To Aru Kagaku no Railgun S - Episode 21 Discussion / Poll

[Anh_Minh]

As a rule (well, more of guildeline...), even dark side members won't murder random innocent people for no reason. But if you actively go against them? That changes things, don't you think?

You assume that "because Saten and Uiharu won't head to the frontline (a questionable assumption to start with), the enemy won't bother them". You assume that "if Kuroko can make a clean getaway, she won't have anything to fear". Don't you think those assumptions are unwarranted? That, if they get in the way of a dark side project, the stakeholders of that projects won't do something about it beyond the purest defensive moves and won't ever try to seize the initiative?

[dniv]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

As a rule (well, more of guildeline...), even dark side members won't murder random innocent people for no reason. But if you actively go against them? That changes things, don't you think?

You assume that "because Saten and Uiharu won't head to the frontline (a questionable assumption to start with), the enemy won't bother them". You assume that "if Kuroko can make a clean getaway, she won't have anything to fear". Don't you think those assumptions are unwarranted? That, if they get in the way of a dark side project, the stakeholders of that projects won't do something about it beyond the purest defensive moves and won't ever try to seize the initiative?

At this point I'm not sure if it's about safety or rather trust. Because I think trust is the issue here. It doesn't matter if her friends get hurt. They would much angrier at her if she let them out and made them worry. If they want to risk their lives to help out, that's their choice. But they are friends with Misaka Mikoto one of the most dangerous espers in AC and one of the most dangerous people in the world. Either way, they still care about her. This is when she realized that she shouldn't be the one to decide whether or not her friends will accompany her into danger. It wouldn't be right from a friendship point of view. I.E. Bond > Danger.

[Anh_Minh]

Originally Posted by dniv

At this point I'm not sure if it's about safety or rather trust. Because I think trust is the issue here. It doesn't matter if her friends get hurt. They would much angrier at her if she let them out and made them worry. If they want to risk their lives to help out, that's their choice. But they are friends with Misaka Mikoto one of the most dangerous espers in AC and one of the most dangerous people in the world.

She's actually relatively harmless. She's not a killer, and she doesn't know much about anything...

Either way, they still care about her. This is when she realized that she shouldn't be the one to decide whether or not her friends will accompany her into danger. It wouldn't be right from a friendship point of view. I.E. Bond > Danger.

If that's how you want to make decisions, fine. But let's not pretend that going against the dark side isn't dangerous. Quasi-suicidal kind of dangerous.

Though in this case the antagonists seem to be a bunch of losers, not real dark side people. There is some involvement, but at a remote. They may decide to just let it go.

[dniv]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

She's actually relatively harmless. She's not a killer, and she doesn't know much about anything...


If that's how you want to make decisions, fine. But let's not pretend that going against the dark side isn't dangerous. Quasi-suicidal kind of dangerous.

Though in this case the antagonists seem to be a bunch of losers, not real dark side people. There is some involvement, but at a remote. They may decide to just let it go.

She's dangerous because of the trouble she gets into she herself isn't that dangerous except to Touma

As to the second thing you said I agree. I think this bunch of scientists seem to be relatively weak so far. Either way, I definitely agree that if they faced the darkness they would pretty much die for sure. I'm just saying that they feel like it should be their choice even if they are really immature about it.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

As a rule (well, more of guildeline...), even dark side members won't murder random innocent people for no reason. But if you actively go against them? That changes things, don't you think?

Yes, there's a risk. But there's a risk in going it alone as well. Mikoto came very close to dying two or three times during the Sisters Arc. Suppose she had Kuroko fighting alongside of her. That would have at least improved Mikoto's chances of survival against Item.

You assume that "because Saten and Uiharu won't head to the frontline (a questionable assumption to start with),

My viewpoint is that you don't paternalize your friends to the point that you actually baby them. If you respect and trust your friends at all, you have to trust that they won't do ridiculously stupid things.

If Saten and Uiharu see Mikoto fighting a Level 5 or Level 4 esper, then I should hope they have enough brains to not get directly involved in that fight.

You assume that "if Kuroko can make a clean getaway, she won't have anything to fear". Don't you think those assumptions are unwarranted?

I'm not making any assumptions. I'm saying its a reasonable risk to take, given all the pros and cons at play.

That being said, Kuroko can make a clean getaway at least 99% of the time. It's certainly a factor in weighing the risks here, imo.

[leukrota]

The dark side is not called dark just cause it sounds cool. There are no rules and as such, no sidelines where to stand if you are in a participating team.

It's been said already is this discussion, but I feel there's a need to lampshade it.

[Haak]

Well if they're really dark then why does participation change anything? As long as Mikoto goes into the fray, then shouldn't that make them easy targets, regardless?

[Anh_Minh]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

Yes, there's a risk. But there's a risk in going it alone as well. Mikoto came very close to dying two or three times during the Sisters Arc. Suppose she had Kuroko fighting alongside of her. That would have at least improved Mikoto's chances of survival against Item.

And it could have gotten Kuroko killed by Accelerator. Heck, if Mikoto was all that worried about her own safety, just eating and sleeping like a normal person would have allowed her to curbstomp ITEM.

My viewpoint is that you don't paternalize your friends to the point that you actually baby them.

No, your point was that the risk was tiny. You compared it to crossing the street. If you want to say that Mikoto should invite them to a suicide mission because she respects their free will, fine, say that. Don't say that it's safe.

If you respect and trust your friends at all, you have to trust that they won't do ridiculously stupid things.

If Saten and Uiharu see Mikoto fighting a Level 5 or Level 4 esper, then I should hope they have enough brains to not get directly involved in that fight.

Yes, but would the enemy see it that way? You see risk only in terms of an hypothetical immediate physical confrontation. From which one can opt out. I see it in terms of "they decide the girls - all of them - are inconvenient. They kill three of them while dealing Mikoto somehow."

I'm not making any assumptions. I'm saying its a reasonable risk to take, given all the pros and cons at play.

That being said, Kuroko can make a clean getaway at least 99% of the time. It's certainly a factor in weighing the risks here, imo.

OK, so Kuroko makes her getaway. She goes to her room to clean up. That room explodes as she enters, because that's how the bad guys work.

See what I mean about your assumptions? Getting away from one fight doesn't make her safe. Neither does not being a physical threat (for Saten and Uiharu).

Originally Posted by Haak

Well if they're really dark then why does participation change anything? As long as Mikoto goes into the fray, then shouldn't that make them easy targets, regardless?

They have rules. Sort of. Though I don't think they're above breaking them.

[Haak]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

They have rules. Sort of. Though I don't think they're above breaking them.

That sounds like an unwarranted assumption too, you know.

[leukrota]

Originally Posted by Haak

Well if they're really dark then why does participation change anything? As long as Mikoto goes into the fray, then shouldn't that make them easy targets, regardless?

Well, even without rules there's pragmatism. They have no problem with using related non participants as hostages for example, but those that do participate become priority targets.

But I do see your point, it's enough to think about it.

[rladls716]

This "dark side" business, even though it is unlikely, if there are people with supernatural powers outside of Academy City are going to be involved, I'm very welcomed for that.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

And it could have gotten Kuroko killed by Accelerator.

Like I said, the risks go both ways. There's a risk in going it alone, and there's risk in involving your friends. I don't think you're being evenhanded in how your assessing those risks, given that I think you're massively blowing out of proportion the risks involved in Mikoto involving her friends.

No, your point was that the risk was tiny.

A person can make more than one point in an overarching argument, you know. My main point is that the risk is tiny, or at least appears to be tiny. But a related point given the context of our discussion is that people should show their friends enough respect that they don't actually baby them.

You compared it to crossing the street. If you want to say that Mikoto should invite them to a suicide mission because she respects their free will, fine, say that.

And this is what I mean by you massively blowing the risks out of proportion. Suicide mission? Just trying to find Febri's creators and get their help in keeping her alive? That's a suicide mission?

You see risk only in terms of an hypothetical immediate physical confrontation.

I see the risks in primarily these terms because that's what the Railgun anime itself shows. How often in this show has Mikoto been the target of a serious assassination attempt? Even during the Sisters Arc, the only times when an attempt was made on her life was when she voluntarily challenged powerful people (like Accelerator) or went around blowing up buildings. And that applies to Railgun as a whole. Even Therestina only tried to kill Mikoto after Mikoto went out of her way to impede her plans, and that was also an immediate physical confrontation.

I don't recall actual assassins or hitmen ever being sent after her or her friends. And that was while she was severely jeopardizing the Level 6 Project!

Going strictly by what Mikoto herself knows, why should she live in fear of people trying to assassinate her or her friends, Mafia and/or KGB-style?

[Rising Dragon]

Wouldn't ITEM count as an assassination attempt against Mikoto during said Level 6 Shift Project? They were pretty much hired to kill her.

[dniv]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

Like I said, the risks go both ways. There's a risk in going it alone, and there's risk in involving your friends. I don't think you're being evenhanded in how your assessing those risks, given that I think you're massively blowing out of proportion the risks involved in Mikoto involving her friends.




A person can make more than one point in an overarching argument, you know. My main point is that the risk is tiny, or at least appears to be tiny. But a related point given the context of our discussion is that people should show their friends enough respect that they don't actually baby them.




And this is what I mean by you massively blowing the risks out of proportion. Suicide mission? Just trying to find Febri's creators and get their help in keeping her alive? That's a suicide mission?




I see the risks in primarily these terms because that's what the Railgun anime itself shows. How often in this show has Mikoto been the target of a serious assassination attempt? Even during the Sisters Arc, the only times when an attempt was made on her life was when she voluntarily challenged powerful people (like Accelerator) or went around blowing up buildings. And that applies to Railgun as a whole. Even Therestina only tried to kill Mikoto after Mikoto went out of her way to impede her plans, and that was also an immediate physical confrontation.

I don't recall actual assassins ever being sent after her or her friends. And that was while she was severely jeopardizing the Level 6 Project!

Going strictly by what Mikoto herself knows, why should she live in fear of people trying to assassinate her or her friends, Mafia and/or KGB-style?

The one thing I do want to point out here though is that Mugino was going to follow Mikoto to accomplish her mission except that Mugino decided in the end to make Mikoto to suffer. So in reality, if the darkness was annoyed, to win, the four of them would have to defeat the entire darkness of academy city, a feat that includes beating Accelerator and mugino among other people which clearly makes it impossible. And they would get chased and destroyed.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Rising Dragon

Wouldn't ITEM count as an assassination attempt against Mikoto during said Level 6 Shift Project? They were pretty much hired to kill her.

They were hired to kill anybody who tried to attack the research facilities. They weren't hired to actually seek Mikoto out and kill her during her normal daily living. It's a huge difference.

Antagonists/villains only try to kill Mikoto when she goes after them. They don't go out of their way to go after her or her friends, which is precisely what Anh_Minh was suggesting. There's just little reason for Mikoto to think that Academy City does things like it was run by someone like Al Capone. Even if Academy City does do things that way, Mikoto has little reason to suspect it. Nobody actually went to her school and tried to snipe her. Her school was never the target of a terrorist-esque attack. Her dorms weren't. While just going about her daily routine, walking around the streets of Academy City, nobody has tried to snipe her.

[relentlessflame]

In the end, the whole plot for this franchise could be ended completely with some well-executed assassinations with physical weapons (since it's not like these people have secret identities -- they walk around Academy City in the open every day). So you have to have a little bit of suspension of disbelief to accept the story on the whole. No matter how evil the dark forces are, we're always going to see the conflicts play out in front of our eyes, and any risk will be confronted in an addressable way. This is the same reason the team of four is getting involved in this arc, whether it's the smartest or most prudent course of action or not: because it's a story that exists for our benefit as viewers, not an actual real, living, breathing world where people behalf the way you or I would in a similar situation. So I personally don't really see the point of fretting about this so much. We know that Mikoto has to inform her friends because we just had an arc where she tried to go it alone and it nearly killed her, and the in-story reason they gave is reasonable enough and fits logically in the anime's presentation of events.

[dniv]

Originally Posted by relentlessflame

In the end, the whole plot for this franchise could be ended completely with some well-executed assassinations with physical weapons (since it's not like these people have secret identities -- they walk around Academy City in the open every day). So you have to have a little bit of suspension of disbelief to accept the story on the whole. No matter how evil the dark forces are, we're always going to see the conflicts play out in front of our eyes, and any risk will be confronted in an addressable way. This is the same reason the team of four is getting involved in this arc, whether it's the smartest or most prudent course of action or not: because it's a story that exists for our benefit as viewers, not an actual real, living, breathing world where people behalf the way you or I would in a similar situation. So I personally don't really see the point of fretting about this so much. We know that Mikoto has to inform her friends because we just had an arc where she tried to go it alone and it nearly killed her, and the in-story reason they gave is reasonable enough and fits logically in the anime's presentation of events.

True enough, but I also believe that it is pretty good in terms of argument that the researchers want Mikoto as the public face of the city and that they want to be able to experiment on her in order to do things like create sisters that ends up keeping her alive.

[Triple_R]

I want to be clear - I'm not saying that the higher-ups of the city are dumb or incompetent for not simply having a hit put out on Mikoto. Perhaps they have a good reason for wanting her alive.

What I am saying is that from Mikoto's perspective, there's no particular reason for her to think that she's essentially dragging her friends into a fight with the mafia or some organization like the KGB.


Edit: As for the people who hired Item during the Sisters Arc, I can see why they'd rather have Mikoto eliminated while she's attacking one of their facilities than having her assassinated in her school, dorms, or somewhere in broad daylight. The former is less likely to cause them unwanted controversy than the latter is.

[SilverTalon]

Originally Posted by dniv

In terms of Saten and Uiharu, there's another reason they could survive. Their opponents would laugh themselves unconscious at their inability to win and then they would beat up their enemies? + Uiharu could hack suits that worked on electricity I bet... I wonder if the mecha terestina made is related to the mechas using the feathers. Electricity didn't work on Terestina's mecha either after all.

The issue isn't that they do nothing, he said people underestimated them. No, those 2 are appropriately estimated to be really, really low because unless there are very specific circumstances, they don't do anything important.

Electricity might have worked if she put as much as she could into it. Remember Harumi thought the same thing when Mikoto faught AIM Burst because it didn't work on her, but Mikoto would never go all out (except that one time against Accel, but she wasn't thinking clearly then) on a person.

Regardless of the electricity shielding though, she can rip them apart with magnetism like she did to Thelestina's mech.

Originally Posted by dniv

If Mugino is working in ITEM against her will and she's the #4 and presumably not much weaker than Mikoto and from the fact that most of ITEM doesn't seem to want to be in ITEM, and if Mugino can't break free alone (I'm extrapolating from their conversation with Takitsubou during the sisters arc), then I'm guessing there are things out there perhaps different from Accel stronger than Mikoto.

That doesn't have to mean that at all. Lets just say Mugino is stronger than everything they can send at her, thats only for a straight up fight. Its not like she is going to be prepared for a surprise attack at all times or something sneaky like slipping drugs into her food.

[dniv]

Originally Posted by SilverTalon

The issue isn't that they do nothing, he said people underestimated them. No, those 2 are appropriately estimated to be really, really low because unless there are very specific circumstances, they don't do anything important.

Electricity might have worked if she put as much as she could into it. Remember Harumi thought the same thing when Mikoto faught AIM Burst because it didn't work on her, but Mikoto would never go all out (except that one time against Accel, but she wasn't thinking clearly then) on a person.

Regardless of the electricity shielding though, she can rip them apart with magnetism like she did to Thelestina's mech.



That doesn't have to mean that at all. Lets just say Mugino is stronger than everything they can send at her, thats only for a straight up fight. Its not like she is going to be prepared for a surprise attack at all times or something sneaky like slipping drugs into her food.

Oh, I mean including that. I'm saying Mikoto and Co. wouldn't want to deal with that either, not just in a straight up fight. That's the point I'm actually trying to make. That the danger goes past straight up fights because they are living in a dark city. Though as RelentlessFlame put it, there is a suspension of disbelief at some point. Though, so far from what I've read of Kamachi hasn't needed too much of that