#but fr fr it’s rly interesting | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

chuuyadelune · 2 years ago

Text

Sigma, The Key To Winning Meursault? Dazai, unpredictability, and the value of choice (BSD 106.5 spoilers)

it’s been a while since i last wrote any sort of analysis on the BSD manga, but this recent chapter gave me so many thoughts which i dumped on a friend (hi yush), so! i decided to flesh them out a bit more. as in the title, i think that sigma is who is going to be the deciding factor as to who wins meursault.

well, okay. maybe not the tipping point (there’s a lot to consider, after all), but he’ll be very instrumental. because not only does it makes sense for his character arc, but also — i think that he serves a very interesting thematic purpose in relation to the ideas dazai’s put forward during the prison arc as a whole.

before anything else, i do wanna say that i agree that this feels like a set-up for sigma’s entrance exam, as several people have suggested. the conditions are perfect: dazai implicitly giving him the choice to help or flee feels like a very fitting dilemma to test the kind of qualities the ADA seeks.

but more than that, i think this concept of “choice” is ultimately what will decide who comes out victorious in meursault. to sum up the main point of this analysis: i think that sigma’s purpose, on a meta level, is to represent two important factors of dazai’s driving philosophies, and two things that separate him from fyodor: the power of unpredictability, and choice.

(chapter 77, official yen press translation)

what’s driving the world... are those in the storm of accidental events who scream... run... and spill blood.

this jailbreak mini-arc is the culmination of everything that they have discussed during their time in meursault: philosophy, world view, strategy, everything. and this conversation from chapter 77 in particular forms a very important part of what makes fyodor and dazai fundamentally different from each other. i would even go so far as to point to it as being the main conflict of the meursault jailbreak.

and sigma, effectively, is caught in the middle of these two. as someone who worked closely with fyodor as a member of the decay, he’s been exposed to a lot of his thinking. it’s evident in the way that he speaks about “ordinary” versus “superhumans”, for example. and in the prison, dazai’s been showing him to methods and ways of thinking other than those of fyodor’s, like showing him that there is no difference between “superhuman” or “ordinary” men.

following this, then, i think we can consider sigma to be at a crossroads of sorts. now that dazai is out of the picture (for now), the decision that he makes — whether to save dazai, flee on his own to save himself, or something else, a return to fyodor’s methods, or if nikolai appears again — will be a very important one in deciding the outcome of meursault. in fact, i’d go so far to say that it’s the ultimate decision of the jailbreak arc.

what i want to focus on here is the mere fact that sigma’s been left this choice at all. because i think it speaks volumes as to what sigma’s role is for the rest of the prison break. and it’s also important for showing dazai’s own way of thinking, and what role chuuya may take. a full explanation under the cut; warning for light storm bringer spoilers too!

Chapter 77: The Potential Of Unpredictability

going back to the chapter 77 conversation, dazai points out that despite all their intellect and cunning, both he and fyodor both wound up in a prison, isolated from everyone else. they, in the most physical sense, are now powerless. sure, they can plan and scheme, but are they the ones making the moves? no. all of this is on the people on the outside, who just act. the true power lies with them; their decisions, rational or not, according to plan or not, are the ones who really move things forward. and where fyodor simply views humans as tools, as boring, below him — dazai knows that this is where true strength lies. if the world were left to the devices of people like fyodor, things just would remain at a standstill. unpredictability, fighting and people thinking up new ways of doing things is how progress is made.

and similarly, meursault thus far has just been a consistent back-and-forth between dazai and fyodor as to who one-ups the other. dazai chooses sigma as an ally; not even moments later, fyodor whips out chuuya as his own card. dazai tries drowning fyodor? fyodor does the exact same to dazai with the elevator (with a bonus of fire, just for fun, you know).

time and time again during this arc, unpredictability — the power of people’s actions beyond scheming — is what has allowed the agency to keep fighting. things like tachihara breaking the confines of the page, choosing to side with the mafia over the hunting dogs; ranpo convincing half of yokohama’s police force to think with their souls and getting them on side with the agency’s innocence; heck, even just ranpo hijacking kamui’s execution plan as a whole and getting the ADA (minus dazai) back together. and i believe it will be a similar case here, in the prison. unpredictability feeds progress. and this is how dazai will prevail.

sigma absolutely has the power to catch fyodor off guard. with the very act of “leaving the rest” to sigma, one of the many who “spills blood”, while dazai himself hurtles downwards in an falling elevator, a scenario is created where the only choice is for sigma to do something. and i’d argue that this is the kind of situation — one where sigma needs to act — is something that dazai’s been aiming for from the start. because he fully understands that this unpredictability is the only way for the stalemate between him and fyodor to be broken. otherwise, things would just remain a consistent back-and-forth as their past exchanges have been. anything dazai does, or thinks up, fyodor counters.

something that’s really interesting to me is how dazai has been gently nudging sigma into a position/mindset to take the role of a more active player from the start of the jailbreak. dazai’s been encouraging sigma to think more for himself (ex. trying to figure out his method of communication from chapter 101, or deducing his rock-paper-scissors trick in 105). and he’s encouraged sigma to look beyond the status of “superhuman” and “ordinary man” that he is so fixated on. all of this is giving a sense of agency back to sigma, who is someone who’s been used all of his (short) life.

(translation via @/buraihatranslations on tumblr)

- but now you understand.

- what?

- it’s all a play of hands. i’m not a superhuman beyond the limits of human wisdom. in this world, there’s no such thing as a superhuman nor an average human.

now, i personally don’t think dazai set up the falling elevator, but rather simply knew it was a possibility, and acted accordingly — if the act of checking the mechanism a couple of chapters ago was anything to go by. this meant that in such a scenario, he had a means of getting at least one of them out. and he deliberately chose to save sigma: both because of the promise he made to get sigma out alive, but also because he knows sigma’s unpredictability has the potential to throw fyodor off. like, i’m fairly sure fyodor wasn't able to predict just how exactly tachihara would break the confines of the page. similarly, sigma has the potential to defy expectations, to see things that fyodor doesn’t. and dazai knows this.

because i mean, you would think, in a jailbreak scenario where you’re playing against your most detested rival with poison (allegedly!) pumping through your veins, the first priority would be to try and save your own ass. because otherwise, what’s the point? especially when your friends on the outside are depending on you to crush the root of the problem (ranpo, in chapter 95, says that dazai is the only one who could defeat fyodor). and i have no doubts that fyodor would have done something along those lines — he’ll likely discard chuuya as soon as he’s done serving his purpose, as he did with previous pawns (i mean, he literally left pushkin to get jumped by both the agency and mafia after the cannibalism arc, LMAO).

this shows a marked difference in fyodor and dazai’s marked attitudes to humanity. fyodor simply sees humans as tools, beings simply manipulated by a ‘god’ (ch.77), and so, nothing really worth... fighting for. but dazai instead sees their value and autonomy. this isn’t the first time that dazai’s put himself in grave danger for the sake of the agency either — he let himself be captured by the mafia for the sake of intel on atsushi’s tiger bounty; in chapter 46 he let himself get shot for the sake of finding out fyodor’s goals. and fyodor doesn’t really understand this. why would he go so far? it doesn’t make sense. and i’d imagine it’d be a similar thing here in the jailbreak. why would dazai sacrifice himself, especially in a life or death scenario when the end-goal is literally to defeat the other person to stay alive?

The Right To Make Choices

dazai’s view of humanity as autonomous beings with the right to make their own decisions is arguably the biggest advantage he has over fyodor. fyodor’s unwillingness to look past humans as being boring and thus incapable of amounting to much on their own is a massive blind spot. as i discussed above; the unpredictability that comes with ordinary folk making their own decisions is exactly what has enabled the agency to keep going.

and you know, it’s all well and good that dazai’s put sigma in a situation where he has to do something. but i’d argue that it doesn’t mean anything if sigma doesn’t have a say in it. something i really want to emphasise is that sigma doesn’t have to save dazai. ultimately, it is a situation where he has to make a decision, but what that decision is? that’s still very much up to his own discretion. dazai leaving him with a very vague, “i leave the rest to you” isn’t so much a, “hey, please save me,” but it feels more like a — “you’ve got this. whatever you do, you can do it.” this expression isn’t exactly one that’s desperate, after all.

(translation by ranpoedgw on twitter)

i’ll leave the rest to you.

because the thing is, dazai has always valued people choosing their own actions for their own reasons. we saw it with chuuya in storm bringer; atsushi still could have said no to joining the agency, or even no to coming back (after the events of chapter 5/episode 4, when the black lizards attack the ADA office). even in “happy group counselling hour” (chapter 64/season 4 episode 8), the advice he gives to fyodor — acting lazy and letting his subordinates be until they decide to do something — still very much involves choice and agency; in contrast, fyodor’s advice eliminates that entirely. chuuya’s a vampire without autonomy as far as we know. he has no other option but to follow fyodor.

and for sigma as a character, the concept of being given a choice is so important. for most of his life, he feels like he’s had no other option but to follow the wishes of people he’s being used by, because he has nothing else to lose or nowhere else to go. so him being given the ability to choose, wherever possible, is significant.

like, i’m fully aware that fyodor told him not to fight the hunting dogs and he chose not to listen to that advice. but the thing is, i would argue that sigma felt he really didn’t have much choice at all in that situation. he was cornered, about to lose the only place that allowed him to form some sense of identity.

so essentially, this single choice here is the most important decision of the meursault jailbreak, but also for sigma as a whole thus far. which is why i think that it’s so vital that this is all on him. with this, he moves beyond the expectations that fyodor has for him, breaks the stalemate, and proves dazai’s philosophy about human choice right. which, i feel, is a more damning defeat for fyodor on a thematic level. and this is, i think; the role that sigma is meant to play in this jailbreak arc.

Human Connection: Chuuya

so, now i’ve talked about sigma, i also want to talk a bit about chuuya, because autonomy and agency is also quite an important part of his character. and i still do think that he’ll be an important part of the jailbreak. just... perhaps in a slightly different way to what i first assumed it would be, and not as soon as i personally was anticipating.

in the same way that sigma’s role is to represent dazai’s philosophies as i discussed earlier, chuuya, as he is here, in the jailbreak arc, can be considered very much to be exemplifying fyodor’s. where dazai chose sigma; fyodor simply sat and ‘prayed’ (if you can even call it that), before chuuya arrived on the scene. his state as a mindless vampire reflects both fyodor’s view of humans as being manipulated by god, therefore choice is irrelevant, and his method of making sure that the only choice chuuya has is to follow his orders, as outlined in chapter 64. but i’m not convinced that this is all there is to it. it doesn’t make sense, not with his character, not with the rest of the story. and not with dazai around. this puts chuuya in a bit of a unique position.

see, the difference between fyodor and sigma and dazai and chuuya is — well, they did know each other for a similar amount of time, 3 years or so (assuming fyodor was there when sigma came into existence). but where fyodor really just used sigma — dazai and chuuya were equals. partners. and this highlights yet another key difference between dazai and fyodor: human connection.

i said earlier that fyodor’s dismissal of human autonomy was a blind spot for him. and i think that’s definitely very relevant when it comes to chuuya, as well; and also why dazai repeatedly puts himself in danger for the sake of the ADA as i mentioned above. i don’t think fyodor was entirely serious when he called their seven-year bond ‘shallow’, and he was just trying to provoke dazai (basically, get on his nerves). but it still highlights their difference in how they view and connect with others. and i still think that this is a set-up for him to be humbled spectacularly in the future, because irony and all that.

something that i think is an interesting possibility is fyodor specifically choosing chuuya because of his prior connection to dazai. he did steal those port mafia files after the confrontation with ace back in season 3; he also saw them end the dragonhead conflict when SKK were 16. going back to fyodor’s view of humans — i think it’s a possibility that he just simply doesn't understand how someone like him can form deep human connections, and using chuuya is both a way of interrogating that and getting one-up on dazai, with the added bonus of chuuya being an extra-strong ability user, of course. (this provides an interesting path for fyodor’s character development, i think, which is pretty overdue!)

whatever the case is, i think one thing that has defined chuuya’s character from age 15 up until now is a rejection of philosophy. not to say that he doesn’t think. but he’s someone who doesn’t exactly see too much value in motivations or thought processes, like we saw in storm bringer — he just does what he thinks is best, and that’s kind of just how he’s always operated. he dismissed verlaine’s way of thinking; he rejected dazai as well. and in a similar way, he would for sure have taken issue with fyodor as his normal self. and i think this provides an interesting point of comparison between sigma and chuuya.

sigma is someone who doesn’t really have all that much life experience. all he knows is what it’s like to be used; but has just been swept along, accepting that he is just an ‘outsider’. because he doesn’t know anything else. chuuya, on the other hand, is someone who has also been used and exploited; but still, has always made his own choices no matter what other people said. even if it lost him the sheep, he went after his own origins. he swore allegiance to mori at the end of fifteen out of his own volition. he continues to put his life on the line for the sake of the mafia until now.

but this is why i personally think it’s important that sigma’s the first to make a choice to break the stalemate, for the sake of his character development. he needs to build the kind of trust in himself that chuuya has. and i think that it’s equally important that chuuya, whenever he acts, moves independently of both dazai and fyodor. because it speaks to his character’s core values, and links with the wider themes of dazai’s thinking.

i really don’t think, actually, that dazai anticipated chuuya being in the prison. but this is what’ll give chuuya’s actions, whatever he does, more weight. SKK plan or not, i’d argue that dazai still implicitly trusts chuuya to do what is best, and believes in his capacity to make choices as he does with sigma. we saw it in dead apple. and it wouldn’t be any different now. where fyodor sees chuuya as a useful tool because of his gravity manipulation, dazai trusts him as a human. and this trust is what will prevail over fyodor’s shallow reading of human nature. it doesn’t have to be an SKK strategy or plan at all. all that matters is proving that connection. and that’s what i think chuuya is there to show, in a thematic and narrative sense. i think it would be much more satisfying this way.

Conclusion

so, to sum it up: i think that sigma will move first and breaks the stalemate, which, in my view, is very important both for his character and disproving fyodor’s ideas about autonomy and predictability. chuuya will likely follow at some point in the future. whatever decision sigma makes now will be instrumental in deciding the outcome of meursault; as i said in the intro, it’s potentially the most important one of this entire mini-arc. the balance of the game all hinges on him.

regardless, though, even if sigma doesn’t break the stalemate, and that falls on chuuya or even nikolai instead — it’s clear to me that the outcome of the prison break, for several reasons, does not lie with dazai or fyodor at all. which still falls in line with dazai’s way of thinking. and as i said, that feels like a more significant victory over fyodor than a physical one, because of its thematic implications.

from a more concrete, story-plot perspective, i can’t really say what’s going to happen next; if dazai has more allies who can help him, or what. if the situation in meursault is meant to mirror that of the airport (which, considering that we keep alternating perspectives, this is probably happening simultaneously), then i do think that it’ll get worse for our side before it begins to get better (and even at the airport, i still can’t say we’ve hit rock bottom yet.)

in the end, though, i think that the ADA has to prevail. they have to pull through. i’d like to think so, at least. and dazai will survive; i haven’t even entertained the idea of him being dead. he’s definitely not going to let an elevator take him out; like the man’s literally died three times in canon. and he just... has a long ways to go still (and he’s already come a long way!). anyway, i digress.

sigma’s choice represents important things both for dazai’s thinking, but also himself as a character. and that’s ultimately the main reason i think that he is going to be who decides meursault. unpredictably leads to progress — but progress cannot be made without respecting human autonomy and the right to make choices, which come about by really connecting with others.

thanks for reading!

137 notes · View notes