Board 8 > Umineko Episode 8 Discussion Topic II (spoilers, obviously)

(+) Yeah! (+)

Because I'm feeling the need to vent and apparently the old topic purged.

Such a trainwreck of an episode. I have a lot of issues with it, but my biggest issue is what it did with Battler.

Battler starts out as a man pursuing the truth. He refuses to accept false tales of witches and the Golden Land. He has too much integrity to take comfort in lies. That's the whole premise of the duel between him and Beato: it's not merely a battle of wits, or a running commentary on the mystery genre, it's a man demanding to know what really happened to him and his family.

And, at long last, Battler wins. He uncovers the full truth. He learns that he precipitated the Rokkenjima incident through his thoughtless treatment of Shannon. He learns, in all likelihood, that his parents are the culprits. (While this isn't stated explicitly, we know that Ange completely flips out upon reading the one truth. I really doubt she goes nuts like that if, say, Nanjo or Natsuhi is the killer.)

And he flees.

Episode 8 is the story of Battler's flight from the truth. He takes refuge by painting a disgustingly saccharine fantasy -- so transparent that even a six-year-old knows it has to be fake -- where everyone lives in perfect harmony and nobody is greedy or power-hungry. In Battler's world, all aspects of the truth that are the slightest bit unpleasant are swept under the rug in the broadest strokes possible. It is a betrayal of everything he once stood for.

Perhaps worst of all, the episode portrays this as something to be celebrated. Battler is presented as the hero as he tries to preserve his fanfiction of the Golden Land. Ange gets roped into this as well; she also starts out as a seeker of truth, but then the truth breaks her as it broke Battler, and the two of them end up fighting side by side to keep Eva's diary from the world. Battler's ultimate victory is covering up the knowledge that he once fought so hard to obtain.

I used to like Battler. Episode 8 destroyed him.


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another place and time, without a great divide, and we could be flying deadly high

I'm... pretty sure you got a ton of stuff wrong there. >_>
I'm not going to be the one to go through it all and type a bunch on it (not tonight, anyway), but yeah.

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Falcon Punch
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFtw7qW7Vcw

In that case I'd be curious to hear your thoughts (if not tonight, then later).


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another place and time, without a great divide, and we could be flying deadly high

I didn't reallly care for Battler since ep 1

opinion mostly stayed throughout the series


ep 8 was alright, but at least ERIKA came back and there were a bunch of cool songs as always

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http://img.imgcake.com/superangelo128/Higurashipicjpgaz.jpg
Good job SuperNiceDog

Episode 8 doesn't make any sense within the context of the rest of the series. Just in Episode 7, discovering the truth was a good thing.

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Black Turtle did a pretty good job.

aww yeah Erika hype

unfortunately I haven't yet found any good fanart of her with pirate hat


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another place and time, without a great divide, and we could be flying deadly high

erika was the only consistently good character

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http://img.imgcake.com/superangelo128/Higurashipicjpgaz.jpg
Good job SuperNiceDog

The ideal the game tries to force on you is an utterly disgusting and lazy one. It would even be tolerable if that's what the message was from the start, but it tries to set itself up as a batlte between mystery and fantasy -- with the main character being devoted to hard truth. Then it suddenly changes this and drags Battler (and the reader) through the mud.

"the graphics aren't the only thing hamfisted about umineko"

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maybe, lol

From: KamikazePotato | Posted: 1/12/2012 12:35:23 AM | #005
Episode 8 doesn't make any sense within the context of the rest of the series. Just in Episode 7, discovering the truth was a good thing.

I didn't care for the theme either, but I think episode 7 was already showing what the series' theme was supposed to be. It basically said that Will wasn't showing the truth because THAT'S MEAN but then Bern came at the end to "show her guts" and all, which is supposed to be...bad. I knew this was what the series was leading up to ever since episode 6 and the "multiple truth" thing but...yeah.

The theme was pretty bad. I understand what the author was going for it, but it just seemed pretty annoying to me. Maybe there's some cultural barrier here that's making the message lost in translation or something, but I really, really didn't like the theme.

From: Drakeryn | #006
unfortunately I haven't yet found any good fanart of her with pirate hat

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http://img.imgcake.com/superangelo128/Higurashipicjpgaz.jpg
Good job SuperNiceDog

Chiru pretty much completely ruined the first four episodes, yeah.

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No amount of planning will ever replace dumb luck.

now this is a topic I can get behind

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http://img.imgcake.com/RegaroUlquiorrapngse.png
Didn't just lose to a nice guy. I lost to SuperNiceDog in the guru.

And

then

I

knew

(but nobody else is allowed to know)

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http://img38.imageshack.us/img38/7760/222bj.jpg

Ness26 posted...
Chiru pretty much completely ruined the first four episodes, yeah.

Episode 5 and 7 are my favorites in the series.

6 and 8 not so much.

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Black Turtle did a pretty good job.

also I contacted Soul Devour recently

he will do Umineko Song Contest 3 in a few months

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http://img.imgcake.com/superangelo128/Higurashipicjpgaz.jpg
Good job SuperNiceDog

I'm not sure what you'd find preferable. Battler discovered the truth, yes, and he didn't think it was worth sharing. That's not hiding from the truth; quite the contrary, he was taking all the responsibility for knowing it onto himself. He wasn't hiding from the truth, he was just hiding the truth.

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"As the size of an explosion increases, the number of social situations it is incapable of solving approaches zero." -Vaarsuvius, Order of the Stick

/saves pic

(but nobody else is allowed to know)

I think it's probable that what we saw in the ep7 tea party was the truth. When Bern denies it in ep8, it's part of her effort to manipulate Ange into unlocking the book for her. Bern lying in ep8 is more plausible than Bern being about to admit to Ange in ep7 that she's not seeing the full truth.

Also what I said earlier about Ange flipping out when she does open the book.


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another place and time, without a great divide, and we could be flying deadly high

I'm not sure what you'd find preferable. Battler discovered the truth, yes, and he didn't think it was worth sharing. That's not hiding from the truth; quite the contrary, he was taking all the responsibility for knowing it onto himself. He wasn't hiding from the truth, he was just hiding the truth.

I'd find it preferable if Battler didn't lie to his little sister the same way Beato lied to him at the start of the series. Implied in the search for truth is the idea that it's better to face reality than swaddle yourself in fantasy. By denying Ange the truth, Battler rejects that proposition.


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another place and time, without a great divide, and we could be flying deadly high

I found Episode 8 incredibly entertaining, but that is pretty much exclusively because I never approached the series in the mindset of discovering the truth - hell, for the longest time I had no idea what I was supposed to be "doing."

I wasn't "doing" much either, in that I never sat down and made a serious attempt to solve all of the mysteries; I was mostly just along for the ride. But I admired Battler because he was trying to discover the truth. If that makes any sense.

Incidentally though, I disagree that Battler always sought the truth. His primary motivation always seemed to be denying a particular truth - that the crimes were committed by witches. He was never seeking THE ONE TRUTH like Ange. He was happy just denying the existence of witches - I think he felt that not doing so would cheapen his family's struggles. I might be misremembering, though.

He wasn't focused on finding the culprit like Ange. But I still think that valuing truth is what made him deny witches so strongly. Like, in ep 5, pinning everything on Natsuhi would've been an easy way to deny witches, but he wouldn't do that -- because it wasn't true either.

I can't say there was a character I disliked more after the episode ended, which I couldn't say that about for any other episode. (Some characters stayed the same, but nobody went down.)

Personally, I came out liking several characters less. Battler and Ange, as mentioned (Ange's trick ending was great, but not enough to redeem her). Krauss/Eva/Kyrie dropped some, because I like them as manipulative bastards and seeing them full of family togetherness was kind of jarring. Kinzo dropped for similar reasons.

Gohda's the only character who I like more now, because of his A++ scumplay.


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another place and time, without a great divide, and we could be flying deadly high

From: Drakeryn | #018
I'm not sure what you'd find preferable. Battler discovered the truth, yes, and he didn't think it was worth sharing. That's not hiding from the truth; quite the contrary, he was taking all the responsibility for knowing it onto himself. He wasn't hiding from the truth, he was just hiding the truth.

I'd find it preferable if Battler didn't lie to his little sister the same way Beato lied to him at the start of the series. Implied in the search for truth is the idea that it's better to face reality than swaddle yourself in fantasy. By denying Ange the truth, Battler rejects that proposition.

Yeah, he does reject that proposition, because it was never really relevant to him in the first place. He was already dead, he really had nothing to lose and everything to gain. Besides, it's blatantly apparent that that proposition doesn't apply universally. You're creating themes out of thin air here, so it's not surprising that they aren't fulfilled.

Battler isn't engaging in any contradiction here; what was good for him isn't necessarily good for other people.

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"As the size of an explosion increases, the number of social situations it is incapable of solving approaches zero." -Vaarsuvius, Order of the Stick

He was already dead, he really had nothing to lose and everything to gain.

The way I recall the ep1 tea party, but I recall that meta-Battler could've been happy hanging out in the Golden Land, but he chose to shatter that because he knew it couldn't be real. So there was personal loss involved. Or am I misremembering?

Besides, it's blatantly apparent that that proposition doesn't apply universally.

How so?


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You put your RESOLVE HAT back on, which conveniently is the same hat as your NORMAL HAT.
{Drakeryn}

The way I recall the ep1 tea party, but I recall that meta-Battler could've been happy hanging out in the Golden Land, but he chose to shatter that because he knew it couldn't be real. So there was personal loss involved. Or am I misremembering?

Hmm... Okay, I guess that's true.

How so?

It's not hard to come up with circumstances where it'd be better to leave someone with fantasy, though they're all kind of depressing.

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"As the size of an explosion increases, the number of social situations it is incapable of solving approaches zero." -Vaarsuvius, Order of the Stick

She could react the way she did in Episode 7!

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"But you have been given freedom. Freedom to be...outside."
"I am lightning...the rain transformed."

I feel it's more that, once Battler arrives at the truth, he decides it unimportant because 'without love it cannot be seen' or whatever. His story written for Beatrice is what he wants to remember, and Battler... well, he's incredibly selfish. He isn't a character representing the theme of truth; he's flawed and swayed by his emotions and attraction to Beato. Plus, the first four episodes were him not realizing the Shannon/Kanon/Beato "how do I hold all these personalities" pile-up and treating it as traditional mystery, as opposed to Yasu's Personality Disorder Island 1986. Ends up being a very personal story to a lover he 'killed himself' (with the Hachijo personality) for.

Plus the last time he tried traditional explanation Erika locked him in a room for thousands of years where he mutilated himself. Odds are that's a pretty good point of reference for what Ange could go through. Different scenario, of course, with a logic error compared to definite truth, but altogether hopeless.

I feel it's more of a dynamic between Red and Blue, with Red representing a terrible scenario and Blue representing all forms of hope. Maybe I'm corny like that, I enjoyed Episode 8 outside of the 'yeah well Red Truth isn't definite anymore if you're deluded enough', but that kind of goes to the theme of 'truth is what you make of it and can be twisted by the person expositing it', as was already proven when it was introduced ( "You are incompetent!" ). But now I just feel like I'm rambling and trying to think of exactly why I liked Battler in Ep. 8. Because I really did, it's just difficult to explain exactly how.

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http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lvb2chGY8D1qm7gfoo1_500.jpg
SuperNiceDog? More like SuperChillGuy. Who is better than me at brackets by a mile.

erika was the closest to not getting ruined but even she took a hit with her 'ange is the REAL witch of truth' speech at the end. though that's totally noncanon since it's in the magic path tbqh.

episode rankings since i forgot to post them last time: 5 > 4 > 3 > 1 > 2 > 6 > 7 > 8
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