A trauma-informed analysis: How Episode 30 of Oshi Ko portrays the brilliance of Arima Kana and her resilience in the early stages of overcoming her trauma

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After all the negative thoughts Kana thought this episode after the reporter confronted her, when she thought of letting everyone involved with B-Komachi down after losing the guy, her thoughts on what the haters and online mob would say, and finally at the spot where Aqua found solace in Kana while playing a game of catch, Kana decided that she wouldn’t be a damsel in distress who turns to a guy, namely Aqua, for help only when she needs it, and that she didn’t become an idol only for Aqua but as a means to stay in the industry, and it’s brilliant for depicting a character in the early stages of overcoming her trauma.

This is significant as for much of Kana’s life, she turned to her mother for validation, which isn’t wrong as everyone needs validation to some extent growing up to develop normally, but Kana’s mother emotionally abusing Kana due to her popularity declining with the end result being that she abandoned Kana led to her daughter developing a huge inferiority complex as well as having abandonment issues. This is why Kana deciding that she doesn’t need to be saved by Aqua is an important moment for her.

Growing up, Kana’s acting career likely wouldn’t have started without her mom’s approval, so as a child growing up, Kana counted on her mother for validation and saw her mother as being the one to allow her to shine. When this arrangement ended, it was obviously a huge blow to her self-esteem, which led to the issues she currently has, and that’s why she fell head over heals in love with Aqua since he basically set her up to shine the Sweet Today live-action adaptation by increasing the level of acting from Melt and bringing about a high enough level of acting for Kana to deliver high-caliber acting, and in that moment, Aqua in a way stepped into the role Kana’s mother was in as the one who’d give Kana the feeling of validation she needed as she perceived him to be the one who saw her true talent, not Kaburagi Masaya, who only used Kana’s name recognition as a draw to promote male models. People with trauma often gravitate to people who will reactivate their trauma, and given Aqua is an emotionally distant person, the odds of him doing something similar to what her mother did to Kana was possible, and Aqua himself was drawn to Kana in a sense ’cause his self-conscious was also trying to recreate a familar situation with Kana becoming an idol much like his mother was, so the dynamic Kana and Aqua had was in a way toxic even despite what they feel for the other, so I’m glad there’s a bit of decoupling here regardless of whether it lasts.

This is why Aqua ghosting Kana for a year led to Kana being in such a poor headspace since she had a strong irrational emotional attachment to him and could only see that Aqua must hate her given he told her to shut up and struck her, not being able to see Aqua’s distress since her internal image of Aqua was the one who’d validate her for her talent like her mother used to, and seeing him act that way reactivated all of her trauma, leading to her asking whether he hates her even if Aqua was in poor shape himself. It’s not ’cause Kana’s a bad person who’s incapable of seeing that Aqua was not well as she likely concluded he was unwell, and that’s why she got out of the vehicle, but when someone’s trauma is reactivated, their mind shuts down, which much of the time leads to them being unable to think about anything else aside from their trauma. I know this as someone who’s had trauma and ’cause I know someone who gets triggered so often by his trauma. Kana still has a fierce desire to stay in the industry after all this time even after living by herself all these years, and that’s why she was so easily fooled by Mako, who gave a tip to the reporter about Kana being at Shima’s place, which is how the reporter knew there was nobody else at Shima’s place aside from Kana, and it was ’cause she was so desperate at the time ’cause of her source of validation was gone.

As a disclaimer, I am in no way saying that Kana is over Aqua now as I’m sure we’ll find out, maybe even in the coming weeks, that she isn’t, but Kana deciding not to rely on Aqua in her time of despair shows that she’s in the beginning stages of overcoming her trauma. I had to include that since I’m sure some Kana haters or Akasaka haters might say that this pivotal scene had no bearing on Kana’s development as a character at all, and they’d be wrong of course. Kana deciding not to rely on Aqua at this moment is most definitely a sign of growth from Kana as to recover from trauma a big step is to focus on self-validation rather than relying on external validation. It’s so important that Kana decided that she very much chose to become an idol for herself to stay in the industry since her acting career was going nowhere, not ’cause she was merely doing it as a favour to Aqua, who she saw as her knight in shining armour. She’s shown that her surviving for years in the industry without her mom wasn’t a fluke and that she can survive without Aqua either even if it’ll hurt her if he’s not around. I was so happy for Kana in that moment and do believe she’ll truly make it in the industry even if it’s not until long after the series ends.

Akasaka’s doing a great job writing such a realistic character in Kana, and it shows a deep understanding of people who have trauma for him to have chosen to write Kana this way with all of the highs and the lows, and it shows that he probably knows at least one person in the industry who has had issues such as Kana’s or has read a lot of credible works informed on trauma that he was able to include a character in his story that could conceivably have come straight from the real world, and the higher-ups at Doga Kobo obviously also see Kana’s character as a compelling one, which is why Doga Kobo nailed all of her scenes with all the care that’s put into adapting Kana’s content. I’ll say it if nobody else has: Episode 30 of Oshi no Ko was absolute cinema as the way it displayed Kana’s mental processes throughout the episode before having her defiantly scream that she’d be all right is just peak anime content. This is how you write someone who’s getting put through the wringer but still decides to push through anyway.

In defense of Akane in Oshi no Ko, who isn’t a perfect waifu, and why that’s a good thing

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I’ve seen a lot of people call Akane a perfect waifu, and I don’t agree with this sentiment. A perfect waifu wouldn’t tell Aqua in Episode 29 that he needs to make his own decision on how he wants to live and that she’ll support whatever his decision is after he has made it. I get the sense that Akane has taken her psychological profiling that she uses to portray the characters she plays when acting too seriously and has read up too much on psychology to her detriment. Although that’s how she was able to step into Ai’s shoes so well for the Dating Reality Show arc and get Aqua curious about her, not everything can be understood just from reading about psychology.

While Akane is right that when one half of the couple leans too heavily upon the other to make decisions it can be a toxic dynamic/relationship, she clearly has no previous relationship experience before dating Aqua, and it shows. She should know that Aqua was doing better mentally when he wasn’t bothered with revenge, but she merely stated this season that she prefers that version of Aqua rather than fully realizing that Aqua was legitimately in a better headspace after giving up on revenge rather than it being a matter of opinion. She should’ve outright told him to continue letting go of what haunted him as it’s not wrong to encourage your partner to do what’s best for his mental health, and the one time Aqua needed Akane’s emotional support more than ever he didn’t get it.

Akane is clearly a kind girl who doesn’t mean any harm, but I see her naivety being horrible for Aqua. She has made it her goal to kill Hikaru in place of Aqua to keep him out of it, but she perhaps let out a freudian slip about that in Episode 29 when she mused about carrying his burdens with him, hinting to Aqua that she knew all along that his father still lived, and Aqua, with him being the intelligent guy he is, most likely caught onto the possible implications of that, making her attempt to safeguard him a failure, not to mention the potential damage to their relationship.

She just wants to be a supporting girlfriend, but she doesn’t know what’s the best approach of doing that. I’m thinking Akane may not have had a great childhood herself with something clearly missing as her idea of what a girlfriend/loving partner should do is somewhat amiss and moreso along the lines of what a teenage girl would read online about co-dependent relationships instead of following in the example of her parents. I’m glad that Akasaka had the courage to write Akane this way even if will be bad for Aqua’s mental health as he’s showing just what can go wrong as people struggle to grow into adults. She’s relentlessly trying to do what she believes is best for Aqua even if some of her beliefs are misguided, and she’s a well-written and flawed character, not a perfect waifu as some people claim her to be.

This will most likely put Aqua back on the path to revenge against Hikaru, and then they’ll go about it as a couple with Akane supporting him with all her heart. Unfortunately, I believe the direction Episodes 28 and 29 went in point to Oshi no Ko ending in a dark and bleak fashion. And while I can see why fans would be very upset with such an ending, if the first arc with Ai was a criticism of the industry and the last few arcs build up to a dreary ending, I can see Oshi no Ko being a story about the very significant mental health crisis in Japan and how underneath the entertaining aspects of the Japanese entertainment industry lies a message of a country deep in crisis with many of the people who engage with this industry, either directly as a part of it or as fans of it, having major issues.

Watching anime for perfect waifu is in my opinion not the ideal way to watch it. You may get solace from feeling close to such a character when watching anime primarily as an escape, but it will not motivate you to improve your life and meaningfully grow as a person or to diversify your perspectives on life and relationships. I hope anime-onlies such as myself can watch the entire series and not pre-judge the ending as terrible, instead focusing on what message Akasaka was trying to tell. There are big deep-seated issues in Japan that often show up in developed countries later, much like a rapidly aging population, a shrinking workforce, and reduced social interaction/withdrawal. The significant mental health crisis is probably a sleeper issue that will creep up on many countries.

A trauma-informed analysis: Why the bashing of Kana due to Oshi no Ko Episode 28 is unwarranted and is a refusal to engage with the story

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The biggest reason for the bashing of Kana is basically that people are self-inserting themselves into Aqua’s shoes and focusing on what a perfect waifu would do instead of engaging with Akasaka’s work in the way he intended for it to be consumed as Oshi no Ko is big on confronting the realities of the misogyny idols and people who work in the Japanese entertainment industry face regarding waifus, which includes idols, being seen as existing solely for all the lonely men out there who feel unfulfilled in their lives, not having their own agency outside of being emotional support for these men and thoughts that are their own.

As for how this relates to Kana, many people who have trauma have a hyperfixation on their own thoughts, actions, and behaviours due to how they’re scared to relive their trauma again, and I know this ’cause I was traumatized myself, and this is referred to as hypervigilance. This can lead to them being very focused on themselves since they had no one else to look out for them when they were younger, not ’cause Kana is an abnormally self-centered person. In the case of Kana, her mother emotionally abused Kana and abandoned her after her popularity decreased as a child actress, which led to her having an inferiority complex and having a fear of abandonment, a reason for her intense desire for validation and feeling needed, which Aqua exploited by roping Kana into joining his sister’s idol group.

Aqua imprinted on Kana since they were kids ’cause he knocked her off her high horse when she had an overinflated ego, and that moment led to her on some level viewing Aqua as this amazing guy since it was a good learning experience for her that changed her life, and she rightfully realized she needed to improve given her self-esteem was tied to her acting ability. Then Aqua did all he did in the Sweet Today arc just to make her shine, and she became obsessed him thinking of him as her Prince Charming and made him the one she would work to have her feelings of validation and of being needed be realized, which is why she was so easily pressured into joining B-Komachi. Kana basically replaced her desire for her mother’s validation for her desire for Aqua’s validation.

And so Aqua avoiding Kana despite her doing what she’s doing for Ruby to seek validation from Aqua led to a serious decline in her mental state as she is someone who seriously needs therapy. In Episode 28, Aqua doesn’t respond verbally to Kana, who deep down wants his validation even if she realized at the moment that he was in distress, and he physically injures her too, knocking her to the ground.

Thus, It actually makes 100% complete sense why Kana acted the way she did since she made it her life to seek Aqua’s validation, and him telling her to shut up and strike her is basically seen by her as Aqua reproaching her, triggering her heavily in the process. As she was basically reliving her trauma all over again, you can’t expect her to be in-tune with Aqua’s distress and react accordingly. When people engage with animanga or any story in general, they should try seeing the behaviour of the characters from their own viewpoints and not that of just the protagonist that they’ve grown attached to. Kana did nothing wrong in the way she handled the situation, and it was the best she could given how serious her issues are. For Kana, Aqua telling her to shut up and strike her is basically denying her entire existence, so of course she’d shut down mentally and hyperfocus and bring up something that is congruent with her trauma in that she believes she is someone who doesn’t deserve the affection of others due to the emotional abuse she suffered at the hands of her mother. That she didn’t think of Aqua’s distress and focused on herself is ’cause instead of Aqua being her source of validation as she had intended for him to be, he’s now instead forcing her to relive her trauma, and her fight-or-flight response activated, a primal reaction to perceived danger. All of this shows that Akasaka understands trauma very well in how he has written his characters, and Kana should really not be getting any flack by people self-inserting themselves into Aqua’s shoes.

Kana acting in this way as an idol, prioritizing her own thoughts and well-being, led to people who see idols and anime waifus as having no value aside from being emotional support for themselves or the protagonists they self-insert themselves into being shocked as it’s a very un-idol or un-waifu thing to do, which is what led to the bashing even though it is not how Akasaka intended for people to view his story and Kana’s reaction.

As for why Kana doesn’t look for validation through friends, a lot of people with a bad childhood don’t have a secure attachment with at least one parent. To sum this up, attachment theory posits that humans are born with an innate need to form close emotional bonds with caregivers for survival and emotional security, and this influences childrens’ emotional regulation and relationship patterns, secure, anxious, or avoidment attachment styles even into adulthood. This is the reason it’s believed that many people with poor childhoods end up having problems with emotional regulation. People with anxious or avoidment attachment styles tend to look for partners who will trigger their trauma even if from the perspective of a normal person it seems insane since it’s an effort in part to gain mastery over their trauma by hoping they can change relationships with a similar pattern as that which initially hurt them.

Kana most likely got into acting in part due to her mother seeing her talent and wanting to validate her AND make money from her daughter’s talent, so Kana who ties her acting ability to her self-esteem, saw her mother as being the one who ensured that she got validation. But her mother emotionally abused her and abandoned her, resulting in Kana developing an anxious attachment in which she will look for a partner who will give her validation even if he isn’t attentive to her needs in general or will abandon her at some point just like her mother did.

Aqua giving Kana validation by putting a spotlight on her during the Sweet Today live action adaption made Aqua step into the role that her mother was in in that he was the one who recognized her talent and got her to shine. Even though she deep down knows that Aqua will not be good for her due to him being emotionally distant and not all that interested in acting, meaning there probably wouldn’t be too many opportunities for Aqua to put her in the spotlight given she deliberately avoids doing so after learning that people skills are more important to talent in the industry, showing that he’s the type who will trigger her trauma.

Many people with trauma such as this will focus on the person they want validation from, even if it goes against what they actually desire in their career. Kana’s primary focus may be her acting career, but she will be an idol for Aqua since it makes her feel needed by him since it’s for Aqua wanting his sister’s idol group to blossom. It is very common for people with an anxious attachment style to gravitate to a person with an avoidant attachment style like Aqua has even though the dynamic is toxic, but such is how things work.

Kana is incredibly well-written and is who I consider to be the best-written character in Oshi no Ko for being extremely consistent in the way she is written, and it should be the case that Akasaka either knows a person in real life much like Kana or he has read many stories from authors informed about trauma to depict her struggles so well in making her seem so much like a person from the real world. I applaud him for doing so well in making Oshi no Ko a compelling story with excellent characters such as Kana.

Analysis: Oshi no Ko’s portrayal of how the pursuit of revenge hurts those around you is brilliant and the possible implications of that for the story

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For me personally, the ugly and unpleasant can make for great content even if not the most enjoyable, and I found this to be outright one of the best episodes of Oshi no Ko after the appalling episode from last week. This episode shows very well how the death of a character can ruin the dynamics between a family due to the ensuing trauma and how one’s pursuit of revenge can negatively affect those around you.

Ichigo basically abandoned his wife and Strawberry Productions due to being heartbroken over Ai’s murder, and given he considered Ai his daughter of sorts, he probably blamed himself on some level for not preparing Ai for something like that given his knowledge of the industry. Now, he’s using Ruby as a foot soldier for his revenge even though it keeps her on a bad path, the daughter of the one he considered a daughter to him. Ichigo was fucked up by Ai’s murder just as much as anybody else, and seeing his nonchalant telling to Aqua that it was just a theory and nothing confirmed after Aqua started having a panic attack while he continues fishing, doing nothing meaningful to calm Aqua, the son of the one he considered his daughter, shows just how much he has changed with him not caring about his wife, Miyako, and showing zero care for the well-being of Ai’s children.

Aqua’s pursuit of revenge himself was what kickstarted Ruby going off the deep end since she realized that the reason Aqua had gotten back into the industry despite for years saying he had no further interest in acting was so that he could find Ai’s murderer after her realization that Gorou had also been murdered just as Ai was and that it was orchestrated by the same person. Viewers should recall that Gorou was the person most important to Sarina before she reincarnated as Ruby as he spent the most meaningful time with her with her parents not even bothering to visit her, so Aqua being on the path of revenge directly led to Ruby going on this path, and she doesn’t care who she has to hurt to get her revenge whereas Aqua had more apparent limits to the lengths he would go. I can even understand why Ruby reacted the way she has given she lost both Ai and Gorou, but Gorou’s death was truly painful for her given she had wondered for so long what had happened to him with Gorou being the biggest thing tying her to this world.

In turn this came back to hurt Aqua himself seeing Ruby become the way she is after he did so much to protect her innocence and how Ruby’s pursuit of revenge led to him encountering Ichigo again, which shattered his illusion about him no longer having to kill his father, who was revealed to be Hikaru in Episode 28. And of course, Aqua had a one-track mind for revenge since he was 4 until recently after Taiki wrongly concluded that their father had already killed himself.

As for Kana, I’m somewhat miffed that she’s getting major flack for not being in-tune with Aqua’s emotional state when he was unresponsive to her due to him spiraling. I’m tired of so many people only watching anime so that they can self-insert into the protagonist’s shoes due to watching anime mainly as an escape. Despite Aqua having a ton of trauma, Kana herself has major trauma from her mother abandoning her when her career stalled, making her develop an inferiority complex and an intense fear of abandonment, making her deeply crave validation even though she goes out of her way not to stand out due to realizing that raw talent is less important than people skills in the industry, which is being triggered by Aqua’s treatment of her, so I believe it’s ridiculous that people are bashing Kana despite Aqua deliberately avoiding her for months and then physically hitting her upon their first meeting in a long while. Kana, with her own trauma, of course reacted in the way she did since the way Aqua is outwardly presenting himself as not wanting anything to do with her, and flaming Kana ’cause she isn’t perfectly in-tune with Aqua’s emotions like Akane is is a failure in media literacy as Kana being a self-absorbed girl is not the takeaway Akasaka wanted viewers to have from that scene. Kana does not and has never known about Aqua’s issues, and she cannot read minds. Not everyone is into psychologically profiling people like Akane is as that’s actually quite rare. The main takeaway Akasaka wanted viewers to get from this is Aqua’s spiraling and how the pursuit of revenge is not a healthy way to live since it pushes people away, much like how he never really got all the close to Ruby since he was 4 all the way up until now, which is probably one reason Ruby even decided to go on the path of revenge ’cause she never developed a relationship with anybody as meaningful as the one she had with Gorou.

As far as the implications for Oshi no Ko’s story, after I had watched Season 2, I thought that Oshi no Ko would have a happy ending, but I believe Episode 28 dramatically increased the chances of the story having a dark ending with the reason I believe this being ’cause Ichigo didn’t also need to be looped into the revenge story, and since he was, what Akasaka may be going for is showing how people get fucked over by something such as Ai’s death, first shown through Aqua, and then Ruby, and now Ichigo too. Another reason I believe this is that I think if Aqua hadn’t lashed out at Kana, she of all people might’ve been able to calm him down since she is the one he fancies, but maybe Akasaka’s deliberately keeping Kana out of the revenge plot to ensure that Aqua completes his revenge against his Hikaru after all with the only one who could talk him out of it never being looped into things. Akasaka was perhaps friends with an idol who was murdered and knew somewhat of the fallout of that girl’s murder and wants to preach about how a life in pursuit of revenge ends up ruining many people’s lives. This would make sense for a mangaka since Japan has a significant mental health crisis, and someone actively working in the industry like Aka does would be in a position to highlight how this is perhaps magnified for fans of and those working in the in the Japanese entertainment industry with how many fans latch onto idols due to something they lack in their own lives and considering the pressures those working in that industry face. In any case, it was an outstanding episode despite the ugliness of what it depicted. I don’t know Oshi no Ko’s ending, but I know western anime fans hated it, and this could possibly be a case of media illiteracy or a lack of understanding on a serious issue in Japanese culture.

Theory: The Hero of the South in Sousou no Frieren may have planned his last stand against Schlacht the Omniscient and the Demon King’s Seven Sages of Destruction knowing of Schlacht’s future sight

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For people familiar with Disney’s Marvel Cinematic Universe, Dr. Strange in Avengers: Infinity War looked through roughly 14 million futures and only saw one future in which the heroes defeated Thanos, so he specifically drove them to that future knowing that was likely the heroes’ only chance to save the universe from losing 50% of its population.

Where I’m going with this is Sousou no Frieren Episode 30 or Season 2 Episode 2 introduced a character known as the Hero of the South who had been previously namedropped in Season 1. This hero used his future sight to inflict considerable damage to the Demon King’s frontline forces and ultimately defeat Schlacht the Omniscient along with three of the Demon King’s Seven Sages of Destruction in a battle with just him against those elite forces of the Demon King. The reason I say he planned his last stand is that he said that even if Frieren had joined him in that upcoming battle that they still wouldn’t have been able to prevent his death. This shows that the Hero of the South could see the various paths and actions he could follow and take and the future that ensues from them. Therefore, if his power is of that nature, Schlacht’s power may have also been just as powerful, especially given Schlacht was thought to be omniscient.

Furthermore, perhaps futures the Hero of the South and Schlacht had previously seen could change due to the influence of the other party, which would’ve been very frustrating for the both of them, and if that had indeed been the case, both of them may have concluded that the best path forward for both humanity and for demonkind respectively would be to have the other killed. If that is the case, the Hero of the South going into battle on his own against Schlacht and the Demon King’s Seven Sages of Destruction may have been the best-case scenario for both humanity and demonkind with the Demon King eventually being defeated by Himmel’s party, a huge win for humanity, and demonkind surviving complete eradication, a win for the demons as well.

If you thought I had concluded my post with that thought, I haven’t as I still have something to bring up based on a past theory I came up when I was watching the first season of Frieren. Heiter said early into Season 1 before Frieren started her current journey with Fern and Stark that if there was actually a spell to bring back the dead that everybody would know it. Frieren then stated later that humanity learning how to fly was a more recent development by adapting the demonic spell for flight for their own use. So it may be the case that the spell to bring back the dead may just not be known yet, but one day a demon will invent it. We already had one demon, Aura, control the dead with her power, so reviving the dead would be one step up from that with one perhaps needing the original soul to be present for a resurrection to take place which would make Aureole relevant. It’s suspicious that the Demon King’s Castle was also in close proximity to Aureole, the place where people can meet with the souls of the dead, possibly suggesting that the demons themselves may have done research on Aureole.

Perhaps the final arc in Sousou no Frieren will involve a demon inventing a spell to resurrect the dead, allowing for him/her to bring back all the powerful demons of antiquity, including the previous Demon King, necessitating for the true Hero to draw out the Hero’s Sword, which Himmel was unable to do even though it was one of his long-term goals. Even with that power, the true Hero would need a strong group himself, and perhaps Frieren engages the demon that invented the spell that resurrects the dead, and she resurrects Himmel after adapting the spell from that demon to help the true Hero who draws out the Hero’s Sword defeat the demons. Then Frieren and Himmel can live happily ever after if Himmel is still alive after the conflict.

On the other hand, I can see a major criticism of this theory being that true resurrections of the dead would undermine the themes of the story about treasuring the people you care about while they’re still alive, so maybe instead of a demon inventing a spell that truly resurrects the dead, what it’d invent is a spell to reanimate the dead under the user’s control, making those brought back the undead. I guess this would better jive with the themes of Sousou no Frieren’s story. I’m partial to powerful demons of the past being brought back in some way given the Demon King’s Castle and Aureole both being located in Ende, the northernmost part of the continent, and I doubt this proximity the two locations have to each other is a coincidence.

A trauma-informed analysis on why Aqua likes Kana in Oshi no Ko and Aqua’s true feelings about him acting

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For those for whom it wasn’t clear that Aqua likes Kana, Akane, who Akasaka uses as the voice of reason in Oshi no Ko, pretty much outright stated in Episode 26 that that is the case. This is not to say that Akane has no chance in the end, but I’m just sharing why it very much makes sense that Aqua currently likes Kana.

Aqua slowly growing to like Kana was built up on early in the series and was literally intentional. Yes, Aqua did state that he wanted to kill Kana back when they were small kids ’cause of how insufferable she was, but fixating on that one line to try to suggest that he doesn’t like Kana was blatantly disregarding what the story was actually telling.

Just note how Gotanda took note of the difference between Aqua’s reactions to Kana and Akane wanting to see his childhood acting. Although Gotanda didn’t draw any conclusions from what he observed, one reason for the contrast in Aqua’s reactions was to show that as much as Aqua likes to put out that he doesn’t enjoy acting or want to be in the industry, he was still self-conscious enough to not want Kana to see his childhood acting. If he truly didn’t give care even an iota about acting, he also wouldn’t have cared if Kana had seen it or perhaps reluctantly allowed her to see it eventually if he didn’t have any expectations of his abilities. Yes, I know he was a long-time fan of Kana at that point, which contributed to his decision to not allow her to see it, but he wouldn’t have denied Kana seeing his childhood acting so pointedly if he didn’t care at all.

Thus, I believe whether it’s due to being born as Ai’s son or ’cause Ai literally said that she wanted Aqua to be an actor, Aqua does genuinely have some level of desire to be in the Japanese entertainment industry beyond wanting to use the industry as a means of getting revenge on his father.

As much as Aqua talked about his lack of intention to continue in the industry given how he failed Gotanda, who gave him multiple opportunities repeatedly, I believe Kana sharing how she was encouraged that Aqua was also struggling along with her in a world shrouded in darkness and how she personally likes his acting as it feels like that of someone who’s put in the work for a long time with him using techniques that are considerate and meticulous validated Aqua wanting to be an actor, whether subconsciously or consciously, at the direction of his mother, Ai. Although some people may dismiss that scene as only about Kana feeling kinship with Aqua, I believe her words did resonate with him on some level as Ai was a huge influence on him back when she was still alive and even after, meaning deep-down he hoped to hear someone affirm that he had acting chops, and since he followed Kana’s career from childhood, her words meant a lot to him even if part of the reason she said what she did was ’cause of what she learned from childhood that people skills are in a way more important than raw talent in the industry.

As someone who has experienced trauma, I know for a fact that a substantial number of people are drawn to people who activate their trauma, not ’cause of a desire to hurt themselves but due to a subconscious attempt to resolve past traumas, which is what leads them to seek a familiar situation, and I know this because I myself like someone who activates my trauma, so I speak from experience. In asking Kana to join his sister’s idol group, he inadvertently created a situation that reactivated his trauma once Akane put it into his mind what could happen to Kana, and whether it be to due to his subconscious influencing him to seek a familiar situation in making that request of Kana or ’cause he saw how accommodating of a person Kana was for the Sweet Today project, which made Kana the perfect person for him to rely on to take care of his sister, Ruby, the situation that eventually ensued with Aqua avoiding Kana in fear of her being killed was a very natural progression of events for people who understand how trauma can affect a person.

And furthermore, another reason Kana is an easy person for Aqua to fall for is she had something more going for her than someone like Akane in that Aqua spent time with Kana in early childhood, and Kana is thus somewhat of a reminder of what things were like back before Ai was murdered and when Ai had wanted him to pursue acting. Hell, Kana herself having expectations of his acting is like a continuation of Ai having expectations him, which increases the sense of familiarity of the situation. Even though his life was thrown upside down after Ai was murdered, he did have a loving mother who genuinely wished the best for him, and that film he was in with Kana was Aqua’s shining moment in the industry for a long time. Kana may have been intolerable as a young child, but she actually has people skills now to iron out her worst qualities, and Aqua still likes the dynamic he has with her casually roasting him due to that past meeting. As much as Akane supports Aqua emotionally and how she’s the one Aqua has shared his issues with, and how she’s the one who improved his acting, he still likes Kana at the moment and that development is rooted in real-world experiences with trauma survivors often being drawn to certain familiar situations.

A Re:Zero Theory: The Divine Dragon is on the side of multiple characters from 400 years ago, which includes Satella, Flugel, and Echidna

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We’ve seen repeatedly through Re:Zero that many characters are acting with future knowledge or at least what they think is future knowledge, such as Satella with her setting Subaru’s savepoints, especially in light of Episode 13’s savepoint, which had extremely intentional timing, Roswaal with his not-quite-Tome of Wisdom, Echidna with her real Tome of Wisdom given how she set up Puck perfectly to be Emilia’s protector all while having lost his memories so that he wouldn’t recognize Roswaal as being the one he knew 400 years ago, which was crucial to the story in many ways, Petelgeuse having been implied to have promised Flugel not to take in the Sloth Witch Factor only to break that promise to protect the love of his life and Emilia, paralleling how Echidna deterred Puck from entering a contract with Emilia until there was no other choice, and with Witch cultists and their Gospels. The central question is what is the purpose for all of these characters having the knowledge they do or think they do?

Why I believe some of these texts, such as Roswaal’s not-quite-Tome of Wisdom and Witch cultists’ Gospels, only delude their holders into thinking they provide actual future knowledge is due to the end result of some of the actions taken in the story so far, current up until the end of Season 3. We know Roswaal’s goal was to resurrect his dear teacher, Echidna, but I question whether the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom really was supposed to help him achieve that given the absence of Otto from its pages as a true future-telling text shouldn’t have that problem and should be able to account for everyone in the world, meaning Otto was excluded ’cause the source of the knowledge intended for that to happen. We know the tea party Echidna still had her Authority: Tome of Wisdom given her Sanctuary trials could fully replicate the past and show glimpses of possible futures, showing it truly was an extremely powerful Authority that could read the history of the world, so the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom, if it really was based on the genuine article, shouldn’t have a problem with missing all the actions of a particular individual from its predictions, so that suggests Roswaal was basically strung along by a book to set up the story of Re:Zero with Subaru meeting Emilia and saving her and leading him down the path that he took to defeat Petelgeuse and sacrifice nobody in the Sanctuary Arc and allowing the tea party Echidna to revive herself given she spoke in Ryuzu Shima’s body in Episode 48. Thus, perhaps the source of the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom’s knowledge is Echidna herself with her Authority, and she just makes whatever she wants to appear in the text due to a connection to her mind with her Authority’s guidance. I’ll delve more into why this may be important after the next item on the agenda, which is the Witch Cult Gospels, the apparently defective copies of the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom..

I’ve always found the Witch Cult Gospels to be suspicious given how apparently no one can read them aside from the holder of an individual Gospel, which, on the surface, could be a good way of preventing any faction opposing the Witch Cult from learning about how the cult works, but based on what I observed of Season 3, I believe Gospels aren’t even intended to bring their holders to their desired future, much as is the case I proposed with the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom. I challenge you to think about a very important detail from Season 3 in that Regulus Corneas said in Episode 3 that Subaru should thank him for adhering to his Gospel when he only did heavy damage to Subaru’s leg and nothing else. If the Gospels are meant to bring their holders to their desired future, which in this case was Regulus making Emilia his wife, there shouldn’t be an order to limit casualties as that does nothing but play into Subaru’s hands. Since Subaru and the crowd was under the effect of Sirius’s Authority, everyone connected to Sirius took the same damage to their legs that Subaru received, forcing Beatrice to expend all her mana to heal everybody so that they wouldn’t be in critical condition, resulting in Beatrice ending up in a state of suspended animation similar to Rem. This suggests that Regulus Gospel’s main purpose in that scene was to put Beatrice in suspended animation so that Aldebaran would give her a healing crystal later, waking her up just in time to have Beatrice join the fight against Lye Batenkaitos close to the end of the arc. Of course I need not remind you of Capella’s retreat as ordained by her Gospel when she probably would’ve been able to kill one of Felix or whoever this Anastasia is before Reinhard arrived since Aldebaran is hardly some amazing fighter that can handle all the Demi-Beasts and Capella at the same time. Thus, Witch Cult Gospels likely aren’t future-telling texts either or defective for the matter but also texts connected to Echidna’s mind since the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom was their prototype, meaning they likely were made at least partially by the same materials, which may have been pieces of Echidna’s hair, fingernails or body fluids, which would be how the connection to Echidna’s mind I have proposed would be established.

I have long believed that multiple characters from 400 years ago, including Satella, Echidna, and Flugel, are pushing Subaru to end the cycle of the world being constantly destroyed and reconstructed, which was alluded to by Melakuera, who said that he faced world-ending crises countless times since the only way Melakuera’s words can actually be right is if in the world is constantly getting destroyed, and now I posit that the Divine Dragon is also one of the characters in on this plot. I have always found it suspicious that Subaru arrived in the world after Lugunica’s Royal Family had perished, setting up the perfect conditions for him to meet Emilia and for Reinhard discover that Felt was the final Royal Selection candidate, and the Divine Dragon and the other characters from 400 years ago may have planned out this scenario centuries ago. How this theory could be tested is if the Divine Dragon shows any hint of having future knowledge in the future, which would make such collusion between different characters possible and have a wide-reaching impact through Roswaal’s not-quite-Tome of Wisdom and the Witch Cult Gospels for the last 400 years.

A Re:Zero Theory: Echidna is possibly lurking near the Emilia camp, and if not the Emilia camp, Roswaal himself due to a line in Emilia’s 3rd Sanctuary trial

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Emilia said in Episode 48, “Who is this? This should be Echidna’s grave…” ’cause she didn’t recognize the corpse, which was that of an older woman compared to the Echidna seen in the Sanctuary trials. Roswaal and Beatrice, however, recognized the corpse as their teacher/mother, showing that the Echidna in the Sanctuary trials and tea parties was not the same as the one Roswaal and Beatrice knew, showing that Echidna had previously cut off a piece of her soul when she was younger, which would explain the presence of the younger Echidna in the tea parties. Episode 50 confirmed this with a small animation of the older Echidna Roswaal and Beatrice knew whose face was closer to that of the corpse.

We know from Season 2 the Echidna from the tea parties had been able to place her soul into Ryuzu Shima, which is how Echidna spoke in her own voice after Emilia’s remark about saving the original Ryuzu Meyer got Echidna annoyed, which caused her to break her act momentarily, allowing for viewers to hear Echidna’s voice through Ryuzu Shima’s body, showing that Echidna’s immortality project had succeeded and that she created at least one soul clone, so it’s not out of the question that the Echidna Roswaal understood to be his teacher may also have been revived at one point. The Echidna Roswaal knew to be his teacher also may not have even been the original Echidna, but she is the one he long sought.

In Episode 48 of Re:Zero, one of the lines from the possible futures Emilia could face had Roswaal say, “I made the realization that I have not walked alone all this time. That is all.” For Roswaal, whose single goal that has kept him alive these past four hundred years is to bring back his teacher, it suggests that there’s an Echidna, not just any Echidna, but his original teacher, who is lurking near the Emilia camp, and if not the Emilia camp, then Roswaal himself, given he would never speak like that in reference to anyone else. What he spoke of suggests a physical closeness to Echidna that made him come upon a happy realization, and I wonder who in the cast could be her vessel or whether it’s someone not yet revealed.

A Re:Zero Theory: Priscilla knew what happened to Anastasia, which is what provoked Priscilla’s comment to the current Anastasia in Episode 59

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To deflect the topic about Priscilla’s trust or lack thereof in Al, Priscilla talked about the unseemly guilt Anastasia placed on her knight, and in the anime there’s no clear indicator of what Priscilla could be referring to at the time due to an information gap.

But later in Episode 60, we see Anastasia use magic, which both Al and Felix both assert that to their knowledge she shouldn’t be able to in Episode 65, so this suggests something happened to Anastasia during the first battle against the Witch Cult.

This would explain why Priscilla mused on the unseemly guilt Julius felt, and it’s because Julius while out to battle failed to protect Anastasia, which is what led to this shapeshifter or imposter, whichever it is, taking the real Anastasia’s place.

Whereas we saw Felt bring a metia that Beatrice activated, there was no sign of Anastasia using a metia. When there was an actual metia, we saw the magic emanating from it, not Felt or Beatrice, and given the magic came from Anastasia rather than an object, there was no metia, so it’s an imposter or shapeshifter.

And given the group didn’t incur serious setbacks against Sirius aside from Kiritaka’s capture, perhaps Anastasia had a mishap somewhere outside their base since everyone was buying time for her escape. In a big city, there are many potential hazards, so it’s not just the Witch Cult you should worry about.

As for Julius showing no discomfort upon returning, Julius has a reputation for being the most knightly of knights, the opposite of Subaru in Arc 3 the self-proclaimed knight, so I believe he could remain stoic if Anastasia had really been hurt due to him being away from her when others couldn’t.

A Re:Zero theory: Before Arc 12, the final boss will in a moment of hubris give Subaru the chance to bring back one person who was lost during his journey

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I believe that before the final arc the big bad will give Subaru a chance to bring back one person who was lost on his journey since I believe the big bad’s Authority allows him/her to affect the story path. This would be why Melakuera in The Frozen Bond OVA said that he faced world-ending crises countless times, and it’s ’cause the world is stuck in a cycle of being destroyed and reconstructed due to the actions of an ancient selfish hero, and the big bad used his/her Authority to make the world highly biased to repeat the general story path the Hero of the world at the time went through when the Seal was likely opened with the Heroine of the story becoming the Witch of Envy in order to stop what comes out of the Seal only for the Hero to not put her down after she becomes a world-ending threat when the threat from the Seal is gone.

I believe that due to the locked-in story path, the big bad cannot meet Subaru much until they are destined to meet late in the story, and due to the big bad having won hundreds of thousands of times or even millions of times, when he/she sees how physically weak Subaru is compared to past heroes, in an act of hubris he/she will give Subaru the choice to bring back a person, who turns the tables on the big bad and shows that perhaps the fucked up story path might be heading in a different direction ’cause of Subaru overcoming his character flaws unlike past Heroes of the story. The big bad would be able to do this due to his/her Authority allowing the guaranteed return of any one person since that Authority is largely responsible for this warped cycle to be present in the first place. The villain would do this since he/she sees no way for Subaru to win since he/she expects for Subaru to be like all the other failed heroes who never overcame their character flaws.

Whether that person outright died due to mortal injuries, had his/her soul destroyed, was sealed, never to return, or taken out of the story through some other means, I believe the big bad will give Subaru a chance, and whether it be through instinct, intellect, or a combination of both, Subaru will choose the right person for the job.