Drdt Spoilers - Tumblr Posts

Ok so first of all major spoilers for drdt.

Anyways one of the most notable themes in drdt is kindness. More specifically the difference between kindness as a trait and kindness as a choice. You can see this with almost every character but the main focus of this theme is Eden.

We know that eden very deliberately chooses to be nice. Other characters like arei view kindness as something you are(The David flashback among other)

So how does this trace to hu? Well its kinda obvious that she choose to be kind to people. Yes she does so in a different way than eden but she still does it. (In fact both eden and hu are introduced first in the prologue)

Yeah that pretty much spells it out for you.

So the first obvious parallel is how they both choose kindness. But they do choose it in different ways. In fact they both kinda fall into preexisting tropes from the danganronpa. Eden takes the archetypal role of a "child" and Hu does so as a "mom character" (bleugh). If you want proof that this was intentional for hu just look at the voice trailer for drdt.

However as seen from characters like Nico this role is subverted in a very interesting way. This subversion isn't really obvious until chapter 2. Obviously when you think of chapter 2 and hu you think of Nico. But you can actually see it more obviously with David.

This comes AFTER a confirmation of davids secret. Even at this point Hu still trusts him AND more specifically gives him an easy way out. If David wanted to keep manipulating people he could have followed on this and gave a bullshit sob story.

There is a similar parallel to this when Ace is being accused. Eden says that his injuries would make it harder to commit murder.

The main difference here is that Eden's defense is both A) Logical and B) not directed at someone she personally likes.

This comes to an interesting conclusion that even though these characters fit the "mom" and "child" role, Eden is more emotionally mature than Hu. This leads to a really interesting dynamic.

It also makes sense to assume that Hu only defends/is nice to certain people. After all when ace is accused Hu jumps right on the toxic accusation train. So lets look at who Hu chooses to defend.

Obviously she chooses to defend Nico. This is more obvious to the narrative that I don't feel thew need to explain it. Nico is bullied. Hu feels bad for them.

Ok then what about David? Welll

She relates to him. Assuming Hu isn't lying about her secret. She can relate to depression. My theory is she's desperate to believe that David got over his depression and thus making it feel possible to get over her's. (Oh im so so curious about her backstory)

Eden on the other hand is nice to everyone. She's nice to Arei even after she insult her. She feels bad for Ace at the end of the trial and even now she's trying to connect to teruko. She's not picky about who she cares about and who she defends.

I don't think this makes hu a worse character. In fact I think it makes hu that much better. She's way more relatable and is an ore accurate depiction of kindness. Also presuming she has some kind of trauma(her secret) her being picky about who she defends and likes only really makes sense.

Anyways that's hu vs eden.

I wanna talk about the Hu/Eden parallels so badly

oh my peenis hurts

What was it like? (mini comic feat. Levi and Arturo)

(HEAVY EP 16 SPOILERS)

also, bonus panel/panel I reformatted:

hahaah the fact Levi didn't see Ace's execution has been tormenting me since the ep dropped so... heres this! I dont like some parts but I spent like 7 straight hours on it so its definitely getting posted.

also I feel like Arturo and Levi (if Levi survives) will be kinda gang in chapter 3. that may be wishful thinking, but its a wish i'll hold onto!

edit ; ALSO WHO SPELT GROUND WRONG? NOT MEE!!; 😂🔫

Chapter 3 Levi (in my brain)

(spoilers obvi)

this is like... half a prediction, half headcannon, igs?

wheelchairs are so. so hard to draw.

Anyway yeah, i figure Levi isn't just gonna... spring up when he's stitched back together. idk if he'd actually lose motor functions in his legs, but i def don't think he'd be able to walk without assistance for a whillleee either way. so... wheelchair! + Arturo not leaving him the fuck alone so he can constantly monitor Levi's condition.

plus plus a lil comic on how I feel his attitude about mentions of Ace:

Even though he said he didn't care one way or the other if Ace died, he seems pretty peeved when other people feel the same way...! Otherwise, I feel like his attitude will be relatively the same, still trying to be a good person from a vast emotional distance! He's just more tired now, and always in mild pain, so... his temper might come out some more.

Before I watch what we have of chapter 2 regarding Danganronpa despair time. I have a question.

Under read more is my question: also potential spoilers

What did Arturo do , I've seen people being vague but I want to know what he did.

I've seen people call him creepy and a pervert and I was wondering what had happened

I don't want to go in blind because I want to warned before watching lol.

If the despair time cast was in an the owl house type universe what do you think their covens would be ?

Tbh I'm sort of waiting for weeby to react to the despair time episodes so I can watch them lol.

But from what I've been seeing around my timeline ..... I'm kind of scared..

Spoiler (up untill episode ,10 lol): I guess , just some things I've seen while scrolling, haven't watched the episodes

Arturo being lowkey creepy lol

Characters outing each other

J is being masc coded [or is flat out in the process of transitioning or something]

Arturo being lowkey transphobic but may get better or something because he stops at one point.....

Arei is dead ?!?! There's a switch theory going around though [with J]

Arturo going rouge

Arturo has a dead sister that is a fresh wound because he tried to kill Eden or something

Arturo !!!!??

Eden and Arei development (maybe this will make me quit hating arei lol)

More Veronica x arturo

Veronica acting like the fandom lol

Teruko ?!?!?!

David ?!?!?!

I haven't seen much with Charles :(

Rose or whit either

Others are talking about hu , something about infantilism....

Don't know how I feel about that , don't know if that'll make me dislike a character untill I actually get around to watching it once weeby does

After everything I still don't hate Arturo. In fact I really enjoy his character.

His character is just too interesting to hate. I luv his character so much

Danganronpa despair time spoilers up to episode 11

Just character talk and my opinion overall

So ummm David.... I started to actually like his character more this chapter. Really glad he's most likely not the killer because I want to see the others characters interactions with David now knowing his secret.

Same with Arturo because boy am I hoping he gets character development. Yeah I never hated his character even with his weird obsession with J but I'm sure his character will get more development now. (Hundred percent sure he's not the killer because in my opinion it'd be stupid if he was).

I also want more verturo moments because I love them as well.

I 100% believe Hu to be killer though but I'm kind of sad if it's true because I wanted to see her interactions with David after this trial. Because I loved the interactions they had. David calling Hu out for her crap but also Hu's reaction towards David's "real" personality was *chef's kiss*...... I really wish Hu was mostly likely not the killer but at the same time hope she is.

Hu never really annoyed me. I can see why she annoyed others but a character like hers can never annoy me because I'd always want more from her and this trial gave me just that. I genuinely believe that's she the murder with no remorse. If she's not then that's fine too. This trial gave me something for her character that a secret like that is not needed.

David song is "the bidding" by tally hall though

Im really scared for Eden though. I don't want her to die next chapter but I'm scared for how this may affect her. She was already hurt so badly about aeri's death and now knowing that David is a full on liar might make her shut herself from the group. But knowing her she's gonna put on a brave face.

Also Charles and teruko continue to be my biggest ship. (Along with whit because he's part of the ot3)

Also what does end of part 1 mean because..... I have no concept of time lol.

Anyway I liked what we have of this chapter. I don't hate any of these characters (Arei I'm still neutral on but I don't hate her. Nor characters that people normally hate like teruko , Arturo, Hu etc in fact I really love most of the ones I listed)

Teruko x Charles x whit thrived so hard this chapter.

[ this has spoilers for all of chapter 2 (till episode 11)]

Charles and whit hanging out interacting being ✨Bros✨

Charles actively wanting to search the second floor with Teruko

Whit being a wingman for Teruko and charles

Charles telling Teruko how much he cares for her by telling her how similar he was to her in the first chapter.

[Whit and Teruko barely had any moments this chapter but I loved their moments in chapter one. Whit trying to make her laugh and apologizing to her if he suspects he's made her uncomfortable. (This is the bare minimum but it's rare to see this in shows.)]

Charles knowing whit's mannerisms

Whit constantly making Charles blush during the class trial

" teruko we fucked up" - ✨married coupled goals✨

The three are roommates. Teruko desperately wants them to kick her out the polycule because she she believes she's hurting them but whit and Charles reassure her that she's the best person to them.

I don't know a ship name for them

They need a ship name because I luv these three as a group and can't wait for more for them. I hope these survive.

Danganronpa despair time ship their list and opinions and reasons

{ before you judge me , please read my reasons , I promise I am sane , I'm just Terrible at how I word what I like and dislike}

Opinions and reasons under read more

Spoilers up to chapter 2 episode 11

OTP:

My brain itches so much when these people interact

Veronika x Arturo - their moments are just so interesting. I want to dissect them so much. I want more moments for them because of how much they bring me joy when they're together. I'm so frustrated that I can't explain this ship , it just itches my brain ◉⁠‿⁠◉

Love

Roommates just because. People I can imagine sharing an apartment together with two dogs name lucky and bill nye

Charles x teruko x whit - explained here

Like

Ships that made me go awww or "I can get behind this

Rose x teruko - idk their interactions in chapter two really made me ship them more than I usually did in chapter 1. The pull up scene was cute.

Nico x rose - their free time event together was really cute. But it's kind of sad that Nico used his time with rose to use something she had around to help with his murder plan with Ace. Other than that their ship hasn't gone down a peg because I still enjoy them as a ship.

Veronica x Ace - I don't know they seemed cute. Saw some other people ship them and I became kind of hooked. There interactions just make me want more.

Get character development

Interactions are funny and make me want more , but are too one dimensional for me to be like "oh yeah they'd be cute romantically" even though one hates the other and the other can't stop threatening them

Levi x Ace? - listen I don't know. There interactions just make we want more. I don't ship them but I also don't see them as a brotp. But I'm also not neutral towards them either. I don't know how to explain them because ?????. I guess I have to wait and see what their characters Intel (unless Levi is the murderer for chapter 2 or something lol )

Mixed feelings

Not ships really but dynamics I enjoy because they pick my brain in a way that's different than my romantic ships and platonic ships

Eden x Arei - I don't know if I should ship them romantically or not. What Arei did to Eden is not okay but that confession to Eden really touched my heart with water and almost drowned it. If only Arei didn't die , I would've loved to see how differently she would've treated Eden after this.

David x Hu? - somethings going on between them in the chapter two trial. I don't know kind of want Hu to strangle David lol [my sister says they read like divorced parents]

Arei x David - you can't fake a blush this one's not really one I enjoy as much as the other ones but I felt like I needed to put this here because I wonder if David actually tries to hide that he has feelings for other people.

David x Xander (xanvid)- same as above.

Brotp

Should stay friends but in a ✨best friends ✨ type of way. I don't know how to explain my brotps just know they could work as roommates but not in the same way Charles , teruko and whit are.

Teruko x David - saw someone say they mirror each other and I can't get that out of my head.

Veronica x teruko - the moments in chapter 2 made me like their interactions

Eden x teruko - their chapter 2 moments and the fact that teruko basically admitted that she didn't want to hurt Eden because of her bad luck because Eden is so nice to her. (I would ship them if it wasn't for brain only seeing them as just friends , may change later on but omg I love these two together) overall very cute

Hu x Levi - dad and mom duo?. Maybe lol but like platonic because they don't read as romantic

Eden x Levi - chapter two interactions. I don't know. their scene in the kitchen was pretty cute

Neutral

Don't think about these ships often enough to dislike them or fawn over as much as the ones above.

Teruko x min - I liked their interactions before her death but I never thought about the ship so their last interaction didn't have as big as an impact on me as the story made it out to be.

Teruko x Xander - same as above but their interactions had a huge affect on me to the point where imma remain neutral untill I get answers for what the heck happened at the beginning "why did you ask me to kill teruko" . Ultimate rebel my butt , taking orders from someone lol.

Arturo x Charles - don't know how this ship came to be so I remain neutral on it lol. Don't hate it as their colors match really well. Just don't see how they would act if they were "together" because they barely interact.

Dislike

I don't understand these ships listed from their interactions to their characters themselves

J x Arturo - their something about 'some' obsessive x target dynamics I dislike. I don't know what it is. I'm neutral on J's character to the point where I can't hate Arturo as a character because of his actions towards J. I don't know how to explain it lol. Their interactions were interesting mostly because it was the most emotion I've seen Arturo show and J's yelling voice makes my eyes light up. (Her VA is so good). Other than I find their dynamic interesting I wouldn't like them as friends or romantic. I says friends only because it depends on how despair time frames them making up with each other because while Arturo acted creepy towards J I don't know how I feel about dog piling someone about their dead sister is the right way to get pay back. J has not obligation to forgive Arturo for his actions towards her either but I wonder where their dynamic will take them after chapter 2 (because I'm confident neither of them are the killer)

J x Arei - never seen the appeal of this ship. I don't know kind of want people to not mock J about the way she dresses or chooses to behave. (This is just my opinion though if you saw it as teasing I won't berate you about it but It personally didn't sit right with me)

Arturo x Eden - Eden accidentally triggered Arturo causing him to threaten her with a scaple because he doesn't want his secret known (not Edens fault obviously.... I just don't want to base a ship off threats to their lives)

Nico x Hu - I don't know , it feels weird to ship this.

Kinda specific, but could you please draw Whit telling unhinged David that he's safe now?

Thanks for the request

Based on that “you toyed with my heart” line

This line has been stuck in my head for days on end... Someone... Save me.....

SPOILERS FOR DRDT CHAPTER 2 EPISODE 13

TW: SUICIDE

I just wanted to share my thoughts on the episode too since I've seen a lot of people do that

By the way I had to watch this like 7 hours after it was released and I have not scrolled through Tumblr yet so I might bring up stuff that have already been discussed. Also all of these notes were written down while I was watching the episode so yeah

-Levi just moved up so much on my kin list it's insane like omg…

- This was one bad day for Acevi fans, huh. I guess the Xanvid came at a price

-Whit I can now see why David told you to shut up I like you but that was bad 💀 (he was probably left affected by how David reacted in episode 12 and is either really uncomfortable or somewhat intimidated by David now)

-Nah nah nah that's definitely not Teruko's secret so I'm gonna start theorizing now. Teruko might have most of the secrets. It's not like they belong to her, but if you think back to episode 8 she said that she doesn't know which secret is hers because so many things have happened in her life. She probably said that she got the family secret because she thought that was the most likely one. Hu's secret might also be accurate to her considering the fact that, in episode 4, she told Arei that failed suicide attempts are painful, hinting at the fact that she might have tried to kill herself at some point (also backed up by the fact that, in episode 3, she says "why save my life if you're just going to ruin it afterwards?" when talking about her medical debt). The idea that she has most (if not all, but I doubt that) of the secrets might tie in with the killing game secret since it says "How could I even select what secret to be your motive?". The wording here is very ambiguous since it could be interpreted as "secrets about your life" or "secrets that are on the board", like the ones that the other cast members have, the latter being something that I bet that nobody in the fandom thought about until this episode. Anyway theory over back to saying stupid shit

-AREI ILYSM YOU ARE MAKING ME CRY YET FEEL HAPPY THAT'S WHY YOU'RE MY FAVORITEEEEE 😭😭😭

-SHE GOT NEW SPRITES TOO SHE IS SO PRETTY

-I MADE AN AUDIBLE GASP NOISE WHEN THAT CG WITH EDEN SHOWED UP HOLY SHIT!!!! I think she might have hurt or killed the girl she kissed? Unless she killed Arei, which is still a posibility, or Levi lied about his secret for Eden’s sake (idea which could contribute to the "Eden killer Levi accomplice" theory), though Charles would have also needed to lie for Eden since he had her secret. Also, if we're going with Eden remorseless murderer theory, in my opinion, it wouldn't make sense for Eden to be a remorseless killer after what Arei said about her making a mistake "that she couldn't take back" (showing that she probably felt remorse for what she did). Also also this is a good time for me to bring up the note with "Eden's motive" that Charles gave to Teruko. That note could be proof of whether or not Eden really does have the girl kisser secret and I want to mention that the note could be anything since we only have Charles' word to rely on. I really hope we get to see what it says because it's been making me more suspicious of Charles (I personally think that Charles is somewhat suspicious so I might make a post about it soon even though there isn't much proper evidence to say that he has something to do with the killing game, there's still a couple of questionable things about what he's done/said). Okay yap session number two over

-Arei moved up even more on my kin list how is that even possible…. I also love how her voice changed so much in this episode. Even in prior episodes, her voice seemed so cheerful and energetic, yet in this one, it's much calmer. Showing that she truly is feeling relieved that there are other bad people in the world like her and that she might have a chance to redeem herself if so. God damnit Mokaui (Arei's VA) did such a good job with all of her voice lines she needs to be credited more

-THE AREI CG I AM CRYING AREI YOU ARE EVERYTHING TO ME ILYSM I CAN'T WAIT FOR THE BONUS EPISODE AFTER THIS

-They're finally talking about the murder method this is a new evolution for humanity

-Monotv causally breaking the forth wall, now we can blame it on the cast that they were talking about the secrets for an entire year because they didn't watch the Chapter 2 recap

-YESSS FINALLY A MINIGAME I’VE MISSED THESE SO MUCHHHH

-Ooh so that's what the broken handles meant also that Veronika art is so pretty

-I wonder why they would want to break her neck though, it doesn't seem like it would help with the murder at all, but maybe the killer was trying to cause confusion

-This is proving a theory that I've had for a while. If Arei was hung from the ceiling of the playground, then that could be tied in with the broken lights and the movie screening room above the playground. How would they be able to get her into the playground from the movie screening room though…

-J 💀 (that's all I’ve got to say literally)

-That's a lot of very precise information Whit I can understand Veronika but why would you know all that. Care to share something with the class?

-The text animations in the debate are so unique like the question marks with Rose and the one that circles around the top of Levi’s head those look so cool. Also getting to hear a lot of characters talk in a row feels amazing. It gives them a lot of depth showing the contrast between those characters’ tones of voice.

-Also there goes my screening room theory damn

-Everyone just roasting Teruko again is the best thing out of this episode /j

-We got puppy Whit 10/10 episode

-Also THREE CGS AND TWO MINIGANES IN ONE EPISODE??? DRDTDEV YOU HAVE BEEN COOKING 🔥🔥🔥 YOU CAN STOP NOW THE KITCHEN IS ON FIRE (IN THE GOOD WAY). YOU MADE AN ENTIRE BUFFET. THIS IS AN ALL-YOU-CAN-EAT YOU CAN STOP NOW-

-Ooooo she's talking about Ace's attempted murder

-(Probably) Nico and Ace focused episode next week Nico and Ace fans are gonna be eating good

Overall, this might be my favourite episode so far. Not like I had a favourite episode before but still this was SO good

Also I just checked my Tumblr notifications why are there 50 like oh my lord 💀

SPOILERS FOR DRDT CH2 E14

Giving my thoughts on the new episode again! It's surprisingly fun

-I'm actually starting to like Nico more, they used to be the second character I disliked the most, but I really like DRDT's different take on the "shy character" trope. It makes it feel so unique and Nico far more relatable

-And just when I started to like Hu more, now she's back at the bottom again (I'm not saying that her character is bad, it's just that I don't really like the mom and emotionally-oriented character tropes mashed together. Those types of characters are usually pretty annoying to me...) Her rebuttal was cool though

-TELL HER CHARLES!!! (can you see that I'm biased)

-WHOA WHOA WHOA COMIC THINGY THIS EARLY???

-they're finally talking about the tape. Theorists, you can rest easy now

-god damnit why are all of the characters in DRDT so relatable. Rose I feel so bad for you girl

-TERUROSE!!! RORUKO!!! YURI!!!! WHATEVER THE FUCK IT'S CALLED!!! (It's not that I ship this, I just love the dynamic between Rose and Teruko)

-Teruko has developed so much in two chapters it's insane

-this might be bad for the Arden stocks

-EDEN ISTG IF IT'S ACTUALLY YOU THEN I HAVE NO HOPE FOR ANYONE HERE

-TELL THEM TERUKO!!!

-David are you being /srs or /j

-why are the chibis so cute. I love it when Drdtdev does this. Just add a little chibi there while they're trying to figure out who the killer is and to not get executed. Also why is the evil Eden one so cute

-"The only person I need to believe me is Teruko." I think you're asking for a bit much buddy

-Even David has started to grow on me a lot with this episode. The way he foils Teruko is so intriguing. I can't wait to see how their rivalry develops

-WE GOT TERUDEN TOO!!! LOVE WINS!!!! (it doesn't)

-Teruko is starting to work with others and maybe even believe in them a bit. I love to see her character arc growing even more. She is such a well written character. Teruko fans, rise up!!!

-[Eden hugs Teruko] DRDTdev you are diabolical.

-time to go to sleep since it's like 3 am for me rn lmao

10/10 episode, as usual

DRDT CHAPTER 2 EPISODE 15 SPOILERS

Another ramble because this episode was FIRE!!!!!

All of these are mental notes that I had while watching the premiere of the episode.

-calling it rn it's Ace

-I am literally kicking my feet rn

-Ace I'm sorry to tell you this but you seem kinda screwed

-NICO'S LITTLE "I'm sorry" THAT'S SUCH AN AWESOME DETAIL

-Whit this is a serious moment please

-I always found the parallels between Teruko and Ace very interesting, even though they didn't show up a lot, so I'm glad that we got more of that. It feels like Teruko was made to parallel almost every character... Interesting....

-Charles: "He'd have the element of surprise as well." Hehehe.....

-THANK YOU CHARLES THESE OTHER GUYS ARE ALL IDIOTS

-Charles: "Your input is unnecessary." Damn Charles really did tell David "Who asked"

-J: "Isn't Ace... too stupid?" Oh my GOD J- (I know most people won't agree but J has just been a bit annoying to me this trial... This line did not help)

-I'm actually starting to like Ace a lot. I liked him even before this episode but he truly is such an interesting character. How he has a hard time choosing between his dignity and risking his life seems so unreasonable, yet so humane. I always felt as though Ace was one of those really REALLY misunderstood characters (even I have mischaracterized him, I'll admit...) and I was really excited to learn more about him, although I didn't expect it to be like this.

-I love Charles so much he's literally me (close enough) Thank you once again Mr Cuevas for showing us the height of the drdt cast's idiocy.

-Even Hu had to try to somewhat help Ace (when she told him to calm down). Though I think it was more because she wanted to not feel "useless" while Ace was desperately fighting for his life

-The way the text in the Non-Stop Debate circles around J's head reminds me a lot of the Literature Girl MV

-Ace's new sprites are so pretty ngl I like them a lot

-I'm sorry but when I saw the argument armament for a split second I thought that Ace had a bowl cut.... Anyway ARGUMENT ARMAMENT YAYA!!!

-Teruko: "We determine who lives and who dies by a majority vote." DID YOU JUST SAY MAJORITY VOTE, TERUKO??????? *Not so, Sou intensifies*

-The Teruko and Ace parallels going hard rn....

-I love how Ace acts compared to Min. Min was desperate to prove that she wasn't the killer, even when she knew she was done for, but Ace just gives up. He's just too tired to argue anymore, he feels too bad about what he's done and he knows that his fear of dying has finally caught up to him and that there's nothing he can do. He was so afraid that he would get killed, so he decided to kill someone first. It didn't really matter who it was, he could have chosen Hu or Levi but he chose Arei simply because it was convenient. Ace is such a morally gray character and a very good one at that. It's very rare that you see these types of characters portrayed in such a realistic way. Amazing work, DRDTdev.

-J: "Murder is unacceptable, no matter what." Okay Tsurugi Kinjo /j

-AREI EVEN BEFORE DEATH YOU WERE BEAUTIFUL

-How we feeling Ace fans

This episode actually left me shocked... Like. WOW. Episode 13 isn't my favourite episode anymore, this is.

DRDT CHAPTER 2 EP 16 SPOILERS

Another quick rundown of my thoughts about this episode but I'm late to this because I didn't get to watch the premiere ❤️ Also this one is a little bit short since I have been rendered speechless (Charles style) by the most recent episode

-Seth Raffield deserves a raise for his voice acting like GOD DAMN

-Ace might be dying but at least the Ace fans are getting an animation with him (I can already see the edits....)

-"Now loading the default XF-Ture personality drivers." XF-TURE?????? WHAT DO YOU MEAN "DEFAULT XF-TURE"????

-"To run this killing game until the death of every participant" Interesting how drdt doesn't have the default "The killing game will continue until there are only 2 people left alive". Very, very interesting....

-MANIFESTING THE TERUKO ULTIMATE LUCK RN!!!

-"Charles, stop looking and cover your eyes!" Awwww cute Charwhit moment <3 but this REALLY ISN'T THE TIME

-The gun will probably not work because of Teruko's luck and she's liv- oh wait nvm Levi's dead

-Most of the fandom (including me) thought that Levi was gonna be the killer and then get executed. I mean he is getting executed so we were somewhat right

-Levi protecting Teruko because she "protected" him in the prologue....

-"He could live, theoretically, but only if he gets immediate medical treatment." And who do you think could do that, huh, Arturo?

-SERIOUS WHIT SPRITE????? SERIOUS WHIT SPRITE????

-ACEVI IS... LIVING????? BUT ALSO DYING????? BUT ALSO LIVING?????

-more pathetic Arturo please I like to see him suffer

-LEVI'S ALREADY DEAD WITH THESE GUYS' ENTIRE MONOLOGUES LIKE DAMN HURRY IT THE FUCK UP

-missed opportunity for "death by horse" but the execution was really unique I've seriously never seen anything like that in any other execution. Also the fact that he didn't even die looking like a bloodied up mess is a much needed change of pace from all the gore in normal danganronpa executions (not saying that that's a bad thing, just that this is something unique)

-imagine if Ace didn't actually have a cardiac arrest from all of the almost-death he's been going through but instead by the confetti. Like what if he has a phobia of confetti and just died right then and there /j

-MORE MONOTV LORE LET'S GOOO

-WAIT ARE WE ACTUALLY NOT GOING TO FIND OUT IF LEVI IS DEAD OR NOT???? Damn, time for Levi fans to go feral

If this post seems somewhat different from my other ones just so you know that it's because I just woke up lmao

BANGER episode though. I wish that I could've been able to show my love for this episode more but I literally have no words

Everything I found in the new DRDT MV

SPOILERS AFTER THE CUT PLEASE DO NOT READ IF YOU WANT TO DISCOVER THESE THINGS FOR YOURSELF

We’ll start with the footnotes. I found nearly all of them, the exception being [8] which I couldn’t find. I will provide timestamps for each, and try my best to explain what it means.

[1] (1:22) - It is talking about solving the crossword, meaning that J would go by Julia and Xander would be Alexander. It’s also saying that David isn’t in the crossword, yet Teruko is. I will go into more detail on the crossword later.

[2] (3:02) - Arabidopsis is a thale cress plant; Drosophila melanogaster is a fruit-fly; and E. coli is bacteria. I’m not quite sure how these link, though.

[3] (2:18) - Literally a quote from Title 17 of the United States Code; which talks about Copyright.

[4] (1:47) - This footnote is attached to a bit of text in the background that says “subtract 4, add to tetraphobia.”. Tetraphobia is the practice of avoiding the number 4, which is mentioned in the description.

[5] (3:10) - As it says in the description, this part of the song has been mistranslated several times, so there is no reliable translation for it.

[6] (2:02) - The little 6 can be found next to the hands that look like this: 🙏. I assume the previous hand gestures were referencing a specific prayer, but I’m not sure.

[7] (2:41) - I’m gonna be honest, there isn’t much to work with here. The footnote in the description isn’t much help and the little 7 appears to be attached to the word “mind”

[8] - I couldn’t find [8] in the video, however, I googled the quote from the description and it comes from Alice in Wonderland.

[9] (2:08) - Again, the footnote in the description isn’t that helpful. This time, its attached to “sing a degraded copy”. The phrase “degraded copy” is in pink, so it’s probably important (maybe), but I really don’t know.

[10] (2:01) - The bit in the description mentions that “10 in Roman Numerals is X” and footnote 10, can be found on the right of the big, pink X in the background. Maybe the footnote is hinting that only 10 people will die in DRDT, because the pink X is very similar to the dead portrait Xs.

[11] (1:32) - Now, this one is probably the most interesting, because it says that ⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪ ⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪ doesn’t exist. Given that this video centres around David, we can assume that this is most likely talking about his sister that he mentioned in Chapter 2 Episode 10, Diana. She fits the amount of letters perfectly. As for why this footnote is attached to “suspicious gaps”, I’m not quite sure. All I know about the gaps, is that there’s four of them.

[12] (2:02) - This part of the video shows that one person received 16 votes, and no-one else received any. This fits in with the description talking about majority vote (YTTD ref? /hj)

[13] (2:40) - Now this one is definitely next to something that’s been encoded. It seems like it’s been encrypted into Base64, but when I put those letters and numbers into a decoder, I got utter nonsense. It could have been encrypted several times, or it could just not be Base64, I’m still trying to work that out. The symbol in the description appears to mean correct as well, which fits with the placement.

[14] (3:52) - This appears to be at the end of a long chain of numbers, split into several parts. If you look at the equals symbol in the back, you’ll find the little 14. The hint in the description says “word length of 256″, which I could easily link to ASCII. ASCII is a form of character storage which only has 256 possible characters. Again, I’ll figure out what all the numbers mean, and translate it into something readable at some point.

[15] (1:48) - Not quite sure what to say here. The 15 is attached to the word “happiness” and the description talks about “ignorance is bliss”

[16] (2:50) - This is found on several screenshots(?) of a music sheet, which is “Entry of the Gladiators” by Julius Fucik.

[17] (2:01) - Probably the first footnote I spotted, I think I noticed it during my first watch, when it premiered. The description is right though, “Democratic-ly” isn’t a word.

[18] (3:04) - This one can be found with the dandelions (weed). I don’t know what the description is talking about though, the flowers are beautifully drawn ^^

[19] (3:42) - This one’s quite interesting because it’s part of a conversation. Not quite sure what it’s about but I’m pretty sure one of the mystery people is David.

[20] (1:53) - The description mostly explains that the 5 stages of grief are kind of outdated because they can be classed as reductionist, only considering nature.

[21] (3:49) - Again, another pretty simple one that I’m not sure I need to really explain.

[22] - This one is literally on screen for barely a second right at the very end, just before the video stops.

Now, I’ll move on to discuss the YouTube comment type things that appeared on the screen at around 1:09. These are in the order of when the appeared on screen (i think lol).

1.  “ ⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪ is like the byakuya/nagito/kokichi of the cast.” - This is probably talking about David, given the personality he showed during Chapter 2 Episode 11. Also, David has the right amount of letters. 2. “lets play spot the komaeda.” - Again, most likely about David. 3. “I like that  ⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪ is a protagonist who also plays the antag[onist]” 4. This one is likely about Teruko given how she’s our protagonist and can be quite antagonistic at times. (*cough* pulling a knife out on several people during Chapter 2 *cough*) 5. “mm  ⚪⚪⚪⚪ anyone?” - Not sure who this is talking about because there are so many people who have a four-letter name. (Levi, Whit, Arei, Nico, Rose and Eden) 6. “⚪ and  ⚪⚪⚪⚪ totally swapped places” - Ok, this is definitely about the J and Arei swapped theory. 7. “ ⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪ will obviously die in ch5″ - Could be talking about David again, but there’s something later in the video that might suggest otherwise, which I’ll talk about later on. 8. “I just hope ⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪ doesn’t go crazy and kill in chapter 3. That would be way [too] predictable.” - Arturo 100% 9. “Everyone in the comment section is a fucking idiot” - Now this one’s kind of mean, but also very interesting. This could be David telling us we’re all wrong, or the creators.

At about 1:22, a crossword shows up briefly, as mentioned during [1]. I like crossword type things so I took some time to solve it. After this crossword shows up, there are several bits of text, which are matched with a roman numerals, so I matched those phrases up to the roman numerals from the crossword.

Across:

I. Alexander IV. Arei - “Right now, why do you cry?” VI. Arturo - “mind exercises 1234” VIII. Nico - “even if I try to think, idk!!! (lmao)” IX. Levi - “look aside from that, give me the usual medicine” - I wasn’t sure what was going on here XII. Eden - “But you’re in my way, aren’t you?” XIII. Teruko - “or” / “To be or not to be” XV. Whit - “Remaining ignorant, isn’t that “happiness”?” XVI. Hu - “Go and cry.”

Down:

II. Rose - “Ego cogito ergo (terbatus) sum” III. Charles - “If you doubt brittle things are broken.” V. Ace - “Right now, why do you go insane?” VII. Julia - “Do it like that, let’s live together” X. Min - “Democratic-ly”  XI. Mai - “God is dead” XIV. Veronika - “Things like substance of the arts”

And to finish off this post, I’ll talk about anything extra that couldn’t fit anywhere else. I’ll provide timestamps as well, lol.

(0:37) - Text says “I am a cat” before the word dog quickly covers the word cat. This could be a reference to how MonoTV looks like a cat, but insists they are a dog.

(1:00) - Text that is very briefly on screen says: “I did love you once so you should not have believed me.”

(1:04) - The person on screen looks like she could be Mai? Not really sure here, but she seems important.

(1:05) - Text at the bottom of the screen says “I’m guilty as charged. Sorry, we’re not there yet.” This could be a reference to how David says “I’m guilty as charged” in Chapter 2 Episode 11.

(1:28) - Text in red says “I hate the things that I love, and I love the tings that I hate.” This could be a reference to the photos of Mai and Teruko.

(2:02) - “Voting results: Everyone will be executed. There is no such thing as “victory” in a killing game.” This does not look good for the DRDT cast.

(2:22) - This looks like Xander. It looks like its from before he got his eyepatch, but that could just be the angle. If it is from before, does this mean David knew Xander before the killing game but lost(?) those memories.

(2:38) - “Note to self: put something here” Maybe something will be added to the video later?

(3:00) - “portrait of someone dearly loved” with an arrow pointing to the photo of Mai Akasaki. Maybe David loved Mai before something tragic happened?

(3:00) - “portrait of someone dearly unloved” with an arrow pointing to the photo of Teruko Tawaki. I think Teruko has something to do with whatever happened to Mai and David hates her for it. I think David was the person at the very beginning of the very first episode of DRDT, he’s the only person that I think has a motive. You can also spot a fork in the background of the MV and at the beginning of the prologue.

(3:04) - There’s a QR code on the books to the right. I haven’t been able to scan it so I don’t know what it leads to yet.

(3:06) - The supporting cast list has Mai Akasaki scribbled out and what looks like “Ms Naegi”  cut off underneath it. On the right of the screen, there was faint text that says: “(i.e. these are the only characters who make an appearance.) which could mean that Arei, Hu and Ms Naegi are in the video. This is a stretch but maybe Hu killed Arei. Probably not, though.

(3:10) - It looks like Xander is the one holding the gun here.

(3:20) - No, that’s wrong!

(3:44) - The lyrics here say “I’ll disappear” and David disappears from the chair, leaving what looks like splattered blood. The words “Chapter 3″ flash on the screen, though its cut off. David dies in Chapter 3 maybe?

Thank you for reading this extremely long post; I’ll reblog it anytime I get more information.

Danganronpa: Despair Time Mastermind Ranking (Least to Most)

Yeah, I should’ve known that I needed to get around to this someday.

You see, the reason why I hadn’t made a theory about the identity of the Despair Time mastermind is that… I'm not totally convinced on any one person being the mastermind. Like, look at these clowns! They’re all so weird! I love them all for it, obviously, but none of their personality quirks or roles in the story stand out to me as particularly mastermind-y. There are a lot of characters that I believe could be the mastermind, but it’s also pretty easy to convince me out of it for one reason or another.

However, it’s not like I had any idea about who the P:EG mastermind would be, either! At least with two chapters under its belt, I can feel more comfortable that I’m not just fully mischaracterizing the Despair Time cast. And I definitely have things to say about various DRDT masterminds, just… in a way that’s kinda hard to rank.

But, that’s no reason for me to be cowardly! I’m sure that seriously scrutinizing all of the characters’ mastermind potentials and ultimately coming up with who I think the most likely candidate is will be super fun. It’s just… going to be really long, so, buckle in. And maybe prepare to take breaks in the middle.

(Spoilers for all three main canon games and DRDT.)

Why is it going to be so long? Well, it’s because, when it comes to DRDT, I think that my predictions will be at least partially based on how long I think each character will make it into the story. If I have a particularly strong inclination that a character is going to die in Chapter 3.456, no matter how unfounded, it might make me feel worse about their prospects of being the mastermind. That’s not to say that a mastermind can’t appear to die (or actually die) before Chapter 6 rolls around, of course. However, it is an uncommon additional hurdle to the story that would require some justification and a little suspension of disbelief if I’m trying to call it years before it transpires.

So, if we’re going to talk about the mastermind, I need to share my current feelings about where each character might place in the death order. Should I update the title…?

Danganronpa: Despair Time Mastermind Ranking (Least to Most) AND ALSO Death Order Predictions

These are my mastermind rankings, so my opinions on where the characters might be headed will obviously be used as the baseline. Naturally, you don’t need to believe in anything I'm about to throw out here. I’m just trying to explain my thought process so that nothing I say later on will come as a total surprise.

Also, since it’s kind of long, here’s the top of the death order section. I think it’ll provide some important context, but if you want to skip it, look for the other green, bold text.

Some of my thoughts were inspired by anderscim’s death predictions theory, as I read that pretty soon after I joined the fandom. I encourage you to go read their work as well!

The tiers are mostly pretty self explanatory– 3-4 means I think they’re at risk of dying sooner and 4-5 means I think they’re at risk of dying later. But, I’ll give everyone what I hope to be a quick rundown on each character just to explain my thinking. 

Xander: Xander canonically died as the Chapter 1 victim.

Min: Min canonically died as the Chapter 1 blackened.

Arei: While I respect the concept, I personally don’t believe in the “J and Arei swapped places and Arei is actually still alive” theory, and I will be writing the rest of this post accordingly. So, to me, Arei canonically died as the Chapter 2 victim.

Eden: Pretty much anyone who’s seen my DRDT theories at this point shouldn't be surprised that I’m listing Eden as the Chapter 2 killer. The logic behind this belief has been explained by my lovely mutuals here and here.

Levi: Alright, on to the ones I don’t have any concrete evidence to support! (There is concrete evidence behind the ch2 murder, even if you believe it points elsewhere.) Levi has had a decent amount of focus already in his trainwreck of a relationship with Ace and discussions of morality with Eden and Teruko. If he does serve as an accomplice to the Chapter 2 killer (see the first link in Eden’s section), then I feel like his clock will really be ticking. He’d be trapped with the branding of a bad person, his greatest fear, and left without any relationships to lean on. I wouldn’t be surprised if someone targeted him as a victim they “believed deserved to die after what happened,” or even if Levi decided that he was doomed to be a villain from the start and decided to kill. Alternatively, he could try to redeem himself as a classic Chapter 4 buff curse sacrifice in some way. In either case (or even in the case of him just being the Chapter 2 killer), I have my doubts that he’ll be making it too much later into the game.

Arturo: To me, Arturo doesn’t feel like a character set up for incredible longevity. That doesn’t mean I’m pigeonholing him as a one-dimensional villain or pure comedic relief, just that Arturo seems like a character who might be set up to have his ideology lead to his downfall. I don’t think he’s dying in Chapter 2, as I believe the narrative would want to see how he reacts to J burning the bridges between them, but I could definitely see the story only needing one more round of daily life (or possibly a trial as well) to resolve wherever his character is going.

Charles: Look, it’s not only because he’s already been pronounced dead at 3. As I elaborated upon in Charles’ section of this post (The Jerk), Charles feels like he’s speeding towards the end of his character arc far ahead of schedule. It could just be that he needed to learn to make friends quickly before Whit makes an early exit, sending him on a secondary arc where he learns to process his current grief and fears as a parallel to regaining memories about Elliot. However, I find it much more likely that the Inevitable CharWhit Doom Scenario plays out in the opposite direction. He makes a lot of sense as a Chapter 3 victim to me.

Nico: Similar to Arei and J, I am writing all of my theories with the assumption that it really was Nico who attempted to murder Ace in Chapter 2, because I think it makes the most narrative sense. (I could keep typing out a “well, unless” every time, but I don’t really want to eat up my time writing or your time reading all of that.) Through that lens, the fact that Nico has already murdered someone and “gotten away with it,” more or less, puts them in a really weird situation. I don’t really see them killing again, as it feels like we’ve already explored the emotional and narrative implications of that happening through Chapter 2. Although, I can’t deny that it would be interesting to see the fallout of Ace being proven totally right and Hu 100% wrong. Still, if they were to be a survivor after doing something so severe so early into the game, it seems like they would have to undergo some sort of redemption for the audience to accept them as a face of hope in the end. I don’t currently see any great paths to that happening, although there’s obviously still plenty of story time for something to open up. For now, though, I feel more confident in placing them as a early/mid-game victim, likely as a consequence of choosing to harm someone else.

Hu: Given her overall lack of focus in the story thus far, I find it likely that Hu will be one of the focal characters of the Chapter 3 daily life. That could be bad news, considering how Xander and Arei fared after being focused upon in their respective daily lives, but… I dunno, I just feel like Hu would survive it, somehow? Wouldn’t be too surprised if she didn’t, but my gut instinct is that she would. I kind of see her character exiting the story in Chapter 4, no preference on killer vs victim.

Veronika: Veronika is a very weird character (an “oddball,” I’ll call it), and thus, my predictions for her are strongly based on the patterns that oddball characters normally follow. I’ll be using canon characters only, because I believe that those are the only killing games that I have the right to assume every DRDT fan has seen. But, you can apply these same kinds of patterns to many fangan characters. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for fangans breaking from typical Danganronpa norms and following their own paths. But, in the case of how oddballs are treated, I think these characters generally tend to follow these patterns because they’re sensible writing practices. I’ll try to explain why each of these conventions makes sense in the following bullet points.

Oddballs tend not to die in Chapters 1 or 2. This is because oddball characters are generally created to supply a very niche kind of comedic relief– examples from DRDT could include Arturo’s commentary on ugly people or Ace’s bizarre remarks of cowardice. Any character deemed worthy of being included in a fangan occupies one of 16 highly contested slots. So, if you include a character for the purpose of making jokes with them, you'll want to get your bang for your buck! It’s hard to fit every joke you have in mind into only a chapter or two. The best example I could come up with for a (canon) oddball who dies early is Teruteru. In his case, the writers likely anticipated that his hyper-flirtatious nature would get tiring if it continued on for too long, and thus, exhausted all of the jokes they wanted to make in Chapter 1 before his exit. An oddball who dies this early has a limited shelf life, and is likely accompanied by other oddballs who can pick up the comedic slack.

Many have pointed out that silly oddballs often die in Chapter 3 (Hifumi, Ibuki, Tenko) as a way to signify the death of fun and innocence. You also have a chance to get rid of some of the more sinister oddballs (Celeste, Kiyo) at a point where it seems unfeasible for them to have stuck around this long without… well, killing someone. In either case, it’s because Chapter 3 is a great balance of letting a character stay in a story for long enough that they achieve whatever strange effects you wanted from them, while also clearing them off the stage before you get into the really serious business. Silly oddballs especially may not be equipped to handle the often turbulent natures of Chapter 4 without breaking the serious tone too much, so it’s best to axe them at the midpoint.

Endearing oddballs (Gundham, Gonta) have a hard time making it past Chapter 4. If Chapter 4 is serious, Chapters 5 and 6 are even more so, and the Chapter 4 killer slot in particular is a viable dumping ground for characters who don’t really have a place in the finale. Their deaths are meant to pull at your heartstrings and prove how a killing game can make literally anyone– yes, even that guy– a killer. (Miu is an outlier; more like an extended Chapter 3. Unlike THH, which has its tonal shift at the end-of-Ch3-Sakura Traitor Reveal, and SDR2, which has its tonal shift at Mikan’s insanity and death, v3’s tonal shift comes at Kokichi's accusation and Kaito and Shuichi's argument, or possibly even Miu's death itself. The Chapter 4 Daily Life isn’t all that serious in and of itself. Thus, Miu dying as a Ch4 victim functions more like killing off a silly oddball before she has to deal with all the betrayal and scheming that occurs later on.)

Oddballs really only die in Chapter 5 to the extent that you can count major antagonists like Nagito and Kokichi as Weird Dudes. As the precursor to the big, showstopping, mind-bending Chapter 5 Trial, the mood is typically pretty… straightforward. Depending on the overall plot’s arc, Chapter 5 is either the point where most of the surviving students are concluding their character arcs and learning how potent a weapon teamwork is (THH, SDR2), or a “dark night of the soul” type moment where all of the slowly growing inter-character conflicts are finally coming to a head (v3). It can also be Version A for some characters and Version B for others, but, either way, hijinks are not ensuing, basically. Plot relevant things happen here, and as such, plot relevant characters are the ones who are dying. It can be hard for an oddball to find a place in the narrative relevant enough to serve as one of its final, poignant deaths without also being a major antagonist.

Despite everything I’ve said about oddballs dying, it is definitely possible for oddballs to survive. Danganronpa is, at its core, a dark comedy, and as such killing off all of your funny joke characters before the ending is probably a bad move. Hiro, Toko, Kazuichi, and Himiko are all characters I’d call oddballs that survive until the very end. The difference in their case is that part of their oddball nature is being… kind of pathetic? I think it helps them fade into the background more. It's also probably easier to give them a character arc than some others... like Veronika.

I’m sure that you can find exceptions to these “rules” I’ve laid out, especially amongst casts that have a high percentage of oddballs (which you could certainly argue fits DRDT). However, pattern recognition brain go brrrr. I don’t think that Veronika fits the description of a Chapter 1-2, Chapter 4, or survivor oddball particularly well. That leaves Chapter 3 (sinister) and Chapter 5 (bewildering antagonist). I don’t know if it’s that Veronika doesn't seem to have much of a reason to kill at this point in time or all of Veronika’s weird mastermind coding that makes me think DRDTdev might have greater plans for her. Either way, I’m leaning Chapter 5, probably victim. Jeez, that was a long section for one character. Favoritism, I guess?

J: J gets her own category because, honestly, I have no idea what to do with her. Could J make it to the end? Sure! Could J die in a Chapter 3 scheme? Sure! Could J be the Chapter 2 killer? Well, I personally believe the evidence points elsewhere, but in terms of narrative? Sure! The only real inclination I have is that I think it’s more likely that she would be a killer than a victim, mostly because Ultimate Effects Artist is a talent that could lend itself to some really creative and fun murder setups. Given that I have more characters pegged as early game deaths right now, I lean towards J late game, but… man, I don’t know!

Teruko: Teruko is the protagonist, and also is a Lucky Student who allegedly “can’t die.” Especially after she made that claim, it would be silly if she died before the ending– it’d just kinda make her look like a fool. I’m not averse to theories where Teruko is no longer the protagonist by the end, whether by her death or someone else taking up the role for whatever reason, but in the sense that “Survivor” = “Chapter 6,” I think Teruko will survive. I’m not here to predict crazy last-minute Kiibo-blowing-himself-up twists.

Rose: I think that Rose has a really nice arc of overcoming her fears and becoming less passive set up in front of her. We spent enough time establishing her relationship with Teruko that I could see her being a good potential friend/support character to Teruko in the endgame if relationships with people like Eden or Charles fall through. (And, at this point, you know what I think about Eden and Charles…) She’s also good at delivering low-key jokes that can provide some levity without totally ruining the tone. We already saw some of that in this scene. The main things that I think could be standing in her way are her photographic memory and history of debt. The photographic memory could be too annoying of an obstacle to write around for the entire game, and instead be an ongoing effect set to expire in in Chapter 3. Additionally, a money motive paralleling THH’s in Chapter 3 could be too tempting for Rose to pass up. Really, what I’m saying is, if Rose can make it through Chapter 3, I think she’s golden. We’ll just have to see how that Chapter pans out in the future.

David: Oh, David. Currently serving as Teruko’s largest antagonist, I can see why people would think that he would die in Chapter 5. However, I’m not going to beat around the bush and pretend that I’m the only person who thinks David might survive, either. As an inspirational speaker, David is established early on as a character who should be a beacon of hope, before revealing that he’s more of a hope-sucking black hole. It would make sense if, alongside Teruko, he learns to find more of a balance between blithe optimism and cynical depression and heal as a person. He has a lot of very obvious depth that I think a lot of people want to see explored, and whose exploration would be very on-brand for the themes of a typical killing game story. Plus, if Teruko ever does stop being the protagonist, David probably needs to be alive at that point to pick up the slack.

Ace: Similar to Nico, it seems like we’ve already gotten a taste of what Ace being a victim would be like, in a way where I don’t think we’re going to see it again. He could still be a killer, but would the cowardly Ace even want to attempt killing someone and throwing himself into the scrutiny of a Class Trial? Well, it is true that Ace believes that “[neither] dying young or living a long, shitty life of suffering… are as bad as this” (the killing game?). So, he could simply grow fed up with the killing game and decide that risking a Class Trial is worth it, even if he does wind up dying young. However, if that were to occur, Chapter 2 seems like the narratively best time to do it, as it’s when his emotions are most potent and probably when others would least expect him to do it due to his weakened state. Like Rose, I feel the period Ace has most to worry about is this upcoming Chapter 2 killer slot, but if he makes it through, his arc of learning to escape his fear by bravely rising above it instead of lashing out to try to knock everyone down feels very viable.

Whit: The pro of the Inevitable CharWhit Doom Scenario is that, hopefully, one of the two would manage to make it as a survivor after the other one dies. And, I’m Team Whit Surviving! Not just based on which of the two I like better (they’re my first and second favorite characters, so I’m taking a massive L either way), but because I think it makes more sense for it to be Whit that lives further on. Unlike Charles, who feels like he’s already in the final lap of the character arc race, Whit has barely left the starting line. The laundry scene in Chapter 1 and Whit’s secret in Chapter 2 have both been used to establish that Whit focuses on his and others’ bliss in hopes of remaining ignorant of everything that stresses him. The main offender, of course, being that Whit lies about his mom being alive to presumably stave off his grief. The easiest way to give him a character arc that resolves that issue is to give him something to grieve– namely, Charles– and soon. If Whit’s main character struggle is pretending that people dying doesn’t bother him, he might need an entire Chapter or more to stubbornly show off his central flaw. Now, it is possible that, if Whit can’t overcome this flaw, he could die soon after Charles and meet a tragic fate. But, those just… aren’t the vibes, to me? A post-character arc Whit who knows how to grieve fiercely but healthily might come in handy if Teruko finds herself handling her own emotions about Xander, Min, and/or anyone else at the end of the game.

And here’s the bottom of the death order section!

Finally finished writing something that nobody asked of me at all. Well, I still think it was important, and I hope you feel the same.

Now that we’ve laid all that out, I think it’s finally time to actually see who I think the Danganronpa: Despair Time mastermind might be! Although, please keep in mind that, despite the large preamble full of story predictions, I’m still pretty uncertain on who I think the mastermind is. So, my points might not be the best supported, and I might change my mind again pretty soon after I post this theory. I expect to be far better at disproving why everyone is the mastermind rather than proving why anyone would be, because that’s generally how I feel… but, onwards we go!

#17: Arei Nageishi

(Forgive me for reusing art here, I’ve drawn these bastards ENOUGH /j)

If I were writing this after Despair Time’s prologue, like I did with P:EG, there’s a pretty good chance that Arei, at the very least, wouldn’t have placed dead last. But, well, now Arei is dead. And also last.

Obviously, there are other dead characters too. But still, Arei is the one who I most struggle to see as the mastermind. Given that Arei died as a victim whose body was thoroughly investigated by several parties, it’s pretty hard for me to believe that anyone could have missed any signs of life. I don’t get the sense that DRDT is in some kind of simulation where everyone can magically be alive again at the end either, so I think Arei is, sadly, well and truly dead.

On top of all that, we know a lot about her backstory from her Chapter 2 breakdown, and none of it seems to point her towards masterminding a killing game specifically. She doesn’t have any particular ties to any big organizations that would have helped her accomplish it, either. While she is NOT just a temporary weather spell whose absence will be celebrated and then forgotten, David… I have a hard time believing that the audience would find her character relevant enough(?) to be a good twist mastermind come Chapter 6 several years down the line.

I don’t think I really need to keep elaborating on this. Arei isn’t the mastermind.

#16: Charles Cuevas

I know it’s a bit of a bold move to put a character who’s currently alive below characters who have already died, but… man, I really just don’t see how Charles could pull this off.

And it’s not (just) because I think he’s going to die in Chapter 3 as part of Whit’s character arc, or that I want to believe that he’s a good person. Really, it’s mostly because of his phobias. How is a guy who started gagging at the sight of blood splattered on the floor supposed to be the one who orchestrated an entire death game? Could he get through the process of creating a brutal execution like Min’s without freezing up and freaking out? Even if he could do it, why would he? Sure, he didn’t seem to remember the fact that he had necrophobia until Xander died, but that might be even more of a problem. Wouldn’t the mastermind, who’s certainly had to consider the others’ deaths before, remember that they were afraid of death? He would almost certainly have to be lying about at least the scale of his reaction, although that’s probably a given if he is the mastermind.

Of course, there are mastermind subcategories that could better benefit Charles. If DRDT is actually a simulation, especially one in which the participants don’t actually die, that would definitely make it easier for him to be the one behind it. We’re also meant to believe that Charles has childhood amnesia, so he could have amnesia in other areas as well and be a mastermind who forgot they were one.

However, as I said before, I don’t particularly believe that DRDT is going to be a computer simulation or that Charles is an amnesiac mastermind. I just… don’t see this one in general.

#15: Xander Matthews

Let me preface this by saying that I’m not trying to argue that Xander is actually still alive. The concept that he would be able to fool not only Min, making her believe that she dealt him a fatal blow, but also everyone else as they identified his body, seems outlandish to me. However, just because Xander is dead doesn’t mean that he couldn’t have entered this game as the mastermind.

We know for a fact that Xander wanted to kill Teruko due to his dialogue regarding the note he received, which lines up well with the popular theory that Xander is the individual speaking in the first scene with the papers and the blood. If we assume he is that guy, then it may seem a little counterintuitive to think that the person who says “I have to end the killing game” would be the one behind the killing game. However, he also says, “Even if I can’t do that… I have to kill Teruko Tawaki,” implying that killing Teruko is of a higher priority than ending “the killing game.” Thus, if, for some reason, Xander thought that orchestrating the killing game was the only way to kill Teruko, it’s possible that he would be willing to let the death game roll for as long as it takes to eliminate his bigger target.

However, I can’t deny that the Xander mastermind theory has some massive flaws to it. For one, Xander is dead. I don’t think we’ve technically seen any evidence that the mastermind has to still be alive as of Chapter 2, but a mastermind-less Chapter 6 would be… an interesting challenge to write, to say the least. Also, while Xander betraying Teruko and the others was a great surprising hook the first time, if it happened again, it would be kind of… underwhelming, in my opinion. It’s the same kind of concept I brought up in my Eden’s Garden ranking:

Then, in Chapter 6, we’d be faced with the revelation that, wow, the mildly antagonistic character was actually a really antagonistic character all along! It just doesn’t seem like enough of a dramatic hook to me, I guess?

“Wow, the guy who betrayed Teruko and became a killer actually betrayed Teruko and was the mastermind all along! And now, he’s not even around to reap the social or karmic consequences of it!” You see.

And then, there is the literal interpretation of the text that Xander (if he is bloody hands man) obviously stands against the killing games. He’s also the Ultimate Rebel, someone who stands against corrupt institutions in general.

If Xander is revealed to be evil later down the line, it would make much more sense if it was as a traitor type. As for being the one and only mastermind, I think the odds are pretty low.

#14: Ace Markey

Hey, it’s another character that’s alive! And, this one doesn’t even have a crippling fear of death. However, he is a massive coward, and that’s the main thing that’s dragging him down for me.

Similar to Charles, what would Ace stand to gain from hosting a killing game such as this? Ace doesn’t seem to have any interest in notoriety, money, the destruction of society, despair, or any other things that I can think of that would motivate a typical mastermind. We’ve seen time and time again that Ace cares most about having control over both his life and how other people see him, even though he often fails on both fronts. I guess both of those things could be solved by hosting a killing game, but… Come on, there have gotta be easier ways to do that which don’t threaten your precious life.

Furthermore, what exactly would Ace being the mastermind have to say about the story as a whole? Jockey has to be in the running for “talents that are least relevant to a potential killing game host.” How about the idea that the mastermind nearly died in Chapter 2, only to go off the rails threatening and blaming his assailant? I… always knew that Nico was… fully in the right for doing that, because it would have killed the big bad early??? Ace Mastermind is the preferred ending for those who believe that Nico can do absolutely no wrong, lol.

I can’t remember where I saw it, but I once saw a theory of writing that said that there are two major kinds of character arcs. One is the typical character arc, where the narrative pushes a character's traits to change over the course of the story for better of for worse. The other, this theory posited, was an arc on the part of the viewer, where they learn that a character that they thought was flawed was actually not as flawed as they thought all along. You could potentially apply this kind of thing to Eden: in the first chapter, some people may have seen her as a dim-witted positive girl, but in Chapter 2, we firmly establish that her kindness is not stupidity and learn how her optimism is a strength.

So, you could say that the character arc DRDTdev is going for with Ace is something more like that, where we spend the entire game learning to treat him more seriously just in time for him to be a real threat as the mastermind? It still feels like a bit of a stretch, though– I don’t know exactly what Ace would do to make us take him more seriously that wouldn’t either send him on a growth arc not super befitting of a mastermind or wind up with him being a blackened. Ace as the mastermind certainly isn’t impossible, but I obviously found it unlikely enough that I placed him below one character who is currently (presumed) dead.

#13: Arturo Giles

Arturo’s role in the story so far is not very mastermind-ish, in my mind. In the prologue, we establish him as a cold and judgmental person who puts his own opinions of how the world works over everything else, especially how other people feel. This already feels like how a mastermind would act, so if he turned out to be the mastermind, it would be more of the same.

Then, in Chapter 2, we establish that he’s a massive simp for celebrities, to the point of transforming into something adjacent to comedic relief. We’re meant to think that his over-the-top sprites and refusal to actually listen to anything J is saying is hilariously pathetic. Other characters are constantly dunking on him, such as Teruko calling him a “bigoted” “crazy person,” and even the narrative gets in on the action when highlighting how he cares less about the fact that J’s life was at risk than that she didn’t come out of it with drip. Narratively, we’ve already seen these characters get the better of Arturo. If we the audience interpret that as confirmation that the surviving cast could easily beat Arturo should he ever come to stand in their way, it could diminish the stakes upon his mastermind reveal.

However, for all of his negatives, there are some definite positives to Arturo being the mastermind, too. Despite his comedic effects, we have seen through his threats to Eden that Arturo is very capable of being very scary in a way that I don’t think we have with Ace. The horror factor of a plastic surgeon as the mastermind could be a really fun and creepy design theme to explore. And, Arturo is obviously super obsessed with celebrities. If hosting a deadly TV show is what he thought it would take to get him in with the Hollywood celebrity scene, he might be willing to go for it.

I don’t really know why he would have made his secret what it is if he was going to get that upset about it, though. I guess if there just weren’t any better options that wouldn’t tip his hand…? Also, Arturo would blend in terribly as a survivor. If you’re heading into Chapter 6 and you have to pick the evil character out of (let me spin a wheel real quick...) Teruko, Eden, Rose, Charles, and Arturo, Arturo is definitely the evil one. (Okay, that was actually a terrible randomized draw for Arturo on the innocence front, but I hope you can imagine how he would oddly stick out of most groups.) Like I said in his death predictions, I find it hard to imagine a character arc for Arturo, which is why I find it hard to believe that he would make it as far as Chapter 6.

#12: Min Jeung

Honestly, if Min weren’t (most likely) dead, she might be pretty high on my list of mastermind choices. While not as suspicious as the Spurlings, XF-Ture Tech is pretty suspicious, even more so with the introduction of that one altDRDT character. Min is related to XF-Ture Tech, so if that company has anything to do with the operation of the killing game, she could have been the one behind it. Min is also very smart, and her talent has obvious applications for how it could have been used to set up/influence the killing game. The fact that her talent is so similar to Teruko’s, Ultimate Student versus Ultimate Lucky Student, could have also set them up for some great parallels and duality down the line.

However… Min’s role as the Chapter 1 killer throws a pretty big wrench in her chances. Beyond the dying part, Min’s role as the blackened was incredibly evitable. It’s not like she was thrown into a situation where she had to kill or be killed, or even one where a motive was particularly difficult for her. If she wanted to be the mastermind and survive until the end, all she had to do was walk away from Xander stabbing Teruko and pretend she never saw it. However, if Min’s goal was the inverse of ol’ Bloody Hands (keep the killing game running, but most importantly, keep Teruko alive), her actions could line up. And then, perhaps Min could have falsified her own execution early to draw suspicion off of her, much like Junko did by killing Mukuro.

Beyond her death, though, it’s really Min’s reaction to being the blackened that makes me think she can’t be the mastermind. The stellar voice acting in Min’s breakdown scenes makes me really believe both that this was the first time she had ever hurt anyone as gravely as she did to Xander, and that she fully believed that she was about to die. Those are two things that a mastermind, especially one headed into a fake execution, would not be feeling. Maybe Min memorized how to be a great actress too amongst all those textbooks, but I doubt it. I can still see several reasons why Min would have been a good mastermind, but her actual death and her reaction to being told she was dying knock her down several pegs in my mind.

#11: Hu Jing

Hu is a bit more suspicious to me than some others just because I think she has something to hide. Between her refusal to share whose secret she received or had herself, mysterious “I want to pay for what I’ve done” hidden quote, and intense desire to be relied upon, there’s definitely something about Hu as a person that the narrative has yet to uncover. Could that something be “Hu is the mastermind”? I dunno, maybe.

Hu also has a tendency to react to things with her temper. That could be a sort of foreshadowing to how she would act as the mastermind, much like how David’s brief spell of apathy during the prologue hinted at the way he would act further down the line. Hu’s defense of Nico could act much the same way. Our overall impression of Hu at this point is that, while she is a flawed person, she’s one of the nicest and morally best people in the game, who’s always looking out for others. Defending Nico to the point of babying them might cross the line a little, but she’s only trying to help everyone…! Hu could make it to the end as a believably heroic survivor and then reveal that all of her presumed poor decisions were actually active malice, and I think she could pull that off.

All that being said… I don’t, like, actually think that’s going to happen. In fact, I’m probably overexaggerating the extent to which people think that Hu is nice and morally good. I’ve seen several people discuss the unjust amounts of hate Hu gets in this fandom, which implies that a lot of people hate her, even if I haven’t particularly seen much of it myself. At the very least, I definitely over exaggerated the extent to which people believe Hu could survive! As implied in the death order predictions, I do personally think Hu is going to die, possibly as a consequence of getting too invested in everyone else’s business when they don’t want her to be and/or wearing herself too thin. There are paths which I believe could lead to Hu being the mastermind, but they seem to be the roads less likely traveled.

#10: David Chiem

While I have no doubts that David has the fame, charisma, and worldview to pull off a killing game… I’d have to wonder about how he would see himself playing into all of it. As we saw in Chapter 2, David knows that his career has a lot of value, possibly to himself but definitely to other people, and therefore, he doesn’t want to jeopardize it. In fact, the reveal of his manipulative secret was the inciting incident behind his massive change in characterization. So, if he were the mastermind of a televised killing game… How would he think that would play out to his viewers?

Now, to be fair, there’s a lot we don’t know about the worldbuilding of DRDT. MonoTV claims that the TV show will be broadcast to a widespread audience. Perhaps that indicates that, in the world of DRDT, publicly broadcasting talented young peoples’ violent deaths is normal, or even sought after. Maybe the cast of DRDT forgot about it.

However, David seems to think that people learning that he sees everyone as manipulable would do damage to his reputation, so it’s a bit of a contradiction either way. If the world has been wracked with despair and craves intense violence on TV, then David’s reaction to his secret is either an elaborate lie or the result of the mastermind erasing his own memories regarding the situation. (Or, I guess the public could see death as fine and dandy but manipulation as a cancellable offense, which is… one of the interpretations ever.) Otherwise, in the scenario that the DRDT world is a normal one, David wouldn’t care about being revealed as a manipulator if he’d already committed to the mastermind bit. If his career was already preemptively ruined by agreeing to commit literal murder, why get so worked up about the thought that people might abandon ship over you not being 100% honest?

And then, there’s also the whole “surprise factor” thing that I keep bringing up. Admittedly, it’s been a longer hiatus between the start of Chapter 2 and the end of Chapter 2 than DRDTdev might have been hoping for, but that doesn’t change the fact that this part of David’s characterization happened in Chapter 2. DRDT fans far and wide have written thousands of words gushing over “the David reveal” or “evil David.” If David were unveiled as the mastermind, we’d have to start writing stuff about “the first David reveal” or “when David showed his true colors again.” You see how it kind of takes the hype away from such major plot points? That’s the sort of concept I’ve been trying to get across with some of my other choices too, but a bit more clear cut.

I don’t know why I sound so much like a hater in this section (in my opinion) when I’m literally putting David at #10, above seven other characters. I guess it’s because I can see why his theatricality and traits foiling Teruko could make him a good mastermind, but also have some major issues with the logistics of him getting there. A lot of good points versus a lot of bad points settle out to him winding up someone in the middle.

#9: Levi Fontana

With our first single digit number, we’ve also reached our midway point of mastermind candidates: Levi!

Levi would be a really interesting mastermind choice because of how his character centers around grappling with his morality. I think it would be really intriguing to have a mastermind outwardly struggling with their attempts and failures to be a good person throughout the entire game, only for the player and the characters to receive the full context of the debacle at the very end. I guess in this situation, it would be pretty likely that Levi would be redeemed at the end? That’s not necessarily a problem. (Honestly, I don’t know if I think the DRDT mastermind could be redeemed or not based on the fangan’s themes… that’s a post for another day, perhaps.)

Anyways, I think that what we know of Levi’s backstory could work well with him being the mastermind. If he does have the “murderer without remorse” secret, that would be in line with orchestrating a killing game. We also know that he’s “been disowned” and that he and his family were “all bad influences on each other.” We’re meant to assume that Levi was fortunate enough to escape a bad/abusive situation (and in all likelihood this IS what actually happened!!!!), but we are hearing about the situation from his point of view alone. There is a small possibility that, if Levi is actually a despair enjoyer, his family cut him out because they thought he was a danger to their lives.

I will reiterate again, though, that I don’t think this is the case. Levi seems like he’s a chill guy, or at least that he’s trying very hard to be one despite how he’s been told to react all his life. The whole “mastermind wanting to become a good person” lens also makes less sense given how channeled Levi’s development is through Ace. Like, I would imagine that, if this were the angle DRDTdev was going for, Levi would be making an effort to get along with everyone as part of his atonement. The mastermind randomly choosing to focus on just one person out of the crowd seems kind of strange, especially when that person is someone as disagreeable as Ace. That kind of plot would have big “the mafia CEO vampire prince fell head over heels in love with me, the random average girl” vibes. Repenting mastermind Levi is the preferred ending for pining lovers to enemies to lovers AceVi shippers, lol.

And then there’s the part where I think he’s going to die. I don’t think Levi is the worst mastermind choice, but I think there are better out there.

#8: Nico Hakobyan

Yay, we finally got to one of the characters that Anon thought was suspicious! It only took… 7k+ words. Oh boy.

I definitely think that the cat coding is the strongest thing that Nico has going for them. It would be pretty funny if the extent to which “Ultimate Pet Therapist” is relevant to the plot is the climactic reveal that “yeah Nico has been talking to a (robotic) animal the whole time.” That’s a joke, as Ultimate Pet Therapist is already quite relevant to Nico’s characterization as someone who prefers communicating with animals over people, but it would be funny as hell from a character designing perspective.

There are less silly reasons to believe that Nico is the mastermind too, though. While it seems like, similar to David, pulling the trigger on Nico’s change in behavior in Chapter 2 would be a bit early, I don’t think it’s as destructive to mastermind Nico as it is to mastermind David. There’s a lot more doubt in people’s minds that Nico even did anything to Ace, to the extent that a decent number of people (in the story and out of it) think that it was someone else trying to kill Ace entirely. Nico also has a stalwart defender in Hu, which adds an extra level of intrigue to the situation. Instead of confirming that everyone was right to be suspicious of David, at least some amount of focus could be placed onto Hu being wrong for trusting Nico and failing to see someone’s true colors again, which could be interesting for her characterization if she was alive at that point.

On the other hand, the biggest reason that I think Nico isn’t the mastermind is also because of the attempted Ace murder. Why would Nico, as the mastermind, try to kill Ace at this time? If Nico wins the Class Trial, then the killing game is over, which is probably counter to the mastermind’s goals. If Nico loses the Class Trial, well, we’ll say that the possibility of Nico dying isn’t an issue, as they could just fake their own death or deny entering the execution. But still, why?

It could be that Nico was trying to remove themselves from the killing game on purpose, but I don’t see why it would be necessary. No one was particularly suspicious of Nico being the mastermind, and if they were worried about their gender identity getting out, they could have simply made their secret something else. A mastermind could kill to avoid the killing game falling into a standstill, but tensions were really high at the time that Ace almost died! With a full day left to go before the motive secrets were revealed, such drastic action wasn’t yet forced. I guess the best option would be that Nico was just really angered by what Ace said, and wanted to retaliate as part of their vicious mastermind nature. Is that worth taking yourself out of the killing game and risking the show’s termination, though…?

There is also the possibility that Nico is the mastermind, but didn’t try to kill Ace. In that case, suspicion of Nico would be such a huge in-universe coincidence that I’m doubtful DRDTdev would have included it as a major plot point.

Speaking of “show’s termination,” I also don’t know why Nico would have any involvement in creating a TV show, both from a backstory/talent perspective and a personality one. Nico doesn’t like interacting with people. Therefore, I don’t know what would possess them to want to create and join a TV show for which the major draw is a big stressful discussion between a bunch of people.

I guess I had fewer reasons why I thought Nico would be the mastermind than I thought. I would love to hear more details about why you suspect Nico though, Anon! I’m definitely willing to believe that they could be the mastermind.

#7: Eden Tobisa

Make no mistake, I still think that Eden is the Chapter 2 killer. However, in the case that she isn’t… mastermind isn’t a terrible choice for her.

The biggest draw of Eden being the mastermind would definitely be the shock value. The seemingly nicest character suddenly being revealed as the mastermind would create a huge hurdle for the surviving characters to overcome. Teruko especially, given that she probably would have grown at least a tad closer to Eden if they survived five chapters together. It would be a little mean to give Teruko a trustworthy friend just to rip it away from her again, but I could see the opportunity being used to highlight Teruko’s growth. When Xander and Min betrayed Teruko, she panicked and shut everyone out, but when Eden betrays Teruko at the very end, she’s able to remain strong and rely on the other friends who she continues to trust. Or DRDT could have an unconventional feel-bad ending, I suppose.

If some kind of time loop is at play within DRDT, then Eden’s talent would obviously be thematically and perhaps practically relevant as well. I could see a lot of comparisons being made regarding a killing game being run “like clockwork.” Her secret quote “you can’t go back, no matter how hard you try” is... actually kind of anti-time loop, but at least the concept of going back in time is somewhat related…? Speaking of secret quotes, her Mai quote, “she kept calling the number, even though no one picked it up” is also really weird. That suspicious hidden evidence could point to her being the mastermind.

However, Eden’s personality is a pretty major issue when it comes to her being the mastermind. Shock value is great in the moment, but it can ring hollow in retrospect if people find that the twist doesn’t make any sense. Masterminds aren’t typically known for their kindness or optimism. So, if Eden is the mastermind, it seems like her whole “even if this world is cruel, I’ll still make the choice to be kind” speech is a complete lie. And, that would be a shame! I don’t think that having an unexpected mastermind at the end of the game is worth the cost of completely demolishing a character that we’ve come to know and love over the course of six chapters and several years. (I’m not saying that complete demolition has to be the case if Eden is the mastermind, but I think it’s a reasonable worry that many people have.)

And, I know that all this talk about how wonderful Eden is might sound rich coming from someone who strongly believes that she just killed someone who wanted to be her best friend. But, that’s kind of the point, isn’t it? As someone who thinks that Eden is the killer, I know very well how a lot of people have a really hard time believing that Eden could do something as terrible as killing Arei. I can only imagine how hard it would be to accept that Eden was the one who put Arei, Min, Teruko, and everyone else in danger, and the one pulling the strings behind every execution.

Eden as the mastermind, to me, is more tempting in concept than it would be viable in execution. And also, I don’t even think she’s going to live to see the light of Chapter 3 day. However, there’s also some definite emotional power behind the accusation that makes me see how shooting for this ambitious choice could be worth it in the long run.

#6: Whit Young

Alright, it’s finally time to talk about Whit. I know that he’s a really popular mastermind choice, but… I just don’t see it, personally. Even though I put him at 6th place. (I do not enjoy putting him in 6th place.) Is that just because he’s my favorite and I’m attached to my interpretation of the character? Perhaps. But, I’d still like to explore some points that I find faulty.

Perhaps the biggest reason behind suspicion of Whit that I’ve seen is the way that he breaks the fourth wall. People connect his asking people to pause for the evidence list to MonoTV invoking similar mechanics, and lines such as “do you really think she’d be hanging out in the playground” to him knowing more than he’s letting on. However, there are a couple of ways that this accusation can be depowered, in my opinion.

Firstly, Whit isn’t the only person who says stuff like this. Veronika alludes to the killing game before it begins, Teruko also breaks the fourth wall to tell the viewer to pause (albeit only in her thoughts, not out loud), and Arei makes the same kind of “hanging” wordplay in Eden’s flashback that Whit did. I won’t say that characters addressing the fourth wall can’t be important at all, because I believe there are some moments where the other characters commentate on how weird it is that MonoTV is talking to no one. However, I also think that breaking the fourth wall may simply be part of DRDTdev’s humor, as exemplified by that “make sure to like and subscribe so that Teruko has enough mental strength to carry on” joke. Whit is a funny guy, so it just makes sense that if DRDTdev’s brain generates funny meta jokes, Whit would get some of them. Everything that Whit says reminds me more of Mia AceAttorney saying “hit tab to open the Court Record” than some sort of groundbreaking DDLC-Undertale direct communication with the viewer. However, I can see why others would think otherwise.

The second is that I think some of Whit’s comments (more so the “dead at 3” and “hanging in the playground” than the pause) are just meant to showcase his intuition. And, yeah, it could be that DRDTdev has been leaving crumbs of Whit’s intuition behind so that in Chapter 6, he can use it to exploit everyone’s insecurities and greatest despair. To me, though, Whit’s intuition has always reminded me of the myth of Cassandra.

For those who don’t know, Cassandra is a figure in Greek mythology who was blessed/cursed to receive prophecies, but for no one to ever believe them. By my interpretation, Whit is a really smart and perceptive guy who has strikingly accurate gut feelings about how things will play out down the road, even when he doesn’t realize it himself. However, the curse of his own coping mechanism– choosing to act like an eternally cheerful goofball– leads the majority of the other students, and perhaps some of the viewers, to never take his point of view seriously. He can only realize the accuracy behind what he said after the bad things have already happened, leading him to blame himself more and more for not being able to speak up and help when times were tough.

This kind of behavior would line up with two different themes we’ve seen from Whit before. The first, that when he jokes around without thinking, he can accidentally say hurtful things that he later reprimands himself for. We saw that when Charles blew up at him at the end of their shared FTE. The second is Whit’s major theme of good things hiding a darker undercurrent. Being the Ultimate Matchmaker is great until you’ve never had a successful relationship yourself. Having an awesome mom is great until the truth comes out that she’s actually dead, and you’ve been covering it up. Growing super close to someone is great until he dies. Having an amazing intuition and understanding of everyone is great until you can never actually use it to help those you care about. Joking around is great until it's all you can do. Pretending everything is fine is great until it’s not.

Like I said, very specific interpretation. I promise I was not citing classical literature to make my argument sound smarter than it actually is. I am aware that my interpretation of Whit is no less or more valid than everyone else’s. However, it’s one that I hold very close to my heart, and thus, I personally have a hard time seeing around it.

However, I’ve also seen a lot of people argue some valid points for Whit, so I can at least acknowledge that he deserves to be in the upper echelon of choices. There’s a lot of weird stuff regarding him in Literature Girl Insane, and he’s certainly an option of someone who felt so much grief that they became totally empty inside as shown in that one hidden quote. I would be appropriately surprised and heartbroken if Whit revealed himself as the mastermind in Chapter 6, so he checks the box in that regard. There isn’t anything from his backstory that opposes the notion that he set up the killing game, and, to quote what I said about our other Ultimate Matchmaker, Toshiko…

While Ultimate Matchmaker might seem like a silly talent to give the mastermind, it could also be a ruse to distract us from the fact that [Whit] has a talent that allows [him] to read people well and make choices that will impact their lives dramatically.

I don’t like it, but I can see the argument… kind of. To me, most mastermind Whit interpretations feel like mischaracterization, but as a theorist, I always try to keep in mind that I’m the one who could be twisting the text to my whims as well. In this my-opinions-based list, though, he’s not getting any higher than 6th.

#5: Veronika Grebenshchikova

Ooh, what spooky art for a spooky mastermind. Let’s be real, though, Veronika is way too obvious of a mastermind candidate to actually be the mastermind. Unless… she’s so obvious that she loops back around to not being obvious, and thus, is the perfect mastermind candidate?!

Veronika is in a really weird place. I obviously have no doubts that she would have any moral qualms about hosting a killing game, because she’s told us herself that she doesn’t. She knows what Monokuma is in immense detail, but claims to have no idea what a killing game is. She’s dressed really similarly to Junko, though. Is that just a coincidence? Are giant pigtails also a symbol of fear in the DRDTverse? I need ANSWERS, LADY!!!

The biggest problem I see with Veronika is the potential for obviousness. Similar to Arturo, if she actually made it to Chapter 6, I feel like it would be pretty obvious what’s going on. An oddball like Veronika is not the typical survivor type (although she could break the mold). Because Teruko’s character arc is all about trusting people, it would make sense if the reveal of the mastermind was someone who challenged her trust to some degree. With Veronika being obviously unhinged the whole time, I don’t think that Teruko would have any particular difficulties with kicking her to the curb.

However, Veronika clearly has the motive to start a killing game, and potentially to spread despair. DRDT has taken inspiration from Trigger Happy Havoc in the past, so it could make sense if DRDT’s mastermind was also inspired by THH’s. Having a so-obvious-it’s-not-obvious mastermind could also be another way to mess with theorists like me, as DRDTdev did with the comments section portion of Literature Girl Insane. “bro Veronika being the mastermind would be WAY too obvious” sounds EXACTLY like “I just hope XXXXXX doesn’t go crazy and kill in chapter 3. That would be way too predictable” or “XXXXX will obviously die in ch5”. If part of the point of DRDT is to make know-it-all analysts rethink the rules they believe to be set in stone, I could see Veronika as a subversive choice.

Veronika definitely seems to be building up to something, but I don’t know if being the mastermind is exactly it. I think that Veronika could make it pretty late into the game, but I still struggle to see her making it all the way to Chapter 6. I would absolutely love to see what DRDTdev does with her writing if that is the case, though. 

#4: Mai Akasaki

(Well, now I feel bad that I’ve never made a colored portrait of Mai.)

As you may have noticed back at our first entry, Arei, I started the countdown off at seventeen, not sixteen. (If you didn’t remember that, I don’t blame you– it was a WHILE ago.) That’s because I thought it was only fair to include DRDT’s best kept(?) secret, the lovely Unnamed Student herself, Mai Akasaki, as an option! Because, man, is she mysterious in some suspicious ways.

“But, didn’t MonoTV tell the students that the mastermind was one of them? Mai isn’t one of the students in the killing game (unless prosopagnosia is REALLY going crazy), so she can’t be the mastermind, right?” Well, yes and no. The scene where MonoTV confirms the existence of the mastermind is SUPER weird. Let’s take a look at it.

On one hand, MonoTV is still in the Movie Screening Room, where it was JUST talking to the student body, so it would only stand to reason that it’s a continuation of the scene we just saw. However, the setting also seems to be doing everything in its power to tell us that this is NOT the same scene we just saw. The lights have been turned off, even though they were on in the scene just before this. They return to being on in the first scene of Chapter 1, which the students treat as being directly after the scene during which the lights were on before. The widget denoting the time, chapter, and episode has completely disappeared, placing this at an even more unknown time than “Time Unknown.” The text indicating that the speaker is MonoTV has even disappeared! I mean, I assume that MonoTV is still the one saying it, considering that it’s on screen and the speech bubble is pointing right at it, but we don’t even know that for sure!

Additionally, MonoTV refers to the viewers directly (“dear viewers”) two speech bubbles after this one, which makes it seem more like MonoTV is talking to us the audience rather than the students in the room. But then, if the mastermind is “one of you,” and MonoTV is talking to us, wouldn’t that mean the mastermind is someone in the audience? That could lead in to some really meta interpretations of the text (i.e. “DRDTdev is the mastermind of DRDT because he’s the one who created the killing game”) or it could indicate that I’ve gone fully off the rails. 

A midpoint between those two ideas is that the mastermind is part of the in-universe audience watching the killing game, as in, a fictional character who is watching the real-to-them TV show that is Danganronpa: Despair Time. That could include Mai, a very notable character who is not one of the sixteen participants in the killing game.

Side note, I’ve seen some people fight back against the concept that Mai could be the mastermind with the idea that making the mysterious character the mastermind would be too obvious. While I sort of agree, I feel like we’re somewhat overestimating the extent to which Mai is obvious. It’s not like no casual viewers would know who she is, because her image was shown pretty obviously in Chapter 1. However, the name “Mai Akasaki” is only accessible by finding the hidden quotes on the optional associated website’s character profiles. To learn anything about her beyond that, you have to have the thought to type the name into the website URL, and then solve another puzzle just to see the bare bones of what’s there.

I’m not trying to assert any sort of dominance or superiority over DRDT fans on YouTube, Twitter, TikTok, or anything else, but from what I’ve gathered, Tumblr is the place you want to go for deep analysis and theories on DRDT (possibly because of Tumblr’s longer word count). Therefore, anything about DRDT that may seem like common knowledge on Tumblr may only be common knowledge to the fans who specifically bothered to come to the deep lore and crack theories website to find deep lore and crack theories. Essentially, this:

Sort of similar to what Gravity Falls did with the reveal of Bill Cipher back in 2012 (at least I think, I wasn’t actually in the Gravity Falls fandom at that time), I think it would be reasonable to plant clues about an overarching villain that people who want to analyze can analyze ahead of time, such that the villain’s arrival can come as a victory to the puzzle solvers and an exciting new development to the more casual viewers.

However, while I believe that Mai has an awesome setup that she could use to become the mastermind, whether she would actually fit the role is another question entirely. As I alluded to back in the first Mai paragraph, I’m rolling with the widely held (among theorizers) belief that the Unnamed Student in Xander and Min’s bonus episodes is supposed to be Mai. In those episodes, Mai seems to be incredibly caring, peppy, and sweet. She knows a ton of little heartwarming details about Min and Xander, and I wouldn’t be surprised if the same is shown to be true with Arei and whoever else’s bonus episodes in the future. Those hidden quotes on Mai’s profile also give off the impression that everyone in the cast really loves Mai– one could call them a “portrait of a person dearly loved,” perhaps.

While it’s possible that these scenes are supposed to highlight Mai’s social prowess and how much she can get people to fall in love with her, they… don’t really seem to be giving off those vibes. We see her thoughts in those bonus videos, and she really does seem to be dedicated to helping Min and Xander out. Mai’s change from someone who wanted nothing more than to help out her friends to someone who was willing to throw all of them into the killing game is something that would have to be explained, and it could be difficult to communicate that shift within the confines of bonus material, if Mai’s content is mostly kept there. There is the concept that Mai could have put her friends into a killing game to protect them somehow, which could be a way to avoid Mai’s character seemingly doing a total 180, but that rationale would need a lot of explanation too.

Otherwise, there’s also the problem that Mai is almost certainly dead. I won’t get super into it myself, because the amazing @1moreff-creator has already done a great job explaining why here (starts in the XI. God is Dead section). I don’t think I need to elaborate on why Mai being dead potentially before the killing game even began would be detrimental to the idea of her being the mastermind.

To be honest, I don’t know how much this idea actually makes sense. I think I’m personally more inclined to believe that Mai could be the mastermind just because I really don’t get mastermind vibes from pretty much anybody in the cast. If the mastermind simply wasn’t one of the members of the main cast, that could solve that issue, right…? Mai is very likely involved in the inception of the killing game somehow, so extending that role to one of being the mastermind isn’t the biggest stretch. However, her personality and living status do throw in some pretty big question marks, so I don’t think she should go any higher.

#3: Teruko Tawaki

Teruko was definitely the first character who I believed could be the mastermind after I watched the series for the first time. However, over time, I’ve sort of fallen off of the idea that she would be. Is that because I’m forgetting key details of the plot, or because I’m drifting closer to the truth…? Honestly, I have no idea.

Let’s start with the strongest “evidence” we have against Teruko, her motive secret: “How could I even select which secret to make your motive? Just about everything you’ve done in your life is worth killing for. The killing game is all your fault.” Although “the killing game [being] all [Teruko’s] fault” sounds pretty damning, there’s the obvious counterargument to be made that this isn’t even Teruko’s motive. In fact, the board currently shows it assigned to Xander. However, the majority of people (including myself) seem to believe that David was lying, and this secret is Teruko’s. So, let’s analyze under that assumption.

Teruko did admit to Veronika that she doesn’t know what secret could be used as her motive because there were so many. Even if that motive secret isn’t hers, that still means that Teruko has done a lot of shady stuff. Teruko’s decision to live on set forever could line up with the mastermind's goal of wanting to keep the cameras rolling as well. The very first scene of DRDT shows that someone who wants the killing game to end also wants Teruko dead, which implies that Teruko and the killing games are on the same side.

Teruko also has a prior history of concealing things about herself from us, the viewing audience. We knew basically nothing about her past or trust issues before Xander stabbed her, causing her sudden change in attitude to come as a blindside. Teruko apparently has a “risky” killing game-ending plan in mind for the end of the second Class Trial that she’s told us absolutely nothing about. And, most notably, Teruko clearly knows things about Mai that she’s decided not to share with viewers at home. (I do believe that Teruko genuinely can’t remember Mai’s name, but she does remember that Mai is similar to Xander and wanted to help, which is more than anything we would have known from the main text on our own).

Point is, DRDT is written in a way where we don’t hear a ton of Teruko’s thoughts. That would make it much easier for her to scheme something behind the scenes, as opposed to someone who we get a lot of emotional reactions or logical theorizing from. It’s actually kind of similar to the difference between Kaede and Shuichi’s styles of narration, as pointed out by ShortOneGaming in their impeccable v3 playthrough! I recommend watching their entire letsplay if you're in the mood for v3, but I found one time where they talked about this concept here. I’ll transcribe it for anyone who doesn’t want to open YouTube right now:

Gina: I do want to call– as my final sort of note– what’s interesting is that you called out immediately that Kaede’s narration was weird. That, it was always, like– dictation? Allison: Yes! Gina: It’s always, like, speaking directly to a person– Allison: Yes! Yes, I did say– It never really felt like actual internal monologue. Like, she never was expressing her thoughts or anything to us. I mean, yes, she was, but then there were those weird moments where she was, like… y’know, hiding it from the player, and… probably from herself, too, to some extent. Like, she was just like, “and then I had to go do this thing.” Um, and like, “we won’t really address how I’m feeling about this.” Gina: Yep. Allison: And at the same time, it hides it from the– the player. And that was very clever. Really good. I mean, her– yeah, her narration was always kind of weird. But, she did have moments where she had internal reflection.

Hopefully, you can see the comparison. By putting a greater emphasis on actions as opposed to what Teruko is feeling (“I kneeled down and touched his neck” after finding Ace’s presumed-dead body; “Everyone else started filtering in” when people walk into the Playground and find Arei’s corpse), it becomes much easier to have Teruko hide exactly what she knows or exactly how she feels about certain events. It’s actually the opposite of the kind of narration that Damon had (“I’m trapped in a killing game… with people who despise me. How… how did this happen? I just wanted to help… I wanted to make sure we didn’t trust each other too easily… and now I’m being treated like the bad guy” after the 0th Class Trial) that made me believe he wasn’t the mastermind!

So, do I think that Teruko would be a mastermind who remembers, or a mastermind who forgot? Well, I could kind of see it either way. Personally, I think that Teruko being a mastermind whose memories are intact is the more interesting version, and I do believe it’s possible. I also don’t understand why someone with as many trust issues as Teruko has would want to remove her own memories if it weren’t necessary. Then again, Teruko being an amnesiac mastermind could make up for some of the… issues that arise with her as a mastermind candidate.

What? She’s in third place, not first. Despite how long I’ve already talked about Teruko, there’s still more to say!

First, the problems if Teruko did retain her memories: why would she ask MonoTV about the mastermind’s identity when the two were alone? Why would she be creating a plan to end the killing game? Why would she pretend to not know who Mariabella Rosales was even though everyone else clearly knew?

And then, the problems that persist even if Teruko did lose her memories: where would Teruko have gotten the resources to plan a killing game of this caliber? Even if she had them, why would she use it on this? Assuming that secret is hers, why would she write that about herself in a plausibly public place (beyond the swapping, Arei looked over Whit’s shoulder)?

Oh yeah, back to that secret. Just because “the killing game is all [Teruko’s] fault” doesn’t mean that she’s the one who planned it. In fact, the wording sounds very accusatory and hostile for something that Teruko would have theoretically written to herself. From the first scene, we already know that there is a person or group of people somewhere who are out to get Teruko. It could make more sense if that entity is the mastermind, and wrote the secret to blame Teruko for whatever she did that got her on their bad side.

There’s probably more to be said, but hopefully you can see why I have so many mixed feelings about Teruko. I definitely think she’s one of the more likely mastermind candidates out there, but I still don’t know exactly how likely that is, y’know?

#2: Rose Lacroix

Once upon a time, a wise and powerful theory alchemist known only by the epithet @1moreff-creator postulated that Rose could be the mastermind of Despair Time, and then never elaborated on the idea at all. For centuries (a couple of weeks) the townsfolk (me) were baffled by these dark and mysterious ramblings. However, as seasons passed by, as travelers came and went, as the tide advanced to kiss the land before slinking back to its home once more– the idea… started making more and more sense?

Rose is a really smart character who has already shown her proficiency in Class Trials. In the first, she utilized her ability to perfectly capture the scene and her knowledge of chromatography. Although her talents haven’t been as useful so far in the second, she’s still managed to keep up with the conversation despite never looking at the scene of the crime. Thus, I can see why, from a writing perspective, DRDTdev would choose to make his mastermind the Ultimate Art Forger.

There’s also the angle that Rose is a criminal, and therefore could be willing to do illegal or immoral things. However, she does seem to be pretty remorseful about it, and she’s already been caught for her criminal behavior before. Unfortunately for her, her relationship with her saviors the Spurlings only makes her all the more suspicious. Even if Rose didn’t want to be the mastermind of a killing game, if the Spurlings forced her to do it, she might have not had a choice. (Xander is very against the Spurlings… Xander is bloody hands guy → stop the killing game → stop the Spurlings?)

I also like the angle of “the Spurlings forced her to do it” because of what I talked about back in Mai’s section– the concept of the mastermind not being among the students. In Rose’s case, you can get the best of both worlds. The entity behind the killing game, the Spurling Foundation, would be a group outside of the killing game for MonoTV to contact, but there would still be a student among the cast’s ranks to suspect and accuse come Chapter 6.

What’s the argument against Rose? Well, I would ask why Rose would want to put herself in this kind of situation, but if it was the Spurlings’ choice, then that explains that. You could say Rose has been too helpful to be a bad guy, but everything she’s done so far has been to help the students win a Class Trial. That keeps the killing game running, which keeps the show on. The biggest problem I’m thinking of at the moment is the notion that the Spurling Foundation would have chosen to make Rose’s secret about how her backstory led her into their clutches. However, the secret doesn’t actually acknowledge the Spurlings by name, and it also frames Rose’s crimes in a way that makes her look like a good person– the opposite of what someone would think of as a mastermind. The secret was also only intended for Rose’s eyes, so it could have functioned as more of a low-key threat to remind her why she needs to stay in line.

Shouldn’t all of this talk of Rose lacking agency make her a bad mastermind candidate, though? If a villain doesn’t even believe in their villainous motivations, the story could end on a really flat note, with the good guys steamrolling an evildoer who doesn’t really care. How are we supposed to reach a satisfying conclusion if the mastermind hardly has anything to be held accountable for?

Those are normally things I would argue, but as many have pointed out, Teruko isn’t a normal protagonist. Actually, I think that this kind of mastermind setup for Rose could be a great way to end Teruko’s arc about learning to trust other people. Rose is the mastermind, somebody who shouldn’t be trusted…! It would be so easy for Teruko to just crush this person who betrayed her into dust– Rose isn’t even putting up much of a fight. But in the end, Teruko will choose to be patient, and see that Rose never wanted to betray Teruko. Even if her actions wound up hurting Teruko and many others, she still deserves a second chance, or at least a second evaluation.

As you saw in the death predictions, I obviously believe that Rose has the potential to make a late game run, whether as a survivor or something else. Writing all of this out, I can see even more clearly why Rose just might be the DRDT mastermind. However, despite all that I wrote, the idea still feels kinda more like a fun AU than the actual truth to me…? So, I still think there’s one person whose chances I like slightly better.

#1: J Rosales

Whaddya know, J’s personal ??? tier catapulted her into the lead. It is probably true that my uncertainty about where she might land is contributing to me deeming her the mastermind– it’s a really weird space in the kill order, as someone who survives long enough to theoretically have a positive character arc while sometimes not being counted among the survivors at the end.

Part of why I put J this high is that I really like the theory of J being the mastermind along with her brother, Ryan. Sadly, I cannot find any of the original theories that postulated this idea to link to, so I’ll try my best to explain what I remember myself. Basically, some people found the scene in c1e4 where Rose doesn’t remember who J is suspicious. They combined this scene with J’s younger brother, Ryan, and J’s talent, the Ultimate Effects Artist, to suggest that J could be using her FX talents to disguise Ryan as herself and have them occasionally trade places. From this Q&A, one of the few things we know about Ryan is that he enjoys crossdressing, which furthers the idea that he could enjoy pretending to be J. Ryan is also (to my memory) the only DRDT character’s sibling whose name we have seen in the main text, which could indicate that he’s more important than Arei’s sisters, Levi’s brothers, or other potential siblings.

I think it’s a really fun idea that I would at the very least want to see come to fruition, regardless of how likely it is. If J was working with Ryan, you can once again repeat the argument that there’s both a mastermind for MonoTV to talk to outside the game and one to be accused within the game. The biggest issue with it is that I don’t know how Arturo wouldn’t see the differences between the two, even if Rose may have. Maybe if J and Ryan haven’t swapped since the Rosales secret got out, and won’t swap again until Arturo dies…? I don’t know, I’m getting ahead of myself.

The thing is, other than just being a unique and interesting concept, I’m not really sure what the point of having J and Ryan swap would be, in universe or out of it. (This is why I wish I could’ve found a link to the original theorist... :,( ) My best argument for in universe would be that there are some things that only J has the skill to do, her being the Ultimate Effects Artist while Ryan is not. However, they couldn’t just have Ryan be the one in the killing game full-time, because he’s too young and therefore wouldn’t have been part of the original Hope’s Peak class. Thus, there are some points in time where J needs to be working behind the scenes (like on the executions or something), and during those intervals, Ryan subs in. Metatextually, I guess it could show how every person in the entertainment industry can be cutthroat, or that every child of a celebrity is bound to get messed up about it somehow…?

Regardless, even if Ryan isn’t involved at all, there are plenty of reasons to suspect J on her own. Ultimate Effects Artist is a highly suspicious talent when it comes to the deception of a killing game (just check out how many people think J already used it to kill Arei), and in connecting her to Hollywood. J may claim to specialize in theater as opposed to television, but 1) she could have been lying, or 2) that could be true, but she’s making an exception this time. Even if she normally works in live theater, if you were a TV executive approached by the daughter of Mariabella Rosales who is also a Hope’s Peak Ultimate student in her own right, would you really turn her away…?

J’s custom weapon is also pretty suspicious. Even if it doesn’t seem to be able to trigger traps like the one used on Levi (though that could be another lie), I could still see it being pretty helpful for subtly operating MonoTV, turning on a monitor, starting an execution, or stuff like that. Charles essentially confirms that the custom weapons were in the students’ rooms since they all woke up, which means that J could have had this remote on her the entire time.

J’s relationships also seem potentially mastermind-y. Thus far, the two characters with which she’s been associated most are Arei and Arturo. Those two (at least, prior to Arei’s change of heart) have been so clearly villainous and hateful that J would obviously look like a nice person in comparison. Why is this helpful? It means that J can get away with doing more objectionable things without raising any huge red flags. If J is the mastermind, we can look back on her demolition of Arturo in the Chapter 2 Trial as a brief early glimpse into how cruel she can really be. But, for the moment, although it’s definitely memorable, many people (including myself) can react to it with a, “yeah, but based on what Arturo was doing to her, it’s kinda justified…” (Not saying it isn’t somewhat justified either way, just that it could also be something more.)

J could also have a range of motivations related to her hatred for her mom. Maybe she’s trying to turn people against the Rosales name to ruin Mariabella’s reputation. Maybe this killing game is a plan to finally have a big artistic success all on her own (or with Ryan) to prove her mom wrong. Maybe she thinks that a world so enamored with fame and glamor deserves to rot in a pit of despair. I don’t know which of these options would be the most likely, but I could see how any of them could be possible explanations for how J got to this point.

I think my biggest argument against J once again comes back to the “why”. I think that J has a lot of potential to be a good mastermind, but I don’t know if that carries over to being a good mastermind for Teruko. Unlike with Rose, I don’t have a good sense of how J being the mastermind would tie into a satisfying ending to Teruko’s trust arc.

@venus-is-thinking and I sometimes like to run randomized killing games as a fun writing exercise (randomize the cast, motives, and mastermind; see where it takes you), and we’ve generally found that the most compelling protagonist-mastermind duos either have the protagonist sharing the same worldview with the mastermind, or being the only person who believes the opposite.

If the protagonist starts with the same beliefs as the mastermind, then defeating the mastermind is a showcase of the protagonist’s development. Hajime and Izuru work as protagonist and mastermind because Izuru is the manifestation of Hajime’s belief that only talented people are important and can make an impact on the world. By renouncing Izuru, Hajime proves that he’s learned that anyone has the chance to change their future if they put in the effort. 

If the protagonist has the opposite opinions from the mastermind, then it proves how crucial the protagonist is to the narrative because they are the only one who could deliver the critical message. A great example of this is Shuichi and Tsumugi. When Tsumugi tries to set up the conflict of “hope good, despair bad” that will keep the killing games going, all of the other surviving students fall for it. Shuichi being the only character who has spent the entire game learning the importance of balancing two extremes makes his callout of Tsumugi incredibly satisfying, and justifies the protagonist swap by proving that Shuichi is the only hero who could have saved this day.

That’s why I think that J would be a great mastermind for a protagonist who has issues with family or stardom, but might not be the best choice for a story with Teruko at the helm. Those are only my observations, though, so I’d understand if DRDTdev planned things differently.

And that is finally the end! Here’s the final tierlist I wound up working off of, which I fiddled with a TON while writing:

(It’s based off of Ocean Unknown’s tierlist!)

Since this has already gone on so long, I’ll try to keep the conclusion brief. Please take all of this with a grain of salt, as I wound up making a lot of claims about writing that don’t necessarily have the strongest foundation. I didn’t write anything that I think is blatantly false, obviously, but whether it’s good advice or not doesn’t necessarily mean that DRDTdev considered it. We may have different priorities in telling a compelling story. And, we’re less than two chapters in! Even the end of the Chapter 2 trial could throw a positive or negative wrench in any of these profiles.

Thank you so much for reading through this whole thing, and if you got through it and still have anything you want me to elaborate on further (a specific character, a specific theory, a specific aspect of fangan writing, etc), I would be happy to do so. I, uh, really hope that this answered the question that Anon asked, haha. Until next time… stay wary. There could be masterminds lurking about...!