Part 65: Episode 5 - Future Side, Episode 3: Cruel violence and hollow words

So, welcome back to Future Foundation. Last time, Aoi got fucking murdered.



Makoto isn't taking it well. Aoi is dead...



...which is why she's getting up any yawning. Right. What?



As she does that, the knife falls down, revealing it's one of those trick knives where the "blade" just retracts into the handle when you press it on something.



Miaya is panicking, thinking that even if she's not dead, Aoi must be hurt, but Makoto takes a closer look at the knife and realizes the red is just tomato sauce. Well, that's good, nobody died.



...right?





Welp.



So yeah, Kodaka pulled an old switcheroo on us by giving us a fakeout death with Aoi. Instead, Gozu bit the dust.



Meanwhile, everybody else is waking up as well.



Kazuo, Kyoko and Ryota (just out of frame) are in their own little group. Kazuo talks to Kyoko about surviving the round, and Kyoko feels like he doesn't seem like he was too worried about that.



Kyosuke and Juzo ponder the motives of the attacker. Kyosuke figures that if he were the attacker, he'd kill from the top down. Juzo says that would make sense, if the goal was to kill all of them.



Our main group starts planning on how they're going to figure out who the attacker is. Side note - Aoi covered Gozu's corpse with her jacket, that's why it's missing now. Anyway, Makoto wants to talk to everybody, question them, that kind of thing.



Miaya suggests hacking into the intercom system so he can reach everybody. Why does this place have an intercom system in particular? Well, remember the whole "overseas Hope's Peak" thing from Despair Side? This is the building for that. It didn't get finished before The Incident happened, which meant construction had to be stopped. Once Future Foundation came to be, Kyosuke repurposed this building as a base. Miaya finds out that for the intercom, they need to get to the monitoring room.



En route there, Makoto notices that Miaya has a bit of a strange way of making a right turn - namely, a 270 degree left turn. He asks her if she's not able to make a right turn.



Turns out that yes, that is her forbidden action, and she's kinda freaked out about it.



So Makoto shows her his forbidden action as well to reassure her.



We also get Aoi's. Jeez, that's an unfortunate one. Better stay the fuck away from Juzo then. The group has a bonding moment over revealing their secrets, and Miaya declares the three of them soulmates.



Then, Aoi hears something down the hallway. She tells him to head for the monitoring room while she draws them away. Makoto says he should do it, but given that he can't run, that's not a great idea, so Aoi heads off. Miaya follows her to be her backup.



We see that the one she heard was Seiko.



She sees Aoi and then Miaya head down the hallway and follows them...



...allowing Makoto to slip by unnoticed.



Meanwhile, outside, Yasuhiro is yelling for the others...



...and is interrupted by an attack helicopter. Yasuhiro ends up hanging off a ledge, and figures the others are probably fine, they know what they're doing.



Back inside, Kyoko decides it's time to head out and do detective shit. Ryota wonders why Kyosuke is out for blood as well now, and Kazuo says that he has a singularly strong will, which can lead to hope, but just as well breed despair.



Ryota has a freakout about how they shouldn't be putting themselves through this and that they need to pull together. Kyoko just asks him to reveal his forbidden action then, which he says he won't do.



So it's kinda hard to pull together when you really can't trust one another. Kyoko talks about how that is the purpose of the forbidden actions when she's suddenly interrupted by Makoto talking over the intercom.



Makoto says that it was Gozu that died, and asks that they come together to talk about the situation. He says that many think he's part of the Remnants, and that he understands why - his own actions have led them to that conclusion.



He then tells a story about rescue missions he ran for Branch 14.



During those missions, he ran into alumni of Hope's Peak, here represented by Hajime/Izuru. He talks about how he could tell they were Remnants - that they killed people and drove the world into darkness. But he could also tell that they were human, that deep down, they might've been as normal as he and the others are. And that they might've had a chance - had they not met Junko.



There was, however, a way to save them - the Neo World Program. Side note - it may or may not have come up before, but this dub uses some particular localizations. Like using "Super High School Level" instead of "Ultimate", talking about "Hope's Peak High School" and not "Hope's Peak Academy", that kind of stuff. "New" instead of "Neo" is probably just another one of those.



Makoto talks about how there were complications, but he still believes it worked. With that, he concludes his story, and goes on to say that if they're going to get through this, they need to place their hope in each other.



To put some weight behind it, he declares that he's turning his back on the game, and reveals his forbidden action to everybody.



He says that if somebody wants to kill him, that's how, and says that if he were the attacker, he wouldn't reveal this information. Finally, he just asks everyone to trust him.



Kyosuke and Juzo aren't impressed. Kyosuke doesn't believe that he can speak of hope like that unless he's experienced true despair. Kyosuke heads out to the monitoring room and tells Juzo to stay back, he wants to do this alone. Juzo says he at least wants to take care of his friends.



We next cut to Sonosuke and Ruruka talking about what they just heard from Makoto. He suggests going out and killing him, but Ruruka doesn't think much of it, preferring to focus on just staying alive. He swears he won't betray her.



Then, Seiko shows up. Ruruka gets snippy at her about being the traitor...



...Seiko isn't happy, throwing it right back at Ruruka. The two argue back and forth for a bit, with Ruruka suggesting Seiko cooked up the drugs in the bracelets, and Seiko seeming more and more unhinged. There's also that feeling again that there's pretty clearly something that happened between those two that we don't know about.



So she then downs a whole bunch of pills...



...and goes into rage mode or something.



Sonozuke throws a knife at her and bails with Ruruka.



Turns out Seiko just caught it in her mouth and breaks it with ease. She also moves on all fours now, because sure.



So with those three having their own little chase, we see Koichi watching from above.



He neatly sums up the situation with "well that was a thing", also alludes to them having some sort of history, takes a sip from his flask and heads out because he has a meeting with "that girl".



Kyoko and her posse are also talking about what Makoto just broadcast, with Kazuo basically summing up Makoto as a dyed-in-the-wool optimist who takes leaps of faith in trusting others, even if it sounds insane.



Kyoko seems particularly interested in the monitors. Kazuo asks her if something is troubling her, and she says she'll be fine.



Then, suddenly chair attack!



And who else could it have been but Juzo.



Meanwhile, Makoto and Kyosuke meet in the monitoring room.



Kyosuke deciding to go straight through the glass for intimidation factor, I guess.



The two have an argument over the utility of words and a positive outlook, with Kyosuke basically shitting on Makoto's worldview and stating that his performance in DR1, while inspiring, doesn't mean shit compared to the real world, since the game had clear rules, whereas there are no rules in the real world.



Basically, his logic is that the shit Future Foundation went through to keep people alive out there is enough to drive someone insane, and words and platitudes can't beat the despair that is out there.



Makoto argues that even if the words are sometimes hollow, they can be filled in, and that words can inspire people to act - that with words, you give hope to others. Kyosuke then, suprisingly, agrees. That if somebody is capable of doing that, it would be Makoto.



...which is why he can't allow Makoto to escape. Kyosuke thinks that if Makoto makes it out alive, he'll convince people that despair can be beaten without bloodshed, and all that will await the people that follow him is more despair. So he can't allow that to happen. Hope, according to him, doesn't belong to those willing to die, but to those willing to kill, and he's ready to kill thousands if it means he can defeat despair.



Kyosuke swings his sword... and we cut to black. We then hear Kyosuke say "how unfortunate - too bad this wasn't a class trial". Yep, we get a sweet-ass fucking cliffhanger. And now, much like when this first aired, we first have to see another episode of Despair Side before we get to resolve this. Fun!

What the fuck just happened?: Aoi getting killed was a fakeout, instead, Gozu got killed. Makoto's group decides to seek out the monitoring room for Makoto to talk to everybody through the intercom. They reach the room and Makoto tries to explain to everybody why he did the DR2 stuff and tries to get them to trust him. Seiko hulks out with pills and attacks Ruruka and Sonozuke due to some apparent history between them. Juzo attacks Kyoko and her group. Kyosuke finds Makoto in the monitoring room, the two have a philosophy-off over how to deal with despair, and Kyosuke swings his sword at Makoto to end the episode.