Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope's Peak High School: Future Arc

Episode 5

You know, I never would have said this based on his series' first game, but Kazutaka Kodaka has grown into a fantastic character writer. We haven't known Kimura and Ando for very long, but this episode manages to wring the maximum amount of sadness from their relationship before its bitter end.

The sordid details we've come to learn through both the Future and Despair arcs (which continue to be blended extremely well) are twisted, complex, and unbearably unfair, but in the end, Kimura and Ando's tragedy may best be summed up by one of my favorite quotes from a completely different anime series: "Admiration is the furthest state from understanding." (Sousuke Aizen in Bleach) Both girls are driven to kill the other when their initial feelings of love mutate into soul-crushing betrayal; Ando feels like Kimura is always unimpressed and looking down on her, while Kimura feels like Ando is taking advantage of her while giving nothing back. Each admired the other so much for all the qualities they didn't have, but they spent all their time obsessing over their own imperfections compared to the "godlike" other girl, leaving them completely unable to understand each other as equally flawed people just looking for a friend. The wacky misunderstanding that convinced both of them that the other had gotten them expelled was just the cherry on top of a thoroughly curdled sundae.

This fearsome falling-out only further reinforces Danganronpa's increasing focus on the dark side of talent. While the Despair Arc's observations on how valuing more talented lives above less talented ones leads to a destruction of unity and a loss of hope, the Future Arc seems to be emphasizing the ways that talent can isolate people from one another on an individual level. Ando and Kimura poured their entire lives into two talents that repelled one another: sweetness and bitterness. Ando devalued her own confectionary skills as trifling and unnecessary compared to the important work that Kimura was doing, but Kimura's work left her carrying a heavy burden that needed an extra shoulder or two to bear. Convinced that Kimura didn't value her work anyway, Ando weighed her down with more requests with only sweets as payment, desperately seeking validation she would never receive, while Kimura struggled under the strain of feeling stretched too thin with no gratitude for her exhausting work. Ando lived in a world of frivolity and happiness, so she couldn't sympathize with or even recognize the pain and sadness she caused. Kimura lived in a perpetual cloud of stress and responsibility over the lives that hung in the balance of her research, so she couldn't sympathize with or even recognize the emotional toll it was imposing on her struggling friendship. But in the end, all either Ando or Kimura wanted was a friend who understood. Even if their talents were destined to make the world a better place someday, they only seemed to make their personal lives worse, and now Kimura's role in the Killing Game has tragically ended.

I realize I've written two paragraphs on this without even getting into the other details of this episode, but I was just so impressed by how much emotion and thematic meaning Danganronpa 3 managed to squeeze out of these characters in such a short time without ever feeling like it was a distraction from the tight main plot. For as much as I've enjoyed the Future Arc so far, it's mostly been a series of clue collecting in a long build-up to the grand finale, so I appreciate having something a little more character-driven to chew on while the hints and twists continue to pile up.

On that note, I should probably get straight to the big Reveal Roundup for this episode. Much like the "Gekkōgahara is Monaca" reveal last time, this episode tosses out the twist that the audience is most likely to have already guessed as nonchalantly as possible: Tengan is a traitor! Well, sort of. He's not the traitor, since we've reasoned out last episode that there has to be more than one, and he's not a "remnant of despair" by his own definition, since he's completely sane and working toward his own personal goals despite cooperating with the enemy. Thanks to his extremely convenient forbidden action (must answer any direct question truthfully), we can safely believe all the truth bombs Tengan drops while hanging from a piece of rebar opposite Munakata.

Apparently, Tengan helped facilitate the Killing Game for two major reasons. 1) He realized that the Future Foundation's original methods for world salvation (which are left suspiciously vague) were completely backwards. At this point, we get a blink-and-you-miss-it glance at the original founding members of the Future Foundation: Chisa, Tengan, Munakata, Bandai, and Great Gozu. That's probably going to be important later. 2) Tengan is trying to ensure the success of the Hope Cultivation Plan, which he refers to as an ongoing effort. This confirms the Despair Arc's painfully unsubtle insinuation that Tengan was manipulating Hajime into becoming Izuru Kamukura through a little reverse psychology. Thinking back to that three-person shot of disappointment between Tengan, Kizakura, and Kirigiri when Hajime took the deal begs the question of whether Kizakura was also a dirty lying double agent. I'm pretty sure Headmaster Kirigiri was actually opposed to the plan, so it's still 50/50 odds whether Kizakura is on the side of Hope or Despair in this Final Killing Game.

Unlike the audience, Munakata doesn't seem very interested in the horrifying possibility that the Hope Cultivation Plan may be continuing on a larger scale, but he does want to know who the killer is so he can stop the game once and for all. We don't get to hear Tengan's answer, but the killer's identity is so shocking that it turns Munakata three shades whiter than he was already and leads to Tengan's execution-by-katana. (Also, Munakata loses an eye. Geez, this show really does seem gory now that the blood isn't all just Benadryl.) My guess is that the name he heard is someone who's already "died," since it's hard to imagine any other name sending him into so much shock. Worst case scenario? It's Chisa. After all, if Gekkōgahara has been replaced with an android, that gives us an extra female body to drop from the ceiling, doesn't it? Chisa is also one of the original founding members of the Future Foundation, and the Despair Arc has given her more than enough motive to fall into despair. It's a crackpot theory, but I'm sticking to it for now.

Next week, we'll get a proper autopsy for Great Gozu, which may give us a few more clues to the mystery. Still, so many questions remain! What's up with that secret entrance Izayoi found? What does Hiro have to do with all this mess, if anything? And if Monaca isn't the head honcho in this final gambit, who is? I'm eager to uncover the answers to these questions, but I'm still sad we'll have to do it without Kimura around. At least one of our players knows the killer's identity now, and he seems to think he'll need Kimura's superjuice to survive the fight (Gozu maybe?), so I'm sure Kodaka's whipped up some doozy reveals I haven't seen coming at all.

Rating: B+

Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope's Peak High School: Future Arc is currently streaming on Funimation.

Jake has been an anime fan since childhood, and likes to chat about cartoons, pop culture, and visual novel dev on Twitter.