May 09, 2024
Author's Commentary #20:
Time to talk about Chapter 20: Fujiko's downfall.
Fujiko is dead. And ironically enough, she ended up being killed by someone close to her, much like Julius Caesar was. Believe it or not, Fujiko being killed off here for good here was actually something I decided to do last-minute for the remake.
In the original, Fujiko actually survives and becomes even crazier, however, I didn't like that plot-point and felt it was better to kill off Fujiko. The behind the scenes story for this is also quite intriguing. In the first draft after deciding that Fujiko would be an irredeemable villain, she was set to simply spend the rest of her life in an asylum. However, a new character known as Nadea would then appear and use her imitation acting to essentially become Fujiko 2.0. I didn't like that plot-point since it felt a little cheap to me to have some unknown character appear and suddenly role-play as one of the biggest antagonists in the series.
Thus, for plan 2, Fujiko survived, and killed Nadea, and pretended to be Nadea pretending to be Fujiko. That's what I ended up settling on for the edited version of the original Escape Witch.
Here however, I wanted to finally settle the matter and ultimately chose to rewrite Yumeko's character to make her even worse than Fujiko. It actually made lots of sense, considering Yumeko was actually the one that warped Fujiko into a yandere bald fetishist. I actually like this choice, because now it allows me to make Yumeko a proper villain.
Funnily enough, Yumeko might actually be the character that has undergone the most rewrites in this series. Originally, she was simply going to be a minor character back when the series was planned to be more episodic and lighthearted. Then, she was going to be an antagonist, but be a bit more redeemable, then she became a siscon, then she ended up getting a criminal record like Fujiko.
Since this is the last we'll see of Fujiko, I also decided to throw in the flashback of the incident she caused at her high school, but from her point of view. The flashback was actually edited into the original Escape Witch, and since the flashback doesn't mess with the new direction I want to take the remake, I decided to add it it. The flashback also reveals that it was thanks to Purin that Fujiko was even able to pull off her plan.
One final thing I'll mention is that Nadea and her partner are still in the remake, however, their role is reduced to just that of the arc they make their debut in. This is mainly because I honestly don't know what to do with them, but felt Nadea's initial role in a future arc needed to stay, thus she and her partner were spared from being removed from the series. I'll talk more in depth about that in a future commentary.
And with that, the Ides of March arc has come to a close. The next arc will focus primarily on Serika, so I hope you look forward to it.
That's all for this commentary. I hope you enjoyed it.
![Escape Witch [Remake] cover](https://honeyfeed-novel-images.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/novel_image/file/14560/cover_thumb_9f88f94f-2a73-4d00-b518-6f20b53f9811.jpg)
![Spice of life [Remake] cover](https://honeyfeed-novel-images.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/novel_image/file/14558/cover_thumb_e0f19edc-753a-4f65-bd0e-b68dc349af99.jpg)