Thoughts on Gou Episode 23
As a standalone episode of Higurashi, I thought this episode was quite good!
In context of it being the penultimate episode? Ha ha. Very funny.
Teppei’s ““Redemption””
I just finished the VN version of Matsuribayashi a few months ago, and Ryukishi’s author notes in it call out how despite Higurashi being about not making any character a villain to be sacrificed to band together the heroes, he didn’t show that in Minagoroshi with Satoko’s subplot. So I wasn’t surprised at all to see him going back and re-tuning that thematic discrepancy with Teppei.
And as far as the portrayal went, I thought it was pretty well done? Teppei seemed believably awkward and selfish at taking the first steps of maybe trying to turn his life around. And I loved that the episode ends on the note that no, even if an abuser does try to change themselves for the better, it’s fully within the rights of their victims to not want them in their lives any more. And Teppei accepts that! Hence the sarcasm quotes in this section title - this wasn’t a black-and-white “redemption,” and it’s justified for both Satoko and the viewers to reject him.
Indeed, I’ve seen some people say this episode felt slow, but I thought the drawn-out tension and unease of the situation helped put me in Satoko’s wary and conflicted shoes even better. Just a great little self-contained mini-arc all around.
...If it is a self-contained arc. The other aspect I’ve seen debated is whether this is just the beginning, and we’re gearing up to see even more of Teppei trying to reconcile with Satoko. But personally, I thought this episode ended his subplot just fine, and we’ll probably move on to other topics for Episode 24.
(At least until if/when we see what was going on in Tatarigoroshi, which... well, even with Ryukishi’s livestream comments, I’m still not convinced that Satoko’s reactions in Tatarigoroshi are completely fake.)
There’s just one problem with this arc: why on earth are we getting this right now? If I actually thought next episode would be the series finale, I’d be very negative about this development wasting time that could be better spent on… literally anything else.
Luckily, it sounds like we might be getting more episodes of Higurashi. And with that on the table, I’m a lot more positive about this episode.
...Mostly because it gives me an excuse to ramble a bunch more about witches, ahaha. And on that note...
Oh THAT’S What “Certainty” Means!
She did it! She did the thing! SHE DID THE - *incoherent Lambda fangirl screeching*
Ahem. Let’s talk about Bern and Lambda’s “powers,” shall we?
In Umineko’s Episode 5/End, we see Bern solving what is… well, essentially a very hard riddle… for her piece by taking a short dip into the Sea of Fragments, fishing through a bunch of timelines, and grabbing a Fragment she found where her piece solved the riddle. And then that’s how the game board progresses.
It’s casual abuse of causality for the sake of showing off. So yes, Satoko is absolutely correct that her card trick is fully within Rika’s abilities!
Anyway, I’d always taken that Umineko scene as an example of how Bern’s ability to grant miracles works in practice. Which then left the intriguing question of Lambda - what does the ability to grant certainty look like, both on the board and off?
Well, I think we just got an answer to that! And oh goodness, it is so extremely Lambda.
See, in the “Bernkastel’s Letter” short story, we did get an answer by analogy - Bern describes her own abilities as similar to walking every branch of a maze, while Lambda chooses a path and bulldozes the walls in her way. So evidently Lambda’s approach is all about using willpower to solve problems with overwhelming force… and now with Gou, I finally understand that metaphor.
Why is “certainty” considered such a brute force approach? Because it’s based on the idea of aggressively and immediately discarding Fragments, until the only Fragments where you’re alive to observe are the ones with your desired outcome. And yes, this initially involved some very gratuitous suicide, because Lambda is nothing if not flashy and extra as hell.
(It’s also starting to make a lot more sense why Rika is so passive in Gou’s first cour - it’s meant to be a direct contrast with Satoko’s looping strategy!)
(Umineko Episode 8 spoilers)
Also, between Satoko’s insistence that she’s not smart enough for St. Lucia and now this, Bern’s “lol dumbass” reaction to Lambda’s heroic sacrifice in Episode 8 suddenly makes a lot more sense. Why are you even mad, Battler, Lambda dies ALL THE TIME?? XD
(end spoilers)
Is this magic? Or a trick?
Like how Bern’s “miracles” are thematically Rika’s looping strategy (just wait and hope for what you want) in miniature, Lambda’s “certainty” is also just Satoko’s looping strategy (yeet yourself out when you don’t get what you want) in miniature.
...but, do these little parlor tricks actually require their looping strategies being applied at Fragment scale? Hm.
I’d usually considered the question of “does Bern and/or her piece have to literally wait through all the timelines as Bern searches for a miracle?” to be unimportant semantics. Infinite time in the Sea of Fragments, etc., etc. Same with Satoko’s trick here - does it matter whether Satoko literally kills herself or not? The effect is the same.
However, with Eua’s rules about Satoko needing to die after Rika to chase her… well. Now quibbling over the exact mechanics of their powers actually might be relevant. Because if Satoko can still pull off these stunts while staying in sync with Rika, then Rika isn’t just facing an enemy looper - she’s facing a low-level reality warper.
Yeah, I think I’m also starting to understand why Bern describes Lambda as such a terrifying opponent...
Really Bizarre New Howdunnit Theory
Previously, I’d thought there were only two possibilities for Gou’s “howdunnit”: first, that Satoko was injecting H173 into people to make them go L5. Second, that Eua was using her godly influence and appearing in visions as some kind of evil “Oyashiro-sama.” But now, with it looking like Satoko/Lambda already has access to her witchy abilities, we have a third option: it’s Lambda messing with the dice, and causing a person to go L5 via certainty hax.
One way to interpret how Lambda’s magic works is that if an event can happen, she guarantees it will happen. And since every person infected with even low-level HS theoretically can reach L5... ha.
This idea also neatly gets around one of my major existing problems with the H173 theory - why is everyone attacking Rika, and not the extremely suspicious girl who just injected them with an unknown drug? But if Satoko is just going *snap* “you’re L5 now!”, that, uh, gets around the suspicious syringe problem. To say the least.
Though wow this is somehow even more utterly bonkers than anything I’d ever considered before? A plausible solution that is essentially “Satoko turned into a witch and committed the crimes with Fragment magic.” O.O
If true, then in hindsight, Satokowashi may be less of a howdunnit/whydunnit backstory arc, and actually more of - and I can’t believe I’m saying this too - a witch training arc.
That just sounds so wrong, and yet, I can’t deny the possibility!
Eua and More Meta-Mechanics
Moving onto our other resident just-get-over-with-it-and-call-her-a-witch, Eua!
...Immediately on hearing her name, Younger Brother bestowed the nickname “End User License Agreement,” and as such, EULA is her name now in my head. What can I say, she makes shady deals that require only a fig leaf of consent! :P
Anyway, I love that it turns out Satoko/Lambda is just as bad with coming up with names as Rika/Bern. D’aww. Though, now I’m somehow even more curious where she got the name “Lambdadelta.” Or when and where Eua got the name “Featherine Augustus Aurora.”
(If the latter ends up implied to be the name Rika came up with for her, that would make Bern’s inability to say the whole thing somehow even funnier.)
I also love that the reason Satoko is looping really is because living with Rika is hazardous to one’s health. Turns out the problem is time loop leakage and not parasites, but do I get half credit on that one, lol?
More seriously, it’s always been a thing that memories carry over in Higurashi, and it’s not too hard to speculate that it could be related to proximity with Rika. So even if the exact mechanics are a little funky if you squint at edge cases, I don’t have any problem accepting this explanation. It’s not like I have a better alternative theory!
(Even the Witch of Miracles knows miracles do not exist…)
Anyway, the main implication, I think, is that Takano also changed her mind because of these memories. (Called it?) However, given that Rika had never seen Takano change her mind before Nekodamashi, we might not get to see that happen until Onidamashi.
Speaking of which...
Which loop is this?
On first watch, another thing that really confused me about this episode was, when does it take place?
At the end of Episode 22, Eua gave Satoko the ability to chase after Rika in the loops. But… this isn’t Onidamashi! If anything, it looks like it might be Watadamashi, since that’s a loop where the club plays games at Da Vinci. Except we saw Watadamashi, and there were no conversations with Satoko showing off her looping powers! And despite the Teppei focus, it can’t be Tataridamashi either, as him arriving in Hinamizawa went differently there too!
So is this just a random loop before Satoko started looping with Rika? Hm… maybe.
However, my current theory is that this is the first loop where Satoko is synched with Rika. Or to be more specific, it’s what I theorized last episode - a loop where Satoko will once more allow events to progress all the way to St. Lucia to ensure Rika remembers her “sin,” and then she’ll kill Rika and dump her in Onidamashi to let the game of revenge truly begin.
And if I’m right about Satoko letting the timeline progress to 1988, that then brings up some interesting possibilities for next episode.
1. One option is to continue the Teppei plot, and to have Satoko actually let Rika attend St. Lucia alone (until her death). That may be why Rika’s Nekodamashi flashbacks never mention Satoko at St. Lucia.
2. The other is that Satoko does return to St. Lucia… but with how much focus this episode gave Satoko’s save scum card trick, I wonder if we might not be setting up for a very different St. Lucia loop. One where Satoko uses her new powers to ace every test and befriend Rika’s groupies. Though since Satoko’s anger is more about Rika’s broken promises than the studying at this point, doing well at St Lucia won’t necessarily stop her wrath.
But it might. In which case, the real question is how both girls will die.
Will Satoko opt for another rigged chandelier drop, given its prominence in the ED? But that’s a bit repetitive. Unless… hm. Unless Satoko does change her mind, and so Eua forces her hand with a real “accident.” Now that would be some laser-guided karma!
Village Destroying Arc, Huh
One last compare/contrast between Rika/Hanyuu and Satoko/Eua for the road.
Long before we met her, Rika apparently started out a bit more active about changing things, but Hanyuu constantly nagged Rika to be extremely passive. To the point where Rika basically never used or even referred to her powers at all except when on the verge of despair. (And even then, the most she would do is make ominous predictions!) Then, after it all was said and done, Hanyuu went out of her way to teach Rika to never even think about using her powers again.
Meanwhile Satoko/Eua is the complete opposite. Satoko tried Rika’s “let’s passively hope for a different outcome” all of one time, then said “screw that” and started using the most flashy, brute force tactics possible. With Eua applauding that and subtly guiding her further down that path.
What a difference it makes, to not be worried about a finite number of tries!
But this also makes me very worried for if/when Satoko tries to return to a normal life. Rika was able to adjust to living as a human again decently well. But Satoko has become so inhuman so quickly, I think she would have a much harder time of that, if she’d even be able to at all.
And so… the more I think about it, the more it feels like this “looper leakage” mechanic reveal may be setting up for a situation where both Rika/Bern and Satoko/Lambda have to leave and/or use the Onigari on themselves, for the sake of the village.
Like, Hanyuu’s realization that “actually, we should have just accepted Rika’s death in the first world” and her insistence that Rika stop thinking like Bern and never use the power again… suddenly that makes a lot more sense in light of this mechanic.
The more the power leaks, the harder it is to contain. Hanyuu just trying to save Rika’s life was enough to allow Satoko to access the Sea, and now Satoko looping is having even more spillover effects.
With them both looping, I imagine it’s only a matter of (meta-)time before the entire town starts experiencing cross-Fragment dreams. And while it seems to be having positive effects for now, I doubt it will lead to anything good in the long term. As I’ve seen speculated, it may even be part of, if not the reason everyone is going L5 so quickly, including people who normally never do. (Fourth possible howdunnit, perhaps?)
If we want to go really out there with predictions, and assume a third cour, then maybe it isn’t so far fetched for Rena to be a third looper. Or heck - the entire club could get wrapped up in the loops!
Oh Rika. Oh Satoko. What have you done?
(Succeeded at being very entertaining, that’s what!)
