- Confirmed, according to Haruka's answer to his 4th second trial interrogation question.
- Given that she has never been mentioned by Amane, being reluctant to punish her, and the only one to doesn't have the cult symbol (the clouds) on her outfit, I guess she is considered an "outcast" somewhat (or at least lower in rank) and that's why Amane doesn't want to mention her.
- The MV shows that Yuri is her brother, so this is false.
- Not necessarily; the video refers to him as a "considerate big brother," but that doesn't necessarily mean that he is biologically Amane's older brother. He could just be an older brother-like figure in the cult.
- In the Second Trial Commencement Notice
, Kazui is noted to protect Futa but not Mahiru, which could have result in her death if Shidou hasn't helped her. As one of the common interpretation of his crime is causing his wife's suicide, Kazui may have personal grudges with Mahiru, who is In Love with Love and additionally Shidou for saving her.
Kazui and his then-wife knew each other (maybe they were friends?) before she transitioned. Kazui longed for the traditional family but knew that he couldn't do so because he likes men. He then meets her who is now a fully transitioned woman and somehow, Kazui thought that he can achieve this dream with her. But he soon realizes that he can't love her as a woman (and to make things worse, possibly love her when she was still a man). He told her the truth one day and it was last straw of grievances his wife could take before she finally decides to end her life.
One of the biggest pieces of evidence for this is that only Mikoto is treated as a prisoner, not John. In “John Doe” when he first comes out, he gets angry and attacks Es. Interestingly enough, he isn’t affected by the invisible wall that the other prisoners are subjected to when they attack Es. John managed to bypass these restraints through a loophole in the system. Milgrams restraints judge based on mind, not body. So John was not labeled as a prisoner, being Mikoto’s alter, and thus able to attack Es.But this poses a question, if John really is the killer as we’re lead to believe, why is Mikoto the prisoner? This could be happening because Mikoto is the true killer, and the reason John was able to bypass the system, was that he’s innocent in how he didn’t actually kill anyone.
Another thing to add is the usage of the death card in “MeMe”. At the very end of the MV, we see a hand giving another hand a card, in which the receiver picks it up to reveal it as the death card. A theory that has been talked about is the suggestion that Mikoto is left handed, but John is right handed. This is shown through the handling of the bat. As in “Double” the scenes with John show him holding a bat with his right hand, and in “MeMe” Mikoto is shown using his left hand for most tasks.
The scene shows a right hand giving a left hand the card, implying that it could be John giving it to Mikoto. Mikoto turns the card and reveals it as death, then someone picks up the POV of the Mikoto’s view on the card, and we see John punching it.
This could be interpreted that since Mikoto was the one to reveal the card, he is the true killer. And John picking up his perspective afterwards and destroying it could be symbolic of him trying to remove Mikoto’s memories of his murder. Even more wild speculation on this theory is that John assisted Mikoto on the murder, as he gave him the card in the first place.
There’s also appearance of the windows in “Double”. A common interpretation of the windows is that when the windows are white, it represents Mikoto’s presence. When the windows are black, it indicates John’s presence. In one of the earlier scenes, John sits on the train surrounded by destroyed, bloody mannequins. But interestingly enough he doesn’t have any blood on him or his bat.
John’s behaviour in Neoplasm is also suspicious. As he claims that he killed a bunch of random people who annoyed him, but “MeMe” contradicts this as in the scene at the train station has him attacking only one person.When questioned by Es about the truth of his statement, John becomes super defensive. Constantly repeating how he’s the killer and Mikoto did nothing wrong.
This is theorised to be that John knows that Mikoto is the true killer, and he’s trying to take the blame for his actions as he wants Mikoto to stay safe at all cost. Even if it means lying about the murder(s?) itself.
- Haruka: Power over water, which is tied to his emotions and gets stronger the more grief he feels.
- Yuno: Power of seduction, but it only works on men. She can also alter her appearance to look so stunning that she can paralyze them, which might extend to being able to make minor illusions.
- Futa: Power over fire. His favorite move would be fire breath.
- Mu: The powers of a queen bee, including flight, a poisonous stinger, and the ability to bend weak-minded people to her will. Her controlling Haruka could be devastating.
- Shidou: An ability that works as both Healing Hands and Harmful Healing.
- Mahiru: Power over love and the ability to control others' emotions.
- Kazui: Either Super-Strength or the power of darkness to represent that he was hiding a secret from his wife.
- Mikoto: The power to divide into many copies of himself, based on his Dissociative Identity Disorder.
- Kotoko: Lycanthropy. When she turns into a giant werewolf, she can savage people with her fangs and claws.
...but as submissive as Haruka is, he is still a mentally unhinged killer and manipulating him will probably not work out the way Mu thinks it will. They've both been voted guilty in the second trial and Haruka's reaction when he finds out will be anything but pretty. If he does try to kill himself, he will take Mu with him first so he and his "new mommy" will never be apart ever again.
- Haruka has been voted guilty. He will have a complete mental breakdown, and will probably turn to Mu for comfort. She won't be in any mood to offer it, though, because, well... see below.
- Yuno has been voted innocent. She will look forward to going home, which she likely will, after having been voted innocent twice.
- Futa has been voted innocent. He will feel conflicted about whether or not he is really a murderer if he's gotten two conflicting verdicts, but will despise the idea of the audience voting him innocent just because they feel bad for him. (He doesn't seem like the kind of person who would like being pitied.)
- Mu has been voted guilty. She will throw a tantrum and probably blame Haruka for not doing enough to get her voted innocent... and Haruka will not take well being rejected by someone he sees as his new mother.
- Shidou has been voted innocent. He will be grateful to be given an opportunity to continue protecting and treating his fellow prisoners, but will prepare himself to have to deal with Kotoko or any further injuries caused by her.
- Mahiru has been voted innocent. She will regain some of her previous optimism and hope for another innocent verdict.
- He wears a rather shabby outfit, and doesn't seem to teach Amane any special lesson in the "Magic" video. Gachata teaches her to live by a schedule, Gozake teaches her how to sing, and Riyone teaches her that she should pray for the cat's injury instead of treating it herself, but Yuri is just seen collecting donations of money.
- When Amane gets a question wrong in front of both Gachata and Yuri, only Gachata punishes her.
- Yuri only punishes Amane when the other three cult leaders are doing it, which (combined with the above) could suggest he doesn't have the authority to punish her himself/without permission from the others.
- Interestingly enough on the timeline conversation for Mu’s birthday in 2023, Futa says how it’s nice to have someone to rely on and accept you and goes on to call Mu the “salvation” for Haruka. Mu laughs and questions why he’s saying stuff about salvation and the strange things he’s been saying lately.
- This could imply that Futa has started taking ideas from Amane’s cult as a sort of relief from the emotional pain he’s suffering from the first guilty verdict. And people think that if Amane gets voted innocent she’ll indoctrinate Futa into her cult.
- It’s likely that time does pass in some way in the prison, as characters bring up stuff such as seasons, birthdays and sometimes making references to how long they’ve been there, so this could imply that the time passing for the prisoners is the same as in the real world. Although interestingly enough the characters don’t seem to age at all despite bringing up their birthdays. In “Of Blessedness and Punishment” Es says Amane to be 12, despite possibly years passing in the prison, and she still looks the same age.
- In one of earlier portal conversations, Mahiru and Mu have a conversation about something, being confused on why it’s gone and talking about how their mental state has in impact. It’s very likely they’re talking about their periods here, and that they’ve stopped happening for whatever reason. No adverse health effects seem to be present, despite being trapped in the prison for an estimated three years.
- There’s also how the two prisoners who were attacked and injured (Futa and Mahiru), haven’t seemed to be recovering from their injuries despite them getting injured at the beginning of trial 2. Which could be that a stopped flow of time is preventing them from naturally healing.
- There’s also to mention all the other strange stuff happening, as prisoners can’t attack the guard through a force described as an “invisible wall”, and later explained to be more of suddenly losing the urge to attack, implying possible supernatural phenomena at play.
- At the same time this evidence could be saying that his family is dead, which would be the beginning of the motive for his murders.
In “The Purge March” hundreds of clones of Amane appear throughout the MV in a massive marching band with a drum major Amane as the leader. The drum major Amane is shown interacting with the other colour guard Amanes, and different Amanes transition to different scenes. As when a colour guard Amane messes up the flag throw, she is punished through water torture and transitions to the real scene. And later on when the Amane in real life holds up her umbrella, it transitions to the drum major Amane.
One of the most common interpretations of this is the RGB theory, which claims that all of the alters are associated with the colours of the RGB spectrum. Blue = Mikoto, the host and prisoner, red = John, the one who attacked Es in “John Doe” and later declared his only purpose is to protect Mikoto, and green = a potential third alter, who carries the most memory of the murder(s) and is shown expressionless and with one eye covered most of the time. The theory is based on the fact that many of the scenes in “MeMe” have a primary colour they focus on in the scenes, with scenes in the real world being in a primarily green colour scheme and the scenes in the mindscape being blue and switching to red at times. People have also pointed out in the scene of the "green Mikoto" sitting on the couch in the real world, when he touches his head, the screen glitches into red, green and blue colouring.
A more general idea for this theory is the symbolism of the tarot cards, as in one of the shots from the beginning show a view of two massive tarot cards (the hanged man and the fool respectively) and then a shot of a regular tarot card facing down on a chair. Mikoto is primarily associated with the hanged man and John with the fool so people speculate that the face down tarot card represents the third one, yet to be revealed.
Another big component of the theory is the motif of two things being close to each other and a third one being further apart, such as in the mind world there being three seats, two on a couch and one on a chair in the back; on the back of the tarot cards there being an illustration of two circles closer together and one further apart; in the scene at the train station the background having three lights, a blue and a red one closer together and a green one further apart. People interpret this as the Mikoto and John being closer together and a potential third one being further apart, an observer to everything that’s going on.
- Another theory is that 11th prisoner is Es. That they’ve committed a crime like the other prisoners and was selected to play the role of the warden. There’s also how in the map of the prison the 11th cell is listed as “000”, a number that Es is commonly associated with.
- Haruka: Some people’s first thought is that this person is Haruka, mostly based on the hairstyle. But looking at it more Haruka has side swept bangs and the person in undercover has messier bangs that don’t fit with Haruka’s design.
- Futa: Another theory is that this is Futa. It looks like that the mystery person may be wearing a mask under their mouth, similar to what Futa wears. There’s also how the messy hair fits up a lot more. The straitjacket design is quite similar, but has a higher collar than what Futa has.
- Es: Probably the most popular theory who who this person is, is Es. The hair matches up quite a lot with Es, although it’s a little bit messier. This mysterious appearance would make sense if it’s hinting that Es may be a prisoner, as it’d be weird to have a random prisoner in this scene.
- The 11th prisoner: Going with the 11th prisoner theory that was mentioned before, it could be interpreted that this mystery person is the lost prisoner that may exist.
: the man Kotoko killed was the son of a wealthy newspaper CEO. Kotoko was initially found innocent of the man's death on the grounds that it was self-defence while stopping him from kidnapping the girl, but the girl recanted her testimony and the man's father paid for an inquiry which found that the wounds on his son's body indicated that Kotoko had gone further than strictly necessary. As such, it's possible that Kotoko was not retried for killing the man, and his father, feeling that Kotoko was going unpunished for the murder, had the girl killed as revenge. While she wasn't directly involved, Kotoko feels responsible for the girl's death, and that's what she's being tried for.