[Game] Umineko - Spoilers, Theories, Interpretations

[Kealym]

Spoiler for space:

Originally Posted by UsagiTenpura

Well Renall I don't think that's bad but it's also a speculation on it's own. Not that this is a bad thing at all.

Rokkenjima Prime is a speculation on it's own.
Personally I think ever since arc 1 they've been giving us too many hints that Rokkenjima is fictional. It's not on any maps. No maps of it existed. Krauss couldn't find Kuwadorian by touring the island on helicopter or something. Kuwadorian is anyway very hard to swallow the existence of. More then all of that tho, I always found it very disturbing that while half the characters either lives or spends most of their lives on Rokkenjima, some (like Jessica) since birth, Beatrice in her first letters always says "People of the Ushiromiya Family, welcome to Rokkenjima". Then you ever have Battler going in depth in episode 1 about what the Ushiromiya family would be if Kinzo didn't find 10 tons of gold, that lastest part added with what arc 8 tells us about Kinzo... seems to again hint a Prime without a Rokkenjima (or possibly any murders).

Personally this is what I think. A lot of things exists only within the story, the Shkanon thing, Rokkenjima, 10 tons of gold, etc... Most things that "might make some level of sense, but honestly, you'd only ever see that in a story" - all these elements I believe only exists within the Yasu stories. Rokkenjima is the "setting for a mystery murder story" that Yasu was writing and nothing else.

And Ange's world should be obvious by now with even herself calling herself a piece, that it is yet another fiction. It's the fiction in which all of this is real.

I ... um ... what?

[Wanderer]

So, are you're saying that there is a real world in Umineko in which there's message-bottle stories and forgery stories, but none of these stories are of actual places or people? And that Ange is just part of that fiction?

In other words, that there is an Umineko world "prime", but in it no island exists called Rokkenjima?

[UsagiTenpura]

I don't think the message bottles are part of "prime" but also part of the fictions.
The only prime that's necessary ultimately is a level of reality from which the fictions are written that is in between the "lower fictions" and "us/ryuukishi's level".

I'm going to give a sorta inacurate example but it might clear up the idea.
"Yasu" loves Battles. She writes a fiction in which the reader is seeking for "Beatrice" as a culprit, but finding who Beatrice is finding "her", and thus a "very shy love declaration", sorta like what Battler and Virgilia talked about in arc 5.

Ange's world I see as basically ... in "And then there were none", just remove the message bottle that solved the whole thing at the end and instead write a story about one of the relatives of the characters left behind by their death and trying to find out, even a decade + after, what happened on that island.

I don't believe that was intended by Yasu/Beatrice orriginally, which is why she'd consider Ange her sin in episode 8 and felt bad about it.

It exists, I believe, only to parallel our own lingering as readers to figuring out the truth.


Also I don't think Rokkenjima itself could be eaten the way it is in arc 8 if it wasn't fictional.

I think Ange realized in arc 4 when she found the SakuTarou plushie that it was a fiction because "this is magic isn't it?" refers to the idea that this sort of scenes only ever occurs in a story.

[Renall]

Are you saying that Umineko is a work of fiction? Because we know that.

Are you saying that, on the R-Prime layer, everything is fictional, including the layer believed to be "R-Prime or something like it," and that no incident ever occurred? Because that's certainly possible ("lol Battler and Yasu are just kids in high school and this is the story they wrote"), there's just no evidence of even a superficial kind.

EDIT: Well okay there's superficial evidence. But this layer isn't even hinted at. It's like trying to imagine Ange's world right after ep2. You can kinda guess, and there's some idea of what it should look like, but nothing solid.

[UsagiTenpura]

Originally Posted by Renall

Are you saying that Umineko is a work of fiction? Because we know that.

Then what's the point of trying to dodge all the implication of an author theory by pushing your suspension of disbelief a level above? And another level above, and so on.

Are you saying that, on the R-Prime layer, everything is fictional, including the layer believed to be "R-Prime or something like it," and that no incident ever occurred? Because that's certainly possible ("lol Battler and Yasu are just kids in high school and this is the story they wrote"), there's just no evidence of even a superficial kind.

EDIT: Well okay there's superficial evidence. But this layer isn't even hinted at. It's like trying to imagine Ange's world right after ep2. You can kinda guess, and there's some idea of what it should look like, but nothing solid.

That's still what I believe we were supposed to do. Basically if you want something akin to deconstructing Beatrice/Yasu's stories to learn more about the author's feelings and her relation to her intended reader. You cannot claim this is impossible to do. Sure deconstruction of a work might not be a well exact science but we've been repeated over and over ever since arc 1 that objectivity will not exist on Rokkenjima.

I remember you calling (as mostly a joke I think) Umineko a thinly veiled love letter to BT, so surely you can understand what I mean.

Edit : I love your kids example since arc 7 ura made an allusion to Bern/LD being school bullies of Ange.

Edit Again : Concerning arc 5, Chrono has a theory where it's basically a fanfiction work of "Erika" *(who'd be a popular witch hunter) that is being retaken by Hachijou to prove it's wrong. Thought it might be interesting to share in the author continuity thing.

Edit Again... again : Can't believe I didn't mention this but, for my overall theory, just think about what Dante did with Beatrice when writing the divine comedy and how much it's been referenced in the story and you certainly cannot say my idea is "out of nowhere" or based on nothing anymore. Keep in mind in the comedy Purtagory is an island too.

[haguruma]

Originally Posted by Wanderer

I see. Well, I like what you're reporting.
[...]
I also like the idea that Eva, or maybe someone else (Ange?), wrote Banquet. I always thought it was strange that Eva lived in Banquet but not in Alliance.
[...]
And on the other hand it makes plenty of sense to me that Tooya wrote Alliance, Dawn, and Twilight.

Yeah, I'm really standing by my theory that Banquet was probably written by Eva to shoulder the truth or maybe it's the theory within Ange's head that formed after she learned some crucial facts. Banquet is truly different from the other stories and you really can question why in this story somebody survived while in Alliance it was still "nobody survives".

End is kind of a difficult case, it depends on what you see in Lambda.
Bern, for me, is first Battler's wish for a logical conclusion and the approach "without the heart", which later changes into the approach of the general public and the avalanche of heartless interpretations he set loose.
Lambda starts out as the subconcious wish for a magical non-conclusion. Remember she gave Beato all her powers in the meta-narrative...and she even threatened to take it away if Beato didn't fight an all out battle. Though I still wonder if she ever shifted into the public wishing for an interpretation with heart.

That'd make End as much as Requiem not into an actual story, but into a collection of theories floating around. But yes, in End it's also kind of hinted that it is no longer the usual ballance of power. Beato is incapacitated and Battler is rather floating around and trying to make sense of what the witches throw at him.
So you could say that End was a theory created by somebody who believed in the magical solution. Thus, there was the setting of Natsuhi shouldering the familys heritage and Beatrice as a magical guidance cosultant helping her out. And this theory was attacked by the ones seeking for a rational explanation and rules of classical mystery fiction...which would be Erika and the Eisernen Jungfrauen coming to Rokkenjima.
Dawn then would be a reaction of Tôya (after he figured it out) towards all those ideas and him entering his own perfected theory (Shkannon) into the mix. The rationalists didn't know what to do with it and effectively lost the discussion.

So we would have a structure like this:

Legend: Written by Yasu - Read by Tôya > Reaction of Tôya at the end forms the meta-world
|
Turn: Written by Yasu - Read by Tôya > Tôya imagining the dispute between magical and rational explanation while he reads
|
Banquet: Written by Eva(?) - Read by Tôya > Tôya reacting towards Eva's attempt to shoulder the blame, which would probably fit with some of the memories he had...only running into a logical flaw (Nanjô murder) at the end of the fiction
|
Alliance: Written by Tôya - Read by Tôya > Tôya thinking about his own theory and coming up with a new approach (Kinzô culprit). He remembers more and more while making this up...especially remembering about his sister Ange who is waiting for him (basically the reason for him not to push the Battler memory completely away)
|
End: Written by Magical Quarter - Read by Rational Quarter - Observed by Tôya > A fight between the magical fans and the rational fans. Tôya is pretty much keeping himself out of it until it becomes to personal and he fights until he reaches his breaking point...where he recovers all crucial parts of Battler's memory
|
Dawn: Written by Tôya - Read by Rational Quarter - Observed by Ange > Tôya who has remembered everything writes something like a "challenge to the reader" (読者への挑戦 stories are pretty popular in the Japanese mystery department). The rationalists try to disprove it and Ange reads the story (probably asks some people who make theories) and has her own thoughts about it.
|
Requiem: "Written" by Heartless Rationalist - "Read" by Loving Rationalists - Observed by Ange > A reaction of the rationalists to their defeat after Hachijôs Dawn novel. They gather every evidence they could find so far and throw them together in a big bowl (the chapel) and try to sort out their approaches. Because it is that unordered and even on the meta-plane just Bernkastel explaining her set-up to Featherine, it's maybe just some board on the internet full of theories.
In the end Ange stumbles upon one certain theory (Rudolph-Kyrie-culprit) and despairs, because it's so much in line with all the other theories.
|
Twilight: Written by Tôya - Read by Ange - Observed by the Public > Generally a last attempt by Tôya to close the lid that he opened by releasing his books and making the Rokkenjima incident popular fiction. Both on the meta-plane as on the real plane we can see it as dedicated to Ange and all other people who still suffer. Though in the end his novel is attacked by all the theories, expectations and ideas that already formed because of the stories and his way of closing the story is almost destroyed.
So in the end it's up to individuals like Ange to decide where they want to stand.

Something like this...

Originally Posted by UsagiTenpura

I don't think the message bottles are part of "prime" but also part of the fictions.
The only prime that's necessary ultimately is a level of reality from which the fictions are written that is in between the "lower fictions" and "us/ryuukishi's level".

I'd say it's possible, but it's not necessary and not actually hinted at within the stories. This'd make the end of Twilight into yet another big bowl of fiction...and the epilogue about Kotobuki Yukari would be basically just an additional frill at the huge lace-dress of the fantasy portion of the story.
But then again Ryûkishi could have just stopped after Requiem and made an ending in which we see child Battler and child Yasu having their little logic battles at some beach.

Maybe you are trying to hard to fuse together "our world" and "the world of Tôya's logic battle". Your level is not wrong...but I think it would just insert a layer between the readers world (our reality) and the reality of after 1986 in Umineko (Ange's and Tôya's world). It doesn't really solve anything, it just makes the ramifications less cruel...because you can say that beyond the Tôya and Yukari who lost everything, there is a Tôya who's just having fun with Yasu.

[UsagiTenpura]

Spoiler for Size:

Originally Posted by haguruma

'd say it's possible, but it's not necessary and not actually hinted at within the stories.

As far as I'm concerned it's screaming at us. Perhaps you should reread earlier arcs?

This'd make the end of Twilight into yet another big bowl of fiction...and the epilogue about Kotobuki Yukari would be basically just an additional frill at the huge lace-dress of the fantasy portion of the story.

What makes you to treat that scene as any more real then any other such scenes in the entire serie beside that it came out later?

But then again Ryûkishi could have just stopped after Requiem and made an ending in which we see child Battler and child Yasu having their little logic battles at some beach.

I don't think you get what I mean at all if you're suggesting that.

Maybe you are trying to hard to fuse together "our world" and "the world of Tôya's logic battle". Your level is not wrong...but I think it would just insert a layer between the readers world (our reality) and the reality of after 1986 in Umineko (Ange's and Tôya's world). It doesn't really solve anything, it just makes the ramifications less cruel...because you can say that beyond the Tôya and Yukari who lost everything, there is a Tôya who's just having fun with Yasu.

I think you get it even less by reading this later part.

We are told in Umineko that it is (within the fiction) a fiction. When you read any given fiction, how much does the author hints at their real world? When you read the Divine Comedy, how much of it is actually based on the real Dante and Beatrice? What can you learn about them?

While the majority of fans turns in circles over "truths" that cannot be proven and might not even exists to begin with, I suggest approaching the story as one where we are supposed to unlock the heart of the author through their work rather then finding an objective truth that we'll never get a clear glimpse of. It certainly does not complicate things.

From my point of view simply said "what came before arc 1 and led to it being written" is more pertinent then whatever Rokkenjima prime murders, and that arc 4 is a sequel written atop of the previous stand alone arcs, and as such is a level built "over" the previous ones.

Obviously it could be that there's no level between Ryuukishi/us and the "lower fictions", but it at least feels to me like we are supposed to unlock the heart of a fictional writer (and not Ryuukishi's), or possibly many in later arcs, so we need such a level.

[haguruma]

Originally Posted by UsagiTenpura

As far as I'm concerned it's screaming at us. Perhaps you should reread earlier arcs?
What makes you to treat that scene as any more real then any other such scenes in the entire serie beside that it came out later?
I don't think you get what I mean at all if you're suggesting that.

I get what you are aiming at, the question I'd like to ask is: what is the gain?
What do we get from considering an additional author-reader relationship X in the context of this fiction. Does it further the message we were told throughout Umineko, that was even mentioned by Ryûkishi himself again and again.

You liken it to the Divina Commedia, but I'd like to question if we have to consider Dante's personal connection to a possible real Beatrice in order to understand the message and implications within the story. It's an additional layer that is probably there...but its presence or absence does not really change the story or what it implies.

You can insert such a scene, but it does nothing except fictionalize the fictional reality of Anges present world one step further. It inserts another fictional author who might be Tôya, Yasu...but could just as well be Kinzô who is a bored gardener in Italy, who wishes his grandmother would have escaped to Japan after the war.
The author layer you imply, which hints at the world before Legend of the Golden Witch is Yasus relationship with Battler in the fictional universe that contains Ange...I just don't see any need to fictionalize that even furtehr.

Any conjecture about wether Yasus or Tôyas emotions hint towards any emotions held by Ryûkishi is really nothing more than conjecture unless he himself bares his feelings in a way that we can assume so far.
If for example he would release a letter that would imply that he had romantic feelings for BT...of course it could be interpreted as a connection to Umineko, but so far that is not the case.

[UsagiTenpura]

Originally Posted by haguruma

I get what you are aiming at, the question I'd like to ask is: what is the gain?

What is the gain in playing Umineko to begin with? or of any of your theories? or of Ryuukishi in writing it? I dont get what you mean by that, I just get you dont find what I propose necessary, but I feel quite the same about most of what you theorize about.

It is nothing but overcomplicating things, often with informations that didnt even appear before late in the story that inherently would make Umineko anything but fair play to consider as a crucial part of the story, including the very name Yasu.

So the simple gain, is being able to solve the serie as early as arc 1 rather then not being able to solve much after arc 8.

[Renall]

I don't really want to find Ryukishi's heart because what I've seen of it so far suggests he's kind of an arrogant hypocritical asshole. At least Beatrice is pitiable.

[haguruma]

Originally Posted by UsagiTenpura

It is nothing but overcomplicating things, often with informations that didnt even appear before late in the story that inherently would make Umineko anything but fair play to consider as a crucial part of the story, including the very name Yasu.

So the simple gain, is being able to solve the serie as early as arc 1 rather then not being able to solve much after arc 8.

Though your claim is that it is easier to construct a fictional author theory after EP1 than construct a reasonable theory after the gathering of the clues is over...which I (and I think others) just don't agree with. It's not that your theory has to be wrong...but I still don't see any profit for the actual whole of Umineko as a story.

Basically if you go back, mostly all information necessary to construct a reasonable theory is present after EP4. You have no verification of what is wrong and what is not...but that is basically what it is about. Truth becomes more and more subjective the more it is shared, that is basically what we can get from Umineko. The fact that there is nothing like an absolute truth...
But the basic structure that is also verified in Chiru can be constructed with most of what we get in EP1-4.
Even "The culprit is Yasu" can be infered from EP3 on, because after Battler already points out that 0715 is maybe hinting towards July 15th, and thus his birthday, you can get to 1129 being November 29th, the releae date of ポートピア連続殺人事件...which is basically synonymous with 「犯人はヤス」. And because you can say that Kanon is probably the culprit, both Beatrice and Shannon had a promise with Battler and Shannon and Kanon are possibly the same person...you can easily arrive at the basic structure of the story.

"Fair play" is terribly easy to stretch as a term, I think.
Some people seem to think that he basically has to verify our ideas while we are making our theories...but where is the challenge in that? If he had told us from the beginning that he would take us by the hand and guide us to the goal once a certain date had passed and then would have delivered such a result...yes, that would have been unfair, because we would have participated under false conditions.
The story at least appears to be fair in so far, that many people arrived at the theories that were later approved within the story...so it can't be unfair only because some people didn't.

Fair play does not imply that everybody will reach the goal, just that everybody is given a chance to reach it...though of course everybody enters the game under different conditions based on knowledge, abilities, time, etc.
A person who is a nerd for Japanese mystery fiction, who immediatly connects 1129 to 犯人はヤス is in a better position than somebody who never read any mysteries in his life...but that does not make the story unfair.

As I said, I'm not dismissing your theory as inherently wrong, I just think it's fueld by the wrong ideas about the story as it is.

[Oblivion]

I got another question. At the moment probably no one knows what really happed on Rokkenjima except Ryukishi(and Battler lol). But does that answer actually exist?

[Wanderer]

Originally Posted by haguruma

Legend: Written by Yasu - Read by Tôya > Reaction of Tôya at the end forms the meta-world
|
Turn: Written by Yasu - Read by Tôya > Tôya imagining the dispute between magical and rational explanation while he reads

-snip-

Something like this...

Wow. I agree on every major point. Not sure on some minor ones, but I haven't sorted them out in my own mind well enough to comment on them at the moment.


@UsagiTenpura-

A question for the sake of understanding your theory better: What role does the meta-world play?

Originally Posted by Oblivion0101

I got another question. At the moment probably no one knows what really happed on Rokkenjima except Ryukishi(and Battler lol). But does that answer actually exist?

That's a topic of debate here.

[Leafsnail]

Originally Posted by Renall

I don't really want to find Ryukishi's heart because what I've seen of it so far suggests he's kind of an arrogant hypocritical asshole. At least Beatrice is pitiable.

The weird thing is you don't get this impression at all from Higurashi in which he's pretty self-deprecating (especially in the staff rooms and when he starts getting bored and breaking the fourth wall towards the end). I thought maintaining an ultra-arrogant narrator voice throughout Umineko was meant to be just part of the experience.

[Renall]

Originally Posted by Oblivion0101

I got another question. At the moment probably no one knows what really happed on Rokkenjima except Ryukishi(and Battler lol). But does that answer actually exist?

Assuming there actually was such an incident in R-Prime, then obviously yes, an answer exists. Facts don't change because they were unobserved.

It is possible, however, that no one knows those facts. The idea that this makes the facts subjective is absurd, it merely means that an attempt to reconstruct those facts the way most characters in Umineko do is merely constructing a fiction.

If a tree falls in a forest, it makes a sound, but no one heard that sound. It's possible to invent what you think the sound was. It's even possible that the sound you come up with is 99.9% accurate to the actual sound that was made. It just isn't possible to verify it.

Unless, you know... science.

Originally Posted by Leafsnail

The weird thing is you don't get this impression at all from Higurashi in which he's pretty self-deprecating (especially in the staff rooms and when he starts getting bored and breaking the fourth wall towards the end). I thought maintaining an ultra-arrogant narrator voice throughout Umineko was meant to be just part of the experience.

I would imagine that's possibly because he wasn't "The Higurashi Guy" at the time he was writing Higurashi. I'm not saying I know it's gotten to his head, but I think it might've gotten to mine if I were, well, The Higurashi Guy.

[AuraTwilight]

Originally Posted by Leafsnail

The weird thing is you don't get this impression at all from Higurashi in which he's pretty self-deprecating (especially in the staff rooms and when he starts getting bored and breaking the fourth wall towards the end). I thought maintaining an ultra-arrogant narrator voice throughout Umineko was meant to be just part of the experience.

Or Higurashi made him super fucking famous and after basking in that glow he became a stuckup ass. If the arrogant thing was supposed to be part of the experience then that just confirms my view that Death of the Author needs to be applied to Umineko because he's just detracting from his own novel.

[LyricalAura]

Originally Posted by Leafsnail

The weird thing is you don't get this impression at all from Higurashi in which he's pretty self-deprecating (especially in the staff rooms and when he starts getting bored and breaking the fourth wall towards the end). I thought maintaining an ultra-arrogant narrator voice throughout Umineko was meant to be just part of the experience.

He outright says this is the case in Keiya's interview, and that he wants to return to his usual voice in Higanbana. I don't see how anyone could read his interviews and think of him as an arrogant person.

[AuraTwilight]

Talking down to your readers tends to make people think of you as arrogant, yes.

"Those who don't understand Umineko have probably never been in love" comes to mind.

[cronnoponno]

Whenever I see or read a mystery, I don't like to try to solve it before the detective, while I do like to think critically about it, that's it. What I like in mystery is how everything always ties together at the end, usually when I see anime or read Fantasy or something, sometimes you just think ''Wow what an asspull'', which is why I personally do not like reader talk-downs, do I really have to solve the mystery before the detective in order to enjoy it?

It felt like Will was seriously looking down on me when I first read EP 7, or at least scolding me for ''not doin it write''.

[Renall]

Yeah, I mean you're creating one of two scenarios here:

• You actually believe this stuff you're saying in interviews, in which case you're a big-headed jerk who is full of himself.
• You're merely pretending to be a big-headed jerk who is full of himself as part of the "experience," in which case you're a pretentious tool.

Note that I'm basing my impressions on outside sources like interviews more than I am his attitude derived from his actual works. I accept that a narrator may sound condescending or something without the author intending them to. There needs to be a firm line between "this is me the author speaking in the voice of the 'character' of my narrator" and "this is just me, the author, chatting with you." If you do all your interviews in character, it stops becoming a character.

Unless it's obvious you're acting in-character, like when Daniel Handler poses as Lemony Snicket. If he's acting like Snicket, you know he's in-character. If he's just hanging out and you interview him as Daniel Handler, he'd be a dick to keep acting like Snicket.