©Kafka ASAGIRI, Sango HARUKAWA/KADOKAWA/Bungo Stray Dogs Partners
War can change a person and how they carry it with them for the rest of their lives; In his old age, my grandfather told horrifying stories about his time on the battlefields of World War II, including the machine gun attack that left him with 10 bullets in his body and killed his best friend. . PTSD is no joke, and discovering that Fukuchi is most likely suffering from it sheds light on what he’s doing now. We see in a flashback that Fukuchi told his then-best friend Fukuzawa that he was afraid that going to war would change him forever, and that’s what we’re dealing with. present: a Fukuchi still trapped in that field, surrounded by people around him. One by one they died in his arms. He thinks he is not acting for himself but for them.
That in itself should make us rethink the name of the organization he heads: The Decline of Angels. The use of “decay” instead of the more typical “fall” is important. A fallen angel is a formerly perfect being that has lost its shine and become something less. A rotten angel is a perfectly rotten being, one who has undergone a (possibly natural) process that has corrupted them from the inside out. Everything decays, and although we would like to think that angels are exempt, Fukuchi argues that they are not. He sees that he has not fallen but become rancid, a once-shining man who has been irreparably tarnished by life. He becomes naturally corrupt in his efforts to do what he is told (and possibly believes) is right. And now he sees it as his mission to make sure it doesn’t happen to anyone else.
Is that a legitimate reason? I don’t necessarily think so, but it’s not my fight; My PTSD was caused by bullying, not war. But the important thing is that Fukuchi thinks he’s right, to the point where he’s at least still trying to convince Fukuzawa to be on his side instead of against him. He doesn’t even realize that by associating himself with bad actors like Dostoyevsky and abusing Bra-chan’s Ability, he’s only digging himself a deeper hole. It’s interesting that he doesn’t kill Tanizaki, Kunikida, and Ranpo right away because that means he thinks that with enough leverage, he can convince Fukuzawa of the correctness of his mission. He may have declined, but there is still something in there that may not exist.
In any case, it seems now it’s up to Atsushi and Dazai, even though Dazai is caught up in a game of tit for tat. tat with Dostoyevsky and the vampire Chuuya. (I’m a bit sad that we don’t know if Dazai’s Quirk can cancel Chuuya’s transformation. Maybe later.) The fact that he brought Sigma with him is for his own benefit and for his sake. She wanted to make sure Dostoyevsky didn’t do that. killing him was a useful reminder that Dazai’s heart was in the right place, but that would have been easier for Dostoyevsky to find out—he was definitely trying to make scathing comments about Dazai’s lack of “worthy” of Chuuya. Meanwhile, Atsushi is now alone, although what matters is who appears in his dreams and tells him what to do. It could foretell that he will meet Aya, Bra-chan – and the Akutagawa vampire. Can Bra-chan break the curse if Atsushi holds Akutagawa tight? Will Teruko change her mind and help? She seems quite torn now that she knows what’s going on. But really, the biggest question is – can anyone really escape this undecayed state?
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Bungo Stray Dogs is now streaming on Crunchyroll.
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