#iwasawa

Just as I was saved… I’ll save someone else like this.

Iwasawa found peace 😭❤️

Iwasawa - with slightly longer hair then intended 😅

Those who feign common sense are laughing; what lies will they tell next? Do they proudly dress up the things that those lies have earned them?  But we must all move forward to tomorrow That’s why I’m singing like this.... You who are crying now, you must be lonely That’s alright, you're just being human The tears that have been shed will say this to me “This is not just a beautiful lie.”  Thank you for honoring our true selves!

I come back to this scene because these song lyrics and the scene itself are so amazingly eye-opening to what the situation in this show actually truly is despite so little actually being said of it. Iwasawa clearly wrote this ballad from the bottom of her heart and through it, she puts to song all that she’s been thinking and feeling in all her time of being in Purgatory. 

The part about “those who feign common sense” who make up lies and through those lies gain things they try to purport as being more valuable and important than they are is clearly referring to Battlefront - we saw at the very beginning of the episode that Yurippe turned down Iwasawa’s request to sing “My Song” at the planned concert because a slow ballad would not be “distracting” enough, so she and GirlDeMo have to instead perform something that’s been okayed by Yurippe as a big diversion performance to keep Angel and the Student Council from catching on to what Battlefront is really doing at that time. So basically, there’s a mandate that, for the sake of the missions, Iwasawa only sing “beautiful lies” rather than what truly comes from her own heart and soul. Regardless of how dedicated or not Iwasawa was to Battlefront’s cause, she found their methods to be unfair to her and to others she’d wanted to reach through her singing. So not only are these lyrics a whammy that turns our perception of Battlefront on it’s head, but if we hadn’t already figured out that Yurippe and her gang are the actual bad guys here, the scene makes cuts to them proceeding with their mission of raiding Angel’s dorm room while she’s out and hacking her computer, with them not giving one flying fuck about the actual meaning behind “My Song” and instead seeing it as just another good distraction performance that works to their advantage, all cast in some very sinister lighting. Angel, meanwhile, is the one who actually turns herself back around from walking back to the dorm when she hears “My Song” starting over the intercom, and goes back to the auditorium so that she can hear the song up close and be there to watch as Iwasawa’s heart’s desire is at last fully fulfilled, which enables Iwasawa to pass on. Again, without much words spoken, it speaks volumes about the characters’ moral standings.

The rest of the lyrics also speak to the themes of the story - “we must all move forward to tomorrow” in reference to acceptance of what had happened in life and moving forward to the life beyond, and the chorus part referring to how simply allowing yourself to feel pain, cry, and act out from loneliness and a need for companionship of others is a natural part of being a living, breathing, feeling human being, lyrics at total odds with “I will keep fighting. I will never show my tears” from Yurippe’s “Brave Song” (which carries the message that “to be strong is to not give into human weakness and to fight without relenting even in the face of loneliness, as people will ultimately end up all alone anyway”). It’s clear that in her heart, Iwasawa was always truly on Angel’s side of the issue of fulfilling your life’s purpose and moving on from it. 

It’s just such an incredible song for an incredible moment that changes the whole game of the series from what we were initially sold without most of the characters actually recognizing it.