Oh, I gotta add
“USHIROMIYA KYRIE CANNOT SAVE BATTLER”
to my list since that was pants-shitting.
The EP7 Tea Party was really great too, shows how powerful Ryukishi can be as a horror writer.
Rosa Musou is still my favorite. There are better scenes later on, but that scene had the most effect on me at the time of reading. There’s just so many things going on:
- We personally witness the resignation of reality, and with how the entirety of EP2 was framed as, “yeah, there’s a rational answer to everything!” this scene comes across as a total mindfuck. (This is the first time in Umineko where magic comes across in full-force, IMO.)
- FUCKING BEST SONG IN THE GAME IS PLAYING
- We get some great characterization with Rosa
- Not to mention the epicness of the battle scene itself
I mentioned that my favorite fight scenes are those with humans against demons, since (at least to me) there’s something really badass about those David vs Goliath scenarios. Magic v Magic battles were less interesting to me (like Beato vs Virgilia) because “oh, she’s gonna use magic, oh she’s fine, she’s gonna use her magic too,” etc.)
Plus, according to the thesis of Umineko (at least my interpretation), a lot of the “true” characterization occurs almost exclusively in the fantasy scenes as opposed the mystery scenes.
A shout-out to system0 Natsuhi in EP1, for me that is where Umineko really began.