guys i know his brother is older guys i know. i fixed the post. u can stop sending me asks about it. i fixed the post. i fixed it. plz forgive me. i slept like three hours last night and was answering asks while editing the final blue trial. i mixed it up with another character. its gonna be ok. i fixed it
AKIBA TAKU!! akiba was born and raised in the historic city of kanazawa to two lovely parents. he was the second of two kids and has an older brother named junzou! hes always been pretty tight with his brother. akiba grew up a pretty happy kid with a pretty good family - his parents put a lot of emphasis on the boys building up their skillsets, both in academics and in hobbies. akiba isnt much of an academic which his parents realized pretty fast so they basically gave up on that front, but hes a pretty great athlete, which his parents appreciated and supported! as long as he was practicing a skill and he was happy, it worked for them! so around age nine, akiba leaned into athletics pretty hard and eventually found himself very invested in archery!
as he hit his preteen/teen years, akiba got pretty popular with girls. he had long pretty hair, he had big muscules, he was pretty sociable and easy to talk to - hes cool! hes a cool guy! so he started dating around a bit cuz he was a teen boy and that was a lot of what was on his mind at any given time. except, slight hiccup - akiba realizes at some point that he is not only looking at girls. he is also starting to look at guys. a lot! because it turns out our boy akiba is Quite Bisexual. hes not really sure how to feel about this at first because its not something hes ever really realized about himself and hes got a little bit of internalized homophobia to deal with but hes trying his best.
so fairly privately, akiba starts shooting his shot with guys. just super casual flings with guys at his school cuz hes just kind of testing the waters. eventually hes at the point where hes 100% sure hes bi and hes struggling a lot with that thought. it takes a lot of working up the courage and fighting himself on the matter and debating about whether or not its a good idea, but eventually, akiba decides to come out to his parents, because their family is close and his parents have always supported him and he feels like theyll be able to support him through this and give him some guidance and yadda yadda. he loves his parents and he wants them to know the truth about him.
except it goes VERY POORLY!! akibas parents do NOT receive him well. they receive him very badly. they want him out of the house NOW. akiba is caught extremely off guard because he has never, ever felt this kind of ire from his parents. they have always been loving and supportive. but theyre basically disowning him at this point. they do not want him as a son. so akiba is out. hes on his own now. at age 16, akiba gets in a big fight with his parents, packs up as much shit as he can in the 10 minutes he has and gets in his van. then he drives off and thats that. doesnt talk to his parents OR his brother again after that. despite being super super close with his brother before, he resents him for not saying a single word while akiba was being screamed at and disowned by his own parents. akiba wants nothing to do with his family. so yeah! he gets in the van and starts driving!
akiba ends up living out of his van from that point. hes completely alone in the world and he is feeling it. he lives in the back of his van, works where he can get work and has a series of spontaneous drinking binges and flings with random guys and girls. hes just coping really. he is desperate for some sort of connection with another human being and he doesnt have it and so he drinks and that makes him sadder and then he drinks more. hes not REALLY an alcoholic as much as hes just like?? sad. and drinking. because hes got nothing else to do.
his ronin persona is sort of his way of coping with that?? ronins are badass and independent and have no master. theyre solitary soldiers. its sick. if he can call himself a ronin he can pretend hes lonely on purpose. way to cope akiba!
My early prediction thread on who I think the culprit of Tetro Blue Ch.1 is and Analysis on Tetro’s first victims and Pink’s first killer
Spoilers for the first victim of Tetro Blue below and Tetro Pink as well! 👇
Okay so I know this before the investigation which would be a better time to theorize HOWEVER I’ve been thinking on who the killer could be in terms of how they parallel our victim with even using Pink’s victim and killer as example. Especially with me realizing the similarities both pink and blue’s victims have.
So before I say my two biggest guess as of right now(heads up I have more to say about one than the other, but I figured I’d mention both anyways). I’m going over Isono and Akiba similarities, then Isono and Sasaki.
What exactly does connect Akiba and Isono together? Well I did make a post about it regarding some connections. Their deaths(blunt force trauma to the head), liked by everyone, friends with student 11, sadly connected by chicken(bruh I swear chicken is just like doors in Tetro YOU’RE DOOMED IF YOU INTERACT WITH THEM!), etc.
But the main one I want to focus on is how both struggle with connection and their family. Key point to their past shown to us is how strain/damaged their relationship is with their older sibling due to an event that happen.
For Isono, it was some sort of fight or accident that lead to sending her sister to the hospital. For Akiba, it was coming out as bisexual to his family, where they disowned him and threw him out. To which his older brother did nothing about it.
These events(assuming for Isono) cause them to lose someone they love and result in now needing to find connection to fill that void of what family they lost.
Isono would seek that through her fans, while Akiba would seek that through girls he would meet and slept with(note he might’ve only slept with just women despite being bi due to thinking he could “pass over” being bi so maybe his family will take him back again).
While during their time in the KG, they finally found potential genuine connections as friends to right beside them(Isono it’s Tsuno and Wada while Akiba it’s Ogura and potentially Ninomiya and Tsukigata).
It’s interesting how these two had similar experiences, but different paths in it. Isono’s caused her to remain in her home completely(if her fear of crowds maybe is connected to her sister’s incident) while Akiba’s caused him to be kicked out of his.
Okay then, what about Isono and Sasaki that we’re bringing up? Well it’s how the two both are opposites with a single similar connection.
Isono despite her phobia and fear of needing protection in the killing game, still remained sociable within the killing game. She tried learning more about her fellow students, she was able to make two best friends that she was even going to go past her comfort zone to hang out with(ramen plan), and gave away the one thing that would’ve given her the protection she desired so dearly.
Sasaki on the other hand took charge since day one, trying to guide the students out of here while trying to maintain the peace. While she did talk to others, she was focus on more or so the vent plan. Isono was the only one she made a good connection with.
Others she tried talking to either was Yanagi making her uncomfortable, Ojima refusing about trying to talk about his trauma with her and keeps spacing out, and Hiroaki just pissing the hell out of her while not properly working with her on the plan. With Isono, they had their experience of the student council, in which they went into different directions regarding it.
Sasaki remained in hers despite what happened with her teacher, residing in her friend group and parents as emotional support. While Isono decided to focus on her streaming career and remain homeschooled to not have to face her phobia either.
These two are fascinating looking back on with how much we seen foreshadowed with them along with their character arcs. Isono’s being to come out of her shell of comfort to trust people she can rely on and care for even if it’s what kills her. While Sasaki’s was her not allowing anyone to help her burden the shoulder and taking everything on her own, isolating her from the others who could’ve supported her and prevented her from killing(ironic knowing how she did the opposite when it came to her teacher situation huh?).
“What this has to do with Akiba and his killer Rosa?!” Well the point I’m making is for narrative reasons if Akiba supposed to have similarities with Pink’s first victim and their relationship with their killer, then I think it’s the same with Akiba here.
So out of the bluedents, who do I think could be Akiba’s parallel in similarity in past with background while being opposites?
Those potential are…NINOMIYA YOUHEI OR NISHIGUCHI MUTSUKO! DUH DUH DUHHH(lol)
Alrighty let’s get to the fun part, though I’ll start with the weakest option first. So Mutsuko, why her?
This is more relying on actual evidence than fully similarities. Like how she could’ve been in the storage room once with Sou having to gather blankets for the night in the freezer. How she felt distress during her secret revealed. She could be similar to that of Sasaki being a leader type character who ended up killing.
Or how she has been shown to throw Sou under the bus with her not even thinking how her punishment affects him or even say “Let’s leave the elevator trio down there!” Ok that last one may been a bad timing joke, but still…
Regardless of that, if she did set up the trap in the storage room, it has to be when she was gathering blankets and somehow done in a way Sou didn’t noticed. Which he is blind, so maybe she could’ve done it but it’s not a 100% guarantee.
As for the narrative connection with Akiba. This could rely on how both of them care and love their families. Despite disowning him and most likely not searching for him at all, Akiba still loves them. While Nishiguchi absolutely loves her family, especially her brothers. Along with still being with them and how she describe they and the whole town would go searching for her if she was missing.
These two are similar opposites in the sense of both having strong connection to caring about their family, but different in terms of how one isn’t in their lives anymore while the other is.
Regardless the main problem with Nishiguchi killer here is how she planned the murder with how her punishment is no 3 hour break from the cuffs, meaning she’s with Sou 24/7 until the next murder. Sure like I said, she could’ve done it on Day 4 when going to the storage room with Sou, but that’s if she’s planning it carefully. Plus I just realized on rewatch they never specified it was the storage room where they got the blankets. I think I just assumed that cuz there were bedsheets in there. So for all we know, they just grabbed their blankets from their bedrooms.
Along with this she hasn’t hanged around Akiba and Ogura to know they spent a lot of time in the storage room nor if she was the killer, I feel like this would only affect Sou badly compared to to the others.
But you know who else fits the bill better and affects the group worse if they were the killer? MY MOM- It’s Ninomiya
“Rosa why the heck you think Ninomiya killed Akiba? Aren’t they friends? Also he doesn’t seem affected by the motive or games at all, why would he-“ Because he’s a coward…okay let me explain further but first, let’s start on his connection with Akiba.
As we know thanks to our many lovely sources to learn about Youhei. Those being the Okazaki’s spotlight, Okazaki’s terminals, his secrets revealed in the KG, and his spotlight! We know a lot about this guy’s background and how he is.
For starters, like Akiba, he was kicked out of his home for doing something his parents didn’t like, being himself. This resulted in him becoming homeless until he found an apartment renting out to young teenagers like him. His dad unlike Akiba’s family at least tried reaching out to him to come home, but he refused to due to hating his parents and feeling happier being away from them. This resulted his dad stop looking for him for good.
Compared to Akiba who would die for having his parents or brother call him, wanting him to come back home, it shows despite the similar path of being forced out of their family’s home, they reacted and feel very different about it. During this time of their lives before being put into the KG, they had a similar struggle.
That struggle is trying to find true connection with others. For Akiba, we know it was to fulfill the loneliness of his heart from losing his love ones and have someone accept him for who he is. While for Ninomiya, he did desire to find those of his same age he would be able to connect with, have a good time and be himself with. And he did!
Only problem was Youhei himself struggles in staying committed in a relationship. This is due to a mixture of how bad his parents’ relationship with each other, his views on not liking the idea of the law and government being involved with it if he were to marry someone, and perhaps Okazaki making him afraid of being in a relationship from how theirs was.
Why is this important? Well it’s important in explaining the connection to him and Akiba to be parallel opposites and also why despite how Youhei is getting along with everyone well and seems very close to those like Ruka and Tsukigata, he would still do this.
As much he likes both of them a lot, it’s clear by him only wanting to a temporary good time and not being here for the long run.
This could apply to him being in the killing game. He bids his time enjoying the light moments, but when things get worse and serious, he needs to look out for 1# and run.
We know from his spotlight he doesn’t think Ruka being a good leader with how much she’s being trampled over the others unless she turn rough about it
(though he does she has potential to be one still).
So just like how some question if Ouno still has fate in her that’s dwindling down, I think the same could be said about Youhei.
But what about motive? Why would Youhei immediately go and start planning to kill someone? My guess for that is two reasons.
Reason #1: His insulin. Until [Juice] when Akiba reminded him about what if he runs out of it, he didn’t even think about the fact of if he runs out. There’s nothing guaranteeing Monomoko will restock it or how long they’ll be in there. Without it, he’s going to slowly die in that lab.
Not to mention Ruka enforce the fact he didn’t tell anyone he was diabetic that what would they do if he collapsed with no more insulin supply left on him. This could’ve secretly install a fear into Ninomiya.
Reason #2 How intense the games and group are being now.
Sure, he’s not specifically being targeted or people being on his back for it. But think about it. Everyone went after Daiki for being an ass and torture him for it. If he didn’t follow in voting for him every round, he’d potentially make enemies with Kumada and he almost did. He’s lucky that they decided to give Ruka the no food punishment than him getting it. After that, the group been more divided than before. It won’t take no time for until then they might go after him for being apart of the “Let’s torture Daiki” squad.
Another reason with a connection back on Isono and Akiba that can connect to Ninomiya being the killer is the episode [Juice]. Just like [Kitchen Talk] with Sasaki and Isono, it was a moment where the two were chilling and chatting in the kitchen while one of them is cooking. If this was intentional hint, I applaud it.
But if not and just because both parties had an episode of being in the kitchen together doesn’t prove anything. Is it still relevant?
YES!
It’s important to note that the killer specifically had to planned to target Akiba or Ogura. Why is it a planned kill and not an accident or just random on whoever? It’s because Akiba specified only him and Ogura have been going to the storage room late at night in a specific spot!
And the only other person we know about that is aware of Akiba staying up late at night to be somewhere like that is thats right! Ninomiya! Because he found out in [Juice].
That combine with the fact he can separate from Hideyuki for 3 hours(btw he did take a break on Day 5 so he could’ve also set it up the day before), this plans out well for him to set the trap!
Though why target Akiba despite being friends with him? Well cowardice/looking out for himself aside…Best speculative bet is the original target was Ogura because of how small she is. The trap would immediately kill her and plus, if he was aiming to frame someone for it, Akiba perfect because of how strong and big he is compared to Ogura. People would assume he planned to just kill her in the storage room with that heavy object he would be able to lift.
Now there’s only one question left remaining to wonder about is….how did Youhei set off the trap if he wasn’t in the room itself? That I feel like we’ll have to wait more on information, BUT if I had to take a random guess of what will be important for the murder.
I think that the hole Akiba punched that Ruka kept staring at will come into play. Perhaps it showed an actual crawl space inside of it.
To which Youhei visiting it along with Ruka everything might’ve gotten the idea from her.
If we look at the map, we can see the storage room is close to the hallway and Cafeteria Akiba could’ve supposedly left the hole in. Meaning perhaps Ninomiya figured out how to set an activation to the trap through that hole.
And knowing Akiba’s schedule, he planned around then to do it. Maybe trying to get Hideyuki to hang out with him in the hallway casually to cast away suspicious.
We’ll have to see. One last thing I want to cover is how Ninomiya being the first killer would be perfect setup for the themes of Tetro Blue we see so far like how Sasaki did for pink along with affecting the group.
Sasaki killing because of the lack of sleep and stress from the KG environment shows how these poor kids are being tortured and force to kill. It shows us the reality of how these children are being preyed upon with their weaknesses and force to go extreme lengths for survival. They were never hungry wolves from the start, they were all once little red who was preyed upon and manipulated into killing by the real big bad wolves(doctors).
Sasaki’s death affected the group immensely with how they now had a lack of leadership in terms of how to escape. Her death cause a butterfly effect in certain characters like Hasegawa or Wada with how their fates would go. It also started the character development of some such as Yanagi or Hiroaki. Eventually down the line gaining appreciation from one of the two who really found out who she was and wish things could’ve turn out differently.
For Blue, Ninomiya’s death would affect 3 major characters in this case. Ruka as she was both his friend and the supposed leader of the group. Him killing would both make her feel like she failed him and everyone because she couldn’t tell he was planning to kill.
Tsukigata as he is one of his closest friends in the KG and would feel betrayed after all the fun/sweet moments they had together. Along with seeing a death would force Tsukigata to become less naive about the situation more than it has with Daiki being tortured and his secrets revealed.
And then finally Ogura, the person who was the closet to Akiba, the one who loved and accept him for who he was, and even someone who was Ninomiya’s friend. She would feel so betrayed and hurt if he threw away everything to hurt them like this when they all could’ve gotten out together.
As for the others in the group, I think since I feel like Ninomiya being the killer would represent the selfishness in Tetro blue of the themes of looking out for yourself than others would hit harder for the group.
Some of them would have to come to terms of their actions of how it caused a ripple effect in one of their own killing because of it. Some might end up like Youhei doubling down on their own self preservation.
I feel like Blue is going to be the opposite of Pink in terms of instead of the group starting out strong and slowly being divided until the end. This group might start out being worse and worse of being separated before coming all together at the end.
Tbh I could be really wrong about all of this and who knows? But this is my guess going forward until we get more information and the trial coming to light.
Okay…I know what you’re thinking…”what the hell is this title and why did you use the word ‘rizz’, and why does Akiba Taku have rizz? We haven’t even met him yet.”
Well to answer that…Apparently according to twitter during a Stage VC event in the Tetrocord server. The staff were sharing their fav ships with the Tetro cast on who they ship said character with.
Some examples of this were like Isono with Sasaki, Hiroaki with Ojima/Yanagi/Harada, Watari all of the girls, Yanagi loneliness for Pink.
For Blue there were some neat pairings that might hint at some character dynamics we’ll see or maybe even what ships might have legs. But the most interesting part is for the blue side is for Akiba. That being “Akiba: Everyone”.
And even some pairings include him like “Hirose: Akiba/Ninomiya, Tsukigata: Akiba, Shishikura: Akiba/Tei, and Isoda: Ninomiya/Maekawa/Akiba“.
This implies that unless these VAs are just creative like us in creating potential dynamics if said characters interacted more, that Akiba will have at least interact with the entire cast to be this shippable.
Oh yeah speaking of shipping, awhile back Von did mention one of the Tetro Blue characters was the most shippable out of the cast. To which I think that with this stage, its hinting that Akiba is the most shippable of the cast.
“Okay so we established that Taku has ‘Rizz’ as you say….what’s there to make a theory off of?”
Well for that, the main basis of this theory is Akiba Taku will survive or at least is not an early death.
How does Akiba being the most shippable means he’s living long? For that I say, it is because of the fact that IF Akiba Taku can be shipped with like almost anyone from the main cast of Tetro Blue, then that means he has to live long enough to have interacted at least once or more with multiple characters.
Think about it….characters like Isono for example only got to have episodes or interact with a few characters compared to the entire cast compare to those who ended up living longer like Yanagi or Tamba. While not guarantee that Akiba will end up as a survivor because of this. This has to mean that he is not a chapter 1 death to allow him to interact with everyone before whoever next on the chopping block. So unless chapter 1 is like…really really long and Taku actually dies as the first victim or killer….I think he’s making it for the long run.
Either way this is just fun theory speculation off of a VC stage event. Don’t take this too seriously or as straight up facts he’s living for sure. At most, this just means before Akiba or any of the people he interacts with specially for them to have him as their picks must live long enough for him to have it.
So like maybe Hirose, Tsukigata, Shishikura, and Isoda might make it pass ch.1 or just one of them get to interact a lot more with Akiba before they die and the others make it to ch. 2. We’ll just have to wait and see.
would hiroaki be into akiba?? what does hiroaki think of him?
hiroaki would absolutely be into akiba. he would have to ignore the fact that hes a moron but he would stare at him relentlessly. hiroaki is into bara is the thing
Writing this as of Day 5, and I'm only covering Students 1-4 in this post, I'll get to the rest in subsequent posts when I feel like it, hopefully within a week
Just going to go through each of them and dump all my thoughts, there's a lot of opinions being thrown around after the mess of Voter Game, so I think now's a good time to get my thoughts in order
Also going to have them all below the cut for possible spoilers, and because this is going to take a while
Ouno Nanae:
I was initially put off by the voice, immediately got over myself after a friend told me it was supposed to be a speech impediment (and even if it wasn't, there's been enough time to get used to it, my sensory issues aren't triggered from it any more), and she's been growing on me more and more every week.
The crowbar thing was one of my favourite bits from Day 1, a genuinely smart survival move when you're as a strong as she is, because as Ikeda says, no-one wants to be the person trying to take it away from her. She's very friendly with everyone, yet she's actively holding a weapon to strike them, yet her general demeanour makes her seem airheaded and unthreatening, there's a three-way contrast to her character that's been consistent this entire time. Making friends with Akiba through playing board games, but then misattributing his name to Yaitabashi is a great showcase of how she's playing the game outside of just carrying the crowbar, she's getting on people's good sides and indulging in her interests while she has the chance, but she's not particularly attached to anyone other than Yokoi, no pun intended. Her behaviour in Voter Game makes that especially clear, she's annoyed with Ikeda because he's annoying (and also stole the board game she played with Akiba, but she likely doesn't know that) and votes for him every time based on that, she doesn't get into any of the moralising arguments about torturing him and she doesn't seem to regret her decisions, she knocked over the dominoes and just let them fall. Nobody other than Ikeda paid any attention to her, even when she would've been a logical vote, so she evidently did a lot better at not making enemies than anyone who actually followed Kumada.
And then there's her Phobia Game reveal to talk about, but frankly, I don't think we have enough information to really get into that, so I'll leave it at this: She has a baby sister at home she openly admits she would kill someone to protect, were it not for her friend Yokoi keeping everyone in check for the moment and reducing the need to kill. She's in the top three people of appreciating Yokoi's work, despite being so generally uninvolved with group proceedings, another very interesting layer to her.
I'm invested in what they're putting down with Ouno so far, I think she's very easy to underestimate, both as a threat and as a character.
Ninomiya Youhei:
I'd probably have more to say about him if I waited another week for his Student Spotlight, but I'm committing to this. He's by far one of the most interesting students from before the series even started, he's thoroughly connected to everyone's favourite narrative-haunting enby queen from the PINK cast. She answered half of her own Student Spotlight from his supposed perspective, and he's repeatedly mentioned in mask_artisan.txt, giving us plenty of information about his life before we even knew he was a member of the BLUE cast.
The punishment he turns down in Phobia Game, and his decisions in Voter Game, speak to the two sides of his character. He's threatened with losing his speaking privileges because he's someone who never wants to shut up, not because he's a yapper, but because he's happy to provide running commentary whenever shit's going down in front of him, though surprisingly not in a troublemaking way, that's Ikeda's forté. He's one of the most kind and helpful people in the cast, though his constant snark and capacity for horrific imagery wouldn't make that immediately clear, he's constantly got Yokoi's back because of their early bond and places a ton of trust in her abilities to keep the group from tearing each other apart, though not enough to talk about his own issues with, that's something he only mentions if he feels like it, personal opinion doesn't really come into it. He's mostly ignoring his medical problems during the game because he doesn't want to make a big deal out of them, that'll just further risk his life, he focuses much more on coasting by and sticking to good people like Yokoi and Tsukigata who have his own back as well.
Hence why Voter Game also reveals a lot about him. He's complicit and he knows it, he's fairly consistently bending to Kumada's will before she's even cast her vote and set the stage, and he freely admits it all to Yokoi afterwards. As many have pointed out, be basically confirmed Okazaki's analysis of him as an "exceptional coward". Tsukigata's analysis of him was as "an authentic Japanese rebel", and while Ninomiya certainly has his fair share of claim to the name (no doubt he's committed crimes, and he's a punk musician who somehow plays the violin, you could even call him a revolutionist for that!), he wasn't able to take a stand against Kumada's authority in the end. His parents were in politics, that's likely the main reason he became a rebel in the first place, but in this case, he was pitted against someone his own age, and he buckled under the very different societal pressure. Okazaki probably already broke him down a bit, in that regard.
Ninomiya has a decent chance of dying Chapter 1, but I'm personally holding out hope for Chapter 5 (though there's no way he survives, the limited insulin access will bite him in the ass just like Hasegawa's limited anxiety meds), there's so much to get into with the unique narrative role he holds, and he's a really fun presence whenever she shows up, I'm a big fan of his chemistry with Yokoi and Tsukigata.
Kumada Erina:
Kumada, Kumada, Kumada. You're directly in the line of fire of the fandom right now, you've been thrown down to F Tier plenty of times already, and even the people who don't do that are mostly disappointed or wary of you. Me, however, I genuinely don't understand formulating opinions on characters based exclusively around morality, it's always about how interesting and compelling they are for me, I don't see why immorality that isn't disguised as moral by the narrative should be a knock against a character's quality (and it's usually not handled fairly across the board when people rank characters based on that, just look at Okazaki and Hasegawa from PINK. Half the point of Blackened!Hasegawa is that he's become so much like Okazaki, but only she gets pummelled into lower tiers for hatred of her actions).
Before we even get into Voter Game, I'd like to talk about her interactions beforehand, specifically with the other two members of the Elevator Trio. She was clearly very upset with how all of that went down, spending most of the night trapped in a dark room with Yaitabashi and Hirose, two guys she doesn't know very well and a damaged wrist, which is only made worse when said wrist is immediately handcuffed to Hirose's best friend who repeatedly accidentally hurts it. Only a couple days in, and she was already being put through a decent amount of pain compared to everyone else, it makes sense that she'd unfairly pick Hirose to lash out onto about it, and it makes sense that her Phobia Game punishment would've been to spend the night down there, she's violently resisting putting herself in such a vulnerable position again. And at the same time, she doesn't want that for any of the people she's allied with, she's a gang leader who's very used to trying to keep an entire crew out of danger, and her killing game allies are essentially a new gang for her. Yaitabashi in particular has repeatedly expressed to her how much he doesn't want to be targeted or pitied because of his hidden blindness, and given that she's definitely used to being unfairly pitied as a gang leader who looks like a little girl, she empathises with him and takes a ton of effort to make him more comfortable, keeping his secret, backing him up during the elevator scenes, and only lashing out at Hirose when she's trying to get it off her mind.
Now, to get into Voter Game. It's very possible that her actions will be re-contextualised later, given that her only post-game commentary about them has been that she wasn't forcing anyone to follow her, and nothing about why she did it or whether she regrets it, but as it stands, my opinion is this: She had a point, and she eventually lost it. Ikeda was a completely fair target, he's antagonised everyone to an unacceptable degree and if the time came where no-one was a particularly good fit for a punishment, it made perfect sense to lay it down on him for the sake of karma, and not making any extra enemies. Going hard on him from the start wasn't a great idea, they needed to get some trust between the team going so the risk of making enemies with later more harsh decisions would be lessened, but it's forgivable, he was an asshole and pretty much had it coming. Going for him literally every round possible was an abysmal strategic move, but Kumada was always hiding behind the excuse of making less enemies, she was trying so hard to convince herself that Ikeda didn't have anyone in his corner and that it was better to pick on the lonely prick than anyone less deserving or less of an enemy already, but Ikeda wasn't alone. Tei was his friend, and several others in the group just felt bad for him after he'd been put through so much physical torture, including her own partner, Denden. She didn't make an enemy of Denden, because she's a very forgiving person and likely knows Kumada better than most, but Hirose, Shishikura, Yokoi, and especially Tei are a lot more suspicious of her than they were before the game, and even the people who sided with her are likely to feel regret for having Ikeda's pain on their conscience, which Ogura and Isoda have already shown. Kumada wasn't a sadist for what she did to Ikeda, she was genuinely trying to lessen the impact of the game by only harming one guy whenever possible, and of course saving herself from being targeted for her similar perceived weakness and antagonism, but her plan was cruel and ineffective, and she's fallen out of favour with way more people than she wanted. Plus, the way she swayed the votes with her tough gang leadership skills was just impressive at a certain point, Isoda's right about the difficulty in pulling off shit like that while looking like she does.
Kumada's stirred up a whole lot of conflict within a single episode, and aside from that, she's built up multiple engaging dynamics I'm excited to see more of, especially with her recent heel-turn into a real threat to the group, I like seeing what she's capable of.
Ikeda Daiki:
So many things I could say, I feel like we really don't have enough of the picture yet with this guy, but who would I be if I didn't try to decipher him anyway?
He's very very reminiscent of one Kokichi Ouma, he looks, sounds, and acts a lot like him, and one thing to know about me is that I do not like Kokichi Ouma, I think he's the most complex character in DR history but that there wasn't a meaningful result to all of his layers, I don't take much of anything away from his character because he's so wrapped up in ambiguity. Ikeda, meanwhile, is just a little more understandable as a character, and that really makes the difference. His talent as an art forger is one of few that's already come into play, selling Tsukigata the board game as if it was valuable Japanese art, and I consider that one of his most compelling scenes on top of the entertaining premise, he's very convincing with the lies he improvises and the price deal he makes, he understands the other students decently and knows how to play into their more obvious weak points. However, he's openly insistent that he doesn't want to get close to any of them, immediately recognising the danger of the game and thinking he's sly enough to make it through by waiting it out and angering people into getting themselves into trouble. He's not. He's painting a massive red target on his back, no pun intended, because he's weak physically and no-one likes him, he played an abysmal social game and only managed to get Hirose's protection from pity.
Tei, not so much. Those interactions are what make it really clear that there's a lot underneath Ikeda's surface we haven't gotten into yet. He provokes Tei not unlike anyone else, and the man is fairly easy to get on the bad side of, but he's also very used to dealing with annoying people as a retail worker, and offers Ikeda food when he clearly wants some. More broadly, he offers Ikeda kindness, and Ikeda literally shuts down at the notion of it, snapping back into his persona after a moment of silence and removing himself from the situation, but it's a lot harder to do that when he's literally handcuffed to Tei and forced to take in some of the nice things he's given. He's not ready to admit that he appreciates the man's efforts, but he is ready to spend the entirety of [Debrief] trying to get him out of the line of fire, and then go back to his usual ways after the fact. He's also not ready to reap the consequences of his rage-baiting in Voter Game, especially from Kumada who clearly has a more intense grudge against him than he can handle, and nobody could be ready to take on five different physical punishments at the hands of their peers, he was put through an inhumane level of torment because of Kumada's meddling, and not even the most desperate efforts of the few people in his corner could prevent him from that continuous cruel fate. Tei went from being reluctantly friends with him to being his ride-or-die, and several people who would've otherwise been somewhat annoyed by him either turned to being his only reassurance, or entirely willing to throw him into the danger zone out of fear for his enemy. At the doctor's instruction, he has no choice now but to shut up, for once in his life. He relies on his words, he's got a salesperson's silver tongue and a penchant for running commentary to keep himself feeling like he's in control, and now, he's had that entirely stripped away.
I'll admit, in the first few days, he wasn't quite living up to the expectation his excellent prologue scene and interview set, his arguments fell flat most of the time and he was giving way too many Ouma vibes to truly stand out. But now that he's being given a lot more focus, and a very clear vision distinct from the gremlin before him, he's creeping right back up on my tier list, very invested in what they're going to try with him in the future. Plus, aro/ace icon!
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