#kassandra plays umineko ep2 for the first time

[kassandra-the-witch]

I am still entertaining a "fifth child" theory, where Kinzo had a secret fifth child, and either that child or that child's child is one of the Beatrices. Kinzo's violent possessiveness of (one of the) Beatrice(s) always struck me as weirdly paternal, if not incestuous. But it would make one of the Beatrices ending up with Battler suspect, unless of course the Beatrice ending up with Battler is completely distinct from the Beatrice of Ushiromiya blood.

[kassandra-the-witch]

The fact that from my provincial university library database alone I am able to pick up on two academic works on Umineko in English (excluding biologist's works on, you know, the actual seagull species) and that I will not be able to read them for a long time (because avoiding spoilers) bugs me. Like there is certainly a niche academic interest in Umineko but I can't engage with it. * sigh *

[kassandra-the-witch]

Me, in home office, trying to sanitize data points in the database I am supposed to be working on:

A thought who has just been born in my brain: The scene in the tea party where Rosa is forcefully subjected to cannibalism is a metaphor for living under white supremacist patriarchal capitalism.

Me, spraying it with water, as if it were a cat misbehaving: Hush, little culver. Your mother needs to work now because that's how we get the money that can be exchanged for the goods and services we need to survive.

The thought, untouched by my attempts to supress it: Beatrice's violence is just a way more overt realization of the actual, but obscured violence of the Ushiromiya family, right? In capitalism, you can barely and only with great difficulty opt out of consuming goods that were created from the repeated violent exploitation of others. Beatrice simply shows that on a much more graphic, interpersonal setting where it matters. The disgust, rage, fear, terror that Rosa feels in that moment is that of any consumer under capitalism that realizes the scope of the violence necessary that this food ends up on the table, ready to be eaten.

Me, pushing the thought out of the mental door: Darling, there are ten thousand similar thoughts to you around here saying that Umineko is about capitalism. We know. That is an open and shut secret. What I need is to compensate for the area I have so far neglected: The inner workings of the characters. Why is Beatrice doing this? What crimes did Kinzo do, what kind of fate did she suffer? Is she repeating cycles of violence and suffering because that exonerates her own abuser, because it is easier for her to be violent than to accept a person she trusted had voluntarily decided in favor of hurting her? At the end of the day, must she accept that Kinzo has been violent by choice rather by the overwhelming inescapability of violence, before she can move on? And who will be the one to demonstrate to her that violence is, despite everything, a choice?

The thought, screaming louder: You see, this is about the homecoming of capitalism! Behind the polished and seemingly safe walls of Rokkenjima, secluded from the outside world exploited to maintain their lavish luxuries, a magical, inevitable force arrives, unperturbed by the social walls erected around them, to expose them to the very violence they propagate! Beatrice is the Mask Of The Red Death! Kinzo is not only a parody of Shakespeare's Prospero but a rather faithful nod to Poe's Prospero!

Me, locking the door behind me: Once again, you are missing the trees for the forest. Let us return to work post haste.

[kassandra-the-witch]

You know, I did anticipate the semi-symbolic cannibalization of an Ushiromiya by another Ushiromiya. It was gruesome but far from surprising or even shocking.

But this:

This was the closest of a jumpscare this game provided since the rock performance. This is above my paygrade. I do not even know what this means.

[kassandra-the-witch]

So that was Umineko Ep2. I haven't gleamed too many new insights into the thematic workings of this story, but I have found many more intertextual parallels. Furthermore, people have anticipated Ep3 to become my favorite, so it is prudent for me to once again delve into long analysis to prepare myself to optimally read Ep3.

[kassandra-the-witch]

Friends romans countrymen I really wish I had the energy to continue Umineko. I know Episode 3 is going to be my thing. Someone told me there's a, like, fusion of Eva and Beatrice in Ep3 and to fuse two evil unhinged women is the unethical narrative experiment of my dreams. Unfortunately work is kicking my ass still and Umineko costs a lot of energy to continue. Literally had an easier and more relaxing time getting into Elden Ring lately. Hope you will still be interested in my thoughts whenever I will manage to continue Umineko

[kassandra-the-witch]

You might be wondering what I am doing, and where I am in the story right now. Work is ramping up again, so my time for diversions does not that often provide the amount of energy I'd like to invest into Umineko.

Last thing I remember from the point in Ep2 where I am at is Tactical Advanced Minotaur and the Demonic Stakes being revealed to be mean anime girls. Rest assured that I was quite dumbfounded by the amount of lore dropped in just those handful of scenes.

("Satan actually works for Beatrice" and "Satan is an anime girl" are things I should have been mentally prepared for with how this story does things, but, no, I was actually staring at the screen making internet modem startup noises)

[kassandra-the-witch]

There is so much happening in today's like one and a half hours I played I am absolutely never going to recover from this. Hell. I have like yet another reading that is sprouting from the vast fields of my brain that are dedicated to thinking about nothing but Umineko.

[kassandra-the-witch]

The sacrifices of the second twilight are about to be revealed...

[kassandra-the-witch]

In chess, a fork is a tactic in which a piece attacks multiple enemy pieces simultaneously. The attacker usually aims to capture one of the forked pieces. The defender often cannot counter every threat.

Fork (chess), from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In a situation in which a fork threatens two pieces of identical value, and the defender has no way to defeat the forking piece and is forced to use their turn in a way that does not involve the forked pieces (perhaps through a discovered attack with check through the prior movement of the forking piece), the attacker has free choice which piece to take. In such a situation, it is usefull to consider which of the pieces of equal value is better developed, or which subsequent attack will develop the forking piece better. If one plays chess by the romantic ideal of telling a story through the movements, the attacker could even consider a completely random choice which forked piece to ultimately take.

Me, just now

[kassandra-the-witch]

My most plausible theory as of the middle of Ep2 is that a mortal, Italian woman named Beatrice (that I have christened Umineko's Historical Beatrice) existed sometime in the 50s, being under the coercive violence of Kinzo, before ascending from mortality to witchhood and having since spent centuries in the time loop surrounding Rokkenjima, waiting for some sort of liberation.

The problem is that multiple vague thematic hints I have encountered in fandom-adjacent spaces suggest that Eternal Witch Beatrice is the older version of a character already at play in the Rokkenjima murder(s), and my best guesses who might be the young version of Eternal Witch Beatrice (Maria, Sayo, Eva) all do not fully add up. Furthermore, that defeats my most plausible theory. I could create a synthesis of both that still allows for Umineko's Historical Beatrice to exist and whoever among the cast ascends to witchhood simply taking on the mantle of that historical, dead woman. Further furthermore, this would move most of the ships involving Eternal Witch Beatrice I have encountered so far from the unhinged to the outright horrible (except for Sayo being Eternal Witch Beatrice I guess? that would just mean some people ship Sayo with herself, which, frankly, is the least concerning relationship for her to be in).

And I fear I have already missed pieces to this puzzle that would solve the riddle entirely. How do people solve Umineko in two episodes. It baffles me to no end.

[kassandra-the-witch]

I'm. I'm going to have to write an essay right about now, don't I. In the first turns of the middlegame of Episode 2. With the information at hand now, some extrapolations might be possible.

[kassandra-the-witch]

In this episode of Umineko, Sayo reinvents the ancient tradition of stoicism

[kassandra-the-witch]

I SWEAR TO THE GODDESSES BEATRICE PLEASE STOP WITH THE COOKING METAPHOR UNTIL THE FOOD I ORDERED ARRIVES I AM STARVING AS IS

[kassandra-the-witch]

Ah and can I ever see the pieces move. Oh how beautiful this ballet is, on an abstract level. You have to appreciate Beato's grace in guiding these fates so.

[kassandra-the-witch]

The fact of George's constant unawareness of the genre he is in... George, even if he ultimately was one of the final girls of Ep1, is more like a first girl. Someone who ominously speaks of happiness and bright futures, unaware of the intense violence lurking around the corner.