So, because of having to record it, I’m still only about half way through the episode. The last thing I saw was George’s fight with EVA-Beatrice (shoutout to Drew Carey and Drew Carey for being the best).
But the appearance of Tohya is definitely something I’ve spent hours thinking over. If anything I’m struggling to remember the sequence of events on the gameboard because I’m spending so much time on this.
It is so awesome to have my claim that there was a different author for episodes 3 onward confirmed. As I said on the Episode 5 thread, it’s one of those things that I felt was staring me in the face as I go back through and edit it (especially now that I’m editing episode 3, where this change occurs). I’m sure there will be more detail later on in episode 6 to work this theory off, but I’m incredibly confident at this point that everything in episodes 1-5 was written down, including the tea parties and Ange’s story, especially after the incredible line ‘my memory of the future is hazy’.
My initial reaction to Tohya being the author, rather than Battler, was pretty devestating, but I very quickly realised that this is ridiculous. A few notes on that;
- Why would Ryukishi mention the male double appearing at the convention, the alternate identity, and the assistant, if they weren’t relevant? Sure, it could be chalked down to being part of establishing the mystique of Featherine, but there’s something particularly deliberate and specific about those mentions which is very different to how the pasts of Bernkastel and Lambdadelta are explored.
- The witch of ‘theatregoing’, ‘spectating’? Hardly sounds like an author to me. There are many ways that this could be explained too, but once again, it’s odd.
- Why would someone not directly connected to the incident be writing about it?
- Every ‘magic’ scene we’ve been shown thus far seems to at least have some allusion to the truth of the moment. It’s hard to tell with the few appearances I’ve seen thus far, but what motive is there for Tohya to write herself as ‘hiding’ her identity as the witch? What difference would it have made to appear first as the witch, or to not appear as the witch at all?
So basically; I still think Battler is the author, at least of Episodes 3 and 4. I’m growing suspicious that Tohya may actually be the author for episodes 5 and 6, thus the appearances of Erika; the more traditional mystery detective from the more traditional mystery author. I don’t think there’s enough evidence to say this for sure, but there definitely enough foreshadowing to justify it, if it is the case.
So I have two courses of action at the moment; either I just push forwards with Battler as the author, or I try reason out why Tohya may actually have written all of episodes 3-6. Or I do both.
I think I plan to continue my claim that Battler is the author (because it’s harder to do but I also think it makes more sense), but I will also explore the motive of Tohya, to try and figure out what obscure reason she would have for writing any of this.
So much like last time, I’m going to run and hide for a bit, and I’ll see you all with a few thousand words in a week or so.