Harsher In Hindsight / Danganronpa

All spoilers will be unmarked ahead. You Have Been Warned!

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Main installments:

Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc

• Between the first two chapters. Mondo is the one who furiously demands to know how Leon could kill Sayaka; he turns out to be the killer in the next case. Also, Mondo mentions both in-story and during free time events that his brother taught him never to hurt a woman, to the extent that he's reluctant even to practice fighting with the much-stronger Sakura. When he does kill, his victim is someone who was assumed to be a girl up to the postmortem examination.
• Danganronpa was released in 2010, but the School Life of Mutual Killing takes place in 2012. The Biggest, Most Awful, Most Tragic Event in Human History took place roughly one year earlier. The Sendai earthquake and Fukushima nuclear disaster took place in Japan in 2011.
• In one of Hina's Free Time events reveals she's insecure about her weight and comments that she'll get "so thin it will disgust you". A humorous (if slightly inappropriate) exaggeration at the time, but come Danganronpa 2 Good Bye Despair and it's revealed that some members of Ultimate Despair actually did starve themselves to near-death in order to feed their own despair.
• It's a Running Gag that Sakura's imposing appearance constantly frightens people, to the point that Yasuhiro refers to her as "The Ogre". Aoi's breakdown at the end of the fourth trial has her screaming that none of others ever actually saw Sakura as human.
  • Adding to that, some of the game's detractors accuse the 15 students of being stereotypes, archetypes and caricatures. Playing through the game will show how each of them come loaded with plenty of motivations and weaknesses that inform those outward appearances. The problem here is that getting to those all that usually requires interaction through their Free-Time Events, which are exclusive to the very friendly Makoto because of the rest rarely having any interest in getting to know each other beside some standouts like Kiyotaka and Mondo. Thus, the feelings held by the detractors are most likely how the students all felt about each other during the game: easily dehumanized and hence easy to betray. Aoi's rant may be an acknowledgement of this.
  • Later entries in the series lampshade this; the idea that the students of Hope's Peak Academy are explicitly characterized by their talents while discarding who they are as people by others is brought up by several characters.
• In Kiyotaka and Mondo's argument in Chapter 2, Kiyotaka says that Mondo resorts to violence so easily because he's a coward. In a moment of weakness over his belief that Chihiro is calling him weak, Mondo snaps and accidentally murders Chihiro.
• The final Free Time event with Chihiro has Makoto recommend Mondo as someone Chihiro could train very well with. Considering what happens afterwards, this becomes a very disturbing and tragic Player Punch.
• The fifth class trial can be this, considering where the mastermind went on to put Makoto and Kyoko against each other, causing Makoto to be nearly executed only to be saved by Alter Ego. In Danganronpa 3, Kyoko's forbidden action played on this, as she couldn't let Naegi live past the fourth sleeping phrase forcing one of them to actually die this time. Sure, she survived in the aftermath of Side: Hope, but that doesn't make this any less harsh.
• In the last class trial, Monokuma tries to throw Makoto off balance by asking him whether his parents and sister are all right. Makoto is unnerved for a moment, but Kyoko manages to get him to calm down. Danganronpa Another Episode: Ultra Despair Girls reveals that Komaru is still alive (albeit held as a hostage), but her and Makoto's parents are revealed to have been killed (assuming Monaca didn't fabricate their deaths), nearly sending Komaru over the Despair Event Horizon.
• The 5th case and trial are rigged by the mastermind so that someone (preferably Kyoko in the eyes of the mastermind) gets convicted falsely and executed. In the True Ending, Makoto is convicted, but is saved thanks the timely intervention of Alter Ego, allowing him and Kyoko to work together to finally bring the mastermind down. Come Killing Harmony, the exact same fate would befall to Kaede Akamatsu, except she was not able to evade death so easily.

Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair

• Nagito's strange behavior comes off as this when it's revealed in his last Free Time Event that he's suffering from frontotemporal dementia.
  • One of the symptoms of FTD is degeneration of communication ability, either causing people to use too-vague words or become tongue-tied, generally inhibiting their ability to express themselves. This not only keys in Nagito's tendency to use key terms like "hope" and "despair" to represent many concepts, but makes his Despair Disease of speaking only lies a kind of double-whammy of speech impediment.
  • His Death Seeker tendencies and desire to become a symbol of hope through dying also take on some horrifically tragic undertones once you realize that the post-diagnosis life expectancy of someone with FTD is only 2-15 years.
• Similarly, try laughing at Mikan's clumsy girl status after her Free Time Events state she does it intentionally out of a desperation for attention.
• Many of Akane's habits and casual references to some parts of her life can be this once you learn about her past.
• While Sonia's "I'll never be queen!" speech appears to be funny due to being a Covert Pervert, there's also an ominous alternate interpretation about that line...
• After Chapter 2's motive is teased by Monokuma, Akane snaps at Mikan when she agrees that Fuyuhiko has a point in that not playing the Twilight Syndrome arcade game to know the motive is dangerous (because not knowing means that the inevitable target will have no way to know that they're on the killer's hit list and plan accordingly), asking her if she wants to kill someone that badly. At the time, Mikan doesn't, but one chapter later she becomes the culprit behind a double murder after getting infected by the Despair Disease. Also, if the class had played Twilight Syndrome, it's likely they would have been able to stop Fuyuhiko and Peko from killing Mahiru.
• Throughout the first two chapters Peko mentions that she invited Fuyuhiko to events but he rebuffed them, and that she tried and failed to get Fuyuhiko to stop acting like an abusive brat and start getting along with the class, but he refused to listen. If he did, it's more than likely that Mahiru's murder and Peko's execution never would have occurred.
• The night before Mahiru's death, Hajime can talk to her while heading to twilight syndrome, she seems distant and closed off, a severe contrast from her usually brutally honesty and sunny personality, something which Hajime notes, turns out she had just played Twilight Syndrome at this point and thus was consumed with guilt over Natsumi.
  • To expand on this, if Hajime talks to Mahiru in free time a day before her murder, she enters a tearful sprite and tells Hajime she can't talk and just to sit with her. At this point she knew Natsumi and Sato were dead and that she had a role in it. In general, it's gut wrenching to realise that Mahiru died distraught and alone with no one to save her all because Fuyuhiko was too stupid and cruel to actually realise how guilty she felt.
• Try laughing at Fuyuhiko's seemingly pathetic constant death threats towards Mahiru after he acts upon them in chapter 2.
• Peko's final free time event heavily implies she plans to ask Fuyuhiko out if they both survive. This becomes extremely tragic after the events of the second trial. Though, not so much after Danganronpa 3.
• Gundham's final free time event, where he tells Hajime that he's not allowed to die without his permission becomes a lot more painful at the end of Chapter 4, with Gundham's implied Heroic Sacrifice.
• Just before the Closing Argument in Chapter 4, Gundham, having already confessed to the chapter's murder, challenges Hajime to "trample" him with his argument to bring the case to a close. His execution has him being trampled to death by an Animal Stampede.
• Ibuki's fifth Free Time Event, in which she headbangs with Hajime and he wonders how her tiny neck can keep up with it, suddenly gets much more disturbing after her death by strangulation.
• Danganronpa 3 shows a very different version of the Twilight Syndrome murder case, one where Mahiru was never involved at all. Word of God confirms that Monokuma purposely altered the truth in the game, meaning Mahiru was specifically set up to be murdered despite being innocent.
• At least one part of AI Chiaki's execution becomes much worse after seeing Danganronpa 3 and realizing that once again, Junko tricked Chiaki with a fake exit door.
• In the final understandable Monokuma theater of the game, Monokuma, in a unusually OOC and depressed way of speaking says how "Everything is a lie. Everything is fiction." Fast forward to Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony, where all the characters personalities and talents being fake, as well as everything being "fiction", was the big twist. Similarly, Fuyuhiko saying in the last trial, "You better not say we're fictional characters!"
• During the third chapter, Hiyoko declares that she doesn't want to die a meaningless death. Days later, she is indeed the victim of a completely pointless murder, entirely for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
• In Chapter 6, what does Hajime say upon hearing about Izuru Kamukura, "a genius who possesses various talents"?
  Hajime: I wish they'd given me one of those talents so I didn't have to be in the Reserve Department...
• Makoto claims in Chapter 6 that "No matter what you do to me, I will never fall into despair!". Flash-forward to Danganronpa 3, and Makoto is Brainwashed so that he falls into despair and attempts to kill himself.

Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope's Peak High School

• In episode 3 of Side:Despair, Yukizome and Sakakura are talking about doing their best to support Munakata and then Yukizome tells Sakakura that she's not giving up Munakata to him. Then episode 10 came out, and it turns out that Sakakura really does love Munakata and the way the audience finds out about his sexuality becomes really harsh.
• Everything about Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair became even more painful thanks to Side:Despair:
  • Most obviously, the fact that Nanami was an actual real person makes the last two trials a lot more painful. Especially in an ironic sense.
  • The Twilight Syndrome mystery was bad enough with the details given, but becomes a lot more bitter with the revelation that it was one of the things that motivated Hinata to become Kamukura.
  • In Goodbye Despair, Fuyuhiko says in his FTE that his sister was the one who deserved his talent. After what is revealed in Side:Despair, this comes off as hugely depressing.
  • When Mikan is identified as the third culprit, she says she murdered for the sake of "her beloved" and it's confirmed that Mikan had also caught Despair Disease, which in her case made her remember her former Ultimate Despair status. The anime makes this even worse by showing Junko's abuse of Mikan and that Mikan was brainwashed into becoming Ultimate Despair, so she is executed in-game for something she had literally no control over.
• In Side:Future, pretty much anything that Miaya does to help Makoto becomes this when it is revealed that she is a robot being controlled by Monaca.
• In episode 7 of Side:Despair, Mukuro kills Kotomi Ikuta when she refuses to play along with the killing game. This same scenario would later play out in the first game, except it's Mukuro who gets killed for pretending to rebel against Monokuma.
• In episode 8 of Side:Future, Andou is revealed to have some sort of mind-controlling candy. Fridge Horror makes you wonder if she ever used it on Izayoi. If so, their relationship gets very disturbing.
• Side:Future's openings contrast each character with an image showing their possible death. Kyoko's death image is her hanging on a noose, a common method of committing suicide. The reveal that her forbidden action conflicts with her desire to protect Makoto to the extent that she effectively committed suicide for Makoto worsens this image.
• It's revealed in episode 10 of Side:Future that Chisa was never cured of her brainwashing from Episode 9 of Side:Despair. This makes a lot thing much harsher, like Chisa's kind personality in episode 1, and Munakata and Sakakura's motivation to avenge their beloved friend who was long gone at this point.
  • This also gives a new meaning to the Side:Despair opening. While Class 77-B were shown metaphorically falling into despair after Junko blew them out of her hands, Chisa is also shown falling alone in a separate scene.
• While Juzo's death was already bad enough on its own, the reveal in episode 10 of Side:Despair that he was killed by the man he was in love with adds even more cruelty to the scene. Not to mention Munakata's last words to him were "You know why." Juzo might have died thinking Munakata was disgusted by his secret. Luckily, Makoto managed to tell him before his death that it was because Munakata thought he was Ultimate Despair.
• In Episode 11 of Side:Despair, Class 77 are all talking about how they're going to make the world better and happier and bring people joy while they're in full-on brainwashed Despair mode. The implications had already been made that they may not have been entirely in control of their actions as the Remnants of Despair due to Junko's brainwashing, but this takes it even further and hints that they may have thought they were doing good during some of their violence. Sweet Christ.

Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony

• Kaede's death is harsh by itself, but getting to the final trial and figuring out she was innocent makes it even worse. She died believing she caused the death of her friend and her friends watched the cruel and agonizing execution of an innocent person that literally didn't deserve it while the actual blackened was happily living between them.
  • In the demo, Kaede's suspected of a murder she didn't commit (especially since Yasuhiro is apparently faking his death), and uses a lie to deflect suspicion off of Makoto. In the final game, she uses a lie to prevent Shuichi from being suspected, then gets executed for, as mentioned above, a murder she didn't commit.
• The scene where Miu repairs Keebo was already pretty controversial, but after The Reveal that Keebo is a first-person camera, added on that Miu is actually a Reluctant Fanservice Girl that doesn't enjoy having an audience stare at her, as shown in Chapter 2 with this particular CG scene with Gonta, it certainly puts the scene in a whole new light...
  • During Trial 2, Miu tells Gonta (in response to the aforementioned incident of him seeing her undressed) that he should think of her during his next tug session. Come Chapter 4, and, well... Let's say that he was definitely thinking of her while tugging on something.
• Pretty much anything relating to Tsumugi after The Reveal that she's the mastermind of the killing game and true culprit of Chapter 1, having set up Kaede to take the fall for Rantaro's murder. Even their rather cute Love Hotel ending is pretty hard to enjoy knowing that they are actually a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing, while the more Jerkass students got endings that at least stay true to their characters. Made even worse by the fact the they are one of the few "hookups" that Shuichi consents to.
  • What is even more harsher is like the rest of the cast, she ended up crying as Kaede was revealed to be Rantaro's "killer". Knowing that Tsumugi is Rantaro's true killer, it is very likely that these were Crocodile Tears instead of generally not wanting Kaede to be executed.
  • The end of the demo reveals that Makoto, Hajime, and Yasuhiro were all just acting for the audience. In the main game, this turns out to be the entire setup of the killing game (it being a widely broadcast reality show) and all of its participants, only take away "acting" and replace it with "Fake Memories".
  • One of the hidden events takes place during Chapter 1, and involves Tsumugi inviting Kaede to the game room so she can paint her nails, only to run into Rantaro, who turns out to be quite a good nail painter himself. After he steals the spotlight from Tsumugi, her voice clip has her say "Rest in peace." Yeah....
• If Kaito's audition tape (which shows him wanting to be part of the killing game so that he can kill lots of people) turns out to be true, then him being the 5th killer became a lot harder to take. Especially since in-game self didn't even want to kill anyone and the "murder" in question was practically an assisted suicide with the victim fully willing to die, while pre-game Kaito probably wanted to murder someone without their consent.
• Both Super Danganronpa 2 and Ultra Despair Girls featured twists in which the events were a "game" in some form - in the former, it was a simulation like an actual video game setting, and in the latter, the girls' path through the city and the ammo drops were all pre-determined designs, and Danganronpa 3 drew visual comparisons between itself and Ryota's anime when the latter was described at points. All of these examples made heavy use of Leaning on the Fourth Wall dialogue that worked on both an in-universe and meta level. In Danganronpa V3, this is a major part of the plot and Chapter 6's trial has much of said dialogue taken up to eleven, creating a long line of harsh thematic foreshadowing the fandom progressively got less and less accepting of until V3 became the "breaking point" for it in more ways than one.
• As tragic as Gonta's death was, it became a lot sadder once it was revealed that the outside world was just fine meaning that Gonta murdered somebody all because of something that wasn't real in the first place. Assuming Kirumi's motive was also honest not only is she in the same boat but the "responsibilities" she thought she was acting on trying to protect "her nation" were all equally fake.
• Hagakure's side comment about how his "character hadn't been established yet" in the first game can seem a little cringeworthy when paired up with the big reveal of this game.
  • In the first chapter we have a humorous scene where Kaede is stacking books in front of the vent in the library, only to realise Shuichi can see up her skirt. This becomes a lot less funny when you realise Kaede probably intentionally pointed it out to fluster Shuichi and distract him from the fact she was setting up a trap to kill the Mastermind.
  • Remember Kokichi's fake body discovery? It's a good thing he never got a real body discovery right?
• Kaede’s execution has her falling on top of a piano right before getting choked by the Monokubs, then crushed by a giant piano. In real life her Japanese voice actress Sayaka Kanda committed suicide a few years later by jumping to her death.

Spin-offs:

Danganronpa Zero

• Try reading the early scenes with the twist in mind. Suddenly, many of the things stated by Matsuda carries some very disturbing implications.
• The novels portray Ryoko Otonashi's condition and the illness of Matsuda's mother as a heavy topic, especially from Matsuda's perspective. In 2015, Nobuyo Ōyama, Monokuma's Seiyuu, eventually retired from voice acting after being diagnosed with dementia. Some articles even state that she has forgotten about her most famous role: Doraemon.

Danganronpa Another Episode: Ultra Despair Girls

• Pretty much all of the cute Ship Tease between Nagisa and Monaca when one takes what happens later into consideration.
• Komaru's speech in Chapter 4 and her mentioning of "losing something important" seems a bit insensitive toward the adults once we learn more about the TV transmissions. Not only do some of these people have nothing left to lose, but what they did have was taken from them in the most horrific way possible.
• The prologue ends with a cutscene that's basically an execution with Komaru as the victim. Fortunately, she survives (only to get captured, but still...) In a later game, fate would not be so kind to Kaede Akamatsu.

Danganronpa Togami

• Toko accusing Komaru of being in love with her brother became this when Kazuya and Shinobu happened.
• Celeste and Hifumi's surprisingly close relationship in this novel becomes this when you recall that, in Trigger Happy Havoc, they would eventually forget said relationship and Celeste would end up murdering Hifumi.

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