So, let’s talk about Akiren, our friendly neighbourhood phantom thief. He’s a silent protagonist, but also he’s kind of traumatised and is incapable of being vulnerable with his dearest friends. More than that, it’s as if he doesn’t want to burden his friends, even if it’s just with his feelings.
The most important part of his backstory is him being falsely accused of assault. It’s the reason he’s in Tokyo, the reason he has a terrible reputation. It’s clear he only brings up this incident when prompted, and he doesn’t go into how he feels about it beyond “Yeah that sucked” even though it was clearly emotionally taxing. His memories of that incident are blurry, he feels dizzy when he hears Shido’s voice, and even though he admits it sounds like the same man from that night it still takes hearing him multiple times before he really recognises him. It’s trauma, pure and simple.
A moment I think about a lot is from Yoshida’s confidant. There’s a point where Yoshida says “You must’ve experienced cruelty and justice in this life. I can tell by the look in your eye. (…) Would you care to… talk about it?” and one of Akiren’s first possible responses is “What good would that do?” A very blunt response. He doesn’t want to talk about it. He doesn’t see the point in talking about it. He’s sad and angry but He. Won’t. Talk about it.
You could argue Proof of Justice is similar. When Ren starts thinking about Akechi after his death, he doesn’t consult his friends. He goes out alone, and ends up crying and mourning Akechi alone, and I bet he doesn’t tell anyone about this afterwards either. He won’t let anyone see that side of him.
Next up, let’s check out the Mementos Mission manga. In chapter six, Ren has to give info to the police as a witness to Asakura’s poisoning by himself. Unfortunately, he’s also got to deal with the police being rude to him about his history.
He’s clearly uncomfortable being judged like this, but he just keeps his head down and takes it. It’s like he’s just accepted it. You’d think, “Oh but Ren can talk to his friends later, he can vent and then they can complain together about how awful those police officers were!” Except, this is the next time we see Ren:
He’s smiling like nothing’s wrong, like he didn’t have to go through something horrible. He’s back to being the leader who everyone can rely on. Back to hiding sad feelings.
This time I want to talk about an anthology story, called “The Curry’s Secret And The Treasure That Joker Can’t Steal.” This story was drawn by Rokuro Saito, same as Mementos Mission (I swear Saito is a godsend).
In this story, Morgana lunges at Ren for being ignored, which leads to Ren knocking over a pot of curry and nearly smashing a special coffee cup. Sojiro is super mad. Ren doesn’t want to admit it was Morgana’s fault, since Sojiro might throw Morgana out, so he stays silent but that just makes Sojiro angrier.
Later, Ann asks him why Ren doesn’t just explain what really happened. She says that it Ren was honest about it then there wouldn’t have been a misunderstanding. Ren’s response is… kind of chilling.
He gets such a dead look in his eye. He’s already accepted that he won’t be believed and there’s no point in saying anything. That trauma’s shining through once again.
In the end, the situation is only resolved because Ann, Ryuji, and Yusuke got together to tell Sojiro what really happened. And Ren seems so happy, like it never occured to him his friends would want to stand up for him.
There are many other examples I could use, like Akiren has to turn himself in towards the end and he just thinks “Oh this way I can protect my friends. But I’m not going to tell any of them I’m turning myself in and essentially repeating my trauma of being arrested.” I love him, but I think he could really benefit from expressing his real emotions some more. (Maybe that’s why Expression isn’t one of the protagonist’s social stats in this game…)
I think I got off topic. Anyway, Akiren is a master of bottling his emotions and he needs a hug.
