#and that inherent conflict between the Moral Argument and the characters themselves is really fascinating to me

[realbeefman]

say what you will about svu and copaganda but the consistently repeated theme that olivia benson was fundamentally born Wrong and the way the violence of her conception radiates out and impacts every single relationship she has. she cannot conceive of an existence that does not render her as an agent of justice rather than a complex person and it infects her interactions with anyone who is able to balance that responsibility. the way law & order manages to successfully recast the police as superhero-esque christ figures is genuinely incredible and like. even the way the show itself oscillates as to what her exact fate is episode to episode. does it get better? worse? can she ever prove herself worthy? is the past ever really past? is this thing she’s been justly burdened with her burden to carry at all? in the eyes of the Law. Our Father who art in heaven. i wash my hands of this.

[oumakokichi]

Thank you for your NDRV3 meta posts! They helped me in understanding the conflict between Harukawa and Ouma throughout the events of Chapter 5. Even though I understand Ouma’s thoughts of her better, I honestly feel sorry for Harukawa. As much as people blame her for what her actions have ended up causing, the remembering light is ultimately the root of the problem in the long term of events. My question is, what do you think would change in Chapter 5 if the remembering light wasn’t involved?

Chapter 5 is extremely interesting precisely because of howevents spiral out of control so much! The Hope’s Peak remember light in Chapter5 is honestly a really brilliant counterattack by the ringleader, preciselybecause it’s fascinating that they decided to utilize so much of the first twoDR games in order to play on the expectations of both the characters and theplayers. It’s a strategy that doesn’t rely on super strategic chess-like movesthe way Ouma does, but entirely on emotion and preconceptions, and it was incredibly effective.

I feel like the remember lights are such a better, morewell-done alternative to dr3 brainwashing. Even if they use the same similarbase technology, the fact that remember lights allow for these questions ofmorality and free will is all I could ask for. Where the brainwashing in dr3was a huge mess which either worked perfectly, without room for any loopholesor escape, or whether it needed a lobotomy in order to work, or whether youcould just be punched out of beingbrainwashed, it still left no room for argument that “no, these people are notdoing this out of their own free will, there’s no choice in the matterwhatsoever.”

But the remember lights are different: the ringleader couldn’tpredict what every character would do after witnessing them, but they couldstill implant certain likely scenarios. By using the remember light in Chapter5 to set all the remaining survivors up as “the remaining hope of the world,”and Ouma as “Junko’s successor as SHSL Despair,” it was a brilliant emotionalploy meant to motivate everyone else into action after Ouma himself had triedto crush their willpower in order to force the game to a halt.

Maki’s actions are extremely interesting precisely because whileshe was undeniably set up by the ringleader and prompted into motion by theremember light, she carried out every single thing she did under the beliefthat it was entirely her own decision, entirely of her own free will—a hugestep, considering she lived her life in her in-game backstory believing herselfto be nothing but a tool to be used by others.

Her mindset and life as an assassin is in fact the reasonshe was the first one to find the remember light in the first place. Whereeveryone else was so depressed that they were literally holed up in their roomswithout eating or showering for days on end, just wanting to die, Maki wasn’tsomeone particularly impacted by the thought of dying all that much. Eventhough the truth of the outside world was certainly horrible, she was alreadyused to so many horrible things in her life that she still went through herusual motions and routine. Everyone else was incapable of functioning even atthe most basic human level, but Maki was still able to go look around thecafeteria and the school at large, and when she found the remember light thatthe ringleader had set up, she was the one who rounded the others up and broughtthem there.

It’s precisely because of her ability to shrug off death aspart of an almost-routine aspect of her life, and her status as someone who hasbeen trained since childhood (in-game anyway) to be ruthless, emotionless, andthe perfect killing machine, that she worked so well as a pawn for theringleader. To Maki, after living a life like that, getting any taste ofsomething she considered to be “a choice of her own free will,” such as herfeelings for Momota, meant that she was very dangerous when let off the railsfor the first time.

She undoubtedly is prompted to action and goes off to tryand torture and kill Ouma because of how she was manipulated by the ringleader.But it’s also true that her own personality and her own choices are exactlywhat led to her being the most suitable pawn for the job. Because she wassomeone with no impulse control (or rather, Momota becomes about 80% of herimpulse control and then that disappears when he’s held up in the machinerybay), because she was a trained, ruthless assassin, and because she could andwould try to kill those in her way if she thought it would benefit thesituation, she walked right into the mastermind’s plans.

It’s hard to say what would have happened without theChapter 5 remember light, because while the other characters certainly would’vemaintained more of their rationality, they would likely have been too depressedand lethargic to do much, at least for a while. And while the remember lightitself is what jumpstarted Maki’s willingness to eliminate Ouma completely, shehad already tried to choke him to death on at least two occasions even longbefore thinking he was a Remnant of Despair, even in front of a whole bunch ofwitnesses, and even though doing such would only have contributed to thecontinuation of the killing game.

Her huge lack ofself-control and her reliance on a talent that would itself only enable thekilling game further is precisely why Ouma made the whole group aware of herSHSL Assassin talent at the end of Chapter 2. He tried, very early on, to forcethe group to come to terms with the fact that whether or not they liked Maki asa person, she was clearly a loose cannon who needed to be watched carefully,and she could and would move to murder someone in plain sight with theslightest provocation (as she did when he taunted her about Ryouma’s motive video).

The possible changes in Chapter 5 if the remember light hadn’tbeen involved are therefore hard to predict, because Maki would still have beena considerable threat, and unlike the rest of the group who were all pretty suicidaland ready to just give up and die, she likely would have just kept going out ofhabit until some external force killed her.

The only possibility for some kind of different outcome Icould foresee is perhaps if everyone sort of…came around, with enough time.Considering Momota also saw the truth of the outside world and was deeplyshaken by it, we can surmise that he was probably also pretty heavily depressedfor the first few days that he stayed with Ouma in the machinery bay (though Isuspect his anger probably outweighed his depression, since it’s Momota we’retalking about). Still, it’s true that Momota managed to bounce back to feelingrelatively normal without using any remember lights at all, and that justthinking about getting back to the group and away from Ouma was all themotivation he really needed to feel like he had a sense of purpose.

If Momota had managed to either come up with some kind ofescape plan on his own (since the plan with the crossbow wouldn’t work ifHimiko and the others were holed up in their rooms and not coming to visit him)or even managed to talk to Ouma and been let go normally, since he would’vecooled his head off considerably, it’d be interesting to see a scenario inwhich Momota met up with the rest of the group afterwards.

The fact that they would all see for themselves that he wascompletely unharmed, and would know that he’d talked with Ouma without theconversation ever steering into “hope vs. despair” territory would likely makeit much harder for the ringleader to use that particular Hope’s Peak rememberlight later on. I don’t doubt she might try,as they themselves said they had actually been hoping to save it for later andhadn’t wanted their trump card to be forced so early, but it would certainlycall for some revision in their scenario.

Maki might well call off her vendetta against Ouma too, ifMomota were able to return to the group unharmed—temporarily, anyway. WithMaki, there’s so much about her being a loaded gun just waiting to misfire,which is ultimately exactly what happens in Chapter 5 as we know it. Therewould have to be heavy focus on the fact that she was the most likely to beprompted into reckless action, or else even if it wasn’t right then, she wouldstill have been the most likely to kickstart the game into action later on,too.

Still, this potential for free will even when the ringleaderlater would like to claim that “every single thing was planned according totheir scenario” is exactly what I like about ndrv3. It’s very clear that thecharacters’ choices and free will have a hugeimpact on the outcome of the killing game, and that unlike with dr3’sbrainwashing, the most the remember lights can do is twist and suggest the mostlikely scenarios. But how the characters actually act specifically, and whetherthe remember lights even work on them at all, is extremely subjective.

They can make it more likelyfor a character to do something, but the characters themselves often keepsurprising, and that’s exactly what makes them such an enjoyable, likable cast.Like with much of ndrv3, there’s a lot of moral ambiguity involved when youreally try and evaluate certain characters’ actions. Trying to determine howmuch of their actions were them being put up to something, and how much wastheir own inherent personality and free will, is extremely enjoyable when youknow that they do get a say in the matter, unlike with characters in dr3.

We can only speculate as to what would’ve actually happenedin Chapter 5 if that particular remember light hadn’t been used at the time itwas. But I think considering the ringleader’s willingness to keep adapting tonew scenarios and writing new possibilities for their “fictional entertainment,”things likely would still have reached a boil some way or other. It’s just amatter of how much the characters themselves would’ve fallen into thesepitfalls and traps with more preparation. Anyway, thank you for asking thisquestion—I hope I was able to answer it well!