#tgre 140

[silverbulletsama]

im alive again

[kanekikenunot]

Kaneki and Irony

One of things that really got to me this chapter was the cutback to Kaneki on the expedition when Touka stood up to face Juuzou. That’s because it’s dripping in irony and character development, which is what makes it so potent and sad. One of the most infamous scenes in the original manga is when Yamori asked him to choose between a mother and child

This moment gave the audience, us, one of Kaneki’s most prominent tragic flaws, his indecisiveness. Kaneki is someone who lacks desires, ambition, and a lack of what he wants in his own life. Kaneki wants to have a little bit of everything because he can’t make a choice. So what Kaneki does is he puts all his hands in different buckets but because it’s such stretch between them Kaneki can’t reach the item in any of them. Kaneki can’t reach his goals because he can’t prioritize on one to put all of his focus into.

This is something that has recently been brought back into play, and the conversation just ten chapters ago. When Kaneki had to make a choice between saving Yoriko at the risk of a trap, or just let it be for the safety of Goat. Kaneki is shocked by the fact that Touka could make a rational decision at the time. Which brought his mind right back to when he himself had to make a decision between the lives of others.

It was in that moment for one of the first times in Kaneki’s life he made two decisions one for what he wants to do on April 23, and the other is what he wants in his life, and what he wants to strive for. However, it’s the what Kaneki wants to strive for is really important to this part of the manga. 

Kaneki decided that his goal, his strive to live at the moment is to protect Touka so she can have a good life because he loves her.

It’s not the healthiest of decisions to place all your happiness, and life goals in one person, but from the perspective of Kaneki never making set decisions or goals for himself, this in many ways was step forward in that direction. It also isn’t the only thing that matters to me is Touka, because he’s extending on how he wants her life and health to be on ghouls as a whole. 

Kaneki wants to be a good leader, he doesn’t think he’s the best as he says himself he is just a “normal” man there is nothing really special about him. He is someone who circumstance just really fucked with him. But, after that conversation with Touka we saw a slow start to a steady change. He is trying to be a good leader, he is taking on the rule of providing to Goat, instead of just a “godlike” figure who throws quinque’s from a pipe trying to make a difference with nothing. He is putting in effort that instead of dancing around the CCG while they starve to feed them then try to make real change.

But, what makes it really sad is in the moment that he makes a concrete decision, that it’s in a situation where he needs to put his hands in multiple baskets. Kaneki had a gut reaction that something was wrong, and when he really dug at that feeling he hit the nail on the head on what was going on in the 24th ward.

Kaneki didn’t leave the 24th ward defenseless, but he admits himself that he was lax in that. He only left a few and they were out numbered and separated as making them weak to Suzuya who was stated to have a good squad but still not being the unbeatable force of Arima and Squad 0.

Yet, even with that knowledge, when Tsukiyama asks him if he thinks they should go back, he stays firm on his decision because after his conversation with Touka he is trying to be more decisive. Yet, this didn’t have to be a cut and dry decision, Kaneki could have left Tsukiyama in charge and took a few expedition ghouls with him to check back at the base, in this situation it could have been both. 

But, Kaneki still hasn’t dealt with another flaw which could help him distinguish when he needs to make a set answer and when he can do multiple things instead of choosing one. That flaw is his savior complex/ his inability to rely on others to reach his ghouls. Kaneki feels like he has to do everything on his own, he fights the CCG on his own, he has to go with the expedition to collect food. He spreads himself to thin at times, when he has other capable people in Goat to help him. Yet, he puts it on his own shoulders, and because of that even with progress it’s still holding him back.

It’s just sad to see everything fall apart for Kaneki, when he was finally starting to grow. But, I hope that this will be a wake up call for him and make him realize how he needs to change to truly succeed. 

[justapanda]

TG fandom be like:

I love you Juuzou but also fuck you.

[hamliet]

Incoherent reactions to chapter 140

Well so that happened

Why would Touka leave flowers at Shinohara’s bedside? I am confused.

So six hours have passed... Urie Hide Marude Matsuri where you at the 24th ward needs you 

“His skin was as glossy and supple as ever” so was his hair

I mean my hair and skin don’t look that good after hours working on them much less six hours after getting shot in the head

A mention of Dragon???? 

This panel of 0 squad has me like

Until you remember that one of the members is dead one is about to be undead one is out for food and the other five are locked in a battle against each other 

Tsukiyama telling Kaneki “no” is my aesthetic

Except this is the one time Kaneki should listen to his gut instinct and reconsider a decision he made 

NAKI (I’m guessing Miza too)

Dammit

I'm glad you learned a few new word Naki because I don’t have words right now like at all

I’m glad one of us is having fun Naki

Brb, if you need me, I’ll be here ugly crying  

(I actually think Naki’s death is absolutely beautiful though but right now I’m going to burrow in my sad mole house)

[rearima]

This is killing me. And he remembers Tsukiyama's name T_T

[otaku24trash]

Who is she

[dreamofcentipedes]

Flowers for the Reaper

Hi everyone, sorry for my absence! I got a massive pre-university reading list dumped on me that needs to be done before the month’s through. I haven’t finished it, but if I don’t do anything other than read or procrastinate I feel like my spine might turn into scriptural binding, my innards to paper and my skin to the cover of the Norton Anthology of English Literature. So this is my non-guilt-inducing recreation period! Here’s hoping I don’t metamorph into a manga volume instead. Oh, and since I’ve been gone for a while and messages have piled up as a result, I’ve had to freeze the Ask feature for a little while. Sorry! I’ll get right on it.

But boy, a lot sure has happened since I’ve been away. Blimey. Don’t give up on Touka just yet, Suzuya has shown a great deal of inclination towards defection, and now Furuta’s in the room with them what better time to swing the scythe the other way? E14 is a clear parallel to the original series’ V14, with even the same ‘ee’ sound, and Suzuya is here as a parallel to Arima, given not only the same flower imagery but the very same epithet by the narrator...

...however, Suzuya has seen the flowers at Shinohara’s bedside that we can only assume were brought by Touka back in Chapter 16.

But why is Touka bringing Shinohara, a man she’s never met, flowers? My guess would be that she knows Shinohara was responsible for her father’s death. Giving him flowers at his hospital bed is thus a symbolic gesture of letting go of past grudges and sympathising with suffering wherever it is encountered, and is the ultimate display of character growth in comparison with her treatment of her father’s other assailant, Kureo Mado. The buds of empathy that sprouted upon seeing Mado’s ring are now in full bloom with Shinohara, who, as Touka must have known perhaps too by his ring, has a family as well.

Only this family encompasses Suzuya as well. In the course of their battle, Suzuya will somehow find out that his opponent is the one who gave Shinohara the flowers - perhaps he will mention Shinohara and Touka will recognise the name, or perhaps he has already seen Touka in the hospital. In any case, the message that Touka delivered in the flowers will translate to Suzuya’s own psyche - one of barrier-transcending empathy and kindness - and it will be what ultimately breaks his loyalty to the CCG, allowing Touka and her unit to escape. The course of tragedy will be broken by the growing empathy and understanding between the two peoples this world revolves around. And in support of this theory, just take a look at Suzuya’s fixation on flowers in this very chapter - not just from Shinohara’s flowers, but from the Reaper’s symbolic death flowers as well.

This is a pivotal moment for Suzuya in what may well be his Judgement Phase, his two potential ways of life represented to him by two different sets of flowers. Touka’s bouquet is symbolic of love, respect, patience and faith, whereas Arima’s field of daffodils is symbolic of the underworld as the flower that supposedly grew in Hades in Greek mythology. He can choose Arima’s daffodils and the ‘Reaper’ side of himself that acts as a killing machine at someone else’s will, from Big Madam to Furuta, thus continuing on from the person he was at the start of the series and embodying the very aspects that Arima despised in himself. Or he can take Touka’s bouquet and embrace his only recently discovered ability to empathise and be the kind of man Shinohara wanted him to be. He doesn’t have to discard his Reaper qualities entirely, as the daffodils in Touka’s bouquet represent - they’re a part of him now. But he must not give into them completely and allow other flowers into the mix of his soul in place of a homogeneous field of death. 

This choice has been a long time coming for Suzuya, his hair having been black throughout :re to reflect the surge of Ninjo qualities in place of his once obsessively Giri soul. And it comes at a fitting time, so very close to Suzuya’s parallel revelation in the original series’ 137. His change for the better then makes me confident he’ll make the right choice now.

Much like the ‘V’ in V14 stood for ‘Volume’ (observation by the wonderful @lilacflamesss), indicating that Volume 14 was the end of Kaneki’s journey in that story, the ‘E’ here is, in a plethora of tongues starting from Latin itself ( e - out of), potentially indicative of exits and escape; not just from the 24th Ward but from the restricting confines of the tragic format that dictated that:

Oh, and since all these original Anteiku raid parallels are happening now, you can disregard my predictions in that regard for the Quinx; which, given their rather morbid outlook, will be very welcome news, I’m sure.

I would wager that good things lie ahead for both Touka and Suzuya, and very much not so for Furuta.

[afrofairy96]

I really can't with Furuta and his facial expressions, One minute he's beautiful, a young Adonis god among men

And then next he's..