So I've just read your post "A Silent Voice Aspec Analysis" and I am so happy but I wanted to ask is...how exactly is Shoya from OAA rep? Could you direct me to all instances which made you think that he is? Thank you in advance!
9/13/22
So it’s been a year and a half since I got this ask and I’m only now answering it— I think about this ask a lot, and it’s not that I don’t want to answer it, it’s that I was waiting for the right time. I wanted to answer it during either asexual awareness week or Arospec awareness week last year or even the year before, but either because I forgot or because I procrastinated it, I never got to it. Now it's ASAW 2024, and I have finally decided to lay down and write this essay, so here we go:
There’s a few points I want to discuss, but in respect for the reader’s time, I will lay them all out right here as a tl;dr before I write them all out thoroughly.
Shoya shows himself to be both repulsed by romance and sexuality as soon as it is pointed towards him. This presents itself in his dialogue, his facial expressions, and his thoughts throughout A Silent Voice.
Shoya often is seen blushing in most instances, whether he’s with Shoko or not, of if he’s embarrassed or upset or neutral. With this point, I think it’s poignant to say he has rosacea.
Shoya himself says multiple times that he is not interested in Shoko, who is his main concern for all of the manga.
The way other characters in A Silent Voice show attraction is completely different from anything Shoya ever does.
The movie changes certain aspects of the manga to get the overall point across and stick to the most important plot lines. One of the things that it changes is literally all the scenes where the other characters assume Shoya likes Shoko romantically, unless it specifically pertains to Shoko’s side of the story, the character who DOES have romantic feelings in this pair for the other.
Shoya shows his immense dislike for romance and sex a variety of times, as aforementioned, but does seem to enjoy physical, sensual touch, including holding hands, and, secondly, the only time he feels jealousy in reference to other people's relationships is not when he thinks Shoko is dating someone, but when he sees her getting closer platonically with other people(Sahara).
The entire story is about Shoya trying to redeem himself for past deeds, and learning what friendship is. Romance only ever ties in when it’s related to other people that aren’t him.
This might have to be split into multiple posts because I have a lot of manga panels to use as reference. First, let’s start at the beginning. On the very first page of chapter one, we are immediately met by Shoya experiencing allonormativity and looking extremely annoyed. As soon as he hears the word “boyfriend” he is amiss, as is implied by the boldness of the word boyfriend. He immediately informs them that he’s not her boyfriend, with a sweating face, and balling in on himself, a thing he does multiple times to show he’s uncomfortable and anxious, while also always having the four little blush marks under his eyes as a character design choice, not a proof of attraction.
In fact, one of the first things we learn about Shoya is that he doesn’t like girls, next to the fact that he’s not supposed to jump into the River, he doesn’t like his mom’s nickname for him, and that he has a sister whose boyfriend sucks, because he can’t “play with them”. Crushing on one doesn’t even cross his mind, but it does for everyone else he interacts with in his class:
“isn’t that great, Ishida?” Naoka asks in response to learning that the new transfer student is a girl.
“Huh? I don’t give a crap!!” He replies, his expression one of genuine confusion and annoyance, with his eyebrows furrowed downwards and his pupils small, mouth low on his face without a hint of a smile or blush.
Shortly after we have a montage of him bullying Shoko along with his friends, we are met with his first instance of romance repulsion at a young age:
Amongst being touched— holding hands with a girl— he does not blush or smile, neither does flowers appear around him in thematic fashion of romantic attraction; instead, he looks angry, his brows furrowing, even the lines of rosacea on his face disappearing to show him paling in disgust. The next panel with his face shows him grimacing, a shadow falling over his eyes and bags appearing under his eyes with sweat pouring down his face. He is not enjoying the physical touch from her. Finally, as he whips his arm away, a blush appears on his face, but only as he hears his friends behind him laughing at him. He’s embarrassed and angry. We get the second bout of amatonormativity from his friends:
He’s blushing, but not from attraction, like his friends joke, but in embarrassment. The next scene shows Ishida saying a word that appears over and over from here on, and the dialogue is, “she’s creepin’ me out” as he walks away with Kazu and Hirose. We will get back to that.
This is only the beginning of Shoya’s journey through navigating allonormativity and deconstructing what friendship means to him. His “friends” aren’t good ones, for sure, and this comes up as a theme throughout. In fact, the allonormativity keeps on even til the end, but I’ll expand on that later, as well. Skip only a 20 pages later, and you’ll see this little scene:
Here, Shoya actively reveals his repulsion towards romance once again by even just being around a place where people go on dates often, and gets angry and upset. Now, it is a common trope for children in tv to hate romance and be seen to grow out of it, as if it’s childish to see it as disgusting and unlikeable, but, in Shoya’s case, even as time passes, he continues to share these feelings, although more quietly, with his elementary school self. Even here, when he’s all scratched up, you can see the blush on his face when he notices Shoko seeing him, but again, this blush, in context, doesn’t seem to be one of attraction, but of embarrassment. In context, he’d just been pushed around by his ex-friends, and chastised by his mom, and has now been seen kicking a wall. There’s no romantic tension or reasoning to this scene for it to be a blush of romantic attraction on his face.
Time skip to him in his teen years, senior year, in chapter 5:
He’s being a bit dramatic by the end, but even so, in the beginning, it’s obvious that his thoughts are his own. In the ten year anniversary edition, his dialogue is, “And you butt-ugly bastards, stop talking about dating. It makes me sick.” This change in dialogue leaves out the “it doesn’t suit you” which can change the connotation a little bit. It changes the meaning from, “You acting like you can date the way you are is creepy” to “just talking about romance at all is gross to me”. And then, sexually, it’s also the same. It’s not only romance, but sex that also creeps him out. “That goes for you too.” (These are also taken out of the movie, because it’s once again not relevant, and also makes Shoya more palpable as a character you can be sorry for. His comments here do sound a lot like endorsing rape culture in a victim blaming kind of way). Then there’s this little nugget a few pages after:
“Apparently, there are some things in this world you just can’t attain. The moment I realized that, my future became clear.”
One of the noticeable things he “can’t attain” is a girl or boy to be in a relationship with in high school. That, or if you look at it in things he can’t be a part of, like, say, being in the class photo, or getting into college, or being In a group of friends, or having a full head of hair, etc., it’s also possible to view the scene of him walking past the couple as him not being able to avoid seeing couples, as all the other things he is actively working towards or interacting with/looking at. As in, “I won’t be able to be in the class photo, I won’t be able to avoid couples, I won’t be able to go to college, I won’t be able to make friends”, or, “I won’t be able to be in a relationship” whether that being because no one wants him or because he himself doesn’t want to be in one despite everyone else in school wanting it so badly, due to the allonormativity he’s experienced convincing him that’s the case.
After this scene, we are back in media rez, where he just denied being her boyfriend. In that context, he just the other day thought about romance being something he either can’t attain because he doesn’t want it, or can’t get it, and when these aunties call him Shoko’s boyfriend, he shows a rather plain disgust and discomfort with it, implying that it’s something he doesn’t want, instead of can’t get.
Then we get this legendary scene: ”Nishimiya…could you…and me..be friends?”
He has a blush here that is unlike the usual four lines we see on his cheeks under his eyes; this one is further into his cheekbones, and it's not from anger or embarrassment, but rather from a shyness. And this shyness doesn’t come from romantic feelings, but for platonic feelings. His words inform the expression, that he wants a friendship with her. And then this happens:
His expression changes instantly. It’s not necessarily one of disgust, but of panic, of discomfort. He’s still blushing, but he’s sweating now, just like before, in elementary school, and he can also hear the ladies in the back making comments just like his friends from before. He’s not angry, as his brows are raised instead of furrowed, but he’s deeply unsettled.
In this next set of panels, Shoko notices the ladies and pulls away, and Shoya’s face is a bit different and more comical. He’s still sweating and blushing, but his mouth is open wider as if to say something, and his hand is limp. When she pulls back. There’s a spark that’s closer to her than it is to him, which I think symbolizes a sudden awareness on her part rather than his. He also looks a bit happier that she let go, with only one sweat drop on his face instead of multiple. His brows are also more relaxed, and his mouth jaw is closing slightly. This is presumably how Shoko is seeing him in this moment.
And when someone interrupts, presumably one of the women who were laughing at him, he gets all stiff again and his blush mostly disappears. Then the panels start being viewed from either Shoya’s side or from his perspective again. Fast forward to when they’re feeding bread to fish a few minutes later.��
He blushes at the thought that he’s having a normal friendly conversation with Shoko, the girl he used to hate, not just “a girl” or “a person my age that’s a girl for the first time since I hit puberty”. He’s not blushing at a romantic encounter or moment, but that he’s making a friend, he’s nervous that he has zits in his face, not because he thinks she’s pretty or something like that, that doesn’t even cross his mind, but that he can have a positive relationship with someone who isn't in his family or someone he works with. And someone he ruthlessly bullied five or six years ago.
Another example of his Asexuality comes right after this, when they both jump into the water under the bridge to rescue Shoko’s old notebook. He accidentally looks up and sees her skirt lifted, but he immediately closes his eye and looks down again without a blush on his face, and immediately focuses back in on finding the notebook without even a moment to get his bearings. It doesn’t bother him at all.
sorry about the bad quality, i had to take this picture for the sake of time instead of finding it online.
The next chapter features the biggest theme of the entire manga and anime besides redemption:
This is brought up again once Shoya meets Yuzuru, who wants to keep him away from Shoko. Yuzuru asks, “Are you really her friend?” And it brings about this entire thought process for Shoya, again and again, in the series. And then he meets Nagatsuka:
This is an example of my second point: Shoya’s blushing. A lot of “evidence” people give for Shoya liking Shoko is that he blushes around her a lot. This is a false equivalence, for Shoya blushes all the time and for anyone and any reason. Here, Nagatsuka does something extraordinarily nice to him for no reason, and he blushes, his confusion evident in the furrow of his brow and him asking, “Why’d you do all that for me?” In the 10th anniversary edition. Nagatsuka’s friendship from here on causes him to blush just as much as Shoko, and it doesn’t stop there. Later in the series when he befriends Miki, he’s also seen blushing around her, and not only that, but there are symbols seen around characters all the time to forward the notion of different points of view within a panel.
Image 1: Blush blush blush~ all of this at the notion of friendship, a complete turn around from whenever anyone mentions romance or sex around him. He’s forming connections with people for the first time since middle school, or even elementary school, to further Point 7. His need for platonic relationships greatly overshadows any hint of romance that is ever brought up, especially with Shoko.
Image 2: Miki sees herself as cute, which is why the bubbles appear around her, signaling a slight pov change. Shoya himself never shows any interest in Miki, nor Miki for him, and it especially shows in this scene with his expression and his thoughts not at all aiming towards her. And when Miki says Mashiba is handsome, a particularly aesthetic, romantic, or sexual form of attraction, this is something Shoya doesn’t even notice; yet, when she says Mashiba wants to be his friend, his eyes go wide with sudden interest. His disinterest towards romance and sex also take into account men, as well.
Image 3: once again, Miki has bubbles around her, but this is not Shoya’s pov until the next panel. This is a good example of background and environmental symbolism not necessarily reflecting on Shoya’s own thoughts and feelings, but those around him.
If we go to the movie, in image 1, this scene is shown with Shoya and Nagatsuka doing a secret handshake, which has a lingering touch between them that doesn’t make Shoya uncomfortable like Shoko’s attempt at handshakes/handholding does, and it’s in the midst of a conversation about friendship, in contrast to how the ladies from sign class assumed it to be a romantic thing with Shoko and Shoya. And speaking of, shortly after image 1, we run into them again:
Once again, the blush appears, but his brows furrow and he has a frown on his face that shows his discomfort, along with the sweat. He runs away because he’s embarrassed, not because there’s any truth to what they’re saying. This bring us again to point 3: Shoya points out multiple times that he does not like Shoko romantically. For the sake of convenience, I’ll add the rest of the times that he does this, and the chapters, to show that he doesn’t change his mind even by the end of the manga.
chapter 15
Chapter 20 (genuine confusion, doesn’t see it as romantic in the slightest, regular rosacea blush on his face. Pure amatonormativity and relationship hierarchy)
chapter 21
chapter 40 (this one needs further explaining but I’ll do it in the next post)
chapter 41
chapter 61 (til the very end, the literal second to last chapter, his friend is being allonormative while he’s perfectly happy and blushing at his friendship with Shoko. His expression holds a seriousness that implies it’s not a joke on his part, as well as the excited look he has as he gets an answer to the question)
Since I can only post 30 picture at a time on tumblr, I’ll stop the post right here and finish on a reblog some day. Yes, I know about the interviews with the author, and yes, I’ll supply those in due time as well.
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