Takeuchi just full-on admitted Young Moriarty was thrown in the plot cause he wanted a boring ikekmen twink version of Moriarty. Threw away about 5 years of buildup between Moriarty and Sherlock having their final showdown just to railroad with a brand new boring version of the character completely devoid of anything that made him interesting and fun. Fuck Takeuchi.
....Excuse me for a moment.
.........Okay I'm back.
I guess we have the answer to my question of why the fuck he even exists, and why the fuck the villain of Traum wasn't Mephistopheles.
Because Takeuchi is and always has been a complete hack. And clearly Nasu is too if some random suggestion from someone who isn't even on the writing team is all it takes to have him mandate setting fire to 5+ years of buildup between two fan favorite characters. No wonder Higashide didn't write Ruler Moriarty to be remotely interesting; he didn't intend to use him at all. God what I would give to know if he actually did intend to use Mephistopheles and that's why there's still somewhat of a circus motif to him. Because I will repeat: Even if Ruler Moriarty was a fantastically written and extremely satisfying payoff to the Holmes and Moriarty plotlines they've been setting up for half a decade (WHICH HE IN NO WAY WAS - I DIDNT EVEN HAVE TO READ TRAUM TO FIND THAT FCKING MUCH OUT), there is zero reason for him to exist. He in no way handles the plotline that had been set up for Moriarty and in reference to literally everything else Mephistopheles is a superior choice AS I'VE OUTLINED BEFORE.
Hey can we talk about why the fuck Ruler Moriarty is a thing And more importantly, why it wasnt Mephistopheles?! Like Higashide has always
THIS HAS LITERALLY ONLY AGED TO BE MORE TRUE SINCE TRAUM'S RELEASE. IF I THOUGHT IT ACTUALLY MATTERED I'D WRITE A WHOLE DAMN ESSAY ON HOW POETIC A VILLAIN MEPH WOULD BE AND THAT'S HOW I KNOW THEY KNOW THAT AS WELL AND ACTIVELY CHOSE NOT TO USE IT. IF I CAN SEE THE PARALLELS AND WHY IT'S A NATURAL CONCLUSION THERE'S NO FUCKING WAY THE PEOPLE WHO'VE ACTUALLY SEEN WHAT THE STORY EVEN IS WOULDN'T KNOW.