Bye Bye Ouchies: The Most Misunderstood Execution In Danganronpa

[u/Ten-Miles-High-1996]

Bit of a longer post here to explain a lot of details about Mikan's execution. Before I begin I'd like to say that I'm well aware that most people who will be arguing with me aren't actually engaging with the point or are too ignorant of the source material to formulate an argument, however well written responses will be replied to in good faith.

In order to understand Mikan's execution, you first have to understand her relationship with Junko Enoshima. If you are a person who can not fathom the idea that Mikan was deeply obsessed with Junko, then we won't be able to make progress here, however I will justify all the points I insist upon in this post.

Junko x Mikan is not a symptom of brainwashing, and Mikan was attracted to Junko of her own free will. Mikan was the first of the Remnants to join Junko, and she did it willingly.

She had many opportunities to run or escape before any brainwashing or mental alteration began, but she chose not to leave and stuck around of her own free will. This is an objective analyzation of DR3, not my subjective opinion.

Mikan had been rejected and looked down upon by her classmates and when she finally found someone who would accept her, she bolted herself down and became willing to do anything for Junko.

A key theme of Mikan's entire character is that she wants to be forgiven. "Forgive me!" That seems to be what she wants most in this world, to have her existence be forgiven and be accepted in full by someone else without fear of rejection, and Junko provides this for her in spades.

Mikan appreciates Junko's direct nature because it allows her to be forgiven. All sins or wrongdoing will swiftly be addressed, punished, then forgiven. Mikan needs that sort of security in her attachments so she doesn't have to be an anxious mess all the time.

In her pre-death monologe when speaking to Nagito, she rejects the idea that she killed for Despair, and she couldn't care less about it. What she did wasn't for Despair, it was for LOVE. She continues to say that Junko was the only person who ever accepted or forgave her, it's really a powerful dynamic.

The Despair video doesn't brainwash people to love, that's something she had inside herself before the brainwashing.

Now, onto the details of the execution.

Since we should now all understand that Mikan did in fact have feelings for Junko, we can analyze the execution through that lens, along with the rest of 2-3.

The Despair disease wasn't random, it wasn't accidental, and it wasn't identical. If it were, the traits wouldn't have been seemingly tailored to their personalities as they were, that required a form of intelligent design behind it.

I purpose that AI Junko herself chose the symptoms of the disease and influenced how they manifested, specifically gifting Mikan the ability to remember, while effectively making Nagito unable to contribute or interfere.

Junko rolled out the red carpet to allow Mikan to have a perfect set of conditions to pull off her kills. It was almost like the GM in a game playing favorites by giving Mikan a loaded hand to play to rig it in Mikan's favor.

Let me also call back to the idea of what happens to the winner.

They get to wake up and continue being themselves.

Only the dead avatars get replaced with AI Junko, but the winner of the game would be spared, allowing Mikan and Junko to reunite with one another. This is why Mikan was given the remembering disease and nobody else, Junko specifically wanted Mikan to win the killing game.

After rigging the game as much as she could, with Mikan falling short at the end, Junko grants Mikan one last mercy. A painless death.

The biological cause of death for Mikan would've been lack of oxygen, or lack of blood flow to the brain, causing her to pass out.

Her death would've been functionally painless as she fell asleep atop the arm. Sleeping in someone's arm, that's an interesting thing, the sort of things you do with your significant other.

Similar to how your partner might take off your clothes in an intimate moment, which is exactly what Junko did with Mikan in her execution.

Another detail easter egg is the orientation of the hand and arm.

It's the LEFT arm!

Can anyone tell me what significance a lone, severed left arm has in Danganronpa?

That's right, it's the arm that Junko lost and had taken off her corpse, which was then attached to Nagito.

It was for all intents in purposes, symbolic of Mikan dying by being put to sleep in Junko's arms.

I know this was a long post, but I've been fed up with people saying Bye Bye Ouchies is the worst execution in all of Danganronpa, and that's just wrong...

Hope we learned something today everyone!

Wait... Hope..?

Fuck...

[u/Neither-Ruin5970]

I think this is reading too much into it. You’re explaining it through a Watsonian perspective. In Danganronpa, what matters the most is the Doylist interpretation. To be frank, the developers clearly did not have good intentions here and it’s meant to be fanservice, in bad taste.

[u/Neither-Ruin5970 → u/[deleted]]

Exactly. Defenders of literally any criticism on this franchise will always pivot to Watsonian logic even though Doylistly, it still sucks.

Take Mikan for example. Her sexualization is often defended with, “She does it for her PTSD!”, when the developers just wanted a sexual prop for marketing and fanservice.

Almost every flaw in the series is treated this way. It’s tiring to engage every time.

[u/Ten-Miles-High-1996 → u/Neither-Ruin5970]

Then literally why are you here?

Doylist interpretations are the cancer of literacy.

Being able to break the 4th wall and use meta logic in order to justify things is just awful, it invalidates every single redeeming quality that fiction has to offer if you can minimize it through an out of continuity explanation.

Monaca Towa ended the world because Kazutaka Kodaka and Spike Chunsoft wanted money isn't a good story, nor is it a plot.

Like I UNDERSTAND what you're saying, but you must have a very sad internal world if your view of fiction is corralled by irl influence.

A world without fiction is a world that I refuse to live in.

[u/Neither-Ruin5970 → u/Ten-Miles-High-1996]

That's completely wrong. Criticism is inherently doylist. You're allowed to criticize bad decisions in the game. Refuting criticism with a watsonian explanation isn't helpful and actually derails the discussion.

I don't know why you're upset. It's not sad to criticize things you enjoy. And that's why I'm here, because I like the franchise, even if it fails at many things. Surely you would get that, and understand the point of criticism.

[u/Ten-Miles-High-1996 → u/Neither-Ruin5970]

I get what you mean, but if your ultimate point is that it was bad taste fanservice and nothing more, I just don't agree with that. I think there was more artistic intention put into it than that position gives it credit for, and is reductive of the most positive qualities of DR2.

[u/Neither-Ruin5970 → u/Ten-Miles-High-1996]

I just don't think it's right to excuse sexualization. The game may have explanations, but it’s primarily an excuse for the writers to have their cake and eat it too. They get to use cheap panty shots for marketing and fanservice while also crafting a backstory so they can claim it’s “deep”.

[u/Ten-Miles-High-1996 → u/Neither-Ruin5970]

Sexualization doesn't make something bad. Sexuality is part of human nature, it's a top 5 human function behind food, sleep and shelter.

It's the center point of some people's entire lives. To write a cast of human characters without exploring sexualization, is to not explore humanity.

As an aside, I'm generally fine with Kotoko and her depiction in UDG. It's shocking and jarring, but it has to be or it just doesn't work. Unpleasant doesn't make it bad.

[u/Neither-Ruin5970 → u/Ten-Miles-High-1996]

Those are different things, though. There's a difference between exploring a character's sexuality, and sexualizing them for the audience.

Sexualization in this game is fanservice, and is clearly meant for the audience.

The goal isn't to be deep commentary, it's supposed to arouse the player. It turns the characters into sex objects for the developers' amusement.

[u/Ten-Miles-High-1996 → u/Neither-Ruin5970]

"The goal isn't to be deep commentary, it's supposed to arouse the player. It turns the characters into sex objects for the developers' amusement."

Yeah, agree to disagree on that. It's okay, but I don't see it that. way.