Without a doubt, the most impressive thing about this show is the sheer number of ways they’ve managed to work in a Monokuma enjoying himself in the background. This time might have been my favorite, because you can just barely tell he’s now using the Oowada butter on his pancakes.

Hot-blooded, so it melts in your mouth

It was abundantly obvious, even before they found the lock on the back of the robot suit, that Hagakure wasn’t the culprit. Ditto for Kyoko, who was so cold and aloof from the start in a way that would have been suspicious in real life but virtually guarantees her innocence in a show focused around elaborate murder mysteries. On the other hand, Celes’ finding of proof incriminating Hagakure offscreen was fairly suspicious. She and Aoi were the two
I was suspicious of last week, and that part tipped the scales of suspicion her way. No way somebody who suddenly produces detailed evidence damning the wrong person 6 minutes into a trial episode and then accuses another person once that line of logic craps out is working out of the kindness of their heart.

From there, it was pretty obvious where the trial was going to go, but it was nice to watch Celes’ elaborate setup unravel. The interrogation scenes are still my favorite parts of the show. Lots of quick camera swapping, creative angles, and over-the-top facial expressions. In general, it’s just full of the kind of stuff that pulls me into a scene without requiring I take it too seriously.

This episode also had what I thought was the cleverest bit of evidence thus far in the series: Yamada’s glasses. On-screen for some time, focused on for about a minute at the end of last episode, but just not the kind of thing most people would notice. Props to Kishi Seiji for hiding evidence on-screen in plain sight like that.

While the discovery of the new, off-camera room on the first floor didn’t present any real hard evidence or hints about who the mastermind of all this is, it did represent the plot inching forward. I doubt we’ll be seeing any real hints in that area before the buildup to the final trial, but it’s nice to know the characters’ searching has borne some fruit and all the buildup the final arc isn’t going to be dropped like an atom bomb in a single episode.