Spoilers for ch61 and the entire series

This is a continuation of my post from 9 months ago: Kanou & Aogiri vs V: the “distorted cage” of TG’s world is a chessboard

As you guys know, many things were more or less revealed in the last chapter and I wanted to discuss a few things in order to organize my thoughts when it comes to Kaneki and the Clowns. 

For this post I am going to assume:

1. that the CCG and V are allied through an agreement with the Washuus (if this doesn’t make sense, please refer to the full explanation linked above). According to Eto, it probably happened a century ago, when the CCG was created to counter the one eyed ghoul she talked about.
2. that Furuta might be Souta (here is the theory if you need it)

As always, this post is only my personal (and very long) interpretation so you don’t have to agree considering that there is still a lot of mystery. 🙂 If anything is unclear, feel free to ask for a better explanation.

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1) The Clowns: a part of V or not?

**The pros for this theory:

• Furuta/Souta has ties to V: Furuta’s ties were mentioned in ch61 and the “twisted birdcage” was always associated to Souta’s character in the Tg trump cards set or in the calendar. So Souta could be a double agent or the Clowns could all be a part of V in the first place.

• 10 years before :Re, the Clowns’ annihilation took place in the 4th Ward and even though Arima was there, we know a few Clowns managed to survive. However, now that we know Arima has ties to V, it is *possible* Arima spared some of them because they attracted V’s interest.

• Kuzen was brought in the organization once because he was strong enough to interest them after all, so it is possible the same happened for Uta and the few remaining Clowns, since Uta was strong and charismatic enough to lead the 4th Ward for example.

• They know quite a lot on many subjects and Itori’s network of info is really impressive, so it could be that as members of V they have access to the CCG’s database (especially since Furuta probably wasn’t a member of the CCG three years ago and yet Itori knew well what happened during the Anteiku raid arc).

**The cons:

We know Souta is behind the accident with Rize and we know that Aogiri needed Rize and Kanou for their goal at the time, so the accident with Rize put a halt in Aogiri’s plans until Kanou joined them. 

We also know V see One Eyed Ghouls as threats to the equilibrium and Kanou did the operation on Kaneki because he wanted to create more OEGs to fight against V (more precisely, Kaneki was the last test before the operations on Kuro and Shiro).

It could be that Souta did all that under V’s orders of course but…

• When Kaneki joined Anteiku, it wasn’t long until Uta and Itori heard about it and that’s when his crazy travel started. They pushed him down several paths to see how he would react and change and in the end, the majority of the Clowns grew fond of him, even though OEGs are a threat for V’s equilibrium.

• Kanou once mentioned to Kaneki (ch98) that a “particular reality was hidden” and that without knowing this reality, Kaneki also “won’t be able to see the truth”. 

Considering this entire chapter was Kanou trying to make Kaneki realized about the “twisted birdcage”, we can be sure Kanou was talking about V back then, before they were introduced by Yoshimura in ch119. 

However, coincidentally or not, the talk about a “hidden truth” happened before with one of the Clowns (ch47).

Itori is also the first one who explained to him how natural OEGs could be born and also that there were rumors about a natural OEG (Eto), but when it comes to the panel above, not only does it sound like an advice, but the subject also doesn’t seem to be something to laugh at.
This panel could be a hint that the Clowns are aware of V but not necessarily that they share the same philosophy.

• The Clowns have their own name as a group as well as their own motto and I’m not sure V share it:

=> TL; DR: So, even if the Clowns are with V, there is a good possibility that they don’t follow V’s “philosophy” or don’t care about whatever goals V have. Maybe they were indeed brought into the group because Arima spared them during the Clowns’ annihilation on V’s orders, but their link to Kaneki goes deep and Kaneki’s interactions with Uta and Itori tend to make me think they might not be on V’s side.

The Clowns and their role in the story don’t have to be about the Aogiri vs CCG conflict like everything else is after all; if anything their role might be more about Kaneki’s story in the first place, like the :Re folks. 

Because, if we’re really going towards an all-out conflict between the CCG and Aogiri in the new arc without taking care of the Clowns first, that might mean Kaneki has his own issues to face besides the war between ghouls and humans (even though this war is totally linked to his own path in Ishida’s world).

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2) Sasaki and Arima vs Kaneki and Eto 

Now that we know Arima has ties to V, I’m seeing the scene of V14 with a different eye (lol).

When Washuu Yoshitoki heard about Kaneki during the Anteiku raid arc (ch133), he called Arima who ended up meeting Ken at V14. Arima was able to experience how strong Kaneki got and as we all remember, Kaneki was then taken into the CCG and his new life began as “Sasaki Haise”.

I think that when Arima saw how strong Kaneki was, he also understood that Kaneki was extremely valuable in the CCG’s fight against Aogiri (which is why the idea was later pushed on Haise that he had to either form or become a ghoul investigator “stronger than Arima Kishou”).

Also considering the link between the CCG and V, V probably approved of the idea and that’s why Kaneki Ken was allowed to start another life as a pawn in the fight against Aogiri, but with that in mind, it’s quite certain that V/the Washuus (and maybe even Arima himself) really consider him to be Arima’s quinque and nothing else. 

Kaneki was saved because they knew he’d be interesting if used accordingly to their plans. This is probably the only reason why the CCG and V agreed he was to stay alive, even though he was strong enough to be dangerous and to threaten V’s equilibrium (especially since he sided with Yoshimura in TG).

And the plan was working well… until Eto came into the picture. 

Eto always interested in Kaneki ever since the arc with Kanou’s lab in TG, but recently that interest sky-rocketed with possible romantic feelings on the side for her.

As we learned with ch61, Eto isn’t apparently the OEK (unless she lied of course, but why would she when she admitted to being the founder of Aogiri?) and there is a possibility that she believes Kaneki is the rightful OEK since he defeated her in the last arc (the other possibility being that she believes that OEG of one century ago to be the spiritual leader of Aogiri as the OEK). 

Anyway, leaving all the speculations aside, because he’s strong and because he’s a OEG, Kaneki is the ace card of this battle, as Arima probably realized three years ago: Ken proved he was able to win against Eto, which means he’s able to fight against any investigator and win, and who knows if he wouldn’t be able to win against Arima now too?

Eto left him with a present after the last arc, he got ranked up to Associate Special Class and moved to S3 as a ghoul investigator: for now the two organizations see him as someone valuable to have on their side for the fights to come. 
I have no idea whether the final fight between Aogiri and the CCG will really be for this arc, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Eto were to try making him join Aogiri before the major conflict breaks out (through a meeting with Takatsuki Sen maybe?). 

That’s Eto’s point of view though, as well as the CCG’s when it comes to the valuable OEG Kaneki Ken… so the question should be where Kaneki thinks his place is in the first place.

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3) Kaneki as a Clown? 

This part is entirely theoretical and until a month or two ago, I wouldn’t even have thought to write it publicly but here goes. I don’t mean to say that Kaneki is already a Clown but that he might become one, if they really don’t side with V of course.

Here is why: it’s almost certain that Kaneki recovered a lot of his memories after the last arc and if we start from there then here is what he should be remembering:

• He had an abusive mother who died and left him with an abusive aunt, so for a long time, Hide aside, he was really lonely.
• Kanou then turned him into a OEG and he was taken into Anteiku. The start was rough but after some time (the Tsukiyama arc), Kaneki was stronger, he had friends (both ghoul and human) and he had a stable and rather happier life for the first time ever. 
• Then Aogiri came into the picture and shattered that stable life.

• It took him a long time before Yoshimura and Touka helped him realize he could come back to Anteiku and be happy again.
• Then the CCG attacked Anteiku and shattered his second chance at recovering stability and a possible happiness.

So technically by now, Kaneki should remember that three years ago, Aogiri and the CCG both destroyed his peace at different times, so… if that’s the case, why should he be siding with either of them in the first place?

As I was explaining in another post, it’s probable he remembers meeting with Uta and Touka/Nishiki/Yomo as Sasaki Haise in earlier chapters and yet it appears he didn’t rat them out. 

As a result, it can be interpreted that throwing Tsukiyama off the roof in the last arc was him giving Shuu a chance at survival (as Hori pointed out), just like he might be trying to find a way to save Hinami from being “disposed” (some speculated that this was what the calendar in the last chapter was about) and that would explain why he doesn’t go see her -> the less he appears to care, the less people will think he had a hand in that.

(Even Urie thinks he’s being harsh)

So in case he doesn’t side with Aogiri nor the CCG, why would he go with the Clowns instead of going back to :Re for example? 

Well, it seems Kaneki really believes he has to fight (because Yoshimura asked him to save Eto, because crushing Aogiri was his goal for a long time…), which means that if he doesn’t side with Aogiri or the CCG, he has 3 choices:

• fighting on his own with perhaps one or two allies (like at that time with Banjou and Tsukiyama), but how is he supposed to maybe take on two strong organizations on his own? He just wouldn’t be strong enough alone. 
• go to :Re, but I doubt Yomo and the others would agree to throw themselves into such a war when they also don’t side with Aogiri and the CCG. Leaving the CCG and Aogiri to destroy each other would be probably the wisest choice in their opinion and I’m pretty sure Yomo would act as he did when Anteiku was attacked.
  The :Re group wants to live on, not to fight such a hopeless war (especially when they have reasons to hate both Aogiri and the CCG).
• join the Clowns. As I said, even if the Clowns turn out to be with V, their link with Kaneki is something weird but deep and I think they’d find it more interesting to be allies with him rather than to watch him go die alone.

Actually, you could read TG (not :Re) by only looking at Kaneki and the Clowns, and somehow, the whole thing can be taken as the Clowns testing Kaneki to see how much he would be able to hold on and grow up by going through so many different things.
And the result of that “test”? Well, they all said (minus Souta) they actually liked Kaneki because he was interesting, so I don’t see why Kaneki wouldn’t be able to join them, especially since it’s one “side” he hasn’t tried yet.

Also, it seems that…

…They might already have a plan involving Kaneki (unless Uta was lying, it’s not impossible), so while him joining them isn’t the highest possibility for now, it’s not completely far-fetched either.

Seriously, considering the Clowns seem to be the neutral chaotic group of the story (not apparently siding with the CCG or Aogiri, which is why I’m still not convinced they’re truly a part of V), Kaneki siding with neither of the “big organizations” would still have his place in the battle by siding with the Clowns. 

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=> TL;DR of the whole post: Considering the relationship between the Clowns and Kaneki up until now, it’s not impossible to say that Kaneki might end up getting closer to them, no matter if the Clowns are with V or not. The Clowns seem to have their own goal anyway and it might be linked to Kaneki.

However, in the case the Clowns really need/want Kaneki to join them (for their goal or just for the heck of it), I wonder if that doesn’t mean the Clowns’ true opponents will turn out to be the :Re group at the end…

Because, while Aogiri and the CCG are fighting the main battle, they have the numbers to rival with each other, which is not exactly the case for the Clowns and :Re, who are more neutral when it comes to the human vs ghoul conflict in the first place anyway.
It’s like, both Aogiri and the CCG have approximately a thousand of men ready to fight the other side, while the Clowns might be a group of 10 members and the :Re group might be even less. 

To sum up, a chessboard is a square, right? It has four sides, so it could be said for now that Aogiri and the CCG are facing each other from two parallel sides (V acting from behind the CCG), while the Clowns might face the :Re guys on the other two parallel sides of the chessboard.  

As for Kaneki? Obviously he’s in the middle of the chessboard, as the ace card/major pawn of the CCG vs Aogiri fight for now, but maybe after that he will stay at the center, as the reason the Clowns might fight against :Re. 

(I’m really not sure about the part on the :Re guys becoming enemy with the Clowns actually, but since the Clowns were mainly the reason Kaneki was forced to grow up so harshly in TG, while :Re represents a possibly stable and happier way to live, calling them opponents is definitely too soon but still something to keep in mind, just in case. I’m not entirely seeing it for now, it’s just a possibility) 

Thanks for reading and sorry if it doesn’t make much sense.