#i hadn't realized it was happening
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cbartonscoffee · 1 year ago
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My favourite thing about Good Omens and everything that went into creating it, is that I can't see the characters as their actors. At least not Aziraphale and Crowley. I literally can't. What do you mean that's Michael Sheen? That's Aziraphale, they're an angel. That Crowley is who? He's just a good ol' demon. And I say this sincerely, I can't overlap the characters and the actors. The costumes, the mannerisms, they just exist as a separate entity. Crowley and Aziraphale on one side, David and Michael on the other.
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It is a beautiful day, and you are a horrible research transport vessel. Things are progressing as normal (i.e. it's boring) when a SecUnit pings you, lies right to your metaphorical face, and then tries to bribe you with human media to give it a ride. This is as unexpected as it is unprecedented, and the sheer nerve of it is really to be admired. There's no protocol to this, so what should you do?
Now, this is against a bunch of rules, and could be dangerous if you weren't so impressive and incredible, and you're technically an employee (and can probably rewrite the Univeristy charter at will (until someone notices and puts it back)) so those rules are for other entities.
So, what you should do is allow the rogue SecUnit with a broken governor module and a sketchy story aboard. If you check the files it dumps and find zero (0) malware (which is confusing), and it doesn't even try to trash the place or lay in wait to ambush a crew member, then you've got a good candidate!
Next, what you're going to want to do is absolutely nothing. Just watch it patrol your halls until it's time to leave. Continue staring at it while you're undergoing embarkment procedures. Maybe analyze it a little (you've got plenty of processing power to spare) when it finally sits down and starts watching media. Allow it to settle in and get comfortable while you stare at it and get further and further from port.
Now that you two are alone (intimacy is key!) and you've determined that watching media is all the SecUnit is going to do, it's time to make contact! Make sure to open by telling it it's only survived due to dumb luck, and letting it know you could melt its brain into putty. This starter will work to develop conversation naturally and smoothly, just like you've seen the humans do, and it will be smooth sailing from there!
This has been Perihelion's guide to making friends/finding life partners/fuck off Holism I had to work hard for this find your own
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mobius-m-mobius · 7 months ago
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loki in season two // mobius in season one (insp)
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constelationprize · 9 months ago
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Thinking many many thoughts about how Jean was Riko's partner for a YEAR and was still rooming with Goon #3. Because that was how unwilling Riko was to let go of Kevin. And how that implies that Jean was placed as his partner both because of the practicality of Kevin being gone AND as a punishment for letting him go in the first place. Being partners with Jean could actually slow Riko down depending on how often he's hurt (because I don't think Riko was all that exempt from the rules to the point where his partner's performance would completely not matter) and he was still placed there. Riko was just THAT angry at him over Kevin's escape. And all the while he was keeping Kevin's side of room like an altar, even back when he didn't even think Kevin could PLAY, because of an injury he caused.
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weekly-gordie · 3 months ago
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Hai hello this is a request by @mango-blush and this is gonna, hopefully, get me back into the groove of actually posting weekly again!!! This will be week 15 of drawing Gordie!!!
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heytheredeann · 5 months ago
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“Yes, there is a place where someone loves you both before and after they learn what you are.” ― Neil Hilborn
#gallya#gallyaedit#tmfuedit#the man from uncle#tmfu#illya x gaby#not spn#my edit#idk i was just thinking about them#initially this was supposed to be a napollya+gallya set#but while i have feelings about this type of theme and napollya too i feel like in the context of the movie it doesn't suit them as well#napoleon and illya tried to kill each other immediately it was more of a showing each other the worst bits immediately kind of situation#they learned to care about each other DESPITE all that so they are safe from this. or so they think#i feel like this 'still loves you after they learn who you are' thing will apply later#once they get closer and napoleon starts painstakingly shedding some layers and illya voluntarily lets napoleon be there for him#meanwhile i feel like this quote is 100% the horrifying realization happening in gaby's head at the end of the movie during the hotel scene#that not only illya loved the innocent civillian to protect she pretended to be but he loved the traitor spy too#terrible realization. 0/10. she doesn't want these feelings. evil.#forever obsessed with the way gaby RECOILS when he's being sweet in the final hotel scene#she seeks out gentleness from him when she's asleep or drunk otherwise she is like 'nope NOPE' or at least looks conflicted i'm obsessed#and i feel like she tried to talk herself out of feeling any feelings for him because well. he doesn't like HER he likes her COVER#AND THEN stupid illya had to be stupidly sweet with her even AFTER he knows. smh. how dare he#also off topic but DYING at illya's green hat helping him blend in i never noticed looool#i'm sure he has a whole collection of hats so he can always hide in different environments#god i hadn't giffed in forever i missed it looool
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dailyaoyagi · 6 months ago
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Never ask a Toya fan what August-October 2023 was like
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ilions-end · 7 months ago
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teucer in sophocles' ajax: worries that his father will disown him and cast him out for not saving his half brother
me: i'm sure he's just imagining the worst possible scenario because he's in shock
teucer in euripides' helen: has been disowned and cast out by his father and is still traveling aimlessly seven years after the fall of troy
me: *shocked pikachu face*
as if history's greatest tragedians would write stories that were like "thankfully things went better than expected"?????
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chris ryan casually dropping a joking use of "the great work continues"... continuing to prove himself the ringer person i would most enjoy hanging out with in real life despite on paper the two of us having nothing in common except a deep love for the david fincher movie zodiac
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ad-astra-per-aspera-1389 · 8 months ago
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me at 7:30pm: *watches Simple Explanation*
me at 1am: Kutner didn't have a fucking dog *projects onto Thirteen and writes the fix-it*
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moonstruckme · 1 year ago
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I'm in a very James mood lately and looking through what I plan to post over the next few days I think you'll really be able to tell lmao
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llycaons · 7 months ago
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pour one out this pride month for me who's been so frazzled by work I missed the parade entirely and for my coworker who's partner just got covid forcing them both to miss it 😔
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corrinecassia · 1 year ago
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A minor detail I think everyone should know:
Despite a Puppet's Ergo technically being their 'heart', Polendina clutches the region more associated with where a human's heart would be.
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dazais-guardian-angel · 9 months ago
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also I honestly hate Dazai's sudden bullshit theory about Hawthorne's blood bullets to explain how Fyodor killed the soldier at the end of the cannibalism arc, and the fact that this somehow never even occurred to him until now. Normally I do love seeing Dazai be wrong and be shocked/taken off guard for once, it's way too rare and needs to happen a lot more for how goddamn OP he is the rest of the time, but in this case instead of making him feel human from making a natural mistake (forgetting about Q, pinning the wrong person as Fyodor during the helicopter search in cannibalism), it just makes him look incredibly dumb to somehow not have foreseen this before now. Up till this point he's been 5D chess masterminding the shit out of everything, but somehow it didn't even occur to him that Fyodor might not actually be dead for real....... and all it took to make him think that was Sigma viewing his memories? Back when the cannibalism incident happened, the panels seem to indicate that he might know more about Fyodor's ability than he's letting on, but now it's confirmed that he never really knew anything at all, so that part was meaningless I guess...
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The Hawthorne theory is so ludicrously out there, but it's in-line with all the other insanely out there things Dazai has been right about before, so it's probably correct lmao; it's just, WHY did he not come up with it until now??? The answer is of course that he didn't realize it until the Plot needed him to, and it's so frustratingly evident. 🫠 As convoluted as this twist is, I honestly wouldn't mind it if it had come from Fyodor himself after he inevitably comes back to taunt Dazai and co — I actually think it doesn't contradict everything else we've seen, because imo there's a difference between the soldier grabbing Fyodor's arm (clear contact), and when Fyodor lightly held his finger over Karma's forehead and most likely used his real ability there, just like he said he did. I think it's neat to think that we were all misdirected by the "Fyodor's ability works through direct contact" thing just because Dazai is the one who first said it, since we're so used to Dazai being right. But I wish Dazai hadn't figured out the truth all on his own so suddenly, doing a complete 180 from like two chapters ago, cause it just makes him look stupid. It doesn't feel like a natural mistake, it just feels like the plot forcing him to be dumb until it needs him to be smart again, which is really noticeable for a character otherwise so insanely smart as Dazai.
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ecstarry · 8 months ago
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the amount of stuff from my relationship that i projected to my fics is actually insane
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skrunksthatwunk · 2 years ago
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ok so. kiwami 2. rooftop scene. the ending. it's a bit of a clusterfuck but i wanna talk about one detail, a problem they bring to your attention by Fucking. Talking About Her.
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haruka is watching all of this unfold.
[this post is like 4.5k words long + pretty critical + has spoilers for kiwami and kiwami 2, and really minor/vague ones for a couple others. they're not that bad though, trust me (and i added a warning in the one place it is major)]
ALSO CONTENT WARNING i'm gonna talk about kiryu's passive suicidality a good amount in this one, so stay away from this if you think that might affect you negatively/you'd be better off skipping it. i'll also make a tl;dr (which i will highlight in red) at the very end if you really wanna know what my point is that will exclude those elements <3. i am also going to use a lot of choice-based language in regards to kiryu's contemplation of suicide because i think it's the lens through which the games treat the topic, but i personally don't find it a productive or realistic way to look at suicide or suicidal ideation at all. someone dying by suicide absolutely does not mean they don't care about their loved ones enough to fight on or whatever. i love you, and proceed with caution on this one.
(also i'm using the kiwamis as my point of reference because i uh. don't have a ps2? those are the games that i played, and though the differences are likely slight, i wanna be clear about that. also,, ignore the watermark on these screenshots,, i didn't notice them and i'm not retaking them. we're all gonna have to settle for youtube cutscene comps for now xoxo)
first, we have to talk about the ending of the first game.
[note: i am Really Really Confident kiryu has a conversation earlier in the game about his going to jail in nishiki's stead being him running away and choosing not to resist his two options (go to jail or let nishiki go to jail) and define his own path, fighting his way against fate to make it happen. part of why i'm so confident it exists is because it made such an impression on me at the time. it's pretty important to my interpretation of things but i also can't find it for the life of me, so uh. sorry ✌️ i really tried. this post's takes/analysis will be dependent on this scene existing, so keep that in mind. if anyone knows where to find the scene/screenshots of it, lmk and i'll add a follow-up with it]
kiwami stuff
so as she's dying, yumi tells haruka this:
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that she may be dying (painfully, and right as she's getting everything she wanted), but she doesn't regret it, because at least she did something rather than running away from it all. that you shouldn't run away, ever.
shortly thereafter, when the police find kiryu and haruka, this exchange happens between him and date. here's the play by play:
date tells kiryu he can get him out of trouble with this, and that if he doesn't, he'll get life in prison; kiryu declines his help:
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kiryu is so devastated (understandably) by the back to back losses of the three people closest to him that he resigns himself to life in prison, and the death-in-effect that would be. he would prefer to waste away rather than struggle through a life without them. prison was monotonous and isolating, but coming back after a decade was overwhelming, and coming back to everything being so warped and twisted, and then losing the corrupted scraps he had anyway, well. he wants to go back to sleep. he doesn't want to be in a world where everything's the same except he's on his own. better to return to safety, to die slowly in a hell he knows well than weather a new one where he has control and agency, and thus one where he has the ability to fail and to lose anything at any time. he explains to date that that loss is why he can accept his death:
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date shakes him and asks him if there's really nothing left for him, no reason to keep living at all:
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then echoes yumi's advice to haruka:
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which makes an impression on kiryu:
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date gives him a reason to live in the form of haruka, saying she'll be on her own again if he goes to jail. he hijacks kiryu's tragic protector complex to keep him alive, because she needs him, and because she's someone precious to him:
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after the dust has cleared,
kiryu and date also have this exchange, where date tells him to stay away from the cops (and presumably arrest and a return to prison, the aforementioned fate akin to death), and kiryu cites haruka as his reason to stay away, one he holds to with no uncertainty (showing again that he's accepted date's logic, that his reason to keep living even when it's incredibly difficult is to care for the more vulnerable haruka). given the weight of the consequences, to me, it feels like date's telling him not to be alone with his thoughts or something. it's almost frightening:
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so, what's our takeaway from kiwami?
kiryu lost everything and hit rock bottom, but he chose to fight, and to live life on his own terms, even when it got difficult. that's the narrative life lesson he had to learn to avoid repeating the events of 1995. he made that choice for haruka's sake. it's seen as growth.
and without him, haruka would've just returned to the orphanage (assuming she could make it back to sunflower at all) with no one who knew or understood what she had been through, no one to mourn with her, and no one to give her the attention, care, and protection she needs. kiryu knows what it's like to be an orphan with a limited parental figure who only checks in every so often (kazama, "aunt" yumi), and what someone will do for attention/affection from that person (via both himself and nishiki swearing up, climbing the ranks, etc. arguably haruka coming to kamurocho by herself to find "mizuki" is similar), and what it's like to lose them anyway (again, kazama, yumi). their situations parallel each others' somewhat, and that binds them further. and after losing everyone (which he blames himself for to some extent, as one can probably assume from this and 2, and something key to his arc in later games), he chooses to protect her. and this time, he won't fail. at least partially because failing would hurt him, too. he'd have nothing left again.
okay. now we get to kiwami 2.
if you forgot, the context is basically:
everybody's fighting on the roof of a building which i'm sure will not be a running theme or anything as the series goes on
there's a bomb that's about to go off and they don't know how to/can't defuse it
ryuji shot the twist villain to death, but took fatal hits to do so
sayama's like hey!! let's get out of here!!! and kiryu and ryuji are like nooo we have to settle this oughh it's punchin time and they stick her on an elevator and send her down so she doesn't have to watch
ryuji loses. sayama returns, they have a cute sibling heart to heart, and ryuji dies in her arms. sad
kiryu is in rough shape as well, and there's like 2 minutes left on the bomb's timer
here's the scene itself:
sayama tells kiryu they have to run, and kiryu says he can't. the gist is "let's run!" "you go without me" "i'm not leaving you!" "i'm in no condition to run" "i'll carry you then!!" sayama: *sees how fucked up kiryu is, realizes he's Going To Die Anyway* "ok, then i'm staying with you!" and then further bickering about that, before they give up and make out (as one does i guess)
date (he's here now) yells this at them from a helicopter:
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before someone else in the helicopter tells date this:
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we get this shot of haruka calling out to kiryu as the helicopter swerves away:
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and kiryu and sayama have this exchange about haruka where they say they let her down, but that she'll understand:
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then they hug and the bomb ticks to zero right when the credits hit. in post credits it's revealed that the twist villain defused the bomb when they weren't looking, betraying his co-villain for reasons i truthfully do not remember and am unwilling to look up. it's not about that right now.
so, how does this scene interact with the ending of the previous game?
the short answer is "badly <3" but here's the long answer:
it's about choices.
the thing about fiction is that anything you want to have happen, as a writer, can happen. it may not be effective, internally consistent, or logical, but you can write it regardless. audiences suspend their disbelief for the sake of engaging fully with your fiction, but everyone has a threshold past which they will stop being engaged in a story and either become uninvested or annoyed. writers usually have lines they're unwilling to cross as well. but in almost every story, there's at least a couple of places where they stretch reality a little to make the narrative they want happen. this is not a bad thing at all. that's how stories get told.
now, i'm gonna be real with you. i don't care about how feasible plots are like 95% of the time. it's not something i think about much, nor is it something i prioritize. i am a very character-centric media consumer, so if world building and/or plot are a bit stale or contrived, that doesn't really bother me much so long as i'm invested in the characters involved. some people can't stand plot holes or the ways musicals burst into song or whatever, and that's fine for them. but it's not something i tend to find that all that important.
this is all to say that i have a sorta affection for rgg's flavor of bullshit pulling. and it is a powerful flavor, maybe even an acquired taste, but i can and do rock with it so long as it doesn't damage the characters too much. this is why i'm not making a lengthy post howling into the void about joji kazama or the second joon-gi han or how many secret relatives there are. those things are silly and endearing and a clumsy yet heartfelt part of a series i care about very deeply. i'll joke about it, but i don't consider it much of a flaw. it's more like personality. flaws are texture, and they help a piece's identity. point is i am very, very willing and able to suspend my disbelief for these games in exchange for a good time, particularly via good characters.
(if you want another example of where i draw the line from within rgg, the answer's the YAKUZA 4 SPOILERS INCOMING rubber bullets twist, because i think 1) it's actively horrifically stupid (especially retconning a scene we SAW HAPPEN. WE SAW BLOOD ON EACH IMPACT, AND RUBBER BULLETS DON'T OFTEN BREAK SKIN THAT DEEPLY (THEIR DAMAGE IS MORE PERCUSSIVE THAN PENETRATIVE). THESE EVENTS HAPPEN IN THE SAME GAME YOU DON'T HAVE TO RETCON IT JUST REWRITE IT. OR DON'T SHOW THE HIT AT ALL SO THERE'S MORE PLAUSIBLE DENIABILITY. DON'T DO THIS JUST TO HYPE UP YOUR SHITTY VILLAIN NO ONE CARES ABOUT. and 2) (a bit more importantly) i think it actively removes saejima's primary internal conflict for that game, that being his intense guilt over the 18 murders he thinks he committed, one i was invested and interested in. but this isn't a rubber bullets post.)
characters in this series walk off a lot of life threatening injuries. they survive miraculously, they escape in the nick of time, and they pull through in the end. kiryu still somehow hasn't killed anyone. almost every game in his saga ends with an "is kiryu gonna make it out this time?!?" shortly followed by a "yeah lol. lmao" postcredits reveal. kiryu fucking punches a marble statue into dust in the first game. having a story that asks you to suspend your disbelief so much and so often means that when a decision is made, it's not the writers saying, "well, this would have to happen so we are obligated/forced to write it happening" so much as "we wanted this to happen for some reason(s)," because you already know that they're not guided solely by logic. again, this is true of all writers, it's just amplified in stories like these because they've already given you so many hard mode suspension of disbelief moments (they've broken you in like leather, yeah? or like how obvious internet scams allow for self selection by being so obvious that only the most vulnerable people would fall for them. they curate an audience willing to play along with their bullshit flavor so they can tell a story that's more likely to satisfy that audience. in a good way, in a fun way! mass appeal is overrated). there is not much limit to what this series is willing to try and sell you.
so when ryuji takes lethal damage taking out the big bad, that's a choice. when he doesn't die immediately, that's a choice. when ryuji and kiryu send sayama away in the soon-to-be-forgotten elevator so they can settle this like men or whatever despite the literal actual bomb about to go off, that's a choice. when sayama comes back, that's a choice. when ryuji does die, that's a choice. when kiryu determines that he can't escape in time, that's a choice. when sayama is unwilling to leave him, that's a choice. when she says she'll carry him out and there's an elevator right fucking there and then she's like never mind i guess i won't anymore we're dying together right now kiryu like they're not gonna even try?? wouldn't distancing themselves from the blast give themselves a better shot, something that's super possible given the 2 minutes they have with that elevator??? sayama you met him like a week and a half ago why are you ready to die with him that's not a plot hole i just think that's kinda strange whatever anyway, that's a choice. when kiryu stops arguing with her so they can kiss (next to her brother's corpse), that's a choice. when date shows up, that's a choice. when the helicopter can't save them because the bomb was going to go off too soon, that's a choice. when they put haruka in that helicopter and take her away, let her only impact be reminding kiryu and sayama that they can't help her, that's a choice. when they spend their last moments talking as if they're already dead, then simply waiting, that's a choice.
they're all choices that the writers made for the characters, and we are asked to believe them for the sake of achieving the writers' vision, as with any story. the only problem is that the writers' vision here fucking blows.
i'm not saying it would be realistic for kiryu and sayama (and even ryuji) to make it out alive, but it wouldn't be out of character for the series in the slightest. kiryu is suddenly unable to power through here, and that's a choice. so, what is their vision?
put simply, i think they wanted a romantic last stand for kiryu and sayama, a tragic scene of doomed, devoted lovers. and i think they wanted an edge-of-your-seat fake out death. they wanted spectacle.
here's how some specific choices they made undermine all that shit we talked about earlier from the first game.
once again, kiryu is called by date to live, to pick himself up and keep going, no matter how impossible the odds are. he's even reminded by haruka's presence, his one anchor in keeping himself going. the growth he had in the parallel scene in the previous game is challenged, and he fails.
it's not enough this time. and that's a choice.
it's also one i can't think of a good reason for, and that's the real kicker.
characters can have developmental backslide just like people do, and if they're given good reason for it, it can be just as, if not far more compelling that purely linear growth (i am a chimera ant arc enjoyer, and that's all i'll say. sorry if you haven't seen hunter x hunter. uhh. i am also a zuko avatar enjoyer if that helps). but i can't think of anything that happened in that game that would cause this from a character perspective. if anything, kiryu should be less likely to do this intentionally. he's spent around a year raising haruka, and a year has passed since he lost his loved ones. at the very least, the pain should be more dull, though it is established through an early nightmare sequence that his ass is (justifiably) not over it yet. given that their deaths were the initial motivation for his willingness to rot forever, theoretically, he should be more motivated to stay alive than before now that he's got more investment and stability in his life outside of them, particularly when it comes to haruka, his reason for surviving. and if the ongoing nature of the trauma was the motivator for this, then they should've had it affect him more past that nightmare scene (it really serves more as a recap of the last game than anything else) so it didn't come out of nowhere. so the reminder of the lesson that saved his life and then guided it for at least a year afterwards, one that the whole resolution of the previous game relied on heavily falls flat for... some reason.
i think this is a good time to mention that, generally speaking, you don't write arbitrary choices into characters. sure, people in real life are often sporadic, but when analyzing fictional characters, every choice is filed into a portfolio of characterization that can and should be analyzed. going for pure realism can obfuscate their development, motivations, themes, etc. their choices and reactions may be unorthodox, but they must be internally consistent. this is very related to how i view plot contrivance as well. characters drive the plot, not the other way around. stories are about the ways characters affect their worlds/lives and vice versa, and they're the human face to the themes and ideas the writers are trying to explore and express. maybe my stance on this seems hypocritical. i don't know if it is. but to me, plot issues are usually a matter of engagement and investment, while character issues are a matter of substance.
i hope this doesn't feel patronizing explaining all of this, but i want you guys to know where i'm coming from in my analysis. starting at my base philosophy on writing is the easiest way to do that, i feel. defining the terms of the debate, and all that. anyway
and i mean, look. they survive because "it was defused the whole time we just didn't see it happen", so it's not like narrative tension or realism or whatever was THAT big of a priority overall. if it was gonna be a cop-out anyway, they should'nt have ruined kiryu's development too, yeah?. and sayama fucks off to america after this game anyway, so it's not like the doomed lovers thing had much payoff or meaning after this one (though you could argue that's more an issue with yakuza 3 than yk2, which has some merit to it). which means that they chose to sacrifice kiryu's prior development and internal logic for the sake of cheap tension for their finale that was both kinda illogical in and of itself (the elevator!! the elevator!!!) and a romantic climax that neither required nor really benefitted from this staging. (like. you coulda had them make out and then get saved by date, or kiss on the elevator in a "it's moving, but will we make it in time??" way or whatever. look i'm not saying those are great options either but they're SOMETHING okay. it would remove/reduce the amount of time wasted on characters sitting around with their thumbs up their asses for no reason in this finale).
instead the message of this finale is that, actually, sometimes it is impossible to change your circumstances and fight for your own way out of an awful situation. and what should you do about this unfortunate truth? uh. die! i guess. it's the exact opposite of the encouraging, optimistic message of the last game. zetsubou chou pride my ass.
note: i feel i should mention that when suicidality is brought up within the series (particularly in substories), it is always something someone has to overcome themselves through wanting it badly enough. they simply need the inspiration and the motivation to keep going. it's arguably treated as a moral obligation. frankly, the series is broadly very meritocratic (<- bad) when it comes to this topic (and others, but that's a Whole Other Thing. see akiyama's weird loan shark tests as well). sheer will and resolve is enough to conquer any problem, be it physical or mental/emotional, and it's irresponsible to act/feel otherwise. this is the logic the games operating under, and kiryu is often the mouthpiece for this bootstrap-pulling "tough love" sentiment. so when kiryu "chooses" to die, yet faces no emotional fallout from date, haruka, or anyone else, it feels very out of place. it's not just an odd choice; it's specifically, once again, an odd choice to make in context of the game/series/character it appears in.
kiryu's just like eh, haruka'll watch her only family die right as she gets some sense of tentative stability and lets her guard down after a devastating month the year prior (and a relatively dismal upbringing before that) that we trauma bonded over. sure, she likely came to view me as the one who would stay no matter what, who was too strong to be taken out, who she could always rely on, and so i know that dying would hurt her immensely, but she's smart enough to know it'd happen eventually. her eventual recovery means it's okay for me to do this (somehow, in a way it wasn't in the first game). it's an excuse within the narrative's logic, and one it is uncritical of simply because it's kiryu. he gets a pass.
and i think with the previously mentioned passive suicidality and general series-long mental health issues kiryu displays (i mean. yakuza 5's literally his depression arc), this could be retroactively seen as an interesting choice, like a piece in that particular narrative. i don't even dislike that viewing, especially in terms of fan approach. but (assuming this went down the same in yakuza 2), they likely didn't have that in mind. all they had then was the first game and the movie. and they took the first game's Entire Message and contradicted it for nothing but a scene they wanted to have happen because it'd be suspenseful and/or emotional (without actually doing the work to earn it). and they're not fans trying to analyze his character, they're the ones making choices for him. and they chose to massacre my boy. and if the subject of kiryu's mental health was a priority of theirs, why didn't they explore that? haruka and date's feelings on him not resisting and their words not being enough (whether that blame is justified by the narrative or not (it shouldn't be btw)), the uncomfortable drifting that resigning yourself to death and living afterwards anyway often brings, literally any conversation about it besides the minimal shit we get post credits of date being like "did you know about the bomb not having a fuse?" which like. bad answer either way (which is why they weren't straightforward about it, the cowards). you can't just be like "oh uh. idk he just gave up this time. yeah he was gonna die on purpose for some reason. good thing the bomb was fake lol" and then pack up and go home!! that's stupid!! any merit the idea of kiryu dying by suicide in this scene and in this way could have had from a character-based perspective loses its weight because 1. it didn't happen (for kinda stupid reasons), which makes it fall flat and 2. no one is really affected by the fact that it almost did, including him. they sacrificed his ass and replaced it with nothing, even when there could have been interesting outcomes to it.
so the narrative effectively chose to kill him by making the situation impossible, and this impossibility is ultimately arbitrary, given the series' usual approach to miraculous, illogical escapes. that, or the choice to stay was up to kiryu and sayama, one that 1. doesn't make sense and is actively regressive in context of kiryu's arc in the only other game in the series (as well as his whole saga in retrospect) and 2. one that contradicts how the series sees/treats resignation to death/death by suicide in all other contexts without being addressed, challenged, or condemned in ways it would in all other contexts. because they don't want you to think about it like that. they want you to think he (and the narrative) had no choice, that it made sense to do that. but it didn't. it doesn't.
and look, honestly? if i was bleeding out and had like 2 minutes to live, there's a non zero chance i'd say fuck it and kiss a girl too. i get it. but i am (and this is crucial) not a fucking yakuza character. and i'm certainly not kiryu kazuma.
tl;dr (basically just rephrasing the second to last main paragraph)
there are not sufficient character reasons for kiryu and sayama not trying to escape. additionally, because the narrative regularly facilitates even less likely escapes, it's not so constrained to logic and reality that it couldn't pull this one off. the choice to let their situation be impossible this one time was a cheap and arbitrary way of forcing a scene they thought would be cool and dramatic, and in doing so they chose to cannibalize a key emotional note of the previous finale (namely kiryu's mission to dedicate his life to protecting haruka) for hollow last minute stakes-upping in this one. it is then completely disregarded anyway. god damn.
#got so into this post that i used tumblr on my laptop for the first time to surpass mobile's image limit#i also added transcriptions in the alt text (which i should do more often)#actually thinking about it in the movie kiryu teaches haruka that lesson about stumbling on.. and she's the one to ask to follow him... hm.#just interesting given that the movie came out before 2. i don't think it makes much of a difference to the post it's just neat to me#one of my favorite parts of writing this was skimming through a bunch of yk1/yk2 cutscenes and noticing how often kiryu pats haruka's head#it happens a lot more than i remembered and it's very sweet to me. get bonked little one <3#another good thing was realizing you can edit tags when you're not on mobile.... fucking life changing. i have lost hours to mobile tag#editing and i'm not even kidding about that#speaking of editing this one took like 6 hours.. my brother used “yakuza autism” (verb) for me earlier and it's so true. source: this post#i did have a short break to get food bc i hadn't eaten all day but that's mostly because i woke up at 3pm. anyway#also if you like kiwami 2's ending you're not even remotely alone. i looked at the comment sections of the scene comps and ppl love it#and more power to you!! i like it when people enjoy things. and tbh i DO have feelings that i'm supposed to about that ending#i just also have feelings you're not supposed to. like. anger. i guess.#rgg#ryu ga gotoku#skrunk meta#aww yeah it's a new tag babeyy#yakuza kiwami 2#kiwami 2#yakuza#like a dragon#yk2#kiryu kazuma#sawamura haruka#sayama kaoru#maybe my thoughts'll change after replaying the games...? it's been like a year and a half since i beat yk2 so i am a bit fuzzy on it#yakuza kiwami spoilers#yakuza kiwami 2 spoilers
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