Various things Ultimate Despair did for the sake of despair
Ultimate Despair (超高校級の「絶望」chō kōkō kyū no "zetsubō") is an organization in the Danganronpa Series founded by Junko Enoshima.
Description
Ultimate Despair are described as a group of people who have "become despair". As Junko describes despair as a sort of contagion/state of mind, it can be inferred that the members of Ultimate Despair are those who have been "infected" by despair. Their goal is to spread despair across the entire world, driving it into a state of self-destructive anarchy.
They defied understanding and did various things for the sake of despair and Junko Enoshima: some starved themselves till their bodies were husks, some offered up their parents to Junko to use for experiments on murder, others slaughtered innocent civilians and forced them to kill themselves as a tribute to their dead leader, one removed their own eye and replaced it with Junko's, possibly to see her despair. It is also said members of Ultimate Despair attempted to produce children with Junko's corpse. It is notable that Nagito Komaeda took her left hand, although it does not function. They also started The Tragedy and kept it ongoing even after their leader's death.
Eventually, the Future Foundation secured their custody - at first only aware that they were killing game survivors from Hope's Peak Academy. When Makoto Naegi and the 14th Division of the Future Foundation realized that the survivors were in fact members of Ultimate Despair, the survivors were made to enter the Neo World Program, where their memories were reset to before they were manipulated by Junko - generally resulting in them not recognizing each other. The plan was to overwrite their memories with good ones, to undo all the damage Junko had done to them.
Unfortunately this plan ended in failure, due to Junko's interference as a virus AI, uploaded into the program by Izuru Kamukura before they were put into the program. As a result, they ended up experiencing much of the same violent events as the "Class of 78" did.
The ending of the Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair heavily implied that even though the Neo World Program did not successfully erase any memories at all, the remnants of Ultimate Despair may have kept their memories from inside the Neo World Program and were able to recant their status as Ultimate Despair. The surviving Remnants of Despair currently reside on Jabberwock Island and are attempting to find a way to awaken their comatose friends, while the Future Foundation left them alone and continued cleaning up the world and putting an end to The Tragedy.
Remnants of Despair
After their leader died in The Ultimate Punishment, most members of Ultimate Despair followed her example and committed suicide. The ones who survived became known as the Remnants of Despair (絶望の残党 zetsubō no zantō).
After Junko's death the fifteen remnants of despair led by Izuru Kamukura planned to resurrect their leader hand over their own body to AI Junko through the Neo World Program. Ironically will be Izuru himself, under his identity as Hajime Hinata, to prevent the plan to succeed activating the shutdown sequence eliminating AI Junko.
In the beginning, the Future Foundation took in fifteen of the students as survivors of Hope's Peak Academy. But upon their further investigation, they discovered the truth that the fifteen people Future Foundation acquired were actually the Remnants of Despair.
“The Ultimate Despair were the responsible one for The Tragedy and brought chaos into the world. Despair in human form, but utterly devoid of humanity... That's what you guys really are. The Ultimate Despairs don't care about principles or morals. They just spread despair everywhere they go... They live solely to torment everything... to burn everything...to kill everything...” As described by Makoto.
Nagito know the unbelieavable truth before the others. It was a special prize for clearing the Final Dead Room. The prize used to have profiles from after the Ultimate Despair entered the school, but Nagito destroyed them before the others saw it. He tried to kill everyone except the traitor, because of his love for hope and his hatred toward despair.
The students were tainted by Ultimate Despair because at Hope's Peak Academy, they were in contact with Junko Enoshima. She strongly influenced the students all during their time at the school, and that's why they became Ultimate Despair. In order to remove that influence, they've been placed into the Hope Restoration Program. That's why the Future Foundation took away their school memories.
The reason why they able to act like their normal selves is because they're within the Neo World Program. But their true bodies in the real world are different. In the real world, they're part of a group that cruelly destroyed their family, friends, and even their own body.
Member Relationships
Despite Junko's claims, there are some abnormalities regarding the organization.
In Danganronpa 2's Chapter 0, Izuru and Nagito meet. However, their dialogue shows that they do not know each other, Izuru having no idea of Nagito or his Ultimate Ability, specifically noting when he understands that Nagito is implying it to be "luck", and Nagito specifically saying that he is meeting Izuru "for the first time" - in fact, he notes that this is strange, as he does recognize that Izuru should have been from Hope's Peak, correlating with Hope's Peak's attempts to hide Hajime's altered nature. Furthermore, their relationship with Junko is strange. Nagito claims to hate her, that he wants to kill her, though he is ecstatic that he was able to sew Junko's arm onto his own without rotting, taking her power because he hates her. However, he then proceeds to not know if he hates her or not, becoming confused and says "huh" two dozen times, as if he is stumbling over the idea. Izuru states that "using people is also a talent" and that it's "his turn to use that person" just as they used him - Nagito catching on that he's talking about the Ultimate Despair, Junko - and that sewing Junko's parts onto his body makes him "a boring person".
Nagito states that he doesn't know what will happen once he gets to Jabberwock Island. Izuru claims to already know what will happen on the island, because he is loved by talent. Izuru also expresses opinions that may contradict the goals of "Ultimate Despair" - a disgust for talentless people that oppress those with talent. He says that those people have brought this world to a deadlock, and created a world that has stopped evolving. To Izuru, these people make no contributions to the world, and his teachers taught him that a certain degree of selection must be performed. Considering that the people in control are Ultimate Despair, and that the Killing School Trip will perform "selection" on which members of Ultimate Despair will survive, Izuru may have been intending to subvert Junko's ideals. However, this may also apply to the pre-Tragedy world, or even the Future Foundation.
Whether or not Izuru's survival and Junko's death are against the plan, or are Izuru's intended outcome. Whether or not the Nagito we met was the original Nagito, or one affected by selective memory removal. Whether or not Nagito and Izuru were allies of Junko, or planned to kill her, or both. Whether or not Ultimate Despair actually agreed to this plan, or were ignorant of their fate. Whether or not Ultimate Despair is even a true organization, or merely a selection of people that Junko drove to Despair and immorality. All of these things are unknown and sufficiently questionable.
Known Members
| Name | Title | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Junko Enoshima | Ultimate Fashionista | Founder/Deceased |
| Mukuro Ikusaba |
Ultimate Soldier |
Deceased |
| Monokuma | Hope's Peak Academy Headmaster | Active |
| Izuru Kamukura/Hajime Hinata | Ultimate Hope/Reserve Course student |
Former/Alive |
| Nagito Komaeda | Ultimate Lucky Student | Comatose |
| Mikan Tsumiki | Ultimate Nurse | Comatose |
| Fuyuhiko Kuzuryu | Ultimate Yakuza | Former/Alive |
| Sonia Nevermind | Ultimate Princess | Former/Alive |
| Akane Owari | Ultimate Gymnast | Former/Alive |
| Kazuichi Soda | Ultimate Mechanic | Former/Alive |
| Nekomaru Nidai | Ultimate Team Manager | Comatose |
| Peko Pekoyama | Ultimate Swordswoman | Comatose |
| Teruteru Hanamura | Ultimate Cook | Comatose |
| Hiyoko Saionji | Ultimate Traditional Dancer | Comatose |
| Ibuki Mioda | Ultimate Musician | Comatose |
| Gundham Tanaka | Ultimate Breeder | Comatose |
| Mahiru Koizumi | Ultimate Photographer | Comatose |
| Byakuya Togami | Ultimate Affluent Progeny (Imposter) | Comatose |
(Whether the members in comatose will wake up or denounce their status as Ultimate Despair is unknown.)
Trivia
- The Japanese word 残党 zantō used as "remnants" in the Japanese name of the "Remnants of Despair" is actually a more specific term meaning "remnants of a defeated faction/political party". This alludes to the fact that Ultimate Despair was an organization, and that the survivors of the Neo World Program defeated Junko.