#Someone once said that they're good as a pairing because in math two negatives make a positive

[shinidamachu]

Speaking of SessKik, I’m actually starting to really low-key get into that ship. Ngl, at first I thought they might be a little too similiar and cold to ever really work together but I remember someone explaining the appeal of the dynamic in that it’s basically two prideful racists coming together/clashing and having to subvert their preconceptions of the other’s race and each other. Plus the fact that they’re both fundamentally lonely people but extremely good with kids (Yashahime Sesshomaru will never be my Sesshomaru) could give them something to bond over. Also what’s more taboo than a Miko being with a hanyou? How about an honest to god full-blooded youkai instead?

The ship would honestly be great character development for the both of them because they’d be forced unlearn and unpack their prejudices by basically confronting their mirror self.

It's precisely because Sesshomaru and Kikyo are so similar that they would make such a great match. Inuyasha and Kagome are only opposites on a surface level. Deep down, they're actually very alike and that's why they work perfectly together: they're different in every possible way except for the ones that matter, the ones that could make those differences irreconcilable. Sesskik would the morally gray version of that.

The fact that they're both stoic, pragmatic, arrogant, self-centered and prideful characters allows them to understand each other better than anyone else ever would because they operate in the exact same frequency.

Not only that, but putting them together would have made perfect sense, story telling wise. They're both lone wolves with similar goals and similar ways to achieve them, acting on the sidelines. Plus, they share the same soft spot for children — as long as the children in question aren't related to them, it seems — and have special bonds with Kohaku and Rin. It feels only natural that they'd team up at some point.

Then, of course, there's the fact that Kikyo is dead and feeding off women's souls while Sesshomaru is the only character to have a sword that brings people back to life and a parent with ilimited access to an amulet that opens and closes portals to the underworld.

I know her situation is more complicated than simply snatching a soul from hell — for many reasons — but in a series such as Inuyasha, where everything is possible, is not really a reach to theorize that if someone had the means to really bring Kikyo back from the dead, it would've been Sesshomaru. Even if he couldn't, the idea of the two of them interacting is still thematically intriguing.

There are also rumors about an interview where Takahashi said Kikyo is the type of woman Sesshomaru would take romantic interest in and I can't help but agree, since the only woman who canonically caught his eyes was Kagura, an independent woman who was smarter than him — which isn't very hard —, had a lot of guts and just wished to be free, a woman he couldn't save even though he wanted to. It's not hard to picture Kikyo in the same role.

The tragic way Kagura dies by Naraku's hand, therefore ending any romantic development with Sesshomaru, could become a parallel with the tragic way Kikyo died by Naraku's hand, therefore ending any romantic development with Inuyasha, the brother Sesshomaru despises. The room for angst and conflict is amazing.

To me the appeal lies exactly on the point you made: the creative choice of putting Sesshomaru and Kikyo together would pay off in great character development for the both of them by subverting their preconceptions of each other and unlearning the prejudice they still held against each other's races.

I love the idea of Sesshomaru finally making enough progress to love a human in a romantic way, someone who would see him not as simply his father's son, but as his own person, like Kagura did.

I love the idea of Kikyo falling for a demon without the safety net of eventually turning them human, someone who, in the most extraordinary of ways, makes her feel evey bit the ordinary woman she always wanted to be.

They would have been able to see through each other's poker faces and feel actually seen, in a way they haven't quite been seen before: for everything that they are. Not just his father's son and not just the embodiment of purety and perfection in the shape of a village priestess.

Sesshomaru and Kikyo are equals. There are no power imbalances, no idealizing each other, no putting each other on a pedestal because they refuse to acknowledge each other's flaws. They're both intimidating people who can not be intimidate by each other and would be totally comfortable being themselves around one another without fear of judgement or putting their partners in a position where they have to constantly make up excuses for their behavior.

Basically, they could have helped to progress each other's character development and pushed the plot forward while still making thematic and narrative sense, with the plus of fixing most of the things that personally bothered me in Inuyasha and Kikyo's relationship.

It's funny because at the same time I have complained about how much I hate that Inuyasha doesn't feel like himself when he's with Kikyo, acting all reserved, sad and cautious, without his signature fiery temper and dog like mannerism, I've seen people gushing about how mature he is around her and outside I'm like "to each their own", but inside I'm screaming: Sesskik. You want Sesskik!

It also doesn't hurt that they're aesthetically pleasing to look at: elegant, lethal and composed. And Takahashi seems to agree there was wasted potential there because it very much looks like she tried to make up for it with these Mao characters. Yes, I know same face syndrome is a thing and so is coincidence, but come one, now.

Their separate personalities didn't call out to me but together they could have made a very interesting dynamic, even if it was only platonic, because asexuality, aromaticity and homosexuality still fits them very well and wouldn't be an impediment for the found family trope and being single is different from being lonely.

I understand the reasons Takahashi didn't go there, though, because it would have taken real work to make it right and to be honest I've always been more invested in the Inugang, anyway. But the potential was there.