Talk:Yumi Ogura/@comment-64.237.139.211-20140421033942/@comment-397235-20140704062548

Good point. I think the bottom line, though, is it's still tragic in many ways. I don't really think anybody deserved to be put in the situations they were put in. I remember being 15...not fondly, but I remember it. That's a lot of pressure for anyone let alone people at that age.

I, on some level, respect Izumi because she always came across (to me at least) as being extremely protective of her class, and each and every time someone dies she sees it as a personal failure. The fact she volunteered to be head of Countermeasures speaks volumes about her personality...on the other hand, her tenure in that role is a complete disaster. You can directly lay Sanae's death at her door in any adaptation (since it's heavily implied she died because Kouichi got her involved in the first place; if he'd known better that wouldn't have happened), as well as Ikuo's in the anime (he basically died doing what she or Naoya should've done but wouldn't). Ignoring Kouichi was a desperate ploy, but all it really did was drive him closer to Mei, which undoubtedly wasn't what she had in mind. Every time she gets involved she just makes things worse: she takes Junta with her to the beach to help out with Matsunaga (or something), only for him to get killed by a boat, the witnessing of which causes Takako to suffer a psychotic breakdown. Constantly venting about how everything is Mei's fault to someone who's already, by her own admission, unstable doesn't make things better, and because Takako is Izumi's right hand girl, she's able to hop right on the Crazy Train and invite the rest of her class to come along, which they do because "Hey, she's in Countermeasures too, so she must know what's going on."

I never really got the impression Yumi was that insane. I think it was more a matter of grasping at straws. She's suffered two extremely dramatic losses literally on the same day, and thanks to Takako, she now has a convenient person to blame things on. Because she thought Mei was dead, in her mind at least, everything was Mei's fault and killing her would at least set things right. She had the right idea...just the wrong person. And I think if Aya had been there, she probably wouldn't have been leading the "Let's kill Mei" squad.

Takako, on the other hand, really is that crazy. I mean, she takes time while she's strangling herself to death to yell curses at Mei, like it's somehow her fault she's dying. Of course, she's also an extremely introverted and dependent person, and she's only gotten worse after seeing Junta get killed. The creepy fixation she has for Izumi is proof of this. A lot of people misread this as sexual, but it's not (if it were, she'd have been trying to kill Kouichi too); it's more a matter of "Well, I'm obviously not going to be happy myself, but I can be happy vicariously through my bestie here, who has a huge crush on the new guy and absolutely fucking despises the girl he's hanging around with. I'll bet I can kill two birds with one stone here..." At first she seems like the last person you'd expect to snap. After Kubodera guts himself, she's the only person who doesn't flip out (she's also the only person you can't actually see during the act, so I'm going by the scene when everyone's outside class). In fact, she really just seems irritated, and appears to be looking at Aya, who's nearly catatonic, with disdain, as if to say "Are you serious? Get over it." She's also the one who tries to console Izumi when she blames herself for Yukari's death, telling her Shigata ga nai (an extremely fatalistic expression which basically means it's out of our hands, so why worry about it?). That doesn't sound like someone who's going to blame anybody for the curse. More like, the curse just...is, and the only thing anyone can do about it is try to stay alive. And then Junta dies, and her entire veneer cracks, and that's it for her. What's really sad about it, though, is if you pay attention, she and Misaki were apparently friends (which is why Takako remembers Misaki and not Fujioka; you don't use first names in Japan except with people you're close to); she and Mei had Misaki in common (they're the only characters who both knew her), and under different circumstances probably could've worked things out. But nobody ever tries to explain things to her, instead they just focus on hitting her a lot. I think that's what bothers me about her death: mental illness (and asthma) both run in my family, so a crazy person strangling herself is pretty troubling for me, even if the person in question isn't an especially likeable character to begin with. You can treat crazy. You don't kill it.

Oddly enough, I was actually talking about this with Devon a few weeks ago. I can understand and sort of sympathize with Tomohiko for blaming Kouichi for sweet little Yukari's death. I'd even understand if he'd gone after Naoya (you know, the guy who tried to end him in the first place?). If he'd confined himself to either of those two, I'd be a lot more bothered by his death. Unfortunately, he killed Aki and Kyouko for no apparent reason at all other than they were convenient, and then didn't care when it was explained he was wrong. His reaction was basically "Whoops, guess I'll have to kill you next. My bad." It'd be one thing if he'd, say, killed Takako in such a way that at first looked heroic (like stabbing her before she could finish off Mei) before trying to off Kouichi himself; then he'd at least have killed someone who'd done something wrong. But no, he just kills the two random girls who did nothing to deserve it. That's why I don't like him, and why he's the only one I really don't feel sorry for (well, him and Kenzou, because if he'd tried to save his friends he'd have survived).