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Bsd Beast - Blog Posts
remembered this line from Beast and now I have to kill myself
Dark era vs Beast
"This story is a tragedy because it didn't have to end this way."
vs
"This story is a tragedy because it was always going to end this way."
beast dazai is considered a tragic character for all the obvious reasons: carried the weight of the memories of his other selves and using that knowledge to save oda from his fate even if it meant dying/killing himself in the end. This sympathetic narrative allows you to ignore the utter selfishness and immaturity of beast dazai and how he runs away from grief and pain, and I mean this in the best way possible.
The real tragedy of beast is that unlike all the other dazais, beast dazai never got the chance to meet and know oda, thence allowing him a new perspective to grow. In The day I picked up Dazai , dazai shows personal growth by the end of the novel, hence why he respects oda a lot. He is treated as a human being who still doesn't know much, and that brings comfort to someone deemed a demon prodigy. In side b of the same novel, beast dazai makes an effort to not know or bond with oda; yes this is because he wanted to ensure his survival by steering him away from the port mafia, but that event is what fundamentally changed dazai- gave him a better understanding of his own humanity.
Despite having all that knowledge of his other selves, of how each universe's timeline will play out, beast dazai didn't seem to grasp that it is grief that allowed the other dazai to grow and be a better person. He didn't understand that in the end, it is the time he (the other dazai) spent with oda that made living worthwhile, not his life. His state of living, the state of perfection in beast dazai's eyes, will still cause him more suffering than the act of losing a good friend.
Because if he had only wanted him to live, then he wouldn't have been so shocked when oda refused to indulge in a friendly conversation, not when he clearly went out of his way to antagonize himself in oda's eyes in tdipud. It's because the realization hit him: he wanted his time with oda to not be cut short.
Having memories of another oda is clearly not enough, he needed his own intimate friendship with his own oda. But with this elaborate plan and his reaction to being rejected, it's clear that beast dazai was trying to avoid pain. He could not accept the grief and pain of loss that he's seen and felt in his other selves, ignoring what came after: growth and satisfaction of ever having oda in their lives at all.
Pain is inherently human and by ignoring and rejecting it, beast dazai rejects his own humanity. Or runs away from it, because it catches up to him regardless. He still ignores it throughout the rest of the story, especially in other characters.
Beast dazai, as we all know, eventually takes his own life. While there is a reason as to why he did it, but it was still part of his plan from the beginning. Meaning, he knew this near fruitless pursuit would still have him unable to handle grief. It's an inherently selfish goal with an inherently selfish way out under the guise of "leaving the rest in atsushi and akutagawa's hands"
(Note: I do not mean in any way that suicide is selfish, but rather the narrative and character of dazai in beast alludes to this. Both concepts can co-exist in a fictional setting)
Despite seemingly helping other characters, beast dazai also trampled on both akutagawa and atsushi's self worth. This made them easier to manipulate for his grand plan, but ignores the damage he's done to them and other characters after his death.
For akutagawa it is the loss of his sister and convincing him of his monstrosity due to Dazai's meddling. For atsushi, someone he conditioned into severe fear and dependency on him, was left alone watching the person he cared so much for fall from the building. And yes, he left him in mori's care afterwards, but dazai should know more than anyone the damage the death of a loved one has, unless it doesn't apply to him.
In the epilogue, mori openly mourns dazai's death along with atsushi. Due to being free of his rigid responsibility as the pm boss, he had the liberty of finally being the caretaker he's always wanted to be but at the cost of the person he considered his son (in comparing dazai to atsushi, who he then calls his son + all the other stances where mori treated dazai like a son etc)
The thing that beast dazai, or dazai in general, tends to not fully understand or accept, is that he is also loved, and his death will cause others pain as well. I am by no means saying he should've thought of others before dying, but it is the lives of others that dazai from the main manga also cherishes after oda's death. Beast dazai made it his entire life goal to essentially protect oda, realize its not the only thing he's wanted from him and gave his raison d'etre a flimsy excuse of meaning in life. It's inherently selfish.
Selfishness is a common theme in bsd, and beast dazai fits right in. Atsushi's selfish desire to save people to give himself a justification to be alive, Sigma's inherently selfish nature of self preservation and identity and so on.
I've probably ranted for much longer than anticipated, but the point is: beast dazai's purpose is a selfish desire to escape pain and loss when it's crucial to the human experience. Dazai in the main manga seems to grasp this much better than beast dazai, it's something the latter is "missing", refusing to grow out of his selfishness and it makes his character more of a cautionary tale.
Beast is seriously insane from Akutagawa's perspective because like. Imagine a man showing up in your darkest moment of revenge, only to completely call you out on all your deeply sensitive flaws and everything that's wrong with you, kidnap your sister, and ask for a rematch without actually leaving a way to find him again and you're just like, "hello do I know you??"
And then some four and half years later you actually find him again only to learn he's like actually the Mafia boss, he for some reason deeply wants you to fight this other guy who you barely know, you get completely wrapped up in his ridiculous scheme for some reason or another, he compliments your fight with said stranger by comparing it to another fight with said stranger that has never existed in your mind, casually reveals the most crazy, existential crisis inducing information, appoints you and stranger who you just met to be "guardians" of something you barely understand when all you want is to find your sister and be a detective, and then you're forced to watch as the man who again, you've met exactly one (1) time before in your life, casually throws himself off a roof and you're just like. "ok???"
I see you your Dazai and Chuuya and raise you Beast Dazai to Beast Odasaku if he chose to stay.
Would You Fall in Love With Me Again from Epic the Musical but instead of Odysseus and Penelope, it's Dazai and Chuuya
okay I'm out
I really like how the unwritten message of Beast is that anyone could become anyone given the circumstances they were put into. Atsushi could become a murderer, Akutagawa could learn to tame the beast inside of him when surrounded by good people. It questions the idea that people are innately good or innately evil. Because while yes, Atsushi is a murderer burdened by guilt and fear, and Akutagawa is a detective who lacks a drive for helping people and has no qualms resorting to...unsavory methods to get results, at the end, we see that despite Akutagawa being told he's meant to be evil, he STILL wants to try to learn. To learn how to live a good life, learn how to tame the beast. And at the end of the day, while Atsushi still wants to protect people, he learns to kill them without a moment's hesitation. The only person he can protect is Kyouka, and he is almost TOO protective of her. I just think it's really cool that you can take these characters, one who is "innately good" and one that's "innately evil" and switch their circumstances, and you can see how they'd really end up. How a good person can become a murderer when surrounded by evil, how a bad person can quench the thirst for vengeance inside of him when surrounded by good people.
Truly another work of art!
Someone put me down please
That's some moody bitch right there
Testing brushes
me and who
More beast memes cause i miss them š
(Also you cant tell me this isnāt something they would do)
AU where Dazai somehow ends up in Beast Universe & confronts Port Mafia's broken boss, gone mad from despair.
Chuuya expects this Dazai to be another hallucination but instead feels a gentle hand to his face that he's never experienced before as No Longer Human soothes his rage.
Farewell, Dear Bandaged-Half.
ā ļø Beast AU spoilers
āYou loved my surprise anyways didnāt you, Chuuya?ā
more about theĀ worst surprise in the world here.
TWā ļø: suicide, blood, angst, bsd beast spoilers :,)
this is how iāll be coping from beast au
edit: awt the beast tags arenāt working so Iām sorry if this caused any damage other than intended angst for intended audience š¤”
Sskk is one of the most emotional rivalries/ships I have ever seen. It is a relationship that actually hits the heart. Skk is iconic. Kyoukenji is cute. Fyolai is poetic. HiguGin is heartwarming. But sskk?
Sskk is deeper than all these dynamics. The more you get into it the more parallels you see, the more symbolism you see. The things they say to each other both stings at times and also makes you cry.
Akutagawa is both at his best and worst whenever he is around Atsushi. And the more the story goes on the less bitter he becomes.
Atsushi despises Akutagawa but he still works with him, because working with Akutagawa makes him more secure, feel as if someone's got his back.
"Don't worry, go you fool"
"That's why Dazai-san left you"
"Just the two of us?"
"Do we need more?"
Akutagawa and Atsushi support and help each other. They work as a team. Putting their differences apart
Because they are quite similar, looking for one thing; reassurance and praise
They have had difficult childhoods with no parental guidance and they grew up to be very different in terms of personality because of their unique circumstances.
All of these emotions. All of this pain in them. That keeps them separate but it also brings them together. Because that's the thing that they both understand. What's it like to have nothing. And they fight because they just want to be a part of something.
And maybe in one universe where Dazai never brought them together, they might be the best of friends like they were always supposed to.
It doesn't matter how their relationship is, soulmates will always find each other.
After all the only person Akutagawa has smiled at besides his sister-------is Atsushi
"Night has fallen, and morning will come too,"
Kenji said while gazing at the paddy field.
"Spring will arrive, and Autumn too. Everything is split in halves. The grass grows, trees wither, animals are born, and they dieā¦ā¦when you live with the land, you slowly come to understand that nature is made up of halves. When something bad happensā¦ā¦when a storm or erosion happens, we feel like bad things will only continue. But in truth, the good and the bad, they are all part of natureā¦ā¦part of living. Thatās how everyone in the village thinks."
"I do not understand,ā
Akutagawa said, looking at the same scenery.
"So fortune and misfortune are equal halves? Do you want to say the same thing to my comrades who died in the slums?"
"That is why youāre the half thatās left, Akutagawa-san"
Kenji looked at Akutagawa.
"You survived. And with a very powerful Ability, too. Everybody passed on their good halves to you"
~Kafka Asagiri, Bungo Stray Dogs, BEAST.
Can we talk about how *safe* Atsushi and Akutagawa feel with each other
How much they're connected to each other is actually insane
They have innate trust with each other (Akutagawa even gave his coat to Atsushi), and they're comfortable with each other, it's wonderful
I think the best depiction of canon "domestic sskk" per se, is in beast
The direct passage from the beast light novel is:
"They continued to shoot the breeze for the next few minutes or so. Both boys shared small yet profound experiences that their colleagues would never be able to understand or even empathize with. The two of them could just be kids, something they seldom did around others.
'This is the first time I've ever been able to talk to someone like this,' the white-haired boy said with a chuckle."
They can relate to each other so strongly, they're opposites yet they feel intertwined. God they have such a well written and like at this point really romantic relationship
I really like how beast can show us a new perspective on sskk (among other things in the Bsd universe), comparing their first meeting in the main series to their first meeting in beast is kinda crazy. When Akutagawa nor Atsushi has the prior information of who they work for, they can get along. In a world with no abilities, no Mafia, no detective agency, they would know each other so well
Also, I'm sure Akutagawa has smiled more than twice in the series, but both most memorable times he's smiled they were both directed at Atsushi (one smile was the one he gave Atsushi while he told him to run before dying, second smile was in beast, shown in the picture above)
It's like Atsushi brings out the best of him, and vice versa. They're just so *perfect* for each other š
I will always love their parallels and similarities, their relationship balance is a perfect representation of the yin and yang
Atsushi knows he can't bear to live without Akutagawa. Akutagawa knows that Atsushi is the only person he's ever met who really, truly understands him. And no matter how much they're in denial about how they're a lot more than just "rivals", they still scream each other's names when one of them gets hurt, because they both *care*
Akutagawa is definitely going to go feral in the next chapter or so oml
remembered this line from Beast and now I have to kill myself
Fun fact! Did you know ch117 didnāt happen?
A Fear Even Greater: BSD Ch. 121 vs. BEAST Ch. 4
I was reading the new chapter today and I couldn't help but notice some similarities to BEAST that I wanted to share. I'm sure I'm not the first person to notice this nor do I usually do this kind of analysis post but I thought it was interesting and I'd like to share so please bear with me!
BSD CH. 121 SPOILER WARNING
I've highlighted the segments from each work that I think are thematically relevant to each other in the same colours because my brain works that way, but if yours doesn't don't worry - I will explain:
In YELLOW we have Atsushi's instinct to flee in the face of the enemy. I touch on this a bit more later on but BEAST!Atsushi is further along this thought process than canon!Atsushi. B!Atsushi seems mostly afraid of pain and violence while canon!Atsushi is more despondent. He's lost hope and had his spirit broken from watching his surrogate family die in front of him (understandably, poor baby)
In GREEN we have Dazai acknowledging/calling out Atsushi's cowardice. BEAST!Dazai is mostly describing how Atsushi used to be while canon!Dazai is snapping Atsushi out of his current doom-spiral.
He does this in most of his other hallucination appearances, not dissimilar to his interaction with Atsushi in Ch. 25.
In PURPLE we have the core of this whole rambling post (*Ā“ā½`*) There really isn't any contrast in these two, both B!Dazai and canon!Dazai are saying the same thing here.
Which brings us to CYAN where we see how the purple bits deviate slightly with context. It's a minor difference but B!Dazai lists the things that Atsushi used to fear (pain, violence, etc.) but canon!Dazai lists the qualities that Atsushi feels he's lacking (courage and hope). B!Atsushi is already able to use this "technique" (for lack of a better term) in combat, likely because he was exposed to terrifying situations earlier and more frequently than canon!Atsushi and has had more time to adapt to them (again, poor baby [ā„ļ¹ā„])
Now in RED we skip ahead a bit in the BEAST chapter to Dazai giving Atsushi his next directive. B!Dazai uses Atsushi to enact his plan and (eventually) bring Atsushi and Akutagawa together while canon!Dazai urges Atsushi to compartmentalize and focus on saving the people that he's still able to save.
Canon!Dazai's request is reminiscent of Oda's final words to him which - knowing Asagiri - could very well be intentional even if this is obviously not the "real Dazai" but rather the manifestation of some part of Atsushi's inner thoughts or Byakko (personally my money's on the tiger theory but we'll see). The Oda/Dazai/Atsushi/Akutagawa parallels will never stop and I'm here for it tbh.
[Dark Era excerpt from this translation from @nkhrchy]
Which brings us to MAGENTA (Could I have done these in chromatic order? Yes. Did I only realize that after typing it all out? Absolutely.) In both cases at this point Atsushi comes to a realization and I think the difference in what that realization is really drives home how well BEAST uses alternate universe to emphasize characterization in canon. Some of this is based on my assumptions about the final page of Ch. 121 and is therefore at risk of being jossed next month BUT I think that what canon!Atsushi is realizing in the final panel ("who you really are") is that this Dazai apparition comes from The Tiger. If it isn't Byakko explicitly I think it's fair to say that it's coming from somewhere within Atsushi himself. So, that being said, let me explain a little bit: B!Atsushi's only recourse is to take refuge in Dazai's plans/orders. His "greater fear" stems from an instance when he deviated from those orders and as a result he feels safest behind the bulwark of going along with Dazai's will. Not the healthiest coping mechanism, but it makes sense considering what B!Atsushi has experienced up to that point. Canon!Atsushi, however, is (I assume) realizing that the safety and reassurance - however harsh it may seem - of the Dazai in his head has actually been coming from himself the entire time. I think it's safe to say that whether it's his subconscious or Byakko, this apparition takes the shape of Dazai because that's who Atsushi trusts during times of crisis; that's the voice he's desperately wishing he could hear. Ultimately canon!Atsushi is in a much better place (despite... everything lol) because he's able to recognize his own internal strength instead of clinging to the safety he sees in Dazai. B!Atsushi does eventually start this process after Dazai fires him and Kyouka (and then steps off the roof of HQ RIP) but he has to take the time first to heal from the anxiety his violent upbringing inflicted on him (quite understandably - let's all say it together: poor babey T_T) There's more I could say about canon!Akutagawa undergoing a similar process re:Dazai but this post is too long! So I won't ā”
OKAY! My brain has never been satisfied with using one word when I could use ten so if you made it to the end thank you and I'm sorry ā” I am not a writer and doing this reminded me why!! So I will definitely stick to drawing pictures (I'm almost finished one I swear! I'm like a plant, I wither into nothing in the winter months)
Bsd Chapter 121:
Dazai (hallucination) to Atsushi.
Dazai to Atsushi: Do you need things like ācourageā or āhopeā to overcome fear? No. You havenāt had those things from the start.
Dazai: You havenāt needed them. What you need to crush your fear, is a fear even greater.
Bsd Beast Chapter 4:
Beast Dazai to Beast Atsushi.
Beast Dazai: I do think youāre correct in saying that youāre a coward. Your former self was a fearful boy who would search for an escape route right in front of the enemy.
Beast Dazai: But ever since that day youāve changed. Do you understand why that is?
Beast Dazai: It turns out that the best way to drown out your fear is with more fear.
If we adopted children into the mafia would that be fucked up or what
Something incredible to me in Beast is just how... wrong Dazai was so often (and, by concequence, Gin). And how he was wrong in a very opposite was from og!Dazai's thinking.
Getting the memories from og!Dazai gave him many advantages, but it also held him back when it came to actually seeing the other people around him. Especially Atsushi and Akutagawa. He was convinced about being born good or evil and innate natures, which is something the story disproves time and time again.
In his mind, it didn't matter that he'd groomed Atsushi for almost five years into being the white reaper. It didn't matter that he killed himself infront of him after making himself the central point of Atsushi's frail sanity. It didn't matter that he fired Atsushi from his one remaining purpose. Why? Because Atsushi was "born good" in his mind because he was good in the original world and therefore any evilness groomed into him would be easily undone without any lasting consequences in his mind.
If he saw Atsushi being reformed slowly by Mori, he'd get to the wrong conclusion. He'd attribute it to nature rather than to Mori being able to rehabilitate him.
And this also shows in his treatment of Akutagawa. He thinks of Akutagawa as being inherently bad because he was in the mafia originally. The whole story is him being victim to confirmation biases when it comes to him and, because of that, the same happens to Gin. His idea with Akutagawa was never, at least to my understanding, to make him into a good man of the Agency, but rather have the ADA hold him under their care to unleash against threats. He didn't believe Akutagawa could become a proper ADA member (because he wasn't originally) but believed that the Agency would take him in anyway (because they took in Dazai and Kyouka in the original universe) and keep him from lashing out unless there was an enemy ahead of him.
And Gin gets fed this belief. It's why she doesn't talk like there will be a point in which Akutagawa might be reformed into a good person. Or that what he needed was to learn to calm down and organize his priorities. She believes he cannot change because that's what Dazai has taught her. Akutagawa's objective by the end of Beas isn't finding her anymore because he needs to better himself for himself and to prove Gin wrong. Not to reach her expectations or demands, but to prove her wrong, to show he is capable of change.
And, surprisingly enough, it's Atsushi who has the best take about Akutagawa in the final chapters, even though in Akutagawa's mind all of their judgements were put as if the same. From Atsushi's words, at least, Akutagawa is described as someone who is bad, who can't understand or separate violence from their objectives and who'll prioritize the violent option above even his objective, but he never expresses the opinion or feeling that that's his nature or he was born, likely because Atsushi know better than anyone how much someone can change or be changed. Atsushi doesn't think Akutagawa is a good person, but doesn't see him as someone incapable of becoming one (which does have some beautiful implications of SSKK always being able to understand esch other better than other can, even if they don't react or deal with the knowledge all that well).
And Dazai in the original universe thinks a lot more like Beast Atsushi than Beast Dazai (I could write a whole novel about the similarities between Original Dazai and Beast Atushi, because oh my god are they interesting). He doesn't believe in good and evil as something inher of someone nor does he see good and evil as concepts that are set in stone, but rather something personal to individuals. It's why I think even if Dazai was sent back in time to the exact point Beast Dazai received the memories, he would have gone through a completely different route when it came to changing the outcome of things. But also because he's changed since leaving the PM and it doesn't seem like Beast Dazai ever really grew up after getting the memories, he stayed both childish and a child.
this place is death with walls
had a vision of beast chuuya with arlecchino's eyes