Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today we\u2019re diving back into Blue Reflection Ray, which most recently offered us the stinger of our delinquent Momo straight-up joining the rest of the cast\u2019s high school class. Apparently no longer content to drive her motorcycle around looking cool all day, Momo has rejoined productive society, which will presumably give her far more chances to bond with Ruka, Hiori, and Miyako. Our team in general are starting to grow far closer; though Momo and Hiori are extremely different people, their contrasts are proving a fine basis for communication, a process facilitated through Miyako\u2019s charmingly annoying provocations.<\/span><\/p>\n Aside from that, our recent drama has hewed to a reliable magical girl template, offering episodic dilemmas centered on the team\u2019s schoolmates much in the manner of Sailor Moon or Ojamajo Doremi. Such conveniently resolved challenges are a natural complement to this \u201cgetting to know you\u201d phase of the narrative, and if I were to guess, I\u2019d hazard that we\u2019re in for another side drama intended to push forward Momo and Miyako\u2019s relationship. That\u2019s perfectly fine by me; both of them are endearingly messy characters, with Miyako in particular proving the show\u2019s standout so far. Let\u2019s see how our team is evolving as we return to Blue Reflection Ray!<\/span><\/p>\n Episode 5<\/b><\/p>\n We open on scrolling across alternately lonely and bored social media messages, as one of our villains states that \u201cfriendship and love. Those are nothing more than fantasies. There\u2019s only one thing you can believe in in this world\u2026\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n And then she gets blocked. Oh no, is this girl an internet troll? Funny how our indicators of social maladjustment shift with the times<\/span><\/p>\n It\u2019s funny, when I was growing up, people who saw online interactions as an open call for abuse frequently defended themselves with \u201cit\u2019s the internet, it\u2019s not real.\u201d Now that the internet is <\/span>everything<\/span><\/i>, and so much of youth socialization occurs across online channels, I assume there\u2019s no longer any question of the internet\u2019s \u201creality.\u201d Instead we\u2019ve just shifted back to the older justifications for bullying \u2013 \u201cthey need to grow a thicker skin,\u201d \u201cthey were clearly asking for it,\u201d all the classic ways those who wish to deny responsibility for cruelty tend to rationalize their behavior<\/span><\/p>\n The troll Uta is unrepentant in the face of Nina\u2019s scolding<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cWhat\u2019s the fun in getting along?\u201d There is a compulsion inside many of us that drives us to be irritants, to spark conflict just because we find conflict enjoyable. Learning to moderate this instinct based on the desires of your company is a natural part of maturation, but many folks just decide not to do that, seeing in those who\u2019d prefer harmony not a valid, respect-worthy alternative perspective, but merely a soft target<\/span><\/p>\n We learn of a chatroom centered around \u201cPrincess Yuki,\u201d a girl who claims to use her spells for those in need. Presumably this will be our episodic focus character<\/span><\/p>\n Momo has elected to bribe her way into the group\u2019s good graces with home cooking. A fine strategy<\/span><\/p>\n Momo states she\u2019ll still be living off-campus, as she feels a connection to her absent grandmother at her old place<\/span><\/p>\n Miyako apparently stayed up all night pondering reflector business. Charming beat as Hiori fawns over her \u2013 given her home life, Miyako\u2019s clearly not accustomed to this sort of concern, and can only handle it by getting defensive<\/span><\/p>\n Miyako draws their attention to Ho-Kago, a social media app for high school girls. It\u2019s funny to return to this production after gorging myself on Sailor Moon, and thus better appreciate how these episodic conflicts echo its style. We\u2019ve switched pop-up shops for phone apps, but \u201ca hostile invader disguising itself in the form of our youth culture passions\u201d is apparently a perennial beat<\/span><\/p>\n Also makes me kinda sad; these sorts of stories used to be predicated on walking around in the real world, now it\u2019s all phone apps. Our daily lives are far less interesting in the online age, and I\u2019m certainly not immune myself<\/span><\/p>\n Miyako describes the \u201cmagic spells\u201d of Princess Yuki, which apparently make their targets\u2019 troubles disappear. Excellent investigative work!<\/span><\/p>\n Unfortunately, her companions are still too dim to connect this to the enemy Reflectors. I am sorry your allies are idiots, Miyako<\/span><\/p>\n Honestly, it\u2019s a pretty brilliant ploy. Young folks are dangerously eager to reveal problems in their personal lives to online strangers, so an advice channel being used to recruit potential targets for Fragment-stealing seems like a great idea<\/span><\/p>\n It\u2019s an interesting twist from the last episode, where the need for open communication was the hurdle faced by our tennis players. Sincerity is crucial, but it\u2019s just as important to choose where exactly you place your trust, and an anonymous online forum is not the safest venue for spilling your guts. Every era has its own hazards of youth, and I suppose every era also needs its own magical girls ready to challenge those who\u2019d exploit those hazards<\/span><\/p>\n Meanwhile, our villains are being all gloomy and prophetic in a church, as you do<\/span><\/p>\n The girls head out on a fact-finding mission to learn more about Princess Yuki<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIs everyone really okay talking about themselves like that?\u201d As with her initial suspicion of the very concept of a phone app, Momo is similarly perplexed by the younger girls\u2019 willingness to bear their heart on the internet. She possesses an older generation\u2019s healthy suspicion of online spaces<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI think the fact that someone\u2019s always there and you can connect is why it\u2019s appealing.\u201d In contrast, Miyako naturally sympathizes with these girls \u2013 given her home life, she can appreciate the existence of these social platforms where there is no cost of entry, where your problems will at least be taken seriously by <\/span>someone<\/span><\/i>, even if you don\u2019t know who that someone is<\/span><\/p>\n It\u2019s an argument that can\u2019t easily be resolved, particularly as our increasingly atomized society pushes more and more of our social lives online. Those who are isolated in real life will naturally gravitate towards online socialization, but the public nature and permanence of online socialization, alongside the greater tides of discourse and the often fanatical followings of larger accounts, means there is always a risk of sincere expression being used against you. Humans quite simply weren\u2019t designed to socialize on this scale; we were built for local communities, not accidentally finding ourselves expressing our shower thoughts to millions<\/span><\/p>\n But never mind all that, Hiori bought them adorable animal-faced ice cream cones<\/span><\/p>\n Hiori and Ruka finally meet a girl who knew a recipient of Princess Yuki\u2019s spell. An implicit tragedy in all of this, that these girls are so consumed by loneliness and despair they\u2019d ask a stranger to take away their emotions entirely<\/span><\/p>\n Momo seems to believe the memory resonance of Hiori and Ruka is related to the fate of Hiori\u2019s sister<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cMy Grams\u2019 secret recipe.\u201d Momo\u2019s relationship with her grandmother also ties her to the past, to the old, unmediated methods of growing close<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cA part of me keeps hoping that my mom will contact me and ask me to come home.\u201d Very human anxieties from Miyako. We can declare we\u2019re taking bold steps forward all we want, but merely declaring it and genuinely feeling confident in such a transformation are two very different things<\/span><\/p>\n Because of this, even she was briefly tempted by Princess Yuki\u2019s offer, and thus can sympathize entirely with her victims<\/span><\/p>\n Suddenly, Princess Yuki\u2019s feed is absolutely overwhelmed with abuse. This is how it goes \u2013 we might be able to disregard a mean comment or two, but when the spigot is opened and you are defined as an acceptable target, the abuse is constant and overwhelming. This is how individual actors merge into the horror of the internet \u2013 it\u2019s never \u201cjust one comment,\u201d it\u2019s contributing to a flood of hatred that no one is equipped to handle<\/span><\/p>\n And pulling back, we see why \u201cPrincess Yuki\u201d is so attached to her online domain \u2013 she\u2019s actually bedridden in real life. Online spaces can be the only sanctuary for people in all manner of difficult real-life circumstances, but relying on them naturally opens one up to this sort of horrifying backlash. There is no easy answer<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cPrincess Yuki\u2019s getting flamed.\u201d \u201cYikes, that\u2019s hilarious.\u201d Again, humanity was not built for this. It is perversely easy to dehumanize a name on a screen; our natural instinct to sympathize with those who are hurting is essentially disarmed by the partial barriers of social media, allowing us to act far more cruelly than we would to anyone standing in front of us<\/span><\/p>\n It seems clear what actually happened: Uta used Princess Yuki\u2019s posts to farm for targets, but is now returning those emotions in order to traumatize Yuki herself. Online, you might intend your words for one specific audience, but there is no telling who else is lurking in the crowd<\/span><\/p>\n That\u2019s basically why I stopped using online question services like CuriousCat or whatnot. It\u2019s just not worth providing any potential ammunition to those who don\u2019t see you as human, or whose empathy has been so dulled by online engagement they actually see violent confrontation as a natural element of discourse<\/span><\/p>\n Having destroyed Yuki\u2019s larger support structure, Uta messages her directly. Stealing the false assurance of the crowd and then wriggling in as her one confidant \u2013 it\u2019s a devious but effective tactic, one frequently employed by online agitators. They will attempt to isolate you from your community and then offer love and assurance, either to make you vulnerable enough to make a mistake, or simply to inculcate you into whatever project\/cause they are supporting<\/span><\/p>\n With Yuki now trusting her words, Uta drives in the knife, \u201cpraising\u201d her for deceiving all her followers<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cSee? You can\u2019t even defend yourself.\u201d Abusers like this will take silence as a declaration of guilt, perhaps even deceiving themselves into believing there is something their target could say to answer and stop their abuse. But in truth, answering these people only fuels the fire<\/span><\/p>\n We can\u2019t really prevent individuals from acting like this, but I do hope we can one day communally understand this as purely abusive, malicious behavior, a perversion of our responsibility to create a safer society<\/span><\/p>\n Uta explains that she feels nothing from friendship, that only pain makes her feel alive. Like many, she casts her suffering outwards and calls it justice<\/span><\/p>\n In this moment of supreme isolation, Miyako reaches out to Yuki, revealing her own feelings of self-hatred as a gesture of common faith. We cannot truly connect if we cannot reveal our scars to each other, but revealing such things online naturally invites punishment from the crowd<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThis world let me forget about me and this reality I\u2019m in.\u201d The internet continues to offer a hope of connection, of a genuine community to those who have no chance to build their own<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI just didn\u2019t want to be alone.\u201d Is that such a crime?<\/span><\/p>\n Thus, rather than the other girls fighting over her fragment, Miyako is able to call Yuki back from the brink with her earnest offer of friendship. A lovely twist on convention<\/span><\/p>\n And Done<\/b><\/p>\n Oh man, that was a great episode! Frankly, it felt like a serious step up for this show in general, complimenting its solid character work and sturdy magical girl foundations with a genuinely piercing exploration of both the dangers and necessity of online communities. For those who cannot find community in their own lives, the internet has proven an essential lifeline, a portal to anyone who might find comfort in your voice. But it is so, so easy to manipulate that gift, and we are not equipped as individuals to bear the callousness of humanity\u2019s collective indifference towards those they cannot see or touch. A crowd will only love you so long as you flatter them, which is why Miyako\u2019s confession was so important \u2013 a true, private gesture of faith, a genuine thread connecting their hearts. I\u2019m excited to see where we journey next!<\/span><\/p>\n This\u00a0article\u00a0was\u00a0mad<\/a><\/em>e possible by reader support<\/a>. Thank you all for\u00a0all that you do.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wrongeverytime.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/October02111133.jpg?resize=584%2C329&ssl=1\")
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<\/p>\nLike this:<\/h3>\n