Quote:
Originally Posted by Triple_R
As Anh_Minh correctly pointed out, Irisu took Hongou off the project in such a roundabout way, instead of just letting the class come to a consensus the script had to go. The only motivation I can see for this is that Irisu didn't want Hongou to be hurt or humiliated. As Anh_Minh also pointed out, if Irisu's only concern was that the script was boring, and she didn't care about Hongou and her classmates, changing the script could have been decided in a much more direct fashion.
People with purely self-serving motivations wouldn't go through all these hoops just to try to spare another person's feelings.
[...]
Honestly, if I was in Irisu's shoes, I don't know if I would have felt compelled to protect Hongou. "You did something selfish against the wishes of the rest of the team, Hongou, and now you're going to be held accountable for it" is a position that Irisu could have legitimately taken with Hongou. But she didn't. She went to considerable lengths to protect Hongou.
Again, that clearly points to Irisu caring about Hongou. Which means that Irisu isn't entirely self-serving.
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I think this line of reasoning rings a bit shallow.
Hongou was chosen to write the script at the class's request. She took it seriously, and apparently did a good job despite not writing it in such a way that people would die. What would
actually have been looking out for Hongou's feelings here would be to either work with her to face the situation, or to stand up for her given all the hard work she's done. Instead, Irisu played on Hongou's guilt and insecurities and provided her with a third option: a way out that would allow her to run away "blameless" from the project while she (Irisu) was free to figure out what to do with the script. You could say "how nice; she's providing a way out for Hongou!", but if we go by "A~ta~shi"'s theory/accusation, her real motivation was that she realized the script needed to change and this was the most efficient way of doing it -- by bypassing the original author entirely. Yes, I suppose she could have taken an "it's all your fault" tact, but was that really likely to arrive at the end-result? Are they really going to ostracise her when they're the ones who basically "voluntold" her to do all the work (even though she had no experience in the mystery genre to begin with)?
She lied to Hongou to avoid telling her what she really felt about the script. She lied to A~ta~shi because she knew she couldn't elicit sympathy from people if her story was just "the author wrote a script I/the class don't like the ending for". She lied to Eru and the Classics Club by setting up a fake premise to get them involved in her problem. She lied to Houtarou because she believed it would motivate him to write an ending that made sense for her movie, and she lied to him again by giving him a false sense of accomplishment as if he figured out a great mystery despite it still having obvious flaws (that she figured most wouldn't notice). And beneath this tangled web of lies, you're asking me to believe that, at the root of it all, she honestly didn't want Hongou to be hurt? I think that's definitely a stretch.
Now granted, I never once claimed that Irisu was "purely self-motivated", and I don't think even A~ta~shi's accusation precludes any possibility of good motives being in the mix to some degree. I'd go back to what I said earlier: I think, like a lot of manipulative people, she thinks she's more clever than she is, and she lacks some emotional awareness of the real impact of her decisions on others (particularly what will happen once she gets found out). I do think there are elements of her decision-making that seem self-serving, particularly her apparently-compulsive need to lie to everyone to accomplish what she wants. I suppose that, in her mind, all this may be what passes for consideration for others... but she's not exactly what I'd call a "good person" either. I would propose that the author's judgement call is that using such deceptive means to arrive at an end is a form of selfishness, because she cared more about efficiency at accomplishing an end than she
really cared about anyone's feelings. Based on her reaction when faced with the accusation, there seems to be a grain of truth there after all.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Triple_R
If she didn't feel guilty over Oreki getting upset, why even bring him up? [...] It doesn't make sense to me for Irisu to bring Oreki up unless she's feeling at least some actual guilt over how he became upset with her. So my thinking is that Irisu brought that up to A~ta~shi in the hopes that A~ta~shi might come up with a way for Irisu to smooth things over with Oreki.
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Two things:
1. I think there are different degrees of guilt. In this case, it seems more like "an awareness of having done something that made someone else upset". It's not clear that she truly felt remorse over what she did. There was certainly no sense that she was thinking she'd never do something like that again. And even if she did want A~ta~shi to "smooth things over", that's not exactly selfless either -- that would be manipulating someone else into cleaning up her mess.
2. I think that Irisu assumed that A~ta~shi was something of a kindred spirit since she was the one who suggested "using" Houtarou in the first place. What resulted from her suggestion is very much on-topic. So she lets her guard down assuming that she would laugh it off and make some joke like "it's his fault for being so gullible" or something -- which you might expect a kindred spirit to say. So I think she was genuinely surprised by A~ta~shi's reaction that shows she has some limits as to the ways she's willing to "manipulate" others and why. And I think that's the only time she really showed any signs of being truly troubled by her actions, but whether she was troubled because she actually felt guilty, or because she realized that she was just "found out" is hard to say for sure. Manipulative people are usually trying to protect their status and position, and I think that's the underlying accusation here.
Anyway, it seems that most of your real contention was about the perception that she's "pure evil" and has no once of goodness in her, and I wouldn't necessarily go that far. But at the same time, perhaps to provide a counterargument to that other extreme point of view (a sort of "devil's advocate" position... literally?) I think you're taking it too far the other way. I think the show has provided ample evidence to cast doubt on her motivation. But, having both presented our evidence and points of view, it's time for everyone else to make up their own minds.