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I am in love with the symbolism regarding the Quinx and the four wise monkeys. And it is incredibly interesting to understand that each one of them resembles one monkey in particular, but what I find even more interesting is that the world of Tokyo Ghoul as a whole treats these four characters with the same flaws that they posses and struggle with and it all culminates in the death of Shirazu.

There is more to the four monkeys than just their resemblance to the personality traits of the Quinx. It also represents every kind of Evil that one can do to a person.

The World does the Quinx Evil.

Let me explain how:

“Hear no Evil.” – Saiko

Saiko resembles the monkey who keeps its hands over its ears. Throughout Tokyo Ghoul :re she is a character who struggles with being more than dead weight because her ability to listen is remarkably poor. She isn’t one to act no matter how dire the situation, prefers to drown out the world by playing video games and indulging in everything but listening to orders and regulations.

Saiko drowns out the world.

The world drowns out Saiko.

She never chose this path, she got put into this situation by her mother who did not listen to her wishes but was in it for the money. Within the CCG her wish to just live life in peace falls on deaf ears, with her team trying to get her to cooperate even though she clearly would prefer to sit in her room and play video games.

This trend of ignoring what Saiko, a character whose biggest flaw is that she doesn’t listen to other people, wants keeps up even after Shirazu has passed away. She doesn’t want to be anything but herself and it takes her a remarkable amount of time until she is even ready to become a terrorist together with Urie – not that she does anything, really. But it’s never about what Saiko wants, so, narratively, it makes sense for her to be far away from the plot.

After all the world doesn’t hear Saiko’s plight, why should it give her attention in the form of an arc?

“See no Evil.” – Mutsuki

Mutsuki resembles the monkey who keeps its hands over its eyes. During Tokyo Ghoul :re Mutsuki first appears as a character who would like to remain unseen. Tooru hates stares, especially those of men, and does his best to keep attention away from him. All things considered he is a rather shy character with a defined problem of being in the limelight and would prefer to stay in the shadows.

Once he snaps due to torture and having his parental figure taken from him, he does everything in his ability to make himself be seen. He becomes a direct contrast to his former persona, embodying what he shouldn’t be in the most desperate of forms. We learn that Mutsuki has snapped once before, due to torture. It is interesting to note, though, that no matter how far Mutsuki seems to push his violent tendencies, he gets away with it. After all he is working under the CCG, an organisation that grooms violence of burdened souls into tools to be reckoned with.

Mutsuki wants to not be noticed, then does everything in his power to get noticed.

The world pretends to not notice Mutsuki.

Everyone ever involved with Tooru’s life chose to look away from his plight. His own family decided to ignore what was happening to him brought upon him by his own father. They looked away from all the evil that transpired, opting to pretend that everything is alright and it cost them heavily – their lives.

Only then did the CCG take notice. They saw the evil that Mutsuki had committed and instead of giving the kid some help, they formed him into a tool to be used. Rather than making sure that Mutsuki could work out his trauma, they pretended that he never had harm done to him, declared the murder of his family the slaughtering of a ghoul and set Mutsuki on a quest to become a Ghoul investigator.

When Tooru began to kill cats, they looked away, like they always did. Because the CCG as a whole cares about the end, not the means. And Tooru, with his violent tendencies, is just as much of a perfect test subject as Suzuya was before him.

Worse though is that his own family, the Quinx, ignore his plight after the downward spiral that was Shirazu’s death. With Mutsuki tortured by Torso and broken by Kaneki abandoning him he becomes more and more manic, and the Quinx? Those pretend not to notice. Instead of listening to what he might have to say (Saiko), instead of talking to him about his traumatic experiences (Urie), they let Mutsuki do whatever he wants to do, commenting solely on the blood that can be smelled on him and talking vaguely about feelings.

The world only sees what it wants to see in Mutsuki, and that means that no one sees him for who he is.

“Speak no Evil.” – Urie

Urie resembles the monkey who keeps its hands over its mouth. At the beginning of Tokyo Ghoul :re we meet him as a standoffish character out for his own gain and no one elses. He butts heads with seemingly everyone, is quick to lose his temper and thinks rarely before he speaks. What matters most to him is his professional importance, feelings come second to this, always.

It is no wonder that Urie becomes a glorified lapdog of the CCG, Matsurie in particular, given his opinion about how to treat others and the fact that his loyalties lie with what gets him towards professional glory and attention. Urie is a character who stands in the shadow of his father, a man who chose work over his own son most of the time, and tries desperately to get out of that situation. Urie is so consumed by an inferiority complex that he tries to surpass that everything else falls to the wayside. His biggest flaw is that while he is a character who is easily getting riled up, he stays silent in all of the situations where he could make a difference, where it would count.

Urie holds his mouth to get what he wants.

The world orders Urie around, all the time, and denies him his every wish.

The CCG compares him to his father, all the time, and he cannot possibly get out of his shadow. It tells him what he should do, all the time, and Urie follows through on those requests only to end up with the short end of the stick anyway.

When he finally pushes through his false belief of self importance, when he acknowledges that all of the reward should go towards Shirazu for Shirazu’s bravery, Shirazu dies instead, rendering the time he does open his mouth utterly useless because his words remain unheard, anyway. Worse yet, after Ginshi has passed away Kaneki makes Urie responsible for what is a tragedy, not a blame that you can push onto anyone. His father figure makes it clear to him that he is the reason for his friend’s demise and has no qualms with talking down to Urie.

And Matsurie? The man blinded by his love for Urie lets Urie become his lapdog and Urie, of course, follows, like a pet given orders. When Mutsuki becomes more and more troubled, he doesn’t have the courage to speak to him about it. Urie calls out Takeomi for being oblivious, wishing the loss that he had to endure on Takeomi. As a character Urie grows significantly, but he never breaks out of the cage that the CCG has set around him until far later, where once again he simply follows orders – this time set up by Hide instead.

No matter how many ranks Urie rises during his time as an investigator, the world still treats him as a man whose inferiority complex doesn’t need to be addressed. People instead ignore the pain that he had to face and don’t speak to him about the loss that he had to endure; instead everyone wants him to surpass his father while not really giving him the chance to become his own person. Urie’s wishes do not matter, the health of the CCG as a whole does.

The world gives Urie orders, and he follows, and keeps his mouth shut.

“Do no Evil.”

Shirazu resembles Shizaru, the monkey who is often depicted either holding its genitals or wrapping its arms around itself. During Tokyo Ghoul :re Shirazu is introduced to us as a sort of comic relief character, the not so intelligent person with a good heart. There’s not really a bad bone in his body, despite his rather ruthless appearance and all in all he is a big softie.

But the world does Shirazu evil. A character who is a genuinely good person has to partake in an organisation that kills people to save his sister’s life. And that begins to eat him up inside the moment he kills Nutcracker and realises that ghouls have feelings, too. Suddenly he cannot separate himself from the monstrous actions that he’s seen ghouls commit, he’s a monster himself. It eats him up inside to the point that he pukes after seeing Nutcracker’s quinque. Out of all of the Quinx, he struggles the most with his place in life.

Despite this Shirazu remains a rather positive character who looks out for others and is a highly empathic person who lacks brain smarts but has his heart in the right place. He knows that each one of the Quinx is in a situation where they lack parents, but has enough empathy to realise that Haise, his new father figure, is in an even more dire situation. Shirazu is able to bring Saiko to work physically at least, is way more perceptive of Tooru’s struggles than one might think and knows exactly what riles Urie up. Beyond that he has the mind to put himself into Haise’s shoes, which is a remarkable trait especially in a series like Tokyo Ghoul where characters are plagued by the fact that they cannot understand the struggle of others. Shirazu is the Squad Leader for a reason.

Most of all he is a character willing to go beyond every obstacle to protect the Quinx and his sister.

…and then the world ends him for all of his efforts to protect his family.

It does not just kill him. Suddenly he cannot speak anymore (to the person he’d like to see, Kaneki). Suddenly he cannot hear anymore. Suddenly he cannot see anymore. And only THEN does he die.

What cruelness the world posesses it gives to Shirazu. It breaks a beaten character to the point that said character loses the ability to see a future for those remaining, wishing for his sister, the very person his world revolved around, to die.

The world really does do him evil, in every sense of the word.