It’s often been joked that the standard JRPG boss fights as “God”, “your evil Dad”, and “God who is also your evil Dad”. The Persona series has certainly been no slouch in this respect; the most recent entry’s storyline bosses include no less than three of your party members’ fathers (one’s an unofficial adoptive father, but it counts).
One may note that none of the recent Persona games have gone so far as to include your evil Dad as the final boss. This is not because the series is bucking the trend. This is because it’s already taken the concept to its logical-yet-absurd conclusion. In Persona 2: Innocent Sin (which is largely unfamiliar to Western audiences due to its late and little-publicised localisation), the final boss takes the form of all of your party members’ fathers fused together:
Yes, this is in fact an unholy abomination made of everybody’s evil Dads – in latex bondage outfits, no less.
There’s not really anywhere to go from there, is there?
I know next to nothing about the Persona series and very little about fathers in general, and I usually have no active interest in either of these fairly popular subjects, but that right there is an official illustration of a repulsive, obscene, baffling monstrosity of a final boss made out of five fathers in shiny rubber sex outfits stuck together in a vaguely humanoid formation by one big shiny rubber sex outfit with suckers, wings on the chest purely for aesthetics and a faceted tentacle chest-phallus, and presumably posed in a way that implies that the five individual amalgamated evil fathers are glaring menacingly at their children while mostly hanging upside-down in a bewildering and disconcerting configuration presumably designed to bypass body horror altogether and combine Freudian themes with BDSM design elements within one big, bold, horrifying mutant freak. ‘Unsubtle’ wouldn’t even begin to describe what I’m seeing right now with my own two eyeballs. This is official art of five evil dads ‘sexy’-shrink-wrapped together by their legs into an evil dad starfish.
This new information simultaneously lowers my previously fairly neutral opinion on the Persona series and my previously already quite low opinion on fathers while sharply piquing my interest in the video game Persona 2: Innocent Sin.
To be fair, this arguably isn’t even the most Freudian thing you can fight in that particular game, much less the Persona series as a whole.
(Other demons you can throw down with include a bearded, naked man sitting on a toilet, and a giant, fang-mawed penis with chariot wheels.)
so i’ve been replaying p2: innocent sin and decided to try doing one of the psp-version exclusive side quests for the first time and out of nowhere it’s just…THROWN out at you, plain as day, that tatsuya is bisexual? he’s already implied to be bisexual throughout both p2 games but this is so utterly blatant and abrupt, i feel like i’ve just been hit with some kind of surprise gay left hook
even in the original version of innocent sin his romance options were still a guy and two girls though so that also counts but this is cool
i’m well aware– as much as i love lisa, i have to pick jun every time:
the main reason i made this post was because of people who aren’t knowledgable about p2 and don’t realize that tatsuya is his own character with a fleshed out backstory, family, personality, and sexuality.
he and maya are outliers amongst SMT protags, which are usually silent and have their personality/interests left up to your interpretation. some people assume tatsuya and/or maya are the same kind of silent protagonist. while you do make plenty of minor in-game decisions for them in their respective games, their characterizations are otherwise set in stone.
(using tatsuya examples below since less people on tumblr have played ep):
i’ve seen people who think that tatsuya’s personality and sexuality are up for interpretation, and i’ve seen people choose to “interpret” him as straight or gay, based upon the romance option they prefer.
but tatsuya is canonically bisexual, regardless of who he dates. whether people are doing this to tatsuya because of biphobia or because they don’t know much about p2 is besides the point.
even in eternal punishment, where maya is now the main character, tatsuya is still implied to be bisexual because it’s an important part of who he is. it’s shown through various minor details, such as tatsuya’s only real friends being anna yoshizaka and noriko katayama, who are both lesbians (solidarity, anyone?) or katsuya being very vocally supportive and protective of lgb youths and their feelings, almost as if someone he knew fit in with people like that…
TLDR; some people get confused and think tatsuya’s sexuality is up for interpretation based upon the romance option you pick, but it’s not, and i don’t like seeing people erase his sexuality. it made me happy to see such an obvious in-game reference to him being bisexual added into the PSP port and since it was featured in an obscure side quest that people may have missed i thought i’d share it.
THIS IS HOW IT COULD BE, PERSONAS 3-5….WE COULD BE LIKE THIS BUT INSTEAD YOU PLAY GAMES W/ MY HEART….
Anyway nelfes linked me to this very good post so I am obligated to reblog it and let us all in on what we’re missing in P2. Goddamn this franchise is weird and cool.
@sam-keeper i feel like you would love this franchise, by the way. this is the same game as the one where hitler wields the lance of longinus and works for nyarlathotep or w.e
it’s not QUITE as blatantly homophobic as persona 4 but its plot is way, waaaay better and has cooler themes & story & characters & villains & mechanics overall. i totally recommend it, if u need a more solid pitch hmu & i can provide
I believe you. Like, its really important for me to be clear that all of my criticizing is grounded in a sense of love, I am not going to escape persona as a franchise until i die because it was too formative and important to me. If I had the money and free time i’d already have played p5.
It just also makes me furious and anything I say about the games critically has to incorporate the abject failure I perceive from them re: dealing with LGBT rep, and thus human attraction, on any meaningful level.
like p4 had HOW many remakes and they never decided to dust off yosuke’s old cut romance arc with the protagonist and put it in the game? they had lines RECORDED for that shit before they cut it, it’s cowardice, pure and simple.
this stuff changing was my one big hope for p5 and ive been repressing the anger ever since but if i’m going to suck the games dick for its perfect aesthetic and fascinating themes (and i WILL, believe me i will if i ever get the chance to produce actual Content™ about it) i am definitely, definitely also taking the opportunity to complain about the franchise basically showing me the door when it had the chance and LITERALLY THOUGHT about including me in the playground
like Persona has literally gone backwards here, Persona 2 had two protagonists who could be in a relationship! I forget their names but im sure @alotofmomos or @nelfes know. It’s infuriating.
Anyway i am serious for all my complaining feel free to drown my submission and asks in instances where Persona 5 touches on Gnostic stuff, even if you’re not sure about it i’ll be happy to take a look because…i love these games and know I will love whatever stuff p5 dumps on my anguished, conflicted face
HI YES DID SOMEONE MENTION MY CANON BISEXUAL SON TATSUYA SUOU AND HIS BOYFRIEND HE EXCHANGED VOWS W IN FRONT OF A BRIDAL SHOP HERE I AM
there we go. so yeah persona 2 is probably the outright best at this stuff its a shame its a TRAGEDY OR WHATEVER
Flying through Storytelling 