#bp shiro

[void-tiger]

Hi! I hope it is alright if i ask you this but do you happen to have or know posts with Shiro and/or Black Lion meta? I struggle to understand their characters since i am more biased towards others but i really do want to understand them better (and if it is alright could they be more ship neutral or from people who are more ship neutral? Most metas i had seen claim to be about Shiro, only to end up as sk ship manifestos and no hate against the shippers but i dont care about sk and it has gotten really goddamn annoying) thank you!!!

I know I’ve made some, but they’re closer to headcanon territory vs proper meta. Check my takashi shirogane, vld shiro, black paladin shiro/bp shiro, blacktashi, and black lion tags. (It’s been probably a few years since I posted or reposted them though.)

I also know @headspacedad has made and reblogged others proper meta, and I often see @mckinlily and @noisypaintersong with Black Paladin Shiro stuff on my dash as well.

I’m trying to remember who else is active who might know—feel free to jump in y’all!

[findmeinthefallair]

Hi, you can ignore this if it's not something you'd like to answer, no worries!

But I was wondering if you'd recommend Voltron (I think it's called? The one with the Keith fella). I see you posting about him/the show and it seems to have some of the same trauma themes/representation as The Owl House? You've definitely made it sound quite interesting

Hope you have a good day and may the week be kind to you :]

No probs, happy to answer this ^.^

Yep, Voltron: Legendary Defender. The first few seasons are great, but I stuck around till the very end because idk I'm permanently invested in the wide variety of characters and always resonate with the core themes, arguably more than I resonate with Owl House. With enough rationalization of canon and filling canon with my screencap edits, I'm able to still savour the show today, as a whole xD (I also love things on an epic scale e.g. the fate of the whole literal universe at stake, exploding planets, lots of blasters and alien weapons, giant robots fighting other giant robots lol)

Compared to Owl House, imho Voltron excels more in the visuals, animation and soundtrack departments. But Owl House's writing consistency very easily outmatches it.

But the concepts and themes aren't as similar between both shows. Voltron is about belonging and teamwork as well, though not really about grief, but doesn't go deep into trauma themes like Owl House does, plus believing in yourself.

And the "believe/trust in yourself" theme specifically, is shown via the bond between the main characters (the Paladins) and the giant robot Lions that choose them as their pilots, where each pair represents one of five elements (Sky, Fire, Water, Forest and Land) and has to build trust with one another. While it wasn't mentioned in canon, I personally think the Lions represent the best versions of their individual pilots, the whole "what you have the potential to be" thing. It even feels spiritual since the Lions do have a spiritual significance in the show.

It's my fave aspect of the show coz each of the five Lions make different contributions to the team, have different personalities e.g. some of them are more trusting and friendlier, have different stats for speed/attack/defense (*geeks out* I have the Paladins Handbook which shows each Lion's stat bars, omg), and if a particular one picks you as their pilot, it noticed something in you that you haven't discovered about yourself yet, and the Paladins unlock more abilities and weapons in their Lions as the plot progresses. There are even some layers to the plot e.g. a former Paladin tries to win back their former Lion's trust, which I enjoyed a lot.

Same to you, have a good week. Thanks!

PS: The Keith whump is great in S2 and S7, teehee.

[justaz]

lance as the blue paladin (former or current, doesnt matter) being a black widow. lance swallowing/killing his pride and letting himself be seen as nothing more than a flirt, an airhead, a blonde bimbo. lance being the teams secret weapon during meetings with planets to get them to join the coalition. lance sniffing out the right guard or advisor or royal that knows everything, getting them wasted and flirting for hours to get them to spill all the dirty secrets. lance being able to alert the team ahead of time if a planet is truly interested in joining the coalition or if they have an agreement with the empire and they lured voltron there as a trap.

lance swallowing/killing his pride and letting himself be seen as weak and stupid. lance playing up the airhead persona so their enemies don’t view him as a threat, them taking out the rest of the team first in their order of who would pose more of a threat to them and them always leaving lance for last bc they underestimate him. lance annihilating their enemies bc he actually is smart and strong and capable.

[empty-blog-for-lurking]

All my Lances have some flavor of gender fuckery/non binary going on with them however it's only sr!Lance who has sat down, thought about it hard and realized that "hmmm actually? To be completely honest? I kinda like being not a boy. It's nice, this is nice😊" Rest of them are too far gone for the Realization™, too deep in the shithole they have dug themselves in

[torveiglyart]

He has arrived. Like the prophecy foretold~

aka me living up to my last post.

As much as I love Black Paladin Lance, I think it only would have worked after the whole Lotor thing. Back in season 3, Lance respected Keith as their leader and vice versa, but, had the roles been reversed, I think there would have been a struggle on both sides. Keith would have a hard time respecting Lance as an authoritative figure, and Lance would struggle listening to Keith and not always lead with the team's needs in mind. Lance was kind of Keith's impulse control in the new set up, whereas a RP Keith and BP Lance would create a power imbalance. Keith respects Lance as an equal, and Lance respects Keith as authority. When Keith leaves, however, the dynamic shifts.

Lance respects Shiro as his hero and leader, but Shiro consistently does not acknowledge Lance as his right hand, and by extension, his equal. Lance is pushed aside again and again, but everyone else listens to Shiro so there's not much he can do. When Keith comes back, there's a new relationship between the two.

Lance appreciates Keith's insight and decisions more after the lack of acknowledgment from Shiro, and Keith is more accepting of authoritative figures telling him what to do thanks to the BoM. It's at this point where a BP Lance would work out. How it would get to a lion switch again, I have no clue, but I do think a changing of the guards part 2 would be a good way to show Lance's character development instead of *sighs* garfle warfle snik and allurance.

Honestly I think allurance should have happened sooner and then like a whole 'soul searching filler' episode where they break up on good terms. It's too often we find permanent or sad endings with media relationships. It would have been nice to see a "hey maybe this doesn't work. Friends?" from Lance and Allura.

Okay, another unrelated thing (sorry). Can someone please tell me the real reason Keith voted Lance in GWSnik? 'Cause "I don't want to spend an eternity with you" is sooooo not a legit answer. He should have voted himself if that were the reason. Is it because he felt bad for Lance? He didn't want him getting called dumb for an eternity? He didn't think anyone else would vote him? Does he actually think Lance was the best person to carry Voltron? Or is he just a sad gay in space?

I guess you can answer in the comments or a reblog but, yeah! Those are my thoughts on Black Paladin Lance! Thanks!

[callmelyc]

I'll just never get over how despite wanting to be the leader himself, Lance still helped Keith be a Leader and see he was capable of doing so after being stuck in his own grief.

And it's canon like?!?!?

They work so well together when it's time to be genuine I'm so ಥ⁠‿⁠ಥ

It always makes me so sad when ppl erase or leave out that part of their journey. That Lance helped. Bc it's just so important to Keiths character.

It doesn't make Keith weaker or less capable that he needed it but he needed someone to get through to him/support him and Lance did just that without even being asked.

It showed their growth and maturity, it's so pivotal and not even from a shipper standpoint.

For Keith to be able to admit he messed up/was stressed?

HUGE

For Lance to listen? HUGE

"This is all my fault. I followed him right into this trap. Everyone warned me, but I didn't listen. I put the entire team in jeopardy."

"Yeah, you kinda did. But now we gotta fix it."

That "we" is so important bc it's not even referencing just them two but the whole team coming together bc Keith was acting too radical he missed they were all there for him if allowed to be. They may have looked towards Lance to approach Keith (though Lance didn't notice nor need it he did so voluntarily) but they followed Keith as a leader from the start.

They were all willing to follow him, they all trusted him.

Lances voice was just loud enough and persistent enough to get through to him bc lance knew without shiro someone needed to try. Lance was so insanely supportive and so insanely important to Keiths rise to true leadership.

Keith accepting the help, the role, as himself and not as a replacement for shiro bc of that is always so powerful. He finally realized he didn't have to stand on a pedestal to be a leader, he could use his team as his pillars just as they could use him as one too.

"You're right. Let's go."

He's no Shiro but that doesn't mean he can't be their leader too.

Screaming

Then later it's Keith reassuring Lance he's more than a replacement or a placeholder. They grow so much bc of that initial support being built up the trust they have in one another is immeasurable.

They understand eachothers positions more than anyone else could bc they're in similar shoes.

Two ppl taken from their lions to another.

Two ppl changing rank in ways they didn't want.

And that unyielding support for eachother is just so so satisfying. This is why I adore their bp Keith and red lance dynamic. Ok it's not as popular but it really shows how they grow as a unit and I wish they'd utilized that so much more.

[scattered-winter]

decided to try making a new header and accidentally made the coolest fake screencap in my entire life. shiro w his bp helmet and keith and lance in their og lions (og screencap under cut)

[velkynkarma]

I posted 834 times in 2022

27 posts created (3%)

807 posts reblogged (97%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@maychorian

@seananmcguire

@jelloapocalypse

@noisypaintersong

@mumblefox

I tagged 834 of my posts in 2022

#lol - 281 posts

#snakes - 60 posts

#cats - 51 posts

#tumblr - 46 posts

#velkynkarma writes - 42 posts

#cute - 38 posts

#pokemon - 33 posts

#yup - 32 posts

#dungeons & dragons - 30 posts

#d&d - 30 posts

Longest Tag: 95 characters

#but only after i turn out the lights and it's safe to come out according to his little bp brain

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Summary:

When Shiro sends an emergency call while the Covenant is in town, Lance is ready to follow instructions and lay low. But he's not too thrilled with one of those orders: to rescue his vampiric roommate Keith from their apartment and get him to safety. In broad daylight. While he's out cold.

Living was nice while it lasted.

A missing scene from Premium Pandemonium, Chapter 19.

Warnings: None

Excerpt:

“You are of course more than welcome to stay here,” Allura says graciously. She sits down on her chair again, accompanied by a chorus of “HAILS!” and “PRAISE THE KINDNESS OF THE LION GODDESS!” from the mice.

“I’ll prepare your rooms, once we’ve finished warning the community,” Coran adds.

“Better prepare one more,” Lance says, and winces slightly. “We, ah…we have one other order from Shiro. Hunk…we gotta go get Keith.”

Hunk blinks. He and his swarm of hair-snakes stare at him. Lance is very glad Hunk is wearing contacts, because otherwise with that much stunning power he’d be on the floor in seconds. “But…it’s day,” Hunk says after a moment, as though this was obvious.

“Who’s Keith?” Pidge asks.

“I know it’s day,” Lance says. “That’s how bad it is, I guess. Shiro warned me to bundle him up good and get him over here. Which makes sense…you know he’s useless during the day. If Sanda showed up…”

“Ooooh.” Hunk grimaces. “Yeah. Yeah, that could…that could be bad. Really bad.”

“Who’s Keith?” Pidge repeats. “And what’s his beef with day? Is he a bogeyman?”

“Vampire,” Lance says.

“Oh.” Pidge’s eyes widen in understanding.

27 notes - Posted April 18, 2022

#4

Phantom didn’t feel like participating. 

Part of this project over here.

36 notes - Posted February 17, 2022

#3

My snake is really weird...

46 notes - Posted May 16, 2022

#2

Summary:

After the defeat of the Galra cult, the Holts dig into the research of their leader, Haggar. At Shiro's request, they search for information about him and his newfound magic in those notes.

Shiro fully expects them to find uncomfortable truths in those pages. But he doesn't at all expect what they actually find.

Warnings: None

Excerpt:

Shiro sits up immediately, on high alert. “Is something wrong? Are you in trouble?”

He’s already running through a mental inventory of his current weaponry, trying to decide if it’s worth rushing out the door or taking another minute to secure a few more knives and an extra pistol. Before he has to make the decision, Sam interrupts his train of thought. “Oh, no, no. There’s no danger and nobody is in trouble. I’m sorry, I couldn’t remember if you had classes tonight, and this discovery is...well, you’ll want to hear it as soon as you can.”

“Discovery?” Shiro’s interest perks immediately. “Is it about the magic?”

At its mention, the fire magic bound to his right arm stirs, tongues of violet fire licking over his fingers once before settling back into the runes carved into his arm. True mine?

He rubs his fingers absently together in a reassuring gesture. If it is, I promise I’ll return you, he thinks in the language of magic. The flames quiet inside of him, calmed.

“It’s...related,” Sam says carefully. “I honestly don’t think it’s a wise idea to speak about it over the phone. Are you available today?”

Well, that certainly catches his attention. “I don’t have classes today,” Shiro says. “Mostly just doing prepwork. I can be over in half an hour, if that works?”

“Excellent,” Sam says. “That works perfectly.”

“I’ll be there soon, then,” Shiro says, before hanging up.

56 notes - Posted November 29, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

I got my dream pet recently, a snake, and I really wanted to try my hand at snake shed pendants. 

I thought it’d be fun to experiment with some fandom ones, so here’s some Deceit pendants from Sanders Sides.  

Featuring Phantom, my ball python, as seen below. And yes, the keychains do have real snake scales in them :) 

See the full post

65 notes - Posted February 17, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[lapis-orchid]

I could keep working on this but then I feel like I won’t get anything out. For Shiro’s birthday, some BP wings. :) I might upload without the background later. Who knows. 

Please do not repost. Reblogs fine :3

[void-tiger]

Sorry this is late but you are so right in the tags (the memes for post se8 au one)!!! Like Kuron didnt deserve any of that shit both in canon and story wise. Like there is doomed by the narrative and then there is whatever this was, like freaking Haxus was given a moment of silence and Allura reminding Zarkon of his shit was treated as more morally wrong then this. And just half the reason i have this au is because i want Jiro to be angry about this like he deserves. Like he did nothing wrong but my good he should have, he deserves to bite people. He 100% deserve to be angry at Shiro and Allura (and Keith. Keith was the one most assertive that he was Shiro, Keith was the one that basically got him killed. Jiro is taping up Keith and Haggars and a bunch of other people's pictures on a dartboard and throws darts at it as stress relief as we speak)

Ohh I am SO angry at Keith.

“The Black Lion Roared! It claims Keith as BP!”

NO, fools. The Black Lion wants to save the damn clone who quite literally threw his bayard away—at Allura; if anyone was “next in line” it should’ve been her. We all know it. Mir practically animated it that way in addition to him wiping the floor with them but nobody actually got hurt. HELL even while possessed he gave them TIME to Get The Fuck OUT. And Allura had to blow up her castle to fix Lotor’s Major Fuckup, anyway. He could’ve easily crippled the paladins or Voltron by killing them Right Then or taking the bayard or Black Lion with him.

He didn’t. He’s literally playing 3D chess in a split second—while possessed—and he largely goes unsung, anyway.

He keeps the showdown against Keith largely in Keith’s Favor and deliberately missing shots and destroying the cloning facility (rip to the clones. They are innocents in this too.) and. Keith still nearly gets himself killed, anyway.

Black Lion’s the one to save Jiro when he’s finally close enough in-range for the Lion to sense him—despite them not having a true Lion-Paladin bond.

Black Lion saves Shiro (and Green Lion saves Pidge) VERY early on.

Black Lion saves Shiro again—while being the most damaged by that S1 Fight against Zarkon and Haggar—by teaming up with Keith very briefly (then has to go offline again; they need a Castle Pickup.)

Black Lion saves Shiro by uploading him—you mean to tell me a Teleporting Lion who clearly adores THIS Paladin and does not come back online until Every Single Character (save Coran) tries bonding with it would just Lose his body like that? NAH. That’s NOT how the scifi tropes for transporters or transporter delays/accidents even work.

As horrific as it is, if the issue was really Shiro needing a body verses Black Lion wanting to save a clone trying so hard and loving so much, too, um. [gestures at It’s Raining Men errr Shiro Clones.] Black Lion had options. I am not a fan of this particular fanon fix. Those clones deserve a chance to live, too. BUT it does point out the even more obvious flaw in what actually happened canonically.

Buuuuuut, Monsantos didn’t care about that. They just wanted their Officially Bastardized Version Of Keith to be their grimdark edgelord BP self insert. (Oh, and make Allura their Narrative Tool to do it.)

-

…soooo…yeah. Jiro deserves to be fucking pissed at Allura, Shiro, the paladins, and especially Keith.

Shiro has every right to be upset with Jiro. (Misdirected, sure. But, imo he’s allowed to be imperfect without getting villainized for it, y’know? Trauma and processing trauma and healing isn’t tidy whatsoever.)

(And Allura should NEVER have been used by the writers for what happened. Or framed as “just as bad as the galra! Teehee!!” in s8, apparently—I staunchly refuse to watch it.)

[the-cool-shit-was-already-taken]

Complaining....again.

Hands down the most annyoying fucking thing people in this fandom do is take Shiro’s plotpoints...the stuff that kinda shaped him as we know him in the show..and just give it to Lance.Like its not problematic and im not telling u to stop or not to enjoy certain things, calm down.But it annoys the shit out of me...and im gonna bitch about it.

Wow Shiro got this insanely cool and mysterious backstory:But what if Lance ,a teenager,was the pilot for the Kerberos mission and he somehow survived the arena with his weak ass.

Shiro is Black paladin and that ties together with his ptsd which is kinda linked to Zarkon, who is also linked to the black lion:Yeah but what if Lance was Black paladin!!

Shiro fucking died and was stuck in the Astral plane for like a year: BuT wHAt If LaNcE DiEd!!!!!

Shiro is LGBT and had a boyfriend: BUT THAT MEANS LANCE IS BI!!

[midnight-weblum-hunting]

“No one commands the Black Lion!”

[marshmallow-fireside-keith]

Keith is the og BP Shiro stan and would come out of the dimension his ooc replacement banished him to, just to fight ’himself’ for mistreating Shiro and stealing his lion

[thechocobros]

hello! i wanted to talk about that thing with pooh - although interpreting it as sora growing up is deep and sounds like nice writing, it's actually less sad afaik! his connection to pooh was weakened because of the events of DDD.

I still can’t say it because i … well, shamelessly skipped that world lolol

I’m an awful fan, don’t follow my example xD

[shalluraxskies]

so i know a lot of people have been worried that shiro isnt going to be piloting the black lion now that he’s back since in all the released videos it’s been keith, but i think i figured out why it’s been keith and not shiro

in the video dw released today, we get a look at who is travelling with who, and i noticed that shiro is travelling with keith. i also noticed shiro is still missing an arm

now im no pilot but from what i can tell it seems to be pretty important for the paladins to have both arms in order to pilot the lions

so my guess is the reason that shiro hasnt gone back to piloting black is because he hasnt gotten his new arm yet

[shadow-djinni]

Oh, please elaborate!

Alrighty! So, I think we’re all aware that I’m not saying anything remotely new by saying that Voltron has some serious issues with its plot and pacing, particularly after Season 2. That’s, like, extremely well-trodden ground, everyone’s been yelling about it for a bit over three years at this point, everyone has opinions but the consensus is that it’s bad, et cetera, ad nauseum. I don’t need to retread it. However: this is a point I’ve been mulling on for the aforementioned three years, which I’ve never put out on this blog before— mostly because back in ‘19 it would have gotten me murdered, and because in ‘20 and ‘21 I was otherwise occupied.

The thesis, essentially, is this: Seasons 1 and 2 set up Shiro and Allura as the clear lead (or “keystone”) protagonists, and the failure to follow through on that is why Seasons 3-8 felt, oftentimes, like a janky, shambling mess punctuated with moments of “hey, what’s this interesting plot point doing in here?”

(under the cut, because this got long)

What is a “Keystone Protagonist”?

First, a clarification on terminology. Every narrative has characters in it whose functions are irreplaceable, and without whom the narrative just…doesn’t go. These are the movers and shakers, the team leaders, the people who are so intimately intertwined, from the very foundation of their character, with the plotline that removing them causes the plotline to disintegrate entirely. Keystone villains are easily identified— they’re the Big Bad and their second-in-command, and their challengers or successors as applicable.

A keystone protagonist, on the other hand, is most readily identified in a small, focused cast— they’re the Chosen One, frequently the POV character, always the one with the coolest powers or the visceral hook. They’re a little harder to identify in ensembles, but even the most far-flung ensemble has one or two characters who make the plot function, and they’re always the ones most tied to and shaped by the plot.

Looking at Team Voltron, the protagonists with the clearest ties to the main plotline are obvious. An Empire, led by a ruler twisted into cruelty, stretches its grasp across the stars to claim a superweapon hidden from them. A ramshackle group, led by the last surviving daughter of the first nation to fall to them, and an escaped prisoner who has seen the worst cruelties the Empire has to offer, rises to face them. Of the main protagonists, Allura and Shiro have faced the most visceral wounds from the Empire; Allura’s entire culture was destroyed while she slept in stasis, Shiro and his crew were abducted, kept as prisoners, and subjected to violence and torture. None of the other Paladins come anywhere near that kind of connection.

The rest of Season 1, and a majority of Season 2, plays this out exactly as it’s set up. Allura spends most of Season 1 rebounding from her loss and beginning to grow into both her powers as a sacred Altean and her role as a leader of Voltron. Season 2 centers Shiro more strongly, as he battles Zarkon for control of the Black Lion and the fate and future of Voltron. The two of them, together, take up the mantle of leadership— and bear it well, given their lack of experience.

And then the Season 2 finale turned it all on its head, and the rest is history.

The Deal with Keith

Structurally, Keith is interesting. He initially comes across as sort of a stock protagonist— the hotheaded, rebellious one, who needs to learn to actually work with the team— and the most interesting first impression of him is of his bond with Shiro. However, aside from that bond, he has no strong connections to the main plot; he’s solidly middle of the pack, below Allura, Shiro, and Pidge, but above Lance and Hunk— until the Season 2 reveal that he’s part-Galra and connected to a group of rebels who oppose the Empire, which introduces complications to the team dynamic right when they most need to trust each other.

The Blade of Marmora plotline, during which this occurred, is pretty widely acclaimed in fandom. I have no idea what the Paladin fans were doing during this time, but I know Galra fans were excited to have a little complexity to an otherwise monolithically cruel, unscrupulous, and violent antagonistic force. If they’d handled that reveal, and Keith’s new connection to the plot, a little differently, it had the potential to both up the stakes and complicate both the portrayal of the Galra and the protagonists’ morality.

You’ll have to forgive me a lack of links— I can’t remember what interview or interviews this next paragraph’s points came from originally, and frankly I don’t care enough to look it up or I’ll have to start yelling and hitting things instead of writing an analysis. Anyway. The showrunners said, at some point, that their reboot was intended to capture some of their nostalgia for Voltron: Defender of the Universe, and that this was meant to include a first-episode plot point— that Shiro would die (or otherwise be removed from command) and Keith would replace him as the Black Paladin. They pretty clearly accomplished this, to what is widely considered the show’s detriment.

The Breakdown

Three main factors contributed to the plot’s disintegration after Keith was moved into the spotlight. As a protagonist, Keith’s backstory and approach to the plot were unsuited to holding the keystone role; the divisions within the team that appeared during Season 3 and worsened after weakened the narrative focus; and removing Shiro and sidelining Allura unravelled the underlying themes and cut off plot threads set up in the first two seasons.

Keith and Shiro are first introduced to the viewer as close friends, from before the Kerberos mission. It’s heavily implied that Keith’s discipline issue, and subsequent dropping-out, from the Garrison were caused by Shiro’s reported death on Kerberos, his desperation to rescue Shiro in S1E1 The Rise of Voltron, and their subsequent rapport and mutual support and encouragement speak volumes. However, while Shiro spends most of the first two seasons stepping into his role as a leader and striving against Zarkon, Keith spends most of it in the background, until the Galra reveal comes to light.

And herein lies the trouble. Holding the reveal of Keith’s Galra heritage until the second season delays his closest tie to the plot— that he’s related, by blood, to the scourge grinding the universe under its heel— until well after the overall narrative and major players have been established. They could have easily fixed this by showing that hand earlier; having Keith know he’s part Galra from the very start, revealing that sometime after the midpoint of the season, and using Season 2 as part of the blowback from the reveal would have much more effectively established him as one of the leads, and made his background better able to support the plot by bringing it in immediately. Deferring it made it seem less important, especially as the fallout was curtailed by the strike on Central Command in the Season 2 finale rather than being given more time to play out.

Season 2 ends, rather abruptly, with Shiro’s disappearance. We open Season 3 with him gone and Voltron struggling without him, and spend half of the (albeit much shortened) season without him around at all. Keith founders in the new leadership role, and, as we’re shown in Season 4, ditches it as quickly as he can to go work with the Blade of Marmora. Aside from the obvious question— why remove Shiro at all, if only to bring him back and then oust Keith?— this causes other difficulties in balancing the narrative. Between the two of them, at least one is missing for six episodes in Seasons 3 and 4 alone.

As one might expect, this is a major faux pas for an ensemble cast. Removing one or more cast members from the screen, and having them develop elsewhere during that time, undermines the viewer’s attachment to and understanding of the character, in addition to destabilizing the ensemble’s dynamic. Additionally, the tug-of-war on command of Voltron calls things into question for the viewer: who is supposed to be in charge here, and why is it taking them so long to establish that chain of command? And if the group can suffer such a huge loss, and Lion positions be swapped so easily, why the big deal around having the appropriate Paladins? Canon seems disinclined to provide an answer.

This radiates out to the rest of the group as well. The Paladins of Voltron, established within the first two episodes as a group of psychically bonded warriors— a ready set up for a found family or battle-forged companions dynamic— collapses repeatedly as members leave and return. The group keeps fighting within itself for far, far more of its runtime than it should have— a not-insignificant portion of Season 7 is dedicated to how divided the Paladins are, over fifty episodes into the show.

Cut Threads, Loose Themes

The Paladins’ relationship isn’t the only thing to suffer from the power struggle. The first two seasons organize a delicate balance of narrative foils and a solid underlying theme, centered around healing from trauma, which is tossed repeatedly out the window in favor of giant robot fights over the course of the rest of the series.

Looking at the motivations of Seasons 1 and 2’s keystone characters— Allura and Shiro on the side of the protagonists, Zarkon and Haggar on the side of the antagonists— a dichotomy reveals itself. All four are incredibly traumatized characters; Zarkon, Haggar, and Allura by the chain of events that led to the destruction of Daibazaal and Altea, Shiro by the backlash of that event ten millennia later. The difference is this: Allura and Shiro both make strides towards coping with and recovering from that trauma, where Zarkon and Haggar have spent ten thousand years wallowing in grief and anger. The Galra Empire as a whole remains trapped in that moment of cultural trauma as Zarkon lashes out, his efforts fueled by Haggar’s unrelenting support and cruel inventions, unable to move forward from it. Even the Blade of Marmora are trapped by it— despite their best efforts, they still work within the framework of the Empire and are unable to stop the cascade of violence. Allura and Shiro, on the other hand, are both shown coming to terms with the harm they were dealt— Allura by coping with her grief and learning to let go of what was lost and move forward, Shiro by facing what was done to him and what he did and refusing to let it define him.

Laid out, this looks like the set-up for a narrative centered around cultural and personal trauma, one with Shiro and Allura at its core. The parts of later seasons which are most compelling— Lotor and Allura’s dynamic, particularly in Season 5, the parts of Season 7 where the protagonists as a whole must deal with the devastation wrought on Earth— also draw from this narrative around trauma and learning to heal from it.

Unlike Shiro and Allura, Keith’s trauma— around the loss of his parents, and, one would assume, the loss of other members of the Blade— is never explored or played out on-screen. The narrative dances around it at best, or outright removes it at worst, such as by the introduction of his mother, Krolia, in Season 5. This, I suppose, foreshadows in the worst way the ultimate thematic undermining: the restoration of Altea and Daibazaal during the Season 8 finale.

…Anyway. Let’s not get into that.

Let’s talk foils.

I’ve mentioned them twice now, actually— and, for all its flaws, VLD is actually pretty good at drawing parallels between its protagonists and antagonists. As mentioned above, Allura and Shiro serve as direct thematic foils to Zarkon and Haggar, both as pairs and one-on-one. The most obvious comparisons, of course, are Shiro and Zarkon and Allura and Haggar— two Black Paladins, one seeking to use the role to grasp for power and control others, the other using it as a tool to bring peace; two powerful Altean alchemists, one using her abilities to twist and destroy, the other using it to soothe and heal. The parallels work the other way, too: Zarkon and Allura are both leaders devastated by the loss of their people and home, Shiro and Haggar both suffer amnesia and physical alterations from their trauma and have grown around those wounds.

Additionally, Shiro and Allura both have another antagonist foil in Sendak and Lotor, respectively. I’m certain I’ve already delved into Shiro and Sendak’s relationship somewhere on this blog, but I’ll touch on it again briefly. Both seem to be (as portrayed in Season 1) relatively new leaders, both stubborn and tenacious, gifted fighters, and both having suffered massive physical trauma and been augmented afterwards in specifically weaponized ways. Season 1, particularly S1E9 Crystal Venom, frames them as a pair of darkened mirrors— a change of circumstances, and one could readily be the other.

Allura and Lotor are a bit more complicated. Both are the only children of a leader of a member nation of the original Voltron Alliance. Both are driven, charismatic leaders with specific goals, and both are also driven by personal curiosity and a desire for knowledge and power. The divergence is in the details— Allura was beloved by her father and encouraged towards her strengths, while also being sheltered by the peaceful circumstances of her youth; Lotor faced parental disapproval and routine rejection, and his natal environment encouraged stubbornness and often cruelty. This plays out obviously in their approaches to leadership; while Allura is open, honest, and direct, Lotor uses subterfuge and misdirection to hide his intentions.

You notice, of course, that Keith is absent from this discussion. Keith has no narrative parallels to any of the aforementioned villains— he’s not in contact enough with any of them to really compare, not even to Lotor, who was a temporary ally of team Voltron— and quite literally undercuts Shiro’s connection to Sendak in Season 7. He doesn’t contribute anything to any of these dynamics, and the only time he’s present for one, he destroys it.