First Impression – Danganronpa 3: Zetsubou Hen
No students? No problem!
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The second half is here, but it’s taking a far different tone from the Mirai anime that’s airing… |
Getting a prequel is cool. The way the 2nd game worked, learning that the kids were the ones who caused the apocalypse was interesting, but it wasn’t really necessary to explore the story behind that in order to complete that game’s plot. Finally learning about how things got this way is a nice extra story. Plus (for now at least) we can see how the students interacted before all of the despair happened. Danganronpa’s character interactions always seem to be under the threat of them killing one another at least, so this time we can see what they were like before. It’s already interesting to see that even when they got their memories erased in the 2nd game, some things are still the same. Soda still totally has unrequited feelings for Sonia, and Nidai still acts as Owari’s keeper in a way.
Having both anime airing at the same time is interesting too. This one is acting as a good foil for the other anime airing right now. The Zetsubou portion is going to slowly sink into a darker tone as Junko influences this class into despair (as shown by the OP), where the Mirai portion is going to get more hopeful towards the end if it follows the same pattern as every other Danganronpa game (though of course, there’s going to be a ton of despair between now and then). Plus this way, there’s a full story going on. Even if you never played the 2nd game, maybe this will provide enough info for the Mirai half to make sense.
We didn’t get a chance to really see what Yukizome was like in the Mirai portion, but luckily she seems to have a big role in the Zetsubou one. Who knows what being able to pull out knives has to do with being the Ultimate Housekeeper, but I suppose that kind of ridiculousness comes with being a former Ultimate. Though of course, her efficiency in bringing the students together might end up being a terribly ironic thing to do. As the Mirai portion showed (or the 2nd game too), these are the students who end up being Junko’s #1 followers. Maybe they wouldn’t have been taken in by Junko if they didn’t have such a sense of unity. But for now, this episode was pretty fun and ended up showcasing the characters (all over again) in a far more interesting way than the first anime did for it’s characters.
Seeing how Yukizome is in this anime, she was probably the best one to kill in the Mirai portion. The murder game seems to work best when there’s a sense of mistrust and discord between the characters. Yukizome was far too competent in bringing the students together in this episode, and had she been left alive, she might have made the rest of the Future Foundation trust each other too much. Especially since from that picture they showed, she was close friends with the characters Naegi was having the most problems with, and she might have pushed for them too close for them to kill each other.
It was really interesting to see that Nanami is an actual person. In the 2nd game, she was just an AI, so from this episode it seems like she was an AI built after an actual person. On the bright side, maybe this means that Hajime can meet her if he ever gets back to the real world again. But on the less optimistic side, maybe having her real self missing from the 2nd game means that she died at some point. There’s also a new character with the Ultimate Animator. He has the same body type as the fake Togami in the 2nd game, so maybe that’s him. If so, it would be interesting to see how the Ultimate Animator becomes the Ultimate Imposter. It should also be interesting to see how Junko manages to get Hajime involved when he’s currently so far away from the rest of the cast in the reserve course.
…Well at least the director is being consistent in taking from the source game when he can. There were a lot of poses that came right from the game sprites, but luckily being an original work, there’s only so much to copy. The episode was fun to watch though. Maybe that’s why they brought back the pink blood? Because it’s a lighter story again? But in any case, it’s nice seeing the characters interact without trying to kill each other. Of course, that’s going to change soon (though I guess it’s nice that they’ll be killing other people and not each other?), but it looks like it will be nice while it lasts.
About Karakuri
University student and the one at Metanorn who's known for wearing glasses. Likes blood, insanity and plot twists, but also plays otome games and adores cute romance anime. It balances out... somehow.
POWUH: and Vampire Lover with 11746 comments
Misleading for a start. This opening was so lighthearted that despite the signature character designs, I almost forgot this was Danganronpa. But since this is Danganronpa, it means this is merely the calm before the storm and after looking at the prologue from Mirai-hen/Future Arc’s first episode, a drastic change in tone is imminent. What I’m anticipating most is how they’ll break mentally.
The purpose gets made clear after seeing each arc’s first episode. Zetsubou-hen/Despair Arc is a prequel story that also feeds extra information for Mirai-hen/Future Arc which is the current and closing story. Doing one arc alone wouldn’t be as interesting and would’ve led to incoherency.
Fortunately with Zetsubou-hen/Despair Arc, the chance of getting to know Yukizome is available. That and a noticeable contrast in behavior between both arcs. Surely in Mirai-hen, she had to have been distraught before coming to terms the people she had to fight against were her own students.