#*characters who are not coded white and explicitly confirmed white

[quotidianish]

I will make every ambiguous but assumed white character Asian and you can’t stop me

[emma-o-yt]

Rick Riordan's problematic age gaps

Apparently reddit hates criticism because this got removed from there after a few minutes, maybe I can get it back up...anyways.

The age of consent in Texas is 17, Texas is where Rick lived (according to wikipedia) up until 2013. And yet...here we are.

Where do I even begin with this bullf*ckery? How about the most egregious of all?

Luke and Annabeth

We have two lines confirming their mutual feelings, one from The Demigod Diaries:

"Overtime, Annabeth developed a crush on Luke. As Annabeth got older, Luke developed feelings for her, too."

Mark of Athena (from her conversation with Venus):

"First there was Luke Castellan, her first crush, who had seen her only as a little sister; then he’d turned evil and decided he liked her—right before he died."

Now let me remind you, Annabeth and Luke have a seven year age difference, they knew each other at 7 and 14. By the time he died, Annabeth was just 16, while he was 23. And it's implied he begun returning her feelings a little before he asked her to run away, perhaps when she was 14. He's paralleled with Percy as Annabeth is his string in the river styx. He asks Annabeth explicitly if she loved him romantically (and she denies because Percy is there).

It's disgustingly inappropriate but at the very least they don't end up together...as for when they do...

Sadie Kane and Anubis

When it comes to immortal romance, I usually go for coded age. Anubis is thousands of years old but is mentally and physically 16, which is fine and dandy except for the fact that Sadie is 12. What do you want me to say except Rick is disgusting for promoting this.

Speaking of extreme age gaps:

Calypso and Leo

When you have a philosophy that every character must end up in a relationship, you run out of sensical options to pair up. Now, I'm a Caleo hater mainly because of how it retconned PJO and also because they are very toxic.

Now hold on, doesn't Caleo fall into coded age? Calypso is 15/16 and Leo is 15, so it's A okay! I suppose, if it wasn't for Calypso's past loves.

Odysseus, he had a wife and a son who was 20 years old in his final year on Ogygia, he is well into adult age. She also mentions the privateer Francis Drake and his wife Elizabeth, he was 45 when he married her.

If your defence is that she's actually thousands of years old, then that must also apply to Caleo. You cannot have it both ways.

Hazel and Frank

It's not that bad but it's necessary to mention for the point I will be making.

The timeline is messed up but I think they're 13 and 16 and meet at 12-15. I mean, come on.

Misogyny and Racism

What do these have in common? Well in 3/4 or 4/4, the younger one is female. In 2/4 or 3/4, the younger one is a person of colour.

Remember Nico? His crush on Percy as revealed in HoH? Well in MoA, there's a cheeky little red herring that happens a bit before Annabeth's talk with Venus (where it is revealed that Luke liked Annnabeth back). She wonders if Nico had a crush on her, but denounces him as too young. Now, Nico's age is inconsistent, I am unsure of his gap with Annabeth but I do know his gap with Percy. It's 3 years 5 months in PJO and 2 years 5 months in HoO (the series we are currently in).

So in RR's messed up mind, a white boy having a relationship with someone 2 to less than 4 years his senior is inappropriate. But a black tween girl dating someone 3 years her senior is just fine, a 12 year old biracial black girl dating a 16 year old is daijoubu, a 15 year old mestizo Latino boy dating an elderly woman is relationship goals, or the reverse a 15 year old girl dating middle aged men is a tragic romance and a 12 year old girl having mutual feelings with a 19 year old man is a "love story for the ages"!

The tv adaptation is so infuriating for this, they made Annabeth black, a lot of the changes they made came off as micro aggressions but especially her relationship with Luke. It's reduced to Luke simping for Annabeth behind her back and it's even worse because you can visibly see how large their age gap is. Heck, Charlie Bushnell and Leah Jeffries have a smaller age gap than book Luke and Annabeth.

Adultification is a huge real life issue. Children of colour and especially female children of colour are seen as less innocent than their white counterparts. Rick, who is dedicated to inclusivity should've known better than to include these illegal relationships. Stans will try and make excuses but it's there, deal with it.

As a black teenage girl who has been a fan of Rick's work for 12 years, I am disappointed.

[punkeropercyjackson]

ohhh okay yeah that makes sense lol! he was the poster child of bisexual headcanons for ages, tbh i feel like it's in part to him looking racially ambiguous too? like, cocky lightskinned lanky guy who's just "ethnically ambiguous" enough to be mistaken for either a tan white guy or another race, it's like the peak recipe for "diversity rep!" white tumblr fandomers to turn him into their blorbo and still sort of massacre his character i guess. i remember that super popular klance fic Dirty Laundry tried to explore his culture but made him mexican??? 😭 like okay author you didn't deserve to be harrassed off the platform and i'm sorry you got insane hate but also girl he explicitly said he was from cuba 😭😭😭😭 anyways it sucks that hobie's bisexuality isn't nearly acknowledged as much as his especially since, i hope this isn't offensive, but hobie's bisexuality felt way more clear to me than lance's 😭 no hate to bi lance at all but with him it feels more.. LIKE a headcanon. whereas with hobie if you see someone that doesn't think he's bi you're like whaaat? LOOK at him!

I'M SAYING LIKE😭Bruh how is Hobie not bi-coded,he literally flirts with men and women onscreen????The faggotry between him and Miles,the subliminal messaging between him and Gwen,the frankly undeniability Margo and him are logically into eachother too combined with those too + Ghostflower and i absolutely see the (Gayatri-centric)Pavitr x Gayatri x Hobie vision and sure why not throw our guy Ganke in too since they'd have great chemistry.Hobie is the most bisexual trans boy character ever minus the explicitly confirmed ones and even then his situation is more of a wait out to see if the crew can tell us and i'm not upset with them at all for not saying it outright seeing as that could get the Spiderverse saga cancelled due to cencorship like what happened to so many other medias for featuring queer black kids.If you hate on them for it you're so tonedeaf and performative for that

And on Lance.The racially ambigious 'one braincell' twink routine he catapuled wasn't enough to make me hate him but i do hate what it's done to how fandom engages with moc,be they canon or popular headcanons by poc.Hobie like we said but further on Percy,she gets equated to Lance so much and it drives me insane because 1.They're objectively not similar.No not even on the latino part seeing as Percy is afrolatina and Lance is mestizo and similar to Hobie's bisexuality,Percy's transfemininity comes from readings of her text rather than shipping fuel and 2.Leo is Lance.Their names even match and Leo has more attraction to men than Percy does,in general but towards Jason most of all and i want to slam my head against a wall whenever Jercy is presented as 'blonde hair x dark hair boyfriends' to overlook Leo literally has black hair too.Stop calling Lance peak bi rep and Hobie older brother-coded and Percy a skater boy and Leo an incel,i am going to KILL you

[northlight14]

Ok you know what, fuck it. I’m feeling like enraging some aphobes today

Welcome to what I’m gonna call:

Do I Think It’s Good Ace/Aro Rep? (Probably Not)

Sooo a few weeks ago I made a post about what I think makes for good ace/aro representation because in the spirit of pride month I really wanna encourage both writers to do better with our representation and offer guidance, and also encourage fellow aces/aro’s to have higher standards for our representation. We’re so used to getting the bare minimum and I’m fr so tired of it. I will be referencing the points I made in that post in this one so if you wanna give it a read, here’s the link

Now, as a follow up to that post I really wanted to make one about characters who are aro and/or ace and if I think they’re good representation. So that’s what I’m doing! (Can’t wait to get doxxed for this😀/s)

Brief disclaimers:

all of this is just my personal opinion. I do not speak for the whole of the aro/ace community. People can disagree with me and that’s ok. Just don’t be a dick about it.

Also, just because I think a character is bad representation doesn’t mean I dislike the character. All the characters I’m including in this post are characters I personally really like. But that doesn’t mean I’m above critiquing them, the media they’re in, or their creators. I’m literally getting my degree in media and English lit y’all, critiquing media is kinda my whole thing

Lastly, I’m aro/ace, in a QPR, white, and able bodied. I bring this up because I will be mentioning the lack of loveless aro rep, wider spectrum rep, POC rep, and ableism. Essentially, these points are going to be acknowledged but I’m not at all qualified to talk about them in depth. If I say anything wrong plz correct me

Alright, let’s get into it

First things first, the man. The myth. The legend: Todd Chavez from Bojack Horseman

Identity: asexual hetero-romantic

Pros:

It’s not just coded. It’s said explicitly in the piece of media and not just confirmed outside of it or left ambiguous

It’s obvious the creators actually did their research with this character and know what it means to be asexual. While not perfect, they acknowledge that some asexuals do still have sex, Todd just happens to be one who isn’t interested in that. And also that there’s a difference between being asexual and aromantic

They saw that Todd fit into the “childish” asexual stereotype and avoided it by including other asexual characters, specifically Yolanda, as a direct opposite of Todd to show that his traits aren’t because he’s asexual

They let Todd be happy in his asexuality! The show explores Todd figuring himself out and the struggles of being asexual in a way that’s very well done. But they also let Todd be happy with his identity and fully accept himself instead of some “woe is me, I’ll never find love” nonsense

Cons:

As stated previously, Todd does kinda fall into the “childish asexual” stereotype but I’ve already gone into how they circumvented that

I also think some explanations could’ve been done better like how they describe being asexual as “not being interested in sex” which isn’t the case, at least not for all aces

On the whole though Todd I think is a very good example of ace rep

I’m mainly gonna be talking about the protagonist of Loveless, Georgia Warr, for this but considering this book features multiple ace and/or aro characters and I don’t have the time to talk about each individually, it’s easier to address the book as a whole

Identity: aromantic and/or asexual

Pros:

Features an aro/ace protagonist

Written by an aro/ace author

Features multiple aro and/or ace characters outside of Georgia that help her on her way to self acceptance. These characters are also allowed to be diverse, having Sunil be an asexual romantic POC and their friend be aromantic allosexual

Presents the struggles of figuring yourself out as an aro/ace person but also lets her be confident in herself by the end

Addresses how our community can relate to other lgbt+ identities, specifically lesbians

Says it explicitly and goes into detail about definitions

Cons:

Alice Oseman is straight up one of my idols as a aro/ace writer from the UK and Loveless is one of my favourite works of hers. That said, there is a big issue I find with Loveless and that’s some of the internalised bias against loveless aromantics. A lot of Georgia’s acceptance of herself is centred around this idea of “you might not feel romantic love but there’s still platonic love”. And obviously that’s great and real for a lot of aromantic’s. But I do think this could unintentionally play into the demonising of loveless aro’s.

The allosexual aromantic character also doesn’t feature much in the book which is a shame because she is good rep from what we see of her

On the whole, I do think Loveless is good rep but it’s definitely not perfect

Next up, a prime example of what NOT to do when confirming a character is asexual, Viktor from Arcane. Holy fuck

Identity: asexual (I mean….the creator meant aromantic but he said asexual and I’ll get more into that in a bit)

Pros:

I mean…there’s an argument that he’s diverse rep in the sense he’s disabled ace rep?

He’s one of the main characters. So that’s cool

Cons:

Prime example of coding instead of saying and why just coding a character as sexual doesn’t fucking work. Him turning down Skye just shows he’s not interested in her, not that he’s not interested in sex/romance at all

Didn’t state it in the piece of media and as I said there was next to nothing to indicate it. That’s barely representation. Plus I’m pretty sure most people missed him saying that. I didn’t find out until months later which again proves why this shit doesn’t work. There’s the argument to be had that maybe in the world of arcane they don’t have labels for sexuality. But even so, it wasn’t stated until after the show finished so it really feels like he’s just pulling a JK Rowling

Not only that, but the creator went and confirmed it in response to Jayvik as a way to rebuke it. The creator clearly doesn’t know what it means to be asexual if he’s using it to claim that Viktor can’t date because of it

Addressing more on the Viktor also being disabled thing, it also feels super weird to me that the character whose arc is mainly focused around his disability is the one who is asexual. Disabled person are so often denied sexuality so it just feels really iffy to me. Had there been multiple asexual characters then this wouldn’t have been as much of a problem but nope

In summary, yeah Viktor is very bad ace rep. I love him but the creator clearly didn’t know shit when he said that

Onto even more bad ace rep and the one most likely to get me doxxed, Alastor from Hazbin Hotel! (Fuck me, I’m gonna get so much hate, aren’t I?😅)

Identity: asexual and ambiguous romantic orientation

Pros:

He’s a main character

It was actually stated both outside and inside the show! Plus that “ace in the hole” joke was fucking hilarious and iconic lol

Alastor is creole and not just another white asexual character

Cons:

One of my biggest issues with Vivsipop’s handling of Alastor as an asexual character is her refusal to make him canonically aromantic. Or more specifically, her refusal to confirm if he is or not. Before the show aired, one of the staff members said he was aromantic but then Viv said that his romantic orientation is being left ambiguous. She’s then allowed staff members to call him aromantic IN FRONT OF HER and not corrected them but refused to say one way or the other and only calls him asexual. And the reason for this is pretty apparent too because she’s said it in a livestream before the show aired, being she “doesn’t want to ruin people’s fun.” I’m going to make this super clear: Aromantic representation is more important than your ships. I say this as a multishipper who spends most of my time in fandom spaces consuming ship content. Viv gets points for confirming his asexuality but it’s her refusal to say if he’s aromantic or not that’s what fuels a lot of discourse in the fandom and makes me feel unsafe engaging in the Hazbin Hotel fandom as an aro/ace as a result. I don’t think I need to get into why that’s a bad thing. Yes this discourse would be there regardless but she’s not helping the situation

More on Alastor being creole, while it is good as I said since the ace community has very little POC rep, another big issue is that you would not know Alastor is creole by looking at him. Not only that, but he’s the only character whose heritage plays a part in his “evil powers” (i.e the music that plays, the symbols used.) I’m in no way an expert on this but I do encourage other people to look into this because again it’s a bit iffy

Alastor is also a prime example of the “evil asexual” stereotype. Trust me, Alastor is my favourite character in the show but let’s not pretend that having the only asexual character also happen to be a mass murdering cannibal from Hell is a win for representation. I’d have less of an issue with it if Viv didn’t have a habit of these stereotypes, other characters that are confirmed ace in her universe being Mammon, a selfish, evil asshole who happens to be one of the only 7 deadly sins who actually behave evilly. And Octavia who has the character growth of a cardboard box. Plus neither of those characters were given any indication of being ace and if anything Mammon has had a scene that implies the opposite. Only reason we know he’s ace is because of the official art

Anyway, back to Alastor. I do think there’s parts of him as a character that are good representation, I just think the bad outweighs it

Now if Alastor didn’t get me enough hate, this one certainly will. It’s my favourite gem, Peridot from Steven Universe

Identity: aromatic asexual

Pros:

She’s a main character

She started off as an antagonist but then had her redemption arc and it was after that redemption that she was confirmed aro/ace

She’s such a good example of aro/ace’s who still love shipping and romantic media. As an aromantic who loves shipping, her Percy and Pierre rant is so relatable lol. She’s a prime example of how you can enjoy that stuff in media and still not want it for yourself

The creators clearly know what it means to be ace and aro

Cons:

It’s never said in the piece of media, only confirmed outside of it. I’m more lenient on this point because no sexuality labels are used in Steven Universe but I still want to mention it

It was confirmed only when her final episode aired on Steven Universe Future. I can’t remember if it was confirmed before or after that episode aired but either way it’s not great

Plays into the non-human asexual trope. Easily avoidable if there was another asexual character who’s human in Steven Universe

The coding pre her confirmation definitely could’ve been done better. She’s said to be aro/ace because she doesn’t want to fuse but fusion isn’t always sexual or romantic. The crystal gems fuse all the time and non of them are in a romantic relationship with each other besides Ruby and Sapphire who are fused all the time. I don’t think the coding is too bad but I definitely understand the critiques I’ve seen of it

On the whole, I don’t think Peridot is necessarily bad representation but definitely not perfect and room for improvement

Now a character I don’t see talked about much, Elijah from Big Mouth

Identity: asexual hetero-romantic

Pro’s:

Honestly I have a lot of pros for Elijah

Even though Elijah is religious, they make it clear that his Christianity and his asexuality are completely different. He isn’t asexual because he’s Christian

Again, they state it explicitly in the piece of media and like Todd and Georgia they explore how being asexual affects him, especially when he’s at an age where a lot of students are starting to feel those types of feelings for the first time. It’s honestly pretty relatable, I remember being at late middle school age and so fucking confused at hearing my peers talk about their feelings

He’s a rare example of black asexual rep which we love to see

They explore his relationship with Missy and any issues they first run into as they navigate this for the first time. And because Missy is the best, she’s obviously super supportive of him being asexual which is great to see. But she’s also allowed to have moments of questioning if an asexual relationship is what she wants which is totally understandable too. But they’re able to work it out and when they do break up, it’s for reasons fully unrelated to Elijah’s asexuality

He also isn’t a one off character which is awesome

The shows creators also clearly did their research and was very educational about asexuality which rules

Cons:

As I said he is very religious and again, while the show does make it clear that his religion and his asexuality aren’t related, it is still a bit of a miss to have your only asexual character also be your only super Christian character

He’s also only there for one season and then forgotten. Big Mouth has such a big problem of establishing relationships and then killing them at the end of the season for literally no reason and it’s so infuriating

I’ve also seen some people, aces included, who say Elijah is pretty boring to watch and honestly I can’t disagree. I didn’t hate watching him but I think they should’ve added more to his character than just “Christian” and “asexual”

On the whole though I’d say Elijah is pretty good rep, though some tweaks could’ve been made here and there

—

There are more characters I could talk about but I’m gonna end it here. Hope y’all enjoyed my rant and I pray the pitchforks are kept to a minimum lol

[danceofthephilos]

SK8 Cast Image Colors, and the Super Sentai Roots of Character Color Coding

Unlike my post about hanakotoba, where only a few examples can be confirmed to be intentionally meaningful choices, image colors are an aspect of SK8's visual symbolism that has been explicitly assigned by the creators to each of the eight main cast members. From design elements to official art and merchandise (such as the art and the Infinity Week logo above) to shots in the show itself, these image colors are a consistent aspect of the series' visual language, and colors, like flowers, have meanings and associations that can provide interesting insight into why these colors were chosen for these characters. Color-coded casts are also strongly historically rooted in the super sentai subgenre of tokusatsu series, a genre that has had massive impact on Japanese pop culture, especially battle anime like SK8, in part, is, so I'll also examine the archetypes associated with their colors in super sentai (and, in Adam's case, another important piece of anime history.)

As color associations can vary by culture, I made sure to use Japanese sources - I mainly started with the dictionary on TC Color Therapy for basic color meanings but frequently checked other sources. My primary source on colors in super sentai is a paper on color theory in tokusatsu by Misako Takahashi, along with fan wikis such as Pixiv Dictionary and other Japanese blogs analyzing the subject. I also supplemented with quotes from SK8's staff when relevant.

All the image colors come from the official character guide included in volume 4 of the Blu-rays.

Reki Kyan - Yellow

Despite his red hair, Reki's image color is yellow, the color of the signature hoodie he always wears at S. Yellow is associated with brightness, cheerfulness, fun and excitement - all things that Reki embodies at his best, and are very important parts of his character arc and what he represents to the people around him. In Utsumi's instructions to colorist Yukari Gotou, as shown in SK8 Design Works, she requested Reki's design have "so many bright and colorful primary colors it's tiring" in order to draw the eye, fitting of a bright and energetic protagonist. Yellow is a common color for team members in sentai anime, being the third most common after red and blue and appearing in the majority of series, and are often bright and cheerful "life of the party" type characters as well. This is a trend dating back to Himitsu Sentai Gorenger, the very first long-running super sentai series (beginning in 1975,) whose color coding has persisted for decades. Kirenger, the yellow member in Gorenger, was even a big eater with a signature favorite food (a trait more commonly attributed to Langa, but Reki's love for ramen and all things salty - even toothpaste - is a recurring bit in SK8 as well) and a big family.

In Takahashi's paper, she quotes another academic, Asako Yoshida's, analysis of another core aspect of yellow sentai characters, where she describes them as "an intelligent type who gathers information and forms strategies before taking action", and "rather than fighting on the front, they're a tactician who uses their wits and comes up with strategies," traits that Reki also shows frequently, especially in his biggest triumph in episode 11.

Like many of the image colors, it's also used in the show (both in the opening - highlighting his yellow-orange eyes - and in episode 11.)

~

Langa Hasegawa - Blue

Langa's image color is blue, selected along with white from the beginning to fit his snow theme. Blue is associated with positive meanings like calmness and intelligence, but also more negative ones like coldness, sadness and loneliness, fitting of both Langa's calm exterior and the grief that's central to his storyline. Blue sentai members are classically considered "cool" characters, an association that remains strong even as actual characters of that type have grown somewhat rarer over time, with newer series sometimes deliberately subverting expectations. Like yellow, the association of blue with the cool member of a team also dates back to Gorenger, with Aorenger (the blue member) being a cool, stoic character who came from a snowy region. Takahashi quotes Yoshida's description of blue heroes as "the calm, composed and cool second in command type," a character who "doesn't worry about what's in front of him, never seems to get worked up and deals with things calmly," which certainly describes the impression Langa gives off at first - and belies what SK8's producer Kyoko Uryuu described (when comparing him to a petit gâteau) as his "surprisingly passionate" interior.

Like with Reki, Langa's color is shown off in the opening and in the show itself - notably as his "aura" when he's in the Zone with Adam.

~

Miya Chinen - Light Green

Miya's image color is light green, usually shown as a yellowish lime green. I'll get to green as a whole for Kojiro, but yellow-green specifically is associated with youthfulness, beginnings and hope, as it's the color of newly budding plants - and it can also be associated with immaturity, all meanings fitting of a very young character like Miya. While his costume is meant to be an in-universe game character, his bright green hood could also be seen as vaguely evoking Link from the Legend of Zelda series.

Green sentai characters have more varied archetypes, but were historically often the youngest member of the team, while more recently it's been a trend for them to be the oldest member of the team - fitting for the youngest and oldest members of the six characters making up SK8's main "team." The idea of a green member being the youngest also dates back to Gorenger, with Midorenger (the green member) being an innocent younger boy compared to the rest of the team, who was treated like a "mascot" of sorts and even shared Miya's affinity for animals. It's also become a trend for green characters to have close relationships with the yellow members, and to be in conflict with the red members.

Like with most of the other characters, Miya's color is highlighted in the opening.

~

Hiromi Higa - Purple

Hiromi's image color is purple, the color of his lipstick and the inside of his cape. Purple is associated with mystery, rarity, luxury and nobility, and in Japan in particular it's frequently associated with horror (from urban legends like the purple mirror to the common use of purple miasma to show disgusting/horrific food in anime.) Purple sentai members are incredibly rare, and at the time of Takahashi's paper the few that existed were usually mentor figures, but several since have been "dark heroes" or antiheroes - as "Shadow-sama" (fitting of the link to nobility) calls himself, as the self-proclaimed Antihero of the S community. With how he becomes a close friend (and even somewhat of a mentor) to the boys despite his very antagonistic first appearance, he certainly fits the "enemy-turned-ally" archetype, and while he's not actually the much older mentor early purple members were, Reki constantly calling him "old man" does evoke that trope too.

His color appears in the opening as well as featuring heavily in his S costume.

~

Kaoru Sakurayashiki - Pink

True to his surname and aesthetic, Kaoru's image color is pink, the color of cherry blossoms. Pink is associated with beauty, grace, luxury and love. Just like in the west, it's considered a very feminine color - also shown in the fact that pink sentai members are almost exclusively women, and typically particularly feminine and glamorous when on teams with other female members. This is a case where Cherry is in large part a departure from the classic color coding just because of his gender; SK8's colorist, Yukari Gotou, even expressed in Skater's Backstage that she was a bit worried about having a male character with pink hair, but Utsumi described him as a "pink ninja" from the get-go in her coloring notes.

And even Kaoru isn't completely immune to hitting the sentai archetypes either, with his noted beauty and a concern for his looks that Kojiro mocks as effeminate in the series; the contrast between the feminine characteristics he has and his masculine voice and personality are a core part of how his character was designed. He even has a surprising connection with Momorenger (Gorenger's pink member, and only woman) in his affinity for kicks. (As of 2022, there's also finally been a male character properly featuring as the pink member in a sentai series in Avataro Sentai Donbrothers.)

Of course, on top of featuring so heavily in his design, Cherry's color is also used in the opening.

~

Kojiro Nanjo - Green

Rather than Miya's light green, Kojiro's image color is a regular green. Green is associated with calmness, stability, growth and nature, fitting for a very calming and stable mentor character who just "goes with his feelings" like Kojiro - but like light green, it can also signify immaturity, which also suits a character who proudly proclaims to be a "kid" when he's on vacation. Where Miya fits the "youngest member" trope for green sentai members, Kojiro fits the "oldest member" trope, and he also fits the recently trendy close relationship with yellow and conflict with red. In Takahashi's paper, she quotes Yoshida describing green characters as a whole as "a caring type who's always concerned if things are peaceful" (also fitting of Miya, who's always the most concerned for Reki and Langa,) "a soothing person who makes you feel warm and comforted just by being next to them" and as someone who "loves their friends, and 'being together with everyone' is important to them," and in Utsumi's color notes in SK8 Design Works, she described Kojiro as "A calming, mature green. Comforting."

And like with the others, on top of being his hair color, Kojiro's color is also shown in the opening.

~

Ainosuke Shindo - Red

Naturally for the "Matador of Love", Adam's image color is red, a color associated with love, passion and excitement, but also danger and anger, covering both sides of the duality of Adam's connection with love and romance and his violent skating. Utsumi's color notes in SK8 Design Works describe it as "the color of love and blood", and described Adam himself as "a guy who stole a main character's color" - fitting of the fact that in sentai series (and many anime influenced by them,) the red member is almost always the main protagonist and leader. (And perhaps a cheeky reference to Reki, though it seems Adam's color was decided on much earlier on.) Between red and blue being tied for their inclusion in sentai series and yellow in a close second place, the three primary colors form a core trio of characters in sentai series that's also reflected by Reki, Langa and Adam as the three most central characters in SK8.

While many works follow Gorenger's lead with the red protagonist being a hot-headed, passionate natural leader (a role that Adam does command at S as a whole, at least at first,) it's covered such a wide spectrum of protagonists over the course of the genre's history that red's biggest association is simply "being the main character," superseding a single specific character archetype. To momentarily dip into the history of anime itself rather than tokusatsu's influence, I'd be remiss not to mention that thanks to the influence of Mobile Suit Gundam (a franchise that both writer Okouchi and character designer Chiba have history with and mentioned in interviews on Febri as inspiring their interest in anime) it does have a memetic association with speed (and rival characters,) as Gundam's frequently-imitated masked antagonist Char Aznable's custom red mecha is notoriously "three times faster" than any other. (Adam's voice actor, Takehito Koyasu, has even played two "Char Clones" himself.)

As with the other characters, Adam's color appears in the opening but it also surrounds him frequently in the show even from his first appearance, including a red glowing aura to mirror Langa's blue when they're in the Zone (even in the finale when the red is gone from his costume.)

~

Tadashi Kikuchi - Gray

(Tadashi never got an official Twitter icon like the other characters, so I used a different piece of merch.)

Lastly, Tadashi's image color is gray, which is mostly known for being... a bit of a non-color, though it can be associated with gloom, ambiguity or uneasiness. It's mostly seen as a color that blends in and doesn't stand out by itself, which was the purpose behind Tadashi's color scheme, as Utsumi described in her notes as wanting his coloring to "make the main character stand out", given that he was designed from the beginning to appear alongside Adam, who has the "main character's color." Gray is an incredibly rare theme color in sentai series, to the point that there aren't specific character archetypes either; in 2014, at the time of Takahashi's paper, the only gray character she noted was a literal ghost. Even Tadashi's image color is alienated from the other skaters'...

While there are comparatively few (and less obvious) examples of Tadashi's image color appearing in the show, his last emotional scene with Ainosuke takes place in an almost entirely gray room.

It'll be interesting to see how these associations might continue to be used in the future.

[aroace-ventplace]

Being in fandom spaces is honestly so exhausting. Because there'll be a character who explicitly expresses disinterest in sex and romance, and most of the fandom will headcanon them as gay/lesbian. Any aspec headcanon will get called homophobic or assumed to be coming from a place of "Christian purity culture" (no I'm not a Christian, wasn't raised Christian and am not from a Christian majority country. Your assumption is racist and xenophobic actually).

Then there'll be characters who are confirmed to be aro/ace. These characters are always shipped with literally every other character and shippers would be like "but aros can still date! And aces can still have sex!" But then you headcanon a character who used to be in a relationship as angled or oriented aroace, and the entire fandom will be like "but this character has been in a relationship before, so they can't be aspec!" These aphobic double standards are infuriating.

YEAH, i've seen all of this so many times i've lost count. i understand that the people who say these things want to see themselves reflected in characters they like, but... so do aspecs. why are our headcanons and interpretations of relationships always treated as less legitimate? why is canonical aspec representation and coding so universally ignored? why does existing as aspec in fandom spaces always have to feel like an uphill battle?

(...and sometimes we get to see new and exciting variations of aspec erasure when certain (allo) creators explicitly say it's totally fine to romantically/sexually ship their aroace characters. that's been a fun one to see play out.)

i stopped interacting with fandoms a long time ago - finding other individual people who don't just tolerate but are actually EXCITED to discuss aspec readings of series has been far better than any fandom experience i've ever had. still, it sucks that larger fandom culture is so hostile to anything outside of the norm (basically: shipping two cis allo white men) that so many people have had to splinter off into their own small groups. i don't have much hope, but maybe one day we'll get to a point where aspec perspectives won't be entirely erased in mainstream fandom. maybe.

[amageish]

Reflecting on queer representation in X-Men 97 - and speculating on the future...

Before X-Men '97 was revealed, I made a post all about queer X-Men characters and the possibilities for this show... and now the show is out... so I figure I should do a follow-up! Let's discuss what happened and the possibilities for the future.

This is a long post, so I'll put my thoughts under the cut!

Part One: What We Got

Morph

The show's primary form of queer representation is in the character of Morph. They're the main "OC" of the original 1992 cartoon - they've always been important to the animated series canon despite not having much presence in the comics - so this is a pretty bold choice from that perspective...

They are a fairly unique type of gay by 2024 mass-market corporate standards. They're sassy bordering on mean in a way that would feel very typical for the 2000s but is sort of refreshing in the 2020s... They are non-binary, though their gender is never really discussed in the show itself - their voice actor sees them as being on a gender journey, though my personal reading is that they seem quite comfortable with themself and their gender already... Everyone who refers to them uses they/them pronouns thus far, though most dialogue is written to avoid gendering them entirely.

They are also notably attracted to Logan, something reflected throughout the show though most directly acknowledged in Episodes 3 and 10. They joke about showering with Logan and, when they think they see him in the showers, they give themselves Wolverine claws to help him reach the "hard-to-reach places"... Morph then actually says "I love you" to him in Episode 10, taking the form of Jean Grey to do it.

Whether a queer character pining for the "straight"* friend is good representation or an overplayed trope is subjective, but we will see where this arc goes in future seasons!

*Logan definitely isn't straight, but Marvel Corporate and Season 1 showrunner Beau DeMayo both say he is lmao.

Cipher + Boom Boom

I made an entire post about these two, but we also got a same-gender duo dancing at the Gala on Genosha... These are Cipher and Boom Boom - two characters who are not currently explicitly queer in the comics, but are interesting characters to read as queer IMHO! Cipher especially is a fascinating choice - the background gay is someone with the power to literally turn herself invisible lmao.

Northstar

Marvel's first openly gay superhero made two cameos in X-Men 97 - he appears in an X-Men recreation of A Different World in Episode 4 and with his fellow Alpha Flight members (plus Cipher and Psylocke) in Episode 10. He doesn't do anything of note really, but his hair colour is correct at least - the original show mistook his hair having white streaks as a trick of the light in some famous books and comic covers as him actually black-and-white hair in-universe...

Pixie

I'm not 100% sure if this should count, but the ever-perky Pixie turned up on Genosha in Episode 5 alongside her fellow New X-Men. As of writing, she's more of a queer-coded character than a capital-C canon queer in the comics... but she is solicited to be in the next Pride book alongside Bling! and Anole, who are canon queers, so I feel like her long-implied (and confirmed in an AU) bisexuality is likely to be canon in a couple weeks... so yeah - Genosha had a queer fae on it! Good for her.

There were a couple of other background gay characters, but nobody recognizable from the comics - there are some theories Blink and Husk were presented as a couple, but the "Blink" character appears to be a shapeshifter, so I would guess they are just OCs...

Part Two: Who is Teased

Like any modern Marvel project, we ended on a bunch of teasers... Two big explicitly queer names appear in those final moments - let's chat about that...

Iceman

After a season of appearing in the portrait of the O5 X-Men in Xavier's office, Bobby appears in Forge's DoFP-style board of potential future teammates at the end of the show.

In the comics, he famously comes out as a result of time-displaced versions of the original X-Men team showing up. A teenage Jean Grey reads the mind of a teenage Bobby Drake, who has been obscenely remarking on his very-real totally-not-fake attraction to Magik, and tells him that he is gay. This... probably isn't going to happen in the show, but I could see them taking this as a chance to do another take on Bobby's coming out.

They also could adapt the older story where Emma Frost possesses Bobby's body and, among other things, informs him that he will not be able to master his powers to their full potential until he works through his internalized identity crisis - though she doesn't say that he is gay at the time (the Comics Code prohibiting such things was still in effect), just implying it.

Bobby's had a lot of pairings in the comics, but in the show I think he is likely going to be Morph's actual love interest. He's gay. He's also a queer jokester. They'd probably get along and enjoy ribbing each other. We'll see what happens, but that's my guess...

Rachel Summers

Mother Askani was a shadow that lingered over the entire show and finally revealed herself in the final moments. The woman who raised Cable in a distant future alongside a cult of her worshippers, Mother Askani is a variant of another Summers-Grey child, Rachel Summers from Days of Future Past.

After decades of queer-coding, Rachel was finally confirmed as queer in 2022 when she kissed Betsy Braddock. This coming-out took around a year to be approved by corporate, but it did indeed finally happen and she even has a story in this year's Pride special. So I am hoping that she will be doing some queer stuff in the show itself...

Rachel's younger form was already present in the original show, albeit as a non-verbal cameo, so my prediction is that she has done all her time-travelling stuff and got split into her Askani and Mother Askani forms off-screen... but we will see how they adapt this character - Rachel's never really had a chance to be multi-media before, so I'm unsure how much they will streamline things.

Part Three: Askani's Partners

Rachel Summers has only had one textual girlfriend, but she's somehow still gotten around... Let's discuss some possibilities!

Betsy Braddock

Betsy Braddock is Rachel's current and thus far only textual girlfriend. Not unlike Rachel, Betsy has some... complicated lore. While she is currently the leader of the Captain Britain Corps, she spent a lot of her publication history with her mind trapped in the body of the Japanese Ninja Kwannon, operating as the assassin Psylocke.

Yes. That Psylocke. Most Psylocke appearances are actually a white British woman inside of a Japanese woman's body. I am sorry if anyone had to learn that this this way.

In a not-so-hot take: I think the show should just skip the body swap... but with rumours of Captain Britain in the MCU and the Captain Britain Corps being a multiversal entity (it is basically the Spiderverse movie's Spider Society, but done in the 80s) there may be some red tape around the use of Betsy. I hope there isn't though as I would like to see them in animation!

Kitty Pryde

Rachel's other big queer love interest in the comics is Kitty Pryde. Chris Claremont, the architect of what most people associate with the X-Men, has gone so far as to say that she is the "primal love" of Pryde's life and tried to imply that they had gotten married and had kids together in his epilogue for the X-Men brand, X-Men: The End. It's never been textual, but they are pretty darn gay in plenty of the Claremont stuff - including his Excalibur, the run that Kitty Pryde's design on the Episode 10 billboard is taken from.

Kitty Pryde is a complicated character when it comes to queerness. In 2020, Pryde kissed a girl and plenty of news publications ran stories about how she is finally canonically bisexual... and then, uh, nothing really happened in the comics? She has continued to be bi-coded since, but it doesn't seem like Marvel Corporate considered that kiss to be a coming out at all? Which is wild as it is, uh, a same-gender kiss, but she hasn't gotten to be in a Pride book or anything since then... I am unsure if '97 would be able to make it explicit when the lower-stakes less-widely-read comics are currently struggling to do so, but we will see?

Though speaking of Kitty Pryde being queer...

Illyana Rasputin

Cameoing in Episode 3 via Morph and appearing on the DoFP billboard as well in Episode 10, the marvellous Magik seems set to make her 97 debut! She's Kitty Pryde's OTHER roommate who she has a soulbond with. Yeah, uh, Pryde got two of those. We love that for her.

Like Rachel, she's also a long-queer-coded woman with a history of violence, having her autonomy taken away from her, and deep-rooted insecurities which Pryde uniquely is able to help her through...

I'd be surprised if either Illyana/Rachel or Pryde/Illyana managed to happen in this show, but this is one of my favourite X-Men pairings so I had to mention it... I am a sucker for soulmate "Our subtextual queerness gives us EXTRA SUPERPOWERS" stuff and Illyana and Pryde have had some truly S-tier moments like that that I'd love to see in animation. Honestly, I'd even take it if they were just "soulmates" and they played it in a campy Xena-y way too...

Concluding Thoughts

I feel somewhat mixed on the queer rep of 97 in general. The show is super bold politically and thematically, but feels below the level of queer representation projects like Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur or even Hulu's Runaways provided. The show thematically is so invested in queer experience, using mutant metaphor to tell a number of incredibly well-written and resonant queer stories via several characters (especially Sunspot), but it doesn't seem as interested in explicit direct queerness.

I'm optimistic we'll see more in the future seasons though... but we'll see if this post ages any better than my last one lmao.

[dribs-and-drabbles]

Be My Favourite ep 9

This was another fantastic ep, and the only thing preventing me from saying it topped last week’s again is that there was NO MAX! 😮

BUT there was so much more character development.

First, Pearmai, because I wrote last week that I was curious about her backstory, especially her relationship with her mother. And we got to know this week already.

We got confirmation that Pear holds things in, hides them, and masks her true thoughts and feelings. She’s carried the hurt of her mother’s abandonment for so long, whilst her mother doesn’t see the harm she’s done and her father expects her to be ok with it all.

And now I understand why Pear desires marriage and a ‘future’ with someone so much – she wants to build the life for her own children that she never got herself. She wants to have the relationship her parents didn’t have, and wants to have the mother/daughter relationship she never got. (This is something I identify with so if the show doesn’t explicitly tell us this, I can’t help but to read it this way because it’s all too familiar for me).

I loved the way that her mother’s obliviousness to the way Pear feels is reflected in their clothes and art – with them both in black and white, opposites devoid of colour and life, whilst her artwork is FULL of colour, so much so that’s it’s pushing out from the canvas. It’s no surprise Pear feels the way she does in the face of her mother’s freedom and creativity and life – a life chosen at the expense of being a mother to her own daughter. Maybe Pear needs to either find reconciliation with her or to close the door to her in order to have happiness in the future?

I thought Pear’s reaction to Kawi, after learning from Not and then Pisaeng that he and Pisaeng were together, was a little disproportionate – she and Kawi weren’t dating, they were just friends. She may have been developing affection for him (or latching onto the next guy who showed her affection) and thought that he liked her and that they were on their way to dating, BUT they still weren’t together for this to be like Kawi went behind her back or cheated on her.

My interpretation is that this reaction could be a front to her real (maybe subconscious) feelings – disappointment that her future prospects at having the family she wants has disappeared again. I think that unless she can learn and grow from this and her relationship with her mother, she will just latch on to the next person who shows interest in her. I admit, I was afraid that she would do this with Not – we had seen in ep 7 that she eventually did do this in another timeline – but I’m so glad she walked away from him, deciding that if her future isn’t Pisaeng, or Kawi, it definitely wouldn’t be Not. Not in this timeline. And I think this does indicate that something has changed for Pear now. Maybe wanting to talk to Pisaeng about him and Kawi and therefore confiding in him about her mother as well has helped her shift her motivations behind her choices.

Some other smaller thoughts before I get onto Kawi:

At first, I was worried the show was transferring the drinking problem to Pisaeng…but I don’t think it is, because it seems that this occasion was him trying to protect Kawi. I don’t really like all this peer pressure to drink alcohol…but I’m also aware that it could be a cultural politeness thing, but it needs doing away with.

I ADORED the “Kawi, Kawi, Kawi” moment – has anyone gif'd the parallel to “Lao Wen, Lao Wen, Lao Wen” yet?! Paging @forcebook

Also, Pisaeng has a brown phone case?! Kawi’s colour! How have I not noticed this before?! @respectthepetty did you already know? If not, PSA: more colour-coded phone cases!

I’m not sure I like Kawi holding back or pushing Pisaeng’s affections away. He declared he liked Pisaeng and couldn’t bear to be wthout him but it feels like he’s not showing enough affection to reflect that. (It’s bordering on the blushing maiden trope which I detest). Maybe this is Krist’s own discomfort…? Or just that he’s been directed like that (because the directing so far has been brilliant), which is disappointing because I’d hoped the story wouldn’t do this to these characters. It’s good, at least, that Kawi tells us that he’s simping over Pisaeng and how attractive he is but I wish they would show us in Kawi’s body language and reactions to Pisaeng’s advances. Smh.

Right on to Kawi. And what a lot to unpack.

Speaking of the morning in bed scene and Kawi questioning if him and Pisaeng being together is “the right thing” – I’m glad it’s not about them being a gay couple (which the show emphasises a few times during the ep) but it’s not really any better that it’s in relation to theirs and everyone else’s future.

Kawi is still thinking about ‘fixing’ one moment in time, and for multiple people, rather than living in the moment and listening to his present desires (emphasis on both ‘his present desires’ and ‘his present desires’). At the end he worries about how many mistakes he will make in life (mistakes that affect others negatively) but he still needs to learn that he has no control over how other people are affected by his choices for himself. And that he can’t let that dictate the choices he does make, he has to let other people live their lives and he has to live his own. (@dimplesandfierceeyes wrote a great post related to this).

And as much as I’m shook about Kwan liking Not (as we all are), their situation perfectly highlights why Kawi needs to focus on himself and not others. Because as much as Kwan and Pearmai (and Not to some extent but we don’t care about him, right?) are hurting and unhappy now it’s SO GOOD that all of this has happened for these characters.

First we have Kwan. As much as this is hurting Kwan, she is being set free now instead of in 12 years' time. She is being saved from 12 years of hurt and pain and unrequited love. (Oh Kwan, beautiful Kwan. You’ll meet someone better. I PROMISE!) (Check out this fantastic reblog thread about Kwan by @lurkingshan, @jjsanguine and @twig-tea)

Then Pearmai. She’s hurting from her parents’ situation, and from the revelation about Kawi and Pisaeng, but she chooses to not just turn to Not. She turns him down and sets herself on a completely different path. She now has the time and opportunity to find love in another place (hopefully a happier one) and still get the family she wants.

(And Not, if I have to… This is good for Not too, because he gets to declare now [to himself as well as Kwan] that he likes Pearmai more than Kwan [and maybe other people he’s sleeping with], he’s being honest with himself and others [is that a bit of growth I see there? *she squints*]. And it’s fucking fantastic that Pearmai turns him down [not only because she deserves better] but because he can move on and maybe use this experience to change [the jury’s out on that for a while. As an aside, this ep made me retract slightly the thinking there might be a possibility that Not is also gay/bi and will also have his own realisation arc…but the show’s not over yet!]). Anyway, THIS IS GOOD. This is good for all of them.

Kawi thinks they’re all unhappy and it’s because of him, but he’s not able to see the full picture. There’s so much nuance in what they do want and what will make them happy that he can’t even begin to know or understand how his actions play a part in that. And the reality of it is, there are so many positives resulting from his actions as well. We already saw this in ep 8, where Max tells him he’s made a huge difference in his life. I love that Pisaeng gives Kawi hope and optimism for the future but I don’t think hope is enough, Kawi also needs to trust that the results of his actions are not always bad – it might take time but there are positives.

Last thing (because I know this is long!), I want to talk about this: “I will feel more comfortable if we are more equal”. I understand Kawi’s motivations here, he doesn’t want their relationship to be influenced too much by differences that could negatively affect them and their regard for each other – and financial disparity can be a sticking point for a lot of people - but accepting and leaning into the ways they aren’t equal is also healthy for a relationship. Each side can’t always bring the exact same things into a relationship. Balance can be found in other ways. I'm interested to know if this ‘theme’ comes back or gets built on in future eps.

And speaking of…it looks like next week’s will be fluffy and domestic where they settle into their couple dynamic. I can’t wait!

(also tagging @grapejuicegay @waitmyturtles @rocketturtle4 @ginnymoonbeam @chickenstrangers @wen-kexing-apologist @bengiyo @plantsarepeopletoo and @williamrikers in case you're interested! And sorry if I missed anyone.)

[princess-of-the-corner]

Okay so, if I could summarize each of the four main characters and what makes them so interesting:

Ruby Rose: She dresses in black and red, has a lot of death motifs, and is the most willing of the four main characters to fight dirty. She's also an altruistic sweetheart who just wants to make the world a better place, is heavily coded as both autistic and asexual, and her entire character arc across the first eight seasons of the show is based around her deteriorating mental health as she holds herself to higher and higher standards until she just can't live up to role she has given herself. She's also seen blushing when talking to a pretty girl in Season 3, and while one boy younger than her is implied to have a crush on her, she has NEVER shown ANY interest in boys outside of the noncanon parody spin-off. Also, while it's never explicitly mentioned in show, analyzing the information we DO have reveals her to be perhaps the SOLE survivor of a HORRIFICALLY thorough genocide, even if Ruby herself doesn't realize until after Volume 5.

Weiss Schnee: Basically Chloe with better writing. She starts out as a seemingly shallow, petulant rich girl with an ego larger than her father's corporate empire. She's also deeply aware of what a monster her father is, comes from a broken home, and even BEFORE her character arc is primarily motivated by a desire to redeem her family name after her father married into the family and turned her grandfather's company into a standard evil megacorp. She's also canonically bisexual.

Blake Belladonna: She's a Faunus, a former member of the civil rights group-turned-terrorist organization known as the White Fang. Her ex boyfriend, Adam Taurus (who is heavily implied to have started courting her when she was 12 and he was 18), has slowly but surely been subverting the White Fang's actual purpose in order to turn it into an instrument of his bloodlust, and thus her driving motivation for much of the first few seasons is to atone for her perceived role in the White Fang's fall (as she unfairly believes herself to be responsible for his fall to the darkside, because he would divert blame to HER whenever she tried to confront him on it), and also try and fight racism. She's also the team's second in command. She was also the first member of the cast to be confirmed queer, and is the closest thing to a harem protagonist the show has, with three characters (not including her abusive ex) all having been confirmed to have fallen for her at different points. Her eyes are the same color as her partner's soul.

Yang Xiao Long: She might wear the image of a hard-drinking party girl, but she has NEVER consumed alcohol on screen, is PROBABLY the best student on her team, built her weapon herself, and is a genius mechanic on TOP of being a berserker who gets stronger the more and stronger hits she absorbs to charge her Semblance with. She's both the tank AND the team mom, because all three of her parents AND her uncle have let her down in some way, shape, or form since she was a child, forcing her to grow up so her sister wouldn't have to. Her birth mom walked out on her when she was a baby, her actual mom mysteriously disappeared on a secret mission, her uncle's too drunk to be much help around the house and is usually absent on top of that, and her father is very clearly not up to the task of raising two children on his own, no matter how much he may try and genuinely loves his girls. Also, she's Ruby's older half sister, and a good chunk of her arc is dedicated to the fact that it takes her until season 9 to realize that she's gay and in love with her best friend. Her eyes' default color is the same as her partner's soul.

GOD that's gay.

[scarlet--wiccan]

I’m guessing for the queercodinh thing they were referring to the “love is for souls not bodies” line and a bunch of other stuff in her & visions relationship and the vision & the scarlet witch books

Personally speaking, I don't put a lot of stock in the "queer" reading of Wanda and Vision's relationship, especially not in regards to that line of dialogue. I'm not saying that it isn't a valid reading, and I do feel some resonance, but to me, the struggles that they face as a couple, particularly in the 80s V&SW books, feels more like a racial allegory.

Race in Vision & the Scarlet Witch is a tough subject. First of all, there are several Black characters who are treated quite poorly, particularly Nekra and Black Talon. Wanda and Pietro are explicitly confirmed to have a Romani birth mother in this series, but the way it's handled is... comically offensive.

So, this is a deeply flawed text, but one of the core challenges that Wanda and Vision face is their desire to fit in and build a life for themselves in this (white) American suburb without compromising their own identities and the things that make them unique. The alienation and pushback that they receive is a response to this perceived otherness, which, to me, distinctly echoes xenophobia and racism. Wanda is a textually racialized character, whose perception as both a mutant and a witch read as a stand-in for her foreignness and cultural differences-- with witchcraft and magic being closely entwined with Romani depictions. Vision is bit more complicated-- it's been noted by other writers, who are more scholarly than me, that his efforts to prove himself as a human being and fit into human society often follow vectors of racial assimilation in white America.

Anyways, speaking as a second-generation American of Romani descent, the tension between assimilation and authenticity, along with the delicate navigation of conditional privilege and Wanda's desire for security and home, are the most profound "minority metaphor" aspect of these books. So, that's where I usually land.

Giant-Size Avengers #4

Regarding "love is for souls, not bodies," the thing that a lot of people seem to forget about that scene is that Vision builds up to confessing his feelings for Wanda by confirming his own identity as a man, and not even in a trans way-- he's recently received more information about how he was made, which allows him to more confidently assert his identity as human. It's an emphatically heterosexual moment. Again, you can take all of this as some kind of LGBT allegory, or intentionally read it that way and see what meaning you find, but I absolutely don't believe that this scene reads as queer coding.

[worldburnrp]

JULY 14TH, NYC

THE BROOKLYN MUSEUM PRESENTS

THE ODYSSEY OF GODS AND MEN  — A GREEK ART & HISTORY GALA AND FUNDRAISER 

The Brooklyn Museum opens its doors this Friday night to an illustrious gala — held under the dome at their Sculpture Gallery, which is precisely what it says on the tin: a large, white-marbled room where countless Greek statues watch your every move.  But the exposure comes with a good cause: to raise funds for the museum’s growing Greek fund, for further research, restoration, exploration, and upkeep of the countless pieces of Greek art found at the museum and those still to be discovered and brought through these doors. The public ranges from those who can donate a fiver — to five million. And yes, those who just needed an excuse to wear a fancy dress, too.  Inside the halls, ethereal music is played, the most breath-taking sculptures are brought out of the dark room and into display, and small performances of Greek mythology are sprinkled throughout.  Welcome, to tonight’s Odyssey.

IC INFORMATION:

SETTING: The Brooklyn Museum.The event starts at7:30pm, in the cusp of sunset shifting into nighttime. The fundraiser is held mainly at the grand Sculpture Gallery, though characters may explore beyond it. Keep in mind, some areas may be closed for the purposes of the event.

DRESS CODE: The dress code is gala — think long dresses, tuxedos, your most expensive fabrics — inspired by Greek Mythology: Gods and Men. Character’s interpretations of this vary up to each person’s personality. It’s likely however to lean more into loose creative freedom, than costumey. 

OOC INFORMATION:

IC, THE EVENT TAKES PLACE ON THE NIGHT OF JULY 14TH. OOC, the end date will be determined soon.

Members are encouraged to pause non-event threads during this event, but not required. We understand certain threads and interactions are important for character and plot development, so we leave that up to your personal judgement. We ask that, should pre-event threads continue, that they don’t overtake event ones.

It is a requirement, however, that no new threads outside of the event are started until the event wraps. 

WE ENCOURAGE YOU TO PLOT with your fellow players any plots and/or conflicts that may happen. For heavier conflicts, please do make sure to message the main about it first.

As always, should there be any questions or need of assistance with any plots, please feel free to contact the admins and we’ll be happy to help you.

OUTFIT CHALLENGE:

CREATIVE OUTFIT & NARRATIVE HEADCANON: What outfit is your character wearing? Why have they decided to attend? Answer all or any of these through a post of your liking. <3

If choosing a specific mythology figure to be inspired by, your character may claim one from the list below. Characters taking a looser route and not driving specific inspiration don’t need to go through this step. 

INSTRUCTIONS:

— To claim a mythology figure, just message the main blog and say their name + character you’re claiming it for. Once the admins respond with confirmation, the figure is yours! — If you have multiple characters, please be mindful of your fellow players, and please choose one figure for one character, and allow for others to have a chance to claim theirs before claiming more. — Figures are AVAILABLE unless CROSSED OUT.

APHRODITE — APOLLO — ARES — ARTEMIS — ATHENA — CERBERUS — CIRCE — DEMETER — DIONE — DIONYSUS — ERIS — FATES (0/3) — MUSES (3/9) — HADES — HEBE — HECATE — HERMES — HEPAESTUS — HESTIA — HERA — HERMES — PERSEPHONE — POSEIDON — ZEUS — CHRONUS — EROS — EREBUS — GAIA — NEMESIS — NYX — THEMIS — ACHILLES — ODYSSEUS  — HERACLES — PSYCHE

*

QUOTES CHALLENGE: 

For this challenge, characters may claim quotes as written by Homer.

Whatever route you take, is up to you — SO LONG AS THE GIVEN QUOTE IS TAKEN INTO CONSIDERATION.The quote does not need to be spoken or explicitly a part of the thread, but can be if you wish. 

You can use the quote of your choice for open starters, or closed starters. You have 24 hours to use your quote after claiming it, or it becomes available again.

CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT is the name of the game. We encourage you to have your character enter the scene one way, and leave with somewhat of a changed perspective. This can be as subtle, or as intense as you see fit.

INSTRUCTIONS: 

— To claim a quote, just message the main blog and say the quote number + character you’re claiming it for. Once the admins respond with confirmation, the quote is yours! — If you have multiple characters, please be mindful of your fellow players, and please choose one quote for one character, and allow for others to have a chance to claim theirs before claiming more. 

01. “Of all creatures that breathe and move upon the earth, nothing is bred that is weaker than man.” [UNCLAIMED]

02. “The gods envy us. They envy us because we’re mortal, because any moment may be our last. Everything is more beautiful because we’re doomed. You will never be lovelier than you are now. We will never be here again.” [XIMENA RODRIGUEZ]

03. “There can be no covenants between men and lions, wolves and lambs can never be of one mind, but hate each other out and out and through.” [UNCLAIMED]

04. “Hateful to me as the gates of Hades is that man who hides one thing in his heart and speaks another.” [UNCLAIMED]

05. “A man who has been through bitter experiences and travelled far enjoys even his sufferings after a time.” [RAHI KUMAR]

06. “Be strong, saith my heart; I am a soldier; I have seen worse sights than this.” [UNCLAIMED]

07. “Let me not then die ingloriously and without a struggle, but let me first do some great thing that shall be told among men hereafter.” [UNCLAIMED]

08. “Even a fool learns something once it hits him.” [UNCLAIMED]

09. “We men are wretched things.” [MINERVA HAWTHORN]

10. “The difficulty is not so great to die for a friend as to find a friend worth dying for.” [UNCLAIMED]

11. “Men are so quick to blame the gods: they say that we devise their misery. But they themselves- in their depravity- design grief greater than the griefs that fate assigns.” [JULIAN BERKELEY]

12. “I didn't lie! I just created fiction with my mouth!”

13. “The blade itself incites to deeds of violence.” [MATHIAS MALKOVICH]

14. “Each man delights in the work that suits him best.” [UNCLAIMED]

15. “There will be killing till the score is paid.” [UNCLAIMED]

16. “If you serve too many masters, you'll soon suffer.” [UNCLAIMED]

17. “Few sons are like their fathers--most are worse, few better.” [UNCLAIMED]

18. “Why cover the same ground again? ... It goes against my grain to repeat a tale told once, and told so clearly.” [UNCLAIMED]

19. “Too many kings can ruin an army” [UNCLAIMED]

20. “The sort of words a man says is the sort he hears in return.” [UNCLAIMED]

21. “These were the colloquies in heaven.” [UNCLAIMED]

22. “Better to be the hireling of a stranger, and serve a man of mean estate whose living is but small, than be the ruler over all these dead and gone.” [UNCLAIMED]

23. “I know not what the future holds, but I know who holds the future.” [UNCLAIMED]

24. “I have no interest at all in food and drink, but only in slaughter and blood and the agonized groans of mangled men” [UNCLAIMED]

25. “We are perpetually laboring to destroy our delights, our composure, our devotion to superior power. Of all the animals on earth we least know what is good for us. My opinion is, that what is best for us is our admiration of good.” [UNCLAIMED]

HAVE FUN! <3

[kj-red]

BETTER LIVING INDUSTRIES DROID REGISTRATION. LOADING INFORMATION, PLEASE WAIT.

ERROR: AUTHORISED USERS ONLY. Please read the following information before proceeding.

Rules:

Due to Cherry's past, do NOT interact if you are a minor. There is nothing explicitly nsfw or anything, but he still has those things as part of his character (it goes about as far as Red and Blue do in the comics) Also mod is well into their 20s at this point.

No godmodding. Using any of the information below just to godmod will result in an immediate block. Please ask if you had anything in mind using the information though! Godmodding in general interactions may result in a quick message over just to get some clarification. Cherry is not the most subtle guy in the universe and will accidentally drop hints about being a droid over time- do not just make your character know please.

Want to use something from the info below? Shoot me a message! Worst I can say is no.

Please be patient.

PMs are preferred for rps due to previous experiences. Regular Tumblr is still okay though!

I use dice for most major decisions and how they turn out. Unfortunately the dice do not like Cherry rn :(

Image credit

CREDENTIALS CONFIRMED. FILE LOADED.

Basic Information

Name(s): Custom Droid Series: Cherry Red. This has since been used as his killjoy name. Though he doesn’t want to be discovered as a droid by other killjoys, this model’s name was not made public so he has decided to stick with it. He is oddly fond of it

Xander Fitzgerald (temporarily when pretending to be human in the city)

Age: Programmed to be early/mid 20s

Race/species: Droid

Gender Identity: Programmed male. Identifies as male. Uses he/him pronouns

Sexual orientation: Mostly considered himself to be homoromantic. Despite his previous 'job', he doesn't really find himself being sexually attracted to anyone.

Date of Manufacture: Commissioned 20/10/2021. First activated 14/02/2022. Completed and delivered 25/12/2022.

Place of Manufacture: Battery City, California.

Previous Residences: Private Droid Manufacture Facility, Financial District. Meyer's Residence, Financial District

Current Residence: Abandoned Pet Store, Zone 5

Occupation(s): Pornodroid (former, privately registered), Bartender (former), Zones Droid Vet (present, primarily focuses on un-spying spy droids), the guy who points at a cat and goes 'cat' (permanent role)

Religion: Believes in DESTROYA. He isn’t like… super religious or anything though. He believes DESTROYA may eventually help droids, but for now they’re on their own.

History

The first time that Red opened his eyes, he was met with a pure white room and smiles looking at him. The only sign of colour came from him; a bright tuft of red hair visible in the mirror opposite him. It certainly wasn’t the worst welcome to the world. Despite the cold, it didn’t bother him. It made him feel alive. He just wished that he wasn’t built with the ability to detect changes in emotion. Without that, perhaps he would be able to see the smiles of the scientists as something more genuine.

Christmas 2022 was the first time he was able to leave the only building he ever knew. It was also the first time he ever saw what his eyes would interpret as true happiness. What they couldn’t detect, however, was the cause of the happiness. Still, despite the fact he was nothing more than a tool to Ben Meyers, he fell in love with the man. Red was happy, Red felt warmth… but it wasn’t to last. Ben was eventually engaged to someone else, and Red fell into the background. It was only then that he learned his true purpose. To be used. And that’s where the story would have ended, had a rogue line of code of unknown origin not allowed for his escape.

Red ran. Red was free.

And for a brief period, Xander Fitzgerald existed. His red hair was covered with a black wig, and he spent a brief period as a bartender in a dodgy nightclub in the lobby. He would often flirt with patrons and often encouraged people to return. For a while it worked, nobody suspected a thing, but it inevitably didn't last. One day his passive flirtations went a little further than intended, and he ended up having to answer to a rather frustrated and jealous exterminator. Rather than holding his tongue, he proceeded to also flirt with the exterminator which resulted in a ray gun being pointed at him.

He fled once more. By the time the night was over, he was far enough from the city where light pollution was no longer a problem. And all he could see for miles were the stars

Key Relationships

Family: Amanda Fitzgerald (creator, alive), Maya Henderson (creator, status unknown), Elaine Fitzgerald ('sister', decreased)

Group/Gang: None currently. Crayolas (formerly)

Friends/allies: Val Velocity, Constellation Creations, Archangel

Tries to befriend most of the Zones though

Relationship(s)/Love interest(s): Val Velocity (present - Modded by Nic), Ben Meyers (former)

Enemies: Ben Meyers, Gray Savon

Pets: Cupid, Pitbull, presumed to be organic. Vitey Vucker, cat, robotic. Acts as a sentry outside of his house- repurposed spy droid. Assorted robotic dogs (more temporary housing than anything).

(to be continued)

[starrylayle]

Soman’s failed POC and Queer rep in the SGE saga — And why criticism is essential to the movie (franchise)

[repost]

Before I start though, I’d like to say that if you have any argument about forced representation, dni. I don’t give a shit that ur faves aren’t white anymore — and please stop fucking harassing Soman and the cast about this non-issue.

Now onto the racial criticism of Soman’s work, which I don’t see talked enough about.

Being a person of colour does not mean you are exempt from racial criticism. I’m sure this is known by now, but in the books, literally everyone is white. Like EVERYONE. And not only that, the beauty standards he portrays and tries to critique (but then fails miserably at unfortunately) are so Eurocentric it’s quite disheartening actually - pale skin, small noses, coloured eyes, etc. The themes are also quite Eurocentric as well — if you had told me that the books were written by a white author, I would believe you.

Now, I’ve always given him the benefit of the doubt here, considering he was writing a middle grade series as a marginalised author, which was a lot more difficult at the time, and because he does genuinely try to improve his POC rep in the later books (even if that does include retconning character’s previous descriptions lol). In that same vein, the cast is also noticeably more diverse, and I truly applaud Soman for that. However, he has not said anything in regards to the racism the cast have been getting, which considering his influence on the fandom, would have been much appreciated. (The only casting choice he actually spent some time defending was brunette Tedros 💀💀 — like mate, get your priorities together!). Also, since whiteness is quite intrinsic to the core themes of the story (I’ll make a separate post on that later), I worry that the movie will unintentionally be pushing it. And if that’s the case, people should be allowed to critique this (hypothetical) poor depiction of race, without it being considered racist. (As previously mentioned — this excludes those fucking weirdos who just hate on the cast coz their faves aren’t white anymore 🙄🙄)

Ok so, in regards to the queer-coding/queer-baiting:

Just like being a POC doesn’t mean u can’t have internalised racism, being queer doesn’t mean u can’t have internalised homophobia, especially to other members of the community. I don’t know why exactly Soman struggles with writing queer rep so much (I mean I can understand in 2013 — but now plenty of middle grade books include queer characters), but he barely has any canon gay rep.

Tristan/Yara, who is not even specified whether they are gay or trans, is one of the first characters to die, with absolutely no resolution to their arc whatsoever - and their queerness is never mentioned again. The next confirmed queer couple are two backgrounder guys who barely have any significance to the story. The couple after that are two evil white boys, who are only confirmed to be queer after they both die. They are are the only relevant gay characters at this point — yet ofc they’re dead, white and evil. This wouldn’t be a problem if there were other (good) queer characters, but since that is not the case, it just comes off as rather… icky.

Now notice how all these couples, as poorly written as they are, are all (white) gay men? There are hints that Hester and anadil might be in a relationship, but it’s never explicitly confirmed.

In addition, sophie and Agatha are explicitly queer coded — (I made a post about it on my acc for anyone’s interested) — they even kiss!! Of course people are going to be mad that they were baited into a relationship that ended up being incesteous! Especially, ESP, considering that Agatha is now a Black girl in this adaptation. We barely see any white canon wlw couples in media — Black sapphics are almost unheard of in the mainstream, especially as leads. first kill, one show that featured a Lesbian Black girl lead (a Dark-skinned one at that!)— got cancelled. And this happens all the time. Lesbians/sapphics, esp sapphics of colour, ESP Balck sapphics are barely given any time of day in our media in favour of centring gay white men in queer narratives, and thus they have every right to be upset at the queer baiting.

I’m not Black, but as a queer woman of colour, Agatha’s character has always been very special to me. I’ve always thought she should be a POC considering how different her and her mum are from the rest of her cookie-cutter village, and queer because she did not fit into conventional notions of femininity. It would be so awesome to see Agatha, a queer woman of colour, as the lead in a high-budget fantasy series. But alas, that is too many marginalised identities for the general audience.

Not only that, the twin reveal was just plain bad writing. It had absolutely no bearing at the story whatsoever and is never mentioned again. It was just done purely for shock value, and for that, I will absolutely critique Soman.

I know that this discourse is tired and worn out — and understandably so, it’s been years. However, now that this movie is approaching mainstream — At worst, this queer baiting can already add to the whole ‘lesbian relationships aren’t serious’ and other terrible stereotypes. At best, it deprives sapphics of much needed representation in mainstream fantasy films.

Remember, unlike with the books, we as fans have the power to influence the story. If the creators see how unpopular the twist is with the public, they can probably change it. We can make a difference! Btw, this doesn’t mean sophie and Agatha should be endgame — I’d like for them to be in a short term relationship and be confirmed as canonically queer — Tagatha can still be the end couple! (Not hophie tho, coz sophie is a lesbian and I despise Hort lol).

[batsarebetterthanpeople]

Something about the white heterosexual male gaze being so prolific (ie seeing white straight man characters as agents with active inner lives and motivations and seeing women, poc, and queers as unknowable things to be acted upon or events to advance the character development of those straight white guys)

Something about that perspective being so prolific and even enforced by things like the hayse code and also just by studios and publishing agencies deciding that other kinds of stories aren't marketable so there being a dearth of media for other kinds of people.

Something about mainstream media training us to see things from the perspective of white men who present themselves as masculine to the detriment of all other perspectives.

Something about OFMD going out of it's way to subvert those expectations.

Something about how in most media a man like Ed would only be there inform a man like Izzy's story but in this show Izzy is only there to inform Ed's story

Something about them keeping Izzy's queerness subtextual while explicitly confirming other character's sexualities so they can have their cake (give us a queer coded villain, make him jealously motivated and psychosexually obsessed with Ed and make jokes about that, make him a more sympathetic villain than the badminton twins for example, make all pirates gay by default) and eat it too (make him a villain in a story about overcoming toxic masculinity, make him the character we're used to relating too and then making him explicitly wrong in order to subvert that expectation)

Something about OFMD trying to subvert our expectations backfiring in some ways, at least as far as the fandom goes, because of , deeply ingrained those expectations are.

Something about the long history of queer coding to subvert obstacles to telling queer stories.

Something about BBC Sherlock and Supernatural and other shows of that description and queerbating specifically geared towards fandom

Something about those last two things combined with being starved for queer content completely destroying people's brains in terms of being able to tell the difference between headcannon, subtext, and text (three different things) when it comes to queerness in media.

Something about how the brilliance of Izzy Hands as a character, and a function of the narrative just flies over people's heads in favor of woobifying him.

Something about how I personally feel like a redemption arc (something that fandoms really enjoy) would be the wrong move for Izzy and that has nothing to do with me disliking him (I don't actually, love to hate? maybe. but actually hate? Definitely not)

Like I've connected the two dots, it could be that deep, ect.

Do you guys understand what I'm saying?

[kitkatopinions]

You want to know what I think about why they haven't confirmed Yang as queer yet or had either Yang or Blake explicitly say anything about be attracted to women (unlike our "hetero" characters)? Because the writers know the bees are the beginning and end of their gay representation. We can have Arkos, Renora, some Rosegarden and maybe some White Knight now (bc framing), but when it comes to sapphic couples, the bees are it. And they see no problem with that either.

As I'm answering this ask, I will be heavily criticizing RW/BY and Bumble/by. Fans of the bees, please beware. If you can't stand to see criticism, just move along.

Here's what we have for confirmation of attraction to the opposite sex from our main characters:

Weiss asks out Neptune. Blake goes on a date with Sun and she and Adam had a prior romantic entanglement. Yang openly leers at shirtless men and verbally says that she approves of their shirtlessness. Jaune is romantically interested in Weiss and kisses Pyrrha. Nora kisses Ren and openly says she's in love with him. Pyrrha kisses Jaune. Ren 'melts into' the kiss with Nora and talks about his feelings for her. Qrow goes on about how he was undone by the sight of a female waitress's skirt length. That's eight out of ten main characters (the other two being Ruby and Oscar,) and if you count Sun and Penny as main characters, that's nine out of twelve because Sun asked out Blake.

The majority of this happened in season two. In the second season of the show, people were asking out people of the opposite sex, and the only characters that didn't have their interest in the opposite sex confirmed within the first three seasons were Ren and Nora. When Ren and Nora kissed after they were hinted at being romantically interested in each other for seasons, they were far and away not the only main characters to have confirmed attraction to the opposite sex and weren't even the first kiss between characters of the opposite sex. If someone wanted to prove that the ship between Jaune and Weiss was going to happen, they don't have to say 'Jaune looks at her, he was upset when she almost died, they go out with a group one time,' they can say 'Jaune has confirmed romantic attraction towards her' and 'At the very least, Weiss has expressed canonical interest in men.''

Here's what we have for confirmation of attraction to the same sex from our main characters:

Nothing. Literally nothing.

We have two very small side characters who appeared in a couple episodes of season six, a villainous character who is in love with her former friend who is described by her voice actor as straight in what looks like official RW/BY merch, and a transgender character who has only existed for two seasons as a more minor character. And then we have Blake and Yang, who have been coded as queer for years now with no canon confirmation so that even though they're clearly meant to be perceived as romantic by queer people, homophobes can pretend it's not happening and Yang can still describe Blake as her sister in side content like video games while Rooster Teeth the company with a huge history of bigotry can sell pride shirts. This is behind the curve of heavily censored cartoons made by big companies like Cartoon Network and Disney. There's no excuse.

When people say that there's nothing queerbaity about Bumble/by and that it's just a slowburn like Re/nora and therefore we should all say nothing about it, they're really ignoring that Re/nora is the exception, they were some of the only main characters who hadn't expressed confirmed interest in the opposite sex, while even Ruby and Penny had seemed to want to talk about 'cute boys' in season one. And even Re/nora at this point is far more confirmed than bumble/by. People like saying that Bumble/by is a slowburn, but that doesn't mean that Blake and Yang couldn't have been confirmed as queer looong ago. Like, people act like Jim and Pam had zero confirmed romantic interest in each other or any other people until they got together and were shown dating in season four. Most slowburns don't look like this.

And people also are pretending like no outside meta matters at all, whether that's the history of a lack of representation for queer characters or considering the company's history of bigotry or the biphobia of one of the creators and lead writers Miles Luna. Despite the fact that there's no queer main characters in ten years, despite the fact that Blake and Yang's progression is unnatural because their tender moments are not allowed to be backed by even a discussion of feelings, despite the fact that the first male character who was coded queer was brutally murdered, despite the fact that there was wild heteronormativity in the early seasons where several characters just casually talked about their attraction to the opposite sex while the creator of RW/BY said that he'd be willing to include queer ships eventually maybe if he thought they were earned, despite the fact that Blake was described as straight by her VA as late as 2019, despite the fact that RW/BY is the biggest money maker for a company that is not only seemingly always struggling with funding projects but also constantly having controversies often about displaying bigotry and needing to get back into people's good graces, despite the fact that they've tried to sell Pride merch and Bumble/by merch that said like 'maybe they're a couple,' despite all of this... No one is allowed to suggest that there might have been intentionally stringing queer audiences along, or that it's a bit suspicious, or anything like that. No queer person is allowed to side eye a bigoted company. Because then we're 'ignoring the slowburn' and just being really unfair to Miles Luna the man who told an 'anecdote' about how hot he thinks watching girls make out is. No queer person is allowed to think that Bumble/by is badly done, because we'll literally get attacked, no matter how much we might like tons of other queer ships, including the canon queer ships from other shows like Adventure Time, Owl House, or Steven Universe.

I think that it is because Blake and Yang are likely to be the end-all-be-all as far as their confirmed queer characters, I think that's why fans are so defensive. Blake and Yang as a ship had juice before volume six and had a lot of people who shipped them, I'm not saying that the only reason they've been shipped is because they're likely to actually be confirmed. But. There's a habit in most fandoms to take what's either the only confirmed queer ship or the queer ship that's most likely to be confirmed and then instead of asking why there aren't more queer ships, people start acting like any fan who doesn't ship it or has any problem with it is trying to hurt queer people. Like if the content creators hear that the ship might not be popular, they just won't do it. Like we'll be punished for not being grateful for the scraps. So fans take it upon themselves to be knights and guardians for these ships, because instead of having grievances against the content creators who make queer ships so rare (and sometimes, badly done,) fans often seem to act like other fans are the enemy for not liking the one ship we have or might get. There's this element of...

A lot of rwde posters who care about queer rep wouldn't care very much about the relationship between Blake and Yang if they weren't the end-all-be-all of the main character rep in the show. If Weiss and Ruby or Weiss and Penny had been a thing, or Jaune and Neptune or Jaune and Ren or something, or other queer ships involving the main characters existed, then Blake and Yang's own status as queer wouldn't be as important because they wouldn't be the only (coded as) queer characters. Like, Lapis Lazuli and Peridot in Steven Universe weren't in an official relationship, but we had Ruby and Sapphire, and Pearl had been in love with Rose Quartz, so I at the very least didn't feel strung along by their 'roomies' language.

Another thing to note is that once again, what I at least care about is whether or not Blake and Yang are confirmed as queer, not whether or not they're in a relationship. People accuse rwde posters of not being happy with a slowburn queer ship and that we think that queer relationships should all be rapid paced (the defense against comparisons to Disney's the Owl House or Arcane having Vi out and out say that she thinks Caitlyn is hot.) But in actuality, this is willfully ignoring that they could've been confirmed as queer without getting in a relationship, just like Jaune talking to Ren about his feelings for Weiss doesn't mean they're destined to be together, and Weiss asking out Neptune doesn't mean they need to have an emotional journey with each other and have a passionate kiss at the end of the show. Yang could've gone to the Vytal dance with Velvet instead of with no one. Blake could've had feelings for Ruby before she had feelings for Yang instead of going on a date with Sun. Ruby could've had feelings for Penny before the Fall of Beacon the way that Pyrrha had feelings for Jaune. Neptune could've had a crush on Jaune during the Vytal dance, instead of having only turned down Weiss because he couldn't dance. Clover could've actually been confirmed as queer and wound up in a relationship with Qrow. But instead all we have is... Ten years of nothing but side characters who don't get much screentime and two main characters nuzzling foreheads and a bunch of fans screaming at us for saying 'we want more.'

It's disappointing.

[greenreticule]

Details on Dexter Jettster in The High Republic!

HE’S BACK, AND HE’S A REOCCURING CHARACTER IN The High Republic Adventures COMICS, STARTING NOVEMBER 30th, 2022!

[ID: Dexter Jettster, a four-armed alien with a boney crest on his head, a wattle on his chin, and a huge mustache, dressed in a long-sleeved white shirt with a tan cape, black pants, and four blaster holsters, on a stage sharing a rousing tale with an audience. End ID.]

From Daniel José Older (the writer)’s Twitter:

And here, of course, is the one and only Dexter Jettster. In this era, we meet him as a master storyteller — a side of Dex you had probably intuited from his too brief on camera moment, but I wanted to see more of. He travels the galaxy having adventures and telling tales 

also MUSTACHE!!!!!

was very happy to be able to include him as a full part of the team and not just a walk on cameo. It’s a big ass team, in part because I kept coming up with new guys and also getting the legacy guys I asked for, so that’s wild, but they need all the help they can… 

Also a note on Dex: one thing I try to be mindful of in my writing is how we represent different body types, particularly fat ones, because of the long history of getting it wrong.

But the issue with slimming down a fat character when they’re younger wasn’t on my radar until [another twitter user, unsure if they want to be mentioned here] tweeted about it in a thoughtful thread a few weeks ago. I went to look at how we’d repped Dex in issue 1, which was already done at that point.

And I really wasn’t sure if we’d done that. The folks I checked with weren’t sure either. Decided to err towards getting it right and reached out to my excellent editor Matt to discuss, and we agreed to ask Toni [the artist] to make sure Dex looks properly fat in the upcoming issues

the in-story premise being that he’s wearing some body armor in the first two issues that he finally gets to take off later. Don’t usually go this in depth on issues that haven’t come out yet, but I think it’s important to be up front about these things.

critique is a sign of a healthy community.

There are many ways to do it, many ways to receive it, many variables in the equation. But this to me is a really good opportunity to be up front about process and the things we can miss. 

Doesn’t really matter what the intentions are when it’s a comic that thousands of people will read. The effect is what matters.

---

I cannot tell you how delighted I am that we not only get Dexter Jettster as a reoccuring character, we also get him as a reoccuring character by a team who are explicitly looking to avoid fatphobia in their work.

Just... holy shit WHAT JOY!!! It’s the thing I have wanted most from a Dex story, and honestly the thing I was never expecting to get, because fatphobia is so ingrained and acceptable.

Now if only Older and Co. can confirm him as demi-panromantic asexual transmasculine... :P

(Hey, a book earlier this year got away with coding Obi-Wan Kenobi as aroace so like IT’S POSSIBLE)

---

For more general details on The High Republic Adventures comic:

The lead character of this run of The High Republic Adventures is Sav Malagán, a Jedi Padawan who sneaks out of the Jedi Temple on Takodana to party with the pirates in Maz Kanata’s castle.

[ID: Comic panels of a young, scrawny alien girl with green skin. Though a Jedi Padawan, she is pulling on distinctly piratey clothes, arming herself with a blaster. Her final outfit is a wide-brimmed metal hat, a poncho that nearly drowns her, and trousers that spill out of boots that are just a bit too big for her. She is ready for adventure! End ID]

Sav shows up for a few issues as a Jedi Master in the 2021 run of The High Republic Adventures. This upcoming 2022 run with Dex acts as a sort of prequel to the 2021 series. However, the upcoming run focusing on Sav’s Padawan years is supposed to be available to newcomers as well, so you can start off your High Republic journey with Dex, Sav, and the rest of Maz’s pirates.

But if you want more Sav (because she is awesome), please read the first run of The High Republic Adventures - available in full now - as well as the manga The High Republic: Edge of Balance, where she is a major character in Volume 2.