PERSONA is back in action!

It’s been a long while since I blogged any PERSONA, let alone watched any, so I think it’d be best to tell what happened in the last episode. Shin’s older brother, Ryou went to go face Kujou, leader of the Marebito, even though he knew he’d lose. Eiko catches on that Ryou is acting strangely and goes out to the snow fields to catch up with him, but she is too late. Ryou lies wounded on the snowy plains with an uncontrollable persona on the lose beside him. Ryou’s enrages persona shoots down Eiko, and she falls in front of Ryou. Now, here were are in episode 14, Ryou and Eiko have been missing for awhile now because the snow on the plains has already melted.

The show also picks up a new opening, which, in my opinion, is much better than the previous one. It’s not that I didn’t like the first opening, it’s just that this one is completely epic. There is a part where it shows each of the important leads and it gives extra emphasis to Jun, so we know that after what happened in episode 13, Jun will be of much bigger interest.

Summary:

Nobody really know that happened that night that Ryou and Eiko went missing. There have been various news reports since then, but all of them just further the mysteries. There’s the possibility that Ryou actually killed Eiko, but that is mere speculation. Sadly, that seems to be the belief that Shin is leaning towards. Because in the start of the episode, Shin suffers a nightmare where his persona and his elder brother’s persona are in heated combat. What is interesting about this is that, obviously before he fell asleep (or somehow while he was asleep), Shin was molding the shape of Ryou’s persona out of clay. It came out to look pretty good and by the middle of the episode he had carved out and edged every groove and minuscule detail. He’s clearly having a lot of trouble coping with Ryou’s disappearance.

After his nightmare, He makes off to the police station as quickly as he can in order to see if Detective Itou has found out anything new. Unfortunately, this means that he will miss out of shaved ice with Jun, Inui, Megumi, and Takuruo, but that doesn’t matter to him and they understand where he is and what he’s going through. This doesn’t change that his friends are worried about him and just as confused over what’s happening too. During this snack time, Jun reveals that “he” loved Eiko. This is a little bit blury to me. I think he’s is referring to Shin beause he says this in response to Megumi who is talking about Shin, but Takurou immediately responds with a statement about Ryou possibly killing Eiko. I’ll just play it safe and assume that Jun is talking about Shin because we know that Shin was uncovering some deep feelings for Eiko and that Jun was catching on to them.

Shin’s trip to the station meets a road block. Apparently, he’d been visiting quite a bit, because the detectives have begun to hide from him since they don’t have any answers to his questions. A lie is sent to the front desk to be relayed to Shin about how Itou is currently on a case; Shin knows that isn’t true, so he sneaks in using a ramen delivery boy costume. He was lucky enough to see the delivery boy having trouble with his burdensome load so he was able to borrow the uniform in exchange for carrying the heavy box. He walks straight up to Itou and hands him his ramen. This comes as a surprise so he finally sits Shin down and tells him straight up all he knows, which is nothing. Itou explains how they know that Ryou and the Reverse cases are connected and that know that he’s gone they can finaly investigate them, but it’s useless. Then Itou comes out and tell’s Shin how he has been taken off of the case. So Shin leaves the station, but on the elevator he rides down with a man with white hair. This man appears again later in the episode, talking with Inui. I suspect that this is the new chief and that the extra spicy Beef Bowl Ramen was for him (just a guess).

While Shin was out all day, Kanaru decided to come visit. Of course, she didn’t know that nobody was home, so this left her standing out front ringing the doorbell until Jun came home from shopping. They step inside to find that Shin was indeed not home so they went to sit on the couch, have some juice, and look through some old photo albums. This is where she sees some pictures of Ryou and Eiko as children and she recognizes the young face of Eiko, the same face that had appeared in missing person news reports.

Shin ends his day off by visiting the fields where Eiko and Ryou went missing. My best guess that he knew this was the spot and that there are this unfounded claims that Ryou is responsible for the deaths is that Eiko’s body was found there, but Ryou’s was not. Ryou was most likely a victim of a Reverse effect, this statement is somewhat supported at the end of the episode. Aside from this, Shin had come to put flowers on the field for Eiko and in his mind he wonders why Ryou would kill her.

On his way back home, he is stopped by Soutarou of Marebito. Shin knows that he is an enemy, but decides to meet with him anyways in case he knew something of Ryou. Soutarou didn’t know anything, or just wasn’t willing to reveal anything, in fact, he stopped Shin to ask try to get some information out of him regarding Ryou. He finds out that Shin doesn’t know what the pills are and that the two weren’t working together. Soutarou goes off on a tangent and starts talking about how everyone is getting tired and is giving up. He quotes the prime minister on a scandal to prove his point: “Oh so troublesome. Just let it be.” Shin can’t believe something like this, but his disbelief is put aside when a waiter says “So torublesome” after being scolded by his manager. And if I recall correctly, Shin doesn’t know about Marebito so he shouldn’t know about the connection between the organization that Soutarou is in and Ryou’s disappearance, but this doesn’t stop him from calling Itou and trying to tail Soutarou. (He knows that Soutarou is a part of an organization and that they are responsible for the Reverse cases, but he doesn’t actually know the name or aim of the group.)

At this time, Wakasa, one of the twins from Marebito (Shiba is the name of the other), is in bad shape. His persona is out of control (probably from overdose on the pills or from finally reaching his limit on the medicine). He steps out of the darkness of the alley and walks onto a main street, releasing his sickly persona; small hands protrude from every crevice in the armor and Wakasa dangles from it in a torn up unconscious state. Jun, Megumi, Takurou, and Kanaru are all in the same vicinity. Jun’s persona respondsand several tentacles from Wakasa’s persona come at him. Shin jumps in the way and deflects the attack. Megumi, Shin, and Takurou step forward to form an combined front against the monstrous persona, when, all of the sudden, a beam comes down from the roof, destroying the persona and person in one hit. Shin looks up to see Ryou and his persona on top of the building and then, the next second, nothing but feathers. This feathery disappearance supports my belief that Ryou had become victim to a Reverse.

Thoughts:

I must say that I am ashamed for having forgotten about this show. I hadn’t seen an episode in so long and was lucky to remember what was going on. I’ll try to get back on the ball for blogging this show, because I genuinely like it and on that 13th episode things were only going to get better so I don’t know why I put it on hold for so long at such a critical point in the plot.

I’m curious to see if they reveal soon if that white haired guy is the new chief and I wish they’d tell more about the whole Eiko Ryou missing bit, but I assume I guessed most everything right and that will be revealed shortly.