[jjblue1]

I apologize for placing so many answer under the spoiler tag but otherwise this message would have been too long (*sighs* why when I'm away everyone becomes so talktive? ;_; )

Spoiler for Replies to Kealym:

Originally Posted by Kealym

I assume Battler solution was correct, since Evatrice couldn't counter it, and the fact that he has to find "a reasonable motive" in a gameboard that seems to be ful of UNreasonable ones is what's most perplexing...

It can be that Battler's solution was corret but we saw sometimes Beato couldn't counter a solution just because it would reveal too much of the solution... and sometimes she used tricks to avoid countering directly or countered slightly changing the words. So the fact that Eva didn't counter isn't an insurance he was right... though it seems likely unless EP 3 is way more complicate than it looks and, for example, Shannon anticipated that someone might check Kyrie's body and purposely hid on her one of Hideyoshi's cigarettes... which while possible seems unlikely.
To do so PieceShannon should either have metaknowledge (know someone would question Kyrie's motive to go get food) or assume that the survivors would check the bodies of the killed ones find the cigarette and grow suspicious toward Eva. While this motive might be interesting... well, it seems hard to assume they would check the pockets of the murdered ones...
There's to say it's weird Kyrie picked up a cigarette she found and kept it with herself. There was no need to show it to Hideyoshi, she could have just said she found it and it would have been no proof for the police (assuming she thought they sould come) as she could have picked it up in any place and at any time. So, the cigarette's presence in Kyrie's pocket seems justified only by the fact it was needed to come up with THAT motive.

Oh well, this is getting too filled with IF so I'll cut it here.

Originally Posted by Kealym

In hindsight, Blore only left the final group ... to go get food from the mansion. Now I wonder if he wanted to investigate something under a false pretense. XD

It might be. After all he was a policeman he might have thought he might find proofs or hints that would accuse Vera or Lombard (or both as the two seems close) or hints about where Armstrong was.

Originally Posted by Kealym

Um ... PrimeYasu, I guess. I more or less mean both (I can't deny that Shannon and Kanon are implied several times to have meta-motives they can't really help), but ... I'unno, you reread EP2, when Shannon breaks down into tears at ROsa's accusations, and I read it with this sort of ire, "You shameless, horrible girl." And in EP4 she seems to just be kind of a bastard in general.

Honestly I always thought PrimeYasu wasn't the culprit on Prime, though she could have inadvertitely set into motion the situation that caused the tragedy or, in case there wasn't really a culprit but an unfortunate incident and her messages in the bottles were left in the sea before it, she caused the tragedy to become an intriguing mistery over which people could gossip about.

So her guilt was either for setting the situation that caused the incident or setting the situation that caused the incident to intrigue the Witch Hunters.

Originally Posted by Kealym

I''ve been thinking about Erika and bit, and how she keeps referring to the residents of Ushiromiya as "ghosts from 1986" that need to acknowledge that they're just dead. And, isn't she also a ghost of 1986, though? As soon as the first person inserted her into a forgery, she became just as "trapped" in those two days as the other 18 humans.

Yes, the interesting part is that Erika also is a ghost. Viewed in this way Erika seems almost to be there to give them some closure and stop them from wandering... though it's a 'cruel' closure as she wants one of them to take responsibility for their deaths no matter if that person was really responsible or not.

Though in a fashion if we think that Erika ended up tied to Rokkenjima it can be that the Rokkenjima incident bugs her as she too won't be allowed to rest until a solution is found.

LOL now this seems a ghost story...

Originally Posted by Kealym

Oh man, and then Erika's proposition to the Golden Land in EP8 felt like "Surrender some kind of solution, and we'll acknowledge your tale as actually well written literature, and worth reading." and Beatrice was essentially "NOOO" and I think EP8 managed a few pretty cool things for all it's silliness.

*nods* you're right, there was also the offering to put the Rokkenjima gameboard in a library for everyone's enjoyment...

Originally Posted by Kealym

Of note, It's Genji who informs that "it's a young man" when he transfers the call, and Natsuhi hears it similarly, though she feels there's room to doubt that going by just the voice.

It's interesting Genji said so because this could have pushed Natsuhi into thinking the caller was a male. She was unsure but Genji thought he was a male and this helped her to believe he was a male as well.

Spoiler for Replies to Asuka0NK:

Originally Posted by Asuka0NK

Well I for one don't really believe in the Yasu = Ikuko Theory because it is just too convenient and it seems Yasu would've had to plan it all out herself.

Many things in Umineko are way too convenient...

Originally Posted by Asuka0NK

So pretty much I think the theory is far-fetched and just too implausible because I think Yasu would've tried to help Battler remember who he used to be.

She might have tried to do so for all we know, only in her twisted way. I mean... apparently PieceYasu aimed to have PieceBattler remember his promise... but honestly I doubt facing the murder of his dear ones might help him remember the promise he made as a kid to a girl who's apparently happily about to marry his cousin...
So I don't really know how Yasu would help Battler to remember. She might not go for the easy way of simply telling him the truth. Also, she might have not cared. She had a Battler who again enjoyed talking with her about mysteries, depended on her and had no will to leave her.
She might have been fine with it or judged that knowing the trth would be harmful for Battler and solve nothing (by the way, you're Ushiromiya Battler and all your relatives are just dead apart your little sister, who, from now on is your responsibility and an aunt who'll likely forbid you to see me and will try to marry you to an upperclass girl. Oh, before I forget, I/one of your relatives/you/all of the above were responsible for the whole tragedy. How do you feel about it?) which might have been not the right thing but she might have decided about it anyway.

Even assuming Ikuko isn't Yasu she likely suspected him to be Battler as she hid the fact she found him the best she could in a moment in which the Ushiromiya tragedy was likely on the news and on all the newspapers, likely also with pictures of the Ushiromiya.

Originally Posted by Asuka0NK

Then Battler says some things that imply the island exploded but I always got this creepy vibe from it that Battler is so happy even though his whole family was just murdered a few hours ago.

I think the Battler's escape is viewed in a 'magic scene' vision as if it was a sort of continuation with Ep 6 in which Battler, after all promised Beato he would leave with her. So, while it likely metaphorically represent Battler's escape, it's more magic narrative than real narrative.

Originally Posted by Asuka0NK

Well I don't know if it was ever said but I believe the reason was to protect someone from being thought of as being the culprit or if Yasu was the true culprit then she most likely wrote these stories for people to find out but what's the point. Why would Yasu care about people finding out she would be dead so why not just write a normal confession? Well I believe as I said she wrote the stories to protect a someone from the eyes of being guilty.

The problem is if that was the motive Yasu failed spectacularly as no one apparently thinks that Banquet, Alliance and End have Shannon/Kanon/Yasu as culprit (Ange meets Hachijo/Featherine and insists she must have figured out something but she never asks her: why you always have the main as culprit?)
In the same way even Lengend and Turn likely were never solved otherwise someone would/should have pointed out that they both oddly blamed the maid.

Originally Posted by Asuka0NK

Maybe Yasu just chose to show herself as a male just for the fact of how Natsuhi seems to be more intimidated by men I mean if you call someone threatening them and sound like a cute little girl you may not be seen as menacing

There's also to say Yasu likely didn't want Natsuhi to connect the caller to Shannon as she later was going to try a trick that connected her to Shannon. In fact, since Natsuhi thinks the caller is male she believes Shannon might be an accomplice or someone who knows something but doesn't suspect her to be him. If the caller had been clearly female she would have assumed Shannon was behind everything.
(Plus Shannon could have said the caller figured out which was Natsuhi's fave season with a very easy trick, 'proving' her innocence)

Spoiler for Replies to Wanderer:

Originally Posted by Wanderer

Actually I've been toying with the very twisted idea that Ikuko is Yasu but that Touya is not Battler. To illustrate, let me quote Kinzo from EP7:

...Her memory... would have returned. ......She must have been Beatrice reborn. ......Her memory was coming back bit by bit. My magical ceremonies were helping her regain her memories one little bit at a time.

This would, of course, make Yasu out as quite a wretched person, even if she's not a murderer. On the other hand, it actually makes a lot of sense if she were to take after her father/grandfather in using "magic" to bind the soul of the one she loves.

It's a really cool theory and I love it but the problem is this stranger looks a lot like Battler as Ange even compared him with a photo... though we know Battler was injuried so Yasu might have had him to undergo to plastic surgery with the excuse he was disfigured (as he apparently was in confusional state she might even have avoided to let him known) or he could have been coincidentally very similar to Battler (LOL, maybe he was Rudolf's illegittimated son of whom he knew nothing about?) as Umineko doesn't really care much about look.

Originally Posted by Wanderer

No, I like it because it makes the meta-world make some sense. I'm not particularly fond of happy endings or anything.

Same here.

Spoiler for Replies to GuestSpeaker:

Originally Posted by GuestSpeaker

I did wonder about the time frame of it all, so it is possible Eva was directed there by Yasu. My thoughts are just that if she arrived there for the first time quite late in the night, it might explain the continuation of the killings.

The problem is this would turn the scene in which discovered the gold earlier into a fantasy that magically happened in reality too only later. Though likely Eva might have been Yasu's accomplice at certain points, sort of like how Rosa was Beatrice's accomplice in Ep 2.

About Kinzo's body any way you look at it, it's complicate to make it work logically almost as ShKannon.
A dead body gets smelly when it decomposes, so smelly that scents attach on everything that's close and it's hard to wash it away. If I'm not wrong humidity and heat help it to decompose faster and I don't know how warm is Rokkenjima but it looks likely it's humid. Anyway, humidity or not, 2 years are more than enough for it to decompose.
So I'll say the best option is to hide the corpse in a place that couldn't be found (as Kinzo must officially be alive in his room and can't be dead by days in some other place) and in which people wouldn't go, not even close.
If Natsuhi (and Krauss) wanted to keep up this story and believed the hiding place was good she wouldn't have digged Kinzo up and burned him.
The hiding place already was supposed to be good enough to survive to a police inspection and be declared missing. Even when the murders started and she assumed the police would come to check, she should have felt sure Kinzo's body wouldn't have been found so why to dig it up and show it burned?

The only explanation is PieceYasu knew where it was and digged it up for her game... which probably would have made Natsuhi suspicious of the servants as they were the only ones to know where it was.

Spoiler for Replies to tempteste:

Originally Posted by tempteste

That person called themselves Natsuhi 'son' in novel. In the manga it was changed to 'child'.

I seem to remember someone said that was a mistranslation and that actually the novel never made clear if the calelr was male or female.

Originally Posted by tempteste

Kinzo thought Beatrice II was a reincarnation. I doubt Beatrice's reincarnation having a male body would stop him.

The novel also said Kinzo was drawn to Beato 2 because she resembled her mother a lot. Likely at the beginning unconsciously he tried to force that resemblance as to still have something of Bice... then that resemblance lead him to the wrong actions. It's also said he tried to resist temptation and failed.
Considering he gave a different name to Yasu/Lion he was already trying to differentiate the baby from the Beatrices. He also wanted to add the baby to his family as Natsuhi and Krauss' child. This would have made harder to have a male baby grow up to remember Beatrice as likely Natsuhi and Krauss wouldn't let him dress as Beatrice or as a girl if he were to be male.

Also Genji would have given the baby a female indenty, which combined to the apparent fact that there was a resemblance between Yasu and Beatrice (or so Kinzo said), might have pushed Kinzo to pursue Shannon too.

After all Beatrice didn't have to necessarily reincarnate in her child... another child might have worked as well.

All in all to say that the 'Shannon' solution was more dangerous for Yasu that letting a male child be raised by the Ushiromiya.

Originally Posted by tempteste

In manga it's 'I'm your child, mom' and Natsuhi still assumes that it's definitely male for some reason. She doesn't even doubt anything.

Well, considering Ryukishi apparently didn't want us to be sure about the child's gender I tend to think there was no proof of which it was otherwise Will would have figured it out. Instead he felt the need to ask Lion wich gender he was because he didn't think EP 5 was conclusive.

Originally Posted by battle22

Lets say this, Battler claims he is the son of natsuhi , Natsuhi did not knew the gender of the child and since Battler claims he is a son, she starts to believe it as well. It was not important to her and this is a theory which my friend told me, hear me out. We know that Yasu is a child of incest right? What if she was born as a 'freak' and people were unable to determine if it was male or female and MAYBE this is the reason Natsuhi Hated that child so much

We've a problem. Who ever told Battler all this story about the kid fallen from a cliff?
Also it was explained more than once that Natsuhi's disgust for the child was due to her inability to have one on her own and the way Kizno presented that kid to her.

Spoiler for Replies to Jan-Poo:

Originally Posted by Jan-Poo

The hardest part to explain is how he was made to "remember" all those things. For example at the very end of EP8 he recognizes that the hall of the orphanage looks exactly like the one in the Rokkenjima Mansion before anyone says anything. You need to pull some kind of bogus hypnotsim hocus pocus, which is yet another overused plot device like amnesia.

From his perspective. The fact that he recognizes that hall should be an almost certain proof to himself, if he ever had a doubt.
To question even that, would mean descending into pure paranoia.

Now that you mention it I've noticed an interesting thing. We don't know if his perspective is reliable as the detective in Ep 8 seems to be Ange, not Toya or Battler.

I've to admit I like the idea Toya might not be Battler but I think it's unlikely he's a random stranger that coincidentally looked like him and for which we had lot of false info about his perspective.

Originally Posted by Jan-Poo

I have no experience whatsoever of externally fabricated memories nor personally nor by what I've heard by others and not even by rumors, if I exclude fictional stories.

The situation you describe, like being exposed to photographs or to stories do not really work, unless he forgets that he has been exposed to them, therefore only leaving the option "I must have experienced this firsthand".

I know that, due to trauma, a mind can protect itself by fabricating another identity using notions it has about something else as if they were facts that really happened to that person.
This however doesn't work the way the novel presents it.
Basically Toya should have woken up believing to be Battler of which he knew a lot because (insert X reason here).
For example, assuming Yasu was a male, he could have woken up believing to be Battler, switching his identity with the one of the person he obsessed about and of whom he knew certain things.
Same for George. It would even work for Rudolf (theorically it would work for a female aslo but she would get soon something isn't right...)

However, as I said previously this isn't how the novel present it and unless Ryukishi was trying to add all this to a 'Dead again' movie trick (the female character thought she was the reincarnation of a woman while instead she was the reincarnation of her husband) using amnesy instead than reincarnation I doubt it could work and, anyway, it would be so intricate I don't think it's plausible.

... though would Ryukishi care about this sort of explanation being plausible? Sometimes I get the feeling that as long as it's possible, no matter how low is the chance, he's fine with using that as explanation.