Leap into the Void
Section 1
Vincent has a troubling dream. Everything in this dream actually has meaning and reveals things about the past, but there is nothing in it that can be made sense of thus far. Just take from it that Vincent feels like he is lost and going crazy, but isn't exactly.
The scene is interrupted by Re-L's investigation. She has one lead on who else might have some clue about the proxy that attacked her, the immigrant Vincent Law. He was seen near the incident and she found his necklace in her destroyed apartment. But Vincent Law is nowhere to be found. She is consumed by her need to find out more, calling Vincent literally every few minutes.
Alerted by Iggy of some high level (top security bureau) anonymous access into the intelligence databanks, she finds someone else who has been obsessively searching every few minutes. I can't seem to read the information that Re-L stumbles upon, but my theory is that it is Raul Creed searching for information on Vincent Law, since he also has a hunch Vincent is connected with the Proxy. The other options are that it is some more information on the proxy's whereabouts or some data being changed in order to manage Vincent's encounter.*
*Upon close examination of the screen with a higher resolution version, there is in fact "Vincent Law" displayed over and over again in a long list on the "Analysis of the access" screen.
Raul Creed. Ah yes. Well.
Hold up for just a second, I think I have been spelling things out pretty plainly so far, just instructing exactly what is true, but I'm not sure that is the best way to do things. Or maybe it is. I don't know.
One of the things that I like so much about Ergo Proxy (besides everything) is the way up to 75% of the story is not actually ever directly talked about, but is instead shown and symbolized. When I first watched this episode, and indeed the second and third times I watched it, I did not clue in. I just knew that Vincent was being pursued because he was picked as a sort of scapegoat and was connected to the monster so was basically too dangerous to let live.
How wrong an impression. How ignorant and simplified that was. And it is plain to see from what we know already. I want show you how Ergo Proxy tells the story, but I also want to leave it open for you to discover.
Raul in his apartment. This scene is placed between Re-L's investigation and Vincent's ambush. That is no coincidence.
He is hitting a few notes on a piano in the dark. That is no coincidence.
His phone rings, but he does not answer. Though it rings and rings and
rings. That is no coincidence.
He slams on the piano keys. That is no coincidence.
Does it make sense yet? How about when I tell you that what flashes on the screens right before Vincent discovers Dorothy, his murdered autoreiv, was Pino?
Does it make sense yet?
So too are things laid out carefully. The lecture of Kristeva is a thinly veiled threat against Raul Creed. (as the Entourages say later in the episode, "Speaking of culprits, what about the Security Bureau?" "There is no cause for concern, we have made ourselves
very clear.") Humans can be replaced just as easily as autoreivs in Romdeau. This is shown by Dorothy's killing, Vincent being ambushed with what appears to be deadly force, Kristeva and Raul's duality, and Raul and Pino's relationship. Autoreiv and human are both equally valuable and equally dispensable.
The incidentally the immigrants only care about promotion, and in a sense are just as mindless as the citizens, as they strive to be one of them.
Moving on, Pino shows up and just starts saying stuff. "Is Pino really Pino. Is Pino supposed to be Pino" is a pretty mixture of childlike nonsense questions and actually really really deep philosophical questions that an awakened intelligence would ask. What makes me, me? Who am I and who determined that and what defines what I am?
Re-L hears the background noise of a tram passing and guesses at Vincent's location and intentions. (She is pretty sharp...) He is trying to escape the dome. She then makes her way there to intercept him.
The interaction between the Entourage of the Administrative Bureau is also saying things that are obvious only on rewatch. Everything they say has many many implications, but I think I will not speak of them here.
Anyway, the action kicks up again when Re-L confronts Vincent. He knows nothing, even though he clearly was somehow involved. He is far too submissive to be lying. Re-L is furious to get no answers, except one. He saw the monsters too. He is like her. Aside: a power suit can be glimpsed on the upper deck as they assemble before all turning their lights on.
Raul Creed shows up and then things really pick up. Re-l tries to give Vincent hope to make him turn back. Instead Vincent rejects his entire life, the entire dome, which he was so dedicated too. So submissive and desperate to be a member of society. Now he gives up. He will never be a part of society and seemingly never hopes to become his own person. And in truth, it is that way for all of us, even in our own "lenient" societies. We are always asked to do things in a way that is proper or serves others, even though we are people. We have our own divergent thoughts, it is not something that is encouraged. The very word "divergent" carries a nasty undertone.
Raul sees that Pino has left the dome with Vincent.
[VIEW SPOILERS]
Mazecity
Section 2
Because I love Ergo Proxy, I want to try to paint the scene myself anyway, so here goes: Raul Creed.
Raul Creed is suddenly not the man he was before. He lost everything. His wife, his child, his little autoreiv girl. He was strong, but maybe not strong enough. Emotion has come to poison his life, but now that everything has been turned upside down, what if he does indulge in those forbidden emotions just this once? Doesn't Vincent deserve it after all? He led the proxy to kill everyone. He caused Raul Creed's life to evaporate like it never even mattered. Why not have a little justice?
So he created a trap. He needed to capture Vincent anyway. Get information from him about his connection to the proxy, maybe use him as bait for the proxy, before eliminating him from ever existing. Whatever the case, he made a little net, and he made it very carefully. Vincent will be lured into it by a call from his autoreiv. Dorothy. Dorothy can be killed. Just like Pino.
Pino. Remind him of
Pino before he has his own life ripped away.
The jangling of an alarm call breaks into his meditated vengeance.
His job.
He pounds on the keys, letting the emotions be born and flourish inside of him.
What use is his job now? What use was it ever to try to control things? What use was it to try and deny fate? How blind he was. He thought he controlled everything, but he controlled nothing. He was right there, and he couldn't have done anything.
He is not the same man any longer, he lost everything, and has become someone else.
No. All he is capable of, is acting as a hand of fate in someone else's life.
Vincent Law.
V-I-N-C-E-N-T L-A-W.
All of this is clear to me. All of this I do not think can be contested, though it is my own interpretation. All of this I had no idea of, even though it was not hidden and not reliant on the next episodes. (although they enforce it) All of this comes from tying scenes together, little details flashed on screen, knowing the character's personalities, and all of it is held in a scene barely 20 seconds long, with no words.
The same thing goes for Re-L's investigation. She acts composed but is actually desperate with her search. With a few words she reveals the actions of Raul, and confirms that Vincent is tied into this, without actually ever showing the data or saying anyone's name. And in between all of this, and her mediation on Vincent, she is showing her changed attitude toward Iggy now that she knows he cannot help but reveal her secrets to the Administrative Bureau. Furthermore, it is another example of how she does not rely on Iggy or shortcuts to do her research for her. Nothing is said, everything is revealed.
Vincent's dream: Vincent dreams of his necklace, lit up a little like the key. He dreams of Proxy One watching the rockets being sent to Mosk to destroy the dome. As Proxy One was on the tram it may be Proxy One trying to get Vincent to be vengeful, or it may be Vincent remembering being Ergo Proxy in the past. The reason for being sad and laughing is because of Proxy One/Ergo Proxy loving but hating his creators and his creations.
The blood on his hand when Vincent wakes up is from killing Monad.
Interestingly the immigrants hunting Vincent are the same ones that hunt Pino later when she returns to Romdeau and all the autoreivs are infected with Cogito, in episode 21. The lines used are similar to when she overhears them hunting Vincent, "He's not just another autoreiv." "This could be my chance for a big promotion!" compared to later, with, "Boys, I think we just got a promotion! All it takes is something like this to get yourself noticed!"
Raul Creed reacts calculatingly, but more than a little vindictively.
He creates a trap for Vincent, tailor made. He calls Vincent in with his own autoreiv. Sets the monitors to go off, displaying his precious Pino, whom he has forced to exterminate following protocol that she has been infected. He has Dorothy brutally murdered, leaving her mutilated body for Vincent to find and see before he is captured. It is done to retaliate for the wrongs that Raul had to suffer, an eye for an eye.
I use murdered here, because that is the equivalent in Romdeau. The killing of Dorothy is more shocking and wrong than you might first think of it. Autoreivs are just as human as the rest of the subhumans. Interestingly it is Re-L who discriminates against them, "autoreivs will always be autoreivs and nothing more" although she likely discriminates against everyone who only follows orders.
The Administrative Bureau conversation: Re-L is being raised as a privileged citizen. She is special, a combination of proxy and subhuman creation. They place her as the Intelligence Bureau Head because she has the aptitude to be very prescient, ("her intuition is far too keen") and being the Regent's "granddaughter" is of high ranking. She reaches her potential, but her potential is not something that the dome wants or needs.
All the dome's citizens are designed, created, monitored and raised carefully for their pre-described roles in society. "The citizens are all modeled on pre-arranged information, local approximations are meaningless." Some interpretations of that last part is that the actions in any one circumstance cannot be predicted, or that they don't matter only the overall performance. Maybe they are suggesting that humans do not exceed their already predetermined roles, so evaluation based on observation does not matter, they are still the same people, already hard-coded to a certain fate.
Re-L, being a combination of proxy and subhuman biology is not the same. She still has a raison detre - to seek out Ergo Proxy, but that is a tangle of reasons. One is because of Monad's nature, to love Proxy One. Another is Proxy One's own doing, (124C41) and perhaps Ergo's desire to die. Another may be Donov's desire to be reunited. Another might be the city's desire to have a proxy to power itself. And a last is Re-L's own nature to question and learn and seek.
The citizens are created from the wombsys, they are not born of natural reproduction. There are family units, but only in name. In truth they are assigned to each other, the same way that autoreivs are assigned to their subhumans. This is shown with the child of the Creeds' and makes sense for how finely controlled the Romdeau society machine is.
What it is to begin to think - Vincent, Pino, Re-L, Raul
Re-L has entered into her obsession with discovering the truth. She disobeys authority despite the consequences, she tracks down Vincent with a single-minded passion, she questions everything around her, and she wants to know the truth behind the lies. Seeing Vincent open his eyes, she realizes that there is far more to him, a dumb "perfect citizen" than she thought, and it probably only drives her further to seek answers. She is learning to think.
Vincent has been forced out of his attempts to become a fellow citizen and now must find his own way. Rely on himself instead of others, and accept himself instead of being accepted by others. He is learning to think.
Raul began to deal with emotions, and thought he could punish Vincent. Well, Vincent escaped, and the emotions, if they ever would have gone away in the first place, are kept alive by the sight of Pino leaving the dome. His job is no longer his only concern and motivation in life. He is learning to think in new ways as well.
And Pino herself now has free will, and is wrestling with who she should be. She sees Vincent being kind to her and decides to help him in her own way. She is still robotic, with her vacant smile, and lack of understanding of what is happening around her. She is pure in a sense as well, but she has just begun to learn to think.
//////// My Reaction
The cross in the chamber - religion and nonthinking. oh god why didn't I SEE THAT BEFORE.
As the Entourages discuss Re-L and Raul and Romdeau's state, the camera takes a top down perspective on the chamber. There is a very definite cross there, and it is a very strong relationship in my opinion.
Donov Mayer and the Administrative Bureau are like holy leaders to their city. They are all powerful, and determine right and wrong in every citizen's life. Additionally, they make thinking optional. They created a paradise, and then told their citizens to trust in them, follow the rules, and they will be given a heaven. To disobey, to think and question is chaotic and unnecessary and to be eliminated. What they say is holy law, and there is no reason to question it. What they say becomes true, since they control everything. Again this is a conflict between the source of truth - authority or reason. Society or individual. External or internal. God or science.
Some people have suggested that the maze and Pino leading Vincent through it is symbolic. I tend not to think so. They also suggest that it is a reference to the rabbit from Alice in Wonderland. I also don't see that. I think they are both kind, both hunted, and both thoughtful, but more than that, I cannot say.
Vincent's ascribed attraction to Re-L maybe coincidental or related to her high ranking citizenship. It may also be her Monad-ness and his Ergo-ness. I don't pretend to know.
He opens his eyes and lets himself see everything about himself and the dome. What is wrong about it instead of just focusing on his objective and putting everything else behind it. He stops ignoring everything that was wrong about it and himself and lets himself see it and everything all at once.
Re-L is positioned between Vincent and Raul. She is held by Iggy, who follows her and supports her in all she does, but is also her crutch that prevents her from completely being free.
[/SPOILERS]
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