Shuji Ikutsuki is a major antagonist in the Persona series. He is one of the two secondary antagonists of the video game Persona 3 (alongside Takaya Sakaki) and its upcoming remake, and the overarching antagonist of the spin-off games Persona 4: Arena and Persona 4: Arena Ultimax.
Initially introduced as the team's supervisor, he is eventually revealed to be one of the main antagonists of the game, being the creator of Strega and the one who manipulated SEES into breaking the seal on Nyx, in an attempt to create a new world that he would rule over.
Appearances[]
Ikutsuki is a bespectacled, middle-aged man with dark brown eyes, long wavy brown hair and a goatee. He wears a tan jacket over his brown turtleneck.
Personality[]
"You must be tired from all the excitement. You should go to bed early. As they say, "The early bird catches the bookworm!" ...Please forgive the pun. *chuckle*"
—Shuji Ikutsuki, Persona 3
Ikutsuki, as the adviser of SEES, is a polite and sophisticated man, never needing to change his tone or manner. He is friendly, always accompanied with a gentle smile and a set of bad puns and unfunny jokes to provide comedy relief when it is needed, and perhaps not needed. As seen in the video recordings, he may also sometimes write down some puns on his status reports even if they are unwarranted or unrelated to the subject. Ikutsuki knows more than he lets on, but nonetheless he is the main source of knowledge for the group regarding all things related to the Dark Hour and thus acts as guidance for SEES.
That being said, in spite of his friendly and welcoming personality, he is unable to properly assimilate into the rest of the group, maintaining an underlying distance that leaves his relations with the others to be civil and nothing more.
After the defeat of the twelve Shadows, he shows a very different side of him to the party at the entrance of Tartarus. He was actually a manipulative, nihilistic and omnicidal maniac with a twisted savior complex, bearing a complete lack of remorse for the sake of complete and utter world annihilation through supernatural means. He is in fact, far from the chairman SEES knew, something Aigis comments on if asked by the protagonist.
Ikutsuki's mindset as a destroyer is implied to be a combination of him having been able to accept the existence of death, but make a great effort to reject it due to his solitude. This brutally mixed Ikutsuki's beliefs together to lead to pursue destruction to start anew; Takeharu Kirijo summarized it as "death as deliverance."
Ironically, Ikutsuki has absolutely no consideration of human life: he would not even acknowledge Aigis' life in spite of having been artificially created, seeing her as nothing more than the purpose she exists to fulfill: not only would he try to control her into killing the rest of SEES for his plan, only to refer to her as a "defective machine" once she turns against his demands and rescues them of her own free will, displaying the sheer hopelessless and madness that make him incapable of seeing anything more past her physical form.
He then becomes hostile, attempting to kill the ones who relied on him and thought of him as a trustworthy figure and leaving a large psychological dent on Mitsuru by killing her father. Once that fails, he chose to jump off the roof of Tartarus and committed suicide for good, out of lunatic fervor.
Judging from Sho Minazuki's treatment in Persona 4 Arena Ultimax and the fact that he had always been loyal to Kouetsu Kirijo's desire to summon Death, this might be his actual personality and the initial, friendly one was a façade.
Profile[]
Persona 3[]
Ikutsuki was a partner of Mitsuru Kirijo's grandfather Kouetsu Kirijo, and fully supported his desire of creating The Fall and the coming of Nyx to destroy all of humanity. He was one of the scientists involved in the experiments at Gekkoukan ten years ago, including the creation of Artificial Persona Users, forming Strega as well.
In the present, he is now the Chief Director of Gekkoukan High School and both chairman and adviser of the Specialized Extracurricular Execution Squad, SEES. His proper demeanor and bad puns lead to him being considered lame by most of the students there. He is also the adviser for Specialized Extracurricular Execution Squad, with Mitsuru being his chief commander. He was trained to enter the Dark Hour, although he lacks a Persona so he doesn't directly fight against the Shadows. He claims that the Dark Hour will end when all twelve Arcana Shadows are destroyed.
Ikutsuki was later revealed to be actually manipulating SEES, especially Mitsuru and Akihiko Sanada regarding the elimination of the twelve Arcana Shadows, which actually does the inverse; destroying the twelve Arcana Shadows actually melds them together into Death itself who summons Nyx to destroy it, instead of eliminating the Dark Hour as he claims.
"Hahaha... You don't get it, do you!? It's useless to search for hope or reasons to live in this pathetic world! A world this depraved must be started over from the beginning! And then! At long last! I will rule over the new world! Hahahaha! I... I was so close... Hahaha..."
—Ikutsuki's last words, Persona 3 Portable
On November 4th, 2009, after his lies are discovered, on the top of Tartarus, Ikutsuki reprograms Aigis to sacrifice the members of SEES as offerings for Nyx. However, Aigis's bond with the protagonist proved too strong and she refuses to shoot SEES as a result. When Takeharu Kirijo, who had taken advantage of Aigis' inner fight, tries to shoot Ikutsuki himself, he dies as well. Aigis manages to break the programming and free SEES. Ikutsuki, lamenting his failure, falls to his death after being wounded in the stomach by a bullet. His mission to revive Death was already complete by the time Arcana Hanged Man was destroyed, and on the next day, Death appears in Gekkoukan High School taking the form of Ryoji Mochizuki.
Persona 4 Arena Ultimax[]
He first shows up in the beginning of P3 Story Mode, where he parrots his words about the Fall before Sho cuts him down and laughs at him and his goals. Ikutsuki has been confirmed dead by SEES as they found his body. Though they are confused thanks to the copies of him that Sho Minazuki made and the similar mannerisms of the Eerie Voice.
Ikutsuki adopted Sho as a child and was his favored test subject, eventually putting a Plume of Dusk inside him in the hopes it would give him a Persona, but that resulted in Minazuki and his own Persona instead. Minazuki wouldn't obey and attempted to kill Ikutsuki for putting Sho in danger. He eventually sought to erase Minazuki, which resulted in Sho falling into a coma. Now that he was no longer useful Ikutsuki placed Sho in a hospital, where he paid the medical bills to keep him alive in this state indefinitely.
Againts Sora's Team[]
Ikutsuki joined Xehanort's team but unfortunately he was killed by Isogai because Isogai was the one who saw his criminal record which was similar to Yanagisawa, and other villains especially he laughed at Aguri in the form of Aguri's teachings until his death Aguri considered a joke and entertainment like the innocent death he committed making Isogai really like Misumi, Anos, Ainz, Keyarga, Yayoi Hozuki, and other Heroes that make Isogai turned into scary assassin demons to target him so that the King, Natsuko, Natsuko's Evil Friends, Nobuaki's evil Friends, other pure evil Villains, and Kazunari's evil Friends were shocked until mentally affected by Isogai's actions which turned sadistic when Ikutsuki was a fellow criminal like the King, and other criminals even though the King considered Isogai to be Nobuaki, and Kazunari but Isogai was much scarier than Nobuaki, and Kazunari, especially Isogai killed Ikutsuki in front of King, and other villains in Nobauki year especially Skull Heart revealing that Isogai was the person who destroyed her just like his classmate, Mukuro, and the members of the ultimate Despair that Isogai is Junko Enoshima's murderer so Isogai is just as feared assassins just whole his classmates especially Isogai reveals that Ikutsuki is a Terrorist especially Itona hate him because Itona sees Ikutsuki like Yanagisawa so He deserves to be killed especially Isogai takes revenge on him for the death of his father Mitsuru heard he was revived then joined Xehanort, and other Villains making Isogai angry even though Isogai, and his classmates as Class 3-E are Hero types from Class A to Class S but the King, and other Villains were very scared hearing Isogai, and his classmates as feared hero by a some of the most pure evil Villain so that the other Villains told him that Isogai, and his classmates were the killers who slaughtered their members as fellow pure evil criminals so that Isogai, and his classmates would not look indiscriminately and finish them off sadistically so that since Ikutsuki's death by Isogai, Kings, and other pure evil criminals always avoid Isogai, and his classmates because Isogai, and his classmates are scary demons who bring death to them as criminals.