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maryfailstowrite · 5 months ago

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Do you want to know who one of my favorite DRA characters is???? do you??? no, you don’t, but I’m telling you either way: it’s Kinji Uehara. Here’s why.

(obviously, spoilers for DRA ahead, so…. beware :))

So, to me, Uehara is an intriguing character from the start. When you hear the title “Ultimate Priest”, it makes you imagine a loud guy who is going to ramble on and on about God and religion and accepting Jesus Christ into your heart and all that… but you’re met with a quiet man that explicitly tells you that he doesn’t force his faith onto others. Even Yuki is a bit surprised, and this brief conversation leaves you wanting to find out more about him…

And oh man, do we find out more.

I think his first shining moment is in chapter two. When Kinjo is trying to start his dictatorship- I mean cult- Sorry, when Kinjo is trying to establish himself as leader of the group, and says that whoever doesn’t agree with his conditions must get out and will be seen as a preliminary criminal from now on. We see Mekaru get out and tell Kinjo he’s insane, which is a power move, by the way, but expected from her. This is Rei Mekaru we’re talking about, after all. She ain’t taking no one’s bullshit. Then Kizuna gets out (not without yelling and crying a bit before, of course), which was also expected given her mental state at the moment… And then there’s Uehara. He literally just gets up and leaves, and only explains himself because Inori asks him to.

So far, Uehara has been a pretty tame person. He got along with everyone, helped at the trial, and overall, he had never gone against anyone. But now he opposes himself (or, rather, Kinjo opposes the both groups against each other, but that’s another tale) against the main group of students, and decides, for some unknown reason to everyone, that being seen as a potential murderer is better than having to follow Kinjo’s rules.

His response to being asked why he’s leaving? This:

Then he walks out. Just like that.

Obviously, the Ultimate Priest would be a pretty moral-driven person, right? He’s supposed to be a spiritual leader, after all.

The first interpretation of this we make is that associating with Kinjo and following his orders would eventually make Uehara do something that goes against his moral compass. Even if Kinjo tries to make himself seem reasonable and reliable, it’s pretty damn obvious he’s not after the first trial. We know that he has a pretty black and white view on criminality, as far as thinking that all murderers (no matter their motive, circumstances, etc.) should die, a moral view that is a stark contrast to the Christian concepts of mercy and forgiveness. Concepts Uehara, as a priest, would base his world view on.

Kinjo and Uehara are basically opposites, morality wise. Kinjo would do anything (and in his case, it really is anything) to maintain the order he believes the world (in this context, the school and his classmates) should follow, and he’d go to any lengths to make sure justice finds every person he sees as ‘bad’, no matter how drastic or dark anyone else thinks his methods are. Uehara, on his end, doesn’t hold any grudges against any of the students that stopped talking to him after he left Kinjo’s group, and he doesn’t even hold a grudge against Kinjo, who is the whole reason why he’s been ostracized from his classmates. He still collaborates with the investigations and in the trials, and there’s nothing that points to him being mad at anyone for basically leaving him to his own luck in a killing game. He believes in and practices the mercy and forgiveness he’s been taught to have as a priest…

Or does he, though?

(Note: There is another interpretation to his response after being asked why he’s leaving. But we need to know what happens after chapter two to make it, so we’ll get to it later.)

Now, chapter three is his chapter. It’s his last chapter alive, and here’s where we get a more deep dive into him. But we can’t talk about any of this without talking about the murder itself, so… let’s get that out of the way.

The third murder case is incredibly gruesome (or at least it was for me), especially Inori’s death. You can hear her screaming for help inside the lab minutes before you open the door and find her tied up and burnt to death. It looks like an excessively cruel murder, especially considering there was no real reason to kill her in such a painful way. She was one of the weakest, if not the weakest character in the cast (physically speaking, of course), and she wouldn’t have shown much resistance if simply attacked (especially against someone like Uehara, who is double her size).

Plus, aside from Inori and Yamaguchi, two other people were attacked. Kinjo was left unconscious on the library floor, and Mekaru was taken out with chloroform and shoved into a locker. It feels unnecessary, and like attacking more people means the possibility of leaving more clues behind… but we’ll get to that later, so hang on for a moment.

Now, personally, after the victim reveals, I was conflicted. I had gotten spoiled, so I already knew who the killer was… and I was in denial about it. I wondered what could’ve driven Uehara to commit such a cruel and almost sadistic crime, and I was a bit scared they would pull the ‘oh my god, this character that seemed calm and collected up until this point is actually super insane and a cold-blooded murderer’ thing the original Danganronpa always does in chapter 3. In this aspect, I was pleasantly surprised.

Uehara being the traitor is a super surprising reveal. Even after ‘solving’ the murder case and voting correctly, it had never crossed anyone’s mind that Uehara was the traitor. Yet, that was exactly why the murders even happened in the first place. The motive video they had been given only existed to give Uehara instructions: If he killed now, the children Monokuma had kidnapped from Uehara’s cathedral would be freed, and if he didn’t get caught, he’d get to see them after getting out.

Of course, Uehara complied. Those kids were very dear to him. And we discover that originally, Uehara’s plan was far less gruesome: He kidnapped Inori from the infirmary and killed her with the spear while she was passed out (I assume he used the chloroform on her too, since she’s passed out when Yamaguchi finds her). But Yamaguchi’s appearance throws his whole plan away, and, as we see in the trial… Uehara breaks down easily under pressure. In other words, he panicked.

I think this is pretty important to understand why he did what he did. He never intended to kill anyone if it hadn’t been because Monokuma coerced him to, much less in such a horrible way. But after killing Yamaguchi “on accident” (wasn’t an accident, but it wasn’t his original plan), he probably started panicking and tried to bullshit his way out of it. He knew he couldn’t just let Inori go, because she’d immediately know he was the one that killed Yamaguchi. Even if she was passed out as he tried to save her, if a guy tried to kidnap you and someone else appeared dead a few hours later… it would be pretty suspicious. Plus, her coat was drenched in his blood, so… yeah, no way she wouldn’t put 2 and 2 together. So, Uehara started putting together a new plan with the first things he saw on the way. He had the phone on him, so his mind probably went there first, and then he started making up the rest of it from there.

Don’t take this as me trying to excuse his actions, though. Even if we think he didn’t realize just how painful his method was when he planned it, he still fucking electrocuted someone alive, which is horrible. He could’ve let Inori go and let her know he was the culprit, sacrificing himself, because the children would’ve still been released. He still had that selfishness in him to want to survive. But I think that imagining him making up a new plan on the way in a panicked state makes it easier to understand why he did things that seem completely unnecessary. And since we already know he’s not good under pressure because of the trial… I don’t think it’s hard to imagine him like that. He most likely acted on the first ideas he had using things he already had on him (the phone for Inori, the chloroform with Mekaru) or the first things he found, and that’s why his plan is so messy. Why did he drag Yamaguchi to the library when he could’ve just left him in the art room’s locker? To leave him next to Kinjo? He wanted to pin the murder on the guy that believes all murderers should die? While said guy was unconscious? Or was it just to confuse everyone and make them think the murders happened at the same time? And why did he shove Mekaru in the locker with the dried blood? That was basically leading the cast to an important clue. Why did he leave Inori’s coat in the art room’s trash? Knowing that they would investigate there, since that’s where they found Mekaru?

Like I said, the more murders/attacks, the more clues you potentially leave behind. And if we take into consideration that he was acting on the go, and that he didn’t have much time to cover up what he was doing (because he did a ton of shit)… It was impossible for him to get away with it. He probably knew this, but he held onto the hope that perhaps he’d be able to survive, and that’s why he breaks down when he realizes he’s cornered in the trial. But when he realizes that he’s been caught, he calms down because… at least the children are safe, right? Right?

One of the most heartbreaking moments in this chapter is the reveal that the children are, in fact, far from safe. Before killing Uehara, Monokuma shows him (and the whole cast) a video of the children’s dead, decomposing bodies, driving Uehara into a state of shock he dies in. I think this is a great way to make the cast’s fear and hate for the mastermind grow, but I feel like it’s also there to make a point. Uehara tried killing his classmates so that the kids could survive. He tried to choose by himself who lived and who died, and in the end, it only caused more deaths. This situation brings a pretty interesting debate to the table, and a pretty important one for the development of the game too.

And that’s what makes this case different from your usual chapter three double murder. The murders didn’t feel pointless. In the original Danganronpa series, it felt to me like some of the murders were just… there. Especially the third cases. They didn’t help develop anyone’s character, they didn’t help advance the overall plot, they just happened. For example, the third case of Trigger Happy Havoc. Celestia goes from being the “Queen of Liars”, a calm and collected woman that maintained her cool even when faced with the deaths of her classmates… to a horrible liar that was caught in, like, 5 seconds. Not to mention, her motive was money. Sure, I can perhaps sympathize with the fact that she wanted to make her dream come true with that money… but as the Ultimate Gambler, she could’ve won that money after getting out of the killing game. It isn’t a particularly strong motive, and it doesn’t make Celestia’s character better or more interesting. The reveal that Celestia was actually Taeko Yasuhiro is probably the most interesting part of this chapter, but we probably didn’t need two murders to happen to make that reveal, did we? Plus, she dies like, half an hour later, so it’s not like that reveal served for much. The deaths of Hifumi, Taka and Celestia don’t particularly develop anyone’s character, and they don’t push forward the overall plot either. They get rid of characters they didn’t want surviving, and that’s about it.

But DRA chapter three didn’t feel like that. And I think the main reason for this is, surprisingly enough, Kinjo.

The third trial is the start of Kinjo’s downfall. Like I’ve already stated before, Kinjo and Uehara are opposites when it comes to morality, so I believe it could only be him who pointed out Kinjo’s issues. And he does it in the only way Kinjo would listen to him: Using Kinjo’s arguments to support his own actions (and the murder he committed).

When Kinjo is going on and on about Uehara being a serial killer (which isn’t factually correct by the way, but sure, Mr. Cop), Uehara tells him that it’s strange Kinjo is showing such strong opposition to him and his actions when they were both using the same logic. Of course, Kinjo is a bit taken back by this, and asks Uehara to explain…

Uehara then responds with this:

He quotes Kinjo. He’s not only using the cop’s logic against him, no, he’s using the same phrase Kinjo used to defend himself and his actions to defend his crime.

After this, Uehara elaborates further: He explains that he sacrificed the lives of the fifteen students for the lives of 100 children. He just chose to save the most people, even if a few lives were lost in the way… Doesn’t that remind us of someone?

Kinjo deliberately chose to put a few people in danger for a chance at saving a higher number of them. He didn’t directly kill anyone, sure, but he wouldn’t have cared if they were killed. Kinjo protected everyone else and left the ones that didn’t agree with him to die, because he thought that was the way in which the most people would survive.

Uehara knows he wasn’t in the right. He knows murder is still an awful act, no matter what the reason was, and that he’ll have to pay for it in the afterlife. But Kinjo doesn’t. Kinjo thinks picking and choosing who survives and who doesn’t is the right thing to do. That’s what Uehara wants him to realize: That the reasoning that drove him to kill is the reasoning Kinjo was using as a leader, and that it would only drive Kinjo down the same path Uehara was dying in: a path of blood-stained hands, a path of guilt, and a path of death.

No one can play God. Not even the Ultimate Priest.

And Kinjo actually reconsiders his stance after the trial (and after everyone turns against him). Even if it was a dead end, because Kinjo ended up just standing stronger on what he believed in until the fourth trial, it makes him wonder about his actions, and it foreshadows what happens in chapter four. It lets us see that Kinjo doesn’t stand as strong and he seems, and that his views are bound to fall apart sooner or later.

Uehara and his murder case develop Kinjo’s character. He’s quiet after Uehara asks him to reconsider his stance so far (which is a lot, considering how much he bitched every time a murderer was found guilty), and he even asks Yuki if he’s wrong the next day. The trial, and especially the conversation with Yuki that it triggers later, helps us see Kinjo as a man who’s been put under too much pressure for too much time. A man that has been trying to protect everyone around him his whole life, but that had a completely wrong approach to it. Instead of the crazy bitch we see him as the whole time, we get closer to the actual person Kinjo is, not the leader he makes himself to be.

Of course, one could argue that having him just break down in chapter four would’ve led to the same series of events (aka him trying to kill himself, and therefore remembering everything and triggering the plot for the rest of the game), but… it wouldn’t have felt the same. If Kinjo had fainted in the fourth trial, then killed himself the next day, it would’ve just left us with a sense of helplessness. It would’ve felt like something that was bound to happen, because no one could’ve helped Kinjo… and that’s what case three brings to the table. Kinjo could’ve been helped. Uehara helps him question his actions, and if only Yuki had pushed Kinjo in the right direction when he opened up to him, perhaps we could’ve seen a much different Kinjo for the rest of the game. But that doesn’t happen. Case three makes us see Kinjo waver and falter, and it foreshadows what happens later on: it lets us know that Kinjo’s confidence wouldn’t last forever, and that he was going to break sooner or later. And it also adds to Yuki’s sense of despair when he sees Kinjo shoot himself in front of everyone: he knows it didn’t have to happen like that. He knows he could’ve helped, he knows he had the chance to, but he wasn’t capable to step up when Kinjo needed him. It makes the scene feel a lot different, and I really like what chapter three adds to the further development of the game.

But when has this turned to be about Kinjo, huh?! This post is about Uehara, so let me get back to him now. Remember the note I left after talking about chapter two? That there could be another interpretation to what he tells everyone when he leaves the group protected by Kinjo, but that we needed to know what happened in chapter three to talk about it? Yeah, let’s talk about it now.

“I always act in the way I believe is right”. We can still interpret this as him refusing to work under Kinjo’s leadership, since it would be a direct betrayal to his core values as a priest. But knowing now that he’s the traitor, it makes me think that perhaps it wasn’t so much about him not wanting to work with Kinjo as a leader, but rather about him wanting to distance himself from his classmates. I think that “doing what the believes is right” could mean causing the least harm he could to his classmates, and distancing himself from them was the only way he had to do that. Knowing he was the traitor would hurt much less if he didn’t get along with anyone in the first place, right?

We get to know the person Uehara is before the death game, even if briefly, from the flashbacks Yuki has in chapter six. We know he tried to think of the well-being of his classmates. We know he was the one that lead Inori and Yamaguchi to the warehouse while the Monokumas attacked the Kisaragi Laboratory in an attempt to protect them, and we know that even if he had a hard time adapting to a class environment when he first entered Hope’s Peak, he formed a bond with Yamaguchi because “he is a more warm-hearted man than any of them”. When one of the Monokumas enters the warehouse, and Yamaguchi holds him so that Inori and Uehara can escape, Uehara tells him that he’ll come back for him. And even in the killing game, we get to know him as a gentle-natured person, and we see just how deeply he cared about the kids he took care of at the cathedral (to the point of becoming completely numb when he finds out they’re dead). Even when he tried to kill, his original plan was to make the least harm possible… but that went horribly wrong, so not like it counts too much (again, I’m not trying to excuse his actions or take any responsibility from him, that murder was fucking awful). He was going to betray everyone sooner or later, sure, but I can imagine him trying to do it in the least harmful way he could. He was forced into a position where he had to do that to cause minimal damage, after all.

Uehara goes from being a quiet person that doesn’t seem like he’ll do much for the plot, to one of the most interesting (and important, in my opinion) characters in the narrative. DRA excels at creating characters with many layers, characters that feel human. There are few characters that can be considered a hundred percent good or bad, because… that’s not how humans work. It plays with the roles you expect the characters to have, it plays with your expectations, and it still allows room for a lot of interpretations of its characters and events (which is something I love in all pieces of media). And isn’t this the beauty of it? The humanity of media? Being able to see and reflect completely different ideas from the same content? In the end, all this doesn’t matter. I could write a whole book of interpretations and theories for the game, and it wouldn’t matter. What matters is that there is room for different interpretations, and that they all together build an independent and unrepeatable experience for the player. So, if there’s something you have to take from all this… enjoy your games. Write about them. Analyze them. Draw fanarts. Make AU’s. Cosplay. I don’t care how good or bad you’re at it, enjoy your favorite pieces of media to their fullest. Allow them to make you think. That’s the only thing that matters, after all. And that’s why I’m writing all this.

Oh, and also, love Kinji Uehara. That’s, like, super super important too. God bless you all, and see you next time.

#dra #danganronpa #danganronpa another #kinji uehara #tsurugi kinjo #ramblings #character analysis #???#character study #??? i guess

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etherealabyss11037 · 4 months ago

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What Were They Keeping from Us?

So, I've began rewatching Weeby Newz's livestreams of Danganronpa Another; I'm currently on Chapter 2 during the reveal of the new motive. Here, the 13 surviving students are forced by Monokuma to take a note from a box containing the dark secret of one of their classmates. Only a very few are openly revealed: Kakeru Yamaguchi, Teruya Otori, Mikako Kurokawa, and Yuki Maeda's. Kakeru's secret, as abruptly revealed by Tsurugi, was that "Kakeru Yamaguchi was teased for being too big in elementary school", which is a trauma Kakeru reveals in his FTEs. Teruya Otori's secret, revealed by Kizuna, was that "he still sleeps in bed with his dad"- and of course, who can forget the classic "Mikako Kurokawa might actually be talkative?" as revealed by Yuki when glancing at his note after promising his classmates he wouldn't. Great job Yuki. Speaking of lucky boy, his secret was that "Yuki Maeda might know the identity of the mastermind"- which was true, depending on how you look at it. Regardless, we now have 9 students whose secrets were never revealed, which has always been a bit disappointing. I'm curious to know what skeletons these kids have in their closet- assuming it isn't just something stupid like Kakeru and Teruya.

Firstly, it's important to take into account that one of these secrets is also in the corresponding character's FTEs, so it stands to reason that the same can be applied to the others as well. Another point is that two of these secrets were actually foreshadowing upcoming reveals, so this may also be the case in at least one secret. Some secrets I'll speculate about will be purely based on knowledge about the character in question. Alright, enough with the introduction, let's go!

Akane Taira: I think Akane would have had a similar secret to Yuki- "AkAne TAira miGht kNow tHE IDenTiTy oF thE MaStErMind" and all that jazz. An underwhelming explanation, I know, but I can't be arsed to think of another possibility. Akane without her dEsPaiR memories is pretty docile and isn't the type of person to inflict harm or mayhem unto others, thus I can't see her committing any atrocities that haven't been wiped from her memory. If you have your own idea, please share!

Ayame Hatano: I see it two ways: in her FTEs, we learn she's had problems with her hamstring, which could have severe repercussions on her physical health if she were to push herself too hard when trying to achieve her dream of becoming an Olympic gold medalist. This secret may be more depressing than dark, but Ayame wouldn't like to have this kind of personal issue exposed to her class. However, if we're to be more macabre and use zero canon evidence to support our theory, we could speculate that Ayame's secret was that she had used steroids/drugs to enhance her performance because she feared her ailed hamstring might compromise her skill. This is an act of cheating that, if ever exposed, could result in Ayame being banned from all future competitions, effectively crushing her dream. Now THAT is some tea I could get behind!

Kizuna Tomori: Honestly, based on her final FTE, we learn that Tomori forces her fellow cheerleaders to sleep with the boys that bodyguard her so that she doesn't have to "waste her precious body" in that manner. Aside from attempting to commit literal murder, sexual coercion is the worst thing you can do to someone, so it stands to reason that such a fucked-up secret would be enclosed in one of those notes. If it were revealed to the rest of the class, I highly doubt they'd be so willing to let Kizuna back into their group, if only by virtue of not wanting to befriend what's basically a pimp.

Kanata Inori: This has zero in-universe basis, but I feel like it's fitting for such a sweet character like Inori to have a rather fucked up secret, such as she severely injured or killed a patient while operating on them. It was an accident, of course, but it would still weigh heavily on her tender heart, and I doubt she'd like to be reminded of it.

Kinji Uehara: Using point number two as stated in the preamble, I believe that Kinji's secret would be that he was the traitor working on Monokuma's behalf. Something like that would decimate an already strained relationship with his class, and Tsurugi would definitely forbid Kinji from joining his group after that- hell, Tsurugi might try to convince Kinji to kill himself or try to confine him to his dorm room for the remainder of the killing game. I doubt Tsurugi would show any leniency to Kinji even if he confessed that he betrayed them only to protect the lives of the orphans at his church, which the others may find to be more forgivable. Perhaps this conflict of interest could lead to the Kinjo cult disbanding early? Who knows.

Satsuki Iranami: Idk. This is Satsuki for Christ's sake. This girl has literally done nothing wrong in her life. ever. (Okay, I know she shot Haru, but it was an accident, and she couldn't help it) Like, the worst thing I could ever see Satsuki doing is like stealing candy as a child or some shit (watch Kinjo execute her for that). Girlypop has literally zero malicious intent towards any creature of any kind.

Haruhiko Kobashikawa: that he's a virgin.

Tsurugi Kinjo: Going by his FTEs, Tsurugi has a few skeletons in his closet- but what I think would really alter his relationship to the group would be the reveal that Tsurugi himself has killed. In what I believe is his third(?) FTE, we learn that Tsurugi shot a group of hostages -who were his colleagues from the police station- when they were being used as shields by a group of terrorists attempting a deadly attack in Tokyo. Although this deed was done for the greater good, I think this would be enough for his classmates to finally reject Kinjo's bullshit. He spent all of chapter two ostracizing and vilifying Kinji, Rei and Kizuna and demeaning them as "preliminary criminals" all because they refused to be under his control, yet fucking Kinjo out here is killing innocent people? I think the hypocrisy would send some of his biggest haters, like Haru, over the edge, and the Kinjo cult would disband sooner than it did in chapter three.

Rei Mekaru: that she adores and sleeps with teddy bears at night. Yeah, not exactly a heart-stopping, bone-chilling reveal, but knowing uptight, "I-am-so-mature" Mekaru, she would not be happy for that information to be known to anybody. It would be hilarious to read aloud, though. I get the feeling that Kizuna would never let her hear the end of it once she found out.

Ah, it's nice to fantasize on how the other student's secrets could have impacted the killing game if they decided to be like Yuki and take a peek at their notes. Although this concludes the characters that were around for when the second motive was introduced, I'll throw in a bonus question for y'all creative thinkers: what do you think the secrets would have been for the three students who were dead (Kiyoka and Mitch) or otherwise preoccupied (Kisaragi) and were unable to participate in the killing game?

I hope you found this lil' food-for-thought shitpost enjoyable, and that you have your own thoughts to share on this topic! Have a good day!

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