I feel the need to make a post about this every so often, and Goro's birthday is as good a time as any. This tends to get lost in the face of the general fandom vibe that Akechi is dead outside of Maruki's reality, but he is NOT. At some point, everyone just started taking it for granted that Akechi really did die in the engine room and treating it like a fact when the narrative never does. I do not believe that he was ever intended to actually be dead and HERE'S WHY:
Even though the characters seem to think he's dead, that's only because they don't know for sure what happened to him after the engine room or when exactly Maruki's powers took effect, and that includes Akechi. He does not know for sure how he made it out of Shido's Palace, understandably because he was badly injured, but he had resigned himself to death and therefore assumed that when he didn't die and found that they'd been transported to a dream world, he was only alive due to Maruki's abilities, but HE DOESN'T KNOW FOR SURE. Maruki doesn't even know for sure, all he knows is that Joker and Akechi had some sort of fraught relationship that ended in what they believe was Akechi's death. He's using that uncertainty against them, in order to up the stakes and make them agree to his terms.
The other characters assert that Akechi turning himself in occurred in the ideal reality, but there were no other indications that Maruki's powers were active on Christmas Eve. Sae is the same as always, and Akira doesn't have that weird dream until later. Why would only one wish come true early and then the rest of the reality snap into place all at once? Maruki clearly does have some influence even outside of the dream world, as demonstrated by Sumire, but that was just intense supernatural hypnotic suggestion, not an actual warping of reality. Akechi showing up on Christmas Eve wasn't just in Akira's mind. But what DOES happen after we know that Maruki's powers are active is Akechi being released from custody. Akira's desire was to be with Akechi and he couldn't do that if Akechi was in jail, so it makes perfect sense that Maruki's powers would prevent him from being prosecuted and imprisoned.
"But Akechi showing up on Christmas Eve didn't happen in vanilla!" Neither did the meat festival. Does that mean that was part of Maruki's reality? Akechi's entire confidant was different in vanilla; it's perfectly reasonable that the story changed due to his stronger canon relationship with Joker and his increased presence in the game. And actually, if the writers intended for him to be dead or really wanted it to be ambiguous, it would have made far more sense not to add that scene at all. Akechi getting arrested establishes that he and Joker are still separated, at first by Akechi's presumed death and ultimately by his arrest, creating the conditions for Akira to want him back.
"Then why isn't he still in custody when the world goes back to normal?" I can't fully explain the timeline weirdness. The characters didn't go back and relive the time they lost in dream world, they just popped out the other end with everything back to where it would have been had Maruki not interfered, and they say that Akechi didn't get arrested in Akira's place, so Akira is currently detained. That does mess with the timeline if indeed Akechi's arrest took place in the real world. However, we never actually see what happened that lead to Akira being arrested. I can only assume that something occurred during the strange void of lost time that resulted in Akechi and Akira exchanging places. This entire part is frustratingly vague and confusing, to the point that I wonder if the writers just overlooked something and decided to handwave it instead of figuring it out. this fucking king crimson bullshit i stg
And none of that ^^^^ even really matters anyway, because even if he didn't actually show up to get arrested, that still doesn't mean he died in the engine room. We know that Maruki can manipulate people's minds. Hypothetically, let's say the ideal reality was already active. It's possible that Akechi was alive but wasn't planning to volunteer to take Akira's place, so Maruki "encouraged" him in order to make sure they were separated. Do I think that's what happened? No, but him not being there on Christmas Eve does not automatically = dead, especially given everything else we know.
"Then why doesn't he show up at the end?" A) he does in the true ending, and B) because he's at the woman's shelter. "That scene was cut, it's not canon." Yeah, well, they still wrote it, which means that when they were writing the rest of the story, they intended for Akechi to be alive and for that scene to fit logically with the events of the plot. There could be any number of reasons why it was cut, but the writers just suddenly deciding that Akechi was actually dead is highly unlikely. They probably did want it to be kind of ambiguous, like in vanilla, and also didn't want to move the focus away from Joker too much.
"That glimpse in the true ending is just Joker imagining him because he misses him." So he's imagining him but didn't see him? Are we looking at Joker imagining that Akechi is walking past outside? Why doesn't the rest of the ending blur the lines between thought and reality like that? "It's a visual metaphor because video games are a visual medium." In that case, it's sloppy, and my other points still stand.
"Why haven't the devs confirmed that he's alive, then?" Because that's not their job?? And the disagreement drives engagement??? Look at how many words I've typed on this post alone. About a JRPG that first released nearly 10 years ago. If I could still feel shame, I would have walked into the ocean already. But on that front, when has the persona series ever shied away from confirming a dead character is dead? This level of ambiguity isn't typical for a series that makes you watch your protagonist die at the end of p3.
"You just can't accept that your precious yandere gf is dead." Entirely possible. I could just be coping right now. Actually, I KNOW I'm just coping right now, but me not liking that my favorite character is dead and arguing for him still being alive doesn't negate the evidence. It's very easy to indulge in the delicious angst (and it is indeed very delicious) of Joker loving Akechi so much it brings him back to life but being together would mean condemning themselves to a life of slavery. Akechi actually being dead hits on so many levels and I have certainly indulged from time to time, but that doesn't change the FACTS.
TL;DR Akechi is alive, canonically, in the real world, and probably was alive the whole time in vanilla too. Joker's wish was still for them to be together, but that manifested in Akechi being released from custody, NOT in Akechi coming back to life after dying in the engine room. I'm not here to harsh anyone's vibe, but the majority of content I see about Akechi seems to accept him being dead as canon when I truly don't think it is.
I don't think him being alive makes his and Akira's relationship any less powerful or Akira's wish any less meaningful. He believes Akechi is dead and only alive in the ideal reality because Akira wants it. Him believing that is just as profound as it being true.
Akechi is still Akira's wish <3
