Omori Manga Ch. 9 Review - Guilt and Blame

Written by Rei Caldombra 5/16/25

Previous Chapter: Omori Manga Ch. 8 Review - Horrifying Basils — Blog Under a Log

We have a shorter chapter this time that just focuses on one scene, which is the scene at the HANGOUT SPOT. I like this chapter a lot and think this is a welcome change to the very fast pacing and long chapters we have been getting. There are notable changes to this scene from the game, but I am a big fan of how it plays out differently here. There are a lot of changes to this scene, but I think the scene works very well as it is presented in the manga and in some ways is even better. The tension and emotions of the confrontation between the main four are super strong and I have a lot to say about how they are all victims and simultaneously at fault in their own ways.

Reminder that I discuss the entire story of Omori in these reviews, and that Omori contains subject matter including violence and suicide. And remember that a lot of what I bring up here are just my opinions and interpretations. Feel free to share any you agree or disagree with.  Omori is a story full of nuance that can be interpreted in different ways.

We pick up right where we left off last chapter, with Sunny and Kel walking in on Aubrey and the Hooligans’ confrontation with Basil at the Lake where they used to hang out. To be clear: When I refer to the Hooligans, I mean all the members outside of Aubrey.

Like in the game, as of now we do not know why Basil is here. Basil likely came back to this spot while thinking about the past. He is so unstable that he broke down into crying and screaming just from the Hooligan’s telling him to leave. 

In the game Kim immediately says that they should “defend their turf” and instigates the fight as soon as Sunny and Kel show up. While in the manga all of the instigation is said by Angel. He does have the “We’ll mess you up” line in the game too, but Kim is the one who really started it. Instead, Kim is the one who de-escalates by removing herself and the rest of the Hooligans from the situation. In chapter 3 of the manga, Sunny and Kel helped Kim not get in serious trouble for stealing candy. They were able to de-escalate the bad situation she was in by putting up the money for the candy she stole. In this chapter Kim returns the favor by keeping her and the other Hooligans from starting a fight. Both the manga and game get to the same point of Sunny and Kel being left alone with Aubrey by the lake, but through different processes. This is a great way of showing how things can play out differently in a way that feels natural to the altered story of the manga. I really like how this played out, if Omori was a game that had branching paths like you’d see in a visual novel this would fit right in as an alternative way to get to a major story point. 

Thanks to the additional context of Aubrey’s home life, this outcome is not as positive as it seems. In the game, Aubrey chooses to stay rather than leaving with the Hooligans. Kim asks if he is coming with them as she leaves. Here, Kim is the one telling her to stay. Kim is being supportive here, telling Aubrey that it is about time that she settled this and says what she’s been thinking. Obviously this is true, Aubrey and the others can only sort these things out by properly communicating. But from Aubrey’s angle, Kim and the others have left her alone. Which we see reminds her of her dad leaving them. Her father did not have much presence in the game, I believe there is only 1 line that confirms he ditched them. Her home life is much lighter in focus. In the manga we had this and the scene of Aubrey’s home in chapter 6 that shows how much of an impact it had on her. It wasn’t just Mari dying that hurt her, it seems like everyone left her in one way or another. Mari died, Sunny stayed in his house, Hero went to college, Kel immersed himself in sports, and Basil eventually drew on the pictures that were precious to her. No one continued to support her the way a good friend should. The town as a whole openly chastises her too, we see this in the church. She was so desperate for friends that she changed herself to a person of strength that others would gather around, even becoming a delinquent and engaging in behavior that she seems to know is wrong just to fit in. So here, the only people who have been sticking by her the past few years just told her to do this on her own. 

The primary context for the confrontation between Aubrey, Basil, Kel and Sunny is different between the game and manga. In the game, the photo album is only brought up right as Aubrey pushes Basil. Aubrey primarily focuses on how they criticize her actions without recognizing that they weren’t there for her when Mari died. But in the manga the context is focused entirely on the album. Aubrey does not bring up them not being there for Mari’s death like in the game. I think that is okay, as the manga made her death clearer earlier than the game did. It was already touched on that the others did not support Aubrey after Mari’s death.

I love the panel of her throwing out the pictures so much. Aubrey, Sunny and Basil all have guilt stemming from what is talked about in this scene. And we can see it plainly on their faces.

The tension in this scene is very strong and was well built up to in my opinion. There’s a lot of angles to this scene that should be considered. Aubrey and Kel both have misunderstandings from their limited perspectives, which lead to them making accusations that do not help them move forward in a healthy way. Everyone makes wrong moves and everyone here is a victim of something. They’re all children overwhelmed by grief. They all want to move forward but don’t know how. I actually like this scene a bit better in the manga than the game.

I like the part from the game of Aubrey screaming in frustration, but I think there’s plenty of great emotions here that excuse its absence here. I think the scene in the manga helps Aubrey’s perspective a lot. We repeatedly get to see how conflicted she is throughout the whole scene. We shouldn’t defend her hurting Basil, but from an emotional standpoint some people need to be more sympathetic towards Aubrey. She has more in common with Basil than people (and Aubrey herself) think, they both felt like they were left alone to fester in their trauma by someone after Mari’s death. The pictures may have been defined as the most special to Basil, but they still meant a lot to Aubrey. She cherished those memories like everyone else, and took her death very hard like everyone else. To see those memories you cherished preserved by these pictures drawn over would break someone. I can’t completely blame Aubrey for wanting to hurt whoever tainted those memories. It is understandable for her to lash out when all her suspects are in one place. And especially when all those suspects are people who claim to be her friend after everything that’s happened since Mari’s death. They didn’t make her feel like they were still friends.

I’m gonna be honest here and admit something I didn’t understand until now about Omori’s story. Sunny is apparently the one who draws on the photos, not Basil. In this scene Basil covers for Sunny.

What Basil says is “It was all me!” Emphasis on the -all- part of that sentence. This is a distinct choice to say all rather than this. This is showing that he would take the fall for everything that happened since Mari’s death. He refuses to believe that Sunny would do something bad. Later in the game you learn that Basil believes that the “Something” that Sunny has been seeing and Basil has his own version of is what pushed Mari and made them string up her corpse. Remember that Basil has effectively been alone this whole time. The cry for help that brought Sunny and Kel here can have multiple layers. It can specifically be meant for Sunny, who he knows is back and who he has been fixated on ever since Mari’s death. The cry for help can be in general to the world, because he has been struggling so much this whole time with no one he could properly relate to. Aubrey chastises him for playing the victim. Out of everyone, Basil is probably the biggest victim here. But from hiding the truth like how Sunny has been looking away from the truth, Basil does not do what is needed for everyone to move forward.

Sunny is at fault here by also not coming clean. A major theme of this game is that Sunny does not face the truth, and we see the repercussion of that in this scene. Aubrey is right in that Sunny lets others do the talking for him. And to blame him for shutting the others out of his life when he and they needed each other the most. But she recognizes the bits of agency he suddenly has that we’ve seen in the manga, both good and bad. Don’t let yourself forget that Sunny cut Aubrey with a knife earlier in the story, he is not without his own spur of the moment violence towards his former friends. But while he is the one who started this whole story, he is still a child who never intended for any of this to happen. The grief he would feel for killing his sister would be overwhelming. We’ve all had times we’ve done something wrong and covered it up. It’s our instinct. That was far more extreme than most cases, but the instinctual action for a child to take is still the same. But by continuing to not come clean, he foists the blame onto Basil. I will defend that we should have sympathy for Sunny, but that is still clearly the wrong thing to do.

There is some fairness to calling Kel self-righteous like in the game, or simple like they do in the manga. I think that Kel has been looking at things between them exclusively on the surface, without regard for the nuance. It is understandable for Kel to think Aubrey and the others are lying about them not hurting Basil and her not ruining the pictures. After their previous confrontations it has been made clear from Kel’s perspectives that she is aggressive and unstable. But he assumes Aubrey must be hurting him because Basil is the one on the ground crying while Aubrey is the one standing. He jumps straight to demanding Aubrey give back the pictures rather than asking her own side of the story first. It makes sense he would want to get the photo album back to Basil, but that can wait when you’re in the middle of a confrontation. He assumes Basil would never damage the pictures because of how he used to be and that Sunny wouldn’t have done it. He says she is crazy and stops her from doing anything after pushing Basil. He doesn’t properly acknowledge her feelings or side of the story. This entire scene, all he does is blame Aubrey in my opinion. And obviously that is not a good way to de-escalate or break ground with someone. But out of everyone here, he is by far the least in the know. He is genuinely acting on what he believes is right based on what he knows. Mari’s death likely hit him the least hard out of everyone, but it still hurt to lose her and the friend group. He still lost contact with his friends and is trying his best to remedy that. But here he is not doing a good job of that sadly.

No one is perfect, and everyone has things they regret that prevent them from moving past their traumas.

Like in the game, Aubrey gets overwhelmed with anger towards Basil seemingly being the one who drew over the pictures and pushes him into the lake by accident. Aubrey pushing Basil into the lakes parallels Sunny pushing Mari. In both cases, someone unintentionally hurt someone they cared about in a fit of anger.

The swirling water behind Basil looks so freaky and cool! And is metaphorical for how he has been spiraling since Mari’s death. You get to see the regret on Aubrey’s face right after she pushes him too.

Here Sunny goes in to save Basil like in the game, but with slightly different context. Another change is that Kel does not tell Sunny to help Basil, Sunny does it on his own. We see Sunny’s heart rate increase before he dives in, which is a cool visual that mimics the hesitation he shows in the game to overcome his fear. This tracks with the previous chapters giving Sunny more agency. Once Sunny jumps in the water, things continue to play out differently. 

In the game version of the underwater segment, Sunny follows Aubrey down the stairs in the house until he encounters SOMETHING IN THE WATER. Mari teaches him to Calm Down until he wins the fight. Then it cuts to Sunny still in the water, with Mari grabbing his hand then showing Hero over him in the real world. In the manga, we first see the door to Whitespace open with Omori standing in the frame. Omori reaches his hand out to Sunny, with them almost touching until Mari comes in just like in the game. We get an additional visual of Mari happy crying over Sunny being okay before we cut to Hero standing over him. 

If Sunny had taken Omori’s hand, I think he would have drowned and died even with Hero there. Omori’s intention is for Sunny to die. In the game, you get the bad ending by giving up against Omori. Sunny refuses to face the truth of what happened and commits suicide by jumping off the roof of the hospital. Two different sides of Sunny’s internal thinking try to “save” him here, and thankfully the good side won. To again bring up the idea of Omori the game having more paths, this definitely feels like it could’ve been another path that led to his death. Any game with choices presents the theme of how things can play out differently based on small actions. Omori as a game and a manga shows how small changes can have big impacts while still ending in the same place.

Our boy Hero is finally here, saving the day just like in the game. And that’s where this chapter ends.

I like how Hero looks here a bit better than in the game honestly. 

We’ll have to wait and see how the next chapter plays out. Since this chapter ends with Hero saving Sunny, I assume we will continue in the real world with the repercussions of this before going into the search for your friends segment. If the next chapter has the same length of previous chapters, I will guess that we’ll go through all of The Last Resort. Now I am less confident that this will end by chapter 12, but it is hard to predict since we could get more short chapters or longer ones. So I don’t really know, but I’m excited to keep reading! Thank you for reading this review!

My Patreon if you would like to support me and the website: patreon.com/ReiCaldombra As a free member you can get notifications for posts on Blog Under a Log and videos on my Youtube channel. When I start running polls again you’ll get to vote as a paid member. But any support is greatly appreciated!