[OH&S]

Uiharu's asspull was essentially the final nail in the coffin for this arc. I thought Misaka was holding her own as well as she could. It was only the final problem of the arc (separating Kimi from the dragon) that needed an acceptable resolution to have me be more positive towards the arc. What we got instead was unacceptable.

I've collected my thoughts here:

Fast facts before the main argument:

• The fundamental source of power for an esper is their Personal Reality.
• The AIM diffusion field (hence referred to as AIMDF) is the weak energy field that is unconsciously emitted by an esper. The type of energy emitted is directly related to the Personal Reality of the esper (mainly what ability they have). The AIMDF itself is NOT the esper ability; it’s an unconscious output rather than an input.
• An ability can be affected through the AIMDF by very specific AIM-manipulation espers (like Takitsubou Rikou and Kihara Nayuta) who do so by interfering with the flow of the AIM in order to directly affect the esper's Personal Reality.
• AIM Jammers do the following:
  1. Emits a special e/M wave to diffusely reflect an esper’s AIMDF causing the esper to interfere with their own power
  2. Dissolves your concentration and intentionally leaves you with thoughts that make you more easily tracked by a Psychometrer.
  3. It’ll weaken, but not eliminate an esper power altogether.
  4. possibility to have your powers go out of control; powers that use complex calculations are especially prone to this.
• Uiharu Kazari has the following traits:
  • Level 1 Thermal Hand
  • master hacker who could potentially construct a strong Personal Reality considering the complex calculations she makes; but alas, she is a Level 1.

Problem to solve:

• Need to figure out how to separate Angel Dragon from Kimi who is acting as a power source due to her being a holistic esper (which by itself is BS but entei08's got that covered).
• There is no ability on hand that could do it.

Uiharu's proposed solution from end of Ch. 126:

• "If it doesn't exist... we just have to create it."
• i.e. Create a new ability from scratch that can separate the angel dragon from Kimi.

How the manga says Uiharu achieves this:

1. Directs all the long range AIM Jammers to herself.
2. Materializes her own AIMDF.
3. Uses the AIM Jammers to alter her AIMDF to change her power into something else. i.e. Broke down and reconstructed her AIMDF into something else (BIG red flag right here).
4. Constantly adjusting the AIMDF on a micro level; an inhuman feat none of Academy City's supercomputers can do.
5. Redefine the real world into a digital one.

The main problems with this:

1. AIM Jammers specifically interfere with an esper's concentration; anything requiring complex calculations are a no go.
   Once all those AIM Jammers were directed towards Uiharu, how was she able to concentrate to pull off the feat?
2. If Uiharu is using AIM Jammers to metaphorically chisel her AIMDF into something else, why should that end up creating a new ability in the first place when the fundamental source of power for an esper is the Personal Reality; NOT the AIMDF?
3. How can Uiharu accurately craft a specific new ability using technology she's never used before given that she's not an expert on AIMDFs to begin with?
   How can she possibly know if what she's doing is working?
4. How can Uiharu even pull off all of this when it’s said to be an inhuman feat none of Academy City's supercomputers can do?
   Is Uiharu, a Level 1, performing calculations better than a supercomputer?
5. What ability did Uiharu even create that would solve the problem of stripping the Angel Dragon from Kimi?
   There's some gibberish about redefining the real world into a digital one.
   Is that implying that Uiharu rewrote reality?
   What exactly did she rewrite/modify?
   BTW These are rhetorical questions; the manga doesn't even bother to present any answers to these questions.
6. Independent to all of these questions, how can Uiharu materialize her AIMDF to begin with?
   • This isn't something that just happens on a whim. Uiharu is not a special or unique esper.
     Even assuming the above 5 points hold, there's no reason why an AIMDF should manifest like that.
     This is different from the aggregations of multiple AIMDFs like Kazakiri Hyouka, the AIM Burst and Aiwass who all are focused around a core.
   • More confounding is the mixed messaging from the manga.
     Uiharu was showing signs of manifesting her AIMDF before the AIM Jammers came into play; possibly hinting that ingesting Kimi's blood had something to do with it.
     But if it was Kimi's blood, there's no way Uiharu would know her AIMDF would manifest like that.
     When Uiharu was pulling off the feat, she seemed to know exactly what she was doing; it couldn't have been Kimi's blood.
     So, which is it: Kimi's blood or AIM Jammers or both?
     Regardless, if Kimi's blood plays any part in this, it’s bad writing as a plot element which we know nothing about was used to resolve the arc.

I have to conveniently ignore all of this in order to accept anything about the arc's resolution. If it just made Uiharu's feat acceptable and gave some sort of closure to what happened with the dragon, the arc would have been salvaged because the good stuff in this arc is really good.

Kamijou didn't need to appear in this arc (and would be problematic for its own reasons) but now I wish that he or Noukan did appear considering what we got instead.

Originally Posted by dniv

...I'm absolutely convinced the thing with Uiharu will come back up later. It's not Kamachi style to make something happen only one by now. Have you all literally learned nothing after reading his whole series?

Railgun has never operated like that. Its more bizarre to think that Railgun would change its structure regarding plot elements 14 years into serialization. And whether its comes up later isn't even the main issue. The main issue is that its unacceptable right now at the end of the arc.

Originally Posted by dniv

It's super obvious this is a parallel to the latest arc in GT and y'all are blind.

Please elaborate, dniv. I don't want to hate this arc but no one has successfully convinced me otherwise.