If we’re heading for 206, the number of human bones in an adult body, it’s interesting to me that the 300th chapter of the series as a whole started with Kaneki waking up in a fetal position…
…because humans are born with around 300 bones. It’d fit with the themes of maturation and moving away from a childlike black and white view of the world and of himself, to Kaneki viewing himself and the world as appropriately complex in this final arc.
Hi Anon! I’d consider it a crack theory more than a theory, but it’s something I always kept in some part of my mind yeah, because…
Kaneki and Mutsuki parallel each other and, well, we know what happened to Mutsuki’s family…
Also, Sensei revealed rather late that Kaneki had an abusive mom and I always thought there could be a plot-relevant reason for that, especially since “Rize” is the one who gave us the first hint for that truth in ch62:
so I’d find it fitting that her calling him a murderer right now would also be in reference to what possibly happened with his mom, if he had a hand (whether it was an accident or not) in how she died.
Besides, there is something Kaneki never solved about his mother. I always thought that he’d maybe finally mention her to someone (like Touka) once he’d feel safe enough to address the subject of his abusive childhood but he never did. So, as @hidewari proposed [x], maybe we still haven’t seen him properly addressing the topic of his mother because he feels guilty about what he did to her, especially considering…
that he seems to be smiling in this memory. Also…
:///
Finally, this is just me but what does “dying from overwork” even means? Was it a cardiac arrest? Or did she fall down the stairs because she was too tired? “Overworking” is not specific enough for me not to think Sensei might have something else to add on this topic.
That being said, the reason I’m considering it as a crack theory is that nothing forces Sensei to go that far in Kaneki’s parallels with Mutsuki. These two characters parallel each other a lot already, so Sensei can choose to make it even bigger or not, it won’t change much for anyone besides Kaneki and his personal issues about his mother.
The second thing is that, unlike Mutsuki, for now I think the most likely version of this crack theory is that, if Kaneki played a part in how his mother died, then it was an accident. Like, maybe he tried to push her away when she was beating him and she fell down the stairs, or any similar event leading to no one doubting his version that she died from overworking herself. Of course, the not-an-accident version of this crack theory can be considered too since, overall, nothing is certain.
TL;DR I’m not sure, but that’s kinda why I cannot wait for Monday’s chapter. It’s alwas been a cracky possibility to me but frankly I was kinda scared to mention it earlier this week, just in case it’d cost me a few angry anons in the askbox. That’s why I was really happy to see that apparently other bloggers were thinking the same thing. 🙂 But best to keep it as cracky for now. :3
We’ll see on Monday. Thanks for passing by and have a nice weekend. :))
Hi Anon! And nope, not necessarily? I mean, look at Mutsuki, didn’t we just agree that the latest chapters were a good thing because that means Mutsuki is finally on a good path to start seeking redemption? 🙂
So, why couldn’t it be the same for Kaneki if he, too, is responsible to some extent for his mother’s death? Besides, for now I’m really vouching for an accident, even if it could have been more than that as long as we don’t get more hints for this crack theory.
The main thing to keep in mind is that TG was the tragedy, not :Re, and anyway…
it’s going to be boring if Kaneki ends up dying at the very end and we wouldn’t to disappoint our very special public. 😉 More arguments vouching for a good ending for :Re here!
Maybe I didn’t expand enough above, but what possibly happened (or not) to Kaneki’s mom isn’t directly plot-relevant. It’s relevant to Kaneki’s characterization and development because his mom issues are something he has yet to confront to this day, but all that this crack theory impacts besides himself is his relationship to Touka and their baby, because Kaneki’s future partially
rests
on Kaneki’s character development.
That being said, Kaneki and Touka always were a set and Touka has her own dad issues to confront before the end, so frankly, whether Kaneki is somehow involved in his mother’s death or not, the only thing it implies is that Kaneki will have to confront himself about this at some point. :))
So no worries, Kaneki’s redemption after Dragoneki where the world is concerned will probably have to do with taking V down for everyone else’s sake.
I hope it makes sense! Don’t worry Anon, we don’t even know if this theory is true. Have a nice weekend :3
Hi Anon! I’d consider it a crack theory more than a theory, but it’s something I always kept in some part of my mind yeah, because…
Kaneki and Mutsuki parallel each other and, well, we know what happened to Mutsuki’s family…
Also, Sensei revealed rather late that Kaneki had an abusive mom and I always thought there could be a plot-relevant reason for that, especially since “Rize” is the one who gave us the first hint for that truth in ch62:
so I’d find it fitting that her calling him a murderer right now would also be in reference to what possibly happened with his mom, if he had a hand (whether it was an accident or not) in how she died.
Besides, there is something Kaneki never solved about his mother. I always thought that he’d maybe finally mention her to someone (like Touka) once he’d feel safe enough to address the subject of his abusive childhood but he never did. So, as @hidewari proposed [x], maybe we still haven’t seen him properly addressing the topic of his mother because he feels guilty about what he did to her, especially considering…
that he seems to be smiling in this memory. Also…
:///
Finally, this is just me but what does “dying from overwork” even means? Was it a cardiac arrest? Or did she fall down the stairs because she was too tired? “Overworking” is not specific enough for me not to think Sensei might have something else to add on this topic.
That being said, the reason I’m considering it as a crack theory is that nothing forces Sensei to go that far in Kaneki’s parallels with Mutsuki. These two characters parallel each other a lot already, so Sensei can choose to make it even bigger or not, it won’t change much for anyone besides Kaneki and his personal issues about his mother.
The second thing is that, unlike Mutsuki, for now I think the most likely version of this crack theory is that, if Kaneki played a part in how his mother died, then it was an accident. Like, maybe he tried to push her away when she was beating him and she fell down the stairs, or any similar event leading to no one doubting his version that she died from overworking herself. Of course, the not-an-accident version of this crack theory can be considered too since, overall, nothing is certain.
TL;DR I’m not sure, but that’s kinda why I cannot wait for Monday’s chapter. It’s alwas been a cracky possibility to me but frankly I was kinda scared to mention it earlier this week, just in case it’d cost me a few angry anons in the askbox. That’s why I was really happy to see that apparently other bloggers were thinking the same thing. 🙂 But best to keep it as cracky for now. :3
We’ll see on Monday. Thanks for passing by and have a nice weekend. :))
I’ve seen people toying with the idea of Kaneki being responsible for his mother’s death (similar to what happened with Mutsuki’s family) for a while now, and that has me thinking.
Rize accused Kaneki of being a murderer at the end of this chapter, and Kaneki mentioned specifically how he had to eat humans in order to save those he cares about. That makes me think that the focus of the next chapter will be the human lives that Kaneki’s taken, which means that we will potentially have some focus on the Oggai and maybe Hide. But, if these theories about Kaneki killing his mother are true, then I feel like that would be a massive revelation at such a significant turning point in Kaneki’s development, especially considering that it would have been the first human death Kaneki would have been responsible for. It could easily be pulled off the same way that Kaneki’s abuse at the hands of his mother was and the way that the deaths of Mutsuki’s family were (especially considering the fact that Kaneki and Mutsuki have been paralleled frequently in the past) wherein, Kaneki had been suppressing the memory entirely and instead blaming his mother’s death on overwork as a way of dealing with the guilt.
It’s not a solid theory by any means, but it would certainly be an interesting idea to play around with and potentially open up some doors for major development and perhaps some revelations about Kaneki’s character and his motives (i.e. perhaps it could be used as one underlying reason that he was so opposed to killing humans but not so much ghouls).
What I really want to come from Kaneki’s talk with Rize
Is that he turns Rize back into himself, this whole arc has been culminating to Kaneki finding out who he is through becoming a monster. One of his biggest flaws is when he is in his headspace, he doesn’t trust himself listen to himself. When he confronts his bad side it’s always someone who has hurt him, Rize his into crossroad the women who inadvertently turned him into who he is, or Jason who hurt him, as haise Kaneki whose memories scared him. When his mind is trying to help him, the one time he did it was Hide or a younger innocent self never the man he is now. He pushed forward a little with the ken conference but this is a step backwards. He is using Rize to hurt him to make him feel quilt for hurting humans instead of accepting what he did and taking it on himself, he will only be able to move forward if he can admit and fight himself on his conflicting emotions. I’m ready to see him finally let go of Rize as this mental torment to make himself hurt. I want him to finally face himself
As many people have noticed already, Rize’s line of calling Kaneki a murderer now that he’s killed human beings is a reference to Kaneki’s long held notion that killing ghouls was acceptable, while it was unacceptable to kill humans.
Hi! Ultimately, I think it will come to what you’re describing (although I don’t think he’s moving within his dragon kakuja at all), especially since we know Touka was last seen following where he possibly was…
so for now I think she’s the one who is going to get him out. However, before we get there, I’m of the opinion that the current cinematic playing in his head is all like a trial he has to overcome, before he will allow the waves to pull his body to “the other side”, through that sea of dead bodies, and he’ll emerge where Touka and everyone else are.
See, since it’s all in his head, it means that on some level he’s already conscious of what he did ever since ch144 (hence why what you described does look like Dragoneki’s eyes) and “Rize” is just supposed to help him reach bigger conclusions, because she was used as a catalyst to major realizations before.
To be honest though, and to address your question of if Dragon is somehow represented in ch157, I wonder if Rize isn’t also representing Dragon on some level. What I mean by that is that Kaneki received her kakuhou but Rize isn’t such a random ghoul, because she’s from the Washuu lineage…
…which is why Dragoneki currently seems to parallel the Nagaraj from around 100 years ago so much. So, more than just Rize acting as a catalyst, I wonder if she’s not also supposed to make him see in what kind of net he fell from the very beginning, and what role he is supposed to acknowledge next.
I mean, if you look at Kaneki’s narrative arc so far, he was stuck in the position of the OEK and was not doing a very good job of it, which is what led to Dragon…
Then again, the whole problematic of the OEK is that it’s a title that Kaneki received from Arima and Eto, a title he didn’t particularly want but that he still took because, at the time, he had nothing else to live for.
Honestly, becoming the OEK should have been easy enough for Kaneki if he had cared about coexistence in the slightest, because the “OEK” terrifies the CCG and V due to the previous OEKs who raised havoc in the past:
However, Kaneki doesn’t care about coexistence, at least not for now…
…which is why he failed to use that title correctly and the OEK will possibly be no more once the Dragoneki arc is over.
That being said, Kaneki always was presented to be the bridge between humans and ghouls, and that from TG’s very first volume, so he’s not going to be able to escape this role by now.
Anyway, back to Rize = a possible form of Dragoneki symbolism, because he was given Rize’s Washuu kakuhou, Kaneki was a pawn from the very beginning in Kanou’s/Furuta’s/Eto’s plans to annihilate the Washuus and current system, and I think it’s highly time for him to realize that too, because he has his own freedom and future to fight for as well, until this conflict ends.
That’s why I see the current cinematic in his head as a trial he has to overcome. There is what Rize literally called him on…
…which is a reality he has to acknowledge, because he killed both ghouls and humans by now. However, there is also the fact that his whole narrative of being a OEG + being referred to as the bridge between humans and ghouls who would bring coexistence still exists in the plot, and he can’t avoid this reality either when he once embraced it in TG until Aogiri fucked everything up.
In other words…
I hope that Kaneki will realize once more about “times when you have to protect something even if it means throwing away something else”.
It will start with acknowledging that he became a murderer, long ago for ghouls and recently for humans, for this very reason (which is not particularly an issue at this point since 99.5% of the cast is the same). However it might also allow him to realize what kind of role he’ll have to tackle next (maybe the Nameless King if there is a real difference with the OEK?), since he won’t be able to have that peaceful future with Touka and their baby as long as this conflict doesn’t end.
Sorry for rambling. I swear I didn’t want to digress xD To sum up, my thoughts are that Rize is a trigger to realizing a truth he’s already semi-conscious about (hence the whole cinematic, since everything is happening in his head) but never worked towards before. So it’s not just supposed to be about looking back on the past, “Rize” is also here, in my opinion, to make him realize what he’ll have to do in the future too.
And once he’ll acknowledge all of what she has to show him, once he’ll be done with this new trial that he created for himself, then he’ll be able to swim through that water without fearing those dead bodies and with Touka waiting for him on the other end.
I hope it was understandable, sorry it got so long. Have a nice day!
I’m going to begin by quoting Dostoyevsky’s The Idiot: “Don’t let us forget that the causes of human actions are usually immeasurably more complex and varied than our subsequent explanations of them.”
Let’s also discuss the term “murderer” in the story. Every single character except Yoriko and Momochi Ikuma is a murderer. The point is not “Kaneki is worse!” but rather “Kaneki is no different.” When I say Kaneki is a murderer, it is not me condemning him, or saying that his actions are not understandable at times, or that I don’t relate to his struggles as the OEK, because I do understand where he’s coming from and I relate heavily to his struggles.
But yes, Kaneki is a murderer. So is everyone. And the reasons they are all murderers are immeasurably more complex than the simple fact that they took away a breathing, thinking, hoping person’s life. Those complex reasons are what give them hope for redemption.
Narratively, Kaneki has been a murderer since the Shironeki days, in which he expressly stated he was murdering and cannibalizing to gain strength. This happened after Yamori tortured him, which was not his fault. However, we are also shown two key facts: 1) Kaneki had violent tendencies repressed inside him all along, that he rightly chose not to act on earlier and as a privileged human did not need to, and 2) that Yamori, as a ghoul, was acting on his violent tendencies earlier, but became a sadistic torturer after his capture by Tokage. We are supposed to compare Kaneki and Yamori post-torture; they both crack knuckles, etc. I’m not saying Kaneki is as bad as Yamori because hell no, but what I am saying is that if we can’t excuse Yamori for become a sadistic evil man after torture, we also cannot excuse Kaneki for killing everyone at the ghoul restaurant for the purpose of strength.
I’ve also discussed the Mutsuki-post-Torso comparison ad nauseum, but suffice to say again, if we did not excuse Mutsuki, we cannot excuse Shironeki no matter how relatable he is, and he is.
As a CCG investigator, Haise won the Golden Osmanthus Medal, which is given for exterminating 100 ghouls a year. That being said, yes, he was brainwashed and amnesiac and that was taken advantage of–but then he stuck with the CCG as Reaperneki once he had his memories back: planning to help Hinami escape, but still killing in the meantime (Shiono, for example, was a human). If we are not supposed to excuse Arima for his murders of ghouls despite his longterm plan–and Arima did not excuse himself–we are not supposed to excuse Kaneki, either.
And the Oggai. I’ve discussed this ad nauseum too, but again: yes, Furuta, Kanou, and Kimi etc. were at fault primarily. Kaneki was manipulated. But. Furuta literally spent a chapter warning Kaneki:
We got Irimi warning Kaneki to not bear the burden alone:
We got Ayato warning him to commit:
And we got Kaneki himself thinking of some good ideas:
All of this is to say Ishida is clearly, clearly, clearly showing us Kaneki had a way out, a way to avoid Dragon. Furuta did not have to win. But he did.
I’m not sure how chapters 143-44 could make it any more obvious. Ishida is literally telling us blatantly that our choices lead us to what we become. Kaneki made his choices. That is why he faced what he did. Even once the ward was under attack he had ways to avoid this–bringing others back with him, etc.–but he didn’t.
I’m pretty sure Rize going to lay this out for him the next few chapters. The whole theme of TG is that there are not black and white lines, ghoul vs human, good and bad, monsters vs human. We can see ourselves in characters like Kaneki and Mutsuki, and the point isn’t supposed to be that we excuse them, but rather that we understand that they are not monsters but can do monstrous things, and guess what? Every single human being alive right now is capable of monstrous things too, but that does not make any of us monsters. Every character is capable of monstrous things, but they are not monsters. Kaneki is literally a monstrous form right now in Dragon, but we still relate to him, and that’s deliberate. It doesn’t make Dragon not narratively his fault or make him a bad condemnable person.
Yeah, I love this stuff! I’m going to have to read into it more later.
I think the shrine represent purgatory, and the water is dragging him down to face what he’s done as a trial before allowing him to live again.
I also get the feeling that he’s going to end up sacrificing his human eye in this dream among the torii gates (with “offering” carved into them) to come back…
Like Odin, who gave his right eye to Mimir (The Rememberer)’s Well for a drink of it’s wisdom.
midnight-in-town 