Talk:Izumi Akazawa/@comment-25409301-20140911182738/@comment-397235-20140913144807

With the hands thing...in the manga it's Tomohiko who does that, and I always got the impression it was a matter of "This is absurd but why not give it a shot?" I never got the impression he really believed it, any more than Izumi. She explains it to Kouichi later on as being more or less a superstition; mostly I think she just brings it up again so he'll hold her hand. :)

Takako thinks Mei is the Extra because of her missing eye. It's...somewhat a logical conclusion to come to. It's just a matter of the Calamity feeding of her own instabilities so it can manipulate her into starting the witch hunt and making its job a lot easier.

Yumi, knowing only what she knows, sees Mei as justifiably responsible for her brother's death (it's odd she doesn't even mention the Ayanos here, but oh well). I think it's less a matter of her seeing Mei as a monster and more her being distraught at losing her best friend and her brother, and furthermore being extremely scared. Fear makes us do some unpleasant things.

Now yes, I agree, if Mei had come back to school the next day telling everyone about how her sister had died, very few people would've really paid attention. Izumi and Tomohiko are smart enough (and maybe Yukari, because she seems like the type to care). Still, in her situation, I'd have gone to Chibiki and told him what was going on to see if he could help. I mean, he knows about the Calamity but he's not actually in Class 3. And if nothing else, that's someone at the Inn who now knows what's going on and can vouch for Mei.

And that still doesn't explain why she didn't try to explain herself at the Inn. Izumi tells her, essentially, "This is all your fault, so I want you to apologize."

What does Mei say? "No, it was out of our control." "No, it had already started."

No, Mei says "This is pointless." That's an evasion. That's "Yeah, maybe this is my fault, but I won't own up to it." And then she agrees to apologize anyway, which is even worse. Like I said before, Izumi told the entire class it was all Mei's fault (and Kouichi's as well, in the manga [Takako somewhat more justifiably makes that case in the film], but nobody ever remembers that), and then Mei agreed.

Like I said, all it would've taken was for Mei to actually explain what happened. So far as the people who come after her and Kouichi (Izumi, Yumi, Takako, Tomohiko, and Takeru in the movie) know, Mei's both caused the Calamity and hasn't lost anyone close to her. That's got to piss them off on some level. I mean, that looks like "This girl caused this disaster; how is it fair she gets off scott-free?"

But Mei didn't. So in a way, she kind of brought that down on herself.