[Game] Umineko - Spoilers, Theories, Interpretations

[rogerpepitone]

Originally Posted by DgBarca

Now...According to the information in EP1 only, the only one who knows that Battler is not Asumu's son is Rudolf. Therefore, with the Sh(k)annontrice theory, Rudolf must have told Shannon that Battler is not Asumu's son.
But...just tell me if there is a clue of Rudolf telling a servant that...

But ho god the Asumu!Beatrice theory is so wierd...Shannon makes more sense but how would she know that ?

Rudolf was behind the baby substitution, because he wanted to marry Asumu instead of Kyrie. Krauss has been shown to be quite skilled at digging up dirt on his siblings. Perhaps Krauss had learned or guessed at the substitution, and was suggesting he knew of it and might reveal it. That could get Rudolf thinking "Does he really know? Does he have evidence? Should I bite the bullet and just tell Kyrie? ..." and hopefully distract him from Kinzo.

[Will Wright]

Originally Posted by Jan-Poo

That was a pretty interesting line of thought. And anti-mystery breakdown... maybe this really means that umineko will be revealed to be not a mystery novel.

Battler:"THIS IS MYSTERY."
Beatrice:"THIS IS FANTASY."
[Alien drops by and kills everyone]
"THIS.IS. SCI-FIIIIIIIIIII"

[Leafsnail]

Breakdown theory is interesting. I can definitely see ep5 as "The mystery went too far... and broke down", as it were, backfiring on itself.

Quite how a conclusive answer can be reached with "Anti-mystery breakdown" is anyone's guess. Could it still be solvable while violating the rules of mystery? Or would it be "anti mystery" in that there's nothing to solve? Hmm.

[Judoh]

Originally Posted by Leafsnail

Breakdown theory is interesting. I can definitely see ep5 as "The mystery went too far... and broke down", as it were, backfiring on itself.

Quite how a conclusive answer can be reached with "Anti-mystery breakdown" is anyone's guess. Could it still be solvable while violating the rules of mystery? Or would it be "anti mystery" in that there's nothing to solve? Hmm.

Other than the one line in in Kanon's tip saying "this is truly anti-mystery". I don't see a lot saying episode 4 in it's entirety was anti mystery.

Was episode 4 impossible to solve? No it wasn't. It's just impossible to know which solution is right. There is a huge difference there.

As for what the breakdown of episode 4 could be I would think that it's when you attempt to hide the truth, but then when it breaks down and you fail the truth reveals itself.

To some extent this is what happened with Kinzo in episode 4. Which was the first episode to portray anyone other than Beatrice as the killer. Except the difference with episode 8 will probably be that it will fail at hiding whatever it is they're hiding on a game board level instead of a meta world level. That's what I think anyway.

[Renall]

Alright. This is going to sound crazy. It's the hybrid theory to end all hybrid theories. I won't claim it's true or the answer, but it certainly got me thinking.

PREMISES

1) Some form of Author Theory is true. That is, there was a "Rokkenjima-Prime" and the stories thus far have been fiction written about, but not detailing the events of what happened there. Eva survived in the Prime world, though the 1998 we see Ange of ep4+ in may not be that world. That world may be similar, however.

2) Some form of Shkanon is true within each Rokkenjima story. Yes, I know, I am an avid opponent of Shkanon. Shkanon is both true and false. I'll explain. I said "Rokkenjima story" for a reason.

3) Reds are true statements about something. Red can just as easily speak a universal or Prime-universe truth as a fictional-universe truth. There is no obvious way to distinguish between the two.

THESIS

On Rokkenjima-Prime, there were 16 people.

• Ushiromiya Krauss and his family: Natsuhi and Jessica.
• Ushiromiya Rudolf and his family: Kyrie and Battler.
• Ushiromiya Eva and her family: Hideyoshi and George.
• Ushiromiya Rosa and her daughter Maria.
• Ronoue Genji.
• Kumasawa Chiyo.
• Gohda Toshiro.
• Dr. Nanjo Terumasa.
• A single servant.

This servant was not "Kanon" or "Shannon."

Hold On, WHAT?

There are no such people as Shannon and Kanon and never have been (or they existed as people known to the single servant and adapted). They are fictional characters.

So They Don't Exist?

No, they do exist. Shannon and Kanon exist in every Rokkenjima fiction. Red text within each game board can, unequivocally, speak of the two of them. They simply never existed as actual embodied human beings on Rokkenjima-Prime.

Where Did They Come From?

They were invented as fictional entities by the servant to conceal her own existence in the fictions she (and possibly later others) wrote.

Why?

To create the perfect mystery, which would not have been possible with the single servant alone, in an orthodox Golden Age fashion. The single servant also probably intended it as a way to scapegoat herself/Beatrice even if someone denied Beatrice as the culprit (since Shannon/Kanon are the "human Beatrice," you wind up blaming them either way).

Also, to act as a message which can only be interpreted by those who realize who she truly is, such as (especially) those who were present on that day. Those unaware cannot distinguish that something is wrong; they simply assume two servants were there.

So Who Is The Servant?

Yasu/Lion. The true servant has the following properties:

• She is androgynous.
• She is most likely blonde like Lion.
• She may or may not be a secret Ushiromiya (it doesn't really matter).
• She is highly intelligent, something of a prankster, and has an aggressive personality.
• She is highly literate, and especially versed in mysteries.
• She probably doesn't have a bust, but I don't care to speculate on that.

This person was present on Rokkenjima-Prime. She does not appear in any game board stories (before, perhaps, ep7). However, as the author (Beatrice) and embodied in the inconsistencies of Shannon and Kanon, she exists even so.

Why Can't It Just Be Shannon?

Shannon's personality does not fit. Neither does Kanon's. Have you ever noticed they seem a bit flat and, not to belittle Shannon fans or anything... not very bright? To believe either one is Beatrice is to suggest they have a very different attitude than they portray. To those not looking at them as a fictional mask for one real person with "Beatrice's" personality, one concludes someone is some sort of schizophrenic. This is not the case. Shannon is Shannon, Kanon is Kanon. Their personalities are consistent. When "Beatrice" appears, we are seeing glimpses of the ficton cracking.

The true Beatrice must be very intelligent, highly literate, aggressive, playful, and attached to Battler. Shannon and Kanon are none of these things. Therefore, they are not Beatrice. They are merely her literary vessels.

What Makes You So Sure They're Strictly Fictional?

1) They are "furniture." Furniture has been established to some extent to be a fictional characterization. Sakutaro is furniture, because he's imaginary, same with the personifications of the Stakes and Siestas. Genji is "furniture" because the poised face he puts on is not his true self; he's noted to watch TV and if he's anything like Ronove is, he's really not the face he puts on. Virgilia is Kumasawa's furniture-self; since she isn't acting in that persona on the board, she isn't acting as "furniture." An alternate persona can in a way be your furniture or witch self, but it has nothing to do with a personality as such. See The Golden Land below.

2) They feel like half-characters. They're not very vibrant. Their pasts are a complete blank. We barely even get their "real" names. Their romances with George and Jessica are sweet but feel "off." They develop as episodes pass unlike other characters, clearly establishing a growth arc which makes no sense for real people but perfect sense for fictional characters in a serial story.

3) They have some pretty impressive powers. Faking death, running without footsteps, appearing and disappearing at will or at strange speeds, magic abilities.

4) They are ideal choices, as they are hard to trace in the real world. Fukuin might have kept records, but they would be hard to get at and potentially easy to doctor.

5) Several things are quite easy to solve by toying with their flexible existence. This is not kosher for real people but acceptable in a meta-fictional context.

6) Battler never seeing them at the same time could be taken as proof they're the same person, or as proof that in the original story, there was only ever one servant, and every interaction Battler had with them is a variant on real events. Yes, this means Yasu/Lion tended to the roses, made the beds, poured the tea... needless to say, she had a lot to do. Suits a multi-talented prankster supermaid though, doesn't it?

So Then In The Meta-World...

Beatrice represents the true servant Lion/Yasu. Shannon and Kanon are probably represented by Zepar and Furfur or somesuch.

What About the George/Jessica Relationships?

They are true, sincere, mutual, and normal.

They also exist only in fiction.

There was no romance for George and Jessica on Rokkenjima-Prime, and their stories and personalities give us plenty of reason to understand why. Someone writing the stories felt sorry for them and developed the fictional existences of Kanon and Shannon into romantic interests who, thanks to the cat box nature of the story, could never be denied.

They were united in the end, just not in the way George would have preferred.

So the Golden Land...

Yup. That was a funeral to fiction at the end of ep6. Every couple happy. Every furniture became human through love in that Golden Land forever sealed away from human examination. George and Jessica are, sadly, dead.

Notice how all of that is conspicuously absent at the opening of ep7? We have Battler all alone with a book and his guide Virgilia, burying a dedication to Beatrice. They're all gone. Battler remains.

Why is Battler Still There?

Because Battler is still alive. Probably. I think that's what we're driving at, anyway, as of ep7.

Who Knows All This?

Battler, obviously.

Lambdadelta knows because the girl who would become Beatrice was Yasu/Lion. So she's understood the fiction angle all along.

Bernkastel seems to have guessed, in part, by the end of ep6. However, she appears to have gone from the association that Shannon and Kanon are covering for Yasu/Lion to the idea that Yasu/Lion was the culprit. Then backed off that with the Tea Party. I'm not sure how much she thinks, how much is right, and what she messed up. But she got close.

Ange doesn't know. Yet.

How The Games Worked

Each game is a fiction. Each meta-storyline is an engagement of author and reader and may chronicle Battler's self-discovery through the fictions of Rokkenjima to find the "1" which, together with his "1" (his own account), makes "2" (the truth). The "1" is in the stories, but it is not the stories themselves, which is why they need not be accurate representations of Rokkenjima-Prime.

Legend, Turn, Banquet, Alliance

The puzzles here work about as Will outlined in ep7. They obey Golden Age conventions because they were written as such. You don't have to like the answers, but they are what they are. They are not, however, the truth. The construction of the stories permit truth to exist in the reading, but no story was ever intended to be a true account. Each fundamentally misses a critical element (such as both Eva and Battler surviving).

End

The parlor scene is now perfectly reconciled. Kanon and Shannon, as fictional characters, can appear at once as necessary for the story. Lambda drops a bombshell hint, though she tries to twist it. Erika exists, but she is a fictional character, the "furniture" of Meta-Erika.

As the truth begins to be torn down, Battler understands who and what Beatrice was protecting. He finds the other "1" and it becomes "2." We could, at this point, reach the "1" as well, but we lack Battler's "1" so we have had to guess at it to get to 2. If ep8 is his story, we'll finally get that 1.

Dawn

The board narrative may or may not make sense. I hate to say it doesn't matter but it probably doesn't. The Love Trial exists to tie up the fictional loose ends. Battler is showing he understands Beato's game by embracing and respecting the fictional (or, dare we say, "Fantasy") elements. He shows that Beato's spirit can be reborn, and gives the fictional world a proper sendoff. Genius Battler is part of his plan to make this happen. Like Beatrice, who is trapped in her game unable to escape as she is sacrificing herself, Battler is willing to sacrifice himself (through a Logic Error). This makes Beatrice remember, and they resolve the matter through the tricks she has prepared.

The closed room and final reds are a dirty trick. Beatrice and Battler inject red about Rokkenjima-Prime. On the board, Kanon rescues Battler. On Rokkenjima-Prime, there was no Kanon and he does not exist anywhere. On the board, there are 18 humans and Erika is one of them. On Rokkenjima-Prime, there were 16 and even if Erika had been welcomed to the real one, there would be 17. Erika suffers conceptual self-denial, realizing she is a fictional character and cannot be the Witch of Truth if she herself is not a true existence (though there may have BEEN a real Furudo Erika, she's probably dead).

Requiem

The fiction at rest, Battler prepares himself for what he as the survivor must do (whatever that is). Bern constructs what she assumes to be the true story. Yasu's life is a semi-fictionalized account, and her backstory may or may not be truth. Bern correctly guesses that there was a real person, but not necessarily who she was exactly.

Lion's existence is a fantasy. There never was any such world, however plausible it might be on construction. Will understands this and fights for the right of Lion's happy world to exist because he knows the decision to have it end in a tragedy is not fact, but fiction. Fiction can be changed. A fantasy can have a happy ending.

Kyrie may be the culprit (I'm not sure), but if she is her motive is something we need to look more carefully at as Bern got this part at least all wrong because she wasn't sure what Kyrie's motive was. Alternately she was mistaken. Eva survives. Battler disappears and probably survives. Someone else may survive (Yasu-trice, the culprit, etc.), but otherwise we can't be sure. The meta-story can work either way, depends how happy vs. bittersweet ryukishi wants it to end.

Battler promises Ange a story. I don't know how that will end, but I have some idea...

[Jan-Poo]

Renall... what the hell happened?
I think everything you said, and I mean the whole lot, makes sense.

But the problem of Kanon and Shannon is it really alright like this?

I mean both Shannon and Kanon aren't real persons and the only real person is Yasu/Lion, so far it's pretty solid I think. However Shannon as a Yasu's cover identity should exist even in Rokkenjima-prime since she is in battler's memory.

A different matter is Kanon. If we suppose that he actually never existed then we solve a lot of problems. However if he's present in the games, there must be some significance.
So I'm thinking that maybe Kanon appeared as part of Beatrice's game (even on Rokkenjima prima).
The only problem with that is that you need to consider everyone an accomplice with the only exclusion of Battler.

This part is still not that clear...


Oh and... for Dine's sake, I wouldn't call Yasu a servant. Yasu's true nature is Lion Ushiromiya, The new family head. The "servant" status is the illusion.

[Renall]

Again, a story that is fiction wouldn't fool Real Actual Prime-World Battler for a second (unless he has some dumb amnesia or something). We just have to accept that Piece Battler and Meta-Battler are existences for our benefit as readers and not exact representations of Battler's memory.

Shannon probably shows more hints at the real servant-self than Kanon if only because she does more, but Kanon's presence is probably not irrelevant.

[Will Wright]

I love that complete theory. I would like to add one thing to it:

Dine's 9th. There can be only one detective.

If we apply the meta-fiction concept to that, it would mean that Battler=Erika=Will.
Meta Battler would equal the fusion of those three, so to speak.

This would clear up the "This is a tale of 17 people" red, and fit with your theory I think.

[Renall]

Well, it can be a tale of 17 people regardless of how many people were actually there. "Reality" isn't a tale, after all...

[Will Wright]

Sorry, I just throw in the word tale out of habit. I played an Umineko styled game with a few friends yesterday and the word tale got stuck in my head because long story short, the GM played around with the "this applies to the entire game" and "this applies to the entire tale" reds.

The correct red is
# [......Sorry, but...] Even if you do join us-
# There are 17 people.

Although I can't make the "18th human" statement make sense with anything other than single Shkanon(which I hate).

Kinzo's corpse is still on the island, that much is certain. If we count Shkanon as two people, then Erika would be the 19th person, not the 18th.

Unless Erika=Kinzo.
...Okay let's not go there.

[Renall]

Originally Posted by Jan-Poo

Oh and... for Dine's sake, I wouldn't call Yasu a servant. Yasu's true nature is Lion Ushiromiya, The new family head. The "servant" status is the illusion.

I don't think it matters because I am like 99% sure she is scapegoating herself for some reason as the culprit when in fact she is not. Wouldn't matter if she is a servant either way. If nothing else, Dine gives us the hint that this is the case.

I think the mistake made is the following:

• In the stories, Shannon and Kanon are used in the culprit role.
• Yasu/Lion is the true presence and Kanon/Shannon are a mask for her.
• Because Shannon/Kanon are the fictional culprits, Yasu/Lion is the real culprit.
• ?????
• Oh wait no it's Kyrie.

However, it doesn't follow that just because the fictional culprit portrayed represents a particular person that said person actually was the culprit. It could be in his or her interest to let people think she was the culprit, if the revelation of the real culprit is something she wants to protect somebody from.

[TehChron]

Renall, I am honestly impressed.

There are no flaws.

[ijriims]

Renall, I just think that the existence of Kanon was not only present in the novels (or the gameboard), but also in the real life, since there were a tons of other servants, and Jessica's classmates should have witnessed him.

Kanon could be non-existent as a separate person (meaning he was Yasuda Sayo in disguise), but this identity should exist in Rokkenjima-Prime.

This is the only thing I don't agree to. And can you also incorporate Golden Truth in your theory?

[Geekodot]

Renall, I think you solved it there. It fits so well, if it isn't the answer, it might as well have been.

[erneiz_hyde]

Wow...just, wow.

Not only is it almost perfectly flawless, I see no lack of love in there theory.

With a theory like that, I see no room left to argue. It is in itself a perfect theory, the only way to deny it is to present another theory of the same level, which none I have seen so far.

[Renall]

It's hardly perfect, but it is as comfortable as I think I am ever going to get with notions like Shkanon and Yasu. Meaningful, but not in the same way people might figure.

For instance, I can't even begin to guess who the true culprit is or why. I can't really argue that's "not important," can I? I mean yes, it's not important on any given game board, but it's still pretty damn important overall! Especially if the culprit (or some associate, like Okonogi) is still alive.

I'm also not sure if personality death applies on the boards or not (if it doesn't, ep3 FT becomes problematic even as an independent fiction, and per this theory there's no personality for Shannon/Kanon to kill off), who wrote which episodes (Yasu almost certainly wrote 1/2, but who wrote the others?), and who they're covering for (Oliver suggested Battler, meaning she thought Battler was the culprit and thus protects him by making him detective, but I got nothing to back that up).

[Kylon99]

By the way, a quick question. Did anyone discuss the 犯人はヤス ("Hanin ha yasu") meme that existed before Yasu was introduced in EP7?

There's a definition here:
http://dic.nicovideo.jp/a/%E7%8A%AF%...83%A4%E3%82%B9

推理物や犯人を特定しなければいけない動画で、とりあえず「犯人はヤス」とコメントすることが ある。
(Loosely translated here) In videos where you have to point out the culprit but can't yet, in the meantime, people put in comments like 'The culprit is YASU.'

I'm still halfway through the episode... (and it's plodding on a bit... argh) but as soon as I saw 'Yasu' I just started laughing. 8)

[Jan-Poo]

It was explained earlier (by dormeur I think...). It was a game of some sort where this character Yasu would always end up being the culprit.

It is believed that Ryuukishi used that as a joke.


Anyway, why suddenly everyone accepts Renall's version of shkanon? It is still a shkanon theory and it's even more hard on what concerns Jessica's and George's love relationships. I thought most people didn't like shkanon because it would destroy the two shipped couples. Not what Renall proposes is that they never existed in the first place.

[Renall]

Originally Posted by Jan-Poo

Anyway, why suddenly everyone accepts Renall's version of shkanon? It is still a shkanon theory and it's even more hard on what concerns Jessica's and George's love relationships. I thought most people didn't like shkanon because it would destroy the two shipped couples. Not what Renall proposes is that they never existed in the first place.

No, they exist.

In the fiction. That's something Battler initially lacks sufficient respect for. Because something that isn't "real" is fantasy, and fantasy isn't meaningful. But fantasy is in some ways the entire basis for Beatrice's feelings for him.

How is it any less real than it is in the sense that Umineko is fiction? George and Shannon are fictional characters with a fictional relationship. Does it matter what layer of fiction they exist on? If they were real people and died in an explosion, does it matter that they had a romance if it will never be fulfilled? In the fantasy, the fiction, that fulfillment is possible.

Granted... that could be a trap... but if it is a trap, I'd argue it's Yasu who isn't real, and then we get into all sorts of twisty turny trouble.

[Jan-Poo]

And didn't I say the same thing?

Didn't I say a long time before that in the golden land all the three couples could exist?

Wasn't I strong proponent of the author theory since EP5?