Why Danganronpa 3 Is So Painful

[@NezumiVA]

Hey, this video's getting some revived attention lately, so for the newcomers I'd like to say: We stand by our personal thoughts on the show, and overall I still think I said everything I needed to, but there are certain aspects of the video itself and overall presentation/wording I would do differently, were it being done over again (even if I still enjoy the end-product). Hindsight's 20/20. Critique is, of course, always permitted - feel free to say whatever you'd like, however, do check out my video titled "Future Plans" if you were curious to see any response to some of the more common critiques of the video itself that people have had. I can't reply to every individual comment, of course, but I think that still covers a few things people might want to know. I think a lot of people experienced some tonal whiplash with this video because of the markedly more negative slant, and I understand that. I couldn't offer any false positivity on something that I was truly thoroughly disappointed by, but needless to say - if it weren't an important entry in the franchise I was doing a full retrospective on, I likely wouldn't have bothered with it, because I (like many audience members) do tend to prefer making content which has a more overall positive focus. So, I'd just say to expect this tone to be an outlier in the future of the channel - I wouldn't be looking for it to crop up much if at all, most of the time. Edit 2023: I would also understand if DR3 fans who were frustrated by this one didn't want to stick around, but I'd like to reiterate - please continue liking the show! I don't want to take that away from you, and I apologize if I conveyed that point somewhat poorly in this particular video. If you'd like to give something else I made one more shot, I sort of directly tried to follow up on and change the way I engage with things I dislike in my Shadow the Hedgehog retrospective, which is in many ways a sort of mirror video and response to the problems I have with this one. Don't know if it'd be your cup of tea, but give it a shot, maybe!

[@devilmaycrysarockingdontcome]

Pin this

[@trulymrword]

Who am I to judge someone's totality of work over a piece that was truly cathartic for them to make? Also I can't believe how they massacred my boi Naegs.

[@EdmondDantes224]

For what its worth, this video was way more fun than actually watching Danganronpa 3 (which unfortunately I did, and discoverd this video afterward. It may be long but it quite thoroughly highlights all the problems).

[@EdmondDantes224]

When the show said dude wasn't allowed to Use His Talent, I assumed what it meant was he wasn't allowed to mind-control people using a Funny Cat Cartoon he might've animated and loaded up on his phone ahead of time or something--you know, just to prevent him from cheesing the game by just telling everyone to look at his phone. But that's probably giving DR3 too much credit.

[@TheAzulmagia]

Seeing as you're covering visual novels with controversial third entries, do you think you might cover the Zero Escape series?

[@mordielleygo]

I still find it hilarious that the events of danganronpa only happened because someone couldn't come out as gay

[@ghoster7600]

At the time it was airing we celebrated him for being gay but in retrospect this is extremely sad look on represation. The fact that a closeted gay man was one of the major causes of the tragedy and apocalypse is so disturbing...

[@midnalazuli793]

​@@ghoster7600 LGBT+ representation isn't exactly positive in Danganronpa as a whole.

[@ghoster7600]

@@midnalazuli793 I'm very well aware, I'm just stating what happened when the show was airing. I think most people was just glad of the crumps of (false) representation.

[@naolucillerandom5280]

If he really didn't want that, it could all have been avoiding with "you were right, she's evil, also, she's going to come tell you I'm gay, I'm not, use it as evidence of blackmail"

[@AnekoFoxx]

@@naolucillerandom5280 Even if Juzo did do that, there was a chance that he could lose the person he’s in love with as a friend. The mere thought of that caused him so much despair that he couldn’t bring himself to do it. I don’t think Juzo thought Juno could cause a worldwide death, rioting, and chaos… he reasoned that whatever she could do wouldn’t be worth possibly losing his friend over. Still sucked that they wrote a gay character like that.

[@KyloGram]

Tengen: *leans down to Makoto’s ear* Me. The sixteenth student lying hidden somewhere in the school. The one they call me. Watch out for me.

[@PigBoy99]

3:56:27 I feel so sorry for Hajime since that means he had to see Teruteru's ideal world.

[@daviddavid-mi5qw]

Oh my god

[@flow185]

Fate worse than death

[@minty3884]

omg

[@BobTheArchmage]

But on the flip-side he got to *destroy* Teruteru's ideal world.

[@joeyburkhart6602]

everyone was mikan

[@GlitchyPixExtra]

I never liked Naegi's new haircut. Sure, it makes him look more mature I guess but it also just makes him look more like a short Hinata which just bugs me

[@GlitchyPixExtra]

God, I fucking hate that this anime literally had a chance to flesh out who the third creator of the Neo World Program was besides Fujisaki and Matsuda and they just fucking kill her off-screen and replace her with a god damn robot. And that's not to mention that Matsuda just sorta stands at a window and that's basically the only reference to him in Despair despite the fact that he was literally a part of the team that made Kamukura and also he should've been helping Komaeda with his dementia considering his mother literally dying from Alzheimer's was what pushed him into neurology in the first place but fucking _whatever_

[@kwanadorer551]

when i first started i was like "Is this hajime???????????"

[@GlitchyPixExtra]

@@kwanadorer551 There's a youtube video with a thumbnail that's from the scene where Komaeda and Naegi briefly interact in Hope Arc and I swear to god, it always throws me off because I always assume that Naegi is Hinata due to the short hair

[@thinkublu]

Ok, but Hope Arc is made orders of magnitude better by the fact that bryce papenbrook added a blooper to the dub which was never removed that I'm so happy stayed in As nagito is being pulled away from makoto Nagito: "His hands were so soft...~" Makoto: "... why was he sticky?"

[@shredjward]

God that detail at the end is such a great one Also hi inkublu fancy seeing you here

[@thinkublu]

@@shredjward hey lmao

[@omori4449]

I don't get it D:

[@samyen3210]

@@omori4449me neither 😂

[@blackwell4701]

​@@samyen3210In innocent terms, adrenaline from basically meeting his celebrity crush probably made Kaomaeda's hands clammy, and the weird comment he makes is him obcessing like many fangirls do when they shake hands with their idol and say stuff like "I'll never wash my hands again!" On a less wholesome note, 😢 Well. You can imagine why he would have been "excited" to meet Naegi in person before hand.........

[@Mockingdragon]

The reason DR2 is my favorite game in the series is the secret depth of the characters... That if you look closely and explore their free-time events and backgrounds, they each have a little seed of something that could have plausibly been nurtured into despair. Mahiru having abandonment issues from her dad, Akane's history of food insecurity and general poverty, Gundham's crippling self-loathing disguised by his Chuuni-ness. 24 episodes of Junko slowly focusing on each of them in turn, luring them to succumb to their existing flaws and temptations, could have been amazing. Instead they all loved Chiaki so much they became despairs after watching an anime. I got so mad I started slowly working on a massive fix-fic.

[@wrigglenight93]

I am expecting a link when its ready thanks in advance

[@tradikematematike1179]

yes please link the fic when you're done

[@samthedystopianrat1945]

Mahiru actually had abandonment issues with her mum, I think. Her dad was a lazy stay at home and her mum went to foreign countries for her photography work, right?

[@midnalazuli793]

While I do agree that DR2 has the best free time events, I just wish the complexity of the characters revealed during their events actually played a role in the story itself. In the main game, they all feel boiled down to one trait, and lack any kind of depth.

[@mayborneflower]

How far along is the fix fic these days?

[@PrincessFelicie]

If you'll forgive me the comparison, Naegi becoming hope's peak principal is a real Harry Potter becoming a magic cop moment. It's a reproduction and continuation of a system that failed that kills the main character's own beliefs in favor of a devotion to a garbage status quo.

[@statesminds]

I don’t think that at all wym. It never said that it only developed ultimate peoples talents

[@Vivians_Shadow]

@@statesminds yes but they also performed human experimentation at least once and actively worked to cover up several deaths

[@TheAzulmagia]

@@statesminds Throughout Danganronpa, we see in the Free Time Events the students have forsaken normal relationships and hobbies in pursuit of their talents, with the more normal cast members like Makoto or Hajime being tethers to reality for them. Hope's Peak Academy also doubled down on focusing on their talents to the point of creating Kamakura Izuru and erasing Hajime's normal sense of self. The point that the series continually brings up in the first two games is that a lot of these kids would have benefitted from being normal school students that didn't have a hyperfixation on their talents, such as Mondo becoming the Ultimate Biker in a display of machismo that killed his brother. But instead of going with that idea, Makoto and Co. just reopen the school that caused all of these problems in the first place and we're just meant to believe that another Kamakura Izuru won't be made down the line or another Junko Enoshima won't just roll up and cause all of the conflict all over again. No one learned a thing in the end. They just perpetuated the cycle.

[@cillbipher2613]

@@TheAzulmagia So basically they shoulda just brought in the demolition squad to level Hope's Peak and turn it into a fuggin park or something.

[@mr.protagonist5639]

​@@TheAzulmagiaok and what about those students who need and want their ultimate talents honed? Wouldn't it be good to have a school for that, helmed by someone that could be trusted? If there are students better suited to a normal school there are probably students suited to hopes peak.

[@oculism5158]

its funny how the dub became miles better than the sub just by virtue of not taking itself seriously. which leaves some form of enjoyment to be derived from this anime

[@nenemyoga]

literally

[@aturchomicz821]

Real💀💀

[@SillyGoobyWasTaken]

Kamakura Kamakura YASS QUEEN!!!!

[@TorosAndMakis53]

4:42:24

[@kirby6925]

i think what killed me about despair arc is that sdr2 itself, whether it be it’s actual main story or through the free times, had very clear cut tellings of the casts’ flaws, whether it be via their actual personalities, or how they were shaped through their backstories. When the game hits its climax you can very easily see how junko exploited those characters and how she could appeal to them. And you can see how despair can be something extremely appealing for them, albeit all for presumably a different personal reason. And then danganronpa3 spits in your face for that.

[@mkwhite5054]

@@johnjekyllson28 yeah, exactly. There’s a few of them where it can definitely make sense but there’s a couple like Nekomaru, Sonia, and Ibuki where it seems like there’d be a bit of a harder time doing it. Not to mention Junko’s brainwashing wouldn’t be an instant thing. You’d have to believe she can manipulate and convince 15 people to join her crusade one by one where no one talks to each other about her, or anyone else, or resists her manipulations at all. Honestly the anger to the brainwashing vs Junko manipulating everyone is weird since her needing someone else to mass manipulate the population makes her less of an untouchable god and more of realistic character. Now, to be fair, I doubt her plan was ever to actually mass brainwash the world or make the remnants of despair since she had already had things underway even before knowing of any of them it just seems like her meeting Mitarai allowed her to adjust her plans and expand them to a global level.

[@kirby6925]

@@johnjekyllson28 That’s the appeal! We *don’t* know what happened to the cast between the year or two they’re missing! Even some of the characters where you don’t think they would ever go to despair? Too bad! They did! That’s the actual canon within the game. I don’t believe that the brainwashing video was in mind when writing sdr2, opposed to the “traditional” kind of brainwashing because that’s what Junko was explicitly written to *do* when taken zero and if into account. Yeah Nekomaru is insanely selfless but the guy has an insanely debilitating heart disease that made it impossible for himself to do sports! that’s a possible goldmine for exploitation! Either way the video was a cop out of writing especially considering how some 3 plot points weren’t ever established until anime planning.

[@wrigglenight93]

@@mkwhite5054 Okay but this was not the *only* way to do it. Nor was it the only logical way to do it, and it certainly wasn't the most interesting. There was two years of time missing where any number of things could've happened. And all of them absolutely did have weaknesses that could've become exploitable given they went unaddressed for long enough. And frankly the fact that you can make it seem almost logical with enough eye-squinting and unearned benefit of the doubt doesn't make it less cheap, uninteresting, or hollow. Not that I think you don't understand all of this already. You're not mistaken, you're being deliberately obtuse

[@midnalazuli793]

This is true. One of the things I disliked about DR2 in general was how the characters' strongest traits were only present during their free time events, which were optional. The characters should be at their best during the main story itself. This is something DR1 does nicely by having some of the characters' free time events actually be integrated into the plot. So the DR2 cast ended up feeling extremely lackluster by comparison. DR3 could've helped improve the DR2 cast by exploring their weaknesses that were brought up during their free time events in DR2, but that never happened. Not only that, most of the DR2 cast, with the exception of Mikan and the Ultimate Imposter, are completely glossed over, and don't do anything important in the show at all. And that's not even mentioning the fact that the method of how each of the classmates fell into despair is completely lazy and doesn't do anything to make them any more complex, while they were already lacking complexity.

[@pandoratheexplorer8211]

@@mkwhite5054 every single sdr2 character had something they were upset about that junko could feasibly have used to make them fall into despair. Dont forget nidais heart condition. Mioda was involved in twilight syndrome and if they adapted it well they could have shown all the girls being bffs so mioda would be pulled to despair by grief/peer pressure from the rest of the gang. She also had a tense split from her old band in sdr2 that she didnt seem too upset about but could also be expanded on. And lets not forget sonias "i have to hide my fears bc i live to serve my kingdom as a princess so i need to be perfect all the time" complex. The sdr2 cast fits the "social outcast" theme well. That being said it kind of sucked that a lot of the cast were only characterized well in their ftes and not the main games. Its easy to forget important aspects of the characters if theyre not connected to a plot point

[@ConnorTheOne_]

Junko in Despair Arc doesn’t feel like the cold and calculated Ultimate Despair Mastermind we’ve come to know, she feels like a goofy slapstick Saturday Morning cartoon villain. She literally stumbles through every step of her “plan”, to the point where she literally happens to have the crux of her entire “plan”, Mitarai, fall into her lap because she just so happened to get injured by Izuru so insignificantly enough that she could leave the hospital right as he was walking by. Oh, and when I say she “stumbles” through her plan, I mean a drunken, semi-conscious, belligerent hobble. That is not Junko Enoshima, that is Skeletor in a wig.

[@colindowden2182]

Dude junko was always a goofy Saturday morning villain.

[@connorharnage6697]

⁠You say that as if she can't be both goofy and a manipulator. Don't forget she had to manipulate Mitarai as well as the entire student council

[@ConnorTheOne_]

I’m all for her ACTING goofy and incompetent, but it’s the fact that in Despair Arc she genuinely IS incompetent that I have an issue with. What I mean when I say she’s goofy is that she’s stupid, the exact opposite of what a “manipulator” should be. Like, in THH and Goodbye Despair, she was acting like a certified goober, but it was clear that she was ACTING as one, or in the case of THH, possibly did actually go insane after all the isolation. However, it’s more egregious here since this is when she should arguably be at her most serious, yet I just can’t take her as such when her entire “plan” that’s been hyped up since the first game is hastily cobbled together and held together with nothing but toothpaste and pubic hair. Nothing she does gives the impression of a genius mastermind. Her “manipulation” in Despair Arc is either kidnapping in the case of the student council, literal plot device bullshit brainwashing in the case of 95% of the characters, or basic compliments in the case of Mitarai. It just so turns out that Mitarai happens to be the most spineless shmuck in human existence. A fucking child could probably “manipulate” Mitarai if they gave him enough attention. Btw, I’m so sorry if any of this comes off as aggressive or anything of the like, this is just meant to be in the spirit of lighthearted discussion

[@IchCharacter]

@@colindowden2182 A goofy Saturday morning villain that successfully manipulated most of the cast into killing each other, got very close to actually convincing the characters of the choice she favoured and basically destroyed the world. She often acted goofy, yes, but she was pretty capable and the only reason she ultimately lost was because she admitted defeat and wanted to be defeated, not because she actually got beaten. In the anime, she was all of the goofy with none of the threat. Anything that could have shown her as she was got skipped over in favour of shoving in more pointless fanservice for the cast of SDR2. It felt like she got demoted from mastermind and main antagonist to Izuru's goofy sidekick that stole Nagito's talent and lost her own on the way, along with her brain. Brainwashing also feels pretty out of place for her character, considering she purposefully picks methods that leave an opportunity for failure so that she can enjoy the despair of losing.

[@colindowden2182]

@@IchCharacter Still a crappy Saturday morning cartoon villain and no amount of glazing will change that.

[@buttercupghost]

I've always said that Nagito was characterized weirdly in DR3, along with Mikan. I don't think its as bad as Mukuro, but it's definitely bad. Mikan's characterization is mainly bad bc of two things 1. She's been reduced to fanservice with no other depth 2. With her fall to despair being because of the despair video, all her complex depth in SDR2 is stripped away. I could never quite put my finger on why Nagito seemed so off, though, but I think this articulated it well. As I've said before: DR3 does not understand its own characters. I think Mukuro is definitely the worst offense, but oh boy does Mikan's treatment by the narrative piss me off. And Nagito's is just... disappointing. Oh, and how they portray Junko is just atrocious. Also, turns out I have pneumonia! So I guess I have nothing better to do than to watch this all in one sitting. We'll see if my brain will allow me to do that.

[@midnalazuli793]

While Nagito has always been a tad extreme, it's balanced out by the fact that he's been forced into an extreme scenario. However, in the anime, his solution to simply delaying a test is to commit a full-blown terrorist attack. Yet, the narrative still treats him as just as mellow as any of the other students, and it just feels off. But yeah, he's nowhere near as awful as Mikan and Mukuro, whose characters have been watered down to fanservice with not plot or depth. Mukuro is definitly the worst character in the anime, because of her being reduced to a mere henchwoman that doesn't do anything but suck up to her younger sister... and... other stuff that anyone whose seen the show should know about. What makes Mikan even worse is that her fanservice scenes are even more consistent, but they also gave her a more important role than the others in the class, which makes her even harder to tolerate.

[@PancakemonsterFO4]

@@midnalazuli793 fanservice mikan is worst mikan and jesus christ she was even nuttier then despair mikan in DR2 wich i already disliked

[@dumpingstirs1143]

Hope you got better, I guess?

[@twonio]

I have one note about the Ryota portion of the video: I know they didn't really make it explicit, but I always assumed that Ryota became less outwardly passionate about his interests and opinions after the tragedy during his time with the future foundation DUE to the role he played in the tragedy and the downfall of his classmates, for which he blamed himself and his passion for anime. I don't think it's out of character for Ryota pre-tragedy to get angry at Junko for badmouthing anime, but it would be out of character for him AFTER the tragedy, because that guilt wracks him throughout the Future Arc, and it is part of what leads him to use the brainwashing anime in the end. Ryota was already a passive character, but after his passion had a direct hand in causing the tragedy, he became even more passive and withdrawn, because the one thing that gave him joy and purpose directly caused the worst thing possible to happen. His arc is subtle, but it is there: he began as someone who was withdrawn and apathetic but prepared to open up about the one thing he cared about most of all. After that very thing ruined his life and the world, he became someone who is withdrawn and apathetic but not willing to be open with anyone at all, and still lacking courage or belief in others because of what he experienced, and what he did.

[@NezumiVA]

Yeah I think that's a fair reading.

[@midnalazuli793]

At least there's a very clear message to learn here: anime only brings pain and devastation, and is the source of all the world's problems.

[@francisfatta]

“Anime was a mistake”

[@amochikaay]

Guys don’t you hate it when you get brainwashed by anime

[@midnalazuli793]

@@amochikaay Happens all the time.

[@Timbeon]

This is a really minor thing compared to everything else Danganronpa 3 does badly, but when I played SDR2, I thought Izuru having ridiculously long hair was meant as a way to visually reinforce his characterization and not just to make him look different from Hajime, emphasizing his apathy and detachment from everything by showing that he hasn't bothered to cut his hair even though it's well past the point of being an inconvenience, but in 3 Side Despair it's already ankle-length when he first wakes up, so that neat little detail gets completely lost.

[@hondaaccord1399]

Hell yeah bro, he's the Ultimate High School Hair Grower in all those skills

[@thelexicon7294]

What gets me is that the SDR2 cast was in many ways perfectly poised to fall into despair - as established by their backstories/predilections in the game itself. Many of them lost a friend (or a sibling) in the Twilight Syndrome Murder showdown. Komaeda and Hinata are emo as hell (as is the Impostor). Owari is implied to have had a terrible upbringing (with so many hints at CSA it makes you sick). Ditto with Tsumigi. Tanaka and Sonia are both drawn to a darker side of life. Even Hanamura has a sick mother and a failing restaurant in a town he reviles. In some ways, even the characters who were used as a lazy one-note gag in SDR2 were still given enough of a susceptibility to despair to expoit. To witness Junko take those threads and knot them into true despair could have been a good character study for them all, and an actually worthy (if unnecessary) prequel. The foundation was there. I will never understand why it was then immediately dropped in favor of Magic Miyazaki's Brainwashing Masterclass.

[@itssovalentine]

Another thing beyond what was mentioned about why I hated Chiaki being real was how it cheapened the finale of SDR2. A huge point of the conflict at the end of that game was that they didn't want to lose their memories of what had happened on the island because that would mean the erasure of any record of Chiaki's existence. After everything she'd done for them they couldn't bear to allow her to completely fade from their memories. But if she's real there's kinda no point to that whole emotional stake. If they had backed out and forgotten the events of the island it wouldn't matter because they'd still remember her, because she was real.

[@atoaster9940]

At the same time, there WAS no stake. Makoto, Kyoko and Byakuya saw what happened, they could've easily told them about her. No, her being real was SO MUCH WORSE. Imagine waking up with the realisation that she was very real and a friend, and her dying like that.

[@BlankedOutSlate]

I think it kinda makes sense when you look at it as her being the cause of why they became remnants. The anime kinda showed that she's the backbone of the entire class, so her death would've been more devastating than any other since she had the most influence. Them forgetting the island would've also been forgetting her entire existence, since the program was meant to be reverting your memory to before you gained trauma, and it'd be a burden to have the memory of knowing someone yet not knowing where they are now or what happened to them after specific events, especially with how valueable they were to the class. Them wanting to remember the island is also an acknowledgement of going past despair, since it basically entitles that they want to hope for the better even when such a detrimental event took place Then again, it's been many years now since I've binged the game and anime, so can't say for sure what was the whole event, but that's mainly how I saw it

[@IchCharacter]

It also really messes with the continuity of SDR2 as a whole. Not just that Naegi easily could and would have brought her up if she was the all-important Mary Sue that everyone's hopes revolved around, but the big theme of SDR2 about living with GUILT OVER YOUR OWN ACTIONS got completely erased by the magical brainwashing video. None of the characters (except Fuyuhiko, I guess, he literally became a murderer but everyone was chill about it until the video, even Mahiru, whose best friend he MURDERED) were responsible for anything they did and AI Chiaki would have known all of this, could have easily told them to absolve them of their guilt and thus invalidated AI Junko's plans, but just didn't. Why? Because of a plothole that got retconned into existence, for once. It basically destroys the entire theme of SDR2 and assassinates Junko's character to cramp in more pointless fanservice.

[@PhantomOfficial07]

Not to mention all of the cast surviving in the end COMPLETELY invalidates the entirety of SDR2. Gundham and Nekomaru sacrificed themselves so everyone can proceed in Chapter 4, for example. What was the point of their sacrifice if everyone lives anyway? There's no stakes. That's why DR3 isn't canon to me.

[@itssovalentine]

@PhantomOfficial07 Also a good point. I liked that the end to SDR2 was open-ended. Maybe they'll recover, maybe they won't. But we have hope. Then DR3 comes and says "lol they recovered a week later"

[@Bag2218]

"They don't have to take responsibility for any of their actions because they were brainwashed" And that right there will always be my BIGGEST complaint about DR3. When this series was first announced I was really looking forward to seeing exactly how Junko managed to take all of these, mostly good, people and sway them over to her side. I was downright excited to see how they they all fell into despair. Lord knows all of their backstories provided Junko with enough ammo to use. Hell, in Mahiru's case, I just KNEW her fall would have something to do with the Twilight Syndrome murders. But nope. The whole time they were just...brainwashed into being evil after watching a classmate die. A classmate whose importance to everyone was established off-screen. That's it. None of them actively chose despair. None of them were actually in control of their actions. None of them have anything to atone for. They were all just...more of Junko's victims. And that sucks...Like...SO much. I'd even go as far as to say it kinda ruins the big revelation at the end of SDR2.

[@sarafontanini7051]

I HATE How the anime just made THAT VIDEO the core of everything. Like it's not JUST a plot device for the uture arc, it's tied to literally EVERYTHING. It's a quick deus ex machina to answer everythign and it makes everything BORING AS FUCK and makes Junko incredibly weak. She doesn't need to do anything, she jsut needs to make everyone watch this stupid ass video tape that was never mentioned before. Forget her whole shtick of being bore easily, or her intelligence or the fact she doesn't rely on the tape for her plans in the games, nope she jsut has this stupid thing do EVERYTHING for her. FUCK THAT STUPID TAPE.

[@Yan_Alkovic]

Well it doesn't ruin it but it sure as hell makes you not want to think of this as canon

[@nekonomicon2983]

Definitely the worst part. How can you blame the 77th class for something they have no control over. Given that the video can literally brainwash anyone regardless of their personality, morals, etc. Makes it a rather overpowered plot device to quickly and conveniently explain why they join Junko. There's no way they could've explained it with the given amount of episodes and focus on fan service so they went for the fast and easy (but lazy) route.

[@shaltiere5468]

You're oversimplifying it. Just because they got brainwashed doesn't mean they're entirely innocent. They probably already had some evil in them. I hope you know that there is no single person in this world who is "good". Class 77 is no exception.

[@Bag2218]

The fact that they (or anyone for that matter) have the capacity to do what they did doesn't really change the fact that their actions were no longer their own the minute they fell under Junko's control. It doesn't matter if there's some hypothetical situation where they were capable of doing it anyway. From the very beginning of their time as remnants of despair, they had all agency and all responsibility for their actions stripped from them to satisfy Mitarai's contrived brainwashing plot. At that point, the only difference between them and Junko's other victims is that they survived.

[@tartra]

3:00:00 - "Does Kirigiri just go around swallowing random liquids? That seems like a health hazard that someone as smart as her wouldn't risk." Chiaki: hmm yes this chewy glob is glue

[@shadow_shine3578]

I mean she was a program, so she couldn't die from it.

[@ptgia1301]

Glad I was able to be there the whole premiere. There were a lot of really good points in this. Saddest thing for me was that, despite my love for her, I can't really make any arguments in Chiaki's favor in DR3. She was done so royally dirty you'd think only Sonia would be capable of it. Overall 10/10 video let's get Tengan Sweep trending

[@midnalazuli793]

Yeah, Nanami was one of the worst parts of Despair Arc. Ignoring the fact that her very existence is a total retcon from what the second game implied, and that it's very obvious she's only there because of her popularity, she's portrayed as even more flawless and even more inoffensive than how she was in DR2, to the point where her death was all it took to drive her classmates into Despair. I couldn't bring myself to like her before, and DR3 made me despise her even more. And what makes it even more sad is that she isn't even the worst character in DR3 by a longshot.

[@joshi8291]

@@midnalazuli793 Totally agree! I feel like she was originally meant to just be an ai but then they added her in just because she was popular. I know some people understandably don't really like Chiaki because she doesn't have many flaws (even though I personally like her), but it kind of makes sense in the context of the game since she's meant to bring the class together and that's why she was created. But making her a real person defeats the whole purpose of her character. And maybe they could have saved it by making her personality different but she's literally the same. It's just really disappointing.

[@the-postal-dude]

@@midnalazuli793 this is exactly the echo chamber i need... i have zero idea how people like her besides pretty privilege. she may have little to no flaws but damn does she annoy me

[@erickamakeeaina1649]

300th like

[@ptgia1301]

When the fuck did this start getting likes

[@ampersketch]

Little did you know the only reason Nezumi decided to start these Danganronpa retrospectives and do a crossover with Austinado was all because of Tengan. Seriously, this was a great video that perfectly explained stuff I didn't like about the anime and even some things I hadn't considered before.

[@midnalazuli793]

Tengan is such a weird villain, I don't even know where to start with him... Ignoring the fact that he's just another generic twist villain, there just isn't anything particularly memorable about him. Plus, his plan didn't make any sense, and he could've had a much less extreme resolution.

[@KittyKatty999]

Makoto becoming the principal of Hopes Peak, is just like Harry Potter becoming an Auror at the end of his series. It betrays *EVERYTHING* the character should stand for, and makes them another villainous adult in their fucked up world

[@jemma927]

When I tell you I was blindsided by that move, that is an understatement. Like, I'm sorry, why would you re-open and become the principal of the *Literal Ground Zero of the Tragedy and the place where all your friends literally died?* I was honestly hoping that at the end of it all, he'd say "fuck it, I'm sick of losing people I love and the foundation is just so screwed up, I'mma head out" and just leave the foundation and basically leave the title of ultimate hope to die there and just live his life as a normal guy with the other survivors.

[@hondaaccord1399]

Tbf, you can't expect J.K. Rowling to make good choices, and with all I've learned about the producers of Danganronpa from these Nez videos, something tells me I never should've expected much from the producers either.

[@OctoAmbush-nc4xt]

It's like if Joker from Persona 5 worked as a cop.

[@TheSalsaGuy216]

⁠​⁠@@OctoAmbush-nc4xtI mean, Makoto in Persona 5 does want to become a Cop for some reason.

[@hscorner3829]

Also yeah, the way Mikan was treated in this show makes me personally sick. She was my favourite character in the series before DR3 took the worst part of her SDR2 portrayal and made that her entire character. (You know what i'm referring to.) The way they took a character that perfectly portrays the dark depths different types of trauma can take you to, and reduced her to a sick fanservice joke is deeply frustrating.

[@midnalazuli793]

I always hated Mikan, and while I agree that DR3 took the worst elements of her character, and amplified them, I don't think her DR2 portrayal is any better. The writers have only ever cared about fetishizing Mikan's trauma as opposed to using it to make her a deep and complex character. In my opinion, this is what makes her the worst character in the Danganronpa franchise, not so much for what she is, but more so for what she represents. I can't help but feel sick whenever I think about it.

[@harlowe8691]

The way they solidified their attitude towards her story is enough for me to lose respect for every writer involved.

[@Envy_May]

​@@midnalazuli793 while it's completely valid to feel that way i actually personally got the impression that the dr2 writers did care and have a more complex understanding, but just handled it horribly tactlessly in the worst way because of Ha Ha Anime Trope Subversion and also just existing in the anime overton window space of what passes for decency like it's bad but. to me at least it doesn't feel devoid of empathy or like the character is ruined in dr2 those moments are painful in that they feel awfully tone deaf and also cringeworthy for that reason and they really do do her dirty in those moments but dr3 by comparison feels downright malicious, like a toxic sludge i think i personally find the biggest difference is in that in dr2 they lead with the terrible anime tropes and then the rest reveals itself after that culminating in the reveal of how it ultimately led to her turning out in dr3 it's present the whole time but in particular it amounts to the conclusion of her arc instead - there's nothing to be said for her descent into despair, no statement being made about how what's been done to her contributed to this, instead it's just Ha Ha She's Been Brainwashed Into Yandere Horn Knee Bait and that's the whole entire takeaway of her character i get not seeing it that way as the dr2 stuff is already a lot to look past and no one is obligated to do so and is not necessarily less correct for doing so but. i think there are also a lot of people like myself who see a pretty significant difference here for these reasons

[@hscorner3829]

@@Envy_May I agree with this.

[@midnalazuli793]

@@Envy_May Well, thanks for understanding and respecting my opinion. Personally, I don't even think it's accurate to label the fanservice in DR2 as a "subversion." I mean, what makes it different from typical fanservice? Sure, the game occasionally makes fun of itself sometimes, but that doesn't really change anything, it's still empty fanservice with no point or deeper meaning to it. There were any other number of ways they could've written the chapter so that Mikan falling over was not a necessity. And I believe the writers are fully aware that Mikan has all the workings to be a complex character, but they simply choose not to explore them, and instead fetishize her trauma, which is just disgusting.

[@melasnexperience]

Props to Austinado for pointing out that "they have trauma" isn't an excuse for poor characterization or an arc that makes no sense. It's become one of those concepts like "it's supposed to be a metaphor" that's used wave away flaws with something the speaker enjoys than actually, say, address trauma or use a metaphor in a meaningful & interesting way. Taking something good and turning it into a "get out of criticism free" magic word devoid of its meaning.

[@cosmochoom]

I enjoy the slice of life In the despair arc, as well as the feeling you know it’s all coming down. I hate the brainwashing stuff. Especially the lobotomy scene, it makes my skin crawl when I see it

[@Ира-щ6м]

Yeah, my thoughts exactly

[@V1G4M1]

I actually like that it makes my skin crawl, but I hate that they went with the whole „brainwashing, but literally!“ concept in the first place.

[@cosmochoom]

@@V1G4M1 I think I know what you mean. Something a little more like influence or indoctrination. That’s what I had in mind when I first played DR2 and it was mentioned

[@V1G4M1]

@@cosmochoom yeah! The fact that monokuma said „one by one“ made it seem like she definitely broke em down slowly by using their individual weaknesses against them. I also to this day believe she did at least do that to mikan, just offscreen (-_-) since, when she joined mukuro in the „let‘s blush for junko“ club, the video wasn‘t done yet.

[@cosmochoom]

@@V1G4M1 if you want, you can always choose what you interpret as canon and what isn’t. For instance, I do not consider Mukuro’s creepy obsession with her sister canon. Her DR:IF personality is always what I think of when I think of her

[@isdisorigionale]

Hearing Austin rip apart Chiaki’s inclusion as a human was EXACTLY the echo chamber I wanted to hear today and forever because god DAMN did they destroy every other member of Class 77s personal motivations for her sake. Every day I think about how cool it would be if Yukizome made a conscious choice to betray Class 77 for the sake of Munakata or something, and Chiaki screamed at her with righteous gamer rage or something MORE than her gamer Jesus kindness waifu bullshit (someday I’ll write this). I’ll never forgive them for how they reduced Hajime’s personal struggle about maintaining self worth in an extremely meritocratic society into him wanting some gamer girl bath water.

[@wrigglenight93]

Even AI Chiaki could get pretty icy when it came to matters of personal conviction. I'd certainly read that

[@the-postal-dude]

also what i find weird is just. the fact that hajime in his source material is in his 20s and like... out of everyone, they chose to force him with the canonical minor. i get it's supposed to be a prequel, but the original creator wasn't involved with this anime and the fact that they clearly just projected onto hajime to get with someone who in canon, has the body and brain of a teenager (potentially minor but their age was never set in stone, she'd probably be around 17 though) i'm having trouble explaining it but i hope you kinda understand what i mean

[@shaltiere5468]

@@the-postal-dude reading a little too much into it I think

[@shaltiere5468]

Hajime is a straight male, of course he wants to partially impress gamer girl

[@shaltiere5468]

Acting like my man's not human or smth smh

[@princeoftheazuresky]

I could maybe, MAYBE have excused the retcon of Nanami being real in the anime if the story had been a commentary on the dangers of putting a person on a pedestal and hinging your mental health on one person who is obviously not going to live up to that standard but they completely flushed that down the toilet because I guess they were terrified of people not liking their gamer waifu anymore. She exists to be perfect and then die in the most miserable way possible to jerk the audience around emotionally and it makes me so cynical to watch. It's so blatantly manipulative and gross by the writers because nothing significant about the narrative would change if human!Nanami was a particularly valuable statue that got broken. She adds nothing. She is nothing but an object that the class desires and is sad when they lose. It is downright sickening that her execution sequence focuses more on how the class feels about losing her than about HOW SHE FEELS ABOUT BEING TORTURED TO DEATH.

[@narudayo5053]

It's litteraly said in the end of the game that the reason for Chiaki AI existence was when they wanted to use an AI to guide them, instead of being a mistmatch of informations, all of their memories joined easily into a single particular person that they see as a guide.

[@vardiganxpl1698]

That is honestly a very compelling and good idea. Mind if i use a similar idea for my pre-despair fanfic. It s gonna focus more on Makoto and Hajine. And yeah, egg boi is gonna die

[@ZE.brigitte]

I always thought it would be better is the real Nanami was someone from, maybe another class, who was actively trying to snap them out from Junko's grasp, and that the reason she was killed, because she would interfer to much with Junko's plan

[@bigtimetimmyjim6486]

DR1: Hope must destroy itself, if the side of despair massacres hope it is the same as admitting weakness to the viewers. DR3: Chiaki is murdered, despair massacres hope, it somehow works.

[@JDubs1464]

Guys hear me out, what if we took a character in Junko, who we saw actually manipulate secondhand in UDG via the Warriors of Hope and Monaca. And just have her manipulate ONE member of the 77th class then hypnotize the rest of them. You know, the 77th class, who all had issues of some sort that could’ve driven them to despair.

[@JDubs1464]

Also the dub interaction between Komaeda and Naegi sweeps, “why was he sticky” and “his hands were so soft” is better than any of the big speeches in the games

[@RammerHammer]

I just realised why I hate the ending to DR3 so much and it's because it's the same as the ending to Harry Potter, it's the coward's way out. Because in both cases the central message is that the systems that are in place are broken and only exist to cultivate strife and tyrrany. And yet in both cases instead of doing the thing that would solve the problem in the long term (in HP that would be to revamp the government system entirely and in DR it would be to abolish Hope's Peak) they both take the approach of "the problem wasn't the fact that the system we created and upheld was a breeding grounds for exploitation, it was that we didnt have the right person in charge" but that approach fails to recognise that that's only a temporary solution, a bandaid trying to cover a stab wound. Because eventually Naegi/Hermione are going to step down and there's no guarantee their successor will share the same values and ideals. It only takes one bad apple to spoil the whole bunch. It's even more egregious that nobody makes that observation at all, I can understand Naegi being a bit too blinded by ambition to not think of the long term consequences, but Kirigiri is much too cautious and perceptive not to have considered the possibility, and at that point if she did she's just straight up a bad friend for not saying anything. Or the more likely answer which is that DR3 spits in the face of internal consistency and calls it slurs to its face

[@amor1064]

The part in no danganronpa zero with the script being read out loud is chilling ,because noone has to show you a thing,your imagination does everything , that fact alone makes this 10x stronger emotionally

[@MiloKuroshiro]

I love when a franchise decides to give me all the answers that I REALLY didn't wanted or needed and devolve into generic mush while trying to inflate the Canon and trying to make sense of elements that weren't supposed to be taken seriously

[@SlickEvan]

This.

[@whaleping]

It’s so nice to find a wild Bowser profile in the comment section.

[@midnalazuli793]

The whole problem is that the writers are trying to make sense of something that isn't supposed to make sense. The writers attempt to explain things that never had an explanation in the first place, and were never supposed to. Like Monokuma said in the first game, "it's like trying to put a mile on a scale." And as Junko quite literally said so herself, "make up whatever reason you want, the truth is fucking lame anyways."

[@bigtimetimmyjim6486]

@@midnalazuli793 Exactly. In DR1, the 6 ask for an explanation about how their memories were wiped and Monokuma essentially says "it doesn't matter"...and he is right, it is completely irrelevant to their situation and would only distract from the themes of the story.

[@missmax2492]

I wish we got to see how Junko actually, y'know, manipulated everyone and everything instead of the brainwashing stuff In contrast, god do I love seeing the SDR2 cast come back. Such fun characters and rendered in very nice popping colours

[@midnalazuli793]

I find it to be insulting to bring them back, just to do nothing with them. It's like reuniting with a childhood friend that proceeds to do nothing but ignore you the entire time they're visiting, then when they leave, you feel cheated and empty. I just wish the writers actually decided to do something with the DR2 cast, rather than just reminding us that they exist.

[@edwardsuou]

Miss Max, do you realize it’s impossible to anyone to do what Junko does with simple down to earth manipulation? If you showed her making people do what she wants with reasonable methods such as the ones Joker (in Batman) uses you would have to explain how she managed to manipulate that many people and how she achieved all the crazy impossible things she achieve without consequences on her or even leaving a trace during despair arc. The truth is the author was in love with the concept of a character who dominated the world with her despair but he’s yet to figure it out how the hell she did it. So everything Junko does for her plan need tons on excuses and near impossible coincidences.

[@colindowden2182]

Come on are you surprised? You think is this shit tier villain have as much charisma to manipulate people to commit mass murders. The only person that might do it would be mikan since that bimbo is broken, but the rest are clearly sane people so yeah brainwashing would be the only solution still doesn't make it any less shit.

[@DLxxx]

Didn't Naegi explicitly say the end of DR2 that Junko brainwashed them? I swear that was actually brought up at some point, lol.

[@missmax2492]

@@DLxxx yea but, brainwashing takes multiple forms. IRL, we consider what gets done in cults, that reprogramming of right and wrong, to be brainwashing. So while the videos are correct on that front, it's the most boring way to do it.

[@kalkuttadrop6371]

There are MANY retcons DR3 created, but one that doesn't get discussed, pretty much at all, is the 77-B retcon. There was no B there, originally. In the original SDR2 timeline, Chiaki isn't real, and Mitarai doesn't exist. Hajime also isn't a class member, though the Impostor was. That leaves us with only 14 students, despite Hope's Peak Classes being 16 people strong. What was the original explanation for this? The two missing students are Yuto the Ultimate Spy and Yatsude the Ultimate Neurologist, both killed during the events of DR0. Both directly confirmed in that book to be part of that class. (And DR0 was pretty much the basis for half of DR2s plot). In order to make Chiaki real and add in animator boi, they had to shove those two aside into Class 77-A, and then proceed to do nothing with them.

[@PhantomOfficial07]

That's a really interesting detail I never knew. I still like Ryota but maybe they could've done something else with him instead. I would've really liked to see Yuto and Yatsude interact with the other members of Class 77th too. If only...

[@kalkuttadrop6371]

@@PhantomOfficial07 Yatsude's whole thing is brain studies and he's already the guy who gave Junko the amnesia machine so did we really need another guy for brainwashing?

[@PhantomOfficial07]

@@kalkuttadrop6371 ideally there is no brainwashing since it was a dumb plot device anyway

[@zwrulez185]

Ways Junko could have actually used the weaknesses of each character to turn them over to despair: *Imposter:* two ideas. One is she could exploit their weakness of not having an identity, and say she’d be the only one who accepts them as they are. This would already establish a deep relationship, and then she could take them down from the inside, offering them their own individual significance if they switched over to despair. Two, she could find a way to have them adopt *her* identity, then slowly reveal the evil side of herself and force the Imposter to continue mimicking it. *Teruteru:* Junko could enter Teruteru’s life by making him lust for her, and by dangling the idea of a possible relationship in front of his face. This would make manipulating him very easy, and then later allow for her to find out the things most important to him (like his mother) and find ways to exploit that, turning his raw emotions into weaknesses. *Mahiru:* Junko would make her feel like what happened to Natsumi and Sato was her fault. She’d consistently trigger her trauma by bringing up reminders of the incident again and again. By turning Fuyuhiko first, she could use him as a way to induce despair in Mahiru as well. *Peko:* Fuyuhiko would definitely need to be despairified first, and then things could go like this: Fuyuhiko commands Peko to join him, stating that her only use is to follow his demands and that he’ll abandon her if she doesn’t, thus giving her entire life no purpose in her eyes. *Hiyoko:* Junko would manipulate Hiyoko into believing that everyone around her was lying to her, since Hiyoko is most afraid of being betrayed and deceived. Junko could first reveal the truth about Mahiru covering up Natsumi’s ally, immediately destroying Hiyoko’s trust in her closest friend. Once Hiyoko was turned into a Remnant of Despair, she could also help destroy Mahiru’s morale along with Fuyuhiko. *Ibuki:* Ibuki would be one of the last ones remaining, because she highly valued not only her friends but also her ability to entertain, inspire, and energize people. Surrounding by despair on all sides, Ibuki would attempt to cheer everyone up, only to find that her words and her talent had no effect on them. She’d believe herself to be useless, and then eventually adapt the mindset of everyone around her. *Mikan:* Mikan would probably still be the first to become Junko’s ally. Milan’s an extremely easy target, because she has *so* much trauma and so many insecurities Junko could exploit. She also becomes attached to people very easily. I don’t think I really have to elaborate on this one much. *Nekomaru:* His could be pretty similar to Ibuki, but I imagine he’d be harder to sway since his whole thing is raising others’ spirits and his own. I imagine he’d be one of the hardest, because seeing the others around him fall into despair would make him even more determined not to, as he’d feel responsible for helping everyone else. Because of this, I think Nekomaru would have to be one of the first to be converted, and Junko could do this by destroying his relations and showing it to him. If she killed off the teams he managed, or better yet, recorded them killing each other… *Gundham:* I see this going two ways. Junko convinces Gundham to join the despair cult by appealing to his love for darkness and his evil persona. Or she could do the opposite, breaking down his delusions and showing him he’s just another normal guy, causing him to fall into despair. Maybe a combination of the two. “Hey, wanna join me and my friends who are super dark and edgy and dramatic? Whoops, you’re actually not legit enough for us. You’re just an average Joe. Oh, but if you were super depressed, we might consider you.” *Nagito:* See, this one’s weird because even in Ultra Despair Girls, Nagito doesn’t seem to be all that attached to despair. I think Junko would have to twist Nagito’s views, which are already super twisted as is. She’d have to convince him that despair was actually hope. In his head, he’d believe that his interpretation of things had gotten stronger but hadn’t changed, where in reality, he’d just be supporting despair. This doesn’t quite feel right to me, though. Maybe Nagito never gets fully converted and just believes that covering the world in utter despair will lead to a greater hope eventually? Just expanded on the stuff he says in dr2. I feel like Nagito is so screwed up that I can’t imagine him ever being inconsistent or responding to normal manipulation. *Chiaki:* I like the idea of her never falling into despair, and I also think her being executed is pretty chilling and great. The idea of Junko getting pissed off at Chiaki’s willpower and just straight up killing her is kinda great, and it’s beautifully tragic that Chiaki gets what are technically both the first and last executions in the series. However, I think her execution should be used as a final push for everyone else falling into despair, rather than it being the only cause. (On that note, Junko could still convince Ryota it was all his fault, meaning Ryota’s reverse character arc could stay the same.) *Akane:* Akane is both very competitive and afraid of intimacy and weakness. We also know she’s scared of the dark. If Junko made her feel extremely weak and vulnerable, as well as accessed Akane’s trauma that she appears to have blocked out mentally, Akane would feel not only terrified but also a deep hatred for herself. She’d turn to fighting as her only outlet. Here’s a possible starting scenario: Akane is lost in a dark alley. She’s paranoid and afraid. She hears something rustling behind her, and sees a shadow. This terrifies her, throwing her into an even worse state. She then sees that the source of the noise is an adorable baby rabbit. (Probably Gundham’s) She becomes enraged and deeply embarrassed by the fact that something so cute and tiny could have scared her so badly. In a fit of passion and fury, she feels the need to prove her strength by the only way she knows how- violence. She rips the bunny apart with her hands. Feeling the first surge of power in a long time, she then goes on a rampage, killing much worse than bunnies. (Shoot, this is just Mondo’s story.) *Kazuichi:* Kazuichi has trust issues as well as a fear of rejection, and insecurities about feeling like a fake. Junko could make use of a despairified Sonia to start breaking him. Kazuichi would fall into paranoia, and Junko could plant this seed in different ways, by making him believe that others are hiding things from him. In order to gain validation, Kazuichi would slowly start to put on a tougher persona, and quickly fall into a trap. (This is something I relate to personally, on a smaller level of course. It’s extremely easy to fall into a persona you can’t get out of, simply because it’s well-received by others. You then feel a pressure to build on this persona, making it worse and worse to the point where you don’t even recognize yourself anymore.) *Fuyuhiko:* Junko could weaken him with two things: one, the death of his sister, and his murdering Sato. She’d trigger his trauma over his sister’s murder, then “comfort” him by telling him that he did the right thing in seeking revenge, and that a kill or be killed mentality is the only way to live. This is something already drilled into him because of his background, which leads into his other weakness: fear that he’s not good enough, that he can’t live up to his name. Junko would force him to prove his competence by committing increasingly worse crimes. *Sonia:* Sonia would be swayed very quickly, because she could then be an extremely powerful tool in spreading despair thanks to her leadership skills. She could be brought into despair via the fall of Novoselic, causing her to feel useless and a failure to her people. She’d adopt illegal methods in an attempt to restore her country, bringing her further and further in a downward spiral. And there you have it. A poorly cobbled together list of ideas. Whether these are better than the anime or not, I don’t really know. But I had fun speculating nonetheless :D

[@etam8099]

Nagito can't be manipulated

[@Ramsey276one]

Thanks for this!

[@burushifudara]

@@etam8099 He can't... But he would totally go along with Junko's plans, like "Yeah bitch, I'm in! This is the perfect oportunity for the Ultimate Hope to be born!"

[@BlobbieworldBlogspot]

yknow how komaeda's luck cycle basically makes it so that good things happen to him & bad things happen to others? he already thinks he's worthless and only good for serving as a stepping stone, so junko could basically be like "yknow what ur right u can't become hope but you can be a stepping stone. yknow how you cause misfortune everywhere you go? the only way you can be that stepping stone for hope is by becoming despair"

[@LanieMae]

Yeah I think it’s true that nagito believed that the more despair he caused the greater the hope would come out of it, as we’ve seen before in the game

[@TheAzulmagia]

An easy fix to the Seiko and Ruruka conflict is to have Seiko withhold the information about not being able to process sugar out of fear it'd ruin her friendship with Ruruka, someone who is probably one of the few friends she has. Seiko tries to make a medical fix for it with her talent, but still gets violently ill and throws up the candy, which Ruruka happens to witness from afar, and then never wants to eat anymore ever again, cementing the idea to Ruruka that it wasn't just a coincidence but actually her candy that provoked that reaction. Now you have a proper give and take between these two instead of Seiko being a perfect girl who did literally nothing wrong and Ruruka just being Satan for no reason. It's really weird how the writers set this up as what was supposed to be a tragic misunderstanding that tore apart a friendship, but made sure Seiko exits DR3 as loved by pretty much everyone in and OUT of universe (Juzo actually is sad that she died while not caring about multiple other people, Nagito praises her for making a cure that saved Kyouko, etc.), while Ruruka is just a horrible person from start to finish (wanting to kill Munakata to start her own organization for... some reason, wanting to kill Kyouko and Pals for trying to escape, killing her boyfriend who has zero character other than loving her because... because?!, etc.) and dies one of the most gruesome deaths alone and forgotten by everyone.

[@PigBoy99]

They could’ve easily fixed the Twilight Syndrome being rushed problem if they introduced Fuyuhiko’s sister in the episode they did, but instead of having the murder happen the very next episode, have it happen when Chisa has to go to the reserve course and have her be there for a few episodes. Give her time to develop her friendship with Hajime, then the murder happens, then show how they react to it, and then Chisa has to go back to Class 77.

[@cantisinferno]

3:33:20 the "so much for the tolerant left" joke being thrown in there had me crying actual tears from laughing. god bless you two.

[@seacrystal6189]

All of the flaws from this anime can be traced down to one motive - marketability. As much as I love Danganronpa, I have to admit that, at its core, it was conceived just to be sold. A kiIIing game set in high school filled with lots of colorful/kinable/attractive characters is screaming to be sold to teenagers. I feel like the higher ups just handed this concept to Kodaka and told him to do whatever he wanted with it. So stuff like the lore have a lot of inconsistencies and take the back seat compared to characters and mystery And there's nothing wrong with that. Obviously, games are made by studios to make money and that doesn't mean the creators can't find the balance and make them be both creative and profitable. But then they made an anime where the focus is the lore and went overboard with the marketability, creating this complete trainwreck The only reason Chiaki is there is because she was the fandom waif. The reason Mukuro is creepy towards her sister is also because of fanservice. The séxy soup scene - also fanservice. The anime does a lot of things that vaguely gesture towards what they THINK the fans like, without understanding why they like them. Komaeda's luck makes no sence because they didn't think it through. Junko is a ~quirky girlboss~ who doesn't plan anything and just stumbles upon the solutions to her plans. The sdr2 cast came back to life cause the fans liked them and that's it. They didn't need to think anything through because they saw their audience as mindless consumers. The fact that the f-ing MASTERMIND was just some guy with no motivation shows that they held no respect for their audiences' intelligence. It was clearly there just to be shocking and it's pointless to analyse honestly. If the creators themselves didn't care, then why should we? This was just a pointless cashgrab that shouldn't be taken seriously

[@midnalazuli793]

I definitly think this show was marketed VERY poorly, especially Despair Arc. It was advertised as a DR3 prequel that would show what the lives of the students of Class 77-B were likes prior to becoming Ultimate Despair. But other than Mikan and the Ultimate Imposter, Class 77-B is largely irrelevant to the main plot of Despair Arc, and it doesn't do anything to improve their characters, which were already severely underdeveloped. Overall, you're 100% correct with your argument, DR3 was nothing more than a cash grab handled by a team that clearly didn't understand what they were working with, and had no respect for the intelligence of the fandom, thinking they were only interested in Junko and fanservice. I don't think I could've put it any better than you did.

[@AkameGaKillfan777]

Literally the opposite of what happened. The distrust concept was what they originally wanted to do, but Spike Chunsoft ordered heavy censorship that they had to work around. This is literally mentioned in the video.

[@PancakemonsterFO4]

IT WASN´T EVEN A KILLING GAME PER SE, JUST POISON ARMLETS AND BRAINWASH TV´S CAUSING SUICIDES YEAH AMAZING TWIST WICH TOTALLY DOESN´T RUIN THE ENTIRE THING

[@EmileeAria413]

Oh... my god. The "Writing Exercise" at the start of "NO DANGANRONPA ZERO?" was fucking amazingly written and performed. I really, really wish we'd gotten that scene instead of what DR3 ended up giving us. It's a shame that the anime was made with such limited time and passion. We could have gotten the perfect ending for the Hopes Peak saga. But instead we got a whimper of a finale that trips over it's own feet.

[@skippysandwich]

As the (self proclaimed) #1 Chiaki enjoyer coming out of SDR2, I have never been able to properly articulate why I hated her inclusion in DR3 so much. I'd always said it was because Chiaki was an AI, her character only really makes sense as an AI, and making her real just felt forced and wrong, but even that explanation didn't feel like it quite covered everything. This video finally put into perfect words why this change irked me so much. DR3 completely screwed both of my favorite DR characters (Mukuro and Chiaki) and I'll never forgive it for it. This video is the single most cathartic thing I've watched in a long time, lol

[@bigtimetimmyjim6486]

As someone who enjoyed Chiaki in SDR2, I appreciated that she had a lot of the "rough edges" that one would expect an SHSL gamer to have; she was extremely aloof and prone to just nodding off as a result of having a weird sleep pattern, and while she was likeable, she rarely went out of her way to seek group social interaction and was not really too memorable when she did. In DR3, these edges were smoothed over so much into an idealized version of herself that it was pretty obvious that she was included in the story to essentially be the perfect victim.

[@catalinaargyriou8603]

potential fix for the Hinata/Nanami thing: she stilll runs into him, but there's not much there. he doesn't recognize the game she's playing, she barely responds to his atttempts at conversation, and the whole thing just makes the audience squirm with second-hand awkwardnesss. Hinata expressses how he wants to become Talented (tm), and Nanami simply responds with "Don't bother," not elaborating further. she does mean what she said in the actual thing, but he takes it as "you'll never be enough so don't even bother trying".

[@buttercupghost]

I'm super sick but seeing this premiere coming up just brightened my day! As for your question, my favorite part was Natsumi! I thought having her be reserve course gave a lot to her character, made more sense than a character actually being the Ultimate Little Sister, made Fuyuhiko's FTEs where he calls her the Ultimate Little Sister sweeter in retrospect, AND made her a much more sympathic character vs a bully stereotype. However, I didn't like the rushed pace of it and how it didn't last that long and we hardly got any time with her, or the retcon that Mahiru didn't know about Sato murdering her and actively covered it up (as I thought Mahiru doing that was really interesting for her character). I also think they made Sato come off a little bit too aggresive; obviously she had anger issues in the game as she describes blacking out from anger and choking Natsumi out, but I think in the anime they had her come off as more of an aggressor in the situation than she needed to be. Natsumi was the one who was supposed to be starting shit, not Sato; Sato was protecting Mahiru, so while it's definitely not okay she killed Natsumi, I think having her take on a more aggressive role in the anime made her seem unlikable vs understandable in her motives. I think some aggression is realistic, I just think they leaned too much into it. But over all, I did like what they did to Natsumi's character and her (brief) friendship with Hajime. I also really liked the Future Arc over all and especially what they did to further Kyouko and Makoto's arcs! I thought Kyouko choosing Makoto over her and almost dying for it was really cool after in DR1 she did the opposite (choose herself over Makoto and he almost died for it). They both almost died for each other because they love and/or trust the other and that's... so sweet to me. Idk, maybe my sense of romance is skewed. The thing I disliked most is... honestly it's a toss up between how Mukuro was characterized/treated and the brainwashing video. But probably the brainwashing video. I really liked Ryota as a character, but I was really looking forward to seeing multiple characters fall into despair, not just his. I think they should have only stuck with him making the hope and suicide videos or had the brainwashing video only be used on the reserve course. In the second option, it would parallel Monaka, too; she manipulated her closest followers, the warriors of hope, and brainwashed the rest, the monokuma kids. I just thought that Junko's ideology twisting people like it was said she did in SDR2 made her really scary, and without that, with the explanation of it just being brainwashing, she's just... less scary and interesting. Also, I really liked SDR2's message of restorative justice. That even the Ultimate Despairs deserve kindness. I thought that was really radical and was one of my favorite parts of SDR2. Like you said, they were the outcasts, the dropouts, just like me. And it was very impactful when the game said they deserve a chance, a future. But... with the brainwashing video, isn't that message muddled? Isn't that idea that even criminals deserve redemption-isn't that idea diluted? They could have even still kept Chiaki's death without the brainwashing video. Just have it so that the class is unsure about following Junko because of her, so Junko proposes they test her hope against her despair and let that decide if they should follow them. Wouldn't Chiaki being betrayed-truly betrayed, by choice-by her friends be super impactful and even more despairing than her actual death in the anime? That, even despite being betrayed by them, she works so hard to save them from both Junko and themselves? And then, that makes the cast missing Chiaki so much that she appears as an AI mean even more, doesn't it? If you wanted to keep real Chiaki and her death, this is an option you could take with that! (Though, speaking of that, I also hated how the anime acted like human Chiaki was retroactively more important than AI Chiaki at points. They should have been equally as important, because they were both people, regardless if one was code.) Honestly, I have mixed feelings on Human Chiaki in general, because I do think it was possible to pull off, but... I'm honestly not sure if they did it. I think they just didn't have enough time to really develop her, which is a shame, because I did like what little we got. Like the idea that she saw talent as some kind of shackle and talentless people as lucky because they can choose what they want to do-that was really interesting, they should have done more with that! And it contrasted with Hajime really interestingly. Over all, I think DR3 was overly ambitious in a way. It tried to do too much, and ended up not doing most of what they set out to do satisfactorily. And while I liked some of the retcons (Natsumi being in the reserve course) others (the brainwashing video) I really disliked.

[@Kaiser8513]

Personally when it comes to human Chiaki if they put a little more emphasis on the decision to make her "class leader" was due to her being the first one to get all of class 77-B to look outside themselves or their personal groups and get to know each other better instead of seeming to be a cult following her they could have still pushed that her death was the final breaking point to start the others down the path of despair. As for her appearance as an AI a very simple solution to explain it is Chahiro could have uploaded former class photos from a yearbook into Alter Ego's data banks and upon the later discovery that class 77 was the Remnants of Despair but could see Chiaki was the only member missing decided to model the AI after their classmate so they would have memories of her even if before they left the island she admitted to being an AI if they saw the class photos they wouldn't be wondering who she was and why none of them could recall her potentially undoing the rehabilitation (potentially as a plan unknowing of Junko's post mortem attempt to interfere). This route would eliminate her existence being an issue in the anime as well as provide context for the AI to have her appearance rather than going with their instructor's image since her personality from the anime would have also worked on the island.

[@midnalazuli793]

I also agree that Natsumi was a really well written character for what she was, and definitly one of the best written characters in Despair Arc. I do wish we could've gotten to see more of her, but I'm still satisfied with what we DID get out of her, though that may just be because the standard is already so low. Also, I believe you're misremembering Chapter 2 of DR2 a bit, because Mahiru never covered for Sato's murder. And yeah, Sato definitely ended up getting the short end of the stick in the anime, compared to Natsumi who was actually made out to be quite sympathetic by comparison. And I also think Future Arc is better than people give it credit for, but I heavily disagree that Makoto and Kyoko play are among its stronger elements. Kyoko being brought back to life after her sacrifice severely cheapens its importance, and makes it clear that the writers want to have their cake and eat it too by killing off a major character and fan favorite, but not having the guts to actually keep her dead. Mitarai is one of my least favorite characters in the franchise, because the show tries to make him appear as sympathetic, even though we have no reason to feel bad for him. At least for me, I didn't at all feel sorry for a character who gets to skip out on classes so he can work on the things he likes to do, all while starving himself and depriving himself of sleep, even though nobody was forcing him to. He just seemed really pathetic in my eyes, and maybe others found him relatable, but he just didn't strike any cord with me. I also have to disagree that the remnants deserved a second chance... I NEVER liked the twist in Chapter 6 of DR2, it totally ruined my perspective of the DR2 cast to learn the magnitude of the crimes they committed, and part of me always wished them dead for causing the Tragedy. And yeah, the anime did a poor job of handling Chiaki's character, by making her even more devoid of flaws and inoffensive than her DR2 counterpart, and giving her very "Mary Sue" like qualities, it just made it impossible for me to like her. I actually think the problem with DR3 is that it lacked any ambition at all. The whole thing was clearly a cash-grab from the start. They had a few good ideas, but they obviously never planned to utilize them to their fullest potential, and only care about giving fans what they think they wanted without actually understanding what it is they wanted to see.

[@buttercupghost]

@@midnalazuli793 Ah, you're definitely entitled to your opinions, but I very much believe in restorative justice as my politics, so I will never agree with you that criminals (even terrorists in the SDR2 casts case) deserve to die, especially when they were abused and manipulated by someone like Junko. (Edit: There are some criminals I would want to die, but honestly I don't think we should kill them regardless, if that makes sense? No one should have that power, even if I wouldn't mind if they died. I mean this in an institutionalized way, by the way-the government shouldn't be killing people, I just don't think it should have that sort of power. Killing is a last resort, if you can't arrest them or they're attacking you right now, if they're still hurting people and you can't get them to stop another way. So, if someone's already in prison, meaning they've stopped being able to hurt people, you shouldn't kill them. And I do genuinely believe that most criminals deserve empathy and understanding, focusing on reforming them, not punishing them. Which is what Makoto basically did. If they're no longer threats to society, and they regret/repent/understand what they did wrong-what's the point in punishment? To punish them would serve no purpose but self-satisfaction, it would be indulgent.) But I did want to comment to correct you correcting me. I just watched someone play SDR2 a week ago. Mahiru threw out the vase Sato used to make the crash; therefore destroying a piece of evidence. She specifically says, "it would be bad if anyone found that for you, right?". That's the whole reason Peko murders her, the motive for the case. I actually began doubting myself and looked up twilight syndrome (the game cutscenes) and... nope. She covered up the murder. Even without throwing away that vase, she would have covered up the murder anyway by virtue of knowing about it (she accuses Sato so we know she knows) and not telling anyone.

[@midnalazuli793]

@@buttercupghost Thanks for respecting my opinion. It's worth noting that the Future Foundation isn't the Government, nor is it government-affiliated. They don't have the authority to kidnap OR kill off war criminals as they please, so I don't believe that their plans fall into the same category as what you're describing. Even if the remnants didn't deserve to die, at the very least, I don't think they deserve to live happily, because the magnitude of what they've caused is just far too serious. I've heard some people say that living in isolation bearing the weight of what they've done is supposed to be a severe punishment for them, but it doesn't feel that way to me when the ending of Hope Arc shows them all laughing and having fun together on a cruise ship. I believe in redemption, but I also believe in comeuppance, and there absolutely are people in the world who need to receive there's, and I know many people who would agree with that. As for the whole brainwashing thing, well... we all know it's a poorly conceived plot device meant to fully absolve Class 77-B of their actions, which I am not fond of. Also, while you are right when you say that Mahiru destroyed evidence, it's important to remember that Mahiru didn't know that Sato was actually the culprit behind Natsumi's murder at the time. The reason she deleted that picture of the vase was because she was afraid it would implicate her friend, whom she believed was innocent. On top of that, she also believed that the true culprit had already been apprehended, which was some pervert. It wasn't until after Mahiru deleted her photo that Sato would finally tell her the truth. Also, for what it's worth, the game doesn't explicitly state the reason why Fuyuhiko targeted Mahiru was because of her destroying evidence, but if it is, I find it to be a little extreme on Fuyuhiko's end, since Mahiru had nothing to do with the killing of Natsumi, so it makes no sense for him to enact his revenge on her specifically, especially considering the actual killer is already dead.

[@buttercupghost]

@@midnalazuli793 The future foundation is the closest thing to a government they have, since the government collasped, and in SDR2 it is shown they had orders to execute the remnants. I don't see this as any different than the government killing criminals, except maybe worse since as far as we know none of the future foundation was elected by the people. There's no government oversight on future foundation because the government is gone, and future foundation is left to act as a crude approximation of government and policing. Again, as far as we know, with none of them voted for by the public. In a way, I find this situation even worse than the government killing people, because instead it's an organization no one elected with no oversight or inforced consequences coming from anywhere outside of the organization doing it. Editting this because I misunderstood/misremembered some stuff: I guess there is some wiggle room for if Mahiru knew for certain in the games dialogue as well, now that I think back on it more, though I do think the interpretation that she didn't know is stretching it a bit. I think, at least to me, that it reads that she suspected it very strongly, and that's why she did what she did. And, again, after Sato told her in the game, and she didn't tell anyone else that she confessed, that still counts as covering up the murder, in my opinion. To me, Mahiru pretty much accused Sato of the murder, which is what started their conversation in the first place, and then said she threw away evidence because it would be bad if for her friend if the police saw it. But, even if that wasn't the case, not telling anyone what Sato confessed to her is still covering up the murder in my opinion.

[@V1G4M1]

Currently at 3:30:20 while I, at this point, have accepted chiaki being „a real person“ for DR3… THIS SPEAKS FROM MY SOUL SO MUCH!!! I like chiaki, I really do! But the fact that she was an AI *CREATED TO AIDE THE SUBJECTS* made her characterization fine. Heck before DR3 came out I was sure she was created specifically by chihiro (or rather, alter ego), judging by the fact their birthdays match and that „chiaki“ literally could be an abbrivation of *Chi*hiro Fujis*aki…* granted, the latter was before I learned more about japanese and how it’s writing works, so it doesn‘t hold up (the chis in both names are the same kanji at least tho!) but it was at least a cool idea! (Plus let‘s not forget the whole „brother and father“ line implying alter ego is her creator. Yeah. This resurfaced my salt about it. I still cried during *that* Episode, but it’s still one of my biggest grievances with the anime. 3:31:25 that lists cracks me up btw, because fuck, teruteru’d love that tier simply cuz it’s degrading LMAO

[@MogMovies]

First time watching this, I remember enjoying the mystery of the future-arc, and the inevitable feeling of everything-going-wrong in the despair arc. Tbh, I still enjoy the anime and watches it every now and then. I’m very interested in you presenting the flaws of the series and showing me a different point of view. Staying tuned…

[@NezumiVA]

This is the kind of response I really do love to see. I, by no means, want people who enjoy the anime to stop enjoying something they like. But I still think critical discussion of it from either camp is worthwhile.

[@MogMovies]

@@NezumiVA The only problem I have with the anime, in the end, is when they explain Tengan's involvement. I'm still not fully certain if he was influenced by despair, or if he acted on his own free will. Hopefully that's a topic being brought up in the retrospective.

[@NezumiVA]

It is! Though to help clarify, they did confirm in the Killer Killer spinoff manga that he was indeed shown the Despair video at some point. They don't really clarify specifically when or how it happened (one can only assume it was Yukizome's doing), but during one scene in the manga he has the swirls in his eyes when he talks about attaining true hope through drastic measures, so I think it's probably safe to say. (Honestly, I think his motives would have been more compelling if he _was_ acting purely of his own free will, and just had a very skewed view of things.)

[@V1G4M1]

@@NezumiVA it was confirmed? Well fuck my hc of „well he never saw it, but was just kinda an obsessed idiot in the end…“ I guess! XD

[@PancakemonsterFO4]

I´d only watch future, Despair Arc is non canon for me and i still cannot remember hope arc

[@danielmcdonagh1693]

Mitarai having his forbidden action being "Using his talent," means he can't just show the "Eh," video to mind-whammy everyone right at the start to stop the killing game.

[@sweesbees]

this whole anime feels like you're reading someone's awful au fanfiction of danganronpa. you know the ones where they have 20% of the original cast, all of them reduced to one characteristic, and they sit in the background while the time is taken up by a slew of ocs to the point where you wonder "why didn't you just write your own story completely separate from this universe. why." the ones that are read by people who are in the fandom but paradoxically refuse to engage with the original media, only fan content, who read this and think "ah. perfect. this is even better than the thing i have not even played/watched/read/etc. screw the original material it's shit anyway!" and yet they are getting the most mangled, most unrepresentative version of that original media through the lens of this SHITTY GODAWFUL THING.

[@Calibritheknight]

Great job on the video you guys! You pointed out a lot of problems I had with Dr3, while adding others that I haven't thought about. Although, I would argue that Nagito in 2.5D subconsciously wanting a world where he doesn't have a talent does make sense due to his 5th free time event where he says "I guess I would live a peaceful life... A boring, normal life with no despair and no hope" after Hajime asks what he would do without his ultimate luck.

[@amaya2447]

I completely agree! Also in his final message on the laptop he states that deep down he always wanted to be a protagonist and that he shouldn't have made fun of Hajime. I was a little disappointed these details were forgotten but I understand that it can easily be missed. :)

[@trulymrword]

Chiaki would have been so much better if she was the opposite of her DR2 persona, it would have made the V3 Twist so much more heart-rending. Cuz let's be real the Ultimate Gamer wouldn't even look at the screen to play Galaga.

[@CalvinChikelue]

As a full bore DR fan, this is one of my handful of comfort video essays

[@entropylol2861]

We all need that one video that explains why you feel that something was off in the anime and why you didnt enjoyed as much as you wanted. Honestly, im susprise there arent many more of these about DR3.

[@TheGreatPM1]

Damn, that segment from Danganronpa 0 was amazing! I mean, you are not wrong when it's hard to visualize but the way you narrate it was amazing

[@cherriegetison6093]

A lot of people are convinced that others lie about their diet restrictions. It's an interesting idea to warp that concept Danganronpa style. I do wish they gave Ruruka a bit more of a kinder side to drive home her insecurities about Seiko declining her sweets. Like what if Ruruka was trying various nonsugar recipes for Seiko, and Seiko needed to keep declining? I think the anime was saying that Ruruka stopped saying thank you to Seiko as revenge for Seiko declining Ruruka's sweets, but it was kind of underwhelming as an interpersonal relationship spanning two shows.

[@bittipasuta]

Well of course Naegi became the principal: Kirigiri calls him "daddy" no-

[@NezumiVA]

NOOO--

[@I-lost-my-account-rip]

HELP WHAT

[@LilithIsDying]

Small thing, but in 2.5, when hinata offers komaeda his hand to help him up, somehow komaeda grabs hinata's arm with the junko hand, which makes no sense due to the fact that he's not supposed to be able to move it, as per chapter 0 of sdr2

[@Fictional_Evidence]

It was such a big mistake of the anime creators that they turned an AI into a human instead of exploring a pre-SDR2 bond between Hajime and Nagito. Nagito's existence was pushing Hajime's development during the killing game, so it would be interesting to see them interacting outside that. Not talking about how Nagito sticking to Hajime since the beginning could imply an already existing bond between them.

[@Envy_May]

this seems like it will be cathartic coincidentally ive just recently been thinking about how much better dr3 could have been as a traditional danganronpa game - i thought the reason they were making it an anime instead was to focus on non-killing-gamey stuff that wouldn't work in the same medium but then they didn't do that at all anyway

[@sarafontanini7051]

yeah making it a killing game again was....dumb. Especially since the new killing game was dumb as shit and wasn't interesting because the solution was the same for every death. Because they couldn't think of a solution that wasn't magic mindd control videotape.

[@kingarubin]

As someone who hates Danganronpa 3 with burning passion, I was so happy when this video appeared in my recommendation lol About Nanami Chiaki... I think the main problem with her is that she isn't a character. She is a plot device. She is there to answer every question the story has. She is a solution to every problem writers can stumble upon. I know some people have called her a Mary Sue but that's something different. Mary Sue is when a story centers around a charater. In Nanami's case, it's not plot centered around her, she is the plot

[@kingarubin]

I also wanted to talk more about "realism". Show doesn't have to be realistic. BUT level of realism should be consistent because otherwise there is no stakes. Danganronpa 3 is much more cartoony than games and that's just creates confusion. It's hard to treat Komaeda's blowing up lobby in DR2 as something serious when in the DR3 they regularly destroy their school. There are some shows in which they can throw character out of the window and they'll be fine. But in others character would be dead after something like that. And both scenarios are fine as long as it's consistent

[@javxion6576]

A super mary sue then

[@Ek_Oaynib]

Now that this video exists, I have the sudden urge to talk about SO many things that irked me about DR3 that I had barely seen anyone in the fandom talk about. In contrast to this, as a heads up, I actually genuinely like DR3, especially Despair Arc, even though later on, I found so many flaws and glaring issues that really made me disappointed when I realized how the anime could’ve been SO much more than the mess that it turned out to be (still a mess that I love, regardless). Ngl, the most issues that I’ve found were from Despair Arc, because Future Arc was sort of forgettable, so I don’t have much to say about the latter. Okay, first of all, what happened to the characterization of so much of the cast? It kind of felt like along with the art style, their entire personalities changed and they turned into a barely-passable fanfic version (hell, this might even be an insult to fanfiction) of their former selves. In SDR2, Mahiru had a bossy personality that was quick to judge and scold the boys in her class but completely ignored any wrongdoings that the girls might do. In Despair Arc, we see absolutely none of that. WHERE THE HELL DID IT GO? Even if it’s not a fairly likeable trait, that was a key part of her personality and her entire character in general, so I guess it was just completely forgotten? Now she’s just really passive with situations, awkwardly watching and politely laughing off the weird shenanigans her class pulls all the time because she’s the only normal person in the group and that’s the only character trait that the writers remembered to include. Next up, Natsumi! Even though she wasn’t technically in SDR2, she’s mentioned in Fuyuhiko’s FTEs and, guess what? According to Fuyuhiko, she’s actually really capable and was actually supposed to be the next leader of the Kuzuryu clan if it wasn’t for the fact that she decided to step down to let Fuyuhiko be the next leader instead. Yes, it’s said that she respected her brother a lot, but what was done in the Despair Arc felt like that was ALL they took from the dialogue of Fuyuhiko’s FTEs. In the anime, she just comes off as a pathetic, hot-tempered individual who hides behind her clan’s name without any capability of her own and chases to catch up with her brother to the point where it basically seems like the brother complex trope that’s known in anime (and honestly, you could just say that it IS a brother complex). The reality is that she IS capable and is in fact better than her brother, but do we see any of that in the anime? No. That’s why she just comes off as lame. The last character I’m going to talk about is Nagito. He is by far my favourite character, and still will be and I enjoyed every moment he was on-screen (even in the anime). However, looking back, so much was done wrong with his personality. He just doesn’t seem like SDR2 Nagito, no matter how you looked at it. A lot of people try to justify that he acts differently and is not absolutely psychotic, like how we saw him for the majority of SDR2 because they weren’t in a killing game environment. That would obviously mean he wouldn’t go to such extreme lengths to accomplish things he did in SDR2 because murder isn’t a constant, looming threat of despair in his school life. This seems like a sound argument, but hey, guess what? Pre-Revealing-That-He’s-Crazy-Because-Of-The-Killing-Game-Setting Nagito existed in SDR2! Did the writers of the anime completely forget how Nagito acted before SDR2’s 1st trial? Originally, he came off as a nice, chill guy that was pretty optimistic like Makoto (though kind of pessimistic in certain ways), slightly socially awkward at times and a bit self-deprecating. The class seemed to actually like him or was at least okay with him. They certainly didn’t hate him any more than any other classmate. We even get to see more of how he acts in Island Mode, and even though Island Mode isn’t canon, this is still official and would be how they would act in a hypothetical, non-killing game situation. Guess who completely ignored or just didn’t acknowledge this? The anime. His personality there doesn’t match up with his SDR2 personality pre-Trial 1 or post-Trial 1. He just gets hated at the start for being “weird” and that’s kind of it and this was even before him blowing up the gym in episode 4. What’s going on with his character? I don’t really know anymore. He gets turned into “Oh no, look at me, I’m so unlucky, but oh, look! Something happened to correct my unluckiness. I was actually lucky all along!” Like the video said, his luck just happens to cause things to work for him while he sits there when in SDR2, he manipulates his luck so he can make things work for him, exactly how he wants it to work because he knows fully well that bad luck will come after good luck (and vice versa). This characterizes him as a smart and pretty darn crafty character in SDR2 while in Despair Arc, it just characterizes him as, well, not that. He just lets things happen around him without really knowing how it’s going to transpire and this butchering of his character can be downright frustrating. Now, some character design and plot retcon issues that really bothered me. Some were already covered by the video, but I’m going to elaborate more on some of my personal grudges against them. In the Twilight Syndrome Murder Case of SDR2, the REAL photos received after being the first to fully clear the game show that Natsumi and Sato’s uniforms have brown skirts, aka the Main Course uniforms. Along with the fact that Natsumi was supposed to have been killed in the MAIN COURSE building’s music room for Mikan, Hiyoko, Ibuki, Mahiru and Sato to have discovered her body, this further proves that Natsumi and Sato were never originally supposed to have been in the Reserve Course and that this plot point was just ham-fisted in last second. I did like the messages they presented that finally pushed Hajime to accept the Kamukura Project, but with what I’ve seen Danganronpa accomplish with their writing in the past (and even later on with V3), they definitely could’ve found a better way to do it without creating all these plot holes and inconsistencies. ALSO also (this is a smaller nit-pick), in the photo portraying Mikan, Hiyoko and Ibuki, why didn’t DR3 use Mikan and Hiyoko’s designs here? Sure, maybe they were too plain, but I can’t really find that as a good enough excuse, but most of the cast are already wearing Hope’s Peak uniforms, so why bother making new designs? They clearly used Ibuki’s design here (slightly altered to be long-sleeved), which meant that they acknowledged this photo’s existence, so why? You can’t even say that “Oh, Mikan actually just doesn’t have her blazer in this picture, but everything else is the same”, because first of all, she has her summer uniform on, as seen with the short sleeves and second of all, her ribbon is green (for some reason but that’s the least of my gripes rn). We never see her with a summer uniform, even during episode 3, so they really just ignored the fact that Mikan and Hiyoko were wearing these uniforms during that time. There are so many more issues that I have with the DR3 anime, but I’ll just end it here because I already wrote an entire essay. If you read my entire comment, thanks! I’m just here to vent some frustrations that I’ve had for a while now, so I hope you got something out of it (or not, and if so, I’m sorry that I wasted your time ;-;).

[@GamerialGirl]

Literally i agree with everything about this because it geniunely felt like the characters were better being out of chracter to make the chracters "look better in the anime than show" 😭 I lowkey even hate this because everything was cut short and rarely not even taken into consideration? where are half of the chr interactions between fuyuhiko and natsumi? apparently they go to the same school and are siblings but ig that didn't matter 🤷‍♀ no because literally the game was PERFECT almost the perfect sequel until the anime sadly ruined alot things about them (i practically ignore the whole thing and think its a alternate timeline LMAOOOOO) and the fact that even in despair arc there's no ending to them...we dont even know what they're doing or with any of them except for makoto and everyone else and they get more screentime compared to the dr2 cast which feels so dumb and makes me feel like the chrs were made for no reason feels like a cash grab???? tbh the anime didnt need to be made it really didnt especially with time cut and so mny characters were butchered because of how either fanservice or hate which makes alot of this sad imo 😕

[@ejm1225]

8:53 "...killing them by spreading it to half of their body and making one of their eyes bleed, Monokuma-style, in the process, which is admittedly pretty sick, aesthetically speaking." How come I never noticed that before? How?!

[@smoldidi]

I would have liked if danganronpa 3 was 16 episodes long, one for each despair student, showing how junko manipulated all of them individually

[@skunkyemerson809]

A funny thing I’m surprised you didn’t mention was that the anime writers completely missed the implication of Kamakura’s long hair(him not caring enough to cut it) and decided it just came with the lobotomy

[@heelturn2]

you heard it here folks! buy one lobotomy, & get BONUS hair extensions free of charge!

[@wyn9693]

they never bring up the ultimate hair grower talent but kamukura did inherit it. tengen has it but he just cuts it really fast so you can't see it

[@BobTheArchmage]

On the Twilight Syndrome bit: When playing Danganronpa 2 I always assumed both Kuzuryu's sister and Mahiru's BFF were themselves SHL somethings and that they were part of Class 77-A (or at least that Mahiru's BFF was). After all, the DR2 cast are Class 77-*B*, which would imply the existance of a Class 77-A, and from Danganronpa Zere we know that there is a Class 77-A, but we only ever learn about like 4 of them.

[@PhantomOfficial07]

Fun fact I learned: originally, the class' name was simply Class 77th, which included everyone from DR2 except for Hajime and Chiaki, and in their place were Yuto and Yatsude from DR0. It was DR3 that retconned this.

[@Videosyncrasy]

This video covered most of my thoughts on the show, but here are some things I actually DID like in Danganronpa 3: * Not only does Hiyoko grow taller in the Despair Arc, we briefly see in the Future Arc that she grows taller again a second time, much like a Pokemon entering its third evolution. This is very funny to me. * It's only on screen for a few seconds, and at the end they somehow retcon it away, but "evil adult Hiyoko" might be the coolest design in all of Danganronpa. *

[@sunisverycool1]

ah a fellow saionji enthusiast

[@Videosyncrasy]

@@sunisverycool1 She is tall now :)

[@sunisverycool1]

@@Videosyncrasy i think it would be really funny if she turned out to be taller than like half the class while kuzuryu just. doesn't grow.

[@yabazyabacoffee]

You've got priorities

[@timeisntrealtheuniverseisalie]

4:23:17 I feel like this mirrors the decision of Harry Potter working for the Ministry Of Magic when he is an adult, the same government that made his teen years a living hell and was full to the brim with corruption and cruelty. Hopes Peak is literally the reason all of this happened and he wants to join them and continue its legacy?!?!

[@2garts379]

As a huge fan of Teruteru, I approve of your theory that he just somehow popped up out of nowhere, and nobody knows how or why. He just is now. And forever will be.

[@SuraimuWasTaken]

One of the biggest narrative bullets in the otherwise strongly built fabric of Danganronpas story telling was making Nanami a real character. Not in the sense that she has good motivation or a well rounded arc but in the sense that she was a student in class 77. She was meant to be nothing but a security protocol in fhe neo world program and nothing more. Making her real was an insult to the connection that not only Hinata but the audience as a whole created with her in SDR2.

[@narudayo5053]

It's litteraly said in the end of the game that the reason for Chiaki AI existence was when they wanted to use an AI to guide them, instead of being a mistmatch of informations, all of their memories joined easily into a single particular person that they see as a guide.

[@codex5949]

@@narudayo5053 this. I am so confused about people in this video saying that Chiaki being real is weird since i remember this being a thing. I always assumed Chiaki is a real person 77-B have a connection with and its nice to see her in Despair Arc.

[@entropylol2861]

3:15:00 "There is nothing satisfying about watching people became broken for the sake of being broken..." This is honestly the best way to explain the main problem with brainwashing on this scenario, its just boring.

[@twonio]

Sorry for White Knighting for Ryota, but I always assumed that he didn't immediately air the Hope video because of the leftover trauma he had about sharing his work in general. It wouldn't be a logical reaction, but an emotional one - logically, he knows the Hope video could be a solution, but viscerally, knowing what his work has done in the past, he doesn't want to show his work to anyone ever again, let alone a piece of his work that packs a brainwashing punch. After what his work did during the tragedy, he probably instinctively doesn't want to show anything he made to everyone, as a result of subconsciously trying to protect himself and others from something like that happening again. Sure, he can still make anime, but showing it to people is completely different. He's always been a perfectionist, and even though he loved anime and making it, he was never overly eager to show it to people unless they showed an interest in it, not wanting anyone to see his work until it was perfect. He's probably thrown away his dreams of making the perfect anime completely by the time the Future Arc rolls around, but I think he'd still probably want to know for sure that his work is perfect and that there isn't a better solution before airing the Hope anime, after all the pain that his previous work caused when it was shown

[@Wince_Media]

I'm so happy to see Marcy and her friend Austin to tear into this anime so deeply! I'm only halfway in the video and already I've seen so much this anime has done wrong!

[@insomniacnerd5592]

Ultimately, this ends up feeling like a fanfiction, a first draft of a script that wasn’t even looked over once after it was written before being put to production. Maybe there are a few ideas that could’ve been expanded upon to become something pretty cool, but it was all left to be botched by a rushed production.

[@Terensworth]

Know what? I'd enjoy DR3 alot more ןf it really was just Tengan admitting that he was everything. No, not responsible for everything, literally he was everything.

[@zeoxdragon]

JUSTICE FOR GREAT GOZU! HE DESERVED BETTER!

[@wuttatota148]

As someone who's favorites are Junko and Naegi, i was quite disappointed with how their characters were handled in dr3. They were portrayed as the absolute antithesis to each other. So i find it disappointing how it was revealed that Junko brainwashed class 77 using Mitarai's talent when Naegi had to actually inspire hope within his peers in dr1. Junko should be able to do the same. Exploit people's weaknesses to bring them to despair just like how Naegi uses trust and exemplifies the bright side to spread hope. About Naegi, my disappointment with him lies with him virtually doing nothing to resolve the conflict at the end. The sdr2 cast came and solved the Mitarai problem while Naegi watched and did nothing. He doesn't really drive the story that much since it's mostly Munakata and Tengan driving the plot while Naegi and the other dr1 cast were just caught up in it. Your whole section about how Munakata's argument actually makes sense, how everyone putting their trust into one person can be dangerous and lead to exploitation made me think that it would be such an interesting conflict for Naegi. Him grappling with his influence on the world as the symbol of hope and how the responsibilities of it weigh him down. Would've been interesting.

[@zetsubo6323]

I’m two years later but yeah, the way that Makoto was written in dr3 is terrible. He lacked one key aspect of his character which is how aggressive and stubborn he is when it’s about his ideal. We’ve seen that part of him in dr1 and even in sdr2 as he was the guy kidnapped the ultimate despairs into the neo-world program behind the back of the future foundation. He was being someone who hides the worst criminals in the world. However, this impulsiveness side wasn’t shown in dr3 and simplified him as a character. In addition, I don’t see dr1 or sdr2 Makoto recreate hope speak academy against. The only thing interesting was the despair video about him that’s all.

[@KiraTesla]

The thing that always drove me crazy about dr3 is how it totally butchers the end of dr2, like why should the remnants have to atone for their sins with isolation and struggle if they were literally mindjacked by an irresistible force? It goes from them having to accept their own actions as members of a cult to having been puppets of an angry god.

[@KiraTesla]

Left this comment partway through lmao, sorry to rehash. Ty for the blooper reel, it was a great palate cleanser and I'm gonna be calling the rain Tengan now

[@dubiousdeliquite6641]

Yea its such an absolute disappointment that retroactively ruins dr2s ending if you consider it cannon

[@MarioGMan25]

I'll give a slight argument that Kodaka actually once said that during Chiaki's final speech to Hinata in DR2 in that odd void, Kodaka had a bit of a spur of the moment inspiration and said that "That Chiaki was a different Chiaki than the AI one.", kind of like a ghost in the machine. So it's not like she was wholly decided to be real during DR3, but it is kind of a spur of the moment retcon inspired by a moment late in the game. This fact probably doesn't affect your argument too much, I just felt I should say it.

[@alexinator-hh5fe]

Danganronpa 3 was so strange to me. The Future arc consisted of characters I wasn't really attached to, aside from the DR1 cast. We didn't really get time to get attached to them before they started dropping like flies. And then they did a bunch of fake out deaths when it came to the DR 1 characters. Then, when they introduced Monaca back into the series, I was so happy they included DR UDG so the game would actually mean something, only to instead blast her and her arc off into space and never touch on it again. The Despair arc was far more enjoyable to me because I love the DR 2 cast. But then they didn't delve into any of the characters. They just made Chiaki into a real person but took away most of her personality, then made Junko into a less interesting villain by having her just brainwash people. Her talent is being an analyst. Manipulating people is her forte. It would've been so amazing to see her actually use said talent to break the DR2 cast. But no. Cheap brainwashing. The anime had some enjoyment for me. But a lot of it was bogged down by all the wasted potential.

[@lux4019]

Very excited for the v3 video, it's my personal favourite entry in the series standing high well above the rest and I love seeing discussion about it, its one of the few things that I like which is super divisive which makes talking about it all the more interesting

[@itsallwayspouringo]

Literally same. Also as a major Kiyo fan, I cannot wait for her to get into how they dropped the ball with his characterization.

[@hypn00s197]

3:35:59 Friendly reminder: That part happened after she met Hinata. So she did make a friend by videogames.

[@definietlynotowl3607]

"Paying animators on Fivrr to do animation memes over my snuff film collection" Junko Enoshimas best preforming KZbin video yet

[@twonio]

I love that the Devil's Advocate Akuma segments, with the Dangan music, start to sound like class trials of their own. All that's left is for Marcy and Austin to be saying "sore wa chigau yo" etc.

[@twonio]

Gosh, now I wish those segments were formatted as class trials...

[@MelaKenzu]

Ngl, Bandai’s design made it really hard for me to watch initially. Being a black woman raised in the still rather segregated south just made that offensive character design almost make me quit the show at start. So sick of characters who look like that or with the giant round bright pink lips still being prevalent in anime/manga.

[@ChaosPancakes]

Honestly, I feel like a headcanon I have that since Chihiro made ai Chiaki is based on someone close to Chihiro works better than what’s in DR3.

[@desmond9740]

I don't know if this is intentional or not, but I really like the transition between inspecting something in the music room and Natsumi's body at 1:12:21

[@catsarecool9773]

BLESS. It's been years but this video reminded me just how angry this anime made me as a teenager and it's wonderful to feel so validated after so many years, lmfao. Props to your hard work and fantastic takes. Thank fucking god I'm not the only one who not only despises Nanami in this anime, but also just found her kinda meh in SDR2. Like, she's fine, but I always got the sense that she was designed to be waifubait first and a character second. Which is forgivable in SDR2 where she has a purpose outside of that, but not in DR3. As much as the term "mary sue" has lost all meaning due to bad faith sexist arguments, characters like DR3 Nanami are the reason I believe it still has some merit. She is not a character, she is a narrative black hole. I could have bought her being based on a real person, but not like this. As for Komaeda, while I agree with most of your points, I feel some need to defend my teenage self by saying I and all my other Komahina-inclined friends hated what this anime did to him too, lol. Aside from that, one thing I'd like to point out is that his feelings towards the SDR2 cast after learning the truth were a bit more complicated than you imply. He acknowledges the possibility that they might have solved his mystery in his final video message, and is content to accept defeat and give them the information necessary to overcome the true enemy. There's a strong case to be made that he intentionally left enough clues strewn around his cabin for the case to be solvable in the first place, which is backed up by some of Hinata's internal monologue during the trial itself, that he feels like Komaeda left it for him as a message. In other words, he hasn't given up on them entirely--he's subjecting them to all to one last chance to prove their hope can prevail. It's subtle, but it's something people overlook enough when analyzing him that it's become a pet peeve of mine. Not that this makes him any less OOC in DR3 whatsoever though, since the writers have proven they don't understand the most basic things about him. He was a fantastic villain and seeing him reduced to a cardboard cutout was painful. Also, on the subject of DR0, in complete fairness they've been retconning that since SDR2. During the Izuru Kamukura investigation that takes place in 0, it's specifically stated that they can't find anything connecting the name "Izuru Kamukura" to HPA. Then in SDR2 it's revealed that the project took its name from the very founder of the academy. Yeah. Sorry for the lengthy comment. I, too, was in the fucking trenches and this video apparently unearthed some old trauma.

[@NezumiVA]

Pinned comment question: What is your favorite and least favorite thing about Danganronpa 3?

[@Lo0serx3]

favorite: the structure. I really liked how you go back and forth between the past and present, it makes for some really suspenseful moments. I liked how Chiaki's character gets fleshed out too. least favorite: some of the hope arc was kind of repetitive and slow.

[@frogfur7100]

favorite: i really like being able to see different aspects of the universe then we usually do, the cast actually in school and the future foundation least favorite: a lot of the characterization just isn’t good. ESPECIALLY mukuro her whole thing pisses me off i love her character so much and the biggest canon portrayal of it is horrible

[@Kriseiri]

favorite thing: juzo least favorite thing: everything else

[@polnareffswifeandgf]

i have to preface this by saying i haven't rewatched this anime in years so i might be wrong here. for least favourite.... oh boy. i think i'm going to have to go with how awfully the characters were treated. the future foundation are extremely bland and it made future arc increadibly boring. i don't think this is entirely the anime's fault since future arc wasn't able to have the same moments of down time that allowed us to get attached to the characters from the games but it still affects my enjoyment because half of the anime is wasted on really uninteresting characters. what's even worse than that is, in my opinion, how they treated the already established characters. mukuro loses all of her interesting characterisation from danganronpa if and becomes an incestuous punching bag, junko is no longer a manipulative genius and instead only got the remnants of despair on her side because of '''brainwashing anime''' (what????) and chiaki loses the few flaws she had in dr2 to become a martyr who's only role in the story is to make everyone sad over her death because everyone loves her and thinks she's the most perfect person on the planet. the dead thh characters with the exception of mukuro and junko didnt even get to speak! characters are danganronpa's selling point and by ruining them it takes a lot of the enjoyment from the story. my favourite part would probably be seeing the cast in their school uniforms and having a happy school life. i think the dr2 cast looked really nice in their new outfits and it was nice to see them have fun together. i wish the thh cast got the same treatment.

[@morningbell3690]

Favorite thing: Junko’s theme song is incredible! Least favorite thing: Everything else!

[@hscorner3829]

You hit every possible nail on the head with this one you two. I've had bitter feelings about this anime too since it first aired six years ago (yes, I am still butthurt about something that happened in 2016) and this put everything about it into words for me, so I sincerely thank you for that. I never gave Naegi much thought in this anime but what you said about what his ending meant actually made me more infuriated. I also appreciate that this was done with still the acknowledgement of all the hard work and crunch the people who worked on this anime were under. I am nervous for how you'll cover V3 as it's personally what saved the franchise for me and has a lot of value to me, and i'll probably take a lot of what I expect you to say about it personally. ...Maayybeee I should sit the next one out.

[@redkite1908]

DR3 has a lot of flaws, but I'd say the greatest is that everything is very much surface level. It's characters are the most superficial versions of themselves you can get, not understanding the ways in which they have personality beyond their traits. Part of the reason people are mad about the brainwashing video isn't just because it feels like a cop out, but because it removes the internality that the DR2 cast do have - even if you argue that it wasn't shown enough in the main DR2 story, it was still *there*. It includes characters not based on whether or not they should be, but based on what they feel people expect to see. Class 77 didn't originally have an A and B! Chiaki didn't exist - she didn't have a file in DR2 because she wasn't a hopes peak student! But she's an iconic enough character that she 'has' to be there - but because the show is so surface level, It isn't even willing to do anything with her character to make her distinct. It would be interesting if Chiaki as a person was actually deeply flawed, perhaps being so obsessed with a virtual world and escapism that she didn't realise what was happening to the school until it was too late. Instead, it's just DR2 chiaki copy pasted into the past, but with less character depth. It includes new characters and a killing game because that's what DR is about, but it never reflects on why or how. The killing games all had a point - hell, in DR2, the killing game was only implemented because Junko couldn't just kill everyone outright and needed to manipulate them. She'd have been perfectly fine with skipping it if she could have, and based on some of her comments in that game she might have even been a little annoyed at doing another one. DR3's killing game is a suqare peg trying to fit into a round hole, included because DR is about killing games and not because it actually was a good way to conclude the events of the saga - if having a definite conclusion is even a good idea for the franchise. And because of that, it has to introduce new characters into an already crowded show when many of those characters just aren't necessary, which also then means having scenes in despair arc trying to justify the existence of these characters. It doesn't look into the deeper themes of the series. It never thinks about the nature of Hopes Peak and its obsession with Talent, and how said obsession with creating geniuses meant that it stopped acknowledging them as people. About the commentary on what that says about the schooling system and how it can treat kids. And so, it sees the rebuilding of that instituition as something inherently good. DR is a series that, on a pure surface level, ishonestly pretty dumb. It never really gives an explanation as to why many of its events happen - how does a series of tragedies at a school lead into the end of the world, for example? But it works because it recognises that a full explanation isn't necessary. What matters is that the world is a terrifying and uncertain place, one where a good ending isn't guaranteed, but also isn't inherently doomed. In only looking into those surface level aspects, DR3 tried to give DR two things it never needed: Explanations and a happy ending. But as Nezumi has said before, no explanation could be good enough, and personally, a happy ending that doesn't acknowledge the possibility of despair and everything going wrong doesn't fit DR's themes.

[@oziancitizen]

Tengan: "You see Makoto, you know that plane that the Komaeda was in, it had a pilot, and that pilot was flying that plane because of his sick cat, and his cat only got sick because after peeing on a bush, it got too close to the neighbour's dog... that right Makoto. It was me. I was that bush."

[@Pcuspy]

Personal qualms with Austin dissing on Monster Musume and Goodbye Despair Chiaki aside, this is a really good and cathartic video for the most part!! But seriously the main character in Monster Musume fuckin punches a racist into another racist thats raw as fuck

[@WallessJ]

I truly appreciate how you are able to critique a work without involving the fans of said work. This is the right way to engage with this kind of art and I love you for it.

[@itsallwayspouringo]

I really like this video and it was as well put together as always. Nice job to both of you. Even as someone who hasn’t watched the series, you two did a good rob of explaining it to someone not familiar with the material. However one thing I think the video could have done without, and this is of course only my opinion, was the devil’s advocate character. I feel like the points brought up in response to his lines could have easily been made without him. Plus it feels a bit like bad faith to address contrary points through an annoying side character. That might just be me, and it’s a minor nitpick. I don’t disagree with any of the points made with him necessarily. Otherwise it was still an enjoyable video.

[@NezumiVA]

I can understand that. A-kuma was mostly intended as a joke, rather than an actual reflection of what we think the opposing camp is like. The points still would have come up anyway, but I understand why the gag's not for everyone.

[@midnalazuli793]

You know, I have to agree. I actually hate the concept of devil's advocate, because it promotes insincerity. It's okay to understand the perspective of others, even if you don't share the same opinion, but actually arguing for something that you don't agree with is a little pretentious.

[@theinfantmetroid]

I'm gonna be honest, by mirroring the structure of DR3 with passing the mic back and forth, you kind of copied one of the issues I had with it wholesale: just when I was settling back into listening to you talk about Future, there was an abrupt stop and suddenly we were back to Despair and vice versa. Of course I understand that, among other things, this was probably a time saving strategy to avoid having to record all 5 hours of this on your own, but for me personally the constant switching left me just as confused as it did in DR3. Also A-kuma, while a GENIUS pun, was kind of unnecessary and came across as mostly mean spirited. Anyways, I commend you for the absolute insanity of making a 5 hour video, even if I didn't enjoy it as much as the others, and I'll continue being excited for the video on V3 (and apparently potentially Zero!!!) and any others that youll put out in the future! Edit: Oh i forgot to mention but the Tengan bit at the end is fucking hilarious I'm crying

[@animalbrad]

Very much agree with this statement. I've never watched Danganronpa 3, and was expecting a point by point explanation like the other videos In This series, the bouncing back and forth reaaaaaly didn't help me understand what was going on. The akuma strawman seemed like it was specifically targeting anyone who liked the show and just was shooting down anyone's feelings of enjoyment. I'm looking forward to any more episodes in the series but I really didn't enjoy this one as much as the others (probs cause I didn't know the source material)

[@PyeFive]

@@animalbrad Tbf I’ve watched the source material, and the structure of this video still confused me a bit. I think it would’ve been better just to go episode by episode and bring up any big points as they naturally came up in the show. That plus the general negativity made me not enjoy this review very much. (Don’t get me wrong: The anime is shit and definitely deserves negativity, but it’s really overdone and nitpicky at points, especially regarding the Chiaki section.)

[@Tasty_Tango45]

I can already tell this retrospective is gonna be amazing!, thanks for all your hard work Nezumi your videos bring me copious amounts of joy

[@LtheOriginal]

48:22 (slams head into desk) God damn it, just because someone voices a character who antagonizes a character, doesn't mean the voice actor them self is like that. The fact that Kodaka had to apologize for that is downright ridiculous.

[@chargoal_games]

The Devil's Advocate was a joke. You raised all of the right arguments, and that's considering I actually like DR3 for its concepts (though not execution), but damn, how I wish Akuma was not in the video. He a was a mockery of objections, as if there is no actual objections to your arguments. More like "average YT commenter" than devil's advocate to me - "Nobody likes Akuma. Don't be like Akuma."

[@AnnieBee43]

This retrospective series has been one of few things keeping me sane this year.. Providing me a lot of newfound love for one of my favorite series. Thank you so, SO much for all the passion you've put into these videos!!

[@delphoxhoopa7289]

Favorite: Ultimate Despair designs Least Favorite: Brainwashing video instead of Junko's manipulations.

[@cloudybo5555]

1. Oh god youre so right about the hope arc. It's so saccharine with everybody coming back to life and completely throws hinata's ENTIRE character completely out the window. So so so...out of character for the series. Sometimes you don't get to atone for your actions, that's the cruel part of their fate in the game. You'd think if he cared about what nanami thinks, he wouldn't of fused with izuru. No matter what happened, he got his cake and ate it too, that's what a lot of this anime feels like actually for the dr2 cast. He's got his original self back With Every Possible Talent In the World. It also renders sdr2 useless in every sense. I kinda thought that the Future Arc would be about Naegi and Co. seeing what's happening in the simulation and following them as they try to stop it, not ANOTHER killing game format but something that lets us see what's happening on the other side. 2. I honestly believe they made komaeda softboy in this anime because he was a fan favorite and they knew it. You gave a really great point in saying he did all that unhinged shit in sdr2 AFTER getting his memory wiped and having his pre-hope's peak personality. 3. Why was the entire despair arc so...brown and tan on top of a dreamy instagram filter?? Why did they remove all the visual interest??? They did have some supper cool colors going on in the student council scene. Wish Nanami's execution had been more visually interesting (this goes for her in-game one, too.) 4. OOF, as Chief Chiaki Nanami Fan (tm) , I do see the where the criticisms are coming from, ESPECIALLY in this anime. I just wanted her to be more, part of why ive basically rewritten her in my head since she basically had nothing to begin with, whoops. It's a shame, because they did the "AI caring for the characters so much that they challenges the protag's ideas of personhood make a lasting impression on the audience" so well with Alter Ego, I really wanted them to elaborate on that when they made one a support role. I hate that she doesn't have a larger presence and is basically reduced to "pretty gamer girl heterosexual love interest that dies (TWICE) so the main character has something to feel sad about." I wanted her reaction to the killings to escalate in personal responsibility and fight her programming a bit more, to have a complicated relationship with the characters knowing what they did and not having her mask be perfect. I think they actually could have had her be a real person, if it wasn't a retcon to fridge her and an actual plot point in the game. I personally think it would be interesting if she was a real person that died and got something akin to ghost in a shell'd (or something like that) where her real body was so damaged that she could only be alive in the NWP, knowing about what her friends did and having an arc about how you can't recreate the fun times of the past and the future has to come. Gamer girl? No, make her Gamer Ghoul. HATE HATE HATE how they explained her becoming an AI in the series. I also believe she shouldn't of been the protag of the despair arc, she should have been a side character. I feel like her reluctance to make friends should have lasted longer than 2 seconds and been a lot stronger, making her antisocial with them. Maybe it has to do with her disregard of talent. I just a lot more for her then love interest and think she has a lot of potential. Okay hyperfixation talk over. 5. Cannot believe one of the most important story beats in this arc (Hajime going through with the Izuru Kamukura project) was do in part to a character wholly original to this anime only (Juzo) who has a marginal amount of screen time. Same goes with Mitari being so important. 6. No matter how many times I've tried to understand it, I cannot for the life of me understand anything they tried to do with Tengan. At All. Not the motivation, not his character purpose, nothin. 7. Thank god somebody brought up how Naegi being the headmaster of a new school is a terrible decision, he's only bound to part of other problems. He may be the SHSL hope but that doesn't mean he can cure the school system of its flaws. 8. Why does Chisa look the same age as the students? I know she's young but still. Why are her boobs so huge? Why is God's name does she run like that? This was such a massive behemoth to take on, so thank y'all so so much for it!! It's incredibly written and I loved sitting in for the premiere, I wish you the best of naps. I discovered your videos very recently and I love your commentary style. Finding the balance between criticism and giving it credit is so hard with this series, but you do it so well and are super funny and engaging in the process. Can't wait to see more stuff in the future.

[@ivannas5540]

On the topic of Junko's butchered character, how poignant would it have been for the mechanisms of Junko's "mastermind plan" of spreading despair to be revealed to just be her being an opportunist in beating people's sense of hope while they are already down. The whole evil scheme behind the tragedy simply just being her quietly influencing others and making them lose faith in humanity and who then later down the line start doing a ruckus as a result of those ideas implanted in their mind. The writers could have made her see and take the opportunity to make a rallying cry to the reserve course after Kamakura kills the student council by pointing out that even the most talented people in the world cannot save the state of the world, and once given all the tools they need might even make it worse, and slowly brainwash them to implant ideas like those in their mind. For class 77-B, let her put the idea out there to them that even as "humanities hope", any amounf of talent they have won't be enough to save the state of the world or change it and have them slowly mentally devolve from there and break down because of that idea. Just make it a spread of not her influence and power but instead of her ideals. I think that would only serve to prove her point in the long run, cause in the end it would only be proof that everyone ultimately resorts to despair in the end. And it would be more realistic, ideals and ideological currents spread from word of mouth, and negative spirals is one of the real mechanisms behind ideological brainwashing and depressive thinking works in real life. But no it all had to be because of clockworks orange brainwashing 🤦🏻‍♀️

[@casualfanatic4217]

Some people have done DR3 rewrites which fix Junko and have done exactly this. Feeding the public information that pushes them to riot and implanting ideas into Class 77 to turn them on each other. People who did this for free understood more on what DR was about than these payed hacks

[@LazKoal]

Naegi and Kirigiri reviving Hope’s Peak has to be THE WORST THING in ANY PIECE OF MEDIA EVER. OH MY GOD ITS SO AWFUL

[@infi777]

very late to this video but holy shit the izuru massacre part that austin wrote was genuinely chilling, what a writer

[@cosmochoom]

I’ve gotta point out how clever it is for the Devil’s Advocate to be named “Akuma” Akuma is another word for devil in Japanese, while Kuma is bear (ofc). His name is basically the Devil Bear, because he’s always playing Devil’s advocate