Just some of my theories regarding these matters:
The extra participant was Hagakure. Assuming the ‘survivors left’ countdown at the beginning of each episode was referring to the characters who were shown in the opening, and not only in the Killing Game itself, then Hagakure is the only logical answer.
The 13th Division leader must not be important, since they never addressed it once. It was always kinda “why is Asahina there instead of her branch’s leader”. I don’t think they were ever important. Maybe they’ll pop up in Killer Killer or something.
Monaca wanted to observe Naegi, right? Maybe after getting to know Komaru in DRAE, she wanted to learn about her brother? This question was answered, but it was a little lazy.
Tengan set things up… probably just by asking around. He’s the head of the Future Foundation, so it wouldn’t be too far-fetched to assume he just looked at some documents.. He was probably studying the brainwashing video Junko created, and, like Komaeda, fell into a despair that was obsessed with creating hope by spreading despair?
Tengan’s motivation was to force Mitarai to use his hope-brainwashing video. He probably realized that Junko’s followers couldn’t be reasoned with, and Naegi probably told him that the Neo World Program failed. He probably thought Mitarai’s video was the last hope for humanity, but Mitarai was the only one who could initiate it.
Kimura had the antidote on her when the FKG began, and she probably keeps a variety of different medicines on her at all times given that she pulled Cure W and her beast mode pill things out of nowhere. As for why she had Cure W specifically… maybe Tengan used a poison that she had already been studying and creating an antidote for? This… also needs an explanation, but it’s not really necessary.
I feel like Munakata and Naegi combined their hopes after Kirigiri “died”, and the two had their big fight. When they spoke to each other, Naegi and Munakata seemed to understand each other, and neither really… acted the exact same as before then? I feel like they combined hopes by opening up to each other.
idfk I’m not saying it was a perfect ending either, especially from a story sense, but I definitely think some of the questions left open are just us fans over-thinking things.
Hagakure being the extra participant is probably right–but it’s stupid. Because he was never included in the game to begin with and they made it clear to us that he wasn’t involved in the game to begin with–he was specifically left outside the Game because “no one liked him.”
Yeah, the 13th Division leader must have not been important–which is why it’s annoying. They spend all of this time establishing that “Asahina was sent in place of the 13th Leader,” and how she wasn’t in the 14th Division despite every other 78 Class member being there. They were either meant to be important and it was forgotten, or it’s a red herring–both of which are horrible writing.
I know Tengan’s motivation–but as I said, it’s really weak and kind of contradictory [I wrote a whole post on it here.] Despite not wanting Mitarai to participate in the Game, he still invited him to the meeting in the first place. Even if he only had a 1% chance of showing up, it was still a chance.
Again, Monaka being there at all was another weak point that never amounted to anything.
No, she didn’t. Because when the Game began, Sakakura accidentally got Bandai killed and she couldn’t do anything. So somehow between the two scenes we see of her before she chases Ando for 2 episodes, she just magically makes something. Yes, it needs an explanation otherwise it’s OP garbage.
It sure would be nice to have an explanation or flashback of how Tengan set things up instead of just “lol I did all of this and you’re never going to get an explanation, make one up.”
There’s “open interpretation due to clues left in the narrative” and then there’s “forcing the audience to fill in the blanks for you because there are no clues.” When you have to rely on the latter, than it’s bad writing.
They did not combine hopes. “Combine hopes” would mean “to compromise/work together.”
The end confrontation with Munakata and Naegi just resulted in Naegi calming Munakata down. There was no “compromise” or “trying to understand each other’s viewpoints.”
Both of them were set up to be the end heroes, but in the end Munakata just relinquishes the spotlight to Naegi and goes off to do whatever (I don’t know because he wasn’t given his own cheesy epilogue like everyone else.)