Yeah. I think I’ve come to terms with the fact that this Episode is far from perfect. But in terms of what it conveys, it’s still one of the most goddamn beautiful endings I could have hoped for. Bravo, Ryukishi.
One noteworthy aspect of this Episode is how it addresses “the truth”. The catbox of Rokkenjima is a big focus of the story, but what about the catbox of the outside world, the future? From Episode 4 at least, the future seemed pretty fixed and reliable as a point of reference. But Episode 8 completely tears that apart and makes us begin questioning what even is “real” in this work of fiction. I know that’s a weird thing to say, but yet so many people are so determined to sort out the ‘truth’ of Umineko’s world. But it feels like Episode 8 was written to be especially regressive here. Bernkastel states that there’s no way Ange could possibly survive the jump, which makes anything that happens after that in any of the Episodes extremely dubious. There’s Ikuko using the red truth in a goddamn press conference with no attempt at explaining how that’s possible. And then there’s Ange telling Okonogi that he told her the words “Without love it cannot be seen”, even though that happened in the Episode 8 reality where she did jump off the building. Lots of weird stuff going on. It’s as if Ryukishi is trying to get people to stop worrying about what’s real and what’s not, and just demonstrate that the goal of determining the canonicity of Umineko’s timelines isn’t really the point. Well, what do you think about that? Do you think he’s trying to lead us off, or am I just being lazy and not thinking hard enough?
