 35? Chapters?

BSD’s greatest suffering as a manga was that it wanted an everyman protagonist to frame all of these more dynamic and interesting characters but due to slating him with all of the Generic Heroic Traits the result is a Typical Heroic Kid who doesn’t... ?? Really have any flaws??? but is also too naive to help anyone with THEIR flaws so?? he sort of neither impacts others nor is impacted himself in any meaningful way outside of doing the Appropriate Hero Things At The Appropriate Hero Time.

I guess you could say he like, learns people? Like him? But while he has no self worth due to being abused all of his life this also doesn’t really impact anything beyond the flavor of the shounen things he shouts while being heroic. 

Hilariously, everything that is wrong with Atsushi as an MC is underscored really well by Kyouka, the more interesting character with an almost identical insecurity and motivation to Atsushi, who has her character arc at a comparative sprint compared to him, despite having far fewer appearances. Almost every scene Kyouka is in, even when they are badly written, shows her dealing with her shitty situation; sometimes this means confronting it and sometimes it means running away from it, but despite being a subtle and quiet character she is constantly aware of her immediate wants and acting in accordance with them. She is impacted by the people around her and is constantly learning and growing, at times defying or disappointing them, at other times living up to expectations. 

Comparatively, Atsushi is around all the time but usually sidelined to witness other people actually seeking what they want, and then you know, at some point he turns into a tiger to defend someone else/prevent someone else from getting what they want. Ostensibly his motivation is that he wants to feel like his life has value, and it starts playing with the fact that he has an abuser whose memory haunts him that he needs to overcome. But ‘character literally always does the right thing, is loved and respected by everyone around him, and what haunts him has no negative effect outside of he says he feels bad sometimes’ issss a hard story to write and sell in a compelling manner. And I can promise you BSD isn’t clever enough to pull it off. He’s just another bland McEveryBoy, here to only have a strong opinion when it comes to doing the right thing, and uniquely gifted with a combination of unstoppable physical power and complete disregard for self that makes for dramatic fight scenes with murderers.

He’s not the worst MC ever? I like his character design, he is cute or funny at times, he’s inoffensive unless you are offended by mediocre trope laden main characters, which I am. But if I have learned anything from arguing with my roommate about media every day for two years, it is that the frequency with which you must endure a particular trope deeply impacts how tired you get of it.  I am exhausted to tears of Generically Heroic Nubile Teen Anime Boys. The fact that Atsushi’s character flaws are ill defined, that his powers always manage to save him, that his purity inexplicably inspires cute girls with no self worth to love him, etc, are all just various bland frostings on a cake I have consumed so many times I don’t even want to look at it again. I do think he’s a pretty lackluster example of the trope, but hell, Chuuya is a pretty lackluster example of the jilted ex partner but I fucking love that cake and will die in it. Generically good boy MC’s? Ehn, not worth the calories.

I will say he improves a lot once he actually starts to have a character arc. I like his dynamic with Akutagawa later in the manga a lot. That’s still the ONLY time I care about him but he does have some good stuff there. Otherwise I just sort of accept dealing with him so that I can enjoy the rest of the canon.

Which you should ALSO do. Please read Bungou Stray Dogs i’m dying and in hell.

[aspoonofsugar]

What do you think of Mori's role in BSD?

Hello anon!

I have talked a little bit of Mori and his ability here.

As far as his role in the story goes I think he embodies two things.

1) The mafia.

2) The past.

1) As far as the first point is concerned I would like to highlight the symbolic role of the mafia in the story.

I have talked a little bit about it in the post I linked above:

At the same time, on a macro level, the story needs a resolution of some type between the Mafia and the Ada since it is obvious that the two organizations are linked because of the past of many characters in the ADA being linked to the mafia somehow. Dazai, Yosano and Fukuzawa all have a past which involves one or more members of the mafia, for example.

And here:

The  mafiosi are who the detectives could become if they were to completely  lose themselves in their most violent and darkest parts, while the HD  are who the detectives could become if they were to embrace simplicistic  ideals over people. This is also why this arc has been particularly  hard on Kunikida since among the members of the ADA he is the one who  risks to do so the most.

In other words the mafia is nothing more than the societal structure which organizes and takes charge of those people society doesn’t care about. The mafia symbolically represents the part of the city nobody wants to aknowledge and everybody fears. In other words, it is some kind of macro-representation of a collective jungian shadow.

The tripartic alliance perfectly illustrates this point:

The alliance is based on the collaboration among three organizations each one associated to a specific time of the day.

The Military Police and the Ability Secret Service are associated with daytime because they represent the accepted authority and law. They are who the citizens look up to and they must adhere to the rules and the laws.

The ADA is associated to the evening because they are an in-between the day and the night. They want to preserve the law and try not to act outside of it, but also see its limits and use loopholes and bend the rules to help people. They can look both at the government and at the criminal world critically, but they have also been shown to work well with both.

Finally, the mafia represents the night i.e. something which is totally not bent by the rules of the day. They are that part of society which was in chaos after the war and over which Mori seized control.

The members of the mafia are basically people society gave up on and who have no interest into being re-integrated in it:

Let’s highlight that Hirotsu has “society” among his dislikes and he is one of the oldest members. In short, he embodies why a person prefers spending their whole life in a criminal organization rather than in the respectable world. It is because of a dislike for it.

As far as Mori is concerned he says so:

He claims to love Yokohama even with its dark side and it seems that he has taken upon himself the difficult mission to organize this side of the city. However, the interesting thing is that, under his leadership, the mafia and the underworld have basically become nothing more than a mirror of society and the same abusive structures and dynamics if not worse have been established. However, this is also why Mori has been so successful.

Mori is loved and accepted by his subordinates specifically because he gave the mafia members the illusion that they can be a society on their own. He gives rules to the criminal world and organizes it, so that it can be more tolerable. After all, it is not by chance that the people most loyal to Mori are those who have experienced a much more chaotic world:

At the same time, these people are also somehow convinced of this:

They have accepted the world of the night as the only world where they can live and prefer this world to have some kind of law, so that they can feel more like people.

However, here lies the contradiction of the mafia and of Mori. All in all, this regulation of the world of the night is also what lets this world survive and favours specific dynamics from which both the governement and the mafia gain something, but which have negative impacts on the individual.

Kyouka’s case is a perfect example of that.

All in all, Kyouka is a victim of both the government and the mafia. On one hand the government chose to use her as a scapegoat to protect itself. On the other hand the mafia weaponized her ability.

She is also an example of how these two realities which should stay separate have actually built a twisted and beneficial relationship. The government can use the mafia as a scapegoat and a place where they can recycle individuals they don’t really want to take care of, while the mafia takes these individuals and turns them into pawns.

To summarize, the mafia represents that part of society which should remain hidden and is accepted as long as it does. Mori is the one who made this possible by transforming the underworld in a society he administers and in this way he makes it tolerated, but also makes sure that the true problem behind these people who have not a place to belong is never addressed nor solved. So, in a sense, Mori is weaponizing a social problem.

2) I have talked about BSD addressing a generational conflict in the meta on the Guild Arc whose link is above.

One of the reasons why the integration between the two organizations and in general among the different sides of Yokohama is so difficutl is not only because of the characters’ personal problems (unwillingness to cooperate, old grudges etc.), but also because the younger characters who have the best chance to change things find themselves in a flawed system they inherited by older characters.

All in all the series explores the theme of having to deal with the consequences of one’s parents’ actions (both negative and positive) and the characters all need to make themselves independent from parental and mentor figures, so that they can become their own people.

As that meta makes clear Mori is one of the representative of the old generation. He has contributed to the current peaceful situation Yokohama is in, but at the same time he has also been exploiting other people’s weaknesses.

Simbolically, it is interesting that his ability is the same, but also almost the opposite of Kyouka’s aka the character I used in the already mentioned meta to explore the theme of facing a parent’s legacy.

Both Mori and Kyouka’s abilities consist in guardian entities who protect their host, but who also exhibit specific personalities.

As it has already been stated Demon Snow represents Kyouka’s parents’ legacy which is ambiguous and with which Kyouka has to reconcile.

Elise is instead a child because symbolically she represents Mori’s tendency to manipulate and exploit the weak. She can also represent Mori’s own emotional side which is underdevolped like a child is.

Demon is initially presented as a dangerous and ruthless monster, but turns out to actually have good intentions and to be willing to help Kyouka, while Elise is introduced as a harmless little girl, but she is later revealed to be a violent ability.

This also fits with how Kyouka and Mori themselves are introduced in the series. Kyouka appears as a cold assassin, while Mori as a friendly doctor. However, these appearences are soon subverted.

However, the most interesting thing when it comes to this foiling is this:

Mori has perfect control over Elise to the point that even her current tantrums happen because Mori wants her personality to resemble Yosano’s, while Kyouka can’t influence the Demon’s behaviour and has just recently gained enough control to use her ability without her cellphone.

This perfectly shows where the two characters are in termsof control over their lives and the things around them. Mori is an adult and one of the most influencial people in the city, whereas Kyouka is a child who has been moving from a horrible place to another until she found someone willing to help her.

All in all, Mori is linked to these two concepts and I am expecting for him to be overcome in the end precisely because he embodies them too much. On one hand I think the conflict between the mafia and the ADA should be settled, but it seems difficult as long as Mori is around because his involvement in traumatic episodes concerning Dazai and Yosano’s pasts makes so that him being around makes so that the conflict is always there even if asleep. On the other hand the younger generation should surpass the previous one and do better and this symbolically overlaps with exponents of the old generation leaving the scene either because they die or because they lose power.

Specifically, I think Mori is bound to play a role in Dazai’s arc because of the two of them being obviously foils, as both Fifteen and the Dark Era show.

Mori is who Dazai could have become if Oda’s death had not made him realize something important:

“He’s a friend”

Dazai is as ruthless and as manipulative as Mori is, but he is not ready to give up a genuine and healthy connection he has made and in this way he both learns and shows that he is able to think outside of an utilitaristic mainframe, while Mori is not able to do so. He probably cares about Dazai to an extent, but he won’t develop this emotional attachment into something healthier.

That said, Dazai’s arc in the manga might very well involve him becoming someone completely different from Mori and so overcoming the influence the man has had on Dazai’s life once and for all and solving his personal conflict with the mafia in a positive way.

As a matter of fact, Dazai’s past with the mafia is brought up pretty often and he has left some important relationships unsolved. The one with Akutagawa is probably the most important, but there are also the ones with Chuuya, Koujo and Q who all knew him and have shown different levels of resentment over him leaving the organization.

At the same time, Dazai is trying to recreate a new version of the soukoku partnership he had with Chuuya and in this way he is stepping into Mori’s shoes as the one continuing the “tradition”.

However, I think that shin soukoku will actually answer Mori’s question:

“Only a diamond can polish a diamond. I wanna see for myself if that is true”.

The problem with Mori’s attempt is that it was purely utilitaristic, while I think that Dazai might be willing to make Akutagawa and Atsushi work together both because he needs them to fight against a strong opponent, but also because he might be trying in this way to fix the damage he has made to Akutagawa. It is still a pretty indirect and manipulative attempt, but at least Dazai is recognizing that there is another level to people other than their strengths and weaknesses. And it is probable that Natsume, by talking about diamonds, was referring to people’s interiority rather than to their abilities. In other words, Mori might have attempted to find an answer to Natsume’s words by onlu combining the ability of two people, while Dazai might find a better and more meaningful one by having his mentees develop psychologically thanks to each other.

These are my thoughts so far!

Thank you for the ask!