#rambled analysis time I guess

[torkhin]

…so I’ve made some connections

(spoilers for all of TMA and TMAGP (as of Episode 15))

Lady Mowbray seems to have a lot of visual similarities to depictions of Scylla from Greek mythos. A woman of violent power with hounds at her hips and a taste for human flesh. The resemblance is uncanny, even with the added flavor of her being a capital-L Lady.

It’s interesting to me to see how the “fear powers” we’ve been introduced to so far in Protocol’s universe seem to have connections with Odyssey antagonists.

- Lady Mowbray aligns with Scylla

- The Sea (the Vast/Buried amalgamation from Ep. 11) aligns with Poseidon/the ocean (or possibly the Sirens)

- Mr. Bonzo aligns with Polyphemus

- The tree from Ep. 3 and the snakes from Ep. 14 align with Circe

- Needles seems to align well with Charybdis

- The starving crowd from Ep. 8 aligns with the Lotus Eaters (or possibly the Sirens)

Heck, even the Man on the Screen from Ep. 5 could align with the Oracle and the traveling merchant (responsible for the violin in Ep. 4 and (probably) the dice in Ep. 9) could align with Hermes (though I would hesitate to call either the Oracle or Hermes antagonists). Which leaves Ink5oul, the volunteers in Ep. 7, and the gambling app from Ep. 13 without any solid equivalents.

To be fair, I think basing all of TMAGP’s antagonists on a single epic may be too small-scale and isn’t enough for a solid theory, but the connections are interesting to dissect 👀

[aroacemisha]

The Wittebane brothers struggled to fit in with their town, and both were offered a different society by the Demon Realm.

And so was Luz.

But while Caleb and Luz embraced the Demon Realm and the freedom it offered them, and they found a family for themselves,

Philip rejected that freedom. But not only did he reject it, he took it away from Caleb too.

And he almost took it away from Luz.

He didn’t allow himself to enjoy the freedom the Boiling Isles offered, and he wouldn’t let them do it either. He didn’t allow himself to figure out his own identity and find a purpose in life beyond fulfilling his society’s expectations to a tee, and he wouldn’t let them either.

And no matter how firmly he believes in his own righteousness, all these years later, he’s still haunted by what he did to Caleb.

As much as he’s convinced he’s right, it doesn’t take away the pain of killing his brother - his only friend and only family - with his own hands, and then going through an endless cycle of cloning him over and over again to try and create the idealized version of him he made up in his mind.

And all these years later, he’s still imitating what Caleb used to look like back in the Human Realm. He still wears his coat, and he grew his hair out to have it in a ponytail.

He ruined his own life and defined himself around a single purpose he now desperately clings to, because he has nothing else left. He doesn’t have friends or a family because he destroyed that himself, and he doesn’t have a home either - the Human Realm he knew is long gone. All he can do now is either continue his work as a witch hunter, or die. He doesn’t know what else to do with himself, and it’s far too late for him to turn back, so he’s stuck in this prison he built for himself.

While Caleb died long ago, Luz made it out alive.

She has a family. She has friends. She has a home. She has hopes and dreams, and she has something to do. She didn’t define herself around a single purpose, and she allowed herself to experiment. She refused to let society define her identity or her purpose for her, and she helped others break free as well - be it refusing to conform to societal norms, or standing up to or escaping from an abusive parent.

Philip chose conformity, while Caleb and Luz chose freedom. Caleb’s time in this world was cut short, but Luz continues to live on and fight for others to have freedom too.

[nemesis-is-my-middle-name]

i know i've posted abt this before also but i did not have screenshots to demonstrate just HOW gently passive aggressive ingo is to volo when they talk. i have no idea if they intended it this way but he sounds so "sadly my strict standard of conduct will not let me tell you to fuck off for asking weirdly personal questions just so you can share your theories but with the subtext toolkit available to me i am VERY much shooing you out of the way so i can get back to what i was actually trying to do."

[witchspeka]

Ritsu doesn't respond to Shou's messages, not cause he's disinterested or doesn't consider him a friend, but because 90% of the time he forgets he owns a phone

Like from an outsider's POV Ritsu seems like he's cold towards him or mildly annoyed but in reality he's just introverted and hasn't had any friends before besides his brother

Whatever you think they feel for one another is mutual, whether it's friendship or love or just mutual understanding and sympathy

Like, I can see them argue and be annoyed with eachother's personality once in a while but they care. I like to believe this isn't my bias but canon fact, Ritsu wouldn't have agreed to help Shou otherwise

They understand eachother. Shou tells Ritsu his big ideas and Ritsu understands how he's come to that conclusion and gives criticism and Shou listens to him. Because he knows it isn't an insult, he knows its genuine advice, he knows Ritsu actually listens and wants to help

That has its shortcomings as well, I think they're overestimating how well they understand eachother sometimes, there's a certain degree of projection happening. Their situations are similar but very, very different

What I'm trying to say is that they don't hang out that often but ten years post canon Shou could call Ritsu up after they haven't spoken in forever, unsure if he even has his number anymore, ask for help and still receive it. That Shou would let Ritsu crash on his couch after he impulsively quits his job even if months passed since their last conversation. It's not about personality compatibility with them, its about trust.

[potatobugz]

what gets me about the spider demons is that they were so close.

Huntsman starts to question his role in all of this and Spider Queen realizes she's being used. She and MK were both pawns; they're not so different after all. So they try to escape their fate, but in the end, they lose. Spider Queen literally went out of her way to save MK in her last moments because she saw herself in him.

They all had so much room to grow and change for the better but they were robbed of that chance. And that's what makes them so so tragic to me .augh

[another-clive-blog]

Still thinking about French Unwound Future being called le Destin Perdu (the Lost Fate) and still being emo about it.

How do you lose your fate. It's meant to happen regardless of your actions : it's greater than you, far beyond the realm of human abilities. It is defined by its certitude. Losing your fate means that you've broken something that can't and should never be broken, and that's what the time machine did, didn't it ? It broke the laws of nature and they had to pay the price : fate may have been broken, but it's a broken mess that remains greater than them all.

Lost Fate also means that they should have been okay. The universe's initial plan wasn't for Claire to die this way, this tragedy was all man-made.

[smolstarthief]

Ok so me and my husband were at a bookstore a long while back and I was skimming through a tarot book/guide and found this page and immediately thought about the PTs' glove colors. I did do some digging later on and it's pretty much accurate though the lists are a bit more of the basic colors but still this is interesting! Especially since tarot is often utilized in P5 and other entries (that and I grew very tired of the common, "their gloves represent their elements" takes).

[theygender]

I may be considering the crime of... Getting a business degree 🤢

[im-smart-i-swear]

can you remember being born? were you born at all

[skitterjitter]

No, no listen, you can extend the metaphor — ‘cause Kisaki if is the Pierrot, then Hina is the Columbine and Takemichi is the Harlequin, and if you take into account that while the Columbine is married to the Pierrot she’s also the mistress/love interest of the Harlequin, as well as working to undermine the Pierrot via resourcefulness and the Pierrot being sterner than the Harlequin then it makes sense why things worked out the way they did

Also — also it makes sense that Kisaki is obsessed with not just Hina but Takemichi, his comment about “goodbye hero” when he’s about to shoot Takemichi brings them full circle because the first time they met Takemichi was acting like a hero

[her-reidiance]

Mostima's First Time after becoming a fallen Sankta, and her reflections on how it feels VS what it felt like before the fall. Is... is that anything?

I mean, a big part of Guiding Ahead for Mostima is that she expresses being able to think for herself, use her own judgment to feel and how to process the sensory intake, right? So like... naturally I got to thinking — at 3am, as one often does — what if the empathy halos are sort of like... obviously they tell you how others feel but what if that muddies your own perception on how you Ought To Feel? Like, originally I had a thought they could be kinky and used in a way to like, heighten one's pleasure and such... but what if they actually mute it for you?

And then Mostima becomes a fallen angel. Suddenly she's cut off from all the others, from that neural transmitter in the sky telling her how she Ought To Feel and she begins to experience the world as Herself? Through her own experiences and her own feelings she begins to form her own ideas and her own thoughts about the world and all it has to offer.

Food tastes different now, not because it's made any different but because now she doesn't have a million other thoughts pouring into her head informing her of how it makes her feel to eat it, she just Feels the way she does about it now and it might change what her favorites are, previous opinions overwritten.

Would explain why she enjoys eating so much and following the food guide in Code of Brawl, she's learning how to explore the world in her own eyes now. So obviously, it follows that other experiences would be altered now for her too, right? Especially with her unusual Self Dilation of Time or whatever the actual name of the ability is. Point is, she always experienced things in a strange way compared to others.

I dunno it's almost 4AM, I'm not fully awake and I might not remember typing this by the time I wake up but I guess that's the beauty of thoughts like these that float in my stream of consciousness like a lazy river. I get to just post these things to tumblr and not even worry about who's gonna see it.

Anyway. Mostima experiencing her first O post fall, and how that changes her entire worldview.

Oh and something else: her bio always refers to her emotional state as one of like, detachment basically right? How she never seems to actually feel as much as she might say she does? I mean, how else are you supposed to act when you finally don't have something telling you how to feel? You're gonna intuit it and you're gonna get it wrong sometimes. That's why she's so off-putting to others, she literally doesn't know how to feel so she's guessing and in a world where people don't usually need to guess...

Okay this is becoming a character think piece where it was supposed to just be a shitpost about thinking gay little sex thoughts about the blue hair cutie mctimestop so I'm gonna go to sleep. Thinking too much is gonna wake me up and I don't want that. Take this for what you will!

[loquaciouscat]

i will defend for my life arataka is much, much more complex than he is perceived as

i know he is like idk. Stupidly bold and goofy but he is

He is the lost young-adulthood, he is guilty for just existing, he thinks he is a burden

He believes he is lost in his life, he believes he is miserable

I know he tries a lot to be helpful to others, and he is

But I can't help but realize Reigen thinks he is some kind of port, people stay with him and they get better in life, trust themselves more, and then leave

Like a port that ships has to stay for a while

Shigeo will be gone soon, Tome too

And eventually Seri too

I can't help but see how he lost his light, his hope for himself

I hope he can move on one day too. He deserves it

He deserves unconditional true love

[quatregats]

Really really do not want to go to this class really really do not want to do this anymore

[designernishiki]

I saw your post where you said something like «Kiryu and Mayumi slept in the same bed for six months» and... I kina doubt it. This bed is too small for two people, it hardly accommodates Kiryu, given his size. So she was probably either sleeping on the floor or sleeping somewhere else.

For some reason I always thought that she didn't live with him at all, just came there from time to time. If you look at the apartment where Kiryu lives, you can see that there are only his things there and no other things. And I don't remember exactly, but Mayumi's profile at the beginning of the game says something like «she's disappointed that their relationship won't get off the ground» or something like that. So, yes, the poor girl was desperate for him while he was in his le gay depression phase.

okay so I was waiting to answer this until I started legit playing 5 so I could have a bit more context and whatnot and now I have done that and hdhxjcjdjv boy do I have a lot of thoughts. warning: this is kinda long.

so I can clarify now that– yeah– they weren’t actually living together technically, she would just come over a lot and spend the night there regardless of his opinion on it (which typically was “you should go home” or “you should stay at your own place for once” no im not just being mean, those are both almost word-for-word). she does have slippers there by the door that denote she’s there often, but his apartment’s pretty barren overall, which to me says less about her being around or not, and more about him probably only going home when he needs to sleep or runs out of things to do, not hanging around there much otherwise– he’s got no books, no radio, nothing. just an ashtray on the table. It’s safe to say it’s not a place he enjoys being in.

And yeah, it’s bizarre how many people say “kiryu had a girlfriend for six months” despite her profile and kiryu himself in dialogue stating… kind of the opposite? ie; that they were not a couple, kiryu was disinterested in her, and their lack of a relationship/kiryu’s lack of interest was frustrating to her. She was never his girlfriend despite her giving her all to get him to budge, and that’s kind of an important part of the dynamic.

(here’s her character profile for reference.)

As for the bed thing… honestly I’ve got no idea how that worked. cause you’re totally right, that bed is SMALL– relatively small for kiryu alone let alone two people, and she wasn’t legit living there so obviously she didn’t have her own room or anything. so my bet’s either that there was a futon that could be rolled out, since that’s pretty common in japan, or that she slept kinda cuddled up close to him and he just sort of laid there stiffly not really sure what to do about it– probably wearing him down with the good ol “well there’s only one bed and I wouldn’t want either of us to have to sleep on the floor…” one night, and she took that and ran with it from then on. either way, also of note, whenever she was around (or could show up at any time) he wore a full sweatsuit, even while in bed. yeah you could blame it on it being winter and all, but come on man who he hell wears a sweatshirt and sweatpants to bed. I think he was just genuinely uncomfortable with the idea of being unclothed in close quarters with her.

it seems like he wasn’t sleeping much in the first place anyway, so I don’t doubt he’d end up slipping away and falling asleep either on the floor or at the table or whatever at times. we know he’s not a big fan of being touched and cuddled or whatever when he doesn’t want it/by almost anyone, so I think it’d just be an ongoing losing battle between not wanting to be too harsh or rude, and preserving his own comfort and boundaries. as an autistic guy who’s particular about his sleeping conditions and necessary privacy myself, it kind of sounds like a nightmare not gonna lie.

anywho. I don’t wanna sound too negative towards mayumi as a character or anything, but it’s pretty straightforward that she was imposing on him quite a bit and did go beyond his boundaries at a time when he was especially emotionally vulnerable– and he let her in because she was in a place of vulnerability, at least so he thought. there’s plot reasons for her persistence in being there to an extent, and maybe that’s why she didn’t take the very very obvious hint that he was not interested in her and not just playing hard to get (is it really a hint when he tells her directly to her face? whatever you get it)

[potatobugz]

do you think the mess in oshiros hotel is meant to signify that hes been letting his problems pile up until its become too overwhelming to handle.

im thinking about the fact that he's definitely the one who's been making the mess but he doesn't even realize it. he ignores the clutter until it becomes too hard to ignore you know? like when it starts actively blocking the way to the presidential suite. he insists that he and his staff will handle it and that madeline shouldn't clean up his own mess, but he still doesn't do anything about it. does he know that the staff is gone? that it's just him there?

mr oshiro is so hell bent on impressing madeline so that she'll stay in his hotel. he's so in denial of everything. he doesn't even realize he's dead, he still thinks his hotel never got shut down. I think his insistence on her staying is bc he really wants to believe that the hotel is open, and a costumer would affirm that belief. it could also maybe be a mixture of loneliness too. (also, him treating her as a costumer even after she says no is absolutely him being in denial. that man is very unhealthily attached to this hotel,)

and even though it was nice of madeline to clean it up, there's still parts of the hotel she can't fix. the plumbing. the windows. the, hole in the ceiling (oops.) she's not qualified to help him, and that's why I think the chapter ends on a bit of a sour note. madeline is of course not a bad person for wanting to help, the point is that she can't. it is unfortunate but true

anyways mr oshiro is a very good character i like him a regular amount. im normal about that old man

[zukkaoru]

why do you people keep making my incoherent post-chapter nikolai word vomit posts popular. why can’t you reblog my fics instead