Psycho-Pass 8: "And Then, Silence"
Episode 8 starts off fast: after a recap and the opening credits, we find the school under lockdown…and Advent Child casually visiting Rikako.
Seems risky! Can’t they just keep texting? Oh well, it’s only episode 8, so he knows he’s not getting captured yet.
Advent Child asks Rikako why she’s only picking students from the academy. She explains how the school is made to churn out Proper Young Ladies for marriage, taking their choices away. I’m going to call this a deliberate parallel to Sibyl and Kagari’s complaint there, but even without that it’s a reasonably compelling reason. Advent Child isn’t outwardly impressed.
(I really should have chosen to call her Oryo. I went with Rikako because she’s a kid and it’s a little more interesting, but no one actually calls her that. Because she has no close friends.)
The MDBSK crew gathers in an unused dorm room to talk about the disappearance of two other students (Stepfather Troubles and Nancy Drew). They don’t have any leads, but they do catch on to the idea that there might be a room on campus that’s not on the official blueprints.
I’m giving the show a point for the two empty beds symbolizing the missing girls, and another for the cool overhead shot.
Back at the ranch, Kogami asks Tsunemori what she thinks, but mostly just as pretext to explain his own thoughts: this won’t be the same culprit, because the presentation is different. Tsunemori watches him do his “profiling” with a bizarre expression on her face.
(I’m just teasing. I think it’s just doing a casual job with an art. Judging by her verbal reactions, she’s in her usual impressed state watching an expert work.)
Kogami shares his thoughts, then asks for permission to go out. Tsunemori is nonplussed at first; he clarifies that he’s asking her to go with him.
恋って？
(Or perhaps a professional crush at the very least.)
They drive to high-security long-term jail, which has all sorts of significance for Kogami (and the other Enforcers). The jail’s security robots were manufactured by Aperture Science.
It turns out Kogami has had a very good idea: find someone who’s interested in creepy art and ask them about the murders.
As a side note, the cells are more spacious than I would have imagined. But I guess they’re in confinement for life.
Art Critic no Kyojin bemoans the fact that creepy art is being lost because Kids These Days don’t donate to archive.org. (Hey, go donate to archive.org. But not for his sake.) He also successfully identifies the murders as being in the style of Rikako’s dad. Kogami thanks him and I realize I’m a little surprised he just helped them out without asking for anything. Then again, he seems pretty accepting of his current state, so maybe he’s just building general goodwill—and particularly with Kogami, who he seems to have a prior relationship with.
Tsunemori searches her case files—in the middle of the jail, in front of this guy?—and Rikako pops up.
Check.
Kogami and Tsunemori hurry to campus, where suddenly it is not nighttime. (I can’t really believe they waited overnight, but maybe they were up all night and it’s now morning?) Ginoza’s wondering what Kogami’s doing out of his cage, but Tsunemori explains. Kogami has no time for this, because…
Holy crap, 472? That’s higher than anyone we’ve seen so far.
Holy crap, I’m becoming socialized into this system. (I’m following the number.)
Back in Episode 3 I pointed out that it was weird that Robot Murderer got a stun gun but Terrified Hostage from Episode 1 got the full-on “Lethal Eliminator”. That sticks out even more here; the gun’s mode seems to be determined by the target’s Crime Coefficient rather than their threat level. Rikako may be a twisted murderer, but she’s not much of a threat to Kogami from across the room.
This very fault contributes to her getting away.
When I first saw this I thought the principal was shocked that a girl in his school had such a high Crime Coefficient, and that his next actions were shoving that information aside in favor of his own morals. Then I remembered that the gun’s report can only be heard by its holder, and that a normal citizen might not know how it works. So from the principal’s point of view, this scary Enforcer had broken away from his handlers and had now reconfigured his gun into a rocket launcher, aimed at one of his students.
If it had stayed in stun gun mode, Kogami might have had a chance to fire. Instead, Rikako gets away.
The group reconvenes in…I dunno, the school’s AV equipment room?
Ginoza asks if Kogami knew all along that it wasn’t the same culprit as three years ago. Kogami says nah, he didn’t know until the second murder. Tsunemori tries to helpfully explain his reasoning; Ginoza is unamused. With his usual caution he says they can’t be sure Rikako committed all the murders. Kogami shrugs; now that they know she’s a 472, they can’t leave her out there.
Kunizuka, presumably with Karanomori’s help, finds a security camera recording of Rikako entering the garbage disposal area. The crew goes to investigate, only to find that that’s where she’s left her latest “artwork”.
Meanwhile, Advent Child’s been tapping the AV room, and listens to their conversation on his phone…right in the middle of the school’s computer lab. WTH are you doing there—
—wait, he’s actually a teacher at this school? When Rikako was calling him “Makishima-sensei,” that wasn’t just a particular kind of respect? Do they not do Psycho-Pass scans for their teachers? What the heck?
(He’s going by “Shibata-sensei”, but still.)
The assistant principal asks him if he’s listening to music, and we get the wonderfully horrific wordplay above: “I’m always looking for new artists”, followed by “I really enjoy finding interesting new talent.” (The Japanese uses a loanword, アーティスト; I’m not sure there’s a commonly-used Japanese word that would have the same double meaning.)
In addition to listening to “music”, he’s also doing something on the school computers. Hm…
iPad Girl blames herself for Nancy Drew’s death, since she was the one who suggested talking to Rikako. Kunizuka tries to comfort her, but she’s not really good at it. I won’t grade her too harshly, though, because what can you say?
This is another example of the way the Psycho-Pass has woven itself into the world, into casual expressions. But I can’t tell if Kunizuka means “cry now, because if you cry later it will affect your Hue,” or “cry now, because if you don’t cry it will affect you”.
Back in the lab, it turns out Makishima was erasing the security recordings of the art room, where he talked to Rikako. Kogami spots this, since he did it after Kunizuka did her search. And—
THAT’S NOT HOW COMPUTERS WORK.
I was going to cut them some slack because the plot needs this, but you know what? No. They could have found him by watching the hallway outside the art room. Although I guess that wouldn’t have had the all-important name drop: “Makishima”.
(Which is there to make up for something I forgot to mention last time: Kagari asked if Ginoza was right to take Kogami off the case, and Ginoza responds that he’s read Kogami’s report, and it’s “delusional”. Hearing Makishima’s name may be a vindication.)
Rikako escapes into the steam tunnels, but Advent Child’s no longer interested in her, and so he…sets his robot dinosaurs on her?
Rikako evades the dinosaurs and then steps in a bear trap. Advent Child’s Butler comes out to shoot her with a shotgun, and if I were making a Psycho-Pass Abridged he would have the worst Texan accent and a Stetson hat.
Rikako puts up one last act of defiance once she realizes she’s going to die.
She still dies.
C-3PO In A Human Suit wonders what Advent Child’s going to do next. Why, play with Mr. Kogami, of course.
I wonder what this will entail. Recruitment? Crime chess? Or psychological torture? I guess we’ll find out next time—hey, the credits are different!
Is it because the game is finally afoot? Or is it just that they had too much time left over in the episode, and decided to put in a longer cut of the credits song? Who knows?
I really enjoyed this episode, though I’m having a hard time pinning down exactly what I liked so much. It’s possible it was just that all the action had finally come to a head, or that I just wanted to see Rikako get her comeuppance. But there’s plenty more going on here: Rikako actually having some reasoning behind her murders, Kogami being an Ace Detective, the interaction between Kogami and Tsunemori, the quiet emotions around the jail, and the additional worldbuilding. And Makishima, already out-maneuvering the MSIMD crew with his audio tap.
This was episode 8, of 22. I’m a third of the way through Psycho-Pass.