WMG / Ace Attorney

Put Wild Mass Guessing specific to these games in the appropriate subpages:

• Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney
• Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth
• Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Dual Destinies
• Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Spirit of Justice
• The Great Ace Attorney
• Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney

Wild Mass Guessing about the rest of the series

The Universe in General

Manfred Von Karma was originally a good person.

Manfred was originally a moral and cairing person with a high sense of justice, who wanted to become a prosecutor to fight for the truth and support victims of crimes, rather than just to win; but due to an extremely traumatic experience, his mental health plummeted, he started developing mental illnesses; went into a state of bitter hatred and depression and started developing pathelogical perfectionist tendancies. His family broke contact with him as they believed that the original Manfred they knew and loved had died. He killed himself in prison after the events of Turnabout Goodbyes due to realizing what he had become.

Borginian sounds like a mix of Indian and Celtic.

The way Lamirior's singing (and her songs) are described makes (at least me) think of songs sung by Enya or Sissel, or the kinds of songs one would find on a Celtic Woman CD. Something borderline unearthly, clear, natural (No not in reference to auto-tune, but as in to nature itself), and beautiful. Her attire also resembles the sort of thing you'd find in a music video for such a song. However, Zinc Lablanc's character, natively Borginian, implies that Borginia has Indian roots as well, as his attire and leitmotif are based on such. The language of Borginian possibly sounds like what Indian and Celtic would sound like if they were brought together as one language, and possibly a touch of another language since "J" in Borginian is evidently said like "Y", since Machi calls Apollo "Apollo Yoostis". Possibly Finnish?

The Ace Attorney series takes place in an alternate universe where the Nazis won.

Why, yes, I do have decisive evidence. Consider:

• The legal system seems more appropriate to a fascistic dictatorship.
• Even though the games are set a few decades in the future, no visible change in technology has occurred, suggesting that some horrific, long war turned back the clock.
• When a Prosecutor from Germany visits LA, he or she is treated with extreme deference, and may be assumed to be familiar with the US legal system... perhaps because the US and German legal systems are now one and the same. The same goes for German rock stars.
  • The US and German legal systems aren't one and the same. You can become a lawyer at a younger age in Germany. The youngest in austria being 25 and even that is a rarity. In 2005 the youngest prosecutor until then was 37.
  • OBJECTION! That is because is in the Germans' best interest to have more GERMAN law enforcers, ergo they allow them to become prosecutors at a younger age
• And most tellingly, given that this is LA, where are all the minorities? There aren't any.
• Except for the Japanese. Aha.
  • OBJECTION! If this is so, explain how Dee Vasquez, Juan Corrida, and Diego Armando not only exist, but were able to become successful at their respective jobs? Also, I'm not sure what Damon Gant is, but he is certainly neither white nor Japanese!
    • There's a simple answer for this, and it also helps explain why the Nazis won. Remember that message Germany tried to send to Mexico during World War I, encouraging them to attack the US? In this AU, they got it. And followed it.
    • But then it wouldn't be the Nazis winning, it would be the German Empire.
  • That may be so, but the defense would like to point out that during the Holocaust, there was also rampant persecution of homosexuals. Explain the continued existence of half the damn cast.
    • In this AU, Ho Yay is outlawed. That's why there aren't any explicitly established homosexuals in the cast. Not even Jean.
    • OBJECTION! Jean flirts with and only tolerates flirting from male characters! Combine this with the decor of his restaurant and his eccentric dress, and you have no other explanation but homosexuality!
    • He's French illegal immigrant. In AU's, everything is possible.
    • Ironically enough, there are conspiracy theories amongst certain circles about Nazis being supportive of masculine homosexuality.
  • Game 3 case 1 mentions both the Union Jack and "stars and stripes" still exist, how would this be if the Nazis took over?
    • It's a common misconception that the goal of Nazi Germany was world domination, or even domination of Europe. They supported fascism elsewhere, and definitely wanted to set up Western Europe as client states and recolonize, but they never actually seriously set out to conquer the world.
    • Even if they conquered the world, states need flags too.
• Incidentally, Apollo Justice takes place in another alternate universe where the Nazis lost, but the Soviets won. Think about it. The AJ courtroom has plain red flags, and Apollo wears all red and says its his favorite color. Hmm...
  • The game is Japanese, remember? Maybe it's an alternate universe where Germany held out long enough for America to have to drop the atomic bombs on Berlin and another German city, so Japan didn't surrender, and the Soviets carried out their planned invasion?
  • HOLD IT! The existence of Dual Destinies has made it clear that Apollo and Phoenix live in the same universe. How do you explain the theory that they STILL take place in different alternate universes?
• In several places (particularly from T&T Case 5 and in AA Case 4) you can see a string of flags held up around the place, both in Gourd Lake Public Beach (only at a specific point in the case) and Heavenly Hall. You can clearly see both Germany and the US's flag. The Nazis (should they have won or remained in power by not being defeated) should have kept their flag if this was the case. Here, I'd like to make a counter proposal to the theory, of which one of three things could be possible. Either the Nazis -were- defeated but the Flensburg Government was recognized as legitimate somehow; two, WWII stretched on for a longer period of time and ended up with a military stalemate as a possible result of the Nazis NOT invading Russia and conserving their manpower, or three... the fascism experienced in America is a result of the Business Plot of 1933.. except that America has its own ideology of fascism that differs to the left instead of right.
  • OBJECTION! ** Jossed. Janet Hsu, the game localiser says: while “Gyakuten Saiban” takes place in Japan, the Los Angeles that “Ace Attorney” takes place in is an alternate universe where anti-Japanese sentiments and anti-immigrant laws were not enacted, and Japanese culture was allowed to flourish and blend into the local culture in the same manner as other immigrant cultures.'

Okay, everything from 'Godot is' onwards is complete nonsense. But I'm sticking with the theory about Apollo.

• Ridiculous! Matsuda is obviously Meekins, not Gumshoe!
• Objection! Matsuda is Gumshoe. they are both pretty much useless except for crowning moments of awesome, very cheerful and constantly scolded by their superiors (Aizawa and Edgeworth).

The "legal system" in the games is, in fact, an aspect of the afterlife where the people are judged for their sins.

Though the lawyers in the system don't know it, they're in fact tasked with helping the process of judging people who have died, to decide whether they're good and go to heaven, or bad and go to hell.

• HOLD IT! If this is true, how could Edgeworth and Phoenix both be put on trial, be found not guilty, and then continue to defend/prosecute?
  • OBJECTION! Because they're lawyers, and very good lawyers at that - if we're dealing with people's souls here, wouldn't the Powers That Be want to hold on to two of their most effective and scrupulous employees? This could also explain Edgeworth's "suicide" note and disappearance, which turned out to only be a year-long journey of personal discovery; as well as the fact that Phoenix can fall into a freezing river, at night, in winter, from which very few bodies are ever recovered, and survive with nothing worse than some bruises and a cold. They're so valuable that they literally cannot die. The real question is why there are recurring defendants.
• Clerical Errors, after all, all bureaucracies make mistakes at times.
  • OBJECTION! ::mug slides into hand:: ::sips:: Then how do you explain ::close-up, speed lines background:: ...the repeated channeling of Mia Fey's deceased spirit?!
    • ...well? How do you explain what?
  • Simple. Mia Fey... never existed in the Celestial Bureaucracy!! She was simply planted into the minds of Phoenix et al to facilite their efforts, and to act as a focal point by The Powers That Be to exert their will and avoid mistrials!
  • HOLD IT! Mia Fey is obviously still alive while everyone else is dead.
  • HOLD IT! A spirit who has been summoned back to purgatory
    • She got promoted out of the game (between the flashback cases and 1-2) and was used as a "trial by fire" for Phoenix to prove he was ready. She can still give him help, but only cryptic, practically useless hints (there are rules about this sort of thing). Perhaps every lawyer in the game has a "spirit" helping them. Fransiska could have her father, Edgeworth, maybe his father, Godot might have Mia as well, and Apollo? He has Phoenix. He doesn't need a spirit aid.
• OBJECTION! The defense has yet to explain one basic flaw in his reasoning, namely that Phoenix Wight was put on trial before he became a lawyer!
  • OBJECTION! Simple: Phoenix died, was put on trial, and the almighty deities who control the system found potential in Wright and made him an attorney.
• This particular trope amuses me, in part, because it can also be argued to be rather close to the original Jewish plot of the Book of Job. (For those unaware: in the traditional Jewish viewpoint, it is far less of a bet between God and Satan and rather a case of humanity itself being put on trial—with Job being the defendant/defense attorney representing humanity as a whole, God being the judge, and ha-Satan being the prosecuting attorney—right down to using curses as "cross examination", using Job's best friends as a form of attempted witness against the defense, and so on.)
  • Some modern (Christian) Biblical researchers even have pointed out Satan has a traditional characterisation not unlike Miles Edgeworth before his Heel–Face Turn—an overzealous prosecuting attorney willing to do anything to win a case.
    • ... And Edgeworth wears red, the traditional colours of Satan/hell/devils/etc.
  • And this pretty much makes this trope officially Older Than Feudalism.
  • OBJECTION! What are the murder victims then?
    • People who are still alive.
    • Spirits who are undoubtedly going to heaven or hell?
    • Made up people to create an excuse for the dead people to be put on trial.
  • NOT SO FAST! (That's more fun than it should be.) Let's say that a group of people who die in roughly the same timespan, a day or two, all enter the afterlife together. Their collective good and evil get mingled together thus masking who belongs in Heaven or Hell. The "trials" are designed for the lawyers to comb through the tangles and reveal the true nature of the dead souls.
  • Then you would get the entire plot of Death Parade. Except in a court room.

The series takes place in a totalitarian dictatorship; the trials are just for show

Let's sum up the facts. Guns are nearly impossible to obtain. Only incompetents seem to actually hold any job. Even self-defense with significan1t extenuating circumstances begets a death sentence. Any sort of courtroom antic is allowed, and let's face it, not only on the side of the prosecution. Prosecutors can taunt, insult, even whip the defense, not to mention the witness and/or the judge. Obvious shams of accusations are leveled at clearly innocent people, who remain guilty until proven otherwise. And the defense attorney(s) themselves seem to be easily-intimidated scaredycats.

• The only thing that remains strange is how can the actual guilty parties get sentenced and the innocent cleared. It's possibly just the dictators' reward for a "good show". Keep everyone entertained and on the edge of their seats (panem et circenses...), and you actually get to indict the guilty parties. Fail, and, well, the first guy they see pays for the crime.
  • You are the button-pressing overlord at whose beck and call sprites dance. All insults leveled at Phoenix are in fact slights against the player. You and your allies are the defense, the prosecution is the enemy. Phoenix Wright is the avatar of Defense, and the dictator is the avatar of Prosecution. You, the player, pull the strings behind Defense. Capcom pulls the strings behind Prosecution. Ultimately, you are playing a zero sum game with the developers in the catbird seat, for they determine whether you can win.
• Note on the gun issue: The game was originally set in Japan, where it is rather hard (read: Damn near impossible) to legally acquire a gun if you're not a police officer.

Japan colonized California in the past

Think about it. The culture of the Los Angeles region is very Japanese, including several highly influential families of Japanese heritage (the Feys, the Kitakis, the Amanos). This would explain not only the presence of a zaibatsu and yakuza (okay they have no problems in the real world, actually), but also the hundreds of years that Kurain Village (and Medium Valley) has apparently been present in the mountains above L.A. Not to mention the myths of the Yatagarasu which were eventually used too.Japan must have avoided the policy of sakoku in exchange for a policy of colonization during the Edo period. This gives plenty of time for the cultural roots to have been laid down. Eventually they probably gave up their territory (or lost it in war) to the expanding U.S. and the descendants of settlers just decided to stick around and intermarry. But they kept borrowing things from their original home, such as tokusatsu, ramen stands, etc.

• So, in a sense... Ace Attorney takes place in the same universe as The Man in the High Castle.
  • Jossed. Janet Hsu, the game localiser says: while “Gyakuten Saiban” takes place in Japan, the Los Angeles that “Ace Attorney” takes place in is an alternate universe where anti-Japanese sentiments and anti-immigrant laws were not enacted, and Japanese culture was allowed to flourish and blend into the local culture in the same manner as other immigrant cultures.'

Earth has undergone an environmental disaster

The L.A. area is shown having heavy snow in a few cases. While this is perfectly understandable for up in the mountains, the amount of snow on the ground in 2-3 at the Big Berry Circus is far from normal for the lower L.A. area which rarely even gets a dusting of snow (and no one really comments on it). Therefore, the climate must be radically changed by some natural or human-caused event. Maybe even the Second Impact...

The Ace Attorney series as we know it is a set of alternate universes that split with the existence of "Rise from the Ashes", the DS-exclusive 5th case.

In the second game, Edgeworth is stated as never having done another case after the incident with Von Karma. This is clearly contradicted by the fifth case of the first game, so one can only assume the fifth case only exists in an alternate continuity that runs through the other games, including Ace Attorney 4. The original continuity only goes up to three, and ends there, presumably with Phoenix never being disbarred in some series of events we cannot know.The origin of the tangent universe is the birth of Ema Skye. She was never born in the original universe, and was in fact created by Schala from Chrono Cross upon hearing the screams of Lana Skye being sentenced to death without anybody to give a good lawyerly representation for her. Hence the creation of Ema, a clone who looks nothing like Schala (see Kid.) This also explains why Lana was so cold to Ema before the events of the trial – she didn't exist, and the false memories only went back so far.For those who say this is a completely overcomplicated explanation that makes no sense, you've obviously never had anything to do with Chrono Cross.

• Yet more 'Nickwank' *tallies*
• Ezekiel finds this explanation both straightforward and logical.
• OBJECTION! If Ema Skye did not exist, then Damon Gant would have had no hold over Lana concerning the murder of her fellow detective. The only reason he could blackmail her is because she was worried that Ema would be found guilty of that very murder! Or are you suggesting she's the kind of person that can turn a blind eye to injustice for the sake of her own career? For that matter, without having Ema in the room as a scapegoat and a way to get an emotional stranglehold on Lana, Gant would have had no immediate reason to kill Detective Marshall, which means he wouldn't have committed the murder of Detective Goodman either. True, he might have manipulated Lana some other way, but the point is that case 1-5 would never have happened.
• Ack! Well...what if case 5 and the SL-9 Incident never happened at all? Then Gant would never become Police Chief. But perhaps he was given a chance to change history so that he WAS Police Chief. But, because it is a Monkey's Paw alternate universe, him becoming the police chief also resulted in him becoming a blackmailing murderer]]
  • HOLD IT! Alternatively, in the first run-through, Lana was found guilty. Over the course of the next two games, Ema realized that Phoenix Wright would be able to save her and so built a time machine to send back a note to herself telling her to go find him, thus created an altered timeline which eventually led to the Apollo Justice and Investigations plots.

Conflict of interest doesn't exist the the Ace Attorney-verse

That is, as a legal concept conflict of interest doesn't exist. Take case 4-3 as an example. The prosecutor is the lead singer of the band whom was playing at the time of the crime. The defense was present at the crime and heard the victim's last words. Clearly there is no provision in the legal system here for a person to bow out or be forced out due to conflict of interest.

• Way more cases than just 4-3 would count as conflict of interest — pretty much any case involving a Fey or Hawthorne, Miles Edgeworth, or Larry Butz would count as this in the Phoenix games, considering his personal relationships with all of them.

The series takes place millions of years After the End.

Millions of years is plenty of time for something big enough to warrant another calender change, thus why it is still the early 2000s. It also explains why cell phones are still like the ones in the 90s and why Kurain has existed for generations and it still doesn't exist in Real Life.

The trials are actually a strange version of the Reaper's Game.

Relating to the afterlife judging idea near the top, the trials are actually a way of judging whether the dead have the right to come back to life. They judge the memories of the souls and use a crime from their past as a fake trial. Also, the judge is the Composer.

• Well, in any case, this can't really be disproved yet, because we've only seen Shibuya's Game; Joshua implies that other cities could be very different.
• There's more than one judge, though. There's only one Composer per city, so the judge must be the Gamemaster, since he can be switched out. The Prosecutors would be the Harriers, I suppose... don't know where the defense attorneys fit into this. As for the Composer... Consider this. If the Composer determines who the players are for each game session, and the players are the defendants... well, the person who arrests the defendants is Gumshoe...
  • So Gumshoe's the Composer and faking incompetence?
    • All those 'save the day' moments he got? A clue he wasn't really as useless as he acted! Now we know the reason the yakuza kept surrendering whenever Gumshoe entered the room!
    • In that case, it follows logic that Ema as the detective in AA 4, defeated the former Composer, taking his place, explaining the cast change, since she wanted to put her own spin on the game. Her bitterness comes from the fact that she has to be a detective, as part of her role as Conposer, rather than her dream job.
    • When you consider that Phoenix used to be a defendant himself (a player), who then went to being a lawyer, then to being a hobo with nobody from the first 3 games 'on his side' apart from Ema, it's not hard to believe that he ascended. Why is Phoenix still around? He's the Producer, which is why he can bend time. If Producers can reality hop, time hopping should be child's play.
    • Wait, so Phoenix went from Player, to Reaper, to Harrier, to freaking PRODUCER? My gosh, we were controlling an Angel all along.
  • ALL of the attorneys are Reapers. Like in Shibuya's Game, the lifespan of a Reaper depends on the number of souls they erase, but unlike Shibuya, there's usually only one or two souls erased per Game, so the Reapers are forced to compete with each other - prosecutors tag certain souls for Erasure at the beginning of the Game and have to stick with that soul for the whole time, while defense attorneys are allowed to pick and change what soul they want to Erase at any time but, as a price, face much higher difficulties. This also explains why having a perfect winning streak is such a big deal, to the point where several Reapers are willing to bend or break the rules - the longer they can keep up their streak, the longer they stay in the game.
  • After her first acquittal, Maya became Phoenix' assistant - thus, she chose to become a Reaper instead of incarnating. Considering that not all Reapers have to erase Players to extend their lifespan (otherwise the Wall Reapers or 777's behaviour don't make sense), defense attorneys could just be another kind of Reaper who test the Player's Soul.
• If that's true, then why is there no time limit? And no mission mail? Not to mention they're not even using psychs!
  • Well... each trial lasts a max of three days, so there's your time limit, at least. If the players are the defendants, then their 'Mission Mail' is getting arrested, I suppose. And as for psychs... um... well... they're... two out of three ain't bad?
    • The Evidence replaces psyches. The magatama and the normal evidence actually cause metal strain on the person using it or the person it's being presented to, depending on the evidence. That's why people react to damning evidence like they've been physically struck.
• Near the end of case 1-3, when Vasquez "calls her boys", she states that "They're good at erasing... various things." This troper believes that she was the composer, up until Gumshoe does his Big Damn Heroes thing.

Ace Attorney takes place in the same universe as Judge Dredd.

The changes to the justice system in AA were stated to be the result of a massive crime problem. Shortening trials- and making sure that most resulted in guilty verdicts- was the first step towards the foundation of the Judge system.

This series is linked to the Buffyverse...

...via Wolfram and Hart. They are the ones Lana Skye "sold her soul" to, and are also responsible for extraditing Godot from Hell.

• There really IS a Demon Prosecutor somewhere.
  Lotta Hart: Y'all know my cousins from somewhere?

The Phoenix Wright games take place in the far distant future/past of the Wheel of Time-verse

In this time period of the WOT-verse channeling as it occurs during the WOT books has been largely forgotten about, existing here and there as 'magic tricks' though the purest and most clearly remembered line of actual one-power channelers is the Fey clan and the Kurain Channeling technique. All potential channelers have blocked themselves and need extreme conditions and or crutches to access their powers. The courts and legal cases, act as the extreme pressure and conditions needed to get around their personal blocks, and things like the Magatama which is actually a Ter'Angreal usable by men and women alike that has been passed down for ages upon ages as a crutch to get around it as well. The reason Witnesses act as though they've been physically struck when crucial evidence is presented is due to the Channeler-lawyers sub-conciously accessing their powers and hitting them with a light weave of compulsion forcing more of the truth to come out. The physical reaction and the fact that they don't spill their guts all at once is due to their unconcious and clumsy use of their abilities.

The reason only women in the Kurain Tradition can hold spiritual powers is that it's a hold over from the White Tower and the only weave properly remembered by the Kurain Tradition is a special secret weave that temporarily allows spirits bound to the wheel to be drawn into the real world again so long as they have a willing host body to inhabit. Explaining how events like 3-5 can occur

Phoenix is a reincarnation of Rand al'Thor. He has an almost suicidally stupid belief in the basic goodness of the female half of the human species (Compare Lanfear and Dahlia anyone?) His mentor sacrifices herself to protect him from a villain he later takes down (Mia/Moraine). He has one princess like love interest who is also, as or more powerful than his mentor was in spiritual power (Maya/Elayne) Pearls has been shown to be quite violent in her quest to keep 'Mystic Maya and Mr. Nick' together though lets be honest, who doubts that as soon as Pearl hits puberty her long cherished hero worship of Nick won't turn into a full blown crush even as she batters Nick into who she thinks he should be with regardless of her feelings just like Aviendha. Which would leave Iris to be an incarnation of Min, a more simple down to earth girl with little to no special powers but a strong love connection to her man who just wants her beloved to be happy no matter the cost.Anyone else care to expand?

The Phoenix Wright series is set in the Venture Brothers universe.

Specifically, in Underland. Think about it, the only people that ever seem to be up for trial are going to get the death penalty. It's been established that Baron Underbheit has established the death penalty for all infractions of Underlaw.

This series takes place in the Death Note universe.

Only five years after the Kira case, and the world has already bounced back aaaaall the way. No reason for it, except it would be cool.

• Expounding on this a bit: The United States overreacted after the Kira case and went too far in the other direction, declared martial law, and suspended Habeas corpus. The government would now rather put innocents to death than risk the appearance of another Kira, especially not within its own borders.

The events of the Ace Attorney games happen in a distant future of the Discworld universe.

In the Discworld books, it is frequently stated that one-in-a-million chances happen nine times out of ten. Most of the events and circumstances surrounding Phoenix's cases are one-in-a-million chances. Phoenix is a descendant of Granny Weatherwax, which is why he's so good at making up Ass Pull explanations that end up being right (and it also would explain a lot about his personality and actions in Apollo Justice). The reason why magic and non-humans don't exist any more is simply because people stopped believing in them. (Hey, it works for the anthropomorphic personifications, as proven in Hogfather.)

• OBJECTION! Clearly the candidate for being Granny Weatherwax's descendant is Damon Gant. I submit to you as evidence his ability to stare into your soul!
  • Mustrum Ridcully seems like a better candidate for Damon Gant's ancestor than Granny Weatherwax.
  • HOLD IT! Esmerelda Weatherwax is clearly established to have gone straight from being the Maiden to being the... Other One without ever meeting the technical requirements to be the Mother! Therefore, it is impossible that anyone is her descendent]]!

Every person in the Ace Attorney universe has either some sort of Bag of Holding or access to Hammerspace with them at all times

This means not just the Prosecutors or Defense Attorneys; everyone has to have one. The most obvious one is Angel Starr's basket, which can hold a plethora of boxed lunches alone, but also will hold whatever evidence she needs to carry and a camera. Then, there's Adrian Andrews with her infinite amount of quick-shatter glasses.

• As mentioned, this would also explain how Phoenix, Edgeworth and all of the other attorneys are able to carry their evidence around, especially the Noodle Stand (which can be fully viewed in 3D, thus not being just a picture Apollo brought to court) and the bear from 2-4. Also explains Klavier's air guitar sound; it's just coming from a stereo in said Hammerspace, as much as it explains how Gumshoe stores all of that confetti.

Alcohol is outlawed in the setting of Ace Attorney

Grape and tomato juice is served in wine bottles complete with wine glasses. There is a bar full of grape juice in the second case of Ace Attorney Investigations. Oh, and that large glass Matt Engarde is swishing around? Apple juice.

• Or perhaps that last one really is alcohol and he just doesn't care.

• OBJECTION! In case 1-5, Gumshoe refers to Damon Gant as having been "quite intoxicated" at the police department new years party. I doubt even Damon Gant would be that blatant. Furthermore, Gumshoe doesn't consider it especially unusual that someone had been drinking. Alcohol is legal, those bottles of juice actually ARE juice. Perhaps making fun of such transparent censorship?
• I always believed they were making fun of censorship, considering it's in a game centered around murders. Plus, the Judge says something along the line of "Unlike wine, this witness has not grown more mature with age." Okay, I've figured it out: Wine is for villains!

Ace Attorney takes place in a loose, alternate Batman universe

The more I think about it, the more "The Stolen Turnabout" seems to have characters that resemble Batman. Then again, my knowledge of Batman is very limited. Atmey is the Penguin, as he definitely dresses like him and seems to share the penguin-based motif thanks to his ridiculous tuft of yellow hair, something Rockhopper Penguins have (though theirs are more eyebrows, admittedly). Penguins are also depicted, for whatever reason, at times to be wearing red bow ties, particularly penguin costumes. He also has a long nose, like the Penguin does. Atmey is also the classiest dresser outside the Turnabout Orchestra/Jazz CDs. AND Atmey's case, personality and even his leitmotif strongly resemble those of Florent L'Belle, who is often cited as looking very much like the Joker. It's possible they were both directly based on different Batman villain, with Atmey having the Joker's insanity over the Penguin's classy background, and L'Belle having just the opposite. I'm not sure if "The Monstrous Turnabout" and it's other characters resemble Batman characters in any other way, but let me talk more about the characters in "The Stolen Turnabout", specifically Ron and Desiree. Ron you could argue is Batman if his parents hadn't been offed, though probably with some exaggerations (thoug I'd love to see Batman shouting Ron's dialogue in the same desperate tone, I must say. In Christian Bale's Batman voice) and some influences from Catwoman (such as, if not mostly, his being a thief). Desiree is a sexy, wild, leather-clad biker with Batman's dislike of crime (well, mostly; she's okay with crime if it's announced). Ron's colour scheme is also green, yellow, and red, just like Robin's. I think if you looked at the other culprits, you could probably make more Batman connections, but Atmey and L'Belle stick out the most.Seeing as Apollo faced down the Joker and Phoenix faced down the Penguin, this begs the question of who Athena will be facing down from Batman's Rogue's Gallery, as well as who the real Batman is.

Ghost Trick takes place in the far future of Ace Attorney, in a timeline where Vera died.

After the Bad Ending of Apollo Justice occurs, Phoenix's last gambit would have fallen through, causing him to commit suicide out of despair. To avoid any of his friends finishing his work or avenging him, Kristoph hires someone to wipe out Kurain and the spirit mediums. Without spirit mediums to perform channellings, the spirit world would have been severely affected. The sum of the destroyed spirit channelling power thus manifested as the Temsik Meteorite and returned to Earth, allowing spirits to act autonomously in absence of spirit mediums.

• Yomiel is a reincarnation of Phoenix (His incredible luck of getting crushed by the giant mascot and still surviving, getting falsely accused of a crime he didn't commit, etc.) Lynne is a reincarnation of Kay, Ema and Maya (Her proficiency at doing illegal stuff like evading arrest, her fangirl status towards Jowd and Cabanela, and her Big Eater tendecies respectively). The rock star prisoner in the special prison is a reincarnation of Klavier, albeit with far less musical skill than before.
  • Lynne also bears a close resemblance to Athena.
• That also explains why the Death Penalty is still in place: Had the Jurist System succeeded, it would have been abolished as having common people decide verdicts might result in an innocent person being executed, so execution would have been replaced by life imprisonment if the Good Ending had occurred.
• Also, Yomiel's despair at being arrested and accused of espionage, leading to him panicking and fleeing occurs because in the far future, good lawyers no longer exist. Phoenix's failure to clear his name and subsequent suicide shattered any hopes of a generation of good defense attorneys following in his footsteps, so Yomiel would not have had anyone to properly defend him and he saw no other way out.

Ace Attorney takes place in the same universe as Case Closed/ Detective Conan

• It explains why it is always murder with complicated tricks.
• Bonus point for the original Gyakuten Saiban which also takes place in the Japan. It explained the three days trials system since the crime rates are too high and murder is a daily occurence.
• Even if it takes place in USA in localization, Shinichi's parents living in Los Angeles. It's possible he could have visited and meet the cast.
• Young!Edgeworth actually looked like Conan.
• Ran's mother is actually a defense attorney
• Phantom is a Black organization member, probably taught by Vermouth to use disguise.

This franchise and the Trauma Center series take place in the same universe.

It makes far too much sense for it not to be true.

• I have been thinking the same thing for quite a while now. The two series do have a lot of similarities.
• Examples please?
  • Percieve/Healing Touch, for one. The over the top Serious Business in both professions, for another. Plus, they both have a touch of Magic Realism (Percieve, Healing Touch, GUILT (admit it, it's clearly a MAGIC DISEASE), Channeling...)
  • Operation=Trial, Angie=Maya, Prosecutor's Office=Delphi, GUILT=forged evidence, Hands Of Asclepius=von Karmas, Press=Scalpel, Present=Forceps, Advance Text=Antibiotic Gel...
  • I have evidence!]] Look at this◊ and this◊ then look at this◊. TAKE THAT!]]

Ace Attorney takes place in the same universe as Megaman

Just look at the robot in Dual Destinies...

Ace Attorney takes place in the same universe as Big Hero 6

San Fransokyo is a part of Japanifornia.

Ghost Trick will take place in the Ace Attorney universe

The game will be made by the same company and even the same designer, after all. And it is about the afterlife. I see no reason why Capcom can't have the games share the same universe, just like Valve did with Half-Life and Portal. Or Cing's Another Code and Hotel Dusk: Room 215 series (possibly Again!! as well).

• Word of God confirmed.

The Ace Attorney series takes place in the same universe as Scrubs.

Both have their unique blend of wacky antics, improbable situations, and a somewhat lighthearted take on Serious Business along with all the drama and tragedy. And along with the similar settings... Ted has gotta be related to Winston Payne somehow. He's just gotta be. Perhaps a cousin or a stepsibling or a half-brother or... something. They've got the incompetence, the Butt Monkeyness, and they're almost identical. And the ninth season of Scrubs will be like what Apollo Justice was to Phoenix Wright: New rookies step in while a few characters from the first series reprise their roles and become mentors while the setting remains primarily the same with a few changes.

Mind reading is a common ability in the Phoenix Wright universe.

You just have to learn it! Everyone seems able to read Phoenix's mind and replies to what he says without him even opening his mouth.

The series' Punny Names are not the actual names of the people involved in the case, but rather the result of anonymizing Nick's case files.

Whoever is relaying the info is "changing the names to protect the innocent". And also at times kinda unimaginative.

• OBJECTION! I believe that coming up with all those puns requires a very good imagination!

All the Japanese-coded characters in the localization are Japanese-American or of Japanese descent.

Only because it's too much of a headache rationalizing why people not of Japanese descent would go around dressing and/or acting the way they do, even in an alternate history. Obviously this canonically applies to the Tenmas and the inhabitants of Nine-Tails Vale, but also to characters like the Feys, Victor Kudo, Metis Cykes, the Blackquills, the Toneidos, etc.

The Legal System

The prosecutors do not actually have the authority to cut Gumshoe's pay.

Gumshoe just thinks they do, and they keep saying they're going to to screw with him. This explains why he never seems to be so broke that he can't afford food and rent, despite being told that his pay's been cut half a dozen times each game. Klavier doesn't threaten to cut Ema's pay because she knows perfectly well that he can't, and probably snackoo'd the hell out of him if he ever tried.

• Objection. During case 4 of Ace Attorney Investigations, it's implied that Manfred Von Karma cut Detective Badd's pay. Additionally, Byrne Faraday cuts Gumshoe's pay in his first day as a detective, and this is thought to be a potential motive for murder.
• Objection! (slams hands on desk) Police detectives like Gumshoe most likely have regular panel reviews where their superiors judge their conduct and adjust their salary accordingly. It's likely that the prosecutors' threats imply not a direct pay cut, but rather their putting a negative comment into the record which will come up at said review.
  • This is backed up by Edgeworth's comment in 1-2.
  Edgeworth: "The good detective had better remember that his salary is up for review."

Why Phoenix was disbarred and neither Edgeworth nor Manfred were when they were caught presenting forged evidence.

I find it odd that people don't get why this was, but I suppose the connection isn't exactly obvious, either. He's a defence attorney, and a defence attorney forging evidence would actually be far more a menace to the case than a prosecutor doing so, because of Double Jeopardy. We learn about Double Jeopardy in Case 3-2, and it means that someone who's been found to be Not Guilty of a crime cannot be charged with the same felony, even if it's later proven they are Guilty. The prosecution is not bound by this, because they fight to prove the defendant is actually Guilty. On the contrary, the opposite of Double Jeopardy happens. A Guilty verdict can be overturned during an appeal. Manfred and Edgeworth, who are prosecutors, both got in trouble for presenting evidence exactly like Phoenix's: neither prosecutor knew the evidence was forged (though von Karma had forged evidence before then, this time, he didn't know). They were not disbarred because they're prosecutors, and the verdict they fight for can be overturned. A defence attorney's verdict cannot. Therefore, the punishment for forgery is much, much more severe for a defence attorney. A defence attorney is just as responsible for the evidence they present as the prosecution is, after all. All three situations were the same, but because Phoenix is a defence attorney, and because a Not Guilty verdict cannot be overturned, he was disbarred. Think of it like... the difference between murder in the second degree (non-premeditated murders, often done on impulse or stemming from an injury not intended to kill but seriously maim), and murder done in justified self defence (killing when defending yourself from attack). While neither murder is premeditated (neither forgery was intended on the part of the presenter), second degree murder still has a malicious intent behind it where murder in self defence is not malicious in nature. Phoenix essentially committed second degree murder in this metaphor (non-premeditated murder with mailcious intent = unknowingly presented false evidence to get the defendant a verdict that cannot be overturned) and was sent to jail (disbarred), where Manny and Miles committed murder in self defence (non-premeditated murder without malicious intent = unknowingly presenting evidence to get the defendant a verdict that can be overturned) and were not sent to jail, though have the offence on their criminal record and conscience (the penalties).

• A good theory, but Simon Blackquill's case seems to imply it's just as difficult to get a guilty verdict overturned as it is to retry someone found innocent (especially if the death penalty is involved since that creates a time limit). Even with both Phoenix and Edgeworth working towards Blackquill's acquittal, it took a hostage situation just for the case to be heard again.
  • I did that that into account, since that's outright stated in Case 1-4 by Edgeworth and I believe by Phoenix in Case 3-3. But it's not impossible to overturn a Guilty verdict like it is with a Not Guilty. The reason Blackquill's case wasn't ever retried before then is because no new evidence was ever found to prove the Guilty verdict was wrong. That's actually stated by Edgeworth as the reason why. It's the only reason why it wasn't retried, because Aura kept trying to get it brought back to trial.

The three-day bench trials started as a sort of "minor league" of the justice system.

Think about it – a half-senile judge and his just plain screwy brother, incredibly low standards of courtroom etiquette, eccentric prosecutors, no plea option, and convictions are automatically retried. Despite the rhetoric about rising crime rates, the real rationale for the new court was to assuage public dissatisfaction with plea deals with a visible "day in court", while also quickly getting weak cases where acquittal was almost inevitable off the docket. To everyone's surprise, "The Great Judgini" ended up mostly handing down solid verdicts that stood up in higher courts, and the preliminary trials became such Serious Business that it was the retrial that was considered a formality.

• Interesting theory, but attorneys can do plea deals during the preliminary trials (like in Case 2-2 where Phoenix has the option of pleading justified self-defense for his client.)

All the over-the-top Courtroom Antics are to get people to watch.

It's no secret that the Ace Attorney court proceeding are a lot more interesting and over-the-top than real ones. This might be to get more people to watch them, and individual attorneys might be trying to get famous by doing something special in court. In the Stolen Turnabout, Pearl says there are tents outside the courthouse with merch for sale. This shows that other people are making money off court proceedings, so all the Courtroom Antics might be to get them more fun to watch and draw in more people.

Character Relations and Origins

Apollo is related to Shawn Spencer

Since Hyper-Awareness runs in Apollo's family, that explains Shawn's ability to detect evidence

• OBJECTION! Shawn's Hyper-Awareness comes from the extensive training his dad put him through.
  • HOLD IT! Perhaps Shawn had the Hyper-Awareness before the training, and his dad trained merely to improve the ability.

Ryuunosuke was reincarnate as Apollo Justice

The name "Ryuunosuke" is a combination of Phoenix's and Apollo's Japanese names. And Ryuunosuke is only confirmed to be Phoenix's ancestor.

Damon Gant is a relative of Volgin.

Orange suit, white hair, death by lightning, sounds related to me.

Misty Fey is Miles Edgeworth's mother. By this same logic Gregory Edgeworth is Mia and Maya's father.

Miles' mother is never mentioned in canon, and the Fey's father is mentioned only in passing. So what if the other is the missing parent of each family? Say Misty and Gregory fell in love with each other. Mia was born, but they realized they had a problem when Miles was born. Kurain's inner family politics is vicious and the Branch Fey families are not afraid to use anything or person to their advantage. There is also the fact that Kurain is not all that friendly towards men. In order to protect and give Miles a normal life, Gregory covered up all connections he had with Misty so they could never use his son as a pawn. Misty and Gregory still secretly kept in touch with each other and visited each other occasionally, later resulting in the birth of Maya. When the tragedy of DL-6 occurred, Misty knowingly went along with Gregory's lie about Yanni Yogi in order to protect their son from suspicion. The guilt of that act, as well as the shaming of the Fey family name is what drove her into self-exile. As the result of their combined efforts neither Miles nor the Fey sisters realize they are siblings.

• OBJECTION! Gregory never lied about Yanni. He was deceived into thinking so by the real murderer.
• HOLD IT! Gregory wasn't deceived, he simply didn't know. He was unconscious when Von Karma shot him, and his last memory was Yanni Yogi attacking him when a gunshot went off, so he assumed that Yogi shot him.
  • Hence the deception.
  • HOLD IT! Gregory is a smart man (he'd have to be to make a dent in von Karma, after all) and he'd know that there would be two immediate suspects for his murder- Yanni Yogi and 'his own son, Miles'. Yanni because he attacked him, and Miles because he threw Yanni's gun and it discharged. While Yanni was pursued as the prime suspect, the police ran into such a brick wall during their investigation that they resorted to using Misty Fey. But they could have just as easily turned their eyes to the only other person in the elevator, Miles. The games have shown that time and time again the court system is brutal; even self-defence is hinted to ruin the defendent's life. Gregory would know this, and that would be a powerful motivator to say it was Yanni—a likely candidate anyway, to remove any chance of suspision turning to his son.
• I wrote about this at length some time ago on CR. Whether or not Edgey was an illegitimate child is up to debate, but it was possible for Gregory to have had some sort of relationship with Misty. As the Master of Kurain, infighting directed at Misty's immediate family would have been particularly intense, and we know already that Fey men often leave due to the structure of the Fey family and the fact that men have no place in the Kurain tradition, so it's not unlikely that Gregory left Misty and took Miles with him to protect him from the family's power complex. The possibility that Gregory and Misty had some sort of connection is made more likely when we consider Misty's involvement in DL-6: having a spirit medium aid a murder investigation was a first, and it carried with it the enormous risk of ruining the reputation of both the police department and the Kurain Channeling Technique. Misty wouldn't have had a lot of reason to help out unless she had a personal connection to the case, which she would have had if Miles was her son. Fast forward to the present, and we see that Edgeworth also bears quite a physical resemblance to the Feys, to the point where his and Young Mia's "shocked" animations are identical. He is also, notably, able to use the Magatama despite his fervent disbelief in it and his lack of guidance by someone who knew how to use it.
  • I'd just like to submit this bit of evidence◊ to the court, thank you.
    • Also, remember Mia's signature head tilt? She does it every time she smiles, both in her original body◊ and when she's being channeled.◊ Now take a look at this sprite.◊ See anything familiar?
    • Some evidence concerning Pearl and Miles: according to this WMG theory, they would be cousins. Now compare and contrast their personalities as children, Pearl as we know her, and Miles as Phoenix described him during case 1-4 as the eight year old he knew before the tragedy of DL-6 and von Karma's influence. Both of them are considered prodigies in their respective fields, very mature and rather sophisticated for their age, intensely proud of their gifted family members and are tend to get a certain sparkle in their eyes when inspired by something. The family resemblance is uncanny, wouldn't you agree?
  • What about Maya's behavior in case 1-4? If you think about it, the way she acts is more than a little odd. Maya has no reason to trust Miles at this point aside from Phoenix's word, yet she steps up to defend him in trial, going so far as to get herself held in contempt of court for his sake. This troper has always found the lack of reasoning for her sudden conviction rather odd. Perhaps a part of Maya subconsciously picked up on the fact that Miles was her older brother and wanted to help protect him as a result of that.
    • Adding on to that, this troper would like to point out that most of Maya's behavior towards Miles is just a little too...familiar. She does act very sibling-like towards him, throughout the majority of the case. Protecting him, yes, but also the way she mocks and/or teases him, either behind his back ("Did you know Edgeworth's secret weakness? He's terrified of earthquakes! He acts like a little boy!" <—all with a big smile on her face), or right to his face ("See, Mr. Edgeworth? You should take a lesson from Detective Gumshoe! That's how you say "thank you"!). If you view her as his sister, her behavior suddenly makes a whole lot more sense. After all, what little sister wouldn't mock their older brother mercilessly if they discovered a "secret weakness" of theirs? Siblings do that sort of stuff to each other all the time. Given the rest of her actions, I find it very believable that she was just running on a sort of sisterly-instinct when it came to Miles, even if only subconsciously.
  • This troper also distinctly remembers a small detail from the latter part of case 1-2, after Phoenix is arrested for Mia's murder, and Maya comes to visit him in detention. One the joking responses you can give in an attempt to cheer her up is that she can help by defending Phoenix in court tomorrow. She immediately responds that she will, and that (paraphrased) 'law runs in my blood, after all!' At first glance, this troper assumed that it was just a cute and funny instance of Maya being Maya, and coming up with some reassurance for the man who had done his all to protect her- especially as Phoenix internally corrects her that it's ESP. However, taking into account this WMG, Maya might not have been too far off. Even if she wasn't consciously aware of it, she be referencing something her sister had said, who certainly would remember more than her about their father and his profession even if she couldn't recall everything about him (such as his exact appearance; if she studied the DL-6 case file in reference to her mother's disappearance, it's likely she came across a picture of Gregory, and may simply not have recognised him because of how long it had been and how young she would have been when she last saw him).
    • Come to think of it: if Maya and Edgeworth are siblings and Maya gets married to Phoenix... Phoenix and Edgeworth would become in-laws. Pretty fun... especially since THEY ALREADY ACT LIKE IT.
    • Which would also explain why Mia became a defense attorney of all things in order to find out what happened to her mother. After all, wouldn't a prosecuting attorney make a lot more sense for her goals? It would give her a lot more access to police records, and allow her to personally hunt down and prosecute the man who was responsible if she ever found him. So why a defense attorney? Maybe she, just like her little brother, idolised their father- even if she was too young to remember everything about him.
  • There's also the fact that Maya specifically said once that her father died when she was young. She was seventeen when she said this (case 1-4), and at that point the DL-6 incident had occurred fifteen years ago. Which means Gregory Edgeworth would have died when Maya was two. That's pretty young, I'd say.
  • Not to mention the Alliterative Family the Fey family seems to have going on for most of their children. Morgan... Misty... Mia... Maya... Miles...
    • HOLD IT! This evidence is less compelling when you remember that it applies only to the English version of the games (in Japanese they are Kimiko, Maiko, Chihiro, Mayoi, and Reiji, respectively). Then again, maybe the translators were trying to give us a hint.
  • It's more than likely Mia/Miles/Maya are half-siblings. This tropes used often with Pearl and her sisters and later with Trucy and her brother.
    • OBJECTION! Why half-siblings and not full siblings? There's plenty of evidence to suggest that they shared both parents.
  • I do believe sometime in Case 3-5, Maya says something that felt just a little... odd. She's the only member of the Main Family left, but Maya doesn't actually say that. What she actually says (which I can't remember exactly, but remember thinking her comment was odd) implies that she actually has another sibling; as I recall, she either says she's the only female member left in the Main Family or that she's the only member left in the Main Family who can take the title.
• Just to add fuel to this fire, it is also possible that Phoenix Wright and Edgeworth are brothers, or possibly cousins! If Phoenix is, in fact, the son of a Spirit Medium, then it is possible he is also related to the Feys. His own father may have had a brief affair with Misty Fey, or it is even possible that Morgan Fey herself is Phoenix's mother, with a second, unknown man being his father. This is supported by his ability to use the Magatama and hear Mia's voice without her first being channeled, and their ability to use the...SUPER OBJECTION!!!
  • That... that would add an unexpected layer of Squick to the Phoenix/Iris pairing.
  • OBJECTION! The validity of the "Mia, Maya, and Edgeworth share the same parents" theory is undeniable. However, this troper is of the firm belief that a further connection between Miles/Maya/Mia and Phoenix as siblings, or even half-siblings, is much too convenient and unrealistic a conclusion to draw. It is entirely possible that Phoenix may share some distant spirit medium blood, but there isn't a shred of evidence to support the claim that he is related to the Feys in any way. They're not the only spirit mediums in the world, after all.
    • Not only that, but it would effectively eliminate the possibility of two of the most popular AA pairings (Phoenix/Miles and Phoenix/Maya) in one fell swoop.
    • Also, keep in mind that Phoenix and Miles are the same age. It would have been physically impossible for Misty to become pregnant with both of them at the same time if they shared two different fathers. If you're suggesting that they are in fact twins, then why would Gregory have taken only Miles and not Phoenix?
    • Minor point, but it is possible for twins to come from two fathers. It’s rare, but it does happen.

Pearl's father is Manfred von Karma. The two evils cancelled each other out and made Pearl the bastion of sweetness that she is.

I take your Pearls and raise it to the fact that not only is Pearl really Manfred's daughter, but Franziska von Karma is Misty (and I do mean Misty)'s daughter. Manfred vK doesn't have any 'good' children- his oldest daughter is a failure, and his wife died in childbirth. He finds that (though it goes against his nature) he misses his wife, and goes to Kurain village to channel her. Misty accomplishes this, and they end up spending... 'time' together. Later, Misty 'wakes up', and in 9 months she is pregnant. Her husband has left her by now, and she doesn't know what to do. Manfred wishes to have his wife's spirit channeled again, and he goes back to Kurain village to find that Misty is pregnant. Putting two and two together he realizes that it is possibly his child. When the child is born, Manfred vK blackmails Misty (using Maya and Mia...?) into giving him the baby. She complies, and tries to forget about it ever happening. The baby is named 'Franziska', and all is well. At least, until DL-6 when Misty vanished. He tries to ignore that she is gone, but at the same time she was the one who could contact his dead wife. He eventually tried to get someone else to channel his wife, and he got to Morgan. She had guessed what had happened to Misty, and so she agreed to channel Manfred's wife. She did not wish to actually channel her though, and instead she made sure she knew enough that she successfully faked channeling his wife. She wished for a child as a 'Take That!' against her husband who had left her, and her knowledge of Manfred vK lead her to decide that he would be a good 'sperm donor' as it were. She made sure that she hid her signs of pregnancy, and then had the baby girl early. It worked, Manfred became too busy with adding the finishing touches to perfecting Miles Edgeworth, and his daughter was becoming a prosecutor in her own right, and he missed the fact that he could have had another daughter. Morgan named her daughter "Pearl" after the way a Pearl is created when a tiny grain of sand- a seed, if you will- gets into the Oyster. She raises her child hoping that Pearl would turn out to be as ruthless as her father, however she didn't think about the impact that Mia and Maya would have on her precious.

• OBJECTION! Maya and Franziska are almost exactly the same age - both are eighteen in JFA. I suppose they could have been twins, with Manfred demanding the child that more strongly resembled him.
  • Ooh- that's even better!
  • Now, it’s worth mentioning that Maya said in 1-2 that her father died while she was “very young,” and Manfred was very much still alive by time she said that. However, Misty would, understandingly, want to forget the whole thing, and so probably lied that Mia’s father was Maya’s father. Bonus points if you combine this with the above theory about Gregory being Mia’s dad. As an aside, this would make Mia and Maya half siblings.
• So, are we going to ignore that this theory basically means that Manfred raped Misty? Because I highly doubt she consented to her body being used for sex.
• OBJECTION! ::Head shake:: Sorry, one tiny detail there contradicts one big point of Pearl's back story. The fact that her father left when she was very young. not before she was born!]]. You're saying that Mr. Von Karma wasn't even aware of Morgan's pregnancy. In addition, it was stated that Pearl's father is Morgan's second husband!]]. Also, Pearl's hair is brown.
  • OBJECTION! There is one way to clear this up:Morgan's 2nd husband either refused to have sex with her for whatever reason or had fertility problems so Morgan decided to cheat on him with Manfred. This most likely caused problems in Morgan's relationship leading to her husband leaving her. Also, for all we know, Manfred's hair could have been brown when he was young and Franziska's hair is dyed.
    • OBJECTION! Let's remember Manfred's character here. Does he really seem like the type to have an affair with anybody? Let's also Manfred's perfection obsession. Do you really think he'd go in unprotected? In addition, he probably would keep his hair dyed if that were the case.
    • OBJECTION! Who said it was consensual? Anyway, Franziska and Pearl actually have a lot in common. They've both been described as prodigies, are (in some ways) more mature than you'd expect from people their age, and physically assault people(especially Phoenix Wright, both of them even knock him out on one occasion each) without any attempt to punish them in any way.
• An attempt to put this theory in a legible story format can be found here. It's a little easier to read than the mass of text above.

Redd White was actually Morgan Fey's ex-husband

Morgan Fey was apparently originally married to a "wealthy jeweler", who left her due to the loss of face when Misty Fey took over power in the family and leaving Morgan's branch powerless. Redd White is wealthy, loves jewels (he wears tons of them), and is clearly obsessed with his public image. Which means, yes, that Redd White killed his own step-sister (Mia Fey).

• You mean that he killed his niece (Mia's mother was his sister-in-law).
• And got his sister in law disgraced.
• This is... unsettlingly plausible.
• Which means that Dahlia and Iris are...
  • ...That makes so much sense. -ponders- He married Morgan to stimulate his business and when Misty took over because of her greater spiritual power, he plotted with Morgan to disgrace her. However, he wasn't going to wait twenty years and left her, taking his children with him and then being convinced to drop Iris off in Hazakura Temple. This theory certainly explains why you can show Morgan Mia's picture and she just smiles. Secretly thanking her bastard of a incarcerated ex? Hell yes! Plus, Dahlia seems to likes to dye her hair...
  • Also, an explanation for why Dahlia has the surname 'Hawthorne': It's Redd's new wife's surname. Dahlia and Valerie were, presumably, plotting the fake kidnapping for some time, and considered themselves Hawthornes rather than Whites as a symbol of their contempt for their father (or in Valerie's case, step-father). Iris goes by no surname because she doesn't consider herself truly a Hawthorne or a Fey, and she certainly wouldn't want to be considered a White. Another theory is that Redd White simply changed his name after the Dusky Bridge faked kidnapping.

Maggey Byrde is related to Glen Elg

It's not often you find two characters in this fandom that share the same traits such as bad luck, unless.... But seriously. Maggey fell from several floors of her apartment building and survived. At the time, I bet her parents didn't chalk it up as the start of her natural disasters of luck, but as one parent neglecting her. This keeps happening over and over in different ways and boom! They're fighting like crazy and eventually divorce and one parent takes Maggey and the other remarries and has Glen, who also has it in his genetic coding to be cursed with bad luck.

• OBJECTION! The whole crux of your argument is your theory that Elg was born after Maggey's parents were divorced, and that Glen is the child of a later marriage from one of them. You seem to forget that... Glen Elg is older than Maggey!. By quite a few years in fact!
  • Then perhaps Elg's parents divorced, leaving one to remarry and have Maggey?

Desiree De Lite's maiden name is Engarde.

They both have the same colored hair, they both have the same eyes before Matt flips his hair, they wear red, and i'm pretty sure their suits are made from the same fabric.

• Looks like Ron is going to be screwed when Matt returns from jail.

Gant is Phoenix's father. And Apollo's. And Zak Gramarye's.

The first two are admittedly crack fanon based on Gant's fandom reputation as a universal rapist (this troper prefers to think of him as more of a love machine), but Zak's face in his laugh sprite is near-identical to his putative father's.

• Objection! Apollo's father is named Jove Justice.

Viola Cadaverini and Vera Misham were Separated at Birth

Either that, or Drew used to be or had an affair with someone of the Cadaverini family, and had Vera later. Think about it. Both of them are thin, waifish, sickly-looking girls who are disturbingly quiet, with ties to a criminal underworld. Not to mention that both of them ended up smack in the middle of poisoning cases that involved a poisoned cup of coffee. Coincidences? I think not!

• Technically, in Vera's case, the poison wasn't actually in the coffee itself.

Joe Darke is Cody Hackins' father.

Well, the ages do match up. And before you say that Cody said his dad was alive and took him to the Steel Samurai Convention... Joe Darke was jailed when he was 5 years old, so his mother may have married another man, and Cody may be referring to his new father, although there is no evidence to support this claim.

Akbey Hicks is Machi Tobaye's father

Both are blonde guys from Borginia with blue eyes, and it would make sense age-wise. This means Machi was made an orphan at the age of 7.

• I... what. Yes, oh, ouch ouch. I wish to subscribe to your newsletter, please?

Becoming a defense attorney or prosecutor is as simple as applying to McDonalds.

I mean, come on. Well-known Defense Attorney Diego Armando wakes up from a five-year coma and immediately becomes a prosecutor. Calisto Yew, as an identity, didn't exist until the case of Cece Yew and goes right to being a defense attorney. Nobody bats an eyelash at either of these. On top of this, Klavier Gavin could not possibly have had enough time to study law and become a super-popular rock star at age 17.

• So Franziska trained in Germany for years to become a perfect prosecutor, and when she applied, she realized that all she needed was a badge/name tag and a smile (though she probably let her whip do the smiling)?
  • Explains some of her bitchier behavior, doesn't it?

The law books are just fluff and the reason Phoenix has so much trouble with them is because he learned everything via word-of-mouth from Mia.

Phoenix Wright and Detective Gumshoe are related in some way.

They both have an iconic appearance (Wright has his blue suit, Gumshoe has his Not-So-Badass Longcoat), they both have survived accidents with far fewer injuries than they should have (Phoenix had all that whipping from Franziska, fell into a freezing river and only got a cold to show for it, has been hit by a car only getting a sprained ankle, while Gumshoe survives a car crash and seems no worse for wear.)

Nick is related to Barbara Wright.

Barbara, one of the Doctor's very first companions, is an incredibly badass history teacher from London. As for why he lacks her English accent, possibly he's related to Barbara through a brother, who is Nick's dad.

Diego and Mia are Arnold's parents.

Godot and Mia had sex the night after Mia's first trial. Mia was pregnant with Diego's child when he was poisoned by Dahlia. The time that elapsed between Phoenix's murder accusations and Mia's death had to have been more than a year. That's plenty of time for Mia to deliver the baby and send it off to Godot's father because she couldn't financially support baby Arnold (lawyers don't make a lot of money in the Ace Attorney universe if the games are to be believed).Now makes since except two things, Arnold and his Grandpa doesn't seem to have Brazilian blood. This is easily explained, perhaps Grandpa had an affair with a foreign woman and got her pregnant and Grandma just forgave him and helped him raise the child because the mother probably couldn't take care of it. That type of logic being used, Arnold probably only has 1/4th Brazilian genes in his blood so the nationality isn't exactly visible on him.The other issue is that apparently there's a journal that detail Arnold's parents as some sort of people that explore a jungle. this journal is simply a fake document to protect him from Dahlia.

• Three years pass between Phoenix's murder accusation and Mia's death, so yeah, the timeline is possible.
  • The timeline doesn't make any sense when you take into account one thing- the time between Mia's first and second trial is stated in game to be 8 months. Not long enough for a full gestation period (unless you intend to claim Arnold was a premature baby), and too long for Mia to not be visibly pregnant. Also I highly doubt Diego wouldn't have known about any potential children he had when he woke up from his coma, both considering he had found out about Mia's murder at the hands of Redd White and he had spent a lot of time around the Feys in general. Moreover, if he HAD had a kid with Mia, I highly doubt he would take revenge in a way that would make him a criminal, considering that child would be a reminder of Mia and he'd probably want to protect them as much or more than Maya, something he wouldn't be able to do while imprisoned.

Diego Armando is related to Dora the Explorer.

He was the Only Sane Man in the Dora universe, and decided to leave the talking maps and backpacks behind for life as an attorney. Dora's family are simply in denial about his existence, thus why he is never mentioned.

• Related: Diego Armando is actually Diego of Go, Diego, Go! all grown up. He does have a thing about cats...

Sena Kashiwazaki is truly Mia and Godot's child given away for adoption.

Prove me wrong. Protip: you can't.

Winston Payne is Daryan Crescend's father.

Based entirely on Payne's hair in case 3.1.

• Given the ages, it's completely biologically possible.
• And consider: Payne is a completely incompetent prosecutor. As shown in AAI, not even fellow prosecutors are entirely aware of who he is. But if his son (also in law enforcement, you may note) was part of the Gavinners, and the Judge was a Gavinners fangirl, it explains why Payne is still getting cases at all. Plus, Payne can't possibly be making enough money unless he has a famous son. New WMG: Payne won't get any more cases now that Daryan has been arrested.
  • Well, the latest game has Gaspen Payne in Winston's stead...

Phoenix is related to Nate Wright.

Same surname, same spiky hair.

Items and Game Mechanics

The Court Record is a Phantom Zone.

It can hold statues, spears, cameras on stands, fishing rods, metal detectors, dogs, a parrot, dancing cardboard badgers, jars, CSI equipment, folding screens, monkeys, dead lions, trunks, umbrellas, sacred swords, jockey calendars, cane swords, glass bottles, noodle stands...The explanation is: Each attorney involved with a case is given a small portal to the case's assigned phantom zone and all evidence they find or need can be conveniently stored or accessed through such medium.

• Also, consider that Ace Attorney Investigatons (the only game in the series that does not involve trials) does not have a Court Record, instead having the pieces of evidence written down. This is obviously because within the game, Edgeworth is not in any actual trials, and thus does not have access to the Court Record.
• Have you ever considered that they just take pictures of the evidence?
  • OBJECTION! On several occasions, the objects are manipulated and even assembled during the trial (this happens, for example, with the Unstable Jar on Rise From The Ashes), which disallows the possibility of mere photographic proof. The object would need to be present in order to be looked from every point of view and being able to be assembled correctly (a photograph, no matter how many pictures you might take, would distort the sides and the jagged parts of the jar due to perspective problems).
• OBJECTION!, in the Gyakuten Saiban movie, it is shown that evidence is shown at holographic panels or something like that.

The Court Record is actually a small, handheld computer used by attorneys.

Whenever someone tells you in-game to "press the Court Record button", they're not showing they know about timed hits, but are talking about an actual digital device used in the game. The "Press" button alerts the Judge and the Witness that the Defence or the Prosecution wishes to speak (it's only polite, after all, to let them know you want to interrupt them, and shouting Hold It! just doesn't scream "politely interrupting"), and the "Present" button brings up the evidence on a screen, akin to the ones featured in The Movie so the item can be talked about (though the actual item will of course be shown to the court at the same time, this function merely allows for the item to be seen by all, especially if it's something small, like glass shards). This also explains how things are instantly added to it: the data is simply shared out once approved by the Judge, and how things can be "updated" in-universe.

• Additionally, the Court Record's appearance somewhat matches or at least is a variant of the system the game is being played on; GBA for the original Gyakuten Saiban games, DS for the international ports, Apollo Justice and Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth, Wii remote for the Wii rerelases, and finally the 3DS for Dual Destinies and Professor Layton vs. Ace Attorney.

Variant of above WMG: "The Court Record" is an app that shows all the UI in the game.

It makes so much sense. it would explain how you can have a 360 view of a Noodle cart without actually having said noodle cart in the courthouse. The Court Record App is sanctioned by the police and is issued and required by all lisensed Defense Attorneys (along with an Idroid Phone of the latest model should the recipient not have an applicable phone) for use in trials.

• It keeps track of what evidence has been deemed 'admissible' and allows for a 360 scan of larger evidence. It also keeps profiles of all involved parties, including members of the opposition. It also keeps a record of any penalties accumulated (both per trial and over the course of the app's life) which is distilled into a green bar.
• During a trial, when a witness gives testimony, the app then records it and breaks it down into sentences. What you're actually seeing during cross examination is said recording, which is why you can scroll through it, even in reverse. It can be voice activated (via Hold It!) and can be added to.
• The sister app to the Court Record is the Organizer app for Prosecutors, which has the above features but also a specialized button for speed-dialling the Prosecutor's assigned Detective or assistant (determined by the user), along with a layout of the crime scene for reference (which is how you get those hypothetical scenarios with circles indicating involved parties).
• Because the smartphone it comes with is so expensive, both Nick and Polly use older phones (i.e. Smokia) for day-to-day use so as not to risk damaging the phone that is vital to their profession. Athena just requested that the app be installed in Widget, which is why her 'reading' animation has her scrolling through screens on Widget.

• There are two problems with this. One, phones are expressly stated in Case 2-4 to be not allowed in a courtroom, therefore unlikely that the court record is an app downloaded to a phone, and two, Edgeworth's organiser was used for cases that weren't yet cases with anyone but the investigators assigned, meaning there was no "court" to have a record of. I think Edgeworth's organiser is exactly what it says on the tin- it's an organiser, just an electric one, probably not unlike a Kindle in size and shape, and doesn't function all that differently from a court record since both are just a collection of data (I chalk the talking to your partner feature as Edgeworth being slightly neurotic. And it was a bonus feature that came with the version that maps out the area and the people in it). Another problem with the brick phones everyone uses arises in that their screens are tiny. Too tiny to be used for purposes of a court record. It's possible Athena was able to get the programme downloaded to Widget, though. The Court Record is probably a totally separate device, though obsolete compared to Edgeworth's organiser, though it still refuses to add in the Judge or his Canadian brother (though it does add Hakari so it's not just a judge thing...) Perhaps it errors?
  • There is a brief animation of Edgeworth's Organizer as the game over screen in GK 2. It's... an organizer. More specifically, one of those day planner/agenda things that opens like a book, with what looks like a leather cover. The pages are lined notebook paper; the contents are too small to be legible, but it's pretty clearly handwritten notes and sketched diagrams. Unsurprisingly, Edgeworth has very tidy handwriting.

Blue parenthetical dialogue is not always thought.

Sometimes, it's the character talking under their breath or muttering to themselves. It's not that anyone is a mind reader when they remark on the blue parenthetical dialogue (as Mia does repeatedly in case 2-4), it's that sometimes, the character accidentally voices their thoughts aloud. It's sometimes used to denote a particular kind of speech. There's also the fact, too, that the thoughts are written all over their face; Phoenix is noted a few times in the first three games that his thoughts are very, very easy to read.

The characters in the game series "speak" in text.

Just how do you pronounce a star in Mask*DeMasque? How can Phoenix be corrected on the name if the spelling he used would yield the same pronunciation? The only logical conclusion is that the characters see dialogue as subtitles.

• How do you manage to say the star in Black*Star?
• The * stands for jazz hands.
  • Note that Ron didn't say Phoenix was pronouncing the name wrong, he specifically said that Mask* DeMasque is spelt with a star.
• That might also explain how Phoenix understood the whole "SPARDA" joke with Lisa Basil and Maya in case 3 of Trials and Tribulations. Technically, "SuPer Admin Restricted Desktop Access" shouldn't be a viable acronym, since the "P" is super-imposed in the middle of the first word. Well, unless you used Bold Inflation to emphasize the second syllable, like "SuPer", but that just sounds weird out loud.
• There was an ad in Japan for the first DS remake where all the characters had voiceovers for their text, except in one scene where Phoenix and Maya started making the usual bip-bip-bip noise of text appearing instead, and Edgeworth got mad about it. Since they could still understand each other, this makes it pretty clear that they can "read" the text.
  • In a Japanese ad for the fourth game, everyone has voice acting except for Apollo, who has to speak in text-and-beeps. Everyone can understand him and is aware of the beeping...
• OBJECTION! When Sal Manella uses the word 'R0xx0rz,' Maya thinks he's saying 'Rocksores' which only makes sense if she only heard it out loud. Come to think of it, the same concept is actually used as evidence during a trial: the Maggie/Maggey issue.
  • Maya may just have been unfamiliar with the word. She's not exactly a character one would expect to be fluent in 1337-speak, and could have been trying to "translate" it without having any idea what it meant.
  • As for the Maggie/Maggey evidence, this actually becomes a piece of Fridge Brilliance when you realize that the defendant who makes this mistake is missing his glasses! As for Gumshoe... well, he IS Gumshoe. He probably just didn't read the picture very carefully.
    • OBJECTION! The person in question lost the glasses when the murder occurred. Before that, he still had them, so he would have had no problem reading the textbox, meaning Fridge Brilliance is not a valid option in this case!
    • YET ANOTHER OBJECTION! The title of the WMG doesn't specify whether the characters only speak in text... and, considering how the victim and culprit didn't SMS another, they must have spoken with their voices. *desk slam* Fridge Brilliance isn't a valid option, but the case still does NOT speak against this theory!

The "life bar" is actually a sanity bar.

Things such as prolonged public ridicule and extreme loss of trust in one's own deductive abilities can eventually have more... adverse effects, culminating in something unseen, but similar to the breakdowns of non-protagonist characters.Which means that the careless use of the- also green- Magatama may just be a tad more dangerous for one's psyche than we thought.

Phoenix stabs people with the Magatama to use it's powers.

When Phoenix uses the Magatama on somebody that has psyche-locks, an impact sound is heard. Afterwards, the background goes pitch black and the psyche-locks appear. The theory is that when Phoenix uses the Magatama, he actually stabs the person in front of him with it, and both of them lose concisiousness. Their minds are transported to the black void, where the interrogation begins. The Magatama has a sharp point◊, which would make stabbing somebody possible. After the locks are broken, or after Phoenix gives up, all the memories of the void dissapear from the other person's mind, and are replaced by the same scenes, but wherever the person was before the stabbing. The wound it would cause is also healed by the powers of the Magatama. This also explains why you can't use it in court, since everybody is too far away from the stabbing range (Besides, stabbing somebody in court wouldn't exactly be a good idea...).

• Okay, but... what about when it's used in the Detention Centre, like with Matt Engarde and Adrian Andrews? He can't stab them through glass that's totally unbreakable so far, and if he could, he'd be arrested on assault charges because the conversations are video recorded. And doesn't Phoenix use it in court in Dual Destinies? It's a good theory, but unlikely. I always assumed Phoenix was looking through the eye of the Magatama (the hole in it), but or by bringing it out between him and his opposition, it made the locks appear and stay there, because I know I'd question why the man I'm talking to is holding a glowing green rock up to his eye.

Wearing an attorney's badge gives the user limited time control capabilities.

Mostly it's the ability to stop or reverse time (by a small amount). If they want, they can freeze some people while talking to others. This explains why sometimes a person in the scene will be frozen in a very active pose while you have time to look at everything. That's because time is stopped. It also explains why sometimes conversations bring up information you've heard before, or they play out in the exact same way if you bring them up again. In the courtroom, this only works during cross-examination. This is the main advantage that defense attorneys have over the prosecution. Phoenix was later able to tap into this technology to make the MASON System.

Little Thief was made by Glen Elg

If I remember correctly, it's said that Byrne Faraday made that little gadget, but I'm not buying it. Just look at that thing and how it works! Holograms and the calculating and I'm not even gonna try and bullshit and attempt talking smart. Anyway, in 3-3 his boss states that he's been doing some work on the side, mostly underground stuff for who knows who. Now, how much more underground can you get than Yatagarasu? Well, aside from the mafia, but still. Also, given Phoenix's klepto ways, I bet he stole the blueprints to that hologram that's used for the jury in AJ...

The poison Atroquinine is made of Borginian Cocoons.

Remember why it's illegal? It's because you could make a rare and deadly poison out of these babies. Antroquinine is a deadly poison. It has no taste and no fragrance and it's hard to get. Now let's connect these thoughts with basic logic.

• But cocoons are how you treat Incuritis. Wouldn't that be like treating AIDS with cyanide?
  • Maybe it all depends on how you process the cocoon? One way it becomes something for healing- the other way it becomes deadly poison. Kind of like how fugu can be processed as a food, unprocessed it's poisonous, and if the posison is proccessed a different way, it's a heart medication.
    • That is correct; in Apollo Justice, it is said that the reasons that the cocoons aren't to leave Borginian borders is because if the purification process in making the Incuritis cure is altered slightly, you get a powerful poison. And an addendum to this WMG: Atroquinine is the poison which Dahlia stole from Doug Swallow and was used in her attempts to poison both Diego and Phoenix.
    • OBJECTION! Diego's poisoning being caused by atroquinine is possible, although, if we assume that the poison intended to kill Phoenix was the same used in the necklace that killed Terry Fawles, the circumstances of his death make it clear that the poison is not slow-acting. The poison used must have been a different one!
    • Actually, at the end of 4-4, it's mentioned that Vera Misham was the only person to survive atroquinine poisoning, rendering the fact that Diego was poisoned with it to be a false claim. As well as that, Phoenix ATE Dahlia's bottle containing traces of the poison. If it were atroquinine, which is lethal at two micrograms (meaning two MILLIONTHS of a gram), the trace amount of poison left in the bottle, which is perfectly plausible to be two micrograms, would have killed Phoenix. (Also in 4-3, it IS mentioned that a slight change in the processing of the cocoons yields a deadly poison.) Otherwise, it's still plausible that atroquinine is the deadly poison from Borginian cocoons, but just not used by Dahlia Hawthorne.
    • HOLD IT! If the doctors caring for him didn't know precisely what poison had caused Diego's coma (for example, if medical technology had not progressed to the point that they could detect the extremely tiny amount of atroquinine present and simply labeled it "unknown causes"), then of course Vera would be the only person on record as surviving atroquinine, but that doesn't mean she's definitely the only one! Furthermore, toxicity is normally given as LD 50, the amount per body weight required to kill half a given population. In that case, it's entirely possible (and even likely, given his well-known sturdy constitution) that Phoenix was merely part of the other half of the population that would have survived two micrograms!

Defense Attorneys and Assistants

Phoenix actually is part spirit medium.

This explains why is is able to hear Mia, even though he hasn't trained in Kurain or elsewhere.

• OBJECTION! Acording to T&T, only women can become spirit mediums!
  • TAKE THAT! The original poster never claimed that Phoenix was a spirit medium, just that he could be part spirit medium! He could still be male with spirit medium blood flowing through his veins, allowing him to use the Magatama, and see/hear Mia without her being channeled.
• OBJECTION! You mentioned that he needs spirit medium blood to use the magatama, but Edgeworth uses it at one point!
  • Gah! ...How did they...? Very well, I concede that point. However, that still doesn't explain why Phoenix can see Mia without being a spirit medium, unless he is part (and only part) spirit medium!
  • HOLD IT! To quote a separate (but related) WMG, if Misty Fey is in fact Miles Edgeworth's mother, it would explain Miles' ability to use the Magatama despite his fervent disbelief in it and his lack of guidance by someone who knew how to use it. Thus, there is no contradiction!
• OBJECTION! T&T says that only women can possess spiritual power, which means that he can't even be part spirit medium!
  • OBJECTION! Saying that "only women can possess spiritual power" and that "Phoenix could be part spirit medium" are not mutually exclusive! Let's say that a spirit medium gives birth to a son. That son (though not possessing any sort of "power") would still be part spirit medium, correct? The WMG is saying that perhaps Phoenix has the blood of a Kurain medium flowing through his veins, giving him the brief ability to see Mai at the end of PW:AA. (This could work especially well if you take into account the fact that many legends of ghosts include those who haunt the living to bring those who wronged them to justice.) Phoenix is not a spirit medium, we accept that fact as true. But, if he has spirit medium blood flowing through his veins, and (maybe) Mia stuck around to bring her murderer to justice, it's possible that the two coupled together allowed Phoenix to see Mia without anyone else summoning her.
  • OBJECTION! Ha...! In the bleak darkness of despair, we all see shadows of those we hold closest. If you insist that this glimmer of yearning was something more, then let's see some evidence!
    • Um... Please forgive me, but I do not have evidence, merely a question. If all it was was Phoenix seeing her because it was the "bleak darkness of despair", then why is it that Godot is able to see (or, at the very least, sense her) at the end of PW:T&T Case 4? Is he having a shared hallucination with Phoenix? Or is it possible that Phoenix, being part spirit medium, was maybe able to "channel" (sorry, I couldn't think of a better word for it, yes I know that it's not channelling) her spirit enough to touch the heart of Godot?
    • Phoenix never saw her in that instance, or heard her, or otherwise sensed her. This troper takes it as Godot seeing a bit of Mia in Phoenix's undying struggle towards the truth, seeing that Mia "is living on in him." This is supported by the fact that the thing that made Godot drawn to her in the first place was her belief in her clients to the bitter end. Also, Godot had demanded that Mia stay out of that particular court battle, insisting that Phoenix man up and battle alone. Plus, Mia's spirit was still residing in Pearls's body at that time.
    • Witness Testimony I think Mia is just too awesome to be stopped by something as puny as death. Phoenix is just lucky she likes him enough to bail him out again and again. You may now cross-examine this statement.
    • HOLD IT! Sorry, can I ask you to define what you mean by "awesome"? The only awesome thing this troper can recall is the extremely satisfying Humiliation Conga she gave to Dahlia in 3-5.
  • In regards to the statements that only women can be Spirit Mediums, allow me to say that Pearl asked Phoenix if he studied some different technique when they first met (of course, she was very confused at what exactly a Lawyer Medium could do), possibly suggesting that there are other ways of channelling spirits besides the Kurain way.
    • The above statement is extremely likely. In 2-2, Pearl indeed mentions that. Phoenix could be part spirit medium, just not part Kurain spirit medium.
  • TAKE THAT! During the credits of 3-5, Pearl reveals Phoenix goes through the 'Special Course' at Hazakura with Maya. He really has no reason to, unless he just wanted to sit with Maya, chanting the same thing 30,000 times.
  • OBJECTION! Your Honor, the prosecutions claims all rest on an extremely objectionable assumption: namely, that it is necessary to be related to spirit mediums to see the people they channel! This is clearly contradicted in "Turnabout Samurai", in which several characters notice that Maya/Mia is not the same person they saw before. The only reason that they weren't sure is that they didn't know Maya well, but they could still clearly see Mia's face. Mr. Kudo in Recipe for a Turnabout also sees her, and gets uber turned on. Also, when Turner Grey wants Maya to channel Mimi Miney for him,neither of them questions the fact that he will be able to communicate with them.
    • TAKE THAT! In the Turner Grey case, Franziska presents to the court a picture of Maya Fey possessed by Mia, conversing with Phoenix, to show the body changing properties of the Kurain Channeling Technique! Also, in the same game, Franziska actually does refer to Mia (she says something along the lines of "Nice to see you in good 'spirits', Ms. Fey.")!

Okay, okay, HOLD IT! Having looked at all the evidence and witness testimony in this case, this troper would like to join the fray with several workable possibilities, Your Honour!

• Point one: Phoenix is part spirit medium (i.e. has spirit medium blood running through his veins). This allows him to see and/or hear Mia at various points during the games.
  • Let's say the spirit medium family he is descended from was the Fey clan. In this case, whilst it has been said that men do not inherit spiritual power, this troper appears to recall that Maya mentioned during 1-2 that the sensitivity to the spiritual realm ran 'particularly strong with the women' – which does not exclude the men from being able to utilize their Fey blood during particularly desperate moments, similar to how humans are capable of amazing feats when adrenaline kicks in.
  • Another possibility: the spirit medium family Phoenix belongs to was not the Fey clan, in which case all rules about the inheritance of spiritual power get thrown out the window, as we don't know if the rules for different bloodlines differ. His lack of ability in summoning spirits or hearing voices more often can be easily Hand Waved as a lack of training or simply that his family's powers are not as strong as the Feys'.
• Point two: Phoenix's spirit medium blood give him the ability to use the magatama. The main objection to this is that Edgeworth uses the magatama at one point.
  • Spiritual power may not have anything to do with using the magatama in the first place.
  • If it does, well then, maybe Edgeworth has spirit medium blood too. After all, his mother is never mentioned in canon. Who is to say he isn't descended from a cousin of the Feys or another spirit medium family? His spiritual ability may even manifest itself into a different ability – such as Logic Chess?
    • Also relates back to another WMG theory below where Misty Fey is Edgeworth's mother (and, following that line of logic, Gregory is Mia and Maya's father. It would certainly explain where the former gets her mad defence attorney skills from).

TAKE THAT! *deskslam* With this evidence, the WMG theory is plausible! *bows* That is all, Your Honour.

Phoenix is Richard Moore.

Policeman turned lawyer turned Private Eye 'Richard Moore' was Phoenix in between PW 3 and AJ. They both have a terrible curse of dead bodies being everywhere they go. Phoenix has always looked up to lawyers; his ex-wife is thus a lawyer. Both have basic knowledge of crime scenes, but can be pretty incompetent. They both need someone to walk them through it or just solve the case for them (Conan, Mia/Maya/any Fey). Phoenix is shown to have an interest in poker and gambling. All that 'grape juice' really is beer, as we know Richard Moore loves, but he's grown a tolerance to it. Both are world-famous, but after the disbarring, no one brought up his lawyer days out of consideration/fear. He couldn't get a case in his beginning days as a PI because of his reputation as a lawyer. After he 'solved a few cases' however, people began to overlook it. Hobo!Phoenix is Phoenix/Richard after PI-ing also fails for him, since he already failed at being a policeman and lawyer. Rachel lived with her mom up until Phoenix enters his Richard stage of life, then she moves back with her mom by AJ (likely due to bad parenting). Hobo!Phoenix really adopted Trucy much later (he was having a friend take care of her), because he missed Rachel once she went back to living with her mom.

• He also lost the spikes because he didn't want people to recognize him, though he eventually opted for Trucy's knit beanie. He began smoking because he was so jaded. The Phoenix shown in the flashback case (4-4) seemed awfully cocky. After being disbarred, out of shock, this facet of his personality grew worse and worse until it became Richard Moore's personality. By AJ, he's mellowed and cleaned up his act, but he's still more like Richard than his old Phoenix self.

Phoenix's submission of false evidence happens during Edgeworth's trial, but it is only revealed during Manfred Von Karma's trial as part of an elaborate plan on Karmas.

We never see Manfred Von Karma's trial, which makes sense because the focus is on defense attorneys. For the purposes of this theory, however, we shall assume that it takes place in the gap between Trials & Tribulations and Apollo Justice, Von Karma clearly having enough legal skill to tie up the courts for that amount of time. Some of the clues Phoenix finds in AA1 seem the result remarkably sloppy cover-up, especially for a Magnificent Bastard of Von Karma's character... but that's because the evidence is faked! Chessmaster time! At his eventual trial for murder, Von Karma proves that the evidence Phoenix submitted during the first trial are forgeries, simultaneously getting an acquittal, and forever soiling Wright's reputation as a lawyer. Only foolish fool foolishness would lead one to believe that they could go up against a Von Karma without repercussions.

• A tip of the Attorney Badge to xdelicious, who's Phoenix Wright The Plan submission inspired this theory.
  • OBJECTION! The troper responsible for The Plan entry is baffled by this. It's clearly stated in the fourth case of Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney that the false evidence was presented in a trial which von Karma had nothing to do with... unless one considers Kristoph Gavin to be von Karma's apprentice.
    • Well, they certainly have a shared tendency to overreact.
  • Not to mention that Trials and Tribulations makes it clear that von Karma is deceased.
    • The above theory was written by someone who had only heard vague spoilers for the third and fourth games, as such, consider it Jossed
    • Having played the fourth game, I'm actually of the opinion that after being disbarred and figuring out exactly what happened and who was to blame, it was Phoenix who pulled off a gambit – in fact he pulled off two. One last-minute one to get Kristoph Gavin convicted for Shadi Smith's murder, and a second one he had planned before the murder to nail Kristoph, restore his good name, and clear the Gramaryes' names. Guess being exposed to all those failed plans and wanna be Magnificent Bastard types taught him how to properly be a Chessmaster.

Phoenix Wright is Batman.

Think about it. He realized that his days as an active superhero were over, and decided to protect the innocent in another way - as a defense attorney. He had to change his name, of course, or else he'd be too conspicuous. On top of this, has anyone else noticed that despite complaining about the bills and yet not taking on many jobs, that Phoenix oddly manages to keep his house rented and pays for Maya's appetite? As Batman, he'd have his fortune to mooch off of. To top it off, it's obvious that the spikes in his hair are simply a result of him hiding his old Batman spikes in it to use as backup weapons.

• OBJECTION! Batman can actually drive.
  • Phoenix could be faking an inability to drive as part of his cover-up.
• Phoenix has a house?
• You know, I can easily see many Batman characters fitting in to the Phoenix Wright universe. Seriously. Picture a courtroom battle between Phoenix Wright and Two-Face. So easy!
• OBJECTION! Bruce Wayne is in his late 30s - early 40s while Phoenix is in his mid 20s in his own arc, and in his early 30s in Apollo Justice.
• OBJECTION! Bruce Wayne has worn many, many elaborate disguises throughout his career. It's not a stretch at all to think he could make himself appear younger.
• HOLD IT! What if this WMG has it backwards, and in fact he was Phoenix Wright then Batman?
• Apollo must be Robin, then, as Scuttlebutt does call him "Boy Wonder".
  • I assume this would make Athena Batgirl, then?
• It IS worth noting that two of the villains in the series have resembled Batman villains, with the personalities switched (I'm referring here to a WMG I put below). We see the Penguin in Case 3-3 with the personality of the Joker (even referring to himself as a clown) and in Case 5-2 we see the Joker with the personality of the Penguin. I'm talking, of course, of Luke Atmey and Florent L'Belle, who it cannot be a coincidence that they're so alike, yet different enough that they can be the Penguin and the Joker, to the point that their leitmotifs tend to sound rather similar.
• Clearly, if anyone is Batman, it's Edgeworth — a rich young man with an overly-serious attitude who devoted his life to fighting crime after his father was murdered in front of him and has a bird-themed sidekick!

Apollo's father is still alive.

What happened to him sounds awfully similar to what happened to Thalassa, and we know she's not dead. Although knowing the way this series treats its long-lost parents, he'll probably die as soon he appears. There's another idea going around that Valant is Apollo's father, but I am unconvinced by it.

• *sigh* ... Objection. Remember the ending? Where Trucy is found out to be Apollo's sister? Add one and one together. It's not hard. Apollo's father is Zak Gramarye. ::slams desk:: And he is dead!
  • ...Wasn't it said that Apollo was born while Thalassa took a year off from the Grammaryes and visited another group? I don't think it was ever said they're full siblings; they're most likely half-siblings. Anyway, this is quite the depressing WMG, since if Apollo's dad shows up and suddenly dies, then both he and Trucy would have had that happen to them.

Jossed in Spirit of Justice.

Apollo Justice isn't Apollo's real name, it's one he himself opted for.

Now, I know characters in the AA universe tend to have astoundingly appropriate names, but not usually the main characters, Gumshoe excepted. Add that to the fact that he grew up an orphan, his Catchphrase and his general passion for the law, and it's easy to see him taking the name 'Justice' and possibly even the name 'Apollo' for himself.

• OBJECTION! A flashback in Dual Destinies shows that his name was "Apollo Justice" in Junior High.
  • HOLD IT! Who's to say he didn't make up his own name before Junior High? A simple Mythology Book from Elementary School could've yielded said name since Apollo is not only the god of Light, he's also the god of Justice.
• This is Jossed in Spirit of Justice, where we learn about Apollo's backstory.

Phoenix's Butt-Monkey qualities are due to the bad karma gained from being a kleptomaniac

Note how perfectly his first case goes, he never stole anything at that point!

Phoenix's Chessmasterism in Apollo Justice is part of his training to become the fourth deKiller.

How many times did deKiller make that offer to Phoenix in JFA? After he lost his badge, Phoenix remembered the offer (and the fact that deKiller got a large roll of cash for one of his jobs) and took deKiller up on it. He already had the required intelligence, determination, and sense of trust between himself and his clients, and so the whole fourth game was a demonstration of his ability to orchestrate events. Since The Plan worked without a hitch, he's now ready for deKiller to teach him the next step...

• What, it took him eight years to prove himself worthy of the deKiller name? Given deKiller's particular interest in him and his own state of despair/desperation after being disbarred, Phoenix has probably already been deKiller IV for several years prior to Apollo Justice. Phoenix's piano playing nets him a low profile, and his poker playing gives him connections to potential clients. He also still has the Magatama, so he won't make the same mistake Shelly made.
  • *bangs gavel* Order! Order in the court! Would the witness kindly refrain from planting Poison Oak Epileptic Trees likely to destroy the respect we all have for the face of the franchise in this manner?!

Phoenix's Butt-Monkey qualities are due to being the reincarnation of Ami Fey

Related Guess: Phoenix carries a bit of Fey blood. How else does he see or hear Mia's spirit without having Maya or Pearl around to channel her? Also, Ami's Butt-Monkey status can be seen by what happens to the things most closely related to her. The Sacred Urn has been broken at least three times, and those are just in the last twenty years or so. That gold statue of hers and its sword have been involved in two murders in one year, one of those being Ami's direct descendant.

Phoenix will become a Godot-esque character

Being so badly damaged by the Gramarye case, he will retake the bar exam – as a prosecutor. Then, he will face down Apollo in the courtroom. Why? BECAUSE THAT WOULD BE EPIC.

• And he'd never drink more than 17 bottles of "grape juice" per trial.
• JOSSED. In between Apollo Justice and Dual Destinies, Phoenix retakes the bar and goes back to his old job as a defense attorney. Granted, he does oppose Apollo in court during Spirit of Justice in a claims trial.

Phoenix prefers noodles to burgers.

This goes a long way toward reconciling the burgers/noodles translation inconsistency between games 1-3 and 4. Maya, as established in the Phoenix Wright Trilogy, prefers burgers, and most of the time, it was easier to cave to her demands than to put up with a whiny Maya who had been deprived of burgers. They did occasionally eat at the noodle stand, just often enough to justify Guy Eldoon's statement that they ate there when Phoenix was a lawyer. Once Maya returned to Kurain village to focus on her training and become the new Master, Phoenix more or less stopped going for burgers at all and started eating noodles all the time instead. Trucy has picked up her father's liking for noodles, because she's more or less grown up eating them.

• Considering that in the Japanese version, Mayoi liked ramen (in lieu of burgers), this may not be far off.

Phoenix is a telepath.

His mind-reading is less than developed, but he does have the ability to project thoughts to others. This explains how come his partner du jour can always read his blue 'thought' text. Not only that, it explains exactly what he does when he presents evidence or profiles. He doesn't show an object or a photograph; instead, he plants an image of the object or person into his target's mind. Since Apollo studied Phoenix's cases and his signature attorney style, he also studied telepathy and learned to project thoughts in the same manner.

• On the other hand, the blue text could just be Phoenix talking to himself, like in an aside or soliloquy in a play. Given the script-like nature of characters' speech, it's not that far of a leap, and his partner's proximity to him would allow him to privately share certain thoughts.
• OBJECTION!] In the first game, third case, Edgeworth answers to the blue text a few times, and then Phoenix says something among the lines of How does he know what I'm thinking? and then Edgeworth answers this. But not with I don't. You're just talking to yourself. Because the blue text is not Phoenix talking to himself.

Robin Newman and Apollo are related somehow.

They certainly look more alike than Apollo looks like his actual sister. It's especially noticeable when they're standing right next to each other. Not only that, but they're both extremely similar in personality (at least, when Robin is pretending to be a boy), though Robin is more reckless. Maybe Apollo was going to have a twin sister, but she was stillborn, and instead ended up reincarnated in Robin.

Apollo Justice's biological father is Damon Gant.

Based on the first three posts in this thread.

• Is is surprisingly plausible. I think I need to go lie down for a little bit...
• OBJECTION! Part of the testimony in that thread has a clear contradiction! See the final post at the bottom of the page here.
  • OBJECTION! Your contradiction holds no water, as shown p41244 here
• And here's another something linking Thalassa to Leto, which the poster seems to have missed: Leto is goddess of "being unseen." Who, pray tell, was blind for a while?
• The only aspect of this that I don't like is that Gant is about 32 years older than Thalassa. To put it in another term, he's literally the same age as Magnifi, possibly a year older. I can totally see Gant being his grandfather though, and he just unconsciously mimics his paternal grandfather.
• Jossed. In Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Spirit of Justice, it is revealed that Apollo's father is a musician by the name of Jove Justice.
  • Gant could still be Jove's father, though.

Phoenix became a stoner during Apollo Justice.

Think about it. Many people complain that Phoenix acted very out of character during the fourth game, and this would explain why he behaved like that. Maybe the reason he acts so aloof and careless towards others, even when he tends to be more awkward and sociable, it’s because he’s under the effects of a calming drug, like reefer, and has become so used to it that he can act almost normal despite using it while also keeping it cool. It would also explain why he doesn’t even flinch by the pain of getting hit by a car (maybe it could even be THE REASON he didn’t reacted fast enough to a car approaching him).

Not only that, but it would even explain why all of a sudden Phoenix is so good at hiding his emotions. In the game, Zak Gramayre hires Phoenix because of his poker face skills, which it’s kind of weird considering, as those who have played the first three games know, that Phoenix is not exactly the most calm, unreadable guy, and is very quick at showing shock or worry during a trial for very small things. In reality, he would not be as good at hiding his inner fears as Zak said…unless he was using some extra help, like marihuana, to calm his nerves and help him relax. How he got it? That’s a good question. Maybe he knew of someone who sold it and got some from him, like maybe Larry, who, in just another giant stroke of bad luck or because of a pretty criminal lady, ended up becoming a drug dealer. But him getting and using marihuana at that point is just a possibility.

What I DO BELIEVE is that, after getting disbarred, Phoenix started doing marihuana in secret, behind Trucy’s back, as a way to cope with his problems, as well as to bypass her almost mind-reading abilities. Zak himself claimed that he felt uncomfortable because of that gift Thalassa and Trucy had, and maybe Phoenix figured out that, using marihuana to calm his nerves, he could show no noticeable tics and thus avoid her detection. He would do this in order to hide from Trucy how he truly felt about becoming the unwanted parent of a girl that, let’s be honest, helped him lose his job (I’m not necessarily saying he doesn’t love her, just that he might feel some resentment towards her); and how bad his situation was, due to him not getting enough money or being in trouble with the law or with the crime syndicates. Heck, maybe it could even explain why he can suddenly play so well at poker (maybe time passes slower for Phoenix when using pot, which can be helpful at coming up with good strategies for winning at poker) or his (lack of) piano skills.

It would make sense too, considering what Phoenix has been through. Having lost the job he worked so hard on, after all he did and all the people he helped, after dealing with so many problems, seeing how many of his friends left him and/or went their own ways, having to deal with a newfound parenthood despite having no (successful) job, dealing with new problems because of the change of business Fey & Co had to undergo, all the legal problems…it would easily push any guy, strong or not, to the breaking point. He would direly need something that would soothe him, and since he doesn’t seem to get too drunk on “grape juice”, and considering he has some contacts with the underworld, it would not be too hard for Phoenix to get some pot to smoke on secret. Maybe he hides his stashes on the piano or somewhere in the basement/poker room of the bar, and during his stay at the hospital he hid it on some of the “Steel Samurai” boxes or in other places.

And before anyone starts reacting angrily because I’m “badmouthing” him, let me make three things perfectly clear:

• We don’t know how illegal or not marihuana is in the Ace Attorney universe.
• Smoking pot does NOT mean you’re a bad person, only that you might, MIGHT, be doing something illegal, and it’s not like Phoenix has never gone against the law.
• Pot is one of the less addictive drugs out there. During the case of Vera Misham, and also afterwards since he had to win back his badge, Phoenix dumped marihuana and sobered himself, which would explain why he acts more like before in Dual Destinies.

Phoenix was the Chessmaster behind cases 4-1 and 4-4.

After all, the timing of his secret mission in relation to the time the murder occurred is a bit too convenient. Besides, he could easily set up the jurist system so that all verdicts are final, and he has double jeopardy preventing him from being tried on the Shadi Smith case.

There is some kind of relation between Phoenix and Kyon from the Haruhi Suzumiya Franchise.

During his time as a lawyer, Phoenix is basically Kyon with more facial expressions, right down to the sarcastic remarks in his thoughts, the Willing Suspension of Disbelief failure when Mia is first channeled, the heroic "She's annoying me to death, but I still love her as a friend" moment and the fact that everybody and their mothers seemed to be able to read his thoughts for some reason. Also, Kyon implies that he, surprisingly, actually used to be rather naive and childish just a few years ago... does that remind you on a certain cold-killer X taking law-student?Conclusion: Kyon too will end up as a Hobo in a few years, he just needs some traumatic experience to make him snap.

• HOLD IT! There's one more possibility: Phoenix is a result of Haruhi accidentally merging Taniguchi, who not only closely resembles Phoenix, but sounds exactly like him, with Kyon (thus, the personality) and Koizumi (who manifests as his ability to always find the truth and later, to use the Magatama). Athena is the result of Haruhi accidentally merging herself with Yuki (hence the superhearing) and Mikuru (hence the red hair). The entire Ace Attorney series is just an accidental universe created by Haruhi.

Phoenix Wright is responsible for every single one of Winston Payne's failures

When Phoenix isn't involved in the case, he actually does quite well. Note that every single case we see him fail involves Phoenix, even when Phoenix is not the main character. We see him win the trail against Maggey Byrde, and he would have won the trial against Luke Atmey if Phoenix had not intervened.

• OBJECTION! Both of those cases had the defense... trying to lose!! I hardly think that counts!
• Well, he was known as the Rookie Killer. How could that name have come about if he wasn't a good prosecutor? Phoenix just throws him off of his groove.

Mia is possessing Phoenix in Apollo Justice.

Being a member of the Fey family, Mia possesses extraordinary abilities regarding channeling (which is why it's easier for Pearl and Maya to channel her). After Phoenix's disbarment, she was so outraged that she used her awesome Big Damn Heroes / Determinator status to force her spirit into Phoenix and fix things for good - hence Phoenix's distant, abrasive personality in game 4. And since Phoenix isn't a spirit channeler, the body-appearance thing doesn't happen.

Wright & Co. Law offices has a tagline focusing on "the truth"

None of the clients who choose Phoenix on their own are actually guilty, and the one time he did have a guilty client, Nick was the one offering his services. Matt obviously wouldn't know or care about an emphasis on the truth, and de Killer wouldn't care, since blackmail has a way of getting people to see things your way. If there was a reference to finding the truth in an ad, then guilty clients wouldn't be as likely to go to that law firm, but innocent ones would. It would also explain the apparent lack of popularity and... unique clientele.

• Everything makes sense now.
• I always thought it might be "We help the hopeless."

Phoenix Wright has the Reading Steiner ability and is sending D-Mails or using Time Leap Machine

That Explains how you're in Phoenix's shoes... with items you WEREN'T supposed to have, bringing them back and forth between times.

Phoenix's guts are shredded to hell.

Remember how he kept cleaning the toilet in Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations? That was also the same game where it was shown (retconned?) that he had swallowed broken glass that was possibly coated in weakened poison which nearly killed Godot and seriously messed up his entire body when taken in its unweakened state before he became a lawyer. Combined with all the stress he's constantly under, we can only be thankful that Mia didn't teach him the Marvin Grossberg Method of Public Speaking.

The reason why Phoenix is seemingly immortal is because of Sissel.

It is confirmed by Word of God that both games happen in the same universe, and Phoenix got into at least 6 life-threatening situations which he miraculously survived. What's to say that he didn't take part in Phoenix's life?

• I believe there's a fanfiction on this somewhere around FanFiction.Net.
• I want this made into a game, and I want to play it.

Phoenix was an orphan

Either that or he had a case of Parental Abandonment. Case in point almost (if not all) playable characters are either orphan or abandoned. We never heard his family either. It makes sense. When he was accused of thieving the money at the school, nobody's going to believe him (and he didn't have family support either). That's why he was so 'touched' by Edgy and Larry's trust on him. Because he didn't have anyone else.

• HOLD IT! When your entire class turns on you, teacher included, for something you know you did not do, you feel alone. Especially if you had to put up with bullying, which considering Mr Wright's Butt-Monkey status in-universe suggests he probably was. You would feel like the world is against you, and one person standing up for you can leave a long-lasting impression, no matter what stupid thing they're defending you for. Phoenix could have had a perfectly happy home life, though perhaps his parents were often busy? Perhaps, even, one of them worked for the school he attended, and that parent couldn't do anything without it being seen as favouritism?
  • Heck, even if his parents had all time in the world to support him and were unrelated to the school they work at, Phoenix's feeling of being alone has a pretty good reason: plenty of children, especially if they are the only child, may take their parents' love for granted and feel alone even if they stand up for them. The bullies wouldn't care either way, or possibly just use the parents' actions against Phoenix.

Lana is Mia's rival in the same way that Edgeworth is Phoenix's rival

• I might have to disagree on that one. As I recall, Lana was a detective before she made the transition to the Prosecutor's office via Gant placing her there to control said office. If anything she'd play a role similar to Gumshoe: the Friend on the Force who will occasionally give you hints at the expense of their salary, to the chagrin of her Prosecutor partner, who would've likely been Neil Marshall. (Cue Mia laying on some Lana X Neil Ship Tease when cross-examining Lana to where it becomes Neil's witness-related Running Gag.)

Apollo is related to Gant.

No, wait, hear me out!While it's sound like a little modification from the other theory, it's possible.Please consider this.It's possible that Gant had a younger brother who looked like him, and closer to Thalassa's age.1. Gant himself is playing organ - it's possible it's run in the family, and his younger brother is a performer.2. Supposed that brother is dead...or murdered. And by some circumstance, Gant cannot investigate his death. We already see that Jake is willing to do anything for his brother, as well as Lana for his sister, why not Gant? It probably motivate him to take an extreme measure trying to control law, either to find the culprit or to avoid the same thing happenings again.

If Gant is Apollo's father, it raises contradiction in which we told Apollo's father is a performer (unless it's a lie). But, if he was Gant's brother (or related by some other way) it explains the similarity between the two. And thus, Gant's physical similarity to Apollo is explained.It would be like Kristoph and Klavier all over again, though...

In the future installment, Apollo will pull a Blackquill...

It occured to me the two had quite similar sprites: for example, Apollo's two-fist objection compared to Blackquill breaking chains. Also, Apollo's thinking sprite (with a finger to temple). Blackquill also had one (though it more seemed like he was mocking the defense).The two also had a change in personality: Athena described 21 years old Blackquill as honest, kind and straight while Phoenix noticed he was now more twisted than snake. In comparison, Trucy said that in 5-4 and 5-5 Apollo looked cool and dark, unlike the Apollo she usually knew. Apollo also capable to take drastic measures, such as taking the stand to accuse Athena.

Now where was I going? Dual Destinies doesn't mention the Gramarye plot points in the AJ. And the last time we had a 'mother who left', she ended up dead (T&T). Also, it seem almost everyone that Phoenix knows is accused of murder, especially the assistants, with the exceptions so far being Trucy, Apollo, and Pearl.

This troper suggests this WMG: There will be a case where Thalassa Gramarye/Lamiroir is the victim. Apollo and Trucy may or may not know the truth. Apollo would confess for the murder just to protect Trucy, who would then be the main suspect. Imagine Phoenix's response where he thought he was saving Apollo, only to find the blame had shifted to his daughter instead. Oh, and Apollo will have black psyche-locks, too. Just because...

• I picture it differently: Thalassa returns for a comeback performance, and invites the Agency with VIP tickets. Butt-Monkey Apollo has to put up with Murphy's Law for the whole day, with the last straw resulting in a very Chords of Steel-laden rant at Thalassa and storming off in a huff. The next day, Nick gets a defense request, and he pulls Athena for assistance, but essentially swears her into secrecy about the victim of the case (Thalassa). He also forbids both Apollo and Trucy (Who find out from Athena since she accidentally blurts it out) from even setting foot into the crime scene. The duo conduct their own investigation, up to and including invoking Perception on their friend/mentor/father-figure. Once the two push Nick into a corner, he pulls out one of the collected bits of evidence and presents it to the duo, Apollo specifically: Thalassa's bracelet, and his own bracelet's long lost twin. The resulting shock sends Polly into Heroic BSoD mode that not even Trucy could pull him out of. In trial, it goes smoothly until evidence of the duo's unofficial "investigation" leads the Police to indict one of them for said crime. Apollo then bursts into court, then points all suspicion to himself and refuses to say otherwise, even when confronted with a Mood Matrix session. Once again, it's up to Phoenix to save his friend from the brink and let the truth rise from the ashes.
  • This one would fit in neatly with the series' occasional habit of writing cases that parallel other ones (Compare "The Stolen Turnabout" to "The Monstrous Turnabout"; the two cases are startlingly similar) as Thalassa being murdered and Apollo taking the blame for Trucy would not only parallel the UR-1 Incident, but would bring elements of "Bridge to the Turnabout" (which already parallels the UR-1 Incident neatly, though not as much as "The Monstrous Turnabout" does with "The Stolen Turnabout).
• It does feel that if any character would pull a Blackquill (or even a Godot), it would be Apollo. Apollo has a very strong Big Brother Instinct and is also someone who is both extremely emotional while actually good at hiding his feelings. Athena never noticed until Apollo unleashed his bottled up feelings what was wrong with him. Never noticed he suspected her. Meaning he was hiding it from her and hiding it well, so he could possibly fool the Mood Matrix. He's also very good at being a prosecutor, which would benefit him if he was confessing as it means he could easily close off openings for the defence to point out how he couldn't have done it and close off for the prosecution how it could be Trucy. We see his prowess for prosecuting when he does Edgeworth's job for him after showing up in court; Edgeworth doesn't actually say much after Apollo starts his testimony, since Apollo does all the refuting of the defence himself. Edgeworth even more or less says Apollo would make a good prosecutor. Between all of that, he could probably make a mostly watertight case against himself if there wasn't any other choice. It wouldn't work for him to up and claim he did it in the middle of the trial unless there were no other options.
  • In terms of what a case in the game would look like where this happens, this is possibly what it would look like: Lamiroir is killed with one of Trucy's throwing knives. Trucy is, of course, accused for probably a few reasons including that she saw the victim last (and there's photographic evidence of her being the last person to leave the dressing room), was the last person seen with the victim, and because there are no prints on the murder weapon (as Trucy wears gloves). The trial progressively gets worse (as they do) and the prosecution in their ever-flowery and melodramatic way points out that Trucy may not have meant to kill the victim (conceding that she may have been practising her knife throwing act and unknowingly hit her mother) but that she's still responsible for her death. Phoenix has his Heroic BSoD and panics, and Apollo, acting as co-counsel, points out that there could have been another killer using a photo of the dressing room as evidence (Open window?). Trial continues and eventually it's revealed that the victim was killed by a blow to the head about an hour after impact (as not all blows to the head are bloody and kill instantly). Further, the thing they found to have possibly been what dealt the killing blow has Apollo's prints on it. He uses all of this to take the blame, since it would have been impossible before them for him to make a reasonable claim that he did it, as the evidence up to then pointed at Trucy, specifically the lack of prints on her throwing knife. It wouldn't make sense. Why? Well, he's confessing to the murder; great. If he was going to confess, why did he leave evidence incriminating Trucy? Apollo doesn't wear gloves, so the lack of prints on the knife would have meant he intentionally didn't leave any prints on a knife that he knows would immediately be linked to Trucy. So, he'd have to wait for an opening in the case to claim he did it (and improvise it on the spot). Apollo directs the blame onto himself, claiming that he didn't realise when he hit the victim that he'd done something that would kill her (in reality, he did hit her around that time and it was an accident and it definitely wasn't hard enough to kill her, meaning his lie would be a half-truth and making it easier to lie and it wouldn't trigger Trucy's perception abilities). He does his best to explain away the evidence incriminating Trucy, by stating that it's possible that Lamiroir fell on the knife when she collapsed at last from her head wound, something Phoenix proved could be possible (though lacked any concrete proof). Unlikely but perfectly plausible given the state of the dressing room, which has already been explained as being caused by her stumbling around. It just was coincidence that Trucy saw her last. He of course knows full well he didn't do it, but if he doesn't claim he did, Trucy will continue to be blamed. Something like this, I think would be what would happen, since him interrupting the trial is already too late for him to reasonably claim he did it and make it believable. There'd have to be a natural shift of the blame from her to him for it to not look like him covering for her, even when he is; he'd have to either claim it was him from the start in a situation where it's possible either of them did it, or what I already said. Unless in the previous set-up, he claims that he didn't realise he killed her until he thought about it, but even then it would be just a little unnatural. The Mood Matrix test in my set-up wouldn't play in until Day 2 where Athena is the co-counsel instead
    Alternately, of course, using this same situation, if he's the first to happen upon the crime scene and he recognises the knife, he could just tamper with the crime scene to shift the blame onto himself, which would easily produce the same thing as what Blackquill did to protect Athena.
• Regardless of how it pans out, if and when the "Therapy Session" is held, there will be no emotion that contradicts Apollo's testimony. At All. After the testimony is cycled through once, Apollo taunts Athena that his testimony is ironclad, even getting a shot at Prosecutor Blackquill, Athena, after a brief Freak Out gathers her Heroic Resolve... and suddenly we get Athena and Apollo standing on the opposite sides of a virtual chessboard. Edgeworth, somehow also able to see this, recognizes this immediately... Ladies and Gentlemen, it's time for a courtside game of Logic Chess!

Phoenix is an Ephebophile and deeply ashamed of it

He has at least one teenaged girl with him at all times, and by the fifth game he's surrounded by three, the oldest being a barely legal 18 year old. He's not interested in anyone over 20, which is why Maya has stopped appearing in the games, and is likely what will happen to Athena, Trucy and Pearl in due time.As further evidence, his only "official" love interest Iris, while 26, looked exactly the same as she did when she was a teenager.

• OBJECTION! There are so many problems with this one statement that I felt like I'd collapse for a moment. First off, I'll point out that Maya hasn't been removed or forgotten at all. Heck, Dual Destinies proves that she and Phoenix did keep in contact. The reason she was away was to fulfill the requirements to properly succeed her late mother as the Master of Kurain, as proven in Spirit of Justice. She succeeds in this. Also, she and Pearl have a life outside of the Wright Anything Agency, and they aren't technically hired either, so they have no obligation to appear every day.
• Next on the list is Trucy: Phoenix had adopted her as his daughter after Zak had disappeared in Turnabout Succession! There is no way that she is going away! Not only does Phoenix genuinely love her as a father, but she is pretty much the financial manager of the Wright Anything Agency! Without her, the place would fall apart!
• Now that Spirit of Justice has been established in the Ace Attorny chronology, it's safe to say that Athena won't be going away either. Since Apollo is away re-establishing the legal system in Khura'in, Phoenix and Athena are the only attorneys left in the Wright Anything Agency. While Phoenix did handle cases on his own by technicality in the first trilogy, there were times where he'd get help from his late boss, Mia, who was also a defense attorney. Having another lawyer on board would alleviate the workload of present cases for Phoenix to a certain degree, so giving that up would be counterintuitive and rather unintelligent.

The initial scarring on Matt Engarde's face is from being slapped by an ex-girlfriend.

Matt has four long scars on his face and with there being four of them, there's not much room for question they were left by someone's fingernails, no? Not with the way they're spaced, and considering the angle and lengths of the scars, it's not unreasonable that it's from a slap. In fact, with the scars all being different lengths, particularly the top scar on his eyebrow, it's far more likely he was hit than doing it himself. If he did it, the scar would go past more than just his eyebrow, and the bottom scar would be the longest. You can clearly see this if you curl your hand up like you plan on scratching yourself like Matt's scars and hold them up to your face. Someone slapping him, however, would leave scars that are all different lengths, AND would justify why the scar second from the bottom is the longest, and the top scar the shortest. Matt is six feet tall, most women would be shorter than he is. someone shorter than he slapping him would probably make the scars look like they do. Her index finger wouldn't leave a very long cut, since it would have the farthest to reach, and would only strike what's jutting out (the browbone). The middle finger wouldn't encounter his face until after the ring finger, because even though the middle finger is the longest, the woman would be striking him from a lower angle, and thus the ring finger, with her hand pointing down, is closer to his face. The ring finger hits first, and the scar second from the bottom is indeed both the longest scar and the one that starts the earliest. If Matt did it himself, the longest and first-starting scar would be the one second from the top, not bottom. Not only that, but the scar left by a ring finger probably wouldn't begin until it reached his cheek anyway. To quote Ema, "scientifically speaking"... he did not put the scars there himself. Who slapped him? Possibly an angry ex who didn't like how she got dumped, who he could never find to make pay, or perhaps the scars boosted his publicity, so he chose not to pursue her. Or perhaps he did do away with her, but nobody ever found out.

Phoenix wasn't really studying abroad between his disbarment and reinstatement.

He was being sent around by Edgeworth for the express purpose of finding Athena Cykes. Athena was the key to finding out the truth behind her mother's murder, and freeing the innocent Blackquill. This was probably obvious to Edgeworth, who couldn't hope to do anything as a regular prosecutor, and a busy one at that, so he sent someone he could completely trust who wouldn't be too busy and who it would be easy to give a cover for: Phoenix. He probably did do a bit of studying, but for the most part, he was looking for Athena. It probably took a really long time, since Athena apparently lived in Spain, France, and Germany at least, and Phoenix was probably gone for a week at a time at most since he wouldn't want to leave Trucy and the office alone for too long (even if Edgeworth [or rather, Gumshoe] took watch of her while Phoenix was away). Eventually Edgeworth managed to pinpoint a much more specific region and sent Phoenix there to set the plan into motion to get Blackquill acquitted. Of course, a LOT rode on Athena being able to become a defence attorney in the short amount of time since Phoenix was able to make contact with her, but Edgeworth probably figured it wouldn't be too hard for Athena to pass the bar if she was already in college studying analytical psychology, which is presumably how Edgeworth located her in the first place.

Additionally, Phoenix asking Apollo to come work for him was part of the gambit because Phoenix initially thought Apollo was more bark than bite in the courtroom, despite knowing that Kristoph was the culprit. He improvised on the spot (as usual) to have Apollo work for him after seeing that he's just as good (if not better) than Phoenix had been (I say better because Apollo built on the foundations Phoenix built for himself [just as Phoenix built up on Mia's foundations] and he was seriously interested in the legal system for longer than Mr Originally-An-Art-Major-At-Uni Phoenix was). By setting up a law office through Apollo, he could tell Athena he had one for her to come work at. By doing that, it ensured she had a job, it got her to America and in the right legal district, and that she could put an end to the Dark Age of the Law with Blackquill's acquittal. Apollo getting Phoenix acquitted of false evidence charges was probably not specifically in the agenda (or at least, in Phoenix's agenda) but improvised by the master of improvising.

Both Edgeworth and Phoenix are fully capable heroic chessmasters. It's not unreasonable to suggest that Edgeworth came up with the Batman Gambit, and Phoenix complied. We know he was working with Edgeworth about something for quite some time, based on the phone call he had with Edgeworth at the start of the game (his tone could suggest he's casually updating Edgeworth in his now usual playful way rather than telling Edgeworth about Athena for the first time; he certainly sounds amused. It was his way of telling Edgeworth that he thought Athena was ready to take on her part in the gambit). We also know that Edgeworth pulled strings to get Phoenix his badge back, not just because he needed his help, but in thanks (as he says at the end of the game that he feels even more indebted to Phoenix). The gambit also included Edgeworth becoming Chief Prosecutor.

There's a few things that support this:

• One, Athena knew Blackquill's time was drawing to an end. This wasn't common knowledge. Phoenix didn't know, which is unfortunately the real hole in my testimony here, but more on that later.
• Two, Phoenix, as a disbarred lawyer, wouldn't need study law abroad. He wouldn't be able to use this knowledge so there must have been an ulterior motive.
• Three, Edgeworth was never interested in places of power; note his reaction to the King of Prosecutors award. He would have had a reason to want to take on Chief Prosecutor, especially if it takes him out of the courtroom.
• Four, as stated, Phoenix and Edgeworth are clearly scheming something at the start of the game. Here's what Phoenix says:
  "These are dark times, where the law has been reduced to rubble, and it's up to us to restore it to its former glory. [...] Yeah, I know what you mean. It looks like your target has finally decided to make a move. [...] Don't you worry; I've got a trusty new partner on board. [...] She's been with us for half a year, though I can hardly believe it. Anyway, her power will be our greatest weapon. [...] Yeah, it's for this very reason I returned. [...] Time to bring it to an end."

We later learn he's talking to Edgeworth. They're definitely planning something. The conversation brings me to point five:

• The tone of Phoenix's voice when discussing Athena is considerably lighter than anything else he says. If he was just as serious talking about her as he is during the rest, then I'd say he was definitely telling Edgeworth about Athena as if the other had no idea about her. He also doesn't mention her name, which you'd think he would if he was telling Edgeworth about a newbie on his team Edgeworth didn't know about. His posture change also suggests he's making light of the situation. People tend to change postures when they adopt a different attitude to what they're talking about. The way his voice suddenly lightens, even becomes teasing, is because Edgeworth already knows about Athena and he's telling Edgeworth only in the tone of his voice, lest the line be tapped, that Athena is ready.

Now, back to that problem I mentioned, the fact that Edgeworth didn't tell Phoenix Blackquill was on death row. Well, Edgeworth probably wouldn't put all his cards on the table (he never does), and frankly, Phoenix didn't need to know Blackquill was on death row. Athena? Yes. Phoenix? No. He could have relayed the message to Athena somehow, possibly via Phoenix without telling him what the message actually meant (ie, that she's running out of time). Now, that would surely make Phoenix question it, but I have an idea as to why he may not. The Statute of Limitations may work differently for Blackquill, since:

• A) his murder was in the first degree
• B) he confessed
• C) he was a prosecutor, ie, a member of law enforcement and
• D) he did so with an illegal weapon.

For the first, he claimed he went there with the express purpose of murdering Metis Cykes. That's a premeditated murder. The only case, I believe, that was murder in the second degree was Case 1-3. Next, self-explanatory. He admitted he did it. Third, we know from Case 1-5 that law enforcement likes to make sure violent crimes, especially murder, are dealt with swiftly when they're committed by someone in law enforcement. Lana says as much. And last point, it probably didn't help that the weapon in question was a katana, which is illegal to own for the general public and automatically makes the murder rather more violent, especially since it happened right in front of her daughter. Ergo, the Statue of Limitations for the UR-1 Incident may well have been a short 7 years, which is why he was set to be executed. His case was unique (Gant, before anyone mentions him, didn't use an illegal weapon, nor was the murder premeditated), so we may never know. The odd bit is... Dahlia died earlier than Blackquill would have. That was probably because she was suspected of the murder of others, and it was known that she definitely had something to do with Fawles' suicide. Blackquill being a prosecutor was what damned the case to a short limitation and saved him from a sooner execution. If this is plausible, Phoenix could have interpreted Edgeworth's message as such without suspicion or asking questions.

Back to the main point... it's certainly not out of the realm of possibility that Phoenix, when he was abroad when he met Athena, wasn't studying but specifically looking for her due to a plan by him and Edgeworth (mostly Edgeworth).

Apollo and Clay were giant Sci Fi geeks.

Well, we do know Apollo used to watch Doctor Who, at least and since Clay was an astronaut he may have been interested in shows like Doctor Who and Star Trek and Apollo watched them with him. And the idea of them going to cons in costume is just amusing in and of itself.

• Apollo + Red Shirt uniform. Fan artists, make it so!
  • And Clay in a blue uniform, since it's sciences and he's an astronaut (which is... science).

Phoenix will get arrested for murder (again) and will have Athena as his lawyer.

Well, she's the only one who HASN'T defended him yet. Apollo, Mia, and Phoenix himself have all defended him.

• If we're going textbook technicalities, Gregory didn't defend him either but that one will be a little hard to fulfill.

Phoenix Wright being an art major in college helps him get some of his clients.

Consider this: most of the cases Phoenix takes on that don't fall under It's Personal involve the entertainment industry in some way. In 1-3, he's defending a television star accused of a murder at a studio. In 2-3, he's defending a magician accused of a murder at a circus. In 3-2, he's defending a thief who may as well be a stage performer. In 4-4, he's defending a magician accused of murdering his mentor. In 5-4, he's defending an astronaut whose exploits were turned into a highly successful film. In 5-6, he's defending an orca and her trainer who are accused of a murder at an aquarium known for its stage show. Perhaps the reason for this large amount of entertainers turning to Nick for their defense has something to do with them discovering he was an art major when looking over his credentials. In two of those cases, the defendant explicitly states that they chose Phoenix due to some sort of theatrics, so I don't think this would be too much of a stretch.

Phoenix is Mia's Horcrux.

When Mia was murdered, she unknowingly would put a part of her soul in Phoenix. That would make him a Horcrux, which explains why he, who isn't a spirit medium, can occasionally hear her. Also, since she would have a Horcrux, even if her body was killed she would still be half-alive, which explains why she can be so easily summoned by Maya or Pearl.

• And we know that by messing up with the Magatama you can shatter your soul, so maybe Mia was really bad when using it, which is why her soul was fractured and a piece of it entered Phoenix!
  • She ran into black Psych-locks on one of her first cases when Phoenix was her apprentice and didn't give up until her soul fragmented! But who would have such locks? Dahlia? Manfred Von Karma? Damon Gant?
    • Redd White?

Phoenix is a Reality Warper

Some (or all) of the clients he took were actually guilty, but because of his childhood trauma he believes so strongly in defending people who are innocent that he retconned this fact. In the early games, his powers weren't great, so he had to find plausible alternate explanations to the events. By game 4, he can violate the laws of physics themselves: whatever magic is behind Trucy's time-and-space defying panties, they still appear to be normal panties on the outside and thus can't cause a car to stall just by being stuffed up the tailpipe, and I haven't even gotten to the MASON system yet.

• Expounding, Phoenix is a mutant/metahuman, with powers along the lines of the Scarlet Witch. The AJAA timeline is the manifestation of a psychological breakdown he went through at some point, a la Avengers Disassembled, and GS 5 will pick up with him facing whatever brought on such trauma, and winning, and then everything returning to post-GS 3 normal.
  • Ok, that's one more tally to the 'Nickwank' counter. Carry on everyone.
• There's more evidence toward this. They say the judge has never given an incorrect verdict. Depending on how you play, you can get either guilty or not guilty depending on how well you do. Put these together, and Lawyers can alter reality with their debating skills.

The Fey Clan and Channelling

Why Maya has such a massive appetite

It's because channelling a spirit uses up massive amounts of energy. Maya's massive consumption of burgers is her way of restoring the lost energy. Also a way of debunking the "Maya is bulimic" theory mentioned above. Maybe the entire Fey clan shares the post-channeling appetite and it's just never brought up.

• So her kidnapping in game 2 (she was starved) must have been absolute hell since she was channeling Mia several times... Damn. You. Matt. Engarde.
  • OBJECTION! That might not be the case! The physical changes themselves could be the cause of this! Radically changing a person's appearance would take massive amounts of energy, requiring A lot of food to keep up with the energy demands!
    • I don't see how this is a legitimate objection to the original claim. The change in physical appearance of a spirit medium to the person they're channelling is PART of the channelling process, therefore meaning that, either way, channelling a spirit would use up massive amounts of energy, regardless of whether or not the body change had anything to do with it.

Misty couldn't control Dahlia for a really simple reason.

Many think it's stupid she couldn't control Dahlia even though she was the master, but keep in mind, she hadn't used her powers for 17 long years, and they need to train every now and then. With her trauma do I doubt that'd be much training.

The robes that the Fey spirit mediums wear are made of a special high-elasticity fabric

Bear with me here. A constant question amongst fans is how the hell Mia stays decent in Pearl's tiny little robe when the latter is channelling her, considering how she barely manages with Maya. Well, here's why: we know that through the Kurain Channelling Technique, the spirit medium's body morphs into that of the person they're channelling. This is an ancient technique, so this fact is very well known. Obviously, the robes the Fey clan spirit mediums wear are made of a highly elastic fabric to fit the body of those they channel. Plus, the degree of elasticity varies according to who wears each set: for Pearl, since she's young/little but very powerful she gets a super stretchy set. Maya, still in training and a lot older/taller, not so much.

• In that case, how do you explain the fact that Maya channels Mia during Case 3-3, while wearing a waitress uniform rather than her normal robes? Well, maybe the waitress uniform is super elastic as well, making it an exception.
  • Well, that's a no-brainer; Maya didn't exactly fill out the costume by herself. It's made for a more buxom and probably older woman. No elasticity needed if there's already room.
• Although, the clothes do look pretty damn loose if you ask me. Maybe the clothes are designed to be loose enough to hold people of similar build and stretch if needed. Just imagine what would happen if someone tried to channel someone the size of Marvin Grossberg.

Talented Spirit Medium automatically gain Ghost Tricks upon dying.

Remember: When Maya first channelled Mia, she had told Phoenix beforehand that she wouldn't be able to do it, since she is still in training. However, suddenly, Mia was channelled and tried to justify it to Phoenix by saying "Remember that I am of Fey Blood too.", hinting that the spiritual powers remain even after death and make it easier for her to take control of Maya's body, despite her being a little unskilled. Following this line of logic, Fey Women don't need the Temsik radiation, their own supernatural energy is enough to give them Ghost Tricks upon death. This explains how Phoenix keeps hearing Mia's voice: Her Ghost Tricks are limited Ghost-to-Human telepathy and significantly boosting a living Medium's powers.

• Alternatively: Magatamas are crafted from fragments of the Temsik meteor, which would guarantee that a medium would die within range of the radiation, and get tricks upon death... Provided that that medium was still wearing her magatama, of course... (Or, in Phoenix's case, hadn't gotten it stolen/lent it to anyone)
  • Doesn't make sense, as Magatama have different colors and are traditionally made of jewels native to Japan. (Yes, Magatama ARE real beads, not something the series made up) Also, the greater Magatama is persumably very, very old... It sure goes back longer than the metorite shower in temsik park.
  • It's more likely that magatamas made of Kurain Boulder, which is itself a meteorite similar to Temsik.
  • Alternatively alternatively, long term exposure to Temsik energy while still alive grants you spirit channelling abilities, and makes you give it off. Spirit channeling abilities can be obtained from hanging around mediums for a long enough period of time, about a decade. You don't inherit channeling abilities, but being raised by a medium would turn you into one. It also takes longer the older you are when you are when you're exposed.

Maya Fey will only remain Master of Kurain until Pearl has completed her training.

That's why she's absent in Apollo Justice – and might be in Dual Destinies. Knowing how much more naturally gifted and mature Pearly is, Maya will remain in Kurain as Master while she trains, growing to be very talented in her own right. Then, when Pearl is ready, she'll give her the seat as Master and go back to work at Phoenix's law firm/talent agency as a freelance spirit medium. I don't care that this is all baseless conjecture and I have no evidence to support my claim, Your Honour! This is my official headcanon! If only because I'm on Pearl's side when it comes to the OTP... ah ha ha...

• That can't be right! Maya is the natural successor over Pearl, that's why Morgan helped frame her for murder in JFA Case 2, so that Pearl could become the master!
  • OBJECTION! So what? We know that Mia was supposed to succeed her mother as Master (before she died, that is) but she left the mountain to become a lawyer, effectively abdicating her right to the title. It's even implied that she knew doing so would deny her any right to power within Kurain, but did so that she and her sister would never be rivals like she saw between her mother and her aunt Morgan. Ergo, Maya could do the exact same thing. *bows* That is all.
    • But Mia did so before becoming the Master. There is no evidence suggesting that the current Master can just up and abdicate the position.
    • A fair point, but there's no evidence suggesting that they can't, either. Besides which, it's never mentioned whether Maya ever actually became the Master or not - just assumed by the fanbase, since that seemed like the logical conclusion to explain her absence.
    • OBJECTION! If the Master could abdicate, Misty would have abdicated the title to her sister or oldest daughter, instead of just going into hiding and leaving everything in shambles and without the Master. Yet she doesn't. Since the Master lineage is outright stated to go down through the Main Family unless there are none left (hence why Morgan tried to have Maya murdered or found guilty of premeditated murder), it's not just the fandom's assumption that she inherited the title, there's strong evidence in the games that suggests it. Mia says that part of why she left was so that there wouldn't be a conflict between herself and Maya over the title like there was between her mother and her aunt. It appears that a candidate can step down from the running, as long as there is a Master already. Further, the Master must carry that trinket around until they die. Another clue that they can't just abdicate, but automatically inherit it. If they could abdicate, you'd think they'd say "or until they pass on the title". Master of Kurain seems to be a title held until death, and is passed on posthumously to whoever in the Main Family has the stronger spiritual powers (which is how Misty usurped Morgan). Further still, why would Morgan outright try and kill Maya if Maya could just decide she doesn't want to be the Master? Why not just convince her she doesn't want to be the Master? Why not just make her life hell instead of going to such extremes? Because there was no other way for Pearls to inherit the title unless Maya was dead. By the time Pearl was old enough to take the role of the Master, should Maya have been convicted for Turner Grey's murder, Maya would have been executed.
    • HOLD IT! You're making an unwarranted assumption. You're assuming the choice is between voluntarily stepping down or being killed. But the incident with Morgan and Misty shows a third option: the most powerful channeller can challenge the current heir. This explains why Pearl was put through such gruelling training, while Maya was left mostly to herself.

  The way this WMG works, Morgan was okay with just letting Pearl be stronger and win, but Maya's powers suddenly kick in in the first game, even though she isn't currently training. Then she comes back and shows a willingness to train that she'd never had before. Morgan starts getting worried that maybe Maya is more powerful than Pearl and could win. And then this opportunity falls into her lap where she could get rid of Maya forever, eliminating any fear of the problem.

  So it's still perfectly possible that Pearl could challenge Maya and become the master. We know she can before Maya becomes the Master, and it's possible that she can afterwards. Maya may not be able to abdicate, but that doesn't mean she gets to be Master if her family has a more powerful channeller who is willing to do the job.

  • OBJECTION! You're forgetting that before Misty became the Master, Morgan was also part of the Main Family. Ergo, Morgan and Misty were the daughters of the Master of Kurain at the time. Now, Misty inherited the title when her mother died because she had the superior skills, thus she kept the Main Family rights, where Morgan was shunted to the most immediate Branch Family because her powers were weaker. You are correct, I concede that point. However, the prosecution maintains that the title can only be passed on upon the death of the Master. *taps forehead smartly* Misty Fey then had two daughters, both of whom were then part of the Main Family and both of whom are implied to have great skill. Had both Mia and Maya stayed, the title would have gone to whichever daughter was the most powerful, just like it did with Morgan and Misty. However, Mia stopped training while her sister did not, making Maya the more powerful one between them by default. She less stepped down, as the person above your claim states, as she did effectively ensure she was a lesser candidate. The title of Master, we know from the testimony of Morgan Fey, passes through the Main Family to the most powerful Spirit Medium in the Main Family, continuing with the fact that the title can only be passed through the Main Family and not to the Branch Family. The only way for the title to go to a member of the Branch Family is if there is nobody left in the Main Family for the title to go to, hence why Morgan tries so hard to kill Maya. That is, the title can't go to a son of the current Master or to a daughter of the current Master with no spiritual powers, even if they're the only ones left in the Main Family. Had Mia not died in Case 1-2 and Maya actually died at some point, Mia would have inherited the title when her mother died because she'd be the most powerful Spirit Medium in the Main Family, even though she stopped training. Because Mia would still be alive, there'd still be a member of the Main Family for the title go to to. The title cannot go to Pearl unless everyone in the Main Family and her mother are dead or no longer able to take the title. *shrug, shakes head* Had Morgan's plan actually worked in Case 2-2 (and Mia died in case 1-2 as she does), on Misty or Maya's death, whichever came second, Morgan would have gotten the title. This is because Morgan would have been the next in line after Misty if Misty never had any daughters or at least daughters with with any power and would be the first member of the Main Family. After Morgan died, Pearl would get the title over Iris, even though Iris is her older sister as Iris has no powers. *folds arms in thought and taps finger against arm* (I think that makes sense... should I draw a diagram?)

  • Also, Maya's powers are superior to Pearl's; they have been ever since Case 2-4. That's why Maya was able to call Mia's spirit away (meaning a spirit can be called away) yet why Pearl wasn't able to call away Dahlia's in Case 3-5. Maya has the superior powers, so no matter how you look at it, Pearl cannot inherit the Master throne with Maya around.
    • You seem to be forgetting that Maya is nearly 10 years older than Pearl. Think of it the other way around: Pearl is already very strong despite her much younger age. Therefore, if you compared Maya's powers with how Pearl's powers would be when she's the same age, Pearl would actually be stronger.
    • We never learn how strong Maya was when she was little. She's always had pretty crippling self-confidence issues, so she may have been stronger than Pearl, but just couldn't access it because of her issues with herself.
• The entire WMG is running on the assumption that Pearl even wants to be the Master of the Kurain Technique. She seems content with just being a Spirit Medium.

Psyche Locks

Regarding black Psyche Locks

Had Phoenix owned a magatama back in original series, asking about DL-6 to Edgeworth would result in five black Psyche Locks.

• Probably. Edgeworth didn't really know about it and kept it locked away to the point that he forgot the exact details. That fits the Black Locks.
  • Actually, probably not. The secret Athena hid so deep in her heart was something she initially had no actual memory of, due only to shutting it away rather than a lack of knowledge of it ( if you recall, it was the fact that she stabbed someone, specifically the man who murdered her mother). Edgeworth didn't recall any new information during the case of a great magnitude. He remembered, clearly, throwing the gun, hearing it go off, and hearing the murderer's scream. That's essentially what was covered up by Athena's locks. He had no idea at all who the scream belonged to (and indeed, mistook it for his father's), but if he had subconsciously known who the scream belonged to (either by seeing the murderer or recognising the voice), he probably would have the black Psyche-Locks. It's likely that he wouldn't have had any locks at all about it, since it's something he genuinely didn't know the answer to at all, and wasn't a secret he just concealed from even himself.

Edgeworth never had black Psyche-Locks regarding the DL-6 Incident, even if Phoenix had the Magatama at the time.

I genuinely am at a loss for why everyone else seems to think he would have. His traumatic event doesn't line up with why Athena had them. Espella and Eve? They most likely had them, since their traumatic event and discovery of the truth behind it closely resembled Athena learning the truth about her mother's death. Edgeworth? No. He remembered everything about the DL-6 that he could possibly remember. He wasn't hiding anything, subconsciously or otherwise. He legitimately had no idea who murdered his father because he passed out after hearing Manfred scream and didn't wake up until long after his father was murdered and never heard the scream again except in his nightmares. His trauma about the event can be far easily compared to what Maya most likely experienced from Case 1-2, Case 2-2, and Case 3-5. Edgeworth didn't have any memories that were blocked from him about the event, ergo, he couldn't possibly have had the special Psyche-Locks reserved for such a thing.

• OBJECTION! If Edgeworth truly remembered everything, then there would be no reason for him to suspect that he murdered his father during DL-6, since the scream was from someone outside the elevator. He might have remembered the scream, but who the scream belonged to would be cause enough for a black psyche lock, just like Athena remembered stabbing someone during the UR-1 incident, but her psyche-locks didn't break until the possibility that the person she stabbed wasn't her mother was presented.
  • OBJECTION! *slams hands on bench* Athena actually saw the person she stabbed, she could directly recall they were wearing a mask, they were a stranger, and wearing her mother's coat. Edgeworth heard the scream and fainted almost immediately after. He wasn't conscious when the power came back on, and the killer of the DL-6 says that the reason he was able to enter the lift was because the power came back on. The person who screamed was still outside in the hall, behind a closed door, and the window looked way too high for Miles to see through even if he was standing. He never actually saw who he shot and who screamed. He just heard a scream and fainted. He had no way of actually knowing who the murderer was because the only thing he knew about them was they screamed in agony. *points* Therefore, there is no way he could have had any Black Psyche-Locks!
    • OBJECTION! *shakes head* It seems we're both trying to say the same thing. It's not possible that Edgeworth remembered everything about the scream, since that would lead him to conclude that the person he shot may not have been his father. The question then is: did he simply not hear everything, or did he hear it, but suppress the resulting memory of it? He should at least have known where the scream came from hearing it; a scream from outside the elevator would have been muffled by the door and sound different than if it happened on the inside.
    • OBJECTION! The thing people say he his behind these supposed Black Locks would be the identity of the killer. Von Karma's statement about the murder lines up with both the testimony of Miles Edgeworth and the statement given by his father, Gregory. Von Karma states that everyone in the lift was passed out when he came onto it. Seeing as Miles Edgeworth never remembers the lights coming back on nor the doors opening, he likely completely lost conciousness almost immediately after throwing the gun, as did Mr Yogi and Mr Gregory Edgeworth. This is backed by von Karma's statements regarding the murder. Shortly after he himself was shot, the power came back on and the doors to the lift opened up to reveal three unconscious people. As none of the people in the lift can remember this happening, or at least, the person we're discussing could not, it's impossible for Mr Miles Edgeworth to know the identity of his father's murderer. Regarding Miles Edgeworth's memory of the scream, as the scream is what he remembers most, it likely did not sound muffled in the slightest to him, at least, no more muffled than anything going on around him as he was passing out from oxygen deprivation.

Black Psyche-Locks do not always come in groups of five.

Five of them means the secret is hidden at it's deepest, where one would mean that it's hidden deep, but it won't take much to unlock it, either, nor will it cause as severe a damage if the chains are forced away. Ema's hidden memory about the "Blue Badger" would have garnered a single black lock, as it takes little for her to remember it, but she herself says the memory was hidden deep inside her.

Kristoph's black psyche lock

Kristoph has a SplitPersonality. It's his other self that 'did it' thus he himself doesn't really knows the details. Plus a sudden change of personality could be considered as 'traumatising'.

• Almost disturbed how close this is to the truth that we know so far given Dual Destinies explanation of black Psyche Locks.

Future Games and Spinoffs

Apollo's mom will be accused of murder and Apollo will defend her (or she is murdered)

Franziska Von Karma will be the protagonist of the next Investigations.

• I mean, how cool would THAT be?
  • Edgeworth used Logic. Franziska will use her whip to get information out of the witnesses/suspects.
  • No, it'll just replace the "Press" button during cross-examinations.
  • Oh so sadly, this seems to have been Jossed.
    • Not necessarily, there could still be a case played as her.
    • Still Jossed. In Gyakuten Kenji 2, the game temporarily allows you to play as Gregory in a flashback instead.

There will be a "Yatagarasu: Ace Thief" game.

There HAS to be.

• And while we're at it, add Ace Assassin to the list!
  • Dick Gumshoe: Ace Detective. It just has to be done.

Logic and Trick 2009 will be named Logic and Fact

"Trick" doesn't suit Edgeworth at all. Fact does.

• An Alternate theory presented is that it will simply be called "Logic."
  • Jossed, it's "Trick and Gimmick".

Winston Payne will be the protagonist of the next Ace Attorney Investigations.

Nuff said.

• It will be a flashback to his glory days when he was still a Rookie Killer and had respect. He'll even have a cool investigation partner like Jake Marshall or something.
• Who?
• Why would the janitor of the Prosecution Offices start solving crimes?

The next game will star Mia Fey and take place some time before the events of the first game, but after the flashbacks in the third.

• Mia's assistant will be Phoenix as a lawyer-in-training.
• Her particular ability would be Decision. In a logic-like menu, a flowchart of the possible events of the case can be seen, and expands as investigation goes along. Then, using evidence, possibilities in the flow chart are eliminated. Then, when only one possibility remains, the truth is found.
  • Doesn't Mia already have a Magatama? And she has been said to be a damn good spiritual medium, I think it might just be Psyche Locks again
• The first case will be a simple one, with Phoenix assisting Mia in court, and her explaining the ropes of court to him. The game's justified tutorial.
• The second case will involve Wendy Oldbag, and be the beginning of her crush on Edgeworth.
• The third case will feature the prequel series to the Steel Samurai, and see leading star, Jack Hammer, accused of a crime. Mia later proves his innocence.
• In the fourth case, Mia is accused of a murder, and assumes her own defense. Misty Fey's desperation will be an important factor in the case. Dahlia Hawthorne may or may not be involved, in association with Morgan Fey.
• Appearing characters include:
  • Mike Meekins as a policeman
  • Larry Butz, who is even more annoying due to being teenaged.
  • Maggey Birde and Lotta Hart, both at younger ages
  • Victor Kudo (giving a second meaning to Mia's comment to Maya about calling her over just for seducing Mr. Kudo in the third game.)
  • Sal Manella, who is presently writing his first series.

Capcom and Marvel will team up and make an Ace Attorney game that takes place in the Marvel universe

Come on who else wants Phoenix to cross paths with Jennifer Walters and Matt Murdock?

The plot of the next game

It would reveal that the phantom's sabotage of the rocket in case 4-5 and the sniper who shot the phanotm were a False Flag Operation. In this game Athena and Phoenix will try to expose a conspiracy that wants to run Japanifornia from the shadows. This game would introduce a new prosecutor, return the jury system, and maybe bring back Kay and Gumshoe. In the final case this new proecutor would be the victim because He Knows Too Much and he will be replaced by the one who is the puppet of the Big Bad, who would be exposed as a culprit and would be replaced by Klavier Gamin. And the one behid it all was the Minister of internal affairs.

Bobby Fulbright will appear in a flashback case

Why else would the developers have the phantom kill Fulbright and take his face instead of just having the Fulbright himself be the phantom? It's so he can star as an awesome and sympathteic character in the past before he was murdered. Hoping for another Edgeworth game.

The next game in the series, possibly Dai Gyakuten Saiban, will include another Parody Sue.

Since Franziska is regarded as one of the Jerk Sue and the Villain Sue, and good arguments can be made for Kay being one of the Mary Sue itself and Juniper of the Purity Sue, it's possible that the very next game in the series, be it the Meiji Era game Ace Attorney Generations or the next one to have Phoenix and co, will have another Parody Sue. She'd probably be either a detective or a defence attorney (since they've already given us the prosecutor, assistant, and witness/defendant). If the former, she'll be in the Ace Attorney games, if the latter, in Investigations.

The anime's version of The Lost Turnabout will touch on the infamous neck snap contradiction

• Come on, it's been questioned by fans for years, it would not be surprising if they finally had an adaption close the case on this. Possible outcomes could be that it casts more doubt onto the idea of the victim writing Maggey's name, or maybe Payne will bring out the dreaded updated autopsy report.
  • Jossed. The anime did end up covering that case at the start of season 2, but the neck snap issue was not brought up.

The game that comes after SoJ will have Athena as the primary player character, and have two main stories- one about Athena's character, and one about the legal system.

Both Dual Destinies and Spirit Of Justice do this. Dual Destinies was about both Phoenix's return to the legal world AND the Dark Age of the Law, and Spirit of Justice was about both Apollo's backstory and the state of Khura'inese law. It stands to reason that if this is a pattern, the third game will be about Athena's growth as a lawyer, and an overarching plot with the state of the/a legal system. Athena will be in three cases- heading two, including the final case of the game, and serving as a co-counsel in a third. In the last case of the game, Athena will be unable to get help for a time, forced to defend her client alone (this I say because Athena has stood alone twice but shut down both times and needed to be helped out by a timely arrival. She could have a co-counsel, though, who is forced to be silent for whatever reason, but either way, Athena is effectively alone).

A future game will have Lana Skye be a prosecutor.

As stated in SoJ, there is a lack of prosecutors after Edgworth fired the corrupt ones at the end of DD. Also it has been some time since her case so she should be released from jail by the end of SoJ. It would also be nice to have Ema work alongside her sister.

A future game will have Kay Faraday appear in a main game.

Does Ace Attorney need another tutorial case where Gaspen Payne is the prosecutor? He went completely, utterly bald in the last game, and if he's still in Khura'in, he doesn't have the advantages he enjoyed anymore with Apollo and Nahyuta rebuilding the legal system. On top of that, it's hard to come up with a circumstance for lawyers as experienced as Phoenix, Apollo, or Athena to go through the "What is the victim's name? You should check the court record!" procedures that come with a tutorial case. So, here's a fresh, original idea for the next game: Phoenix is supposed to be the defense attorney for a murder trial that Edgeworth is prosecuting. However, something makes them both unable to be at the trial, and they have no choice but to have Maya Fey and Kay Faraday replace them at the last minute. Two bubbly, goofy assistants who have never handled a court case, facing each other for the very first time! It allows them to build a friendship of their own.

AA 7 will introduce a Love Interest for Athena.

Let's look at the patterns so far, shall we? The closest thing to Love Interest Phoenix had so far was Iris, who was introduced in AA 3. The closest thing Apollo had to Love Interest is Juniper who was introduced in AA 5. It only follows that some guy (or girl) will be introduced for the last one from the Turnabout Trio who still haven't met her "special someone".

Iris and Gumshoe will be back in the next game

Again, let's look at the patterns. Aside from the fact that Iris was one of three defendants(excluding Engarde) who hadn't made reapearance of any kind after their original game(the others being Max and Lana) there is certain pattern of characters coming back in Apollo Trilogy. In AJ there was a mention of "kid" who was sending Phoenix Steel Samurai dvds and Maya was 26 at time and by no means qualified as a "kid" so it was probably about Pearl. There was also a mention of a friend who traveled abroad, and Edgeworth is prone to being out of country. And in DD both reapeared. Again, in DD Maya sent a letter to Phoenix, and it was mentioned that a friend left them forensics kit, and said friend was obviously Ema. And in SOJ both Maya end Ema reapeared with added bonus of Ema being back to cheerfull scientific investigator she was instead of being pissed of detective from AJ. Now if you show Phoenix's badge to Edge in Turnabout Revolution Phoenix will mention his "sources" and Edge will mention looking into siad sources salary, clearly suggesting certain detective. And in Turnabout Time Traveler Phoenix said that Edge doesn't know any flowers because he doesn't have anyone to give them to, suggesting that he has someone to give them to. And let's face it who else can in be if not Iris? And this would be 10 years(in universe) since Hazakura, coincidentally the same ammount of time Yomiel from Ghost Trick spent in prison in the ending before reuniting with his love.

Trucy's high school graduation will be extremely important in the seventh game.

If only because it would be a perfect excuse to get her, Apollo, and Thalassa together to reveal their relation, seeing as Thalassa presumably still spends a lot of time in Borginia and Apollo is in Khura'in for the forseeable future. And none of them would have to die. In this case, the most likely victim is the valedictorian (assuming Trucy herself isn't this, then likely a staff member like the principal or vice-principal. It's also possible Thalassa ends up the or a victim). Because Trucy, Apollo, or Thalassa would be the most likely defendants (even if it's not so at first), the relationship between the three of them would be a huge piece of information during the case (especially if Thalassa is the victim). This would also likely be the final case of the game, considering the reveal is so major.

• It could also work out where Trucy gets attacked by the real killer (trying to make sure she can't be a witness), which is why Phoenix leads the defence (something that would be needed for him to reveal the truth), Apollo is his co-counsel for at least part of the case (he might leave when he finds out Phoenix was hiding things from him), and Thalassa is the defendant. Eventually Phoenix is forced to reveal who Thalassa is to explain why she would never hurt Trucy and the fact she's Apollo's mother comes out when her bracelet becomes important evidence.

Lamirior will be revealed to be Apollo and Trucy's mother... but only after she's been killed.

Obviously one of her kids will serve as the defendant. Phoenix will lead the defence (again, like stated above, this would be kinda needed for him to reveal the truth, since it's not something Apollo could work out. Trucy yes, since she spent actual time with and got to know her mother, but Apollo, not so much). When Phoenix manages to almost prove the first one accused innocent, suspicion will fall on the other one. This would eventually force Phoenix to reveal the truth.

The final game's DLC case would have Humanity on Trial...

... with the ad hoc firm of Sahdmadhi, Edgeworth, and Fey providing the defense and Dr. Metis Cykes assisting. Inga and the real Bobby Fulbright^note who would prove that the phantom was haming him up, but not by much would serve as the detectives and Manfred von Karma would be roped into helping whomever is Prosecuting. Manfred and the spoilered detectives would either have obvious reservations (Fulbright) or have a Heel–Face Turn moment along the way (the others).

A future game will have a child as a killer.

The Great Ace Attorney already had a teenager as a killer, so the next step would be to have an even younger killer.

Ace Attorney 7 and Ace Attorney 8 will have Apollo Justice as the title character

So far, there has only been one Ace Attorney game that had Apollo take center stage: Apollo Justice. Afterwards, he's been shunted to the side, sharing the spotlight with Phoenix and Athena in Dual Destinies, and Phoenix in Spirit of Justice. But since Apollo turned out to be the true protagonist of the latter game, now would be the perfect chance for Ace Attorney 7 to have him be the title character after all this time, so he could fully take center stage for the first time since his debut. And if they want to have a trilogy of Apollo Justice games (similar to how the first trilogy had Phoenix as the lead), then they could very well conclude Apollo's arc in Ace Attorney 8 before Athena takes over as the lead in Ace Attorney 9.

The Judge

The Judge was a Prosecutor in his youth.

Think about it. His Favoritism towards the Prosecutors is blatantly obvious. He allows Franziska to physically assault people, Godot gets no reprimand for throwing scalding hot coffee at the defense and even when there's rock solid evidence that the defendent is innocent he still refuses to declare them not guilty until the real murderer is found. And even then he gladly accepts whatever straws the real murderer is clutching at. This would also explain why he is so easily enamored by a couple of female witnesses but is completely unaffected by Mia's large breasts.

• Mia never tries to use them on the Judge. He's pretty gullible and is pretty easily led. As for Godot and Franziska, I always interpreted letting them get away with their antics as a result of being afraid of them.
• Makes sense, because judges are usually lawyers with additional training. So it's a 50/50 at the very least that the Judge was a prosecutor.
  • HOLD IT! Remember that, localization aside, this is a Japanese game based on the Japanese legal system. Judges there, like most Civil Law countries, are trained separately and aren't always attorneys or prosecutors first.
• Favoritism towards the prosecutors is very, very Truth in Television in Japan.
• JOSSED! (Apologies in advance for writing this all over the page) Dual Destinies provides two separate reasons for why this theory is, at the very least, implausible:
  • Blackquill asks the judge at one point whether he has "always wanted to say the opening statement". Note the wanted; doing so should make it clear that the judge has never said the opening statement, meaning that he never has been a prosecutor.
  • Furthermore, case 5-3 clarifies that there are separate courses for judges, attorneys and prosecutors, at least at Themis Legal Academy. While it may have been possible for the judge to have gone through both the prosecutor- and judge-courses, this seems unlikely.

The Judge is a Reality Warper

See the above suggestion.

• Fridge Horror since on the first day of case 1-4, Edgeworth was declared guilty for about five minutes before Larry stepped in. He was later found not guilty. So did he become guilty and then reality flipped back or what?
  • Actually, it is possible to get a verdict overturned. (case 3-3 anyone?) Larry interrupting created a reasonable doubt in the judge's mind as to Edgeworth's guilt, and this Troper believes that if case 5-3 is anything to go by, the guilt has to be established without a reasonable doubt. (Plus, the judge had seen Phoenix in action before and knew that if the trial ended there, it might have resulted in OBJECTION!s filling the room.

Ini and Mimi Miney have a brother called Moe Miney

...perhaps Moe the clown.

• They probably do have a brother named Moe, but it can't be Moe the clown, as his real name is Lawrence Curls.
  • A WMG inside a WMG: Lawrence Curls, AKA Moe the Clown is their uncle.

Random

Ema Skye is hot.

Don't deny it. Its better than the other theories here....

• HOLD IT! Ema Skye the stand-in for Maya, or Ema Skye the detective? Choose your answer carefully.
  • Let's see. The problem is, she's kind of a bitch in Apollo Justice...
    • TAKE THAT! But the other one is sixteen.
    • Objection! 16 years is too old for lolicon!
    • OBJECTION! Have you SEEN Mia!?
    • HOLD IT! What does Mia have to do with this? Except for one photo shown at the very end of 3-5, Mia has never been seen in loli-form. Did you mean to write Maya? (who is a year older than Ema but looks younger due to her near-total lack of curves)
    • OBJECTION! You honor, the purpose of this inquiry is not to determine "Is Ema Sky hotter than Mia Fey?" but rather "Is Ema Skye hot?". Mia's hotness, while smokin', has no relevance to the case at hand! If the opposition wishes to claim Mia's hotness holds some relevance to the case of Ema's hotness, I must ask they prove it... with evidence]]!
    • 'TAKE THAT! Phoenix (or you the player, whichever you prefer) has been with both, Ema and Mia at some point during his career. Phoenix has only worked with Ema on one case and that was when she was a hyper spunky 16 year old (thus not being legal in California), while Mia was in her 20s before she died and even after death, she is summoned back many times to help Phoenix in his cases. As mentioned before, Ema, nearly 7-10 years later, has become a cold ice queen unless you bribe her with Snackoos or a fingerprint duster. Not to mention she can be somewhat flaky. Mia, however, can not only retain her "goods" while being channelled, but she always has something to help you out with and has a much nicer personality. Between a smart and smokin' woman and another woman who stuffs her face whenever you even annoy her, the defense proposes that Mia is an easier fish to catch compared to Ema!
    • 'OBJECTION! ::Smirks, wags finger:: Nice try, rookie. But look back. What have you proven? 'Mia Fey is a very nice, smoking hot lady. Nicer and hotter than Ema, certainly.' ::Slams hand on desk:: As if anyone with eyes did not already know this! ::Points:: Yes, Mia IS hotter than Ema, smarter, and nicer! And if that were the purpose of this trial, you might have managed a full acquittal! But I must remind you again, the purpose of this trial is to determine 'is Ema Skye hot?', and ONLY to determine that fact! Mia Fey's hotness ::Slams hand on desk:: still has no relevance!
    • Urk! (I thought I was on the right track...? Damn, I don't have any other options!) The defense...the defense...
    • Phoenix... you're looking at this the wrong way. Don't ask why she isn't hot... point out evidence that only exists because she isn't...wow. Is that her? And I thought Lana was hot... Nevermind, Wright. You're on your own on this one.
    • Phoenix Wright!!! You foolishly foolish fool! Only an idiot would not think of a night with Ema once laying eyes on her I mean...was that out loud? Shut up, lets go home Adrian.
    • No fisher brags about any fish but the one that got away, Trite. Ema is not nearly so objectionable as you claim. The unavailable ice queen angle is still quite attractive. Or would you really ::slams mug on desk:: ...turn down Franziska Von Karma as well?!]]
    • ...! Godot! ::slams hand on desk:: I must ask you not to bring up Wright's relationship with Franziska! For...er..personal reasons.
  • The defense would like to propose that Detective Skye is, indeed, a stone-cold fox, if you manage to snap her out of her bitchiness. As evidence, he would like to present various pieces of forensic investigation equipment, which make her instantly more personable. If you date her, bring a fingerprinting kit.
  • I find her young self cute as heck, and for her older self, the ice queen types normally annoy me, but something her attitude is funny (QUIET, SNACK TIME) and her happy go lucky self can come out every so often, generally with the aid of scientific crap

• ORDER! (bangs gavel) We're here to discuss if Ema Skye can be considered "hot". We aren't discussing if she's the hottest thing in the series, just if she qualifies. Any more bickering about irrelevant topics will result in penalties!
  • 'TAKE THAT! Ema is definitely hot. ::holds paper sheets in his hand while hitting them, triumph music starts playing:: She was asked to provide security in The Gavinners concert, even though she publicly dislikes Klavier, such a band surely has the power (both as celebrities and as law officers) to have any member of the police staff they requested. On top of that, there weren't any groupies waiting in the Gavinners' dressing room. given all this evidence, one can assume that one or more of the Gavinners had the intention of performing actions of questionable nature with the detective. ::Slams hand on bench:: And why would someone have this intentions? ::Points finger::Because she is indeed hot!!!
    • (Gasp!) Mr. Nick! How dare you do that to Mystic Maya! (Slap)
  • What's going on in this thread, pal?
    • Say, Nick, you can hook me up with this Ema chick, right? Nick, buddy?
    • ::Wince:: Your Honor...this is...this is undue badgering of the troper! I won't let this...rookie slander the woman who rid me of my hair!
    • Wait a sec, folks. This gal's got her two cents, too! Ain't this "Mia" gal dead? ::Looks at picture:: HOO DOGGY! That's ghost I saw in my picture!◊
• (Slams Gavel) That's enough! The evidence presented to me is quite clear. I see no reason to continue this trial. This court finds Ema Skye VERY HOT BUT IS STILL A DEFROSTING ICE QUEEN
  Sal Manella: Best...WMG...EVER! :D
  • A splendiforous deduction, Mr. Wright. ::"flashes rings":: But I would prefer my darling little April May, wouldn't you agree?

Ema was turned into a Nobody before the events of Apollo Justice

Just to explain her bitchy attitude. It also renders the above WMG useless. Proof, you ask? Remember when we first meet her in Apollo Justice. She comes off as a bitchy detective who couldn't care less about you. Then Apollo gives her the bottle of fingerprints, and suddenly, she is reminded of a time when she had a heart. Nobodies use their memories to portray fake emotions. Then there's her Japanese surname, which means "jewel moon." Jewels can be considered sacred. "Sacred Moon" is the background music for The World That Never Was, the city of Nobodies.

• OBJECTION! Her sour attitude is because she was stuck in the criminal affairs department (not her strong point) of the police after failing to qualify in the forensics department (her field of expertise), which all happened during the year that Apollo Justice took place (2026). Adding insult to injury, she was stuck with a prosecutor whose attitude really irritates her (and whom she partially blamed for Wright's disbarment). Being in a situation like this would make a grump out of anyone. Being a grump does not turn you into a Nobody.

Kay Faraday is hot.

She charmed a national ambassador who's twice her age within hours, made even Franziska and Detective Badd show softness with her, somehow convinced Edgeworth to not immediately dump her somewhere when they first met despite how annoyingly Genki she has, and later managed to drag him off to the Allebaht/Babahl embassy events when he just wants to take it easy after spending the previous day investigating three murder cases at a pace that made 24 seem sedate. Canon Sue? Perhaps. But still indisputably hot.

• EUREKA! ::points:: Obviously, Kay Faraday has stolen your heart.
• NOT SO FAST! This is all circumstantial Mr. Prosecutor! This old pack ain't gonna run with weak reasoning like that. You know what I'm talking about? Proof!
• OBJECTION! ::points:: Your honor! Without proof, that statement is nothing more than a personal opinion, and won't do in court! ::slams desk:: All that it proved was that Kay Faraday is a charming young lady, which doesn't prove that she's 'hot'! I am forced to ask for some evidence]]!!
• TAKE THAT! In Turnabout Ablaze, she stood next to a burning building! That would make her very hot! While it is impossible to prove that she is hot through opinion... :desk slam: You can certainly prove it with fact! In fact, since she has been closer to the largest fire in the series than the above witnesses... I submit to the court that Kay Faraday is the hottest girl in the series!
  • NOT SO FAST! Sorry, pup, but this wolf ain't gonna bite. Just 'cause she was standing near a fire, doesn't mean anything if you're trying to prove she's 'hot'. But if that's your line of thinking... ::close up, speed lines:: Then I guess everyone involved in that case is potentionally hot?!
    • ::head scratch:: Well... yes. Can you name a single person in that case who wasn't hot?
• OBJECTION! ::slaps paper:: Are you implying that everyone in that case was hot? :slams hands on desk: There is just one thing off in your logic. ::points:: What about the people who were in the other building? ::close up and speedlines:: What about Oldbag?!?!
  • (Barges in) Mr, Edgeworth, sir! We just got a report back from the boys in the lab, and it says Kay's very short skirt is more than a little titillating! I think this might be enough to prove she's hot, pal!
• OBJECTION! Kay Faraday is a pettanko with no real sex appeal! Plus, while not making a comparison to the hotness of other Ace Attorney females (such as in the "Is Ema Skye Hot" WMG above), the fact is the player has been exposed to way hotter, and as such, Kay Faraday and her mild attractiveness should leave no impact on the player. Thus, she shouldn't be considered hot. (On the subject of her younger self being adorable, however...)
  • NOT SO FAST! You refer to the precedent set by the Ema Skye WMG. However, it was established there – and thus stands true here – that only OBJECTIVE hotness matters! Furthermore, in addition to her still having a chance to fill out a bit more, breast size is only one aspect of perceived hotness! I submit for your consideration her incredibly short skirt.
    • We accept her skirt into evidence and concede on the matter of Objective Hotness. Ah, but lest you forget the rest of her outfit, her ugly rubber boots nullify the hotness of her legs and short skirt. While you could be looking at a whole lotta leg or some fetish-y Zettai Ryouiki, these abominations of footwear stare you right in the face. You cannot concentrate on a ruffling skirt when those things catch your eye. Furthermore, Kay has no fashion in any sense of the word. Her ensemble does her body a disservice. Her scarf does a fine job of covering up her neck and collar bone and any other sexy elements. Her outfit in general looks terrible, and her face is an awfully generic "mischievous face", offering no unique appeal. Now if you wish to suggest that Kay is hot au natural or in other clothing, without her joke of an outfit, I may have to reconsider.
    • TAKE THAT! I will submit this piece of fanart, which may not show as much skin as other females in the AA cast, but definitely shows that Kay, given the chance to grow a little older and "fill out", can definitely be one sexy Great Thief. Therefore, you must reconsider now and conclude that Kay is, indeed, hot - or at least, has the potential to be hot.

Edgeworth would make a hot woman.

• He'd certainly pull of a Tres Bien uniform better than Wright.
• 'OBJECTION! This court will not accept evidence that will mentally scar the judge!
• Scar... OR IMPRESS?!
• ::Gavel bang:: No, just scar. ::Penalty::
• (Ack! I must be on the wrong track! ... Maybe I can turn this case all around... Think outside the box...) Aha! I have you now, Your Honor! I move to accuse ::close up, speedlines:: the judge of murder!
• HOLD IT! ::Courtroom doors slam open, a la Franziska in 2-4:: Did someone say Edgeworth (and Wright) in Tres Bien uniforms◊?

Dick Gumshoe is hot.

... Well, I think so anyway.

• Why else would Franziska keep whipping him?
  • So Phoenix is hot too, under that logic?
    • But Franziska whips Gumshoe and Phoenix (and multiple other people) because she thinks they're fools.
• Er, I actually think he's hot, too...

Edgeworth will eventually be murdered.

It happens to everyone else Oldbag likes.

• By this logic, Larry Butz will never die.
• OBJECTION! It only happens when those that Oldbag likes are mentioned for the first time! Edgeworth's been around for three games, and he hasn't been killed!
  • Yet.
    • TAKE THAT! Edgeworth is alive and well in Dual Destinies. It remains to be seen whether he survives the next game, but for now, this case is closed.
  • Where was Edgeworth during Apollo Justice...?
    • Abroad, most likely. Edgeworth seems to spend a lot of time abroad. Whether this entails studying foreign legal systems or bedding six German milk maids simultaneously, I can't say.
    • OBJECTION! T&T establishes that Miles Edgeworth is, in fact, not a playboy and is furthermore horrified by Gumshoe's suggestion to the contrary! The defence moves for a verdict of "asexual"!

Godot was hospitalized at House's hospital.

Godot was in a coma since Dahlia poisoned him, and was awoken when he smelled the aroma of the coffee a doctor brought to his room. And House has been know to use the comatose patient's room as a cafeteria.

Thalassa wasn't shot by Zak or Valant

Someone else took advantage of the amount of bullets that were flying around to shoot her from a secret position, and then set Valant and Zak up to take the fall. Her shooting will be something Apollo has to solve as part of the backstory to the last case of his arc.

• So you're saying that she could've been shot from the grassy knoll?
  • Nope, it was definitely the book depository.
• Here's an idea - She was shot by Magnifi! Because he felt he needed both of his possible successors under his thumb, and had planned out his death even then.

Redd White is the victim of a Death Note owner

All those 'suicides' he was apparently responsible for were murders via Death Note designed specifically to set him up. Then the guilty party wrote in 'Mia Fey: Blunt force trauma. Killed by an intruder to her office' and 'Redd White: Suicide. Breaks into the legal office where papers incriminating him are being kept and takes the papers through any means necessary. Later that week, is extremely insolent towards a lawyer investigating the death of his superior, then calls the police to have said lawyer arrested for murder. Five days later, commits suicide in his jail cell'.

• Can't the Death Note only control actions for about a month leading up to death? I revise your theory—he really was a bastard that caused suicides but the entire case for his murder of Mia was due to a Death Note.
• Perhaps the Kira was very clever at manipulating things to frame White. Probably not though. New theory: White himself is a former Kira, and for each of the people being blackmailed he wrote in 'redrafts his/her will to leave a large sum of money to Bluecorp, then commits suicide'. However, he for whatever reason lost his Death Note before the beginning of the series.
  • Fridge Brilliance: The papers that Mia Fey hid were pages from the the Death Note that she managed to steal from Redd White and wrote this scenario in it: 'Redd White: Suicide. Breaks into the legal office where papers belonging to him are being kept and takes the papers after killing Mia Fey with the container the papers were in. Later that week, is extremely insolent towards a lawyer investigating the death of his superior, then calls the police to have said lawyer arrested for murder. Five days later, commits suicide in his jail cell'

Daryan Crescend is Elvis

Really, I've only written this because there are already entries guessing this about Dr. Kelso and the Shinigami king, and I want to turn it into a full-blown trend along the lines of 'X is a time lord', 'x show is being imagined by Shinji Ikari' stuff. But as for my evidence, he's a rock musician with strange hair, he has to be older than he claims (Klavier said he was the first detective he ever worked with, when Klavier began prosecuting at 17 because he's German... but Daryan isn't German and he's the same age as Klavier) and he's a drug smuggler (the cocoon), and we know Elvis, tragically, had drug problems.

Coffee is what saved Godot from being poisoned, and is what's required to keep him alive.

The poison that was given to him - while experimental and cooked up by a pharmacology student - could have had its potency reduced by the chemicals in the coffee it was slipped into, thus preventing it from being lethal. As for why Godot has to drink it so often, now, is pretty obvious: the poison messed with his central nervous system, and the caffeine in coffee is a powerful stimulant. He probably needs the caffeine to keep his nervous system active, and prefers to take it in the form of his own coffee blends.

• Good idea. It would help explain how he is able to drink so much coffee without dying.
• That explains WHY he died; He was a whole day without coffee in 3-5, right? The next day, he starts to randomly bleed. And then he dies. Now that was spoilerrific.
  • Except Word of God says he's still alive.
    • Sources please. Which Word of God is this?
    • While I don't know nothing about this Word of God you guys are talking about, I never doubted that he survived that. What makes you think he died, pal?
    • The last picture in the credits, where he's shown standing next to Misty and Mia, basically watching over the others with them.
    • Objection. You're forgetting one little detail...the other two with him in that segment are dead. Also note the positioning of the pictures on the DS: He, Misty and Mia are looking down at everyone else, with a white background, on the upper screen of the DS. The visual metaphor of "watching over me from heaven".
    • Hold it! That picture was present in Larry Butz sketchbook, and is implied to have been drawn very shortly after the last trial ended. Would you have the court believe Godot somehow died in such a short time period? It's possible Larry was using what they call "creative freedom" to picture someone who could otherwise no longer stand together with everyone else (as he was imprisoned), and was watching over them figuratively. Also, the whole thing is as you claim, a metaphor. It's not strong basis for whether Godot is alive or dead!

Maya and/or Pearl were killed shortly after the end of AA3.

Phoenix adopts Trucy less than a year after the end of AA3 (confirmed by relative ages). At no point during the MASON system investigations is any indicator ever given that they're around. OK, fine. Maybe they're just out getting ice cream or dealing with Kurain stuff. Except that Trucy is still hanging around for the next 7 years, and clearly doesn't seem to be at all familiar with either of them. At this point Pearl is practically Phoenix's adopted daughter too and almost the same age, so you'd have to figure they'd hang out. Then we have Trucy's end of game comment about finding a new "mother" and Phoenix having nobody to turn to when he gets disbarred. Not to mention the fact that every single closed off mentor type in the series has to have some horrible death in the family to be dug up later. Then Pearl being dead could cause an imprinting sort of thing with Trucy, causing him to investigate the case of her father with such badass dedication. As for how it went down, heck. Morgan could have gone for a take 2 on the last case of AA3 after dying in prison. Apollo Justice 2 is all about digging up the details.

• JOSSED! as of Dual Destinies. Pearl appears as a teenager. Maya is said to be too busy to see him, but wrote him a letter.

What happened to Maya and Pearl between 3 and 4?

With Misty Fey killed, Maya decides it's high time to get back in gear for training so that she can become the next Master. So, shortly after the events of Trials and Tribulations, Maya and Pearl head back to Kurain Village to start vigorous training. Phoenix, being without a Fey by his side for That One Case, doesn't have the better judgment regarding that one piece of evidence, and with no one there to stand by him, he had no confidence/help in talking with The Bar Council, leading to his disbarment.Maya later returns for a visit, and finds Phoenix no longer practices law, and, in fact, has a daughter (which likely resulted in an epic slapping from Pearl like we have never seen). Because she is still unaccustomed to the idea that she is the Master, Maya has a hard time accepting a role of a mother (or maternal figure), and so returns to Kurain Village to put on the hat of Master again, until she feels that she can handle it all. Pearl returns with her, as since she does not have a talent that she can really support herself with, she would be just one more mouth to feed with an already struggling family. She also returns to train and help Maya, of course.As evidenced in case 4-2, Maya still keeps in contact with Nick, whether or not it's a major part of either's lives. This shows that they still hold a place in Phoenix's heart, they're still alive and well, and they may be called on in a future game.

• HOLD IT! Look at how Maya dotes on Pearly, and then tell me she's not maternal/sisterly.
• Also, when Pearl reappears in Dual Destinies, she doesn't seem to have any issues with Trucy's existence.
  • OBJECTION! Pearl doesn't have memory loss! After Phoenix came out of his slap-induced coma, he just explained to Pearl that he adopted Trucy and did not "betray Mystic Maya" with some tramp. When they meet again in DD, Pearl already knows the story and so has no reason to freak out over Trucy.

Ema was filming the events of case 1-5

.Phoenix Wright, in his new incarnation, has a badge on his hat. In the final case, this badge is revealed to be a camera that he used to film various things. Now, think back. Where have you seen that badge before? Yes, on Ema Skye's lapel, in the final case of AA 1. From this we can conclude that Ema was filming that case. But why? I've no idea, so someone else can guess at that.

• She carries it just in case—but keep in mind she meets her idol Miles Edgeworth in this case. She probably kept that footage forever.
  • If it makes you feel any better, that same hypothetical footage would also show Ema accidentally insulting Edgeworth to his face. Twice. She probably deleted it as soon as it wasn't relevant to the case anymore.

Phoenix didn't try to find the truth and reclaim his badge because Sissel was making it hard to find work anyway.

Obviously. I mean, how many people did Sissel un-kill in one night? If we assumed Ace Attorney and Ghost Trick took place near each other and the only major crimes that seem to take place there are murder and costumed burglary, what's a defense attorney to do when people suddenly stop dying in such numbers?

Matt Engarde is a former successful child star, and has been in show business a long time.

.Well, he's only 21. How else do you think he got that evil?

• Does that mean that Corrida is also a former child star?
  • A slightly less successful child star. This feeling of inferiority led him to discover Matt's deep, dark, secret of totally having a crush on the red-headed girl from math class, even though girls have cooties. Juan then planned to expose this scandal, ruining Matt's 'no girls allowed like a spring breeze' image. This, in turn, led Matt to hire the school bully to give Juan a wedgie.
    • I remember reading a forum post which mentioned how interesting it would be if Matt and Juan's rivalry started in childhood and escalated. You know, Matt flicked paint on Juan's head, then Juan stole Matt's pencil, and so on.

Maya Fey went to/is at law school

She was so disgusted with the bum rap Phoenix got when he was disbarred that she took as much money as the village had and went off to college, leaving Pearl in charge. Using whatever knowledge she gained from her time working with Phoenix she hoped to make sure no one go railroaded like that ever again. That was why she was gone during the missing years, and in the second Apollo Justice game she will make a triumphant return and start working at Wright and Co.

• Please let this be real?
• If this doesn't happen, I will cry.
• Okay, I was previously hoping that AA5 would be Phoenix-centric again, but now I think I'd rather be playing Maya Fey: Ace Attorney.
• Who would play the role of her assistant?
• I wish to submit this possibility to the court.
  • http://greenmage.deviantart.com/art/Maya-Fey-Ace-Attorney-77504204
• If Capcom isn't already making this, then they're wasting their time! Maya uses her status as a defense attorney to defend the innocent, and to inspire Phoenix and remind him of why he became a lawyer in the first place.
  • This can't be right... The prosecutors are the more 'outlandish' of the two, and you got to admit a Spirit Medium Attorney is as out there as previous ones!
• She should totally rip Godot off and become a prosecutor to see if Apollo is worthy of continuing the legacy.
• Perhaps Pearl could be her assistant?
  • Jossed. Maya is confirmed to be still training in Kurain in Dual Destinies.

Ema and Klavier are secretly an item

It begins with a one-night stand shortly after "Turnabout Corner", and escalates from there. It's the real reason why Ema got assigned to watch over the Gavinners' concert. No amount of pull, even in the Ace Attorney work, gets a homicide detective working security. Getting your secret girlfriend to do it? Considerably easier. Plus, there seems to be just a little bit too much petty infighting, more than you'd get from someone you only occasionally work with.

Ema is secretly the Gavinner's backup drummer

Well, they said all the band members are involved with law enforcement, and she's a detective. She claimed to be working security at the concert because she didn't want to admit that much association with the glimmerous fop. She has no idea how she got roped into this. Really. The glimmerous fop's nice abs have nothing to do with it.

Kristoph Gavin has Dahlia Hawthorne's hand

After being arrested for the murders she committed, Kristoph was the defense attorney at Dahlia's trial. He was also present at her execution, and afterwards removed her right hand and sewed it onto himself, a la Ocelot. Since Dahlia was a Fey, her hand possessed channeling powers of its own. This allowed Kristoph to channel Manfred von Karma, Damon Gant, Matt Engarde, and other villains, hence the "devil" in his hand. This also explains his use of nail polish. A girl's hand has to look good, after all.

• Alternately he channeled her into his hand somehow as she is just as much the devil as Satan is.
• While I like this theory, I think it was (unfortunately) stated that Dahlia and Iris have very limited, if any, spiritual power, so I doubt that Kristoph would be able to do any channeling with her hand.

Von Karma's granddaughter is the main prosecutor for the 5th game

(Not Perfect Prosecutor) as in the one with the dog named Phoenix.

• If she does, she absolutely MUST be a Phoenix fan girl.
  • JOSSED! For now. But let's hold out for the next games in the series, shall we?

7-8 years latter, Pearl Fey has big boobs

Because it would be funny (on a related note, Relative Error MUST be her reaction to Trucy/Apollo)

• On that note, Maya turns out to take after her sister as well.
  • The prosecution submits that being a pettanko is part of Maya's charm, as well as her personality. Unless they give Maya a personality redo like with Hobo!Nick, a flat chest will forever and always be associated with her.
• HOLD IT! Maya was still tiny at the age of 19. Pearl with Gag Boobs? Maybe. Maya? Nope.
• JOSSED! Pearl appears in Dual Destinies with a teenaged body. Judged by how she turned out, it appears that all of the chestfat among the Fey sisters was given to Mia.
  • I will concede that Pearl is not particularly well-developed by Dual Destinies. However, unlike Maya, she still has time to fill out some more (it's not unheard of for girls to have a late-teen growth spurt). Certainly not to Mia-level, but she's already bigger than Maya was at the same age, and she may be bigger than Trucy as well (it's hard to tell).

In German versions of this game series, The Von Karmas And Klavier were trained in Japan

Think about it. In the original Japanese versions, the Von Karmas etc. were from America, and the regular lawyers from Japan, where the series takes place. In the American version, since the setting shifts to America, the prosecutors are now from Germany. In the German version of this game series (which I know there is one of, but I can't find any information on), the series will come full circle, and the Von Karmas and the like will be from Japan.

• Sorry, fellow troper, it's not the case. I have one of the European versions of JFA (comes with French and German language options as well as the regular English one.) And I can say from my playthrough of it in German that the Von Karmas, at least, are from Germany as much as they are in the English version. Would have been brilliant if it did go full circle like that, though.

The Patriots are the Totalitarian Dictatorship from the previous WMGs.

Think about it. As mentioned above, the trials are ridiculous kangaroo courts. But they're still needed to maintain the facade of a free society, central to The Patriots goal of controlling information flow in society. Obviously, the Ace Attorney games take place in a continuity that is pre-2014 USA. Any discrepancies in the dates can be explained by Patriot information changing. Hell, the entire Ace Attorney series could be a LITERAL video game, in-universe: a VR simulation set up to train lawyers like Apollo to be like Phoenix Wright, the "Big Boss / Solid Snake" of the battlefield of the courtroom, after they got rid of him using fake evidence when he outlived his usefulness. Using Memes! Possibly... Maybe. Any games with improvements in the perceived hijinks of the legal system are set after 2014 - when The Patriots were taken down. Any discrepancies there can be handwaved by the fact that the system is still recovering from having its "head" (The AI system) cut off.

This also explains why the games are set in Japan for Japan and California for the English release, while the characters seem to fit into any environment: The characters are all Patriot/Philosopher sleeper agents, in the same vein as EVA/Big Mama and ADAM/Adamshka/"Revolver" Ocelot. They can speak the language and act as natives of any land they are sent to, whether it be Japan or California.

• The crossover potential is amazing.

The Phoenix Wright in the fourth game isn't the real Phoenix.

He is in fact Sanae Hanekoma, disguised as Phoenix. Note the stubble, mysteriousness, refusal to give a straight answer, and all-around Chessmaster-ism that Phoenix "Stupidity Is the Only Option" Wright could never master. Also, his ability to escape being hit by a speeding car into a light pole with only minor injuries is because he's actually an Angel.

After each game, reality changes

Everything in the next game has better sprites. This isn't because of artistic ability of the artists getting better, but after each time Phoenix goes around recollecting about the events of the game in question (credits), everyone he hasn't met becomes better shaded. It's a coincidence that everyone he hasn't met gets better drawn. 3-1 and 3-4 are him reading about the cases; that's how he imagines them.

The games are designed to spawn Memetic Mutation.

I hold as evidence that the collective writers here have, on several occasions, slipped into character, or at least used the various catchphrases from the games. This also tends to occur in just about any Ace Attorney-related thread Neo Silver Thorn has ever read. As such, it leads me to believe that the games are, in fact, an experiment in memetic mutation that Capcom is performing on the gaming community.

• OBJECTION! I object! That was...damn it.
  • ::bows:: Your honor, the prosecution would like to thank the defense for proving its point.

The WMG above in mind, the Ace Attorney series is created, not by Capcom, but by the La Li Lu Le Lo.

It's all an exercise in using memes to control the populace- and it's a resounding success. As a sidenote- since the La Li Lu Le Lo were defeated in 2014, does that mean the Ace Attorney series has run its last game? And if it has.... is that good or bad? Side-sidenote- who was the jerk who edited my post from saying 'La Li Lu Le Lo' to saying 'La Li Lu Le Lo'- wait a minute....

Machi smuggled in the cocoon in order to pay for Lamiroir's eye surgery

She really means a lot to him, we can see that, and I can't see him wanting the money for himself. Not only that, it's not long after the end of the trial when she decides to get her eyes fixed. (Seemingly on the suggestion of Phoenix, who already pieced it together.)

• OBJECTION! The Borginian Cocoon in question was smuggled in quite some time before the case actually happened (if I recall correctly, at least a month?), according to when Prosecutor Gavin and Lamiroir met, which would mean long before Mr Wright ever met Lamiroir. Lamiroir stated to both Mr Justice and Ms Wright that she was afraid to remember what kind of person used to be. She tells Mr Justice that she fears that being able to see again will bring forth this terrifying truth. *taps paper smartly* The young Mr Tobaye claims in his testimony that he "needed" the money, with implication that he needed it immediately. Furthermore, if he needed a great sum of money, enough to risk his own life, it implies he does not often have a lot of it to begin with and that the why he wanted it was likewise life-threatening. Would that not raise suspicion to Lamiroir as to where he obtained enough money out of the blue to give her a surgery for a non-life threatening issue? While the defence's reason is plausible, so long as Lamiroir's injury was not life-threatening, the prosecution finds it hard to believe that Mr Tobaye, a fourteen year old child, would gamble everything for some petty cash over a surgery he knows the recipient does not desire.

Lamiroir's blindness and amnesia were not due to physical damage.

Lamiroir is blind and amnesiac after an accident, but doesn't appear to have any scaring around her head, which lead me to wonder what was going on. Remember how she doesn't want to remember who she is? In certain cases of psychological trauma, people can blank out their memories - and sometimes, they can also force themselves to lose their vision. Lamiroir, when she first appears, isn't just worried about getting her vision and memory back, she's actively stopping her own body from remembering.

During case 4-3, sometime after she is attacked Lamiroir gets to thinking about it. During court, just before she translates for Machi, that's when she decides that she wants to remember. At that point, everything floods back to her... just in time for her to see her son and daughter working together.

But that goes against the game, correct? At the end of 4-3, Phoenix remarks that a doctor examined her and found her blindness was due to an accident? ...But at this point, he knows she's Thalassa Gramarye and is actually playing along with her lies. After all, she's just been in the hospital, so it makes sense that a doctor would see her then. Plus, we all know Phoenix is a bit of a sneaker barsteward at this point.

• Given that in Case 4-4, there's a rather non sequitur bit of dialogue between the conclusion of the MASON system and the start of the last day of trial, the timeline proposed by this WMG seems to be disproven. To quote: Something inside me... rising... surfacing... Something important... lost long ago... it's close now... so close. Although it's never directly explained, it's quite obvious that's supposed to be Lamiroir on the verge of regaining her memories.

Phoenix is not just pointing enthusiastically, he is throwing small objects at the others in the court

This is why the witness always looks like they're being hit physically.

Maya was not originally going to be in this picture

Namely this one◊Namely Capcom was worried that if it was just Mia Fey and April May like that then people would get the wrong idea of what the game is really like. So Maya was added in to hopefully make things seem more innocuous, but like other examples of censorship whether it actually does do that is of course up to you.

• Why is April May even in that picture? She was an accomplice to Mia's murder and gave testimony in an attempt to get Maya arrested for it.
  • Probably because April is the only other female character in that case and Capcom thought that was a justifiable enough reason.
  • It would have been better if they just had Mia and Maya hugging each other in a sisterly way.

Mia entrusted Maya to Diego.

Basically, in the second case of the first game, Maya mentions the law firm Mia said for her to go to if she was ever in trouble. Note that Maya never mentions the name of the lawyer himself. Now, look at Grossberg. From what we can tell, he's a bit of a coward, he complains, and from what we can tell, he kind of annoyed Mia when she was a new lawyer. Why would she entrust her sister to him? It's more likely that she was actually entrusting her sister to Diego, who was A) a lot more calm and reliable than Grossberg, and B) comforted her after her first, traumatic trial.

• Well, why wouldn't Mia entrust her sister to her lover?
  • Because by the time Mia told Maya about Grossberg & Co Diego was already incapacitated?
    • OBJECTION! Recall that Maya said "My sister gave [Grossberg's Address] to me a long time ago.". It could very well be that this "long time ago" was well before Diego was poisoned and fell into a coma.

During the seven-year break between AAs 3 and 4, Phoenix single-handedly shut down the black market.

In the second case of AA2, the victim had bought a gun from the black market. In the first case of AA4, Nick claims that the black market is a thing of the past. How could he know for certain? Because he destroyed it; he had to do something to pass the time before he had the idea of becoming a poker pro.

• However, that just might have something to do with Edgeworth's brilliant disruption of a major crime syndicate in Investigations.
• I like this. I'm just imagining Phoenix destroying the ENTIRE BLACK MARKET just because he's bored

Another game will be made, detailing Phoenix's adventures as a non-attorney in the seven-year break.

He'll become a bit less of a Non-Action Guy, as well; replacing his ubiquitous Attorney's Badge will be the Phoenix Rising Uppercut. (Based on his comment on Apollo's uppercut at the end of AA4, case 1:

Phoenix: "Oh, about your uppercut. Try yelling 'Take That!' next time. I find it packs a little more punch."

He "finds" that it packs more punch. In other words, he learned from experience. Experience punching people.

• Phoenix Wright: Ace Piano: Pokerface and Punching... I think you are onto something.
• Experience, you say?

Prosecutors

Edgeworth is a robot.

In the first case of Ace Attorney Investigations, Edgeworth explicitly discusses the mechanics behind the revolutionary new "think before you speak" system. However, when he talks about "tapping the Logic button", he has his finger to his temple. On top of that, the image showed every time the Logic menu is opened is... the same image of Edgeworth tapping his temple. He's not simply painting the fourth wall; as a robot, he actually does have a button there that accesses his memory banks and overcharges his positronic brain for the sake of making connections.

• A very interesting WMG. A robot that ages, I suspect you mean? Would it be that Gregory Edgeworth made him and Manfred reprogrammed him after DL-6? Do earthquakes make him malfunction, thus the 'passing out' in AAI case 2? I would be quite happy if you expanded on this, because you seem to know what you're talking about.
  • Not the same troper, but trying it anyways. It would also explain why Edgeworth is not interested in women, but shows affection for his fellow men: Women are different, and men look more like him. It's just his progamming saying that "Different is bad, Look-alike is good", like many programs. On that same line of thought, it would explain the vast number of awards and cases he's been on and won. He's a robot. He can work much more than the ordinary human without getting tired. And for the ending: To justify his fanboyism with The Steel Samurai, Edgey often states that "Other people cannot grasp at the deep meaning of the show.". It sounds like a lame excuse, but think about it: The logical mind of a robot is the most suited to say if a show has actually meaningful messages or not!
  • The Steel Samurai is also a man made of metal, like a robot.
• Not only this, but perhaps it explains the shift in personality and morals from the first game to the second. Perhaps he really did 'choose death', and so the 'revived' Edgeworth is really robot was modeled after him. Nobody really noticed due to fact Edgeworth had a cold demeanor beforehand, and thus being sympathetic was not a nececary trait for Botworth.
  • Additionally, it shows why in 2-4 he wasn't very sympathetic about Adrian Andrew's suicidal ourburst. You would assume that someone who felt that way at one point themself would understand, but Edgeworth pushes her further - evidently the Robot didn't have that part programmed into it.

Manfred von Karma was a demon who was stuck on earth.

Sort of connected to the "Phoenix Wright is connected to the Buffyverse" at the top.Manfred von Karma was a demon/demonic being who did something to piss off the ruler of Hell, and as a punishment he is sent to Earth until he learns "failure", at which point he will be dragged back to Hell to serve the kind of punishment only humans receive there. Once on earth, he decides he kind of likes being evil there, and he decides to become a prosecuter using his connections with various non-human beings to forge evidence, and never feel failure. However, Gregdeworth manages to mark his record. vKarma is shocked, and nervous about going back to Hell, when he gets shot. It is because of his non-human abilities that he is able to shoot Gredgworth, and not have to go to a doctor about the bullet in his shoulder. Because of his actions, he no longer feels like he failed, pissing off the ruler of Hell/whoever punished him. It is only years later, when he loses to Phoenix Wright that he truley feels failure, and when he dies, he goes to Hell/whatever you want to call it. Franziska, however, being a Half-Human Hybrid, has the compulsion for non-failure, but it isn't as strong as it was in her father, allowing her to break away from the compulsion.

• The kanji in his name even means 'Great Demon'... enough said.

Manfred von Karma made a deal with the Devil.

This is a more sensible version of the WMG above.Manfred von Karma made a Deal with the Devil for something. (Maybe a child who was just like him?), the price being that he would go to Hell as soon as he felt true failure. He killed Edgey-Daddy, and so the black mark that Edgey-Daddy gave him didn't feel like a 'failure', however when Phoenix Wright beat him, he felt true and utter failure, and the contract was fulfilled, meaning that the child that was just like him (Franziska) was no longer just like him, and was able to grow and change as evidence by her breaking down in front of Edgeworth, and learning that there is more then just "perfection" in life.

Manfred Von Karma committed suicide.

We used to have this one, a few bullet points deep, but it seems to have gotten shuffled off. A brilliant lawyer, and an undefeated prosecutor who doubtless has accumulated favours no matter how much of a Jerkass he was, simply doesn't get executed in less than three years. Remember, a conviction in the three-day trials doesn't lead directly to sentencing, but to an automatic retrial in a higher court – and then there are still appeals. On the other hand, Von Karma was obsessed with perfection – and he lost his win record, his long-plotted revenge, his reputation, and his freedom all in the same day. For a man so given to overreaction, this could easily lead to deciding that he was truly guilty of imperfection, and being his own hangman not long after. This adds resonance to Edgeworth's particular disdain for suicide in the final case of the second game – not only did he obviously not do it himself, but he sees it as the final failure of Von Karma and his way, in contrast to the new path he's chosen for himself.

• I came to the same conclusion due to the fact that it took Dalhia five years to have her sentence carried out but Von Karma was dead before a year had even gone by.
• It's possible that he refused any further trials or appeals and wished to have his death sentence ushered in, so didn't so much commit suicide as refused any further trialling. His record was damaged beyond repair because of that Not Guilty verdict (both because it was him convicted instead, and because he lost the case), even if he was found Not Guilty in a retrial or an appeal. There's also the fact that his sentence might have been ushered on anyway because A) he's part of the law enforcement; B) he's actually quite old, unlike Dahlia, so his trial was given priority; C) Because of his age he possibly died in prison; D) It's a lot easier to prove he had the most to do with the murder of Gregory Edgeworth and that he'd set up the plan to get Edgeworth convicted than it is to trace Dahlia to the poison, since ballistics markings are a lot more distinct than a bottle on a pendant.
  • Unlike America, Japan (whose broken justice system is the basis for Ace Attorney's) does not do much in the way of appeals. Also, Japanese execution dates are secret – the condemned only learn their death is imminent 24 hours before they're hanged, and the outside world isn't informed until after the fact. It's certainly conceivable that Manfred's execution was fast-tracked for some or all of the reasons above. This troper thinks it's more likely he died in prison due to simply giving up on life.
    • Yeah, but we know appeals exist in the Ace Attorney universe, because Case 3-3 IS an appeal case. Considering Manfred's personality, he's unlikely to allow himself the more slow path of death by giving up on life. He'd want his death sentence carried out immediately; no retrials, no appeals, none of that; and he could have gotten that because the legal system is so twisted and he has connections. If he wanted, he could have gotten his sentence overturned; Bansai Ichiyanagi, for instance, could have been an asset. He'd snap his fingers and order his immediate execution, wanting to get it over with as quickly as possible because there's no coming back from the shame of losing two cases in one day to a rookie attorney AND being found guilty of a murder he very nearly got away with AND having it revealed he forged evidence for a case 16 years ago (even though he wasn't guilty of this; Ichiyanagi framed him) AND having all his flaws laid out for the world to see all in the same day. He'd kill himself before giving up on life, if his execution date wasn't within the week. He's too proud for that. I also believe he would have wanted this so that his daughter never had to see him disgraced like that. I at least think Manfred loved his daughter dearly, even if he was a strict parent to her and didn't always know how to express his care for her, and always wanted her to admire him. I don't think she was ever told the truth about why her papa was sent to prison, either, until about four years later.

Manfred von Karma is the one who instigated the 3-Day Trial limit, the Statute of Limitations on murder charges, and the Evidence Law with the help of Blaise Debeste.

Raymond Shields tells us that the IS-7 happened before the 3-day trial limit, and considering that Edgeworth had to be told this, the limit had to be instilled sometime around the incident. With that in mind, there were two people in power at the time who we know for a fact are incredibly corrupt; one is Manfred von Karma, the other is Blaise Debeste. Considering that the "official" reason for the trial limit is that there were a lot of cases that needed doing, this reason is likely just an excuse for the real reason, which is that Manfred von Karma was displeased with the IS-7 and wanted to ensure no other cases like that happened again, and that Blaise found that it made it easier to write his own truths. It's also worth nothing that when he faces Phoenix, Manfred is incredibly impatient and expects trials to last mere minutes, not hours or even days, something that was not the case when we first meet him. He's impatient, sure, but he's also genuinely busy. His Clock King tenancies sixteen years later can be seen as impatience at wanting the trial to end before it's proven the defendant's truly innocent. It cannot be because he's up against a novice; he sees all defence attorneys the same, no matter how many years they've been around (except Gregory, but he left an impression). Further, on the Statute of Limitations point, it makes it harder for someone to overturn his perfect verdicts and thus, stain his record with claims of false convictions. In Real Life, at least in the US, there isn't a limit on murder convictions. The fact that there suddenly is one could be a result of Manfred manipulating the law to serve him. He wouldn't want any verdicts of his to be overturned. Further, his "official" documents about the IS-7 state Jeff Master murdered Isaac Dover; he's not an accomplice. Manfred is not above forgery (he just didn't force the autopsy report that got him the penalty), so he could use this report as a way to ensure Master cannot be re-tried, because of the Statute. Now, for the contradiction in this argument; the judge and the detectives would notice. We don't know what judge presided, nor what detective took over for Lacer after he was fired. Manfred is pretty good at dismissing arguments that oppose his own, and Blaise can make people "disappear" that oppose him; if Blaise was the one that forged the report in the first place for Manfred, then it's possible he did away with people who would contradict the report who actually have some weight to their words. Finally, Evidence Law. The thing that got Manfred his penalty would not fall under legal evidence by Evidence Law; it wasn't really related to the case at hand because it was evidence proving the confession was forced but NOT about the actual case, and it sounds as if Badd gave Gregory the evidence before the trial began. I'd think knowing that, the reason why Manfred wanted such a law to exist would be obvious; so he could not get penalties like that again for his interrogation tactics. Blaise, of course, helped ensure these laws came to be, as they helped him create his own "truths". The 3-Day limit and the limit on trying someone for murder definitely sound as if they were brought on by someone corrupt wanting to take the legal world into their own hands; after all, it both sharply increases false convictions due to lack of research into the case, and prevents them from being given a fair re-trial if the real culprit is found.

Edgeworth wears a clip-on cravat.

How else could he swap it out for a fresh one in under a second when Kay sneezes into it?

Godot has some severe, ADHD-type manic thing.

The coffee is self-medication. Without it, he'd barely be able to pay attention to the evidence, and would be painting his case on the walls of the court in chalk just to help concentrate. He's so laid back because he errs on the side of caution, and if he acted any more excitable he'd never be able to make it between recesses without a Bladder Failure from all the coffee. The "red on white" vision issue may be a result of stress-related ocular trauma (such as constant but mild hemhorrage that tint everything red, he's just not good at telling colour by shade, and the visor affects light in some way that makes it easier to differentiate "red-tinted red" and "red-tinted white") rather than or in addition to the poison, or it could be entirely unrelated.
If the above guess that the Ace Attorney court is the minor leagues of the judicial system, this is probably why Godot isn't in the Major League- they wouldn't let him keep up the caffeine habit, and he'd therefore be useless as a lawyer.

Other

Kristoph Gavin was mentored by Aristotle Means.

We know for a fact that Klavier was mentored by Constance Courte; ergo, we can assume that he was enrolled at Themis. If the younger brother attended Themis, then isn't it reasonable to believe that the older brother did the same? And if Kristoph attended Themis and studied to be a lawyer, then he would have been taught by... Aristotle Means. Kristoph's actions - specifically, the dedication he showed to achieving victory and the lengths he went to in order to secure both it and his safety - certainly seem to embrace the good professor's "the end justifies the means" philosophy.

• If the above is true... then that means that Aristotle Means is indirectly responsible for the Dark Age of the Law.

Damon Gant's ultimate goal was to bring down Quercus Alba's smuggling ring

Consider this entire entry to be one giant spoiler, otherwise I'd have to spoiler just about every other sentence.

The last thing Damon Gant says to Edgeworth at the end of 1-5 is this: "You despise criminals. I can feel it. You and I...we're the same. One day you'll understand. If you want to take them on alone...you'll figure out what's needed". This quote seems rather out of place if we assume Gant's motives were as purely selfish as he claims. So what could he mean by this? Consider the following:

• It's never really explained what Gant's motive was for doing all the things he did. We know he wanted to control both the Police Department and Prosecutor's Office, but to what end? It's unlikely that he was simply hungry for power for power's sake. He seems relatively sane, and certainly knows how to enjoy the simple things in life (swimming, anyone?). He was already in line to become the next Police Chief, so he went to all that risk just so he could control the Prosecutor's Office as well. This wouldn't serve any "purely selfish" goal such as fame, wealth, or glory. All it would give him is some behind-the-scenes influence over the outcomes of investigations and trials. Why would anyone care at all, let alone care so much as to commit murder and blackmail?
• Gant seems to have a burning hatred of crime, as much as Edgeworth does. This is shown in his final quote to Edgeworth (above) as well as an earlier line: "Tough on crime and tough on people. That's how I was raised". This might explain his desperate desire to control the Prosecutor's Office. If he had that much power over investigations and court proceedings, he could ensure that no criminal, no matter how slippery, would ever escape justice. Gant seemed to realize that some criminals could evade the current justice system. If a criminal enterprise could exert control over the justice system—say, by planting spies in the Prosecutor's Office (Jaques Portsman) and as defense attorneys (Calisto Yew)—the only way to bring that crime ring down would be to have even MORE control over the justice system than they did.
• There's a couple of parallels between Rise from the Ashes and the Investigations story arc. There's a general theme of "the limitations of the law" running through both. In Rise from the Ashes, Lana makes a comment about "doing what we had to do to get Darke the sentence he deserved". Lana and Gant (and Edgeworth, to a lesser extent) felt that the "law" was too limited in its ability to bring certain dangerous men to justice, hence the need to fabricate evidence. This shows up in Investigations when we learn the truth about the Yatagarasu: Faraday and Badd had decided that the power of the law to bring about justice was too limited, and formed the Yatagarasu to work outside the bounds of the law, as that was the only way they could defeat Alba's crime ring. Also, in both cases, the villain is ultimately defeated by an illegally obtained piece of evidence: the patch of leather to Damon Gant, and the "trump card" to Quercus Alba. In both cases our heroes question whether is it "right" to use this evidence. Finally, this final confrontation in Investigations is foreshadowed by Gant's quote to Edgeworth: "One day you'll understand. If you want to take them on alone...you'll figure out what's needed". And we see that this troubles Edgeworth—he later says to Phoenix that given a few more years, he might have tried to do what Gant did. And what happens? A few years later, Edgeworth is forced to use illegally obtained pieces of evidence...in order to get Alba the sentence he deserved.
• When Gant is defeated and forced to confess to everything, his dialogue and body language seem to indicate that he's almost...relieved that Wright figured everything out. As if he didn't really want to do what he did but felt he 'had'' to. Or as if Wright's ability to figure him out eased some doubt in his mind about the capabilities of the justice system.

Here's what I think happened: Gant was wronged by Alba's smuggling ring somehow. Maybe Alba had a family member killed. For whatever reason, he wanted to bring them down at all costs. But he knew the current justice system couldn't do it. He knew that the ring had control over the courts and that the man in charge was a man the law couldn't touch. The only way he could think of to defeat the smuggling ring, was to have even more power and control over the justice system than they did. With control of both the Police Department and Prosecutor's Office, he would have more influence over the outcome of trials than any of the smuggling ring's spies. He could make sure every ring member got the sentence they deserved, and he could make sure they would all eventually testify against the ringleader.

This explains Gant's words to Edgeworth, gives him a sensible motive, and most importantly, makes him a Well-Intentioned Extremist.

• Yeah, your theory actually very well fits. And now with a recently translated AAI 2, we may apply it to it as well. There are a couple of similarities between the ending of AAI and 4 case of AAI 2. For example, in both we need to bring down the mighty person with high position, who surpasses law, and we can do basically nothing to achieve it. In both cases Edgeworth does things which he first doubts in, but in the end decides to do them anyway, because he thinks that it is right, in AAI 2 he put away his badge, and later lied about his status as a prosecutor to let him make investigations. Gant's quote "What are you doing in court? You despise criminals. I can feel it." may indicate exactly this. Being in court gave Edgeworth nothing to bring down Bansai, so he put away his badge to be able to bring him down. What speaks even more about it is that in the end of the game Edgeworth learned, that the whole reason why he was able to bring down Bansai in the first place was because Souta Sarushiro let him do it, and not only let, but forced him to investigate the area by bringing Kay to the roof of the Grand Tower, in advance writing a fake letter to Bansai, to force him to kill Tsubasa Kagome. So this was possible to accomplish only by using illegal means... There wasn't any other way to do it. This also exactly follows the second half of Gant's quote "One day you'll understand. If you want to take them on alone...you'll figure out what's needed" - he wasn't able to bring Bansai down alone in the end, it was with Souta's support, because Edgeworth actually didn't do what Gant hinted him to do, he didn't use forged evidence or illegal evidence, so he couldn't bring down Bansai without it alone. He managed to do it only with Souta using illegal means and writing the fake letters. In the end we even learn that Bansai actually had all kind of evidence in his room, including the ones which originally belonged to Smuggling Ring, including the Alif Red statue which mysteriously disappered in the 2 case of AAI and thought to be in Smuggling Ring's possession, but it wasn't, it was in Bansai's possession, which speaks a lot about his real relation to Smuggling Ring. Notice that even after both its leader and co-leader were brought down, Smuggling Ring was still active, so we can assume that Bansai knowing about them covered up for them the whole time, and didn't stop to do it even after Alba was sent to jail, because it was well profitable for him. And Gant could know about it and could probably have wanted to bring both of them down, knowing about their relations. Notice that the first thing which Gant did when he became Chief of Police - gave Lana Skye a postion of Chief Prosecutor - the exactly same position as Bansai had. He couldn't do it when Bansai was a Chief Prosecutor, but as soon as he got a promotion, he put his plan in action. He couldn't bring down Smuggling Ring as long as Bansai covered them up, so he did everything to faster become Chief of Police and to give Lana Skye the same position as Bansai had, to be able to find leads, and uncover the truth and send Bansai, and later Smuggling Ring, as well, to the prison. So in the end I think that Gant wanted to bring down both of them, but he couldn't bring down Smuggling Ring without bringing down Bansai first. This also explains why all persons who knew something about Smuggling Ring suddenly died - just as Bansai said in an actual game - he made them disappear, to ensure that nothing happened, that could reveal the real identity of the head of Smuggling Ring and connection of other people to it. It also explains how such guys as Jackues Portman and most likely Calisto Yew as well could become respectively prosecutor and defence attorney, given that both of them were spies, and Calisto Yew didn't even use her real name when received a defence attorney badge.

Ema Skye hooked up with Franziska von Karma while studying abroad

Look at Ema's oh-so-condescending expression and tell me she could have learned it from anyone else. The relationship likely didn't end well – Ema probably got fed up with the perfection obsession and so ended up with a deliberately 'take it easy' attitude – but it could have started easily enough. Ema interns at the German Department of Justice equivalent, meets Franny on a case, Phoenix comes up in conversation, Ema defends him against accusations of being a foolish fool, things get heated, and suddenly everyone's clothes are on the floor.

• This may be one of the best things I have ever read.
• Where does this put Adrian?
  • Watching.
    • One True Threesome?

Matt Engarde has a real Split Personality, deliberately created

His true self finally comes out after "calling himself" on the wristphone...and when he used it earlier, in jail, Phoenix doubted that he could get a signal. This would also nicely explain the total lack of Psyche-locks..."he" actually doesn't know what he did. At some point in the past, he actually took Method acting to the point of insanity, and created a "cover" personality that would be far more publically acceptable, and only dimly knew of him, likely believing any communication between the two personalities to be literal calls.

• OBJECTION! If that were the case, then going by Dual Destinies, Matt Engarde would still have Psyche-locks: black ones, in fact.

The Judge and Manfred von Karma share a grandchild

So, according to Court-Records.net, the Judge has a grandchild, name and gender unknown. According to Game 1, Case 4 we know that vKarma also has a grandchild. Wouldn't it be fun if the grandchild was the result of the Judge's (potential) Son, and vKarmas other daughter?

Zak (or Maginifi) got rid of Apollo

Think about it. When she comes back to the troupe, she brings her son (Apollo) with her. Both Zak and Magnifi are well-established jerks, so it's not beyond them to seperate Apollo from Thalassa for whatever reasons. It doesn't seem Trucy ever knew him until the 4th game, so it must have happened pretty quickly.

• "I also have a son." "Not any more, you don't! * dropkicks offscreen* "
• Well... I disagree. After doing some math, you'd know Thalassa was seventeen when she got married (she was married for about a year, in which Apollo was born to her, and she was 40 in the game while Apollo was 22, making her 18 when she had him). Apollo was born right around the time her husband died, again while she was only 18. Being a teenage widow and mother, she may have given up her newborn baby in a fit of despair about her husband's sudden death and possibly because she didn't think she could handle being a single mother. She gave him one of her bracelets because she did genuinely love her son and wanted to give him something that would forever indicate him as a member of her family, as the bracelets are a family heirloom. Giving up Apollo may have been an attempt to avoid being reminded daily that she'd once been married. Zak and Magnifi might have been jerkasses, but me, I always thought Magnifi blackmailing Zak and Valant was punishment for harming his daughter (albeit a really twisted punishment), as (to me anyway) he didn't seem like a jerkass at all when giving Zak the rights to his show. Valant was a bigger jerkass than him by blaming Zak for murdering Magnifi when there was no murder in a fit of envy. With Zak, I still can't work out what he did that made him such a jerkass. He disappeared, yes, but Phoenix would have been screwed over either way and he definitely loved his daughter very, very much and wouldn't have left her unless he didn't think he had a choice. People, as much as everyone would like to think, don't always think logically, so what happened with them may have been a case of Surprisingly Realistic Outcome.
• Zak is also pretty obviously flabbergasted by the information when he hears it from Phoenix in "Turnabout Succession" because he had no idea Apollo existed at all. Obviously, he could be faking his reaction, but it seems fairly genuine considering the difference between the reaction and his usual demeanor.
• Jossed as of Spirit of Justice. Apollo's father died while abroad, and Thalassa couldn't find him.

The Gramayres were originally from Borginia

At the very least, Magnifi and Thalassa lived there; Zak and Valant may or may not have come from there as well. When Thalassa/Lamiroir woke up in Borginia without her memory, she didn't magically aquire a new language while forgetting her own. She defaulted back to her first language, which would have been more deeply ingrained in her mind anyway.

Jeff Angel from Hotel Dusk: Room 215 grew up to become Damon Gant

His real last name is Damon, after all. He'd be roughly around the same age as Gant by the time of the Ace Attorney games, has being annoying down to an art form (although his really long pauses could use some work) and really really hates criminals to the point of forging evidence to get them convicted.

• OBJECTION! Jeff Angel was 18 in 1979. By 2017 he would only have been 56. Damon Gant is 65 in 2017. A CLEAR CONTRADICTION! Also, Jeff turned himself in to the police for robbery at then end of Hotel Dusk. *cue Speed Stripes* There's no way someone with a criminal record could become chief of police!
  • You're forgetting that Jeff Angel's father was a corrupt lawyer with strong ties to Nile. It's not out of the realm of possibility that he pulled some strings to clear his son's record. Or, for that matter, decided not to press charges, since Jeff stole the gun and money from him. In addition, Simon Blackquill from Dual Destinies prosecutes cases despite being a convicted criminal.

Phoenix or Apollo is the reincarnation of Edward Marshall-Hall

How cool would that be?

The defendants in all of Manfred von Karma's trials prior to the Gourd Lake Incident WERE actually guilty.

In the 4th case of Investigations, it is alluded to that he has a great respect for the law and hates criminals to a T. Mack Rell was actually guilty, after all. He would only pick cases where he was absolutely very sure that the defendant was guilty, helping to sustain his easy 40-year streak of wins. Von Karma decided to prosecute Edgeworth because he planned all of this, aware of the talent of Phoenix Wright which led the trial to its end so he could see Edgeworth's confession to the court about DL-6. Von Karma went into this case fully aware he would lose as far as Edgeworth supposedly murdering Robert Hammond. Remember how not angry he was when this was proven? He fully expected this. He only broke down when Phoenix managed to prove that Edgeworth didnt shoot Gregory Edgeworth.

• Unfortunately, as of Ace Attorney Investigations 2, it's proven that in the trial that led to the DL-6 incident Von Karma had an innocent man convicted. Oddly, he wasn't personally responsible for the forged evidence.

Maya Fey is bulimic.

She's rail-thin and is implied to regularly eat multiple burgers at a single meal. Phoenix is aware but in denial; his constantly cleaning the toilet is, in part, an attempt to hide the evidence.

In the interim between Ace Attorney Investigations and Ace Attorney 4, Larry Butz becomes a lawyer.

Devastated by Phoenix's disbarring, he finally gets off his ass and commits himself to becoming a defense attorney, in order to prove his best friend's innocence. However, he ends up getting roped into joining Kristoph Gavin's office and becomes an Unwitting Pawn as a fallback plan, eventually becoming convinced that Phoenix really was a phony and did deserve to be disbarred. A future game will have him confront Phoenix about this, kill him out of anger, then cover it up and go after Apollo Justice to ruin his reputation and crush Phoenix's legacy, ending with him finally realizing through Apollo's expert defense that he'd been had and committing suicide in his despair.

• That would be sad
• I'd rather not believe this WMG.
  • JOSSED!, fortunately. Larry's motive for the murder would fall apart now that the two big reasons for the dark age of the law are back in action and free of accusations.

Kristoph Gavin is a disciple of Manfred von Karma

When Kristoph and Klavier were children, von Karma was training Edgeworth as part of his revenge. However, Manfred had also noticed the resolution in Miles's friend, Phoenix, and predicted he would become the one attorney that, with Edgeworth's help, could bring an end to him in time. As such, he set a second gambit in motion; he murdered Mr. and Mrs. Gavin, lightly trained Klavier as a prosecutor and took Kristoph under his intellectual wing, teaching him to be obsessed with personal perfection and instructing him to become a defense attorney in order to eliminate Phoenix when the time came.

• ... WTF
  • Well, where else would he get the notion to destroy one of his professional opponents and murder everyone else involved in such a psychopathic manner?
  • He also learned to punch the stand/desk instead of slamming it. Needless to say, Kristoph improved the technique.

Alternately, Kristoph Gavin's mentor was Aristotle Means

We know that Klavier is a Themis alumni; why not his brother, as well? And with Means in charge of the Defense Attorney department at Themis, it would have been almost impossible for Kristoph to not cross paths with him at some point.

• Heck, why would not both Manfred and Kristoph have him as their mentor?
  • Seeing as Manfred was born in 1951 and Means was born in 1982, I highly doubt it. In fact, it's more likely that Manfred mentored Means, who later went on to mentor Kristoph.

Klavier Gavin and Ema Skye will be part of the Second Yatagarasu

.To compliment Wright-DeKiller WMG.

• In Apollo Justice Ema didn't actually flunk out of forensic school, she chose to come back to help Kay as a detective.
  • That's why she's acting as security at the Gavinners concert, she's really watching for evidence of the cocoon smuggling ring.
• OBJECTION! Kay specified girls of around the same age. Replace Klavier with Maya Fey. She would act as the defense attorney with Kay as the prosecutor. Kay said she wanted the second Yagaratsu to be a team of three attractive women. With two previous Wild Mass Guessing devoted to discussion of how Kay and Ema are hot and considering Maya's sister, this could work.
  • OBJECTION! Maya never meets Ema or Kay. Replace Maya with Franny. The Yatagarasu needs three skillsets. Kay provides the infiltration and uses Little Thief, Ema is the investigator who covers up evidence and uses her mad science skillz, Franny controls the courts and uses her Interpol contacts to find the information for Kay to steal.
    • I vote for Ron DeLite being the third, personally. (You can't tell me he isn't pretty enough or girly enough! Not without lying.)
    • SILENCE! A broken blade is a useless blade, meant for naught but messy thrusts. *desk slam* One thing that you have forgotten is that the Yatagarasu consists of a Detective, a Prosecutor, *points* and a Defense Attorney. Since Kay is neither of these, she is the odd girl out! *thought pose* But there is a viable successor for the missing slot, one which should easily come to mind if you give it just a little thought...
• Personally, I always thought it would be Kay, Maya and Trucy. The three sidekicks from each each arc, coming together as one. Kay would provide Little Thief, Maya would provide spiritual aid, and Trucy would provide her magical prowess.

Shi-long Lang is a gay wolf furry

That explains the adherance to the wolf motiif and the skin tight leather

• Well, the character designer did want him to be shirtless...

In the seven-year gap between the Phoenix and Apollo games, Edgeworth, Gumshoe, and Kay become the second Yatagarasu.

I can't be the only one who saw the connection. Both generations would be formed of a noble prosecutor, a trusted detective, and a hot chick. Besides, they need to do something.

• That can't possibly last. Putting Gumshoe in charge of concealing evidence?
  • Of course. He... er... "loses" it.
  • Gumshoe was at the breakup of the first Yatagarasu, and got the idea to continue the legacy. He's been the second one all along and is really just Obfuscating Stupidity so no one will suspect him. After he meets Kay they have a conversation about their mutual interests and team up, and Edgeworth gets suspicious after a while.

Quercus Alba is related to ExDeath.

He is clearly a human-shaped tree.

• HOLD IT! I'm more than fairly certain Alba wasn't created from a thousand evil souls being sealed into a tree. But I applaud your reference of the evil tree.
  • Quercus Alba is the exact inverse of Exdeath: he is a thousand evil trees sealed into a man.

The judge will be a defendant soon enough.

Think about it; everyone eventually returns either as a defendant or as a corpse. Eventually, the judge (whose name will likely never show up) will be picked for one of them, and seeing as EVERY trial needs a judge, they can't afford to kill him off.

• The Judge can't be a defendant and a judge at the same time either, so in either scenario his brother will have to come to reside over the court proceedings. Cue dramatic flashbacks and insight into both judge's characters, and an enormous plot twist when it's revealed that the bailiff did it.
  • Meekins? Seriously?
    • It's an accident, he kills someone with his crazy arm waving and the Judge taking pity tries to cover for him. Of course it turns out it's all a set up by some diabolical mastermind.

Come Apollo Justice 2, some characters from Phoenix's days will show up

While some are painfully obvious, there are many ways this could happen:

• Gumshoe: He'll be one of the people Apollo has to defend or the detective in a case where you defend Ema.
• Maya: Either the above lawyer reasoning, Kruian master or a defendant.
• Pearls: Prosecutor, assistant to Maya or defendant
• Judge's brother: See the above Judge is a defendant WMG
• Edgeworth and Fraziska: Cameos, witnesses and/or prosecutor/defendant, depending on the person
• Larry: it's Larry, he'll get into trouble somehow
• Payne: But thats a given
• Mia: Either in a "Play as Phoenix" case, or in one of the above Maya/Pearls cases. May or may not involve giving Apollo a charged Magatama.

The Gramaryes would eventually become the thought police

In the Orwellian world, the Gramaryes would be the perfect candidates for identifying any subconscious twitch or contraction that could give away a person's thoughts... the inner party would have a field day with these guys.

• Objection! Nineteen Eighty-Four takes place in... it should be obvious, while the games take place quite a few years later. How exactly do you expect your theory to hold up, witness?
  • Objection! *grins and leans forward over the bench* Ja, that's true, Herr Forehead, but isn't it possible this witness is referring not to the current generation of Gramaryes, but to the past? After all, *objection point* Magnifi Gramarye was most certainly around in 1984, as his lovely daughter was both just two years later.

Closed eyes are an almost sure sign on evil.

Thins about it. If a character spends a lot of the time with their eyes closed, chances are they are the real killer. The cutoff point for how much time they spend with their eyes closed seems to be somewhere between Larry Butz and Damon Gant. Anyways, characters who spend a lot of time with their eyes closed include.

• Frank Sahwit
• Damon Gant
• Ini Miney
• Kristoph Gavin
• De Killer
• Big Wins Kitaki: A mafia boss
  • ...who turns out to be not so bad... when he opens his eyes, of course!
• Ernest Amano
• Marvin Grossberg?
  • Well, Marvin Grossberg did rat out Misty Fey, which in turn caused pretty much everything bad that happened to the Fey family in the series. That's pretty evil when you think about it.
• Also there's Director Hotti, but he so obviously fits into the hypothesis it's not worth discussing.

I haven't seen all of the cases yet (I'm still working my way through the second game) but the only other people I see who can make a claim to this are Larry Butz and Lotta Hart, and they both are selfish butt monkeys who keep on getting in your way. Maybe they're just less evil.

• OBJECTION! ::desk slam:: I-5 gives us Colias Palaeno, with closed eyes 90% of the time but turns out to be a really nice guy. Further, after Quercus Alba undergoes The Reveal, his eyes hardly stay closed throughout the rest of the case! ::point:: This clearly contradicts your hypothesis!
• Kinda justified, because by the last case of the most recent game people are bound to pick up on something like that subconsciously, and I can't be the only one who thought that the game was trying to make me hate Palaeno.

After losing his badge, Phoenix became a secret informant for the police.

I doubt someone like Phoenix would give up so easily on helping others and doing justice, badge or no badge. He seemed to know a lot about the kind of customers of the pub he works at, and even knows a secret or two about the poker room and the deals that take place there. I bet the “failed piano man” and “professional poker player” are nothing but a cover-up for his real job: he’s an informant for the police, and he uses his contacts and knowledge of unlawful deals and secrets to help people like Gumshoe (especially Gumshoe) capture criminals, prepare raids, or even find some valuable clues for certain lawyers and prosecutors. Maybe he even got some extra cash from it to help maintain himself and Trucy, and might even have helped him a bit when he needed to get his badge back.

And before you ask, yes, this theory and the “black market” one are perfectly compatible.

Snackoo is a euphemism

Ema really likes to Snackoo Apollo, and after a while, Apollo learns to enjoy it.

• Rape?
  • If that's the case, then what does this mean:
  Phoenix: Let's see. This bag of snacks here was meant for me...

Diego's love for Mia was unrequited.

• Mia never refers to him as her boyfriend, and doesn't make any particular effort to speak to him when they meet again.
• Diego, despite his obvious feelings for her, never refers to her as his girlfriend.
• Grossberg refers to Diego as Mia's boyfriend, but she doesn't acknowledge it. He may have known about Diego's feelings for her and just assumed.
• Mia was extremely shaken by the events of 3-4, but that could have had just as much to do with seeing her first client kill himself in front of her as anything.
  • Well, maybe Mia prefered people with who she had an "intellectual attraction", like Lana Skye. And by "people" I mean "women". And by "maybe" I mean "please, make it canon".
  • No, I believe it's confirmed at some point. The wiki, at least, says it's true.
  • The wiki is written by fans as well; it's not an official, canonical source. There's absolutely no confirmation in T&T that Mia and Diego had a reciprocal relationship — in 3-4 she seems put-off and startled by his flirting and calls him "Mr. Armando", which seems too formal for a boyfriend. Even if they got together after the events of 3-4, there's still no in-game proof: Diego's wording is "the woman I loved" which is just as applicable for one-sided love as for a girlfriend, and even when channelled in 3-5 or when she appears to do the Super Objection with Nick she doesn't say a word about loving him back, or even having any sort of relationship with him beyond "co-workers". Furthermore, neither Maya nor Nick knows anything about "Diego Armando", which would be strange if Mia had been dating him.

Edgeworth is becoming the Ace Attorney equivalent to Sherlock Holmes

He's got the detective skills, extensive knowledge in many fields, and has learned the benefits of keeping a Watson around the place. He may quit being a prosecutor to help the helpless, or do some investigating on the side with Gumshoe in tow.

• He's even got the "complete disinterest in romantic/sexual relationships" down...
• OBJECTION! Watson is actually competent!
• Besides, this troper thinks Phoenix would make a better Watson.
• Personally, I think it's more like Conan and Kogoro, or at least Takagi.
• OBJECTION! This theory's jossed, your Honor! The Ace Attorney equivalent to Sherlock Holmes... is Sherlock Holmes!

The games are a Take That! at the culture around the Japanese judicial system

After reading this I can't help but wonder.

The Judge is immortal.

No matter how far into the past or the future the games show us, the Judge never seems to get any younger or older. He's always the same perpetually grey-bearded and bald man. That's because he's immortal, and no one has ever noticed. He was a judge long before Phoenix was born, and he will continue to be one long after Apollo dies of old age.

• Let's see if he sticks around during Dai Gyakuten Saiban.

Franziska continues to idolize her father because she is in denial about circumstances surrounding his downfall

Based on Investigations, it's very clear that she looked up to ol' Manfred and consoles Kay seeing as her father is also a prosecutor. Fast forward several years later, when she finds out that her father is dead, a murderer, and not perfect. She most likely didn't take this very well and whenever she thinks about him, she tries to think about the ideal person she looked up to so that it doesn't destroy inside. Edgeworth, being her adoptive brother, probably knows that it would be best to let her live denial and rather than rebuke her for speaking well about his father's murderer, decides to let it slide. Compare that to when Ernest Amano mentions Manfred and Edgeworth isn't exactly pleased to hear his name.

• This becomes very unlikely as of Investigations 2, where, in response to Sebastian coming to realize and subsequently refusing to accept that his father is a murderer, Franziska solemnly states that one must come to terms with the mistakes of one's father, no matter how much one might look up to or idolize him. This suggests that she has come to accept that her father was not perfect and committed evil deeds in his pursuit of "perfection." In fact, now she seems to idolize the idea of perfection rather than a specific manifestation of it.

Quercus Alba wasn't speaking in gaming terms metaphorically

In actuality, he was breaking the fourth wall. During the final "battle", he mentions high scores, getting game over, saving your game and whatever. Somehow, I find it hard to believe that a 72-year old ambassador/ex-general/criminal mastermind is interested in video games. My theory is that he is completely aware how annoying he is, and he's trying to get under your skin. Yes, your skin. In one of his animations (to be more specific, the one where he flashes his medals) he's also doing a Troll-like face directed at the player.

Oldbag is from space.

When she returned from her vacation in Trials and Tribulations, she was dressed in the same space suit from the second game. She took a vacation back to her native homeworld and her gun is real, but it fires something that, while nothing to us, would actually be deadly to aliens. Alternatively, she's Samus' daughter.

Larry Butz will get his own Investigations game.

Since people complained that the first Investigations was too easy (since Edgeworth is a genius), Capcom will make a game with Larry Butz and make it the toughest Ace Attorney game ever to mirror his idiocy and the fact that he has no legal power. Like the other main characters, he will also have an exclusive game mechanic to let him harness his inner "Laurice Deauxnim" and paint mental pictures. It'll work like a one-man Magamata, though with hints of Edgeworth's Logic.

• Actually, I think this idea is clever in an absurd sort of way. Frankly, I'd look more forward to this than a game starring Franziska Von Karma or, ugh, Godot.
• Maybe Larry's exclusive game mechanic will be based on analogies, allusions, and metaphors. You have to use seemingly useless evidence or examine certain objects in certain ways to create "Eureka" moments for your idiotic protagonist.

In Apollo Justice's game, Phoenix's friends weren't absent - they were just as Chessmaster-y as Phoenix himself.

Maya had to take her position as Kurain Master, but seriously wanted to do something about it - so she had Pearl occasionally channel Mia in order to secretly help Phoenix out behind the scenes, or rearrange things to make events more convenient for him. Maya, of course, would encourage him by sending him Steel Samurai stuff. Meanwhile, Edgeworth and Franzy would know that they would be unable to help Phoenix directly as prosecutors, so they ended up finding Klavier Gavin and mentoring him.

Edgeworth's Pet the Dog moment was not 1-3.

He wasn't legitimately searching for the truth in that case... he just wanted Will Powers, the Steel Samurai, to get off.

• Or we could look at it another way. Edgeworth was in a difficult position, being forced to choose between regaining his reputation after his 1-2 loss broke his perfect record or saving one of his personal heroes. When Phoenix raised the very viable possibility that it was someone else, Edgeworth finally made his decision to hear him out, once and for all sacrificing his record for his love of the Steel Samurai. The Samurai's innocence rekindled his belief that justice is best when solidly backed by truth, leading to his Heel–Face Turn. In a way, the Steel Samurai redeemed him.

Winston Payne is a patient, vengeful Chessmaster.

After losing to Mia Fey, he vowed revenge on her, but he was too afraid of being caught to kill her himself. So, he looked into her past to see if there was a reason anyone else would want her dead. And there was. When the time was right, he told Redd White about Mia's investigations. While Mia died, as he had hoped, he had, in the meantime, acquired a new foe, Phoenix Wright. He once again looked for some way of making him a target. He found it in Kristoph Gavin, playing on his anger at not being chosen. Payne thought that Kristoph would kill Phoenix, but he settled for seeing him disbarred and ruined. This bodes ill for Apollo Justice...

• Perhaps the title 'Rookie Killer' means a very different thing to what we thought...
  • Gaspen Payne calls Phoenix Winston's "long-standing rival", and before that, he has been bullying Phoenix's assistant into a brief BSOD. It's not unlikely that he's in on the thing, as well - making Athena give up that soon would rob Phoenix of a very useful ability in the courtroom.

Maya Fey gives up her seat as the Master of the Kurain Channeling Technique

She hands the title off to Pearly, who then goes into intense training to hone her own spirit channeling powers. Maya herself has either gone into self-imposed exile, due to being the center of one too many Fey-related incidents (the death of her sister, her own accusations of murder, and 3-5's entire surroundings), or she has gone elsewhere in the world to pursue a different path, but still keeps in touch with Phoenix Wright, who never let her know that he was disbarred out of fear of shame.

• Jossed as of Spirit of Justice.

The MASON system is...

A mix of science (Little Thief) and what for all intents and purposes we're going to call "magic" (Kurain-style channeling). When you "travel" back in time, you're really viewing a channeling of a person's past self being channeled through a type of Little Thief System.

Tres Bien was put under new management by case 3-5.

Considering that the original owner was probably charged as an accomplice/conspirator to cover up to murder, he certainly couldn't run the place. The court seized it and sold it at auction, so the food probably doesn't suck anymore, meaning that the celebration party has at least tolerable eats.I hope.

• Or Viola could've bought the restaurant out and use it as a front for Mafia-related activity.

Edgeworth uses Axe Body Spray

It would certainly explain his massive popularity with the ladies....

• More like Old Spice.

"Shelly de Killer" is an alias.

I know this is Ace Attorney, but that's just a wee bit too silly. Plus, what kind of assassin tells his real name to an entire courtroom? Knowing the series, though, his real name is probably "Michel de Quilleur" or something.

• "de Killer" is the line of Assassins he comes from. Presumably, as with any professional assassin, he has several (hundred) aliases he can adopt at any time for safety, and only uses his real name of Shelly de Killer when he is openly stating that he is an assassin.
• He does mention that he has yet to “find” a successor in 2-4 and suggests to Phoenix that he could become the fourth de killer, so maybe it is just an alias. I do have wonder though, how exactly does one become the new de killer?

Marvin Grossberg is a Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass.

Some time down the series, we will witness him taking a defense case, and he will wipe the floor with the prosecution.

• Well, he was mentor to such awesome people as Mia Fey and Diego Armando after all!

Edgeworth is a (Bal)seraph.

For four years straight he managed to utterly convince courts that his side was correct, no matter what side that actually was, until such time as he ran into a certain someone who could counteract his Resonance and ultimately put him through redemption — after which he not only becomes a champion of truth, but loses Life Meter for coming to untrue conclusions.

Manfred Von Karma would hurt Franziska is she did something that wasn't 'perfect'

Just an idea- when Phoenix or Edgeworth exposes a hole in her theory, she'll draw back as if expecting them to hit her.

• It's a nice theory, but everyone does that, while Edgeworth has the same possible reason, no one else does.
  • OBJECTION! The great majority of witnesses and prosecutors simply act surprised or tense. No one actually does anything similar to Franziska's bracing and instinctively dodging in self-defense. Also, consider her behavior of whipping people into submission when irritated with them! It is a classic sign of childhood bullying or physical abuse. Therefore, we have strong evidence to suggest that Franziska von Karma was abused by her father!
    • OBJECTION! The fact that Franziska reacts in such a way isn't indicative of any such fact! I would ask the court to remember Ms. von Karma's basic nature and character: that is, she's "brilliant", but is severely lacking in emotional maturity. With that in mind, I would ask the court to compare Ms. von Karma's "reactions" to those of an upset girl from an anime who is seconds away from screaming "KYAAAAAA!" You'll find that Franziska's reactions are very much similar in that they show a lack of maturity. This is no proof of abuse.

Franziska is an Opposite-Sex Clone or (also) adopted

No mention of a wife, a clone being a prefect fit for Mr. Perfect / ability to "pick and choose" instead of blind chance of the uh, normal way fitting.

Matt Engarde is Satan

He wears red, calls himself a "handsome devil" and killed a man with the initials JC. Plus, the wineglass thing has to be dark magic.

Doug Swallow didn't really die

Instead he was merely shocked unconscious. He decided that his current life had sucked so he pretended that he really was dead. He bribed some doctors into making a fake autopsy report. His decision for his new life, was to become a movie star by the name of Matt Engarde. The two look very similar to each other and even wear similar clothes. The reason Phoenix doesn't recognize him is the same reason he doesn't recognize Marvin Grossberg.

• OBJECTION! While he could have lied about his name, age and hair color, and could have become an absurdly rich TV star within 6 years, there's one thing he would have a very hard time changing: his height!]]. Data says that Matt Engarde is five centimeters taller than Doug Swallow. That's nearly two inches.
  • OBJECTION! As Doug Swallow, he logically would have spent lot's of time hunched over while working in a lab.]] However, as actor Matt Engarde ::close up, speed lines:: he would stand up tall to become more presantable!]] Thus explaining the height difference.
    • OBJECTION! And what of Engarde's supposedly long-lived (since childhood) rivalry with Juan Corrida? Or do you propose that Swallow and Corrida somehow met outside of the acting biz or made up a good rivalry story for publicity? (Though if the rivalry were invented, it obviously got very real very fast)? I am quite intrigued.

The poster of the movie that made Mia cry in the office is of Toy Story 3

Considering the fact that the series takes place in the future-ish (actually, we're inching up on the date now), this is entirely plausible. And awesome. Maya likes Steel Samurai, why can't Mia be a Toy Story fan? Of course, this would also imply that Phoenix hasn't seen Toy Story 3, which is just sad in and of itself.

• HOLT IT! There's no way he wouldn't at the very least recognise the characters with the amount of promotion Disney/Pixar does for its pictures, and he notes that he has no idea what the movie in question is, and nor did Mia. Considering that Toy Story 3 came out when Phoenix was in high school, even if he'd never watched Toy Story or its sequels, he'd at least know who the characters are. Perhaps the movie was, in fact, The Iron Giant? It's a good deal more obscure, something he has a chance of never having heard of or seen, since it came out when Phoenix was only 7 years old, in the same year as Toy Story 2 (which received considerable more marketing) AND Disney/Tarzan.

The localized version of the series takes place in a fictional city in California known as Hope Springs

Read the explanation here. I didn't come up with the theory, but it sounds damn plausible (moreso than Los Angeles) and it's now in my head-canon.

There will be a defendant named Bill Stickers

Which is to say that Bill Stickers may be prosecuted. What? The WMGs can't all be deep and insightful...

• Considering that we had a WGM above titled "Ema Skye is hot" (she is, by the way) we can withstand some non-deep and non-insightful ones.

Winston Payne lost his hair due to poisoning, not merely psychological factors.

The script even hints at it—just before Payne loses his hair, the following exchange takes place:

Mia: So, if she's so trustworthy... then I'm sure there couldn't possibly be any poison in here, right?

Payne: Err... Well... Ummm... You see... Umm... Y-Yes...

Mia: OBJECTION! ... And here comes the backpedal! Come on now, "Rookie Killer"! Show this rookie how it's done! How much trust do you really have for this woman? Are you willing to bet your life!?

Payne: Gggg... Nnngh... Unnngggggh...

At this point, the background fades to white. This Troper imagined him timidly picking up a pill and licking it. Next thing we see, Payne's hair comes flying out. Physical proof that Dahlia Hawthorne was untrustworthy! Small wonder Payne was so shocked by the experience.

The MASON system was co-created by Yomiel

• For two reasons: one, even more crossover WMG. And two, because "multidimensional programming theory" is both the best possible computer-related specialty and almost allows the apparent time travel shenanigans to make sense. Kind of.
  • This can be easily combined with the preceding theory about it being a descendant of the Little Thief system.
  • A pretty theory, but Yomiel is the one person who couldn't have done it alone, since he is the only empowered ghost we know who does not have the power to rewind time. Now, if he were to make it in collaboration with Sissel...

The characters actually know that they are not real but characters in a game.

Think about it, it all makes sense. At one point Maya says that Phoenix's face reminds her of a video game character. This makes Phoenix say this rather tell-tale line:

"How ironic if you knew the truth..."

• It's not uncommon for AA characters to break the fourth wall, so this is pretty likely.

The Perfect teacher from Courage the Cowardly Dog is Manfred von Karma's wife.

Both have a strange need for perfection. The teacher abuses Courage when he is imperfect and it's implied that Manfred did the same to Franziska and Edgeworth. Both have a Villainous Breakdown. And both are the villain of their respectful episodes.

• Maybe she's his mum, and he raises his kids how his mum raised him? That's kinda what goes through my head whenever I see this WMG. Franziska has to get her beauty from somewhere, and Phoenix's inner thoughts about her suggests that the only thing she inherited from her father in terms of looks was her smarmy little smirk.

Manfred von Karma did give a damn about Edgeworth.

Initially, he just decided raising young Miles as a prosecutor would be insulting enough to Gregory's image. His ideal was to care for and raise Miles as a worthy von Karma prosecutor, achieve more greatness for himself, and wipe Miles of his Edgeworth identity and implant him as a true von Karma.

What made him resentful against Miles Edgeworth, however, was his failure against Phoenix Wright; after the second failure, he decided to eliminate this failure from the family, and thus 1-4 took place.

• I doubt it. A remark in Turnabout Reminiscence:
  Manfred:As if someone as worthless as you has the right to claim something such as perfection!

Edgeworth did actually intend to kill himself.

Mundane WMG, but it is a bit difficult to believe that a man that savvy would honestly not realise that "Prosecutor Miles Edgeworth chooses death" would be read as a suicide note, and he had no real reason to fake his death. It seems much more likely that he, in a very bad state, decided to settle things for good, left his note, went and stood on a bridge or something... and had an epiphany, realised what he was doing was stupid, immature, and not going to solve anything, and got back down again. He couldn't go back, because his note might well have already be found and that would be a horrible thing to try to explain, and he needed to put himself back together anyway, so he left for Europe. It's this troper's firm headcanon.

• This theory becomes stronger if you consider Rise from the Ashes canon. In the original games, the exact circumstances around the time of Edgeworth's disappearance are left more ambiguous, whereas with Rise from the Ashes we get to see just how mentally unwell Edgeworth was during and after the trial. Considering how he behaved at the end of the case, the idea that he did intend to kill himself (and leave the message as a suicide note), but came around one way or another is highly plausible.
• Whether or not this theory is valid (I personally think it's rather likely), I wanted to correct a few things about your first point. It's very clear that Edgeworth had always left the note with the intention of making it seem like a suicide note. That being said, Edgeworth had a rather huge reason to fake his own death. Namely, the dozens upon dozens of rumors circulating around his name. Whether or not he had intended to fake his death from the beginning or it came about as a result of his potential epiphany doesn't matter, because the end result is that he faked his death for a full year. Why? Well, he was away in Europe, yeah, but I hardly understand why he'd stay away for so long, especially considering he seemed like he had figured out what he was doing as a prosecutor LONG before he returned in his epic scene with Franziska and Phoenix. Perhaps he wanted to let the rumors about him settle down. He was "dead", even the people who scrutinized him would settle down after he had been gone for a full year. He lets the rumors die down a bit, comes back during a high profile case (even though he didn't intend to be the prosecutor to begin with) and subsequently brings a lot of attention to himself, and makes an official statement about being away to learn what it meant to be a real prosecutor and voicing his intentions of finding the truth above all else, therefore simultaneously thwarting all attempts to paint him in a bad light. Someone tries to bring up his sins of the past? He's a changed man now. Someone tries to get new dirt on him? He doesn't give them anything to use against him. Even if he hadn't originally intended to fake his own death, he definitely benefited from doing so.

Gumshoe is suffering from malnutrition.

His declining competence over the course of the series is thanks to years of living on nothing but instant noodles, thanks to all his pay cuts.

• OBJECTION! If he truly was living on NOTHING but instant noodles, there definitely would be some physical changes. In the first 3 games, he uses more or less the same sprites in all of his appearances, so he must only have instant noodles when eating at home, but is able to balance that out somehow in other ways.
  • OBJECTION! Actually, your Honor, Gumshoe himself claimed that noodles is pretty much all that he eats back in Investigations. He says, and I quote: "I'll have you know that I eat three square meals every day, pal! ...Okay, so all three of them happen to be instant noodles [...]". So the poor fella really lives on nothing but instant ramen. Maybe his coat and clothing hide his physical deterioration from the malnourishment? Or perhaps he has big bones that don't showcase his true health?

Phoenix and Apollo are narrating the entire series from their death beds.

At the end of some cases, Phoenix often monologues about stuff. Only thing is, his monologues seem a little... out of characther. It sounds way deeper and mature than their usual speech. This gets even more apparent when we can read Apollo's thoughts. So they could be remembering the whole stories from a point far beyond in their lifetime, maybe even their deaths. It would also explain some Gameplay and Story Segregation, with the Cross-Examinations being points where Phoenix/Apollo remembers things in another order.

The Judge is behind EVERYTHING.

After all, he's the ONLY absolute constant in EVERY trial. Every single trial has the Judge, whose name is never revealed, presiding. Everyone pays him the utmost respect, and thus he is never suspectedof his crimes. The biggest evidence for this? In Rise from Ashes, it is the Judge who gets the Big "NO!" when everything is figured out. In every crime, the Judge either manipulates the evidence to lead it to someone else or manipulates whoever is found guilty into doing it for him.

• The judge isn't present in EVERY trial. What about his brother (the one with the yellow beard)?
  • Given that he's the only other judge AND the usual judge's brother, he's obviously in on it too.
    • Considering the judge's violent reaction when accused of murder... But then, why were there no Psyche-locks?
    • Probably the same reason why you never see Psyche-locks in court. Possibly, the Magatama doesn't work well in court, perhaps because there are too many people present, each of whom are hiding their own secrets.

Kay will become a defense attorney

... and then team up with Edgeworth and Gumshoe to form the second Yatagarasu. After all, the first was also a team of a prosecutor, a defense attorney, and a detective.

Redd White knew about the SL-9 case from 1-5.

In case 1-2, when Phoenix tries to accuse White of blackmailing for a living, White calls the chief prosecutor, who he happened to be blackmailing. Now, fast forward to case 1-5, where you meet Lana, the chief prosecutor. Now, what was that thing she was being blackmailed about in that case?

Ob Jek Shun is a Shout.

It's a lesser version of Unrelenting Force, which is why it knocks the targets back slightly.

Phoenix and Edgeworth both are Time Lords. Specifically, they're the Doctor and the Master.

Here me out here: After the whole trauma and tear-jerky scenes in "The End of Time", and sometime around the Doctor's 12th or 13th regeneration, the Doctor and the Master realize they're sick of fighting each other, and agree to Chameleon-Arch themselves into kids and live some life together as childhood friends again. They manipulate certain events, thus causing Gregory Edgeworth to adopt li'l Master (they never said he wasn't adopted), etc. However, the Universe really hates the last of the Time Lords, so causes DL-6 to occur, causing a scenario that is eerily deja-vuish. It causes the two to seperate again, only to meet reunite as(court-room) enemies. Or something.

The President of a major country will get taken down at some point.

We've already taken down a prosecutor with 40 years of experience under his belt, the Chief of Police, and a FREAKING AMBASSADOR. The leader himself is the next logical step.

• The last case of Prosecutor's Path reveals that the President of Zheng Fa was asssinated in the past and replaced by a body double... which then got himself killed by the Big Bad.
• While not a President, the Final Boss in Spirit Of Justice is a queen.

The Phoenix trilogy is actually just Phoenix telling his story as he remembers it to Trucy and possibly Apollo.

Think about it. Have you noticed that in cases such as the end of 'The First Turnabout' and 'The Stolen Turnabout' Phoenix is talking in past tense? It's possible he's recollecting the old times back when he was a lawyer, in his brightest days.

Every time someone says TAKE THAT, they are actually punching somebody in the face.

In Apollo Justice, when Apollo punches Phoenix, Feenie says that the best way to punch somebody is to yell TAKE THAT because it adds an extra zing. Maybe whenever he was, for example, pwning somebody's psyche locks, he punched them hard in the face every time he figured something out. The psyche locks don't break because of emotional breakdown, but rather the fear of being beaten to death by a drunk attorney.

• OBJECTION! Phoenix gets to break Mia psyche-locks while they were separated by a glass. Also, this would imply Phoenix punched 8-9 years old Pearl on at least two separate ocassions... And I really don't want that to be true.

Everything yelled in court that is accompanied by the signature red, bold letters physically injures the person that it is directed towards.

It's like a spell. That's what the copious finger-pointing and desk-slamming is for. There's a reason that the resident defense attorney or prosecutor reacts like they've been shot when they've been presented evidence that works against their favor.

The material Attorney's badges are made of is radioactive.

Being in constant close proximity to the material (like say, wearing a badge made of it for hours on end every day) causes semi-permanent brain damage, causing the wearer to act dumber and goofier. After the wearer spending enough time without exposure to the badge material the damage is undone, causing them to become smarter and more serious.

There'll be another form of prequel case in the series

• Just like segments of AA 3 where you played as Mia, there would probably be a case where you play as Edgeworth's father, Gregory.
  • Well, GK 2 had a case where you played as Gregory. Perhaps, seeing as AA 5 is switching back to Phoenix, we'll have a case of Apollo's from a few months earlier which is crucial to the plot?
  • Well, there is going to be a prequel game, taking place in the Meiji Era of Japan, centred around Phoenix's ancestor, Ryuunosuke. So, uh, confirmed?

Von Karma was trying to escape the courtroom when he banged his head against the wall

• It wasn't out of panic. He was trying to create an escape route for himself. Later on, he did the same thing in prison, but was successful. The police covered it up, saying he was killed. This explains the difference in length between his incarceration and death and that of Dahlia Hawthorne.

If Manfred's granddaughter appears, she'll either be a Phoenix Wright fangirl or see him as a Broken Pedestal.

She named her dog Phoenix. However, since that incident, Phoenix exposed her grandfather, which got him executed. Even if Manfred was a bastard, he still seemed to care for his family, so the guy responsible for her grandfather's death, no matter how deserved it may have been, can break a little girl.

Desirée DeLite was Mask*DeMasque, NOT Ron DeLite.

Think about it. One, Desirée is stated to be a thrillseeker, something that thievery plays right into. Two, Ron DeLite really does not come off as someone capable of doing it. As in his mental profile doesn't allow for the capability to be a thief. What is more likely is that Desirée is Mask*DeMasque, turning to thievery to both serve as excitement and to pay the bills once Ron is fired. The costume is bulky enough to hide the fact that she's a woman. Ron decided to help her by using his knowledge of security. And the final piece of evidence? Neither Ron DeLite OR Luke Atmey could have stolen the urn...but Mask*DeMasque WAS seen leaving the area WITH the urn. The way that was thrown out was Luke Atmey forged the photos on an earlier day, but there is no proof that this is the case, only that this was a possibility. I assert that the photo WAS taken at the exact time and day initially said...but it was Desirée DeLite, the REAL Mask*DeMasque, who no one suspected, in the photo. This also explains why Ron was so insistent that he was Mask*DeMasque, as he wanted to take the fall for Desirée because, as stated several times, he would do anything for her.Also, compare both◊ of their◊ mugshots. Exact same pose, exact same smile, even similar neck thickness. She has to be Mask*DeMasque.

Kristoph has an intense inferiority complex towards Klavier

Kristoph is the older brother to a child prodigy who's not only a famous rock star but also a prodigy prosecutor. Even Kristoph who is an accomplished defense attorney, probably one of the most accomplished, is overshadowed by his little brother. This caused an intense inferiority complex with his brother which started his obsession with always being the best. For example, in the final case, Klavier admits that Kristoph shared all of his notes on the Zak Gramarye case with Klavier so it'd be a fair battle between them. However, he did not show him the forged note. If he had shown him, Klavier would have forfeit the court case since that would prove Zak's innocence. Kristoph purposely withheld the forged note because he wanted to beat his brother in the court in front of everyone. So his rage against Zak and Phoenix was not because he was just some mad man, it was because it killed his chance to finally beat his brother and that pushed him over the edge.

The reason behind the punny names

It's because they aren't real names. The cases are probably real, but the real names and places are changed (and maybe the dates, too). This also explained the Japanese culture.

Manfred von Karma wasn't executed.

He died from lead poisoning. Turns out leaving a bullet in your shoulder for fifteen years is really bad for your health.

• OBJECTION! That timing would be... er... well, a little too convenient, don't you think?

Max Galactica was inspired to become a magician by Troupe Gramarye, or at the very least, Magnifi Gramarye.

After all, they were TV Magicians and stage magicians, it's possible he idolised the troupe. He was only 7 or 8 when Thalassa left the troupe and had Apollo, and they were already famous by that point, and when Thalassa returned, the troupe was still very famous for another decade. Galactica wears cards on his costume, possibly because he couldn't decide which Gramarye he liked best (as all four of them were represented by a different suit), so he wore them all. Magnifi's spade brooch is also a purple similar to the colour of what Max wore in his costume, which makes sense because Magnifi was the leader of the troupe, even if he retired.

Larry Butz is the new master of the Kurain

Well he was technically the apprentice of Misty Fey.

The ring on Godot's left hand...

Was going to be a proposal ring to Mia.

Franziska used to be a competitive horseback rider.

Maybe it's just me (and maybe I'm just starting the obvious), but have a look at how she dressed when she was thirteen◊. She looks like she's wearing riding boots, and her trousers are oddly high-waisted unless they themselves are the breeches used for riding. It would also explain why she has a riding crop. Rather than just being something she picked up to hit people with, she actually used to use it for competing. Her gloves could potentially be black riding gloves, too. If you look up traditional dressage wear for the rider, Franziska's outfit bears an uncanny resemblance with exception to her lack of sleeves and black gloves (dressage usually requires white). It's highly likely she quit riding sometime after she became a prosecutor, though it might not have been wholly of her own will, because there's definitely an odd shift in her behaviour from the age of 13 to 18. Not a fairly obvious one, but at 13 she seems to be almost cheerful, where at 18 that's replaced by smugness. There's also the fact that her Animal Motif is a horse, not just to Godot but to Edgeworth, who calls Franziska "the same wild mare she always was". The younger Franziska was also highly competitive, perhaps she got it from being an event rider? After all, with Miles being a proficient flautist (as in, he played the flute), it's clear that the two were allowed to have other interests besides becoming prosecutors.

It's not so much that attorney badges are handed out like sweets or a job at Mickey D's, but that children view attorneys like superheroes or sports stars.

Attorneys seem to have a big deal made of them in this universe. Edgeworth being a "demon prosecutor" sounded like it was not exactly headline news, but pretty close to that. The fact that a defence attorney was murdered (presumably by a prosecutor) and his body found in a lake warranted interrupting current television programmes (something that in my memory at least was only brought on by things like the 9/11 terrorism attacks and the suspicious deaths of really important people). Usually they only save that kind of news for, well, the news. Clearly, legal figures like that are held in the highest regard, even the attorneys. The reason there are so many and why they get into the news so often is, simply, the world is already in the legal pits (no doubt in part through the last 40 years of Manfred von Karma leaving a permanent stain), but it's considered the "neutral" state that the law "naturally" is. It's clear Manfred still has his influence because none of the prosecutors, even the ones who came in after his death like Klavier, wear their prosecutor's badges, something von Karma was stated to be responsible for.

Investigations 3 (if there ever is one) will feature Phoenix Wright as a Hero Antagonist for at least one case.

Because come on, what would be more fun and/or hilarious than finally being on the other end of Nick's zany explanations and poking holes in them until he starts making sense?

• It is canon that Phoenix had gone country-hopping in Europe in Dual Destinies (it IS how he met Athena, after all). Considering his "job", how do you suppose he could've afforded that? As world-hopping for the purpose of studying legal systems is Edgeworth's schtick, it's not too far of a stretch to say that he had invited Phoenix for one of them. It would seem more appropriate that one of the cases be in another country with a disbarred Phoenix as either a debate partner or assistant. Not only would that make the Yaoi Fangirls squee, but it would actually mean that Edgey had extended a hand to help his friend even when he couldn't help his friend out of his disbarment.
  • Studying abroad isn't just something Edgeworth does. He, Athena, Franziska, and Shigaraki all independently studied abroad, and it's not unreasonable to suggest either Payne brother has, too. It's probably uncommon for an attorney to not study abroad independently in this universe. I don't think Edgeworth would take Phoenix with him anywhere. It's not his style to have anyone tag along with him. Edgeworth is very independent, he wouldn't bring someone with just to have them stand in court with him. Phoenix is very much a defence attorney, not a prosecuting attorney. He wouldn't make for a good co-counsel to a prosecutor. Phoenix, to wit, is very much like Edgeworth's father, a defence attorney to the heart. What makes Edgeworth and Phoenix such a good team in court is their opposition to each other. I have a different theory for why Phoenix was "studying abroad" after he was disbarred (which I admittedly just realised while drafting this reply), which I'll detail in the next WMG.

Magnifi's Secret Test of Character just before his suicide was the last part of a gambit to see who really hurt his daughter.

Bear with me. There aren't a lot of people who would sanely use their child's fake death as a ploy to blackmail their students for pretty much no reason. Magnifi did it to make Valant and Zak resent him and continue to feel remorse and guilt and think about what happened to Thalassa, and when he learnt he was not long for the world and stuck in the hospital, he set the last part of his plan to work it out in motion. He suspected Valant, so had Zak come first, and told him to essentially do what happened to Thalassa. It can't be a coincidence that Thalassa sustained her injuries from being shot in the head by a stage pistol, and that's exactly what he told Zak and Valant to do. There were three possible outcomes:

• One, not shooting at all. This would imply A) guilt and B) it meant they weren't clever enough to take on his legacy anyway. In the case of guilt, it meant they refused to fire the pistol that as far as they knew, took Thalassa's life by their own hand. Bit of a leap of logic, but nothing out of the ordinary for the Ace Attorney world. As to the lack of cleverness, it meant they were unworthy of his legacy. Clearly Magnifi spent an awful lot of time in England.
• Two, shooting the clown doll. This would imply A) innocence and B) cleverness. Magnifi intended for THIS result to happen. Whoever shot the clown doll shot the pistol, but didn't shoot Gramarye. Meaning they had no guilt about firing the pistol into something's head, and since both men cared about Thalassa, this would indicate the one that did this was not the one who hurt her. As to the cleverness, it meant they understood his word play enough to earn the right to his legacy. It's also the "innocence" answer by default.
• Three, shooting Magnifi. This would imply guilt. By shooting Magnifi they were silencing him about their crime of "murdering" Thalassa, and in his last moments, Magnifi would know who the real cause of Thalassa's injuries was.

Three would have left Valant out of luck if Magnifi had been wrong in guessing Zak wasn't the cause. The gambit does rely heavily on personal judgement of the results, though, since Zak could easily have been the one who did it, and he just happened to work out the solution to the puzzle.

There will be a fan-made game that takes place in the Pokémon world but has the mechanics of Ace Attorney.

This could go several ways: either the cases are Lighter and Softer than those of Ace Attorney (Shin Gyakuten Touhou has already shown how that is possible), or the game takes place in a darker AU of Pokémon.Detailed speculations, whereof most follow the other possibility, below.

• Possible protagonists:
  • Red or Leaf from Pokémon Red and Blue, taking care of cases in Kanto, Johto, and the odd mission in Hoenn. Things will be rather different depending on who you choose:
    • If you choose the former, he's the attorney, with Leaf as his perky childhood friend assistant. This Red is similar Pokémon Origins; after becoming the Champion and travelling over the world, he gradually loses interest in battling as he just keeps winning, and also believes that he has enough authority to determine the fate of those accused of various crimes. Not all of the accused can be bad guys, right? Meanwhile, Gary sees an opportunity to finally get back at Red for humiliating him and becomes a half-time Prosecutor as well as a Gym Leader.
    • However, if you choose Leaf, things are slightly different. Years after the events of Gold and Silver, she goes looking for that missing mute-deaf friend who was the reason that she taught herself sign-language: Red. After defeating him on Mt. Silver, she convinces him to join her in the attorney agency she has always wanted to form in exchange for a warm and safe home, and Red slowly but surely comes back to society as a respectable member. In this scenario, Gary takes the chair of prosecutor not only to get back at Red for humiliating him, but because he kind of misses having somebody to compete against - as a Gym Leader, the challengers either get beaten at the spot or defeat him once and never return.
  • The possible player characters from Platinum and X/Y joining The Looker Detective Agency. Their cases take place in Sinnoh, Unova and Kalos - yes, there's a lot of traveling involved.
    • In Sinnoh, Barry acts as the prosecutor, and choosing either Dawn or Lucas makes the other of them a detective - being the assistant to a Professor is a great thing when you have access to lots of advanced technology!
    • Meanwhile, playing as Calem and Serena gives you Shauna as your assistant. The one you didn't choose becomes the prosecutor.
• Possible supportive characters:
  • Looker and Emma, as mentioned above.
  • A detective named Ash (no relation to the Anime-Ash), if only for a Mythology Gag involving this book's title.
    • HOLD IT! Why can't it be Ash Ketchum? After all, the AA equivalent of Sherlock Holmes is Sherlock Holmes. I could see Ash presenting some initially flawed conclusions which you, as player, would need to correct.
• Possible cases:
  • A former proficient Trainer from Kanto has settled down to make a living growing berries, and has two separate farms, one for personal use and one for commercial use. The personal farm is poisoned, killing the Trainer and his/her Pokémon when they eat the berries (yes, even the Pecha Berries were rendered useless). Gym Leader Koga is suspected to be an accomplice at the very least due to his extensive knowledge of poison.
  • A Lavaridge rookie is just trying to go through the maze that is Flannery's gym when he finds a body in one of the pools there. It soon becomes clear that somebody from Lavaridge has to be the culprit, as no outsiders were in the town at the time, and naturally the gym member standing the closest to the pool becomes the prime suspect.
• HOLD IT! In the Ace Attorney verse, the Prosecutors are formally part of the system. Therefore, the Gym Leaders would be the Prosecutors, not the Rivals. Blue and Cheren could still act as Prosecutors becasue although they start as rivals, they became Gym Leaders in future installments. In fact, with Giovanni being both criminal mastermind and Gym Leader, he could easily be Red's Manfred von Karma. And, thus, we have the explanation for why Blue doesn't have a father.
• Well, there exists a crossover fan-game with anime characters. Does it count?

The main mastermind behind all games is Misty Fey.

And Maya Fey is her accomplice. Misty Fey never died. She was the main villain all along. Dahlia Hawthorne was innocent, Misty framed her and made her to believe that she killed Valerie Hawthorne and Doug Swallow while she didn't. Morgan Fey always tried to save everyone from the evil name Misty Fey. She also tried to make Pearl a hero and that's why she gave her a mission to summon Dahlia's spirit. Maya Fey was Misty Fey's accomplice. They acted in cooperation with each other. Maya Fey was really the one who killed Mia Fey. She killed her because Mia eventually learned of her mother's wrongdoings. But she didn't know about Maya. After the murder Maya made it look like Red White was the one who killed her. Though he was only spying about her. But in the same time she wanted to gain Phoenix's trust so she stayed at the scene of the crime and pretended to be the one who found the body. She also wanted to made it look at first sight that she may be the only one who commited the crime so Phoenix would trust her completely.So she went through all the accusation thing to gain Phoenix Wright's complete trust and framed Redd White for the killing he never did.

Misty Fey was also the one who killed Edgeworth's father. After that she summoned the wrong guy intentionally to be expelled from village and to start performing her evil plot. She made Von Karma to sent the letter to Yogi. And she made him to take all the blame on him if he wouldn't be able to find Miles Edgeworth guilty. She threatened to kill Franziska if he wouldn't listen her. Also she was the one who planted this bullet into his skin to be reassured. Maya in the same time was forging evidence all the time and pushing Phoenix to the wrong thoughts and decisions so he wouldn't be able to guess that Misty was really behind all things. Mia completely trusted her sister so she unintentionally helped in her evil plot all times.

In the end of the first game Maya left Phoenix Wright to discuss their plans with her mother. After her returning she threatened Matt Engarde to act like an evil guy in case her wrongdoing would be found. Matt was really a good guy all along. His good and charming self was the real one. After the end of the events of 2 game Maya tricked Pearl into going to the Hazakura Temple. Misty Fey knew everything about Morgan's plan and wanted to use it in her own evil plottings. They plotted there to kill Phoenix Wright and put all the blame in Pearl and Dahlia. But Godot was kind of nuisance. Misty didn't want her to look suspicious so she agreed to his plan. Misty Fey really summoned Dahlia Hawthorne instead of Pearl to fake her death. She never died. And the body they found was the one which was supposed to be her. But it wasn't. This was the fake Misty Fey who everyone though to be real. This was the phantom just like the one in Dual Destinies who they used in their evil plans. They killed her and left her at the place of the crime. Godot believed in Maya Fey's innocence. He never knew what Misty and Maya plotted and completely trusted them. Because of his unawareness Godot was framed in killing that he didn't perform. Finally Maya acted as a poor innocent girl and fooled Phoenix and Godot even more by defending latter in court. After that their objective was performed - the only one who could guess their real intentions went to prison. So the only one nuissance left to remove was Phoenix Wright.

Maya forced Kristoph to make a request for creating false evidence for Grammarie trial, to pass it for Phoenix Wright and then to gain his complete trust. Kristoph's brother's life was in stake. By this she catched too hares. The Kristoph went through a large amount of shock and achieved black locks that sealed his memory. Because of that he really thought that he was doing all just for his own goals. And Phoenix Wright lost his badge and lost his links to previous cases and all chances to know who is the real mastermind behind all of this. That was also the reason why Maya went back to Kurain Village. That wasn't because of her training. The sole reason for this was to stay away from Phoenix Wright to not let him know the truth behind all things. That was also the reason why she didn't support him when he lost his badge. She hated him and wanted him to stay away from her and her mother's plottings. Sadly, because of Chief Prosecutor Edgeworth (who Maya and Misty thought to be harmless for their plans) Phoenix gained his badge once again. And that was the reason of all events in Dual Destinies. Both Maya and Misty actively tried to make all Apollo, Athena and Phoenix quarrel with each other. They did all to confuse them. They even hired yet another Phantom to do all the killings by threatening to reveal his identity... That was the reason why the Phantom was so afraid. He wasn't only afraid of the moon rock. He was much more afraid of Maya Fey. The one who Phantom was so afraid in the end of the game was actually her. He knew pretty well what she would do with him if he will reveal his or her identity. And Misty still remained in shadow by this point. You may only guess what she would do in the next game. By her's and her daughter's hands countless lives were lost. And poor Phoenix Wright never even suspected WHO has been the real mastermind behind all the things that he has passed through.

When Maya finally returns, she'll have become an absolute stunner

EVERYONE who knew her will take notice of just how incredibly gorgeous she's become, including Phoenix. However, she'll still have the exact same goofy personality that she's always had, clashing humorously with her looks.

• I always thought it would be the opposite, where she still looks rather plain, but carries herself with a more regal air and is more mature as the Master of Kurain, which might make her appear prettier without her having actually changed her appearance at all. Being Maya, I expect she'd still have her Manchild tenancies at times, though, no doubt in ribbing Phoenix, Edgeworth, and probably Apollo. It just wouldn't be as prominent as it used to be, since some (if not most) people, however childish they were as teens and young adults, do mature over time and can still retain their childish tenancies. Of course, that might just be a personal preference, as I find her immaturity annoying rather than endearing, though I do see and understand that people like Maya the way she is, as people find her cute and funny. Though I do like Maya..
  • With the release of Spirit of Justice, YMMV on your definition of "absolute stunner", as she does look similar to her past appearances, but she definitely looks more grown up and mature than before, the key word here being "looks". Oh, and yes, she does get the chance to throw an insult at Apollo by 6-5.

Kristoph Gavin is Vampire Hunter D.

People don't usually have demons in their hands. I know it's on the wrong side and doesn't talk, but maybe the familiar needs time to mature... I dunno, it's just too fun an idea to not post.

• Or maybe it does talk, I mean, just 'cause we don't see it talking in-game doesn't mean it can't...

Asexuality is the most common sexuality in the Ace Attorney universe.

It would explain the complete and utter lack of romances (even ones that don't involve the main cast), and why so many characters don't seem to feel emotional attachment to anyone besides strong friendship or family-like bonds. Almost nobody feels any sexual or romantic attachment to the people around them. Everyone who does feel romantic attachment to someone else is labelled as equally unnatural as any other by most people. It would also add another layer to why Case 3-1 was so sickening to everyone involved, especially Mia. Because there was romance involved, and Mia in particular doesn't care for romance. As a WMG up above points out, it's never stated for certain that Diego and Mia were romantically involved. Which his feelings for her would explain why Mia could be so flat-out rude to him; it wasn't the sexist comments, it was that she knew he was crushing on her. She still hires Phoenix because she believes that his strong attachment to Dahlia was born out of overexposure to her charms (see next WMG).

It also explains why, when we hear about peoples' parents, we almost never hear about both. The only people who I can remember we ever hear about both parents are Trucy, Apollo, and Franziska (who's father briefly mentions a wife in Investigations 2 when Franziska was just two so it can be assumed that she's Franziska's mother), and even then, none of them are together any more (though all of them were terminated by the death of one of them). Whenever we hear about parents outside those examples, we only ever hear about one parent, and the other is never even mentioned. We never hear about Edgey's mum or Athena's dad for instance. I believe Cody Hackins from Case 1-3 mentions his father but nothing about his mother. With Franziska's family, it's possible that in this universe, Germany works differently romantically than most of the rest of the world.

Everyone being asexual for the most part also explains part of why Larry is so disliked; because he claims to feel romantic love. If this WMG is true, maybe he's actually a hipster and that's why he claims to be in love so much. Because it makes him unique. It also explains how he goes through so many girlfriends and gets dumped so quickly. Dating isn't about romance in the AA universe, but trying to find a suitable mate and Larry's pursuing romance.

• Could you kindly explain the relationship between Gumshoe and Maggey then? Maggey's intro in 2-1 was that she was dating a fellow officer. That is romance in the workplace, which is already frowned upon IRL, but there it doesn't even given a second glance. Likewise, Case 3-3 has Phoenix finding out about Gummy's crush on Maggey and the way he reacts isn't negative, in a sense:
  Phoenix:(Note to self: Gossip with Maya about this later.)

The way I see it, the reason why there isn't much romance in the games (aside from the meta reason being that Capcom loves their Ship Tease and trying not to make any romance canon) is because it's in a work environment. While it's not illegal per-se, it's given a negative connotation because of a concept that is strangely absent from the AA-verse; Conflict of Interest. Case 3-1 is already a big example of what happens when a Law officer goes on an emotionally-charged crusade.

• Phoenix himself may not be someone who actively frowns on romance, since there's always exceptions (ie, not every heterosexual is homophobic). I actually thought the problem people would take with the explanation for the WMG (since the actual WMG itself is plausible even without the idea of disdain for people feeling romantic attraction) was that it actually kinda contradicts what has been directly stated about the Kurain village (that is, the way Maya discusses the high divorce rate would seem out of place), which I can't think of a neat handwave for right now. However, I am going to attempt to handwave Maggey and Gumshoe for my own amusement. With Maggey and Dustin, it may have been seen by everyone but Gumshoe as little more than them "testing" to see if they could tolerate each other enough to marry for the express purposes of mating (marriage being little more a ceremony to claim someone as their 'mate' to produce the most ideal offpsring; not a law but simply an ideal many are raised with). Maggey, to my recollection, never says she loved Dustin. They may have been very good friends talking about settling down as most couples do in this little WMG. The only person who ever mentions romance was Gumshoe, who is about as unlucky as Maggey herself and might be someone who does feel romantic love in a world where it's looked down on. Or maybe Maggey is also part Veela as I detailed in the next WMG about other characters, I dunno. I mean there is some basis to my little WMG (like the lack of sets of parents and that Ship Tease is only conjecture, since I at least very rarely see romance in places everyone else does, and the lack of, again, romances among even the non-main characters and the ones that exist tend to be between multiple people and centred around one person), but it's not without it's holes (such as Maya's talking about divorce and Pearly's obsession with romance not being weird to other people). It's certainly not a watertight theory, but it is somewhat plausible. It actually did only just occur to me that any time we do see romantic attraction (excepting the Delites and whatever Larry's got going on, which I've explained how both exist in my theory, and Juniper's crush on Apollo which I touch on below), there's always more than one person vying for one person's affections (Gumshoe and Dustin with Maggey, Regina and everyone except Acro and Franziska, Dahlia and every man except Diego, Thalassa had her two husbands and Valant, Klavier and Edgeworth both have legions of fangirls in-universe, Angel Starr has her innumerable boyfriends though I never took them as her romantic boyfriends but her word for informants... I think that's all of them).
• I really don't think this theory is all that plausible. The only indication at all that it's somewhat plausible is the lack of official romantic relationships between many reoccurring characters, but once again that's mainly due to Capcom's fondness of ship-teasing as opposed to actual official relationships. The problem here is that everyone seems to openly know and acknowledge romantic relationships as expected within the game's universe, even though seeing an actual relationship is rather rare. Diego and Mia may very well have been dating at one point, indicative of Mia's open animosity towards Dahlia (who by that point poisoned Diego), as well as official art portraying them in a very romantic light (holding hands/arms intertwined, walking next to each other, etc.), and even if they weren't Diego outright states that Mia was the woman he loved. There are many indications of the judge and other male characters noting the sexual attraction of certain female characters. People seem to have a very strong understanding and acceptance of romantic relationships, and seem a bit disconcerted when a relationship turns out to be nothing of the sort (i.e. people's reactions to Angel Starr's multiple boyfriends). However, some of the most obvious signs that this theory is probably not accurate are both the utter openness of everyone when discussing possible romantic relationships (if, as the WMG claims, romantic interest is frowned upon, then the sheer amount of discussion regarding it would be very out of place). Pearl, a very, VERY sheltered little girl understood the concept of romantic interest and assumed that Phoenix and Maya were romantically interested in each other, a conclusion I highly doubt she'd jump to if asexuality and platonic relationships was the norm. However, probably the most telling evidence is Juniper's actions regarding a certain rumor that Hugh would confess to her if he won the mock trial. Rather than allowing him to confess and simply explaining to him that she was asexual like most other people (even if she wasn't), she went through great lengths to prevent him from NOT winning (i.e. rewriting the script to favor the prosecution, showing Robin, etc.) just to keep their friendship in tact. I highly doubt someone as honest and timid as Juniper would take the more difficult route if she could be straightforward about something that wouldn't even be personal.

Related to the above, Regina Berry, Klavier Gavin, Dahlia Hawthorne, and Thalassa Gramarye are part-Veela, or rather, a Veela-like species.

That's why everyone falls in love with Regina, even though nearly everyone is asexual, and why people are so easily attached to the other three. Because they make people fall in "love" with them. Regina is much closer to being a full-Veela than the other three because her charms affect nearly everyone, instead of just primarily the opposite sex. It also explains part of Ema's hatred for Klavier; she's attracted to him partially because of his Veela blood, and hates it because she's also secretly closeted about the fact that she feels romantic attraction (as evidenced by her crush on Edgeworth as a teenager) and his Veela blood makes her want to proclaim her attraction to him (as his fangirls do and are fine with doing). Dahlia and Thalassa likewise are part-Veela, as people fall all over them. Dahlia can even make things burst into flames (her butterflies) like how Veela can throw fireballs when they go into Harpy mode. However, the Veela trait that makes everyone attracted to them doesn't always get passed on (as it hasn't been to Trucy or Kristoph). Apollo inherited some of his mother's Veela abilities, but they don't always work. That would explain why he's the biggest Chick Magnet with the canon female characters. Oh. And Edgeworth. If I count Klaiver and his legion of fangirls, I should count Edgeworth since he has in-universe fangirls, too, according to Gumshoe.

The reason Maya doesn't show up any more is because Mia isn't needed in the story any more.

Well, it certainly explains why Maya's not around; Nick doesn't need her to channel her sister any more, so she doesn't have as much reason to be around the office except to hang out.

Maya's response to the "Ladder-vs-Stepladder" debate is a quote from the Steel Samurai.

Hence why her reply is exactly the same every time.

Kane Bullard was originally meant to die from asphyxiation.

Bullard, for those who don't remember as I sure as heck don't expect you to, was the victim in Case 3-2. This has been nagging at me since I began playing these games and first came across this case. If you look at the photo of Bullard's corpse, he doesn't show any signs of being hit on the forehead. Fine, I'll buy that as possible. What I find odd is the weapon is never brought up (at least, I don't recall it being brought up and I definitely don't remember what it was if it was mentioned). Which is pretty unusual in these games. Now, have a look-see at his body◊. Notice something odd? Apart from the lack of head injury? His tie is twisted around behind him (it goes to narrow when it gets to his neck to just be facing the correct way, especially since with the way Bullard is laying, his left shoulder should be raised slightly, therefore making what of the tie that is to his right shorter by virtue of moving his chest to be slightly raised on the left; you can even see that his shoulder is raised slightly in the picture and the knot for his tie if you look hard enough), his tongue is protruding out (yes, that's his tongue and not his lower lip; his lower lip is not even close to that full in his character art/mugshot), and his eyes are bugged (I believe they're bugged because when eyes are drawn closed, there is rarely a line drawn all the way around the eye to indicate the entire eyelid. Usually, the top is left out or rendered by a short line that doesn't connect to anything, yet here it's drawn in and connects to the other two lines drawn. Ergo, his eyes are open and his pupils are pointing to his right, where the knot of his tie and thus, his assailant, were). These things (the eye bulging and the tongue protruding) do tend to happen when you choke on something, your tongue sticking out due to attempting to cough. Which begs the question of why the hell did they change it if he originally died by asphyxiation (supposing I'm right anyway).

Franziska kept de Killer's calling card from Case 2-4 as a reminder of the case, and that's why it was never given back.

Case 2-4 had a huge emotional impact on Franziska, since that's when she really changed who and what she was. She may have kept it as a reminder that she no longer has to be perfect, that (ironically, given the case) the defendant isn't always as guilty as she grew up thinking they were, that the truth is more important than the verdict, and that it's more than okay to lose. She never gave it back because it began to hold sentimental value to her.

Gregory Edgeworth was familiar with the (older) cast of Professor Layton.

Edgeworth is British, which we can probably assume his father Gregory is whom he got his accent from. If Gregory was an attorney in England, he's probably worked with at least a few cast members from Professor Layton, and Greg is a proper gentleman, just like Hershel. We also know the universes of Layton and Wright are one and the same.

• While I like the ring of the title 'Barrister Edgeworth' I don't think that Edgey is British (or at least, British citizenship by birth). Probably British ancestry, as the last name implies Edgey had some blacksmiths as ancestors.
  • Since when do surnames mean ANYTHING in relation to their origins in fictionland? The name is just supposed to mean he's like a double-edged sword and worthy of battle. The reason I say Edgeworth is British is because he actually has a RP accent, or a stereotypical, formal, proper English accent, in all the games (even in the original trilogy and Investigations). He had to get it from somewhere, presumably his father since his mother clearly died before Gregory did.

The reason Ema failed her forensics exam is because she didn't follow the official, by-the-book directions.

When you first meet Ema, she tells Phoenix she's "been developing a new scientific method of case investigation". If she used that new method when taking her test, she would fail because the test most likely required her to preform by the book. Even if her methods were ultimately better, she failed only because she didn't follow directions, which is pretty important.

• The first thing Ema does when she gets her footprint analysis kit out is turn to the instructions for help. I think it's safe to assume Ema has no problem following simple instructions.
  • When was it said she did that through the whole thing? She might have improvised on parts of it, but followed instructions where she didn't think she could improve. It's also possible by that point she was more willing to follow instructions, since that's why she failed according to this WMG. It's more likely she failed because of not following "simple instructions" (which putting it that way implies she's too stupid to follow them when she's not) than saying she failed because her sister sabotaged it or because she didn't know what she was doing.

Grossberg Law Offices is the name of the office for all of the State attorneys, or at least, it has state attorneys working for it.

And that's why Mia was able to take Phoenix's case in Turnabout Memories without (apparently) consulting Phoenix, and instead begging Grossberg to let her take it and how that was able to happen. And before you ask about Kristoph and Apollo, remember that Phoenix made the choice to switch lawyers, not Apollo so it's a different story.

Edgeworth never told Franziska exactly what her father was convicted for.

Having a hard time explaining this one so it makes sense... Franziska doesn't seem to know anything about the DL-6 and what her father did during that case. She, in Investigations 2, is clearly shocked and horrified to learn her father forged evidence in the IS-7; she should have known this if she knew what happened in the DL-6 because that was the motive behind Manfred killing Gregory. It would also explain why she continues to talk about her father with praise in front of him. She's not being a jerk, she's Innocently Insensitive. As to a reason, that's easy; Edgeworth was sparing her feelings. She doesn't need to know that her father murdered Gregory Edgeworth. If she did, it would hurt her more than what Case 1-4 looks like if you remove the DL-6 aspects from the case: her father helping a stranger get revenge for being wronged by a defence attorney. He was simply not telling her the whole truth, especially since he probably knew that Franziska's whole world started to crumble with the knowledge that her father helped with a murder alone. Edgeworth neglected to tell her that he'd manipulated evidence, hid the truth for 15 years, tried to blame Edgeworth himself for murder, let someone else take the fall for the same murder, attacked and could have killed Edgeworth's own defence attorney and his assistant... Had he told her, Fran probably wouldn't have stayed as true to her father as she did up until I2, where she avoided mentioning him except when comparing Yumihiko's situation to her own.

• Except that this would be rather out-of-character for Edgeworth, given his penchant for Brutal Honesty. It's possible that he did tell Franziska the whole story, but she was in denial up until I2 and the resolution of the case that led directly into DL-6, at which point the evidence of her father's corruption was undeniable.
  • It doesn't fit because she seemed legitimately surprised to learn her father tampered with evidence, like she'd never been told why he had a black mark. Considering how she acts by this point in the series, the only thing that makes sense is that she was never told. Franziska makes it a point to mention that she doesn't care who the culprit is, just that the truth is brought to light. Even if that means someone she cares about, be it her brother or her friend, is a criminal. So she wouldn't be in denial that her father tampered with evidence or was a killer. Considering Edgeworth treats Franziska like his little sister (since that's what she is), it's possible he didn't tell her everything because she's his little sister. The one time he is harsh with her is when she's throwing everything she's worked for away over nothing. He doesn't always use brutal honesty, not immediately and not if there's no point to it. He won't, for instance, tell Kay her father was murdered, until he has no choice (though Kay knew anyway). Telling his little sister, who he's watched grow up for 15 years, that her papa murdered his and then used her brother for revenge against petty slights both Miles and Gregory committed would be pretty cruel, even for Edgeworth. Keeping in mind that Franziska's strongly implied to have never had an actual childhood because of Edgeworth and her father, hence her inability to properly grasp emotions and reality (her introductory game shows both). Keeping in mind also that Franziska loves her father and brother very much, even though she feels that she lives in their shadows. I think he didn't tell her for the same reason he's not comfortable telling the ten year old Kay her father is dead. But that's just me- I place a lot on the fact that he's her older brother and might have some Big Brother Instincts to her. Of course, it's possible Edgeworth never told her anything about the case because he disappeared soon after the case wrapped up.

The reason Franziska considers Edgeworth her "little" brother is a mix of him being a von Karma for a shorter period of time, and through that something resembling Middle Child Syndrome.

Edgeworth came into the family after she did, so is the "baby" of the von Karma family in terms of years of being associated with the von Karma family name. Odd logic but it sounds like something she'd believe due to her obsession with and her faith in her family name. She also seemed to consider herself The Un-Favourite, at least compared to Miles. Between her elder sister and her adopted brother taking all of her father's attention like the baby of the family usually would (likely due to being Gregory's son and being older, thus able to understand better and more than the seven years younger Franziska), Franziska considers herself the middle child.

The results of Ema Skye's forensic exam was tampered with

Basically, Ema didn't fail the exam like she thought. She passed it by a very slim margin. However, somebody tampered with her test results and so as far as anybody's concerned, she failed. This is why Ema is as bitter about it as she is, because she thought she worked hard to pass the test, and thought she passed, and so to believe she failed crushed her.

So why would somebody tamper with her test? Simple: her sister Lana. It's because of Lana, and all the terrible things Lana did while she was being blackmailed by Damon Gant. The scandal surrounding Gant and Lana destroyed a lot of credibility in the police department and the DA's office. Not to mention both ruined a lot of careers. Not to mention Ema herself was suspected of accidentally killing a very popular prosecutor. There was bound to be more than one person with a grudge.

So Ema "failing" the forensic exam might actually be some mean spirited payback against Lana Skye through Ema. And the only reason that Ema succeeded in becoming a detective was because these same people didn't want it to be obvious they had sabotaged her career.

Phoenix's disbarment was actually caused by him breaking a mirror

Breaking a mirror brings 7 years of bad luck. Now, how many years did Phoenix go without a badge before getting his name cleared?

Kay will become a detective

Just look at what she usually does in the Investigations games. She seems like she'd be more comfortable out in the field, investigating and "stealing" evidence from criminals and shady witnesses than prosecuting or defending in a courtroom.

Maggey has prosopagnosia.

The non-facial cues she uses to identify Phoenix are his hair and his blue jacket, which is why she gets confused in case 3-3.

Nobody survived DL-6.

This is all a figment of Phoenix's imagination, because he wants desperately to have his childhood friend back, the one who defended him when nobody else would. None of this ever happened. Edgeworth's "death" at the end of game one/beginning of game 2 is just Phoenix trying and failing to come to terms with Edgeworth's actual death in the DL-6 incident. This would explain the court system: no murderer was found in that case so Phoenix, having been a little kid and not knowing much about the judicial system, came to believe the entire system was corrupt. Thus, the corrupt prosecutors, etc.

Parenting is the most hazardous occupation ever in the Ace Attorney world.

Because there are no people in the entire series who ever have both parents alive and in their lives for long at one time, excepting Trucy, and everyone thought that her mother was dead until AFTER her father was actually murdered. Like Disney, Ace Attorney suffers from the incurable OOPS Syndrome: Only One Parent Syndrome Syndrome, but unlike with Disney, it's gone terminal so that more often than not, both parents are dead.

• Considering that every birth parent in the series is either dead, missing, or an asshole, witht he exception of Damian Tenma, this is pretty clear.

Wendy Oldbag was the paparazzi that took the picture in 1-3.

Oldbag was the paparazzi who took the photo those 5 years ago when Hammer's accident happened. It could be said that she was silenced by way of being offered a job there to keep a watch on her. There are two major points to support this.

• When queried on how she owned a copy of the photo, she says she would rather not talk about it.
• She also once claims that she was a twinkle among the stars. That would be a good description of someone who's job is to snap photos of unsuspecting celebrities and actors.
• It also explains why she has affection towards actors. She probably just snapped photos of those actors she adored.

One of these days some high ranking member of the police or prosecutor's office is going to accuse an innocent on purpose as a Batman Gambit to use Phoenix to find the real culprit.

Let's face facts: Phoenix wright is better at finding the real culprit in difficult cases than the entire police department combined, in every single case he's involved in. It's not a big stretch to think that some morally-grey member of law enforcement, who really wants to catch the real killer but who has absolutely no clue who it really is, might arrest somebody with some connection to Phoenix, somebody they know is innocent but who a pretty good case can be made against, simply to ensure Phoenix's involvement in the case, thereby guaranteeing that justice will be served.

The Judge's grandson has been accused of murder

Udgey's brother is clearly Canadian. Under Canadian Law, if a minor under the age of 18 is accused of committing murder, their name, the victim's name, and their families' names will be changed to protect their identities, i.e. "Linda Andersen." That would explain why nobody knows his real name, as well as the dirt Redd White has on him:

Phoenix: I understand there must be quite a bit of PRESSURE on you.

As for the ID card, he probably just scribbled an illegible doctor-signature.

A future game will introduce a new judge, who will turn out to be the killer in the last case.

So far, we've had witnesses, prosecutors, defense attorneys, detectives, and victims be the culprits, but never the judge- yet!

• Confirmed. Ga'ran took over as the judge in the second case of "Turnabout Revolution" to deliver a premature guilty verdict.
• Double confirmed. The Great Ace Attorney introduced Hart Vortex, not only a judge but cheif of justice, in case 5 of the second DGS game he became the judge and turned out to be not only the killer but the mastermind behind it all with a breakdown that can put everyone else's to shame.

A future case (or game) will involve a secret group that is bringing the dead back to life.

Dahlia was afraid of Iris

I know this sounds crazy but hear me out. Dahlia had a lot to say about Iris in the last case, none of it good (generally Iris was called a "backstabber"), which suggests that Dahlia is not particulary fond of her sister. But in their backstory Dahlia plans to kill Phoenix right after Diego's poisoning and Iris talks her out of it. That's right, the vilest murderess in the series (maybe except Queen Bitchy) who cares about no one but herself was talked out of killing someone by her Nice Girl sister, whom Dahlia openly disliked, that's how convincing Iris can be. Later during Pheonix's trial Dahlia initially claims that Phoenix didn't do anything to Swallow, which, if Mia would take it at face value, could save Phoenix from guilty verdict. Now why would a person who cares about no one do such a thing? Because if Phoenix was found guilty Iris would be pissed and Dahlia wanted to avoid that. Initially she tried to frame him because she panicked after killing Swallow, and Didn't Think This Through, but then decided that she doesn't want to make Iris angry, and tried to fix this. That's also why she mentioned lightnings, she wanted to make it look like lightning strike rather than Phoenix. Why would she earlier try to kill him then? She didn't just try to kill him, she also wanted to frame Iris, to get rid of her. But framing Phoenix for Swallow's murder would leave her with no way of dealing with very angry Iris. Of course once Mia tried to expose her, Dahlia decided that pissed off Iris is still a lesser problem than guilty verdict for murder, and then tried to pin it on Phoenix to save herself. Now during Hazakura, when Maya locked herself in the cave she set only one Trick Lock. But later when Dahlia threw Iris into the cave she set up five just to make sure Iris stays in the cave. Because Iris is that scary under that cute smile, and Dahlia being her twin sister knows this.

Single-Target Sexuality is the most common sexuality in Ace Attorney universe.

Alternative to the theory above about asexuality. It actually does better job at explaining why we hardly ever hear about both parents and most times we hear about single one the other is dead. No one ever remaries. Let's look at the couples so far shall we?

• Phoenix and Iris, between their break-up and Hazakura case neither was with anyone else.
• Mia and Diego, Mia had no boyfriend after Diego went into coma, and when he recovered he was still in love with her.
• Judge and his wife are confirmed to be Happily Married.
• same for Ron and Dessie.
• Jack Cameron and Jill Crane, after Jack died Jill spent 12 years plotting her revenge, Justine suggester they're Together in Death.
• Dhurke and Amara, 25 years of undying love.

This is also why Larry is considered such a weirdo, not because of his interest in romance at all, but because he's Serial Romeo. The characters that we know have remaried(Morgan and Papa Hawthorne) are confirmed to have not married for love in the first place. This is also why Dick didn't get Maggie, she is Dustin-sexual and therefore not interested in anyone else. Thalassa getting Zak after Jove is just an exception to the rule.

Season 3 of the anime will consist largely of "Rise from the Ashes".

Mainly because they need to introduce Ema prior to Apollo Justice. The fact that "The Lost Turnabout" was adapted out of order, presumably in order to introduce Maggey, makes this more likely. On the other hand, they'd need to rewrite Edgeworth's role in the case, which wouldn't make as much sense after game 3 as after game 1.

While he was visiting England...

...and meeting ProfessorLayton, Phoenix also got copies of the case files of Ryunosuke Naruhodo's trials in England. This would later inspire him to introduce the jury system to his homeland.

Trilo Quist is some kind of disturbing eldritch parasite creature living off of Ben, Pheonix is delusional throughout most of JFA, Max never had feelings for Regina, and Bat's "crush" on her was really just a very agressive internship.

I'm not quite sure which category this would go in, so I'm just going to put it in the "Other" category for now. Basically, this theory is that Trilo is a parasitic creature that disguises itself as a puppet and lives off of human beings, draining their life. This process also makes Trilo take on his host's personality (while also removing the hosts) and makes the host look more like him. Obviously Ben isn't fully dead yet, which is why he still can talk and doesn't look entirely like Trilo.

The reason I made this theory is because it is incredibly unclear whether or not Ben and Trilo are the same person or if Trilo is some kind of cursed muppet, and I'm probably the only person in the entire universe who cares. Another reason is to somewhat Retcon (is that the right word? i think it's the closest to what i mean, but i don't know if retcon is the right word to use here) the love triangle.

You see, neither Trilo nor Ben actually have feelings for Regina at all. Trilo simply sees Regina as a potential host since Ben is close to death, so he's trying to get closer to her so she'll be more likely to attempt to use him as a puppet for some reason, even though I can't imagine a single scenario where she would (i guess his plan's just not working very well or something, which possibly explains his disappearance in gyakuten kenji 2? idk i haven't played it).

"But what about Max?" I hear you say in a normal tone of voice. I've seen this headcanon a few times before (referring to the one i'm about to talk about), but I'd like to say that I don't think Max has feelings for Regina either, but thinks Ben does, which is why he attacked him. He just wanted to be friends with her and Pheonix is still kind of delusional from being hit on the head by Richard Wellington.

As for Bat I genuinely have no idea how to fix him, his whole part of the case kinda hinges on his crush for Regina, so it wouldn't make much sense to remove it...unless the guy's just trying to hire her for some kind of internship instead of a date (inspired by a random tumblr post i saw) and Pheonix is wildly misinterpreting it because of the amnesia mentioned earlier.

As for decisive evidence I genuinely have no clue, I really just made this theory to kind of "fix" the case.

You know, now that I think about Pheonix being delusional, I've come up with a new theory that somewhat integrates into this one...

Pheonix is completely delusional throughout all of Justice For All (or at least turnabout big top).

He still has his amnesia from when Richard Wellington hit him. The events of the game are based on what is actually happening, except with a great deal of twists, turns, retcons, wild misinterpretations, and general delusions, because, he's, well, delusional. This includes things that are focused on that have no reason for being so, or just plain don't make sense (for example, Max attacks Ben because he thought he was in love with Regina, and Pheonix whimsically decides he didn't want that to happen because he also had feelings for Regina), not to mention Acro literally calling him insane.

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