Katawa Shoujo Forums

megiddo wrote:She seduced and raped hisao. She got naked and exposed herself to Hisao without his consent. Hisao was under pressure to live up to social expectations and did not feel entirely comfortable going through with Hanako's plan. Just because someone doesn't say no doesn't mean it's ok. Hisao was raped.

Seriously, you can see how enraged Hanako can get in her bad ending. Hisao couldn't refuse her advances, as he was in legitimate fear of physical violence if he did!

We're sarcastically mocking people who think Hisao raped Hanako by pointing out how maddeningly ambiguous rape accusations become when you try to factor in things like social pressure, non-verbal communication & body language, uncommunicated internal thoughts & states of mind, post-coital regret, etc., right?

The fact that (and sorry to use this point over and over) the writer had Hisao react in a cookie cutter way to nearly every situation without learning his lesson until the resolution was frustrating. The fact that I can feel the artificial foundations of the entire conflict completely removes my disbelief from suspension.

Hisao's white knighting is really only at its worst between Hanako's panic attack and her birthday. Before that, Hisao notices how Lilly seems to encourage him hanging out with Hanako and wonders to himself how she's expecting him to help, seeing he's neither a plastic surgeon nor a psychologist. As Hanako opens up to him, Hisao does become attracted to her and even plays with the thought of asking her out. It isn't until Hanako's panic attack that he friendzones her and becomes obsessed with being her shield from the big bad world, at the cost of his own well-being. When Lilly calls him out on this behavior, he does do a drastic cutback on his white knighting and makes an effort to focus on more on his own life, though he keeps Hanako in the friend zone. When she sleeps with him, he realizes she doesn't need to be there and takes action to salvage things after the awkwardness threatens to shatter their bond.

Hisao does develop over the route...thing is just he develops up to the first part of Act 3, then regresses during the remainder of the act and spends the latter half of Act 4 getting back to the point where he was at the start of Act 3. So it's not consistent positive development, but it is development.

Guest poster, I'm agreeing again. Actually in a sense, it also mirrors Hanako's development. She's starts out slowly getting better, or att least around Hisao, until she gets that panic attack and her birthday, during which she regresses a bit. And that panic attack was mostly due to Misha and Shizune's insensitive meddling and poking. Heck, even I would have gotten angry at the student council if they were talking like that to the girl I liked. After that, she's back in a positive line though, perhaps evne earlier than Hisao and even despite his counterproductive behavior.

Actually in a sense, it also mirrors Hanako's development.

Mirroring is a pretty accurate description of Hisao and Hanako in general. While several of the girls change Hisao to become more like themselves, on Hanako's route he remains somewhat like he is at the start of Act 1 because that's the emotional place Hanako's been in for years. She's kind of an exagerated version of Hisao in several ways...she rolled the misery dice and got a 6 instead of a 4 like Hisao. But the two share a VERY similar mindset overall. (though Hanako's is hidden between 10 layers of shyness)

Some of the parallels between Hanako and Hisao:

- Both are the only child in an ordinary household and neither is born disabled like Rin, Shizune or Lilly are. Both are only averagely social, preferring a small circle of friends to a big social circle. Both lose pretty much their entire life, including their friends, when the events happen that turn their life upside-down and leaves them scarred. (and hospitalized for a long time) As a result, they both become "broken people" and somewhat bitter about human contacts in general and both like to just live by the day without having any clear plans for the future.

- Hanako's panic attack and Hisao's heart attack also have some parallels. In addition to people who experienced a panic attack stating it kinda feels like a heart attack and can be just as terrifying, the results for both characters also overlap somewhat. Prior to his heart attack, Hisao was about to be confessed to, but afterwards the subject isn't brought up ever again. Prior to Hanako's panic attack, Hisao was playing with the thought of confessing to her, but afterwards he drops those plans and they remain in the fridge until Hanako sleeps with him. So both cut a potential relationship short, though in Hanako's case, not permanently.

- Their hobbies also overlap. Both like reading a lot and both picked it up for similar reasons and in similar circumstances. They're also both quite competitive in games. During the Risk game in Act 1, no matter what option you pick, Hisao states the outcome of the match matters to him a lot. Likewise, after being beaten at chess by Hisao, Hanako starts reading up on chess tactics in order to get the better of him later.

- Both have a lot of trouble sharing details of their past with others, even with their friends. The only way they can do so with one another is through a comfortable give-and-take.

- They both tend to withdraw when going through a rough time and tend to push away people who try to pry at the wrong time. An obvious example with Hanako was her bad end. But Hisao has a very similar situation in Act 1 where he feels like crap after his heart flutter on the track and Misha starts prying, resulting in Hisao blowing up at her and telling her to "piss off". It wasn't quite the same, seeing that Misha wasn't patronizing...just too dense to realize the person she was pushing to open up needed some space to get their bearings.

- The results of being dragged into a club by overbearing fellow students also has similar results on them both. After joining the student council in Shizune's arc, Hisao becomes a lot more confident and is quick to make plans about his future. Likewise, Hanako being pulled into the newspaper club by Naomi (who Hanako describes as loud and somewhat tiring, but nice...like someone else we know) results in her too gaining confidence and making plans for the future.

- In Lilly's route, Hisao becomes a lot like Hanako in several ways. They both like Lilly a lot, but are annoyed by her pity and mothering tendencies, but ultimately get used to it so they don't call her out on her mothering. The biggest parallel experience is their similar reaction when they're afraid of losing the person they love. Hanako defies her disability by stripping naked in front of Hisao despite her insecurities about her scars. Hisao defies his disability by running after Lilly despite his weak physical condition. In both cases, their desperate action appears to backfire severely at first, but ultimately results in a happy end when their loved one reaches out to them.

No doubt the bond that develops between them in Hanako's route is the result of them sensing a kindred spirit in the other. It's not unlikely that part of the reason Hisao's white knighting is so much stronger in Hanako's route than in Emi's is because Hanako's plight somehow feels more personal to him. (codependants trying to fix another person often pick people who remind them of their past in a way...like an alcoholic's daughter later picking an alcoholic partner and trying to fix him)

Guest Poster, what can I say? You keep hitting the nail squarely on the head.

In any relationship, it's a losing idea to want and try to "fix" the other person, it's a form of benevolent arrogance. It's OK to want to support the other person, and it's OK to worry about the other's problems. But you have to understand that you'll also have to let them support you, that you have to enjoy being together regardless, otherwise, like Hanako realises, you'll just end up breaking up. A relationship that both people don't appreciate equally, where both people don't get something out of it for themselves isn't stable. Luckily in Hanako's story, Lilly was there to put Hisao back on the right track, and Hanako's brave move gave him the emotional slap that he needed to snap out of it.

If would have saved me a lot of misunderstandings if I had realized or if someone had been around for me to help me realize those things 6 years ago in stead of just now by playing KS.

"I've been meaning to give you this for a long time."

So yeah, I do think she's better off at the end of her own route. In the end, she gets what she wanted. It's a shame that her route ended there, I feel like the stroy could've gotten a lot further. Her response to the romance and how she deals with it is something we can actually only guess at, while that wasn't the case with the other paths.

Also, Hisao isn't a perfect character, far from it, he makes a lot of mistakes. This gives him a lot more depth than some all-knowing pimp who knows exactly what makes everybody tick.