#hello danganronpa fandom this one's directly for you

[aetherphobia]

Y'know what? I feel like throwing myself to the wolves today.

Hello Danganronpa fandom! I would like to hear unbiased opinions, please. Emphasis on unbiased.

In my opinion, V3 was honestly one of the weaker games of the franchise. And our resident asshole (/lighthearted) of the game, Kokichi, is believe it or not, not a perfectly written character.

Please do not come onto this post calling me a dumbass that is falling for "propaganda." I know his plan was to end the killing game the whole time. The problem is that he doesn't have a solid motive to do so. At least not one that is clear to the viewers. His plan may have been to checkmate the mastermind, but his plan seems to fall apart when you realize he has no proof Monokuma would end the killing game. He’s doing this massive elaborate plan, assuming Monokuma won’t just pick a random person to execute so the game can continue. Because fundamentally, this game is unfair. Kokichi assuming Monokuma would play fair makes his plan just seem redundant, as well put together as it may have been. A buddy of mine posted a similar opinion a couple days ago and got absolutely dogpiled because she wasn't absolutely praising the hydrologic press that he was crushed in (too soon? Nah it's been four years it's fine). In fact, one of the points made above was one I directly copy pasted got from her in specific and I took so that you as the readers could hear her without her getting all the notifications. will not be stating any names out of my respect and care for this friend. But for the love of god, don't dogpile anyone for their opinions.

The purpose of this post is to hear outsider, completely unbiased opinions about Kokichi as a character. So when replying to this post, take those biases and lock them away in a safe. You don't need to throw them away entirely, just put them away until you hit the post button. Info dump to me and clearly point out what exactly his motive was, based entirely on the context clues of the game. What are things that are clear as day? What can be read in between the lines? Why did he want to end the killing game? What was his motive? If you think you know the motive, explain to me what I apparently missed and when it happened. Provide me proof and screenshots. Just all around make it make sense without using profanity and calling me an imbecile for not understanding something that was not written in a way that was clear. I dont not want those kinds of responses, as they really do not help. And as lightheartedly as possible, calling me names in the replies over something like this really doesn't provide me with a reason to take your word for it.

And hey! If you agree with me, I would also genuinely love to hear your personal take on the whole thing and what you think could've been done better with his character. What are your ideas? What do you think would've been really cool and interesting if it had been implemented?

I do not condone the way a lot of you handled my friend's post. So please do not talk to me the same way. Please come in to this post with the assumption that I have already completed the game and I already know what happened.

I humbly await for your perspectives.

[chaserainbows]

☿ : A trope you dislike?

Ask the mun!

Villainous character that committed atrocities gets away with everything scot-free, even treated like a misunderstood victim, because they did one nice thing once

Don't get me wrong I'm all for tragic villains and redemption arcs but here's the thing, it has to make narrative sense and the character has to earn their second chance, being a skinny white guy or having a popular queerbait ship doesn't cut it

[sillyguyhotline]

How YTTD Challenges Conventional Norms of Emotional Strength

Hello! I’ve been thinking a lot recently about how emotional vulnerability is present throughout YTTD’s characters, particularly how Nankidai contrasts more feminine coping mechanisms with more traditionally masculine coping mechanisms. I’ve touched on this topic before (albeit less directly) when I’ve discussed why I think Nao and Kanna are criminally underrated by the fandom, but I’ve never really talked about it in detail. However, when I was talking about the misogyny in Danganronpa last night, there was always a thought in the back of my mind that YTTD was different, fundamentally better in its portrayal of female characters and femininity as a whole. And as I thought about it more, I realized that the reason I think this way is because of how well it portrays and handles emotional vulnerability of its characters.

I think, first, that it’s most important to establish how emotional vulnerability in the context of gender is most commonly portrayed. Men are typically not allowed to show emotion or to cry, and their strength is determined by their lack of emotion. Conversely, the perception that women are the weaker gender is often characterized by their increased freedom to show emotion, and any “strong female character” is simply an excessively masculine woman who’s cruel and emotionless. In fact, the version of Reko we see as a doll, the Reko before Alice’s death, is actually a perfect example of the common “strong female character.” She barely cares about her brother, she’s rude, she exhibits little to no compassion, and she lashes out at the people around her. But this is not the Reko we know and love, and in fact it is the Reko whose cruelty is exhibited by her willingness to kill a version of herself. She isn’t introduced as a good character, she’s introduced as the person Reko no longer is, the person Reko has grown past, and that is a good thing.

I also find it very interesting that the two men who are physically the strongest (Keiji and Q-taro) and who assert themselves as the most masculine leaders from the beginning actually turn out to be some of the most weak and cowardly characters in the game. Q-taro has a lot of confidence in himself and his abilities; in Russian Roulette he is proud and boastful, claiming that he is strong and experienced enough to shoot the gun. However, in the first Main Game he is scared enough of dying that he nominates the children to be killed off so he doesn’t die, he has an ending where his cowardice gets the best of him and he sacrifices everyone else in order to escape, and in one of the endings to the arbitration room attraction he is too scared to push the button. His character arc doesn’t come about because he becomes stronger or more resilient, it comes about because he realizes that his life is not the only valuable one and that compassion to the rest of the group is crucial. Keiji, too, suffers from incredible emotional weakness. Though he is incredibly muscular and centers himself as one of the group’s leaders immediately, one of his biggest flaws is his inability to deal with his own emotions. Though he’s aware of how atrocious his actions have been, he’s far more willing to hide from his problems, avoid confrontation, and take advantage of his selfishness than he is to actually make steps towards change. And this undoubtedly a flaw of his! 

Then, on the other hand, you take the third “buff” character, but the one who doesn’t immediately aim to set himself up as a strong leader. While Keiji’s first goal is to take charge of the group and Q-taro’s first goal is to establish himself as the strong one, Alice is immediately set up as a coward. Sure, when we first meet him in the locker he’s sort of intimidating, but as soon as we interview him we realize that he’s sort of an idiot and doesn’t pose much of a threat. The interesting thing, though, is that Alice is really the most emotionally mature out of all of the buff men in the game. Like Keiji, he has committed a terrible crime and has come to terms with the consequences for what he’s done, but unlike Keiji, he’s willing to take actions and make reparations. He lets himself be a more compassionate person, becoming a protector over Kanna of sorts, and he never prioritizes his own well-being over that of the people he cares for. He is a fully-fledged, unapologetically emotional character who doesn’t try to bury his problems in the hopes that they won’t come back to haunt him. Out of all of the “strong” male characters, his approach to his issues is a rather feminine one, but it ends up being the one that cements him as a better person than the others.

Now, I set this up while talking about Keiji’s lack of emotional vulnerability, but I believe that one of the biggest components playing into it is how trust is such a huge factor in the game. And this begins to involve Shin, too. It becomes clear throughout the course of the game that one of the only reasons Sara has made it this far is because she harbors the ability to put her trust in others and because they put their trust in her. We see, then, that Shin becomes an enemy to the group because he refuses to trust any of them and mocks all of them for being so willing to trust the others. Our biggest point of contention with Keiji, as well, is when he refuses to share his Me-Tokens with us out of fear that we could learn something about his backstory. Both men have terrible experiences with vulnerability, and they loathe the prospect of putting their trust into anyone else for fear of what could happen with it. However… the game sets this up as a very bad thing. Lack of vulnerability turns Shin into a villain, and the only way that he manages to redeem himself is by utilizing his compassion for Kanna and sacrificing himself. Keiji, similarly, loses his credibility as a person because he refuses to be vulnerable, and his distrust of himself and avoidance of his problems are what make Midori’s attacks hit so hard in 3-1A. Our villain characters exist because they cannot trust anyone, because they cannot be vulnerable, and in the same way we see Sara turning into a villain as she loses her trust in the rest of the group.

To tie this all together, I think that this is why Nao and Kanna are undoubtedly the strongest characters in the game- because they are female characters who are allowed to show emotion, because they are allowed to show their trauma, and they’re allowed to grow past that. When we’re introduced to Nao, she’s already someone who appears very weak in a feminine sense, panicking and freaking out in response to the situation. Kanna is the same; her sister is dead, and this has left her as a weeping, emotional mess. Nao’s condition only gets worse as the game goes on; she loses the mentor who’s most important to her, and in a blind panic she ends up causing a lot of harm and concern to her fellow participants. In any other game, this would probably have been where the characters of these two would have stopped, or even how they would have ended. They’re women, they’re not supposed to be strong, they already have weak and emotional coping mechanisms for their problems. However, Nankidai lets the two of them grow past this point while still letting them retain their more emotional components. Nao lets herself retain her memory and affection for Mishima, but she makes the conscious decision to abandon the AI and work with Shin to combat the evil one. Kanna retains her friendship with Shin, but she does so carefully, displaying enough kindness to him to make him change his heart. Even when she tearfully pleads for Sara to let her die, it comes from a point of what she considers emotional wisdom and her own evaluation of her usefulness to the group. If she’s left alive, her character comes full-circle and she realizes that she does, in fact, have value to the group, which gives her the will to live on. Both of these women have well-developed character arcs that allow them to feel vulnerability and emotion. They become stronger and wiser people without fundamentally changing who they are, and their femininity doesn’t have to be compromised or belittled for them to become better people. Though they are physically the weakest characters and have some of the biggest low points of the game, they are in fact well-developed and emotionally mature. Their vulnerability is what gives them this opportunity, and it truly wraps together how well Nankidai portrays femininity and vulnerability in his story. 

[shsl-box-worshipper]

Hello there~~ This is your DCMK Secret Santa finally appearing!

How are you doing dear? I hope December had a great start for you!

I am already brainstorming whenever I can to find the topic for your present!

Does fluffy ShinRan sound good?? ❤️ I’d love to know if you have any favorite or ideal scenes! 🥰

FUCK YEAHHHHHHHHH, I FINALLY GOT ONE BABY!!!!

I mean-*clears throat*

I'm doing great, despite the fact that I hate that spooky month ended so quickly. Oh, and fuck yeah. I love ShinRan from the bottom of my heart (which is weird considered I'm supposed to be around the mental age where CoAi is more popular but oh well, love my badass karate gril and her detective dumbass.)

Anyway, hope you're doing well secret santa, and I don't really wanna give you any scene ideas because for some weird ass reason *Stares directly at the Danganronpa fandom cuz it's all their fault* I really like angst AND fluff. But oh well, since you wanna make fluffy shinran, I'm completely okay if you just do a christmas type shin-dig or smth. I'm srry for my lack of ideas, i'm not the kind of person who likes asking for anything.

[your--isgayrights]

hello hi 2 7 11 13 25 26 31 (👁️👁️) and 32. i know its a lot but im curiouss

afklasfsf hello!!! don’t worry i love the excuse to ramble haha.

2. Why do you write fanfiction?

Hmmm this is one that can be sort of simple to answer but also sort of complicated? I write fanfiction because it’s my way of processing the way that the original work made me feel, like it’s a natural decompression. It’s also just something that it’s good to have a creative outlet for. I’m not really a person who does self inserts or ocs in fanworks, but I do think that I put a lot of myself into my writing. When there are emotional parts of my work, they are directly coming from the way that I have felt in a certain time in my life. Fanfiction lets me use characters that other people already know to communicate these feelings and have them be understood by someone other than myself.

7. What element of writing do you struggle with most?

Getting started writing is always a struggle for me, because I’m very good at daydreaming and writing nothing down. I have so many snippets from moments of inspiration that I had that somehow translated into scenes in my notes app, but stitching them together with transitions can be hard for me to start doing. Usually to get in the mood, I will read other fics in the fandom or reread the original work itself. That gives me ideas and keeps the characters voices in my head haha.

11. Who or what do you find yourself writing about most?

This is sort of outside of orv, but I have this very specific niche of writing adult characters who went through traumatic situations in their child or teen years. The trauma will usually be from the original text, and then I will want to write the character after the fact, growing up and being old and somehow just managing to live even after all of that. Having this feeling of existing after the war, of marveling at the fact that you are still alive, is very important to me.

Rest under the cut!

13. First fandom you ever wrote for?

Hahaha.... Um. If we’re talking about when I first wrote any sort of fiction based on fiction, it was probably warriors cats when I was like... 8. If we wanna talk about first published work, I am embarrassed to say that I do in fact have three separate ao3 accounts for a couple different fandoms. My first fic was from Danganronpa V3, but I’m going to ask that no one go looking for it because I’m a bit embarrassed.

25. Have you ever daydreamed about side adventures/spin-offs from your fic? Tell us about them!

Yes... I might publish a collection of scenes from other povs once I get through “and at the very least, the wall will change.” because I have a sort of mental map of the way that every character feels in a scene that can be sort of limited by writing only from KDJ’s perspective.

26. Is there anything you’ve wanted to write, but you’ve been too scared to try?

Honestly I have a 40+ chapter fic I was writing for a different fandom that I want to get back to some day, but the way that I planned it out was vastly overestimating my own writing abilities, and I sort of hate the way it starts out now. This is why I know that getting the eight chapter “and at the very least, the wall will change.” done is very doable for me, though, because I learned from the experience.

31. Do you have any OCs? Tell us about them!

Oooh haha yeah. I dunno, there are a few stories that I’ve had in my head over the years (I used to make a lot of comics of original characters), but nothing I’m making content for right now. I had a story way back when from the perspective of a boy who is best friends with a kid named Ravi. Throughout the story you get the sense that Ravi takes the pov character for granted, as he seems constantly depressed and troubled by something that the pov character desires to fix because of some sort of emotional history between them. Everything in the world seems to be about Ravi. But then it begins to creep in that everything in the world really is centered around Ravi. A long time ago, he gained the power to reset the world, and make it in his image. But no matter what he does, the world that he wants doesn’t come out right, and none of the people in it seem real to him, because they only do what he wants them to. The climactic scene is Ravi breaking down in front of the pov character and asking him what he wants, that he must want something, that he can’t really be dead. Ravi has reconstructed his old life, and the pov character is the shell representing his best friend that died when he remade the world. The pov character only wants what Ravi wants, though, and in the end, he kills him.

It was from like my junior year of high school, and I think that writing that one was my way of processing one of my longest childhood friendships ending, so sorry if its a bit angsty!

32. Summarize a random fic of yours in 10 words or less.

Oh nooo I’m terrible at summaries. Um. Uh.

“KDJ doesn’t value himself. YJH is traumatized about it. Romance.”

[mamichigo]

AO3 | Writing tag | Ko-fi

Hello everyone! I finally got around to making an announcement post, but I’m officially taking ko-fi writing commissions. If you can afford it, please consider supporting my writing!

How will it work:

When you make you buy me a coffee, you get to make a request for a fandom/character of your choice.

I will only write for series I have seen myself. There’ll be a list of my fandoms below the cut.

I’m ship selective. If you’re unsure of how I feel about a ship, please message me about it before making a request.

You can either tell the details of your commission directly through ko-fi or by messaging me. Just make sure to tell me what’s your @ if you do it through ko-fi.

If I go over the word count, don’t worry, you don’t need to pay any extras.

Things I won’t do: NSFW, kinks, the general bad stuff (pedophilia, rape, incest, abuse). Suicide is off the table, and anything else triggering will have to be discussed beforehand. Adult x minor ships are a hard no as well.

I will do gore, horror, and violence, but I also need to discuss those beforehand.

Once you have made a commission, I will provide you with my discord tag so you can easily contact me! I will then provide previews of what I’m doing so you know where I’m going with the story.

Remember that I have school and a job to worry about, so your request most likely won’t be done on the same day, or even the same week. If you’re okay with waiting then go right ahead.

Feel to check out examples of my work on AO3 or my writing tag.

Transcript of the prices as well as fandoms list below the cut!

Prices:

3$: 500-700 words

6$: 800-900 words

9$: 1k

12$: 1,5k

18$: 2k

21$: 2,5k

27$: 3k

And so on!

To summarize: Each nine dollars is a thousand words; an additional 500 words is 3$.

Main fandoms (ones I’m very or fairly familiar with):

*Italicized are the fandoms I have published works on AO3

Kimetsu no Yaiba

Bungou Stray Dogs

Danganronpa

Kingdom Hearts

Good Omens (TV show)

Netflix Castlevania

MCU

Moomin (Cartoon)

Venom (Movie and comic verse)

Detroit: Become Human

Haikyuu!!

Pokémon

The Witcher (TV show)

Steven Universe

She-Ra

Black Butler

The Legend of Zelda (Breath of the Wild not included)

Other fandoms (I’m not up to date with or I haven’t been involved with in a long time):

My Hero Academia

Kagepro

[hcpefulmarshmallow]

Hello friends, I just wanted to make a quick case for some of the lesser-liked characters in the series. Mostly our blackened, but pretty much anyone who does something morally questionable, directly related to the killing game. There are a lot of people in this fandom who are highly critical of some of them - which is fine, it’s okay to be critical of your media. But there are some important things to remember I just wanted to bring up:

 (Oh, and I’m mostly talking about 1 & 2 because hoo boy v3 is on a whole other level and gets SO much more complicated)

 --These people were kids at the time. Even though technically they were older than they thought they were, their memories had been wiped, and their minds (and in some cases, bodies) were reverted to their 16/17 year old selves. 

 --They were thrust into an extremely difficult situation I challenge any adult to face, and come through morally pure. What passes for ‘good’ in the real world isn’t the same as what’s good in a game where it’s kill or be killed. Can you honestly say that there’s no situation on Earth, even one that seems near impossible, that would push you to go directly against your own moral code?

 --Recall, if you so bravely will, the discourse around the H.unger G.ames when it was first released, and all the discussion about the ethics of the tributes themselves. The general consensus was usually: no, they aren’t evil, they’re children put into an impossible survival situation by adults. Even the careers, who trained for this their whole lives, were brainwashed into believing in the “glory” of being a victor. It’s the adults that sanction the child killings who are evil. The tributes might not all be likable, but that’s not something they deserved to die over.

 --I’m not saying this gives the characters a free pass. It’s still pretty inexcusable to physically or sexually harass someone, but under these circumstances, there are some things that require a closer look. 

 --For instance, Sayaka gets a lot of crap for luring a fan to his death. And yeah, under normal circumstances, that would be an abhorrent things to do. But these aren’t normal circumstances. We have no indication Sayaka planned to kill anybody at the beginning, but that all changed for her rather quickly when she saw her DVD. The game was no longer a game. It was a trolley problem. She had to choose between her band - the people she considered family, who she loved more than anyone in the world - and this group of strangers she thinks she’s never met. Imagine yourself in that context. A teenager, terrified out of your wits, cut off from the outside world, surrounded by people who might try to kill you, and forced to choose between them and your closest loved ones. Again, not exactly righteous, but at least sympathetic. 

 --Let’s take a more grey example. Teruteru, who I personally struggle with and love as a character at the same time. I love the role he plays in the story. From a narrative sense, his character is used well in my opinion. He knew about Nagito’s little plan, but chose to do nothing about it. In fact, he used it to his advantage to commit murder and try to escape the island. He claimed he was just trying to save everyone else from Nagito, but that has a glaringly obvious fallacy: the trial. If he got away with it, everyone else would have died anyway. He could have, and should have, just told the others. I truly believe this lie about ‘saving’ everyone is something Teru told himself to justify his actions. If you recall, he was established early on as being the most terrified. He spent most of his time trying to deny what was before his very eyes, because he was singularly incapable of comprehending any of it. That already makes him the easiest to manipulate, and the quickest to do stupid, thoughtless things. And then he learns that his mother’s life might well be in danger. Once again, he has to make the choice whether to try and save his loved one and sacrifice everyone around him to do it, or...not. And I’m not saying there’s a right answer to this conundrum. Either way, you’re doing something you’ll regret for the rest of your life. But when you factor in his age, his fear, and his love for his mother, his actions become far more understandable. Does this absolve him of his other bad behaviour? Certainly not. It’s entirely valid to be made uncomfortable by a guy who uses a girl’s perceived naivete to coax her into a sexual situation, or speculate about the colour of womens’ panties, no matter how much he loves his mama. But remember, not all immorality is created the same.

 --Does love justify murder in any context? That’s for a higher power than me to say. Danganronpa doesn’t pretend to present a typical good vs evil narrative. It doesn’t try to make it easy for us. It doesn’t try to tell us that all people are good or evil, black or white, one or the other; and the characters that frame the world this way tend to have quite skewed moral compasses themselves. To hate a character isn’t to condemn everything they ever do, and to love a character isn’t to endorse their every action. And you’re allowed to like or dislike whoever, based on whatever you want. 

 --That said, when drawing your own conclusions, take in more than just the characters. Take in their lives, their circumstances, and then make up your mind. You’re also allowed to be sympathetic towards a character you dislike, or find fault in a character you do like. Again, it’s not all up or down here. Take in the type of story this is, and the fact that if all the ‘good guys’ were purely good, it would be a rubbish story. Take in the fact that these terrified kids are being manipulated at every turn, and while that doesn’t heal the damage they do, it certainly makes them more redeemable. Take in the fact that, while they do some messed-up stuff, most of these kids are good and harmless under normal circumstance. The circumstances under which most of us live our lives. They might be somewhat immoral, but we’re not necessarily any better. And the only way to know for sure, is to actually be in that situation. The only way to know your limits, is to find them. And I sincerely hope none of us ever have to find out whether we’d kill or be killed. But if you write off everyone in the story who ever did anything bad, decide that makes that character automatically unworthy of your interest, then you’re missing the best thing about DR, my friend. At least, that’s my tea on the matter. 

Tl;dr: it’s okay if characters in a work of fiction do immoral things, even if those characters are supposed to be the ‘good guys’. There’s no such thing as a morally pure human. Be critical, by all means, but don’t criticize.