If sword-pulling has undertones of sexual assault, then this scene has undertones of murder. Kanae’s skin turns blue, Anthy stabs her heart, she screams, and her body goes limp.
We only ever see Kanae “murdered” in this way (for the rest of the Black Roses, the scene is cut short), but we can assume that something similar happens for the rest of them, if for no other reason than that this show loves to reuse lines.
As the Black Roses go deeper underground, go deeper into their own psyches, they also seem to be going deeper into Hell – or rather, Purgatory. Death, and suffering, but at the end of it… well, at least a slim chance of positive change. Miki, Kozue, Nanami, and Tsuwabuki seem better off; Kanae, Jury, Shiori, and Wakaba do not.
When they get “murdered”, their “hearts stop” – they are maintain an unchanging emotional state. (This is kind of what I was hoping Homestuck would do with its dead characters, but that didn’t seem to happen.)
Yes! That kind of ties into what I was saying here. Mikage coaxes people who wouldn’t normally be Duelists into an emotional state where they are, and then Anthy(?) freezes them in that sate through this symbolic act symbolic murder.
And I’m just now remembering a few more things that tie the Black Roses to death. There’s the fact that they all have murder on the brain; they want to kill Anthy, even the ones who have no reason to resent her. Then there’s something Kanae says: “This is the real me. The other me I buried within myself” – and something she does:
(Since you mentioned Homestuck…)
:OOO
By the way, at the end of the Black Rose arc, I thought that we were supposed to conclude that the 100 boys were never really killed, Nemuro Memorial Hall was never rebuilt, etc., but after the finale I now think that it all did happen, but everyone forgot about it and their memories were rewritten after Mikage left. Is that your interpretation?
