In the sixty-seventh episode of Monster<\/i>, Johan finally explains his experience to Nina, revealing the truth of the Red Rose Mansion. But can he be trusted? If you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re intrigued, then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to watch Monster<\/i>.<\/p>\n
Trigger Warning: For discussion of trauma, torture, nonconsensual medical experimentation, gaslighting.<\/b><\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m Home\u00e2\u20ac\u009d does something very well to its audience: Like Nina\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s experience, it gets us to question reality. I still don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know if Johan was behaving from a place of trauma, if he was maliciously stealing from his sister, or if it was all a complicated mixture of the two. Which is entirely possible! I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t think this is ultimately going to be anything BUT messy. At the very least, though, I believe Nina. I believe her version events, and I believe that for whatever reason, Johan made them his own, further confusing her and contributing to her painful journey to recover her memories. But for the first half of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m Home,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d this wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t what I was grappling with. No, I thought that the story Johan told was true, and I couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t deal with the fact that this was the very first time he had ever seemed so sad<\/i>.<\/p>\n
Nina is pre-empted by Johan, who says that the most terrible story she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s ever lived is actually his<\/i>. Taken from the Three Frogs, he was imprisoned in the Red Rose Mansion in a pitch black room, where Franz Bonaparta acted out his bizarre experiment on him. Whatever this experiment was\u00e2\u20ac\u201dsurely linked to Capek\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s eugenics program\u00e2\u20ac\u201dthere were many admirers who were present on the day of the infamous massacre. Were they there to show support? Did Bonaparta invite them specifically to poison them, or was that a last-minute decision? Why did he do that? Look, either way, it explains all those snippets of memory we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve seen from Nina. The red in those images was wine<\/i>, not blood. Still, 42 people were murdered by Franz Bonaparta, not<\/i> Johan. Why? These people clearly supported what he was doing to Johan. And why let Johan escape?<\/p>\n
From there, Johan made his way back to the Three Frogs, where he reunited with his sister. Eventually, he set fire to it, then the two of them escaped, nearly died crossing the border, were picked up by General Wolf, and so on.\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n EXCEPT THIS ISN\u00e2\u20ac\u2122T WHAT HAPPENED. I initially thought it was understandable that because she was so traumatized, Nina remembered the stories that Johan told her as if they were her memories. But by the time Tenma arrives, Nina is nearly broken down by how frustrating and frightening this experience is. BECAUSE THOSE ARE<\/i> HER MEMORIES. Johan stole<\/i> them. Watching this unfold felt disorienting, too, as I thought I had everything figured out. Except I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t? And what was<\/i> true? It wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t until Nina remembered her brother REMOVING HIS DISGUISE that this fell into place. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s too specific of a memory to be fake, y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122all. What does it mean<\/i> though? Because it implies that even back then, he was trying to confuse Nina. Why? For what purpose???<\/p>\n All of this felt like yet another emotional gut punch, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not even the only plot in the episode<\/i>. Because there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s also Capek\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fate to deal with. It figures that the man wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t truly consider the ramifications of his actions until so late in his life. Now<\/i> is when he wants to think about what he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s done? But up until this point, Capek has gotten everything he has wanted. His eugenics program was probably a success in his eyes. He\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s had money, power, and prestige. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s only when Johan turns on him that he thinks about this nightmare he has helped create. So it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s poetically tragic that his own organization is who takes him out. He built this fascist empire, and their own paranoia got the best of him. A paranoia, mind you, that was inspired by the one person they built this whole plan around: Johan.\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Johan remains a puzzle throughout this, and I imagine I won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t get clarity on him until the end of the show. Actually, if I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m being honest, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not even sure I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll get him\u00e2\u20ac\u201dtruly understand him\u00e2\u20ac\u201don the first watch of Monster<\/i>. After leaving Nina, he heads to an unnamed location to meet with an unnamed person. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m guessing this was one of the many henchmen we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve seen that Johan employs? I remember, for example, that woman who helped set the fire in the library. These people have to come from somewhere<\/i>. So, this at least gave me confirmation that Johan has been paying people, and that some (or all) of these people have also killed for<\/i> Johan. For what, though? What were they all working towards? Why was this man so confused by Johan wanting to change the plan? Well, he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fucking dead now, so I won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t find out from him.\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The answer has<\/i> to be in this final location: Ruhenheim. And that place is already meaningful to us, not because we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve heard of it, but because of who finds<\/i> it: Inspector Lunge, who we last saw in \u00e2\u20ac\u0153That Night.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d What happened at the end of that?<\/p>\n Lunge said that Lipsky\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s father was Franz Bonaparta.<\/p>\n MEANING THAT IF ANYONE KNEW WHERE HE LIVED, IT WOULD BE HIM. Holy shit. This is it. THIS IS THE BIG CONFRONTATION. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s gonna happen!!!! It makes sense, too. Franz Bonaparta is the center of this, not Johan. Whether Johan is a victim or a perpetrator is a separate question, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s entirely possible that he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s both. Horrific things were done to him as a child; it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s possible he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fulfilling his mother\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s last wish of getting revenge. But he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s also done HORRIBLE things to other people. How is this all going to come together? I still don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know. But the end of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m Home\u00e2\u20ac\u009d was about as clear of a message as I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m gonna get:<\/p>\n This is where the end happens.<\/p>\n (If there even is<\/i> an end.)<\/p>\n The video for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m Home\u00e2\u20ac\u009d can be downloaded here for $0.99<\/a>.<\/p>\n Mark Links Stuff<\/b><\/p>\n – You can now pre-order my second YA novel, Each of Us a Desert<\/i>, which will be released on September 15, 2020 from Tor Teen!<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0<\/strong> In the sixty-seventh episode of Monster, Johan finally explains his experience to Nina, revealing the truth of the Red Rose Mansion. But can he be trusted? If you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re intrigued, then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to watch Monster.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[699],"tags":[700],"class_list":["post-7506","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-monster","tag-mark-watches-monster"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7506","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7506"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7506\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7506"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7506"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7506"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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