Maria’s family.
A special analysis of Maria’s family – including Maria, Rosa and Sakutaro.
The best type of relation you can ping Sakutaro and Maria’s relationship to is to compare them towards the old classic adventures of Calvin and Hobbes. Well it’s a bit different than that, considering some circumstances, but it’s the best example. Before we get into Sakutaro let me just give everyone a basic idea of what kind of child Maria is exactly.
Maria Ushiromiya
Maria is nine years old and has a well known fascination with the occult. Now because of this fascination she tends to be very isolated in her class, as she’s considered to be creepy. Anytime she’s not being isolated she’s being bullied. Although it wasn’t always like this – according to the VN Maria use to have many friends in her old home and even had birthday parties with other kids. However after she moved and began to get into the occult (which is presumed to of happened because she began meeting with “Beatrice” annually on Rokkenjima) she became socially isolated. This didn’t go well with her mother – partly because Maria didn’t have any friends which worried her and partly because Rosa looked bad being the mother of a weird and socially awkward child (or she thought she looked bad).
So Maria created her own friends, with the belief that they were real. This included Sakutaro, but there were more than just him (the forest band and a bunch of others). The idea that Maria could create a ‘soul’ for her toys and make them her friends is what granted her the title of Origin Witch. Is there more to this though? After all, just making an imaginary friend can’t constitute one becoming a witch. Of course it depends how one looks at witches, but that’s a completely different topic.
Anyway, as we know Rosa “kills” Sakutaro. Now “kill” as in she destroyed his stuffed animal or rather vessel. However, as Ange said Maria only believes Sakutaro is dead because his vessel is gone, but Sakutaro can appear whenever he wants to anyone as long as they know of ‘magic’. Now what does this mean for Maria? Is she REALLY going to kill her mother – then again who kills their mother over broken toys or toys that got taken away. Which makes you wonder-
What is Sakutaro?
Okay besides the obvious ‘he is Maria’s friend and stuffed animal’ and what not, there is more to it. Think about what Sakutaro always said to Maria (or what she thought he said) when Rosa was out sleeping around with men (no that is not Rosa’s job to clear it up). He consistently told Maria that Rosa loved her and did care about her – that she was just busy with work, but would spend time with her daughter if she could.
Sakutaro always encouraged Maria to believe in Rosa being a good mother, even when Rosa had forgotten their promise to go to the movies together. At that point Maria was crying and pretty much giving up on believing in the goodness of her mother, but Sakutaro distracted her from that loneliness and pretty much saved Maria’s belief in Rosa. So what is Sakutaro to Maria – yes he’s her best friend, but perhaps can he be considered almost a guiding belief of Maria’s love for Rosa.
If you think of it that way it makes sense why Beatrice couldn’t ‘revive’ Sakutaro for Maria. Because in reviving Sakutaro you also have to revive Maria’s belief in Rosa and that she can really truly be happy with her mother together. When Sakutaro was torn apart Maria basically descended into hatred towards Rosa for destroying the lion. With Sakutaro’s death came the death of Maria’s love for Rosa, which Sakutaro had always encouraged Maria to keep alive in her heart.
However the fact that Sakutaro still ‘exists’ in some form, does that mean that all hope is lost as far as Maria’s love for Rosa. Only time (and that troll Ryukishi) will tell.
The meaning of Uu-
A spell for happiness – a spell to always be happy with Rosa that originated from one of the happiest days of Maria’s short life. The spell was ‘created’ when Maria was singing a song she heard while having a picnic with Rosa. However, Maria couldn’t remember half of the song and substituted the real lyrics with the sound ‘Uu-’. Rosa was so happy with how cute Maria was being that the latter decided to always use the sound and chant it to be happy with Rosa. So whenever you look back on earlier episodes of the season (episode 1 is a perfect example) keep in mind that most times Maria might have been chanting ‘Uu-‘ to calm Rosa and use her happiness spell. Of course Maria probably said the noise so much it appears to become a verbal tic (a sort of tourettes possibly).
The meaning of this phrase is probably one of the most tragic things in the entire game. Maria says the noise around Rosa a lot in order to make her mother happy and create magic, yet Rosa only becomes enraged by the noise rather than not. Maria can stop saying the tic around her mother of course, but if she does that then the spell won’t work and Rosa won’t ever be happy with her again.
So she keeps on saying Uu-
Continues to say it to make Rosa happy.
Only the spell for happiness merely enrages her mother.
But she will continue to say it, because it’s the only way in her mind to bring back the happy memories of her mother to life.
Rosa Ushiromiya
Black Witch Rosa. This is not canon.
She’s probably the adult out of the seven with the most development, which makes her a fan favorite. (along with other moments, such as Rosa Musou) But what kind of character is Rosa exactly.
Yes she’s not an amazing mother. At all.
But besides that, there is almost a certain aspect of inferiority. Specifically related to her older siblings. She never excelled in grades like Eva, never had a chance of being the next head like Krauss and was never really good with managing relationships like Rudolf (both in business and love). This inferiority has also led her to hate her siblings for certain reasons (as Beatrice described in her gourmet meal to Rosa in the conclusion of the second arc).
However, you have to wonder if all the abuse she suffered is still happening or is just in her head. In the game the narrator described how Krauss would punch her when she was a child. First off Krauss should have been busying trying to get Natsuhi pregnant since the 50’s, so I doubt he would have time to punch his little sister around. Besides, punching her? They have a possible 20 year difference between each other; I doubt that Krauss would be THAT stupid as to punch his little sister around.
Then there’s Eva, who has a very similar age gap to Rosa as Krauss does. I don’t doubt Eva bullying her little sister around at all and it still happens to this day (Eva calling Rosa stupid on several occasions). But then there’s Rudolf, who Rosa said had betrayed her and bullied her even more than the older siblings combined. But if he did that it doesn’t show it at all – between Krauss, Eva and himself he never shows signs of picking on Rosa. At one point in the game he actually tells Krauss and Eva to stop picking on Rosa, when they mock her fashion company. She also seems to get along fine with the three spouses.
Does she hold some hate to the family? Sure, it’s easy to see the family is full of pricks (well at least the 2nd generation is). However it seems this hate has seeped into her relationship with Maria, going as far as to physically punish Maria, or sometimes just outright abuse her, just as her father had. Even worse there are signs of emotional abuse as well, what with ripping up Sakutaro among other things. Still it looks like this cycle of hate continues on.
Conclusion
Good End confirmed to happen Never 8(
Well I written more than enough I think. Of course this could go on and on, but that would bore you to tears.
Rosa and Maria’s relationship, both the good and bad aspects of it, is an interesting topic in Umineko. It’s a shame Ryukishi hasn’t devoted much attention to the other parent-child relationships, excluding the relationship between Battler and Rudolf, but even that development is still full of holes, mostly coming from Rudolf’s side of the spectrum.
Episode 22 is coming up this Wednesday and yes it should finally begin the 1st twilight. I’ll probably post another profile article featuring the furniture + demons after that.
Analyzing Umineko no Naku koro Ni 
oh, I tough that Rosa’s is more influenced by Society. Sometimes it seems that he only want to be a good mother to the society. For example all whar Rosas says to do to Maria at telephone
Well at the end of EP 2, during her crowning moment of awesome, she realized that she was wrong in doing that. Still narrowing it down to just society is a bit inaccurate, in my opinion.
Sakutaro was killed because he was clearly chick magnet and no one likes harem male leads.
I did felt bad for Maria and Sakutaro but her reaction to kill her own mother over a stuffed animal was too much. I mean really? I still suspect Beato had something to do with this.
I’m always astonished how mischievous Ryukishi07’s games are. It never gets old.
Although you say fan favorite it seems that not many anime watchers like her much, which saddens me. Rosa seems to be in a worse position compared to the other siblings and doesn’t seem to be fortunate with anything at all. Not even her daughter is what she expected. (uu) It always seemed to me like she was never given a fair chance. Plus the game almost forces me to not dislike her even I wanted to. Then again this might be what the author wants me to think. Like in EP 3 when the game tells us how ‘angry’ Beato was when Eva B. killed George and Shannon. Of course, after the third arc is over we all know that this was a trick. Oh, that Beatroll.
Beato has nothing to do with things that happen outside the gameboard. She can’t create fake scenes in 1998 or before 1986. You have to see it in Maria’s eyes – to Maria it wasn’t that Rosa ripped up her favorite toy. It was that Rosa /killed/ her best friend, when he had done nothing to anger her.
Also she is fan favorite – she’s pretty much in the top 5 in every poll made after a new game is released. All the siblings are in pretty much bad positions – maybe not as much as others, but yeah. And I don’t think you should look at it as the game forcing you to hate Rosa. She isn’t designed to be a bastard character like Satoko’s uncle was in Higurashi – she has room for redemption and there can be a good end. But good ends don’t happen when one party does things right. The other party has to work for a good end too. How long can Maria keep playing ‘witch’ until she just gets too old for it? Would she still keep doing it even after 10 or 11?
I think that anime fans just judge Rosa character about what she have done in the end (epioe 22 right now). Yeah when I just read this part on the novel I hated her too much.
However Novel readers seems to judge her as character. Rosa as character is great. She is really interesting as a mere human.
P.D Say just society is a bad reason I apologise. Rosa actions must be influenced for a lot of things surely. So it is impossible to give just one