I didn't want to propose the Les Yay because I thought it would make me look like a Yuri Fan Boy. =P But, yeah. That bit just before Erika start to rant about her former boyfriend (or would be girlfriend?) didn't help at all either.
Anyway, nice text. It would be cool if you continued, even though it wouldn't be the same thing. But, heh, you were half right about Jessica and Kanon.
I may end up doing something more similar to my treatment of the first four VNs, which were (1) much terser and (2) often written much after the fact. So, instead of the 20+-instalment-fest that was EP 5, just a couple of posts with the highlights.
Post bit by bit as you read is cooler. However, since you already read everything, I suppose it is better the old way.
BLUH
A shame you couldn't do a stream-of-consciousness LB. (I was looking forward to your WTF?! reactions to Erika and the Big Reveal) Still, your commentaries are fun enough to be worth the wait.
Dead
Erika an absolutely irredeemable complete monster? Sure, she is more evil in EP 6, but I wouldn't call her a complete monster. Specially when the final scenes have her having a friendly chat with Beatrice and Battler.
edited 17th Jul '10 10:36:09 AM by SRC
Dead
Something to take into account when reading my commentary is that I'm a strongly Anti-Fantasy Reader : I want to puzzle out the correct set of "real" events that rationally led to the deaths in each iteration. That's the point of Umineko for me. In that view, the "Magic" and "Meta" scenes are a nice distraction (and a welcome source of hints to the mysteries), but not an end in themselves. I've several times found myself bored during those scenes because of their arbitrariness (the magic duel) or their predictability (the meta climax) and yelled at the screen * for the novel to get on with it and switch back to something more interesting. In contrast, I've never been bored by the investigation and debate sequences.
In that view, I consider that the people on the island are more "real" (and interesting) than the magic people. So when I indict Erika as a Complete Monster, I'm really talking about the shipwrecked girl on the island. And if you take her actions at face value, she's an insane and bloodthirsty sociopath.
The next summary installment should be coming along tomorrow. (Not tonight, as I plan to re-read some of EP 1 to confirm my impression that Battler never saw Shannon and Kanon together.)
Oh, come on, I bet there is a good enough reason for someone to start to kill people they just met by accident. You must give a chance to Erika.
About Shannon and Kanon, that is right. I've reread the beginning of Ep1 recently and I am also pretty sure. I am pretty sure as well that have never see it for the first 4 Episodes neither. It started at Ep5, when he is not, incidentally, the Detective anymore. Also, as far I remember, the twoare never even shown doing something important, or even interacting with (living) people during the same time frame.
edited 1st Oct '13 7:11:51 PM by Heatth
So, er, where were we ? Oh, yeah, Shannon was going on and on about the legends of the witch Beatrice, doing little unnerving things such as opening windows after the servants closed them.
"So, to sum up, rumors of the witch started because you're a klutz who sucks at her job ?" Okay, that was a low blow from Erika, but it was Actually Pretty Funny.
Ensues an epic debate between Erika and Maria (who soon morphs into MARIA) about the existence of magic. In another demonstration of needless cruelty, Erika tears through MARIA's arguments and brings the poor little girl to tears. Dlanor assures us that "this arguments is entirely UNNECESSARY", but I beg to differ, as it finally states clearly how magic works on the gameboard. Yes, it's only Erika's opinion, but it's confirmed by pretty much everyone else during the course of the VN.
Here's how it goes : Beatrice's magic trick for Maria works because Maria closes her eyes while it happens. Leaving ample room for Beatrice to smuggle in the candy while she isn't looking. Erika can easily reproduce it, and she does. More generally, magic can only work if an human could have done the same thing through rational means. Which means that magic is just an embellishment of the stuff actually happening. It had already been heavily implied, but it goes better with it being clearly established as a ground rule for the game. Of course, this means that the Game Master's task is fiendishly difficult, as he must come up with "impossible" murders that can still be explained rationally.
After this discussion, the group comes back to the guestroom. And nobody's keen to stay with the unpleasant Erika, who's stuck talking with Kumasawa for a while.
Because Game-Master!Battler just loves —ing with Erika, her guest room is now very far from the cousins' room (so no listening on them !) and there's not a strip of usable tape in the whole island. Eh. Erika ups the ante by refusing to make the detective proclamation, robbing herself from the power of the red. Why ? Because this way she's in a weaker position than in EP 5, so if she wins this rematch the overall balance of the games will be in her favor.
Oh, and we also have a flashback to her sob-story of an origin story. Which isn't much : she got 96 instances of proof that her boyfriend was cheating on her, which apparently broke her heart. I'm completely unmoved, especially considering her history of misinterpreting facts on purpose, and downright fabricating evidence when needed.
Meanwhile, we get the usual "pledge of love" scene between Shannon and George... except he's even more goddarn creepy than usual in this one. He reveals that Shannon first caught his attention while Battler was flirting with her six years or so ago, and decided to conquer her from that point on, remaking himself into someone she'd love. Er, right.
Kanon and Jessica have a similar scene later on... except that Kanon goes on and on about how he's not human and needs magic for their love to work. He's still got half of the butterfly jewel given by Beatrice, but he needs Shannon's half for it to work. You know what this means : magic duel !
Enter Furfur and Zepar, the two demons of love briefly shown in the wedding flashforward. Reading their description again, I now note that they're siblings of opposite sexes. Er, it's far from obvious which is which. Anyway, they'll offer one of the couples a chance at love, in exchanges of a few trials. And just to make things more confusing, new!Beato enters the fray, as she needs magic to become complete too. Her partner, of course, is Game-Master!Battler, who's by now stopped seeing her as a failed Replacement Goldfish and genuinely supports her quest to become like her former incarnation.
First trial : each lover must kill someone to prove their love. Uh oh. George goes first, and ambushes Eva, the main obstacle to his romance. Awesome martial arts ass-kicking ensues for a while. He succeeds, of course.
Then comes Jessica's turn. She targets Kyrie more or less at random (the parents' discussion has reached a pause by then). Kyrie's love pep-talk to Jessica is... quite disturbing, as she once again goes on and on about how Asumu was a Manipulative Bastard and that Kyrie was about to kill her when she died on her own. Moral of the story : do anything for your love. If that implies for Jessica to ambush Kyrie out of the blue (she's seen through her excuse for being in the mansion), so be it, but don't expect Kyrie to go without a fight. And a pretty good fight it indeed is. (Jessica wins, of course.)
No such drama for Kanon, who swiftly and quietly kills Rosa in the parlor room. Too bad Maria was in the same room... But then Shannon appears, and even the combined might of MARIA and Sakutarou (negating all attacks on Maria) aren't enough to counter her Lethal Harmless Powers. Ouch.
Meanwhile, new!Beato gets the better of Natsuhi in her bedroom. As for Game-Master!Battler... he's done his part.
...
It's a few hours after midnight, and the parents discover the series of corpses. Eva in the guest suite (where George supposedly moved her corpse after their fight), Kyrie in Krauss's study (where she uselessly barricaded herself during her fight with Jessica), Maria and Rosa in the parlor room, Natsuhi in her bedroom... and Battler in another guest room. Interestingly, the "master key" puzzle is completely bypassed, as all the rooms are closed from the inside with a chain. (The parlour room doesn't have a doorchain, but the coat-hanger serves the same purpose.
Your move, Erika.
"keionbu ni yokusou, nyan?"
Erika's first instinct is to profit from the confusion to investigate the crimes scenes for a bit. However, without the Detective status she has to walk around the adults and has neither the time nor the means to even identify whether the victims are really dead. She's good, but not THAT good.
Erika does manage, though, to have a conversation with Krauss, Hideyoshi and Rudolf to convince them that the servants are especially suspect. (The point of using the doorchains is to clear the master key holders from suspicion, and who benefits from that, indeed ?) Darn, even without the Detective prerogative she's one smooth talker. She even convinces everybody to hole up in two rooms in the guesthouse (Kanon, Genji, Gohda, Krauss, Rudolf and Jessica in the cousins' bedroom ; Shannon, Kumasawa, Dr Nanjo, Hideyoshi, George and herself in the next room *).
Side note : Rudolf yet again complains that he didn't have time to discuss something really important with Kyrie and Battler. This is turning into a Running Gag by this point...
By the way, Hideyoshi raises an interesting question : why was Gohda the only servant on duty in the mansion that night ? The former explanation was that he's the only one Krauss and Natsuhi trust, but that's bollocks : he's actually the only servant not in the "let's keep Kinzo alive" conspiracy, so I rather think they don't trust him at all. So why ?
But first, let's do some meta-investigation. Battler gracefully confirms that Each of the victims was alone in their respective room when the adults forced their way in ; only Krauss, Hideyoshi, Rudolf and Gohda entered those rooms until Erika checked the rooms ; none of those four adults are the culprit. It is of course impossible to close the door-chains from the outside, and to enter or leave the rooms through any other way than their respective front door.
None of which is really great news for Erika, despite her cheerful mood when she reports her findings to Bernkastel. Her master is obviously irritated, and ponders sending her to oblivion without even waiting for her inevitable failure. Seeing this, Battler takes pity for Erika, and is kind enough to offer her enough tape to seal three rooms, with even the ability to put it into place retroactively. That's no substitute for the Detective status (or even enough to seal all the murder scenes), but it gives her a fighting chance, eh ?
As soon as Battler has stepped out of the room, Erika announces that everything is going Exactly As Planned : the whole thing was an act to trick Battler in giving out the tape at no price whatsoever. Especially considering the rules for the Game Master : sure, he can readjust his scenario as must as he wants after Erika's alterations, but if she can point out a logic error (a mismatch between the "real" and "magic" scenarios), it's even worse than a loss for him : he'll have to spend eternity trying to solve the contradiction.
"You know, I wasn't acting..." Dear gods, Bernkastel, we know you're playing it both ways for your own entertainment, you don't have to repeat it every ten minutes...
Back to the guest house. The reason why Erika had everyone separate into two rooms is that it makes her next trick very easy : she pretends she still has something to ask Krauss, and steps out of one room purposely to go to the other (and spend the night there). She plays up Hideyoshi's paranoia so that he closes the door very quickly, and now she's free to wander through the domain as she wishes without anyone the wiser !
First things first : she seals both of the rooms with tape. And has it confirmed that the "victims" are each in the room they were found in, while Shannon, Kumasawa, Dr Nanjo, Hideyoshi and George are in the next room other. After some prodding, Battler even agrees to say that EVERYONE ELSE besides Erika is in the Cousins' bedroom. That's interesting wording (after EP 3, she's careful about enumerations of people), and seems to favor the witch's side (as Erika is now the only character wandering around), but obviously she's got a plan.
Just as she steps out from the guesthouse, Erika finds a letter proclaiming that Battler's body has disappeared. It wasn't there when she entered, of course. Erika isn't very interested in pursuing the matter of the letter's provenance, as it's actually perfect for her plans : you see, she's retroactively sealed Battler's murder scene just after she examined it. Oh, Crap!. Either Battler loses some face and announces the seals are broken, or he persists in his original scenario, with a high risk of logic error. Ouch.
Erika makes a run for Battler's murder scene. It's still sealed. As Erika enters the room, the whole scene goes into bullet time or something, allowing both debates to adjust their theories on the fly. The guest bedroom is made of a main bedroom and a bathroom. Erika starts by investigating the whole bedroom apart from one place ; she can't find Battler's corpse. (Mate in two moves, both players announce.) Erika then enters the bathroom... and is distracted by the water hose drenching her as she enters. Battler's corpse isn't there either. That leaves the one place in the bedroom she hasn't investigated : the closet. Of course, while she's been busy in the bathroom, a not-really-dead-Battler would have had ample time to leave the room. Battler isn't in the guest room anymore.
But wait ! Erika had sealed the door with the door-chain ! If you're wondering how she had set it after it having been broken down by the adults, well, you'll note that "enough tape to seal one room" doesn't specify how many times one can seal the room with it. She just fixed the doorchain with tape. And is now proclaiming a logic error on Battler's part.
Lambdadelta steps in as referee. She checks with Battler, who to his credit has a counter-scenario : Kyrie might have faked her death, entered the guest room while Erika was in the bathroom, let Battler exit, re-sealed the doorchain, and hid somewhere.
Kyrie can't have helped Battler out of the guest room. Wait, since when can Erika speak the red truth ? She's made no detective proclamation ! How can she be so sure of Kyrie's death ? And then I, the Reader, connect the dots and realize the horrible truth. The monster !
What about Eva ? Rosa ? Maria ? Natsuhi ? Nope, they can't help Battler either. You see, this is the real reason why Erika didn't make the detective proclamation : this way, she had her hands free to make sure those five were really dead. By killing them herself. If you inspect those crime scenes now, you'll find the bloody plastic bags she used to cover her clothes and not sully them with blood.
Erika helpfully confirms that none of the five were initially really dead, and that the whole thing started as a prank against her. Well WHO'S LAUGHING NOW ?
You'll also note that Erika also made sure that the 11 "alive" people couldn't help either. (Dlanor confirms that the seals on the two rooms' doors are still INTACT.) So, how could Battler have escaped ? LOGIC ERROR !
Now, this is not the end for Game-Master!Battler. If he can find a way to get himself out of this room while still putting back the chain behind himself, that would break the logic error. But until he does, he's trapped in this guest room for all infinity. Yep, that explains all those obscure scenes about someone trying to escape the same room.
But that's just Game-Master!Battler's mind. His body's still around, kinda like BSOD!Beato from EP 5. Which leads to the opening wedding sequence, a masquerade wherein Erika is about to take over the game board and be promoted to full Witch and Game Master status.
...
Your move, Beato.
I just want to say that it is always nice to see the thoughts of someonelse on this. Though I am most likely pro-fantasy(it just makes things prettier and does not tie into Higurashi as well in someways both are pros by the way in my mind) I have always made sure to try and think it though from the mortal side even if after a certain point it is not actually easier to side with magic. Actually there is a scene in episode 6 possibly several I cannot quite remember where it is pretty heavily hinted that the author dislikes people who read without thinking immensely. In an unrelated note episode 6 killed one of my favourite theories surrounding the mystery vs. fantasy debate.
edited 24th Oct '10 6:20:32 PM by Kavoir
According to a fairly recent ad campaign anyway.
BLUH
And here I'd thought there'd been an update. Oh, well.
What was your theory, and what killed it?
Hmmm well it was a theory about the nature of the game so it does not really matter and it was more the whole episode I would also rather keep specific posting about the game out of a live blog thread if it is alright with you but if you can direct me to a discussion or even more appropriately a forum version of wild mass guessing I would be glad to answer you there. I am sorry for any inconvience this causes you or anyonelse.
edited 25th Oct '10 4:35:39 PM by Kavoir
According to a fairly recent ad campaign anyway.
For information, I have no problem with discussing theories here, as long as there are absolutely no EP 7 spoilers (even under spoiler tags). I don't plan on writing the last instalment of this liveblog anytime soon (it's been three months, my memories are too fuzzy by now), but I know how EP 6 ends.
It's pretty obvious to me that Erika and Dlanor's relationship go goes beyond a purely professional level.
I've just remembered I did start writing something up a few days ago :
The sixth game opens with Shannon and Kanon preparing the guesthouse. Shannon tells Kanon about George's planned proposal and that she will accept it, which gives Kanon the impetus to finally confess his feelings to Jessica. He goes with Gohda to meet the relatives at the dock, and everyone remarks his much sunnier disposition. Kanon manages to be alone with Jessica in the gardens, and confesses to her. Jessica's more than happy, and reprocitates. Both Jessica and us learn Kanon's real name : Yoshiya. Of course, Kanon still needs some time to make his affairs in order, but Jessica'll wait.
Those two are SO DEAD.
New!Beato has been listening to all this, and wishes she had such intimacy with "Father" (i.e. Battler). She resolves to learn as much as possible about the former Beato in order to become her and please Battler. Kumawasa agrees to help her, morphs into Virgilia and leads her to... Featherine's library, which has accounts of all the previous games. New!Beato is put into the care of Featherine's assistant... ANGE-Beatrice. Awkward.
Now, don't get me wrong : Ange actually quite respects new!Beato. But she's not really looking forward to this innocent girl becoming the bitch she hates. Despite her misgivings, though, she starts reading the past games' account with new!Beato (she's curious about the transformation too, after all).
We switch to an horrible storm, and I'm delighted to hear "Patchwork Chimera" as Erika ditches her lifejacket and lands on the island. So delightfully creepy...
Erika's even more of an annoying guest as before, proclaiming her intellectual superiority over everyone else. George tries to defuse the situation by holding a riddle contest, but it horribly backfires as Erika steamrolls through it. She does lose her nerve, though, when Battler finds the best solution at the "what's the minimum number of times you have to cut cheese to get 8 slices ?" riddle *.
Back to the person locked in the room... they try breaking the window with a chair, but the hole in the glass isn't enough to let them pass... And the glass is growing back, trapping their left hand ! To make matters worse, the witch is just outside (though they can't see her) and BITES one of their fingers. Ouch.
"Hey, did you hear something ?" Sorry, kids, the plot obviously doesn't want you finding that room yet. It's time to go back to the guesthouse and sleep. Erika stops for a while near Beatrice's portrait, which is an occasion for Shannon and the kids to share some witch stories.
Meanwhile, new!Beato has read all the tales about Beatrice, and still has no clue how to become her. She is sent to a few years in the past, where she finds older!Beato... who doesn't look any older than her, but whatever (older!Beato looks a lot like "Beatrice" from EP 2, but with longer hair). They're obviously both incomplete parts of the real Beato, with older!Beato having the meanness and the budding magic power (although she's not that happy about having to fuse with new!Beato). Older!Beato shows how she's building back her magic power, causing enough disturbances for the rumors about a witch to grow.
Eh, I was right on Kanon (kinda), and wrong on Jessica.
Do not expect this level of detail if I ever get around to writing up the rest.