#AUGH WHY DID JIN HAVE TO DIE AAAAA

[asingleshampdition]

Sympathy for Jin Shirato

In all honesty, I actually feel just as, if not worse for Jin, than I do Chidori; especially in Reload, despite Chidori being the most fleshed out of the Strega three. This character analysis will not include developments from Shadow Cry, as I'm not aware of most of its contents enough to include it. (P.S. There are no visuals because for some reason, Tumblr doesn't want to save with them.) I think the motivations of the three Strega members are very important. All of them came from the same background, as child experiments; and thus, we can draw fair conclusions from them.

Takaya wants to get back at the world for hurting him. He's a man who is very weak-willed, and wishes for death, as long as it means others come along with him. He's adopted this view in which his only purpose in life is to bring everyone down with him: as he's been granted the power to do such (in the form of Hypnos), he's under the impression that his life is meaningless otherwise. This is why he's so unwilling to give up the Dark Hour to SEES; he's unwilling to start over, because in his mind, he's built up meaning for himself. Takaya doesn't really care for anyone; everyone he comes across, to him, is either an asset he can use to achieve his goal (Jin and Chidori), or an obstacle (SEES). As much as I'd like to believe Takaya genuinely did care for Jin and Chidori, I can't see it. At the end of the game, Takaya becomes a cult leader; Strega had always had parallels to such, and cult leaders, like Takaya, don't typically care about their followers. Rather, they see them as tools, to get their way. From my point of view, Takaya is an irredeemable piece of garbage, in the games, and cannot compare to Jin or Chidori in terms of sympathizing potential. As previously stated, I'm not accounting for Shadow Cry in this post, so I don't really know how the pathetic wet cat man is portrayed there. Chidori's motivation is that she, quite literally, has no motivation. She finds no purpose in life, and therefore, doesn't really care what happens either way. In her eyes, dying just means she'll never wake up again, and the end of the Dark Hour? "Cool, more days to live until I inevitably die," is probably what she would've made of it. Either that, or, "oh no, Medea!" Chidori's motivations are so radically different than both Takaya and Jin's motivations, and I believe this is why she was able to break away from such a cynical, nihilistic line of thought, much more easily than the other two. The only reason she followed, and was loyal, to Strega, was because Jin and Takaya were similar to her. Other than that, she held no regard for them, and did not consider them friends. It did not matter, to her, who she followed. If Takaya had been a better guy, maybe with hopes of reform, she probably would've turned out better as well. The only person she really cared about, until Junpei, was herself; as selfish as that sounds. She considers Medea her only true friend, as a representation of how she isolates herself, in order to not be afraid of death. So, where does that leave Jin? I believe Jin, unlike Takaya and Chidori, possesses a trait that neither of the other two have: genuine care for the few people close to him. The reason Jin doesn't want the Dark Hour to disappear is very similar to Takaya's; however, as shown in Reload, this isn't really the case. We have to remember that Takaya, essentially being a cult leader, even before he starts such, is incredibly manipulative and charismatic. Think of Jin as a young, impressionable dude, who is at an incredibly low point in his life; someone who is emotionally vulnerable, someone who can be targeted. The perfect candidate for a potential cult member. Then comes along Takaya: someone who is kind to him. Someone who treats him with dignity, with respect; someone who is there for him when he needs it most. Someone who 'saves' him. Kind of like Chidori, I believe Jin could've fallen for anyone; it didn't have to be for Takaya, it just had to be someone who was kind to him during the darkest time of his life. Unfortunately for him, Takaya does not truly care for him, unlike the vice versa, and whatever kindness Jin experienced from Takaya may or may not have been an act of manipulation. Kind of like how cults usually target young, impressionable, emotionally vulnerable individuals. Jin was manipulated into siding with Takaya; and kind of like a cult member and a cult leader, the member would align with the leader's ideals. Therefore, I do not believe Jin's true reason for standing against the Dark Hour's absence is the same as Takaya's.

This is not to say Jin doesn't have a 'real' reason; unlike Chidori, I believe he does. His statements on 10/31, being: "If the Dark Hour disappears, we might forget everything that happened, won't we? / I'd forget you and Chidori, the things we did together, our time at the facility... All of it." I find this line an incredibly simple way of painting Jin in a sympathetic way; and yet, it's incredibly tactful. Jin values the time he's spent with Takaya and Chidori; he values them. To him, they're like family. They are what SEES is to Makoto/the protagonist: his friends, the only friends he's ever had, and he'd rather die than forget about them. The only problem is that both Takaya and Chidori hold little to no regard for him. I'm somewhat sure he knows this, and yet, he still chooses to view them in such a way; even after Chidori pays virtually no mind to him as a person, and when Takaya separates from him in the final stretch of Tartarus, knowing that Jin would probably die.

This conclusion does raise some questions, though; when Chidori sacrificed herself for Junpei, why didn't Jin say anything? Rather, why didn't he try and stop her? After all, he's mostly silent, and Takaya does most of the talking during the sequence. Strega's philosophy on death is to not fear it, as it is inevitable. Perhaps this is also why Jin does not show sadness when Chidori dies? To Jin, as well as Takaya and Chidori, they've accepted that they will all die someday, because of the suppressants, as well as their Personas. Jin doesn't view Chidori's death as sad, not because he doesn't care for her, but because Strega has already established that death is inevitable for people like them. Another potential reason for Jin supposedly not caring for Chidori's death is the presence of Takaya. As a cult member is to a cult leader, Jin is dependent on Takaya. Since Takaya only views Chidori as a pawn, perhaps Jin would take on Takaya's view on the matter; to Jin, Takaya is wiser than anyone else. I really can't think of any other reasons as to why Jin wouldn't show much emotion during Chidori's death, other than either one: Jin specifically referring to Takaya, and only adding Chidori in as an afterthought, in his quote, or two: bad writing. The first one I doubt, as I feel like Jin would be one of the last people to tell a half-truth (to Takaya, of all people, to boot); especially since his last name is Shirato (white door), referring to how he can't keep his fatass mouth shut when talking about important information with SEES. I don't really think the writers would make such an oversight; adding Jin's sympathetic statement, and then forgetting to make him sympathetic otherwise. Not saying it's not possible; it definitely was, considering the quality of the villains' writing in the older versions of Persona 3. I just find it unlikely. This all just goes to show that Jin could've ended up just like the SEES members, if not to a greater extent than Chidori. He loved the ones he was close to, and he believed in bonds, to some extent. Of course, maybe not in the way SEES does, but the point is that he did; and bonds are the entire premise of the Persona series. Takaya never believed in bonds at all, throughout the entire game; he's too focused on himself, so he's out of the question. Chidori doesn't believe in bonds until Junpei shows up, even with Jin and Takaya in the picture. Jin is the only Strega member who would go as far to die for his found family, the only member who loved his companions from the start.

The more I think about it, the less I really blame Jin for who he became. Like I've mentioned before, you have to think of Jin as a cult member. A cult member who was 'indoctrinated' by Takaya, because he was naive, impressionable, and a lost soul; looking for someone to love him, respect him, stay by his side, and 'save' him. Would you fault a lost soul, someone who is incredibly emotionally vulnerable, as well as naive, for being manipulated into a cult? Sure, you could view Jin as 'stupid' for falling for Takaya, but that's the thing: people who become cult members aren't always stupid. They could be the brightest, most mature person you know; and that's not the point. Cults target people who are lonely; who want love. No matter how bright, mature, talented, well-read you are; at the end of the day, you are not immune to manipulation, if the manipulators pull the right strings. I think that's what's most scary about Jin: his story revolves around how someone so bright, so talented, someone who was one the right track, who more or less had the right mindset about relationships, was thrown off course, because he was also lonely, naive, and lost. It's very similar to many people who join cults; his character, even in Reload, can be written off as just some cynical, Takaya-obsessed bomb maniac, kind of like how a lot of people write cult members off as off-putting, evil, and sadistic. I think Reload did a terrific job at exploring this part of his character, even if it was just a few extra scenes. Or maybe I'm just overanalyzing because he's my favorite character lmao, who knows?

#jin shirato #takaya sakaki #chidori yoshino #persona 3 #p3r #strega #character analysis #AUGH WHY DID JIN HAVE TO DIE AAAAA #I WAS OK WITH HIM DYING IN THE ORIGINAL GAMES BUT THEN THEY GAVE HIM COOL ART AND MADE HIM A GOOD CHARACTER #BRUHHHHHHHHHHHH