Discussion Characters / Danganronpa2GoodbyeDespair

Except Komaeda is literally played up as the closest thing to a Love Interest for Hinata in the entire game. Hell, we had an aborted confession from Komaeda in his final free-time event. An aborted love confession. Not to mention there are some things that don't add up, like Tsumiki (someone who should have been jumping for joy at the chance to help Hinata after he passed out on the beach) leaving Hinata behind in the prologue, which left Komaeda alone to be the first person you actually have a meaningful conversation with, not to mention Komaeda is the first character we see in the entire game, even before Hinata himself. That's classic Anime Love Interest Introduction b.s.

As for Dangan Island, you seem to be really mistaken. Dangan Island is confirmed to be canon by the game devs. Yes, it's an alternate universe, but it's a canon alternate universe, meaning the events may not be canon to the main storyline, but the characterization and character development are. The entire point of Dangan Island is to show more about the characters that can't be shown in a toxic environment like the mutual killing game, as well as characters that died sooner than others.

Komaeda only wanting to be friends with Hinata at the end of his Dangan Island ending has no impact on whether or not he has feelings for Hinata. In fact, it's likely because of his feelings that he friendzoned him, whether out of fear of Hinata's safety, or because Komaeda himself didn't want to face his true feelings for Hinata. He's not incapable of moving beyond friendship at all — it was a personal choice not to.

There are too many stereotypical Love Interest things between Komaeda and Hinata for Komaeda to not be considered a serious Love Interest, but at the same time, it's zig-zagged so much that it makes him both the Love Interest and the Not-Love Interest. Just like Komaeda, it's pretty complicated.

(I'm the troper who first added Not Love Interest hi)

...Um? Komaeda is the same guy in both situations; Dangan Island just goes to show that his behavior in the game really was founded on circumstance rather than an inherently malicious nature, which is something Nanami attests to in the chapter 5 trial. Dangan Island appears in the game, so while the story events are not considered canon, the characters are still, well, in-character.

That being said, I agree that it doesn't necessarily mean he isn't the love interest. Rather, it just adds to how the trope is zig-zagged. He's certainly not a straight-up love interest, though his feelings for Hinata are canon and he certainly is the closest thing there is to one. If I absolutely had to put a yes or no answer on it I'd go with yes because even in Dangan Island there's plenty of subtext, but a shrug and a "kind of, maybe" is a bit more appropriate.

On a few side notes...

1. Whoever added that 'Nanami' is Hinata's love interest: please do not. Not only are you disregarding the importance of a same-sex relationship with far more going for it in terms of evidence by doing so (which isn't canon either lol), but there's no substantial textual indication for their relationship being anything more than platonic. Just because Hinata and Nanami are the most important male and female character and they have a meaningful relationship, they automatically want to make out? Mild incidents of Ship Tease that don't hint at any deeper romantic feelings do not a "heavily implied" canon couple make. If anything, they'd just get a spot in a Ship Tease entry, but Hinata has ship tease with other characters too, so don't leave them out. Owari, Koizumi, some instances of Ho Yay with Kuzuryuu and Souda... and that's not to even mention Komaeda, but that's not exactly ship TEASE in the strictest sense of the trope most of the time, so I don't know where that would go.

2. Hinata does not refer to Komaeda as "that bastard" after the chapter 5 trial; the translation this is based on is a frequently inaccurate that should absolutely not be cited for nuances in wording. The word he uses is the third-person pronoun "aitsu," which he uses for 'everyone.' "That bastard" is a valid translation in certain contexts, but in this one, you'd be best off with just "he/him." Even the girls. So basically this is the same as saying "when talking to Komaeda he uses 'omae,' a rude second-person pronoun, therefore he dislikes him" when it's just... his pronoun of choice.

Thanks for both responding. When I wrote the thing though, the problem I had was what piddleworth pointed out. You said you wrote zig-zag. That's fine but then someone went on to add how it was eventually subverted because of how Komaeda didn't ask Hinata to be his boyfriend in Dangan Island and got really confused because "so what if he wants to be friends with Hinata in Dangan Island? That doesn't change the canon material and the main game?"

Plus someone was adding how Hinata was in love with Nanami and I was frustrated because while I know what happens, I don't have the exact dialogue to see if it was a confirmation or not. But now that i know its obviously pairing bias, I'll remember to delete that when I see it next time because I'm pretty sure there wasn't anything that showed that Hinata liked Nanami in that way. Like he does as a friend and the final scene with her encouragement is important but at the end of the day, I felt that was shoved on to be identical to Makoto and Kirigiri being the main male and female character.

Plus I didn't know if Monobear mocked Hinata for Komaeda's feelings. I'm reading that Monobear mocked that during the 5th trial but i can't confirm it.

Then I knew Hinata would never refer to Komaeda as that bastard. It's out of character and makes Hinata fall into that "Hinata is a jerk" meme characterization again. (And it wouldn't make sense to refer to Komaeda as a bastard after Komaeda got murdered. Like yeah I would be angry for the whole bomb thing but then to see him dead in such a horrible manner wouldn't warrant such swearing).

That's another thing that kind of annoys me. Gundam murders under a bad circumstance and Komaeda probably did the same thing yet Gundam is so sympathetic while with Komaeda its like "..."

Thanks for the clarifications though on what was there originally and what wasn't there when I made the post. It really pisses me off how the yaoi pairing gets labeled as less important if there happens to be a female character that is important to the story like the protagonist. :/

Yeah, that wasn't me. I'm not really sure who that was, but I edited it as soon as I caught it. Actually, iirc, they said it was subverted because of Komaeda's actions in chapter 5, which... isn't really it either. At any rate, yeah, not subverted, still zig-zagged as ever. We'll have to see if they make cameos in DR 3 or something to decide what to finally make of it, I guess.

The extent of the ship tease they get in the main game is Hinata getting mildly flustered at seeing Nanami in a bikini. Her freetimes get a bit more shippy, in which she says she doesn't know how to fall in love, but not really overtly so, and her final voiced line is about remembering her after they leave the island. Besides, Nanami would be far from the only character to express romantic interest in Hinata during FT Es (see: komaeda, obviously, but also koizumi).

To be perfectly fair, after taking a quick look at the original, the ship tease in that line MIGHT be a mistranslation, I'm not sure. On first glance it looks something more like "upupu, the power of friendship burns even in death, this really is like a hot development from a shounen manga, huh?" which... leaves it kind of ambiguous how "hot" is used here, exactly, and there's no "forget about friendship." The translation we have for chapters 5 and 6 is really unreliable. He certainly mocked their friendship in his usual fashion, but I'm not sure it was ship tease in the original, exactly. This matter would probably require a native speaker to iron out, or at least someone more fluent than myself.

Yeah, the "aitsu" thing is just how he normally refers to everyone, and there... actually isn't anything indicating Hinata held a significant grudge towards him after that chapter—that seems to be the fandom projecting, unless I'm forgetting something. I'm not sure I'd say the Gundam issue is exactly the same, though.

No problem! It bugs me too, and I have no idea where "lol Hinanami is canon" even came from. Regardless, this isn't even about shipping (neither is canon tbh) so much as just actually being able to tell what's going on between characters when you're writing down what should be objective information about them, holy fuck.

I know this discussion's old, but there's something about it that bothers me. And I'm keeping my own shipping preferences out of it before I'm accused of such.

I'll be honest, I'm not liking this whole "Komaeda is (the closest to being) Hinata's love interest" claim. Mainly because I've played through the game more then once and I've never seen anything that hints at it in the plot proper. The Free Time Events certainly shouldn't be used to claim this because the FT Es between all the girls but Peko will imply they have romantic feelings for Hinata by the end of theirs. But it's likely that they don't all love him in canon. The FT Es are more like side things that don't cross over with canon itself. And if we're going with canon itself, Komaeda's behavior towards Hinata after learning he's just a reserve course student and not a SHSL/Ultimate seems to shoot any potential feelings Komaeda had for Hinata out of the water. Plus there's no real canon evidence that shows Hinata seeing him more as a friend, if even that. I'm not saying he hates him intensely, but the Chapter 1 trial definitely took whatever close bond they had and strained it.

Really, there is no "love interest" for Hinata. If we're talking subtext, then one could easily argue Nanami or Komaeda could be it, but it's no more than Ship Tease in the end. I mean, Kirigiri isn't really Naegi's love interest so why should either of these characters be pinned as Hinata's? People just seem to be claiming these characters must be love interests when they aren't, and that's the fandom's problem.

You mean the fact that he tried to commit a murder?

It should probably be considered a spoiler, yeah. It ends up being important to his characterization, but it's still a pretty major twist in the first chapter, kind of like the revelation that Sayaka had attempted murder and planned to frame Makoto for it before she was killed in the first game. Since that's under a spoiler tag in the entry for the first game, I'd say this should be too.

I personally would keep it under spoilers to people who aren't aware of the plot twist.

Looks like Oecchi answered your plea. Thanks Oecchi.