Little Busters! - Refrain Arc Discussion

[Coffer]

He does realize he was wrong after the (T.T) moment, hence why I didn’t take it into account, but you have a strong point regarding him not explaining his reasoning to her in the first place (and it makes it all the more sad when you account for the fact that he and Komari effectively became the only ones Rin trusted anymore, with Riki being the only one she could reach). I’m still not sure if I outright see it as him giving up on Rin at that time though - it’s more that he still trusted Kyousuke and his plan at that point and, as you said, didn’t want to stop her from something that both he and Kyousuke rightly felt she had to do (go so she could become stronger).

It’s funny because, by turning against Kyousuke, he still treated Rin as less than an equal, but it’s also depressing because both before and after that he did it because he felt it was necessary at the time (first to let Rin grow despite his own complaints, then to protect her despite fully acknowledging that both of them needed to become stronger).

[Aspirety]

Don’t forget guys, we’re hosting a Little Busters freetalk on Discord voice at 3PM Sunday UTC. That’s 9am CST. Hope you can make it!

[HeliosAlpha]

Refrain as Told by Images

Refrain is all about callbacks–natural with “refrain” meaning repeat and all–but I wanted to focus specifically on paired visual compositions.
The Fire Fades
Comparing Kyousuke from the start of Common and the start of Refrain isn’t pretty. The key component of these images is lighting. We can see there is a difference in the natural light streaming through the window. The Refrain pic looks to have been taken later in the day with orange tints starting to take over. Now we actually seem to have more than just natural light here. In the Common pic we see the manga volume is shaded from the light of the window, but then how come Kyousuke isn’t shaded in the same way? It’s as if Kyousuke has a separate light shining on him from behind the camera or possibly he himself has an innate glow to him. Since we’re talking about fabricated images, we don’t need to concern ourselves with how this lighting is accomplished; Kyousuke simply isn’t the same radiant super human he once was in our eyes.

From Bad to Worst
A completely different transition Kyousuke goes through in Rin2 is from suspicious schemer to oppressive ruler. These images are then about escalation instead of contrast. When he’s first confirmed as the one behind the letters, he looks cool, in control and like he knows way more than he’s telling, but he’s still pretty much the same Kyousuke as he pull Riki into the woods. That is all stripped away as we see him stand up as a completely unopposable deity. These images have a similar composition: medium shot, tilt to the right. We go from a level camera to a low angle to emphasize Kyousuke’s power. Normally I’d say the tilt is about making viewers feel uncomfortable as their worldview is broken down; HOWEVER, most CGs are tilted between 30-45 degrees, so the conventions of Dutch angles don’t really apply here.

Full Closure
Now to talk about something happy for once. The end of Rin2 and the “intended” end of the dream world mirror each other with the same shot of Riki’s school bench. But whereas Riki’s world fades into black in complete failure, Kyousuke’s world disappears into a white light, its duty fulfilled.

Contrast
Okay, we’re getting a bit looser with the connection here, but my post my rules. I just want to talk about posing and contrast in images.

• First we have my favorite Rin CG by far. The energy and joy when she turns around combined with how much her reds and black pops against the colors of the background leave such a strong impact.
• Second we have a similar composition with a large focus on Rin’s hair, but her pose isn’t as much about energy. The text in this scene refers to Rin as “transient,” and it’s true that she doesn’t pop as much here. I believe this is due to how the light makes the color of her bangs look a lot more faded. She also has this light blue aura around her which blends her into the sky more.
• Speaking of fading into the background, when we see Rin in Episode:Kyousuke as she’s about to be shipped off to the other school, she’s literally being melted into the white void. She’s completely alone with no way to resist.

The Culmination of Everything
So this is the big visual representation of Riki’s growth. He gently but firmly takes control of the screen and reaches out towards a downtrodden observer. All of this obviously a callback to when we saw young Kyousuke do this at the beginning of the game. (What do you mean they didn’t make a CG of that? It’s the foundation of Riki’s entire character arc, and stretched out hands is the biggest motif in the whole narrative. Why would they not make a CG for that?)

No, this one doesn’t count. It’s a completely different image.
Fuck it, here’s the anime version. I seriously forget that this CG doesn’t exist. The text constantly refers back to that moment with Haruka and Mio for example. In LIttle Busters!, being like Kyousuke = helping people = reaching out your hand. It’s everywhere.

[Naoki_Saten]

Let’s talk about Cats!
Sometimes, something about the cats in LB is strange, but we’re usually too busy with the story to notice. Admittedly, most of the stuff I’m going to talk about happens in Rin2, but also requires Refrain knowledge of the world.
Kyousuke brings cats as presents for Rin when he returns from his trips. The latest addition to the gang in school, Lennon, is a part of Kyousuke - and the one bringing his mysterious missions to Rin. But what about the other cats?

The first time I’ve noticed strange behavior was when Riki tried following Lennon to find the mastermind behind his missions in Rin2. The one who brought him to Kyousuke wasn’t Lennon, though - one of the other cats has deliberately led Riki around the school grounds for a while, as though beckoning him to follow, before finally arriving at the place Lennon’s been waiting at. Lennon “thanked” the cat by licking its head. So, does Kyousuke indirectly control the other cats through Lennon’s actions? Or does he have a more direct method thanks to his position in the world?

Next, when Riki and Rin make a run for it, the cats follow them up to the gate, but none of them cross it, as if they know what their owner is up to. And not only that. Riki, while ignorant of the secret of the world, is wary of those cats. Though it sounds ridiculous, he thinks Kyousuke could somehow be keeping tabs of them if they take any of the cats along. Well, maybe it doesn’t sound too ridiculous considering the behavior of that one cat just a week prior. As we know, though, his guess was actually spot-on.

After running away, Riki and Rin find themselves a bunch of new cats like Guts, Irfan, Akutagawa, Shumacher, etc. Pay attention now.

• Schumacher - was seen sleeping with Rin at least once
• Akutagawa - makes quick, delicate meows
• Irfan, the first cat Rin had caught. Manly, perfect, has a massive body.
• Guts was caught by Riki. He’s ugly and rough, has a deep, raspy voice. He seems to have gotten attached to Riki, because that’s whose futon he was sleeping in from then on - and he refused to leave it!

So, don’t the last two seem awfully similar to Masato and Kengo? Especially Guts and his strange attachment to Riki. The counterargument to that would be that Riki has never specifically mentioned Guts and Irfan fighting. But let’s think of it this way: Kyousuke must have been somehow observing Riki and Rin. There’s no way he wasn’t - those two are the reason the world was created. He could have been watching them through cats or maybe some other way. We’ve never been told what other stuff he can do. (Also, I have originally assumed that Kyousuke was the one who made the police move in, but now I suspect an alternative possibility.) So, could the other dreamers have been doing the same for the same reason? Could Schumacher have been Komari? Or rather than stand-ins, could those cats simply have been created by the world itself while borrowing some characteristics of the dreamers?

Lastly, Refrain. Now Lennon is the only cat left in the world. Could the drop be related to the departure of other dreamers? It’s not exactly proportional, and we’ve never been told about a decreasing number of cats after the completion of other girls’ routes.
According to Riki’s “memory”, Rin used to have more cats than just Lennon, “But they had left one by one, as if fleeing from the Rin who had changed so much.”
Why that specific wording? To keep the setting consistent after a faulty reset?

EDIT:
Here’s the line by Kyousuke that I mentioned on the podcast

Well, we obviously barely get any worthwhile info on the cat mysteries, but what do you guys think?

[Pepe]

Definitely an interesting take on things! I don’t doubt that the Riki/Rin batch of cats are somehow connected to Kyousuke (either through dream world control or projection), but this is the first time I’ve thought that they could be connected to the other members. I’d have to review how they act around the two, for sure.

But where does that put dorj?