Well, this is what regret feels like because I've already read all of Nanami except her first post and rereading stuff is pretty much the bane of my existence. On the other hand, Nanami ties into some thoughts I have regarding one of V1's most famous characters so I get to explore that a little, which is the lemonade I am making.
V1 profiles are weird to a modern eye. Nanami's is actually really long for V1, detailing her relationship with her overly-critical single mother (though Nanami also doesn't really know how to assert herself) and her return to Japan. This latter bit is where we're first introduced to Nanami's most substantial relationship: Madelaine Shirohara (who you've probably heard of at some point or other). Madelaine is also handled by LadyMakaze, and Nanami is used as a very flattering lens through which to examine her, with stuff like:
Madelaine always stood out for her coolness and maturity, as well as her confident nature. She was always looking after others, and though she never paid attention to the fact, there were people who looked up to the older-sister figure Madelaine Shirohara. Comparing herself to Madelaine, Nanami saw herself as plain and mediocre, having no special qualities of her own, and even went so far to believe that Madelaine only befriended Nanami out of pity.
We then learn that Nanami secretly resents Madelaine heavily. Madelaine moved to the US, and then Nanami did too, but only a week before the abduction (and she was not at the same school as Madelaine). This is actually a thing I quarrel with somewhat, because it's an end-of-school trip for Barry Coleson, and I'm not really sure what use it is to stick Nanami into class for only a week or two of finals. It also has no bearing whatsoever on her abduction, since she was snatched on her way to school, rather than from it.
So, the good stuff from Nanami's profile is mostly her core concept. She's a bottler, one prone to passive aggression. She's a follower and she absolutely hates that; she's torn between a desire to be her own person and a fear that she can't possibly succeed. It's a potent cocktail of traits all set to boil over in an SOTF situation.
What's less great is the Madelaine focus. I've insinuated a little, but Madelaine is treated as a real focal point of Nanami's profile, and this centering on Madelaine continues in the actual game. It's not a particularly interactive manner of writing, and it does not actually do its job from my perspective; I sort of resent being told how awesome Madelaine is when there's nothing yet to back it up. I also don't dig the coincidence of Nanami being the sole student from her Oregon school to be abducted by the same group that took the class including her best friend/secret foe. This is compounded by something we'll talk about soon: Nanami almost instantly runs into Madelaine in-game.
So, the game begins. Nanami is wondering around on the dirt path, and we're told that she's studiously avoided all other contact thus far, fearing death at the hands of the others, all strangers to her. Nanami muses, though, that she could kill in self defense if need be. She's also upset at going it alone, though, feeling lost without someone to guide her—that someone, she muses, would usually be Madelaine. There's an awkward bit where Nanami muses that though Madelaine would be super useful in this sort of situation, she's probably not here, and she stops crying and walks on, telling herself she'll never have to rely on Madelaine again.
This is an alright intro that does a good job setting up some of Nanami's internal conflict and detailing her very unique situation. It is also, I feel, undercut really hard by the fact that Nanami runs into Madelaine in her very next post.
Nanami trips over a rock and as she rights herself sees a group nearby, and is shocked to realize that one of the students in it is also improbably wearing the same Japanese school uniform she is. Adam Dodd is the only one to really notice Nanami's arrival, but he's blasted out of his mind on morphine (which is one of the recurring themes in V1 Dodd's story that is, I feel, a really mixed bag, but that's a conversation for another time). David Jackson suggests just shooting her to save the potential for trouble, but is stopped by Marcus Roddy, who rather astutely points out that that's not a course of action fitting to those styling themselves as the good guys. Everyone else also chews David out, and he replies that he's just being cautious—his inattention almost got members of the group hurt before, and there's no telling if this girl might attack them. Everyone calls David awful for this (spoilers: he's Cassandra in this situation).
Nanami's narrative features some casual sexism that is a bit tricky to say whether comes from Nanami herself or the narrative, but I'm gonna give the benefit of the doubt and say it shows Nanami's "traditional" values and lack of self confidence. That said, it's an odd quirk that's pretty common n early SOTF and I'm really quite glad it's fallen away. Here's the bit:
wrote:
It was bad enough that a girl with a shotgun, of all things, approached her. But this new stranger was a boy, much more rowdy, much more dangerous than any girl. She hid her eyes behind pale, shaking hands, letting out gasps and sobs as both girl and boy began to argue.
Nanami bargains in her head for more time, and that's a great little moment of desperation on her part. Madelaine finally notices her and this is where I start to have issues with the scene.
wrote:
One girl out of those 300...the chances were extremely slim...but somehow, Madelaine knew as soon as she saw her crying form, that it just had to be...
"...Nanami?" she murmured, trembling slightly. Her stance weakened a bit as she stepped forward, almost unsteadily. "It can't be..."
I'll bring this up more throughout the scene, but my huge gripe with Madelaine is she feels like a fanfiction character escaped into SOTF. Madelaine is special, the one who stands out, the one stuff revolves around... not due to anything she particularly does or says or is, but because of how the narrative and the other characters treat her. Her prose is notably more flourish-filled than anyone else's, and her plotlines are jam-packed with (sometimes unearned) drama. It makes tons of sense why she was a huge deal in V1, when a ton of characters had posts that were one or two paragraphs without punctuation, and honestly the era was much closer to BR fanfic than to the current styling. On the other hand, SOTF was developing into its thing already—the seeds of the current game can easily be seen in characters like Hawley Faust and Adam Dodd—and I feel like by comparison Madelaine has aged very poorly. Her interactions with Nanami showcase these issues repeatedly.
There's a bit that's very well-written tracking Nanami's progressing lies (though some of the actual details don't quite mesh well—2005 was a long time ago but not that long, so I'm not totally sure why Nanami's primary mode of communication with Madelaine is snail mail).
We also start to see some of the cracks in Madelaine's nice girl act as she comforts Nanami:
Now, she continued to hold onto Nanami, as the shorter girl buried her face into Madelaine's shoulder, letting out muffled sobs and soaking her blazer with tears. At this, Madelaine could not help but feel a tinge of nostalgia. She remembered holding onto Nanami like this while she cried over this incident concerning some boy, back in junior high...though she never knew the details. Nanami always got hurt over seemingly petty things...it was understandable how someone like her could break down completely in situation like this.
Nanami is apparently Madelaine's best friend. I think it's a bit telling that she didn't bother to figure out what made Nanami upset. She thinks Nanami's concerns are overreactions to little stuff.
Madelaine promises Nanami that the group will get out alive together, but Nanmi, in a pretty good moment, is appalled at the thought of trusting her life to those who just casually contemplated shooting her. Nanami wants to leave... and to bring Madelaine with her. It's revealed that this is mostly manipulation; Nanami knows that Madelaine is such a kind and caring person she'll gladly give her life for those she cares about (meaning Nanami) and wants to use her as a tool, without the baggage of the group.
The issue here is that's a really quick jump in motivations on Nanami's part since the only thing that happened between this and the post before was Hawley glancing vaguely in their direction.
Anyways, Dodd is having none of it and unleashes a string of incredibly inappropriate commentary. Madelaine slaps him and it's treated pretty decently actually, in that the rest of the thread doesn't like it. It's also used to plug Madelaine again:
Nanami had watched silently as Madelaine walked up to Adam to deliver a slap to the face, suddenly reminded of days long past. It was not the first time that Shirohara-san had defended her so fiercely. There was that incident when a group of boys tried to torment her, and Shirohara single-handedly scared them off with only words and a single slap.
Callum Hadely's handler posts to remind everyone that Callum is still right there (doing what? No idea! Nobody's mentioned him at all, but apparently he just attacked them or something).
Nanami is introduced to the group, and basicallytold she has to stay with them. She's not thrilled about this.
wrote:
What disgusted Nanami the most that for all that she was reluctant to admit it, Shirohara-san was right, as always. Leaving now could only mean death. But now, all Nanami could think about was how much she resented Shirohara-san at that moment, just because she was right. She was always right.
I think we're not supposed to be sympathizing with Nanami here, but... Madelaine's being framed by the narrative as in the right even though she's really not so untouchable. She just escalated Dodd's inappropriate behavior to physical violence, made no effort to deal with the fallout, and is ordering everyone around without doing much explaining. Nanami's narrative goes on more about how special Madelaine is (and Nanami is not).
It annoyed her slightly, that she was able to make friends and allies so quickly. But that was Shirohara-san...she was always like that. No matter how cold or scary she may seem at times, she always managed to make friends with others. She always seemed to possess something special that Nanami did not.
Whatever it was...Nanami had no idea even now, and it made her feel envious. As she crawled to her feet, hugging her daypack and keeping to herself a bit, pacing around. She began wondering if there was anything at all that was special about herself, and if anybody saw it at all.
Madelaine returned to the group, deciding to continue helping out with Marcus' injuries. She was silent in deep thought for a few moments, and it seemed as though her prior irritation towards Adam had faded. But that was Madelaine after all, she was not one to hold grudges against others, no matter what they did.
What Madelaine really has is that she's the character favored by the narrative, and Nanami is not.
Callum runs off, the group talks, and Nanami sits and stews. To her great credit, Makaze actually checks in with Nanami every time she posts, even if Nanami isn't doing much of anything.
Speaking of, the somewhat-neglected Amanda gets a check-in that cuts away to the V1 Afterlife—this is one of the V1 quirks I'm pretty down on so I'm just gonna say that I have zero problems if someone's personal headcanon is that the Bar and Grill exists or whatever but it strikes me as poor form to include it in narrative without a modicum of deniability (because it's gonna get denied anyways by most of the site). I have a bit of an issue because Amanda's post is very long but tends to focus on everything but Amanda—she recaps everyone in the group, spends a ton of time musing on Dodd... but that's the bulk. Her post is a bit self-aware about it, and the doubt that comes with that is a good moment, though.
The group muses about escape, and David notes that the terrorists don't really care if you mess with the cameras. My, how times change! Hawley muses some, and in all of this Nanami sort of fades into the background. Madelaine has a similar recap post flitting over every member of the group, and Nanami leads her away, musing rather sinisterly that Madelaine may not be returning to them soon... or at all.
Adam's story to date is recapped in its entirety which is actually not a bad thing, I feel, given how long it is already. This recap does, however, sit really oddly in the middle of a thread—especially following the two roll-call posts the precede it. Basically, all action has stopped for a pretty substantial span of time to rehash a bunch of stuff that those following Dodd and friends would probably already know. It works alright if you've got no clue what's going on with Dodd and friends as you read... but there aren't really any characters that'd bring you here if you don't know them except Nanami. It feels like maybe it was to catch up readers at the time (as IIRC there'd been a big boom in participants) but I still think the placement leaves something to be desired given how long it all is.
Nanmi talks briefly with Madelaine, tricks her into handing over her tire iron for a moment, then pulls her own pistol and shoots Madelaine in the collarbone. This sequence is pretty well structured and paced, but Nanami's thoughts are entirely absent. She's become an antagonist to Madelaine, and all the narrative focus is on Madelaine's peril and suffering; Nanami is there to create that situation.
Everyone comes running because gunshots are loud and the pair were actual still within sight of some of the group members. Hawley rushes to tend to Madelaine, while Amanda trains her gun on Nanami. We're told that the others arriving was Nanami's plan. I'm not sure I buy it—Nanami's spent the whole scene trying to get Madelaine away from the others, when she had ample opportunity to get the drop on her while being totally ignored by the group. It feels like a narrative overcorrection—stuff went off-script, but rather than adjusting to compensate the script tries to smooth it over. Nanami monologues a good bit about why she hates Madelaine—it's mostly what we've seen before (she feels like Madelaine's protection robbed her of all agency and resented being pitied and treated as helpless)—and Madelaine is crushed by this more than by being shot.
The others try to flank Nanami. Dodd actually has a really good moment here, trying to goad Nanami into focusing on him instead of Madelaine. It's sold well, makes sense for his character and is a great look at what made V1 Dodd a popular protagonist. He also mentions that Nanami basically has one shot, because she's surrounded by heavily-armed people and the only thing keeping them from blowing her away is the damage she could do on her way out (which is a big part of why Nanami's lure-everyone-to-watch plan doesn't make logical sense and feels like a Band-Aid).
The standoff escalates further; David shoots at Nanami, hoping to disarm her, but instead scores a graze that causes her to fire a similarly cosmetic shot along Madelaine's cheek. Dodd taunts some more, Hawley chimes, in, and the tension mounts.
It's the danger to her friends that stirs Madelaine out of her stupor. She muses that she never meant any harm, that she was just trying to be good to Nanami, and that she'd far rather die than see others hurt on her account. Nanmi, for her part, gets more worked up:
She raised her eyes to look at the group again. "Why else would Shirohara-san show that sort of kindness to me, other than to act out of pity? Why else would she even tolerate me, when no one else would? Like you guys just said...I AM pathetic. I AM a weakling. And because I was weak and helpless and so pitiful...Shirohara-san befriended me. Just how stupid is that? I wanted to be one in control...I wanted to show her that I no longer needed her pity, by doing this to her!"
Desperate for them to understand her, she cried out with fury towards the group, "Why are you trying to protect her, anyways? You've barely even known her for that long, but are you saying she's that important to you? Tell me....what's so good about her? Everyone says she's so great, but she's just a normal person like me! What is it that makes her so wonderful and precious, that you're so willing to let yourself get killed just to give her a living chance? How is it that she's worth so much?!"
In any event, Nanami is distracted for a second and Madelaine pulls herself together enough to draw her own pistol (of which Nanami was unaware, failing to realize Madelaine had only disclosed her assigned weapon and not the one Amanda gave her earlier) and shoot Nanami in the back. She then immediately rushes to Nanami's side, trying desperately to save her, and this sort of highlights a bunch of my issues with Madelaine, in this scene and overall.
Madelaine's story wants it all. It wants her to be the center of attention. everything in this Nanami sequence has been geared towards pushing Madelaine into focus, held hostage as the others are forced to watch. It wants Madelaine to be the one to ultimately resolve the situation—a ton of stuff happens in the post where Nanami gets shot, keeping anyone else from really being able to get a word or action in edgewise, and it's Madelaine who takes care of things where others have somewhat arbitrarily failed (whatever happened to Marcus, who was trying to flank Nanami and get her under control while her attention was elsewhere?). And it wants Madelaine to nevertheless retain the moral highground, as she acts only to protect her friends and immediately tries to stuff the genie back in the bottle and help save Nanami from the wound she just inflicted. She even throws herself between Nanami and David when the latter expresses his frustrations with a kick.
And throughout all of this, I'm wondering where Madelaine's flaws are. Nanami views the girl as so perfect her very existence is a mockery... and the narrative seems to only really disagree with the mockery part of that. Nanami recovers a bit and points the gun at Madelaine (somehow, despite the fact that Dodd is at that very moment pressing her chest to the ground trying to stop the bleeding) and threatens to take Madelaine with her into death, and Madelaine sobs and admits to total fault despite having acted only out of pureness and love. Nanami is shocked and realizes just how much better than even what she'd thought Madelaine is, and muses about how really Madelaine has the worse deal even though Nanami's the one bleeding to death:
Shirohara-san would pay for it all. Nanami would leave this would soon. It would all end easily for her. But Shirohara-san would live on, enduring all of the pain that came from the mess Nanami caused. It was as though Shirohara-san had inherited Nanami's sin, and was paying the price in her place. How awful was that...?
So, in case it's not clear, I've got some real issues with Nanami and her arc but mostly as it relates to Madelaine. Nanami is pretty much a prop, one better developed than many in V1, but perhaps more frustrating for that—who exists to push Madelaine. The span from Nanami's first post to her death is eight days OOC, and every aspect of her narrative is focused around pushing Madelaine. In the moments where Nanami herself gets to shine through, I think she's cool and interesting. I think her plot has real meat to it, and could've gone amazing places were it allowed to play out a little more naturally, were the other group members allowed actual agency, were it not so rushed. As it is, though, the whole affair is flawed in some ways that are really frustrating to me.
And so, at the end, I find myself not agreeing with the remorseful, penitent Nanami slipping away, wishing Madelaine nothing but the best. No, I'm right there with bitter, angry Nanami. Madelaine is too perfect, and I really do resent her for it. Give me the flawed crybaby instead, any day.