Hmm…
Well for one thing, Meta!Beato’s goal isn’t to just make Battler remember his promise-it’s to resurrect his soul. If you’ve read EP6, you likely know that Beato and Battler have the same mindset.
Also, Sayo had a lot of reasons for not telling Battler the truth upfront. One of them being afraid of rejection and that she was torn between letting him go or staying with him forever.
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Disagree. The VN did a good job of telling you Sayo’s struggle. In fact, I think EP7 actually encouraged readers to go back through the previous arcs and piece together the culprit. EP2 is a fantastic goldmine for figuring out what made Sayo who she was, its just in the background a bit.
If you want, I know Akatokuro from tumblr used to have amazing analysis on Yasu’s character.
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i think so too. just because umineko was really subtle & made you truly figure out sayo for yourself doesn’t mean that it’s poorly written.
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Seraphitic is pretty sharp. I haven’t listened to the episode 4 podcast yet, but he definitely has better understanding than I did after 4 episodes. Based on his posts, at least.
Update 1/18/17: Ok, as I was reading BrokenBongo’s post, I was convinced that he was actually spoiled because it was so accurate. Until about halfway through, then it goes off the rails.
He understands what Beatrice wants Battler to ask. The “Why done it?”
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I know of akatokuro’s Goats Re-Reading Seacats blog, and unfortunately, it only goes up to EP5. I also highly recommend seeing s2gtiger’s Umineko liveblog that just finished up recently (they finished EP7 and intend to start up EP8 in October). Since you guys aren’t getting at what I’m trying to say about how the Umineko fanbase was like long before we ever had the manga to clarify things (and why a lot of people from pre-2013 Umineko fandom found Sayo Yasuda to be terribly unsympathetic), I highly recommend looking at s2gtiger’s liveblog, as their tags and posts on the series really show what it was like in the time and why there are so many things from that time about how a lot of the fandom found things in EP7 and 8 to be ridiculous (and why a lot of people didn’t like Sayo).
And I wouldn’t say that the VN did a really a good job of portraying that Sayo is technically transgender. EP2 has a lot of her gender identity issues (hello the Beatrice versus Shannon entirety), but one wouldn’t know that the person behind the murders is transgender. Ryukishi may be subtle at times, but if you reread his stuff, he’s as subtle as an 18-wheeler semi-truck in a bubblewrap factory (and as I’ve said, back when the VNs were released, people weren’t as aware of transgender people as they are now, especially in a positive light as Ryukishi portrays her.) Don’t get me wrong. Ryukishi is a great writer, but he has a lot of weaknesses like his subtlety being far too subtle (honestly, how many people could have solved the epitaph before EP5 where the biggest hint for solving it was located, and even then, it was put in a scene where you were more likely to pay more attention to what kind of person Krauss is away from his family), and his repetitiveness is… well, I explained it already.
i am getting at what you’re saying. i just disagree. & tbh i feel like you’re making it sound like umineko came out a long time ago when it’s only been a decade, & trust me, lgbtq activism was definitely a thing (including in japan) a decade ago. it’s not inherently a bad thing to be ignorant about certain issues but i’m saying that, as a person from the lgbtq community & who relates to sayo in a lot of other ways, her story does make an enormous amount of sense. i get that it must have been extremely confusing for many people when umineko first came out. but i’m just saying that i think it’s frustrating when people dismiss sayo as being oversensitive or whatever.
yes, i have reread umineko & i agree that ryukishi isn’t a perfect writer. but i think it makes sense that he wanted to be extremely subtle about many things in umineko because of how controversial so many of its themes are. (i’m asian, btw, so maybe i understand this point better than westerners.) his writing definitely could use some editing but that doesn’t take away the fact that umineko is solvable if you read critically. (& i guess i’m in the minority because i think that ep 8’s overall message is fine but… yeah, it has its flaws.)
also i’d agree that sayo can’t clearly be labeled as transgender because even she’s not sure about how she identifies. but in addition to her gender issues, let’s not forget that sayo’s bisexual too which is also incredibly stigmatized & more reason why ryukishi may have wanted to be very subtle about writing umineko.
basically: agree to disagree on ryukishi’s writing?
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anyway i also really like how ep4 talks about cycles of abuse & its permanent psychological effects. i’ve found myself rereading maria & rosa’s interactions in ep4 a lot &, god, rosa is an incredibly vile character but she’s really well-written. so much of umineko is about how misogyny destroys people & relationships & how it can fuel abuse & self-hate…
i mean, rosa, natsuhi, & eva had so many issues because of the misogyny & abuse they’ve faced. & they’re technically among the most privileged women in japanese society. but that doesn’t shield them from kinzo & krauss’ hateful attitudes or, in rosa’s case, intense stigma against female sexuality. then let’s think about sayo… if rich women like rosa, natsuhi, & eva can’t escape misogyny & abuse even though they’re cisgender women who can bear children, then sayo will only face a million times more stigma & hate…
anyway, there’s so much to unpack re: gender & abuse in umineko.
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Regarding the main gameboard plot of this episode, how far involved do you guys think Kyrie was? The “test” is clearly called back to in the Episode 7 Tea Party where Kyrie and Rudolf used it as an excuse to call out the cousins one by one and kill them off.
Do you guys think Kyrie was actively and knowingly involved in murdering people in this episode? But if that was the case, why did she still bother going along with the ‘script’ in the end and tell Battler to believe in witches? What do you guys think happened here?
I do have a question about Rosa and the man she meets with in EP4. As far as I remember, it isn’t stated who this man is, correct?
Is…this Maria’s father? Or could Rosa be pregnant with a second child? Or, maybe this is just a typo?
It is said Maria’s father probably went on to build a family after he left Rosa, and this man appears to be married.
That guy is incredibly cold if he’s Maria’s dad. He spends the entire time talking like he doesn’t even know her, and doesn’t seem to have any sort of interest in her.
I’ve always assumed that he’s some random guy that Rosa’s dating, though that is a very depressing possibility.
I believe that man is a person Rosa was trying to have a relationship (although it would be several layers of god, what a messed up man if that person WAS Maria’s real father, like, damn, pay your child support!)
Also, with the revelation from a certain just-released game on how illegitimate children and their parents are treated in Japan (spoiler alert: it’s very bad), it really puts Rosa and Maria in another light to me. Not saying it excuses what they’re doing, but it does add another layer of meaning to their actions (particularly Rosa’s rant of wanting happiness as a woman). I do kinda wonder if Ange also had that stigma of being an illegitimate child (since Kyrie got pregnant with Ange before Asumu died), and if that contributed to how Ange was treated.
Just spent the last few hours writing up a blog post about the Episode 4 Tea Party, cause I felt like it.
For anyone who’s interested: Link
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That was a nice read.
Rereading ep4 it’s pretty obvious that Battler just doesnt care about everything and is there just to play and goof around with Beatrice, while Ange is completely forgotten and the reason for why he is playing is forgotten as well. Ofcourse Battler doesn’t see it himself, but Ange understands it pretty well. Even if she understands it, she still tries to manipulate him into it. Battler looks pathetic saying how he almost cornered the witch, saying that even thousand years, he will win her, implying that he is ready to play with Beatrice for another thousand years. Just like Ange said it’s a cage to lock up Battler forever.
There are a lot of parallels to Yasu when Ange explains why she feels isolated and how lonely her world is.
While Yasu wants deemphasize her misery in different ways, Ange accepts it and resigns to it.
I really like how Ange’s character is shown through relationship with Maria, she stole the diary to keep herself from loneliness and now it became her best friend. She even says that this is not just the diary, but another part of her (trying to hint us how splitting personalities work).
Rosa/Maria scenes are really sad when rereading because you know that Sakutaro is just a simple toy bought from a shop and how Rosa tries to justify herself all the time, I felt a little bit digusted. Ofcourse she has work, but when she doesnt she always keeps all free time to herself. She is happy that she gave her such a good present, a friend, so she can just spent much more free time by herself. But she is not happy that Maria is taking Sakutaro outside, because that would be embarrasing for her if someone will see her. Rosa is very isolated and lonely, Maria is her only ally, but at the same time she uses her as a scapegoat for everything. But Rosa is a human and she does love Maria inside. She feels guilt, love and her suffering. Rosa is jealous of Maria just because she can’t have friends like Maria does.
The way Maria describes Sakutaro is such a big hint to how Yasu thinks of Shannon, it’s so funny. Sakutaro to Maria is like Kanon to Shannon, lol.
EP 4 explores characters of Ange and Maria - members of Mariage Sorciere, and also how they came to believe in magic. The story itself asks audience to try and understand the story of the third and final member - Beatrice.
In 1998 sequences Okonogi out right tells Ange that Kinzo actually chose successor beforehand, but Ange doesn’t accept it and instead believe in Eva theory. But you know WITHOUT LOVE IT CANNOT BE SEEN, and Okonogi hints at Eva theory being wrong too saying that he couldn’t imagine Eva killing Hideyoshi and George. He tells her (us) that to reach the truth, she has to look from another side too. It’s funny how one of the bad, shady characters in the game gives us a lot of hints, clues.
When Beato gives Battler the right to use blue truth and he claims that Kinzo is already dead, we switch to the gameboard. Where the same situation is happening with Kyrie vs Krauss. Kyrie saying that if Krauss cant prove tht Krauss is dead, then he has to accept it and ofcourse Krauss can’t counter it. It’s really fun to see this parallel between meta world and gameboard. This is pretty much Kyrie episode, as we learn a lot about her but not directly. It’s really interesting how in this episode, it’s not Yasu’s fantasy for the most part it is Kyrie’s.
After Ange takes a break from the game Maria and Beatrice/Yasu appear to teach her the magic. Like in Maria’s case the magic to turn miserable and bad situation into something you can live happy with. The magic both Yasu and Maria have, another hint for the readers!
Yasu is excited because Maria can create imaginary friends that she can talk and play with, wink wink… 
When Ange is being bullied in the classroom Ryukishi gives us yet another clue. Ange orders stakes to DIE. She rejects them, she finds them useless. And by doing that they become dead. Just like what Yasu does. Mammon can’t kill anyone, only if Ange is willing to do it. Magic used just as a cover up for these murders. Ange asks to kill her, just like Yasu in the end of the episode. Ange asked her classmates, but Yasu had a bomb and gold. But classmates just laughed at her, the only “ally” at that time was the teacher. She realised that someone is actually on her side. Yasu hoped for the same, that this person would become her ally, but he didn’t.
On the way to the Rokkenjima, Ange admits that she did hurt Maria. It’s true, because Battler and Ange were in a normal family and they had a lot of freedom to themselves. They couldn’t think about how they words can hurt someone like Maria and Yasu. Ange came on this island to apologize for Maria, for her harsh words that led her to be like that. Right now Ange understand that magic for Maria was another way to survive. And she shouldn’t have said about it so harshly.
Ange is curious why Maria couldn’t summon Sakutaro after he died and Sakutaro outright gives us another clue. The reason is that she saw Sakutaro being torn apart and she decided that he died.
Underground Shannon and Kanon outright confirm that they are part of Beatrice saying that this game feel weird and Beatrice is acting strange, implying they know everything about previous games and know what Beatrice always does. Then they proceed by saying that “It’s weird for both of us to survive on the first twilight”. I mean how more obvious you can get, hehe.
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So one of the biggest questions I’ve had after reading Episode 7 is how Ange survives the gunshot wounds from the Sumadera bodyguards-slash-assassins. While the common idea is that Amakusa killed all of them, it is shown that they do actually fire bullets before they are killed. In the manga at least.
So it is my theory is that Okonogi is the mastermind behind Ange’s survival. When Kasumi visits the Ushiromiya group, it would hardly surprise me if Okonogi thought that her guards would be carrying firearms and so had them checked before she could ascend to the same floor Okonogi was on. This is common practice in multimillion corporations. Since we also know Okonogi thought everything out beforehand, it’s possible he could envision Ange separating from Amakusa, so took the additional preventive measure of loading the guns taken away from Kasumi’s bodyguards with blanks. This explains how Lucifer can defend Ange against the bullets.
So ultimately, Ange does survive, however in regards to the credits scene, it’s important to remember that Ange switches between Ange Ushiromiya and ANGE-Beatrice a lot in this scene. Kasumi solidifies the transformation by tering Maria’s grimoire to pieces and giving Ange the resolve to prove her magic once and for all. Since in this state she fully embraces her role as ANGE, we can say that she is effectively no longer Ange Ushirmiya but ANGE in its entirety. Hence, it can be said ‘Ange dies in 1998’.
And for those of you who find this explanation too flimsy or warped, the other explanation is that Amakusa kills her after killing all the Sumadera bodyguards and their mistress. But that’s quite a sad ending
Yeah but what about how we can see that ANGE survived by looking at later episodes?
What about how the credits say Ange rather than ANGE?
ANGE represents the spiritual journey the real Ange goes through. That’s the basis of my argument.
Her outburst with Ikuko is perhaps the biggest problem with that. When Ange references that Ikuko ‘can’t pull the wool over her eyes’, Ikuko smiles and gives us an ambiguous comment, This is probably an indication that either Ange has at some point of time envisioned herself speaking with Hachijo Ikuko (which would then take her into the Meta World as ANGE), or that we must assume, for this theory to hold, that the 1998 events in the various episodes overlap.
My other argument involves some Higurashi spoilers for an example, so it is spoilered. If it becomes such that Ange experiences these events differently, then the other way to look at it is that we have to apply a Higurashi perspective to her role as opposed to an Umineko one whereby she can mysteriously remember everything in parallel worlds. It makes very little sense either way.
The last thing I can summon up to support this theory is that it is similar to a case with Ikuko’s Red truth at the climax of Episode 8, and that ANGE is a vessel for Ryukishi07 to give an example of the readers’ journey themselves through the Meta World. Specifically for those readers who wish for Beato’s games to be resolved and a fitting conclusion for Battler to be brought forth.
Honestly, the theory denying the magic behind Ange surviving the Sumadera guards still stands even if this doesn’t, however, to provide closure I decided to add a theory explaining how her death is mentioned in the credits. If you consider the events that happen near the moment she gets minced, her character seems to go back to the skyscraper (at least in the manga) which is contradicting even the temporal arrangement of events, since we know by that time she’s already on Rokkenjima. Unless you consider her to be dead as in shot by Amakusa, in which case the second question answers itself.
Additionally, we have Episode 8’s red truth from Bernkastel proclaiming the same death ineffective, so unless you want to go as far as to say Ange has been dead all this time, then again, your question answers itself.