#i am aware people ship some of these but we are talking canon here

[charliewrites99]

Representation

Super rare male friendship on tv

VS

Slow-burn over several seasons, friends to lovers between two guys (neither of which was introduced as queer)

[waywardsalt]

ship thoughts bc im trying to untangle what i want to do with this (not limited to tags this time yippee)

ok so like. bellum x linebeck is a weird ship and the only ship i have in my small little collection thats Like That

i mean. the other ones are like…

damibeck is soft oc x canon its my canon linebeck ship theyre boyfriends theyre husbands damien is his childhood friend and they are very close from the get go for various reasons its like. generally normal romance its a comfort thing at times but also something i can make interesting or at the center of a conflict

ganonbeck is a fun crackship sort thing that started as a joke but turns out to have genuinely interesting ideas you can use with it so its probably the most versatile in how i use it

bellum x linebeck is the only one where they canonically meet and good lord idk how to convert my weird abstracts ideas and thoughts (and joke ideas) into coherent ship ideas but ill try here

like. bellum isnt much of a character while linebeck is a great character so off the bat i kinda have to figure out. what bellum is like. but i think he generally finds linebeck interesting and is civil in a post game setting for a handful of reasons, including that curiosity abt linebeck and a vague respect for him. i think linebeck has a shaky understanding of bellum as well as a similarly weird respect, but would need a little more time to really trust him, but they both start off with some weird comfort bc like. they probably know each other p intimately already

like with bellumbeck stuff bellum likely learns a lot abt linebeck through that, and going with the ideas i have abt what goes on during that, linebeck learns a lot abt bellum, too, so they have a baseline understanding of each other. i want to keep empathy out of it generally, esp on bellum’s side of things (i hc linebeck as being low empathy but with bellum specifically its either low emparhy too or no empathy at all, problem being i have a hard time like. recognizing empathy vs no empathy like idk what the difference is if that makes sense. i want bellum to actively choose to be nice or w/e instead of just like. feeling bad or w/e, idk what part empathy might play in recognizing that you have similarities with something)

like i dont want to spill the beans on a lot of linebeck and bellum backstory stuff bc id rather do that through fic stuff, but they have a general understanding of each other through like. vague. situation comparison (with linebeck its like. minor dot connecting and some stretches of imagination but that doesnt do it all for him while for bellum its a kinda oh shit moment), and bellum just finds linebeck interesting in the unconventional (and frustrating) way he had to deal with him and how and why he failed to 1) fully control and convince him of certain things and 2) linebecks survival is something he did not anticipate at all so for bellum theres this fascination in linebeck as hes a guy who broke every rule bellum thought was in place with this thing he’d done before and is just like. hey man what the fuck. in that curiosity. in a strange sense linebeck is untouchable to bellum bc of this (not literally but. yknow)

like i dont think id want to write this as some kind of explicit or conventional romance, just some weird relationship thing that slips into romantic, into sexual, into intimate, and then back out into that weird nebulous area

damien is there. this is in post ph context. damien is very much there and interested in bellum as well but its very different i just wanted to bring it up bc it does slip into polycule territory in post ph

theres probably walls and walls of text i could write abt this while untangling what i might want to do with bellum x linebeck but uuuuugh im tired

like on the physical side of things tho its. really weird like linebeck has strict boundaries and in a sense bellum has broken them before and so they have a bit of a tricky physical relationship bc linebeck has a hard time sorting his feelings towards bellum out and bellum can be kinda touchy feely with him at times, and the strangeness that comes with sorting things out with his lil demon form and with his humanoid form

also the tentacle stuff

im very much thinking abt the tentacle stuff

i dont. im not familiar with that kind of stuff

its been the biggest barrier for me in thinking abt this ship and generally its just bellum using em as arms and to grab and hold stuff and different ways they can apply when he interacts with linebeck like hes got a bunch of different clingy stuff idk. he can do weird hugs. while experimenting with damien linebeck figures out he kinda has a thing for being tied up and then (both he and bellum) have to face the fact that they likely know either when that might have started or that it complicates things a little further

[inawickedlittletown]

No Queerbaiting Here

A long time ago…I’m talking May of 2021, I wrote a meta post about queerbaiting. Essentially an essay. I wrote it right before the S4 finale of 9-1-1 aired because I was frustrated by Buddie fans calling Queerbait entirely like the boy that cried wolf. I still stand by it. Sort of. 

Now, even back then I was pretty clear about how 50/50 I was on Buddie ever going canon. (Maybe not in that post but certainly elsewhere) But, I shipped Buddie then and wrote a lot of fic and meta and participated in fandom. I never said it couldn’t happen…I just would never be bothered if it didn’t.

Where we stand now: It’s not going to happen. 

And where I stand now: fully immersed in Bucktommy. And what’s more, I am more than perfectly happy about Buck and Tommy staying together and going the long-run. Although I can still look at Buddie and think it’s a cute ship, I just don’t want it in canon. I would not be satisfied if the show went that way. But what’s more if Buck and Tommy don’t work out, that would be disappointing, but I’d be okay as long as they got to be happy. There is, after all, always fanfiction. 

So, I wanted to revisit this concept a bit now that Buck has been confirmed as Bisexual and now that he is in a relationship with a man. Not Eddie. Tommy. And somehow, some Buddie fans are still crying queerbait because their ship is not canon. That’s not how it works. Also…shipping works outside of canon, that’s the whole point of shipping. 

To reiterate from my original post on queerbaiting, here’s the definition from wikipedia:

“Queerbaiting is a marketing technique for fiction and entertainment in which creators hint at, but then do not actually depict, same-sex romance or other LGBTQ representation. They do so to attract a queer or straight ally audience with the suggestion of relationships or characters that appeal to them, while at the same time attempting to avoid alienating other consumers.” 

Here’s where I stand: Buddie was abandoned a long time ago. If it was ever a real possibility, we won’t ever know. What we do know is that Oliver was aware that at one point he had given them the go-ahead to make Buck Bi. Whether this was by putting Buck and Eddie together or having Buck realize this another way, we just don’t know that. We don’t have that information and nor will it probably ever be provided to us. Narratively, I know that a lot of fans figured the timing of it fit with S4 and that particular finale but we really just don’t know despite what happened in the finale.

I found that interesting looking back at my own post from back then and the discussion that followed where some fans felt that the way the finale went would determine if Buddie would be another queerbait ship. (I think most people agreed after the will scene that it wasn’t queerbait because it did leave a kernel of hope that Buddie might still happen). 

And yeah, I guess you could argue that the network deciding not to go the route of a queer storyline points to missed opportunity. That doesn’t then mean that any queerbaiting occurred or that any fans are owed anything just because something that was set up or that the writers were writing towards was then scrapped by the network. Is it a shame that it didn’t happen in whatever way they wanted to play it out, sure, but only because Buck would have been confirmed queer earlier. In the same vein isn’t it nice that we have a confirmed Bisexual Buck now? That the show managed to bring it back to that.

A Buck that is happy and free and that has realized something so monumental about himself? Isn’t it nice that all the queer coding that Buck as a character has received since the start of the show is actually finally not just queer coding but full on character development? That we can look back at the show and see all the things Buck did around other men for exactly what they were. 

When Tommy first returned to 9-1-1 in S7, I think a lot of us were excited by the spoilers about Buck and Tommy because of Bi Buck, but also because this was the thing that could lead to Buddie. 

And then…then Tommy was actually on my screen and I doubted it. I actually thought maybe the spoilers were wrong and this was about Eddie and Tommy? That episode flipped things in such an expertly way that by the time Tommy and Buck were sharing a kiss for the first time I was right there with Buck. On a second watch, it is all there. Buck was never jealous because his friend was ignoring him. He was jealous because his best friend had the attention of the guy whose attention he wanted for himself. The writing on that was perfect and no amount of twisting it can change what happened on screen. 

Buck was not jealous because of Eddie. Tommy was never interested in more than friendship with Eddie. And Buck and Tommy have nothing to do with Buddie. Tommy is not a stepping stone, a way for Buck to be ready to then embark on a relationship with Eddie. That’s both disrespectful to Tommy and Buck, but just not what the story being told on the show is doing. 

The storyline is monumental. Having a big strong guy, a firefighter, figure out his sexuality in his thirties is such good storytelling and add to that Tommy. Someone that we already know, who already works as a first responder, and who can show up and wow Buck in such a way that he realizes something about himself? This is what I’ve always wanted. Because guess what, Buck never questioned his sexuality before this. Not when he met Eddie and not when he met anyone else, not until Tommy. 

Going into the new season we know a few things and one of those is that Buck and Tommy are thriving. The media coverage talks about them as a solid couple, it talks about Buck having someone to turn to and complain to. It talks about how they are still in the getting to know each other phase and I love that for them. I love how they are being treated and described and I can’t wait to see what plays out for them and how much of the build up of their relationship we may get to actually see. 

Do you know what the media and the show never talked about outwardly like this? Buddie. Whenever it came up it was always brushed aside in a way that was respectful to fans and what they saw, but without ever confirming or hinting that the show would ever go there. They never queerbaited anyone with Buddie, what they have done is say “yeah…we know what you see” and then turned around and given us a Buck and Eddie friendship and Buck kissing Tommy, going on a date with Tommy, and thriving with Tommy. 

So, no queerbaiting here on the show where half of the major canon pairings are queer. It’s actually more like some fans baiting other fans with theories and headcanons that just don’t fit.

[eddiezpaghetti]

It has come to my attention that SOME OF YOU who read my last Byler post remain UNCONVINCED. So I'm gonna tack onto it this:

I'm older than fucking God and air, and I've been out and proud since 2007. Yes, I know what homophobia is, and yes, I know what queerbaiting is. I know about Supernatural and Teen Wolf and Sherlock and blahdyblahdyblah. No new ground is being covered here. I thought I made that clear in the original post, but, clearly, I did not.

I am aware of queerbaiting and homophobia, and I'm still wholeheartedly certain in Byler being canon anyway.

Okay, so there are three types of relationship I want to discuss when it comes to queerbaiting. They're all, like, "queer relationships that could have happened, but didn't".

First off, queer-coding. This isn't really a thing so much anymore, but it still crops up every once in a while. I'd argue it probably happens most with male-male relationships in family shows these days. First example that comes to mind is Mr. Smiley and Mr. Frowny from Steven Universe. You can't make a relationship canon because some shitty overhead bastard overhead said no, so you get as close as you can without compromising the show. Can't make someone gay? Well, now their comedy routine is a blatant allegory for a romantic relationship. Boom-shaka-laka. This is something I don't see being a problem with regards to Stranger Things, but I want it to be there as contrast, a demonstration of one of many things queerbaiting is not. However, one could argue that, thus far, Will Byers is, canonically, queer-coded. It's pretty fucking heavily implied in the show, and the creators have confirmed it, and you're gonna be able to see it if you're not FUCKING BLIND, but word of god is not technically canon which means that interviews don't technically make something canon, blahdyblahdyblahdyblah, technicalities, Robin has been explicitly stated in the text to be queer while Will has, thus far, not, outside of good ol' Show-Don't-Tell. Of course, anyone with two brain cells to rub together can tell that that's going to change by the end of Season 5, but, hey, for what it's worth, I'm throwing this out there.

Alrighty, Thingamajingama Number Two: "Oops, I accidentally made the greatest love story known to man." AKA, a genuine, honest-to-goodness mistake. Unfortunately, we do live in a heteronormative society. Sometimes people who don't think about being gay much write a friendship that's incredibly compelling and don't even consider the possibility that it could have been read as romantic. Something something Top Gun something. This is, again, not queerbaiting. This is Steddie, this is Ronance, this is Elmax, this is your favorite flavor of non-canon ship this week, this is not Byler. The creators know DAMN well what they're doing. They've talked about it. We know this. Nothing new here.

Which brings us to the topic of discussion here. Actual queerbaiting. This usually starts out as an "accidental greatest love story", and then reacts to fan response. And when I say "reacts", I mean like a goddamn chemical reaction. Like bleach and ammonia, bitch. It's noxious and it's gonna kick your fucking ass without mercy. This is when a creator is like, "Hey, let's get our queer audience invested, but we're not actually going to give them what they want because our straight audience isn't here for that/we personally think it's gross/we don't give enough of a shit to want to research a goddamn thing to write a real gay character," blah blah blah whatever excuse they want to come up with this time.

And when you think "queerbaiting", I want you to think "bullying". Because that's what it is. It's lucrative bullying, like beating us up and taking our lunch money, but it's bullying all the same. And it's a real goddamn thing, even if people misuse the word a lot, often when they mean one of the two above, sometimes when they mean "bury your gays", which is another homophobic thing entirely that I'm not going to get into here. Queerbaiting is the thing we're focused on, and it's real, and it's bullying. And here's the reason I want you to think of it as bullying:

They

Think

It's

Funny.

They are actively making fun of us.

That's why Dean had the "Cas, get out of my ass," line in Supernatural. It's why the "Do you like boys?" line happened in Teen Wolf. It's why "Lie with me, Watson," happened in the RDJ Sherlock Holmes movies. Because "It's just a joke, mate." "It was just a prank, bro." "You didn't really think it would happen, did you?" "You should see your face."

So here's probably the biggest reason I don't think it's specifically queerbaiting in this specific instance of Will Byers and Mike Wheeler.

Stranger Things has never, not once, made a gay joke. Ever.

Every single time queerness comes up, it's dead serious.

Lonnie calls Will a fag, and the show is not at all reluctant to show what a goddamn horrible person he is. And when Hopper latches onto that, it's not as "Hahah, is he gay, though?" It's because he's trying to determine a potential motive for Will's disappearance, and even if someone had interpreted it as a joke, Joyce immediately has a line that functions as snapping her fingers in front of the audience's face and yelling "FOCUS" when she says "He's MISSING." Basically outright saying "This isn't funny!"

Troy calls him a fairy, along with targeting Lucas and Dustin for their skin color and disability respectively, and Mike gets damn near murderous. Troy is portrayed as a goddamn monster and the show portrays it as justice when El makes him piss his pants and later breaks his arm.

Steve calls Jonathan "queer" as a slur and gets the shit beat out of him for it.

Billy's father is revealed to be homophobic and abusive in the same breath.

Mike says "It's not my fault you don't like girls!" and we're shown how devastated Will is and Mike immediately follows him to beg for forgiveness.

There is a joke in Robin's coming-out scene, but it's not at Robin's expense. It's at Steve's. Specifically for being heteronormative.

Jonathan has multiple scenes where he's trying so hard to tell Will that he's always going to love him as he is, whether he's gay or not, without pressuring him to come out before he's ready.

Even when there's a little bit of ribbing at Robin's expense, it's always because she's an awkward nerd who's nervous around pretty girls, just the same as Lucas and Dustin are teased when they both first develop crushes on Max, and even then, even then, it always comes as a package deal where they make fun of Steve's girl problems at the same time.

Stranger Things is an emphatically pro-gay show. It may not be the core point of the show the way it is in, say, Our Flag Means Death, but there is nothing less than respect for its queer characters. Its queer characters are always taken completely seriously. No one is making fun of us. They never have. That's why I have serious doubts that this is queerbaiting. It would come completely out of left field for the bullying to start in Stranger Things' final season.

So it's not at all likely to be queerbaiting because queerness is taken completely seriously. The creators have talked about Will's queerness, at least, so it's not an accident. And queer-coding would be silly to expect from this show when it's already on its final season. Like, what is Netflix gonna do? Cancel it? Not to mention all the explicit queerness that's in there already. And no one's gonna "What about the children?" a show that's had sex scenes in it since the first season.

There's no fakeout here. It's gonna happen. Breathe.

[die-mitri]

idk you have to consider that kabru is 5'6 and underweight. if anything, people who give him abs and muscles are wrong about him lol he canonically starves himself and he's too lazy to work out. from what i've noticed labru fans draw kabru with body hair and nice shoulders, and a couple of them make him trans. i really hope you're not talking about the people who give him a pre-op chest when you talk about those who "feminize" him lol...

No need to be condescending brother, we all love the same guy here!!! I just get annoyed that people seem to mess around with Kabru's masculinity all willy nilly so they can fit whatever ship they like into heteronormative roles.

My point was mostly that people seem to miss the mark and either hyper masculinize him or forcibly feminize him and it's a super weird way to interact with the character.

Idk if ur the person in my comments or someone else, but in case y'all are different ppl, I do wanna make it clear. I am literally a 5'6 poc trans man, who starves himself out of laziness/tunnel vision, is hyper-aware of the people around me, leading to me masking ALL of the time (partially to lead people towards my personal goals). He and I are pretty much the same dude. I'm not talking out of my ass or anything, I'm just projecting(?) my reality onto a character that resembles me in almost every way.

The truth is that Kabru is rather androgynous in both presentation and personality. And that switching it up for the convenience of a ship is strange.

He's not an accessory for the white men of the story. He shouldn't only be relegated to Mithrun's caretaker OR Laios's biggest fan/hater. He's very clearly his own character, with a complex and interesting past and motivations. And if he was with either of them, it would be for a good reason. (I'd like to write a meta on the context of his relationship with the both of them and how it changes throughout the story but that's for another day)

I'm just sick of people taking him (and me) at face value or making up some idea in their head of how he (and I) should be, while ignoring the parts that break the illusion.

We don't have to agree, but I'm definitely not incorrect.

[purple-dreams9]

If Thea was Theo, a controversial opinion

I want to preface this post by stating that this is not meant to change anyone's mind or opinion. I am not here to tell you to like a character or to ship a certain ship. You are free to hate Thea, write her off your fics, ignore her existence, and ship Kevin with the milkman if you so desire. This is also not an essay. Instead, think of it as the thought dump of someone munching over it for days.

This all started with a conversation about Thea with a couple people on a Discord server. I've been mostly neutral about Thea, not understanding the overall hate but not knowing much about her either. It led me to read Nora's most recent post about Thea, the replies and the "Why do you not like Thea?" poll, and I've seen plenty of Tweets about her, too.

In general, I noticed one main element when people explain their stance: it is not because Thea is a woman and people want to ship Kevin with male characters. The real reason(s), branched in different directions: the age gap, the lack of building of her character, how little she shows up/how little we know about her/the feeling of her being shoo-ed in out of nowhere as Kevin's love interest, and her attitude (inc. her lack for communication with Kevin after he left the Nest, her comment to Jean in TSC, etc.)

I have been in many fandoms for over a decade, some with more prominent mlm ships, and to be honest, none of those reasons seemed to truly justify the dislike of Thea to the degree she is disliked in the fandom as a whole, especially as the romantic interest of a main character. It seemed to me that most of it is rooted in the desire for Kevin NOT to be straight, but to be gay and be with a guy (or bi, but I see more people using "gay" for Kevin. And some prefer Aro/Ace Kevin, but these fans are a bit more quiet and subdued with their headcanon.) See, even taking Thea out of the equation, there are no popular mlw ships for Kevin with characters from canon, and even in fanon ships the counterparts are mostly (if not all) men.

That got me thinking: "What if Thea was Theo? How would that change how fans interact with this character, even if her personality was the same? What about the relationship with Kevin? Would fans approach the ship differently if he had had Theo as a boyfriend instead of Thea as a girlfriend?"

Of course, it is all hypothetical. For one, a big part of her character is that she is a woman of color (note that I am not black, so I am in no position to talk about how her race plays out with her character) in a predominately male and white team (violent cult) that had to fight her way to the top. It wouldn't quite have the same weight or the same background if she was a male. For two, I am aware it would bring another discourse to the table, that of the "predatory gay men stereotype" (even though there was nothing predatory or "grooming" in their relationship, but that conversation is not for this post.) I am sure plenty of fans would still hate the Kevin/Theo ship, and Theo himself.

Still, I allowed myself to picture it. I read, once, that women used to ship male characters together because female characters were underdeveloped and were not interesting. I wondered if this applies to fandom as well, how certain fandoms prefer to develop and grow male characters.

Things like "lack of canon information about Theo" would not be an issue. Fans are very good at filling in the blanks and building a character from the few spare parts given by the source. This also applies to "there is almost no interaction with Kevin" because let's be honest here, guys, ships are sometimes made from nothing. Rarepairs exist, and even ships like pre-TSC Jerejean can explode in popularity.

With how big of a part Kevin plays in the books and how big his shipping fandom is, if Theo was a thing, I truly believe we would have seen him bloom in fanon spaces. He would have given space and opportunity to grow, change and develop both as a character and in his relationship with Kevin.

The "forbidden relationship" trope and the possibility for angst would have fans foaming, fics working around Theo's past and how he had to fight his way to the top would be written, AUs where he leaves the beliefs of the cult behind and reunites with Kevin would also exist. We would see stories about how his and Kevin's love story played out before and after Kevin left the Nest (at least one primarily focused on the notes they used to pass each other in secret). His mean comments and bitchiness would be ignored, played down, understood, forgiven, or found charming (like Andrew's throughout the series, or even Abby's in TSC.) In a few words, he would be more present and less disliked.

AFTG is a predominately queer fandom, and there is nothing wrong with wanting representation, but I also think it's necessary to use the same scale for female and male characters that are romantically or sexually involved with more popular ones. It's fine not to like Thea, but also to sit and think: would I asses a male character in the same way? How would my view of them change regarding their gender? Just food for thought, I guess.

Again, this is not a call to action of any sort. It is just me, rambling and putting my thoughts down. I can't see different realities so this is basically all fiction. I wanted to take it out of my brain, hear what others think and that's it. Ship what makes you happy. Create what inspires you. Curate your experience. All that being said, Id love to hear your thoughts, but I wont debate anyone's opinion because that's truly, not what Im seeking.

This got longer than I intended so I'll end this here. If you made it, thanks! I hope you have a nice day.

[beauspot]

The Bear Season 2: And Why I’m Fucking Annoyed (Full Spoilers below)

*Long Post*

The Bear is something truly special. When it dropped in June of last year it wasn’t a major hit right away. It was a sleeper and it grew its fanbase over time. If you were here this time last year you remember how small the fandom was posts on every platform could barely reach 200 interactions, but with the Golden Globe wins and the word of mouth this fandom began to grow and expand, because season one of the show was just so good.

Season 2 however is an interesting piece of media. I am well aware that I have some bias in this department and I can’t view this season objectively, but neither can the rest of you so I’ll say what I want.

To start off I really enjoyed some of the episodes this season, the first two? Excellent. The Marcus Episode(with my husband Will Poulter at his side)? Fantastic. The Richie Episode? Perfection. And let’s not even talk about Fishes, which was beyond words. I genuinely went into this season wanting to like it and praise it the way I did the previous season because I thought it was good. The writing—which is spectacular in nearly every other place—takes a nosedive with this romance plot. I still do think it’s good, but I can’t act like this whole season hasn’t left a sour taste in my mouth, because it has. Because the show runners are lying racist misogynistic nasty assholes who bullshitted us for nothing.

Toward the end of last year/beginning of this year Chef’s Kiss fans words made their way to some journalist who then asked about the potential for it with the actors and the writer( in an article stupidly named “don’t worry the bear doesn’t want carmy and sydney to kiss, either” the writer of which goes on to ship carmy and marcus so clearly they have excellent taste 😒) who all shut it down. Fine. That’s fine. That’s their opinion and it doesn’t affect us. What bothers me is the words of the co-creator Chris Storer who said this 👇🏾

He went on to say the show was also just meant to be focused on these people doing their jobs. So fine. We said even if it won’t be canon there’s no way they would bring in a new love interest cause that’s not “the vision” they have for the show, right?(He also goes on in the pic above to act like we couldn’t separate our love of the plot of the show from the ship which is…infantilizing and annoying) continuing on though, he also said this

He thought it would be cool to see a show with no romantic plot. Mind you this statement was made in January and the show starting filming in February. So unless they want me to believe they added this romance plot as some last minute thing (which very well could be the case as Claire has quite literally no personality outside of being pushy and being Carmy’s girlfriend) they knew they were having a romance plot in the second season and chose to lie about it. So the actors, the creator, basically everyone who was apart of this project said that Syd and Carmy were a weird ship (a strange thing to say to your, at the time, small audience even if that’s how you felt) just for them to turn around and have Carmy with a new love interest from school and have Sydney and marcus develop feelings for one another in the second to last episode? can y’all be fucking forreal for one minute?

Suddenly all you “yesss let men and women be friends, not every show needs romance” ass bitches want to ship something. I can tell you know Syd and Carmy have chemistry otherwise you wouldn’t have been shaking in your boots hoping the writers wouldn’t get them together. There was some dumb post i saw rooting for Claire and Carm but then adding ‘no one was better than platonic Sydcarmy’…

I see you.

I spoke about this before, but this constant sidelining of black women in these types of shows irks me. Sydney is basically hunting Carmy down for 85% of the season because he can’t do his fucking job he’s so consumed with Claire. And I know people are gonna say i’m being overdramatic, but it’s so clear they just did not want their main white boy to be with a black girl. Something that happens over and over and over again so many fucking times you can just lose count. Carmy, who in season one was so in tune with Sydney’s emotions he quelled his own anger and anxiety to ask if she was ok now ditches her at their restaurant to go help some girl he hasn’t seen since high school. He ditches her to go to a party then has the nerve to bring up Claire’s helping to inspire him.

Like yeah no shit Sydney is sorry that she’s there, y’all are opening a restaurant together which could fuck both your lives if it fails and Carmy is off doing god knows what instead of his job!

WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED?!? And yeah, Carmy fucks it up at the end with Claire but that doesn’t negate the rest of the season. Chef’s Kiss shippers are strange and delusional and the show doesn’t need romance and then Claire is half naked in Carmy’s apartment? Look Carmy deserves happiness, his life has been basically nonstop stress and trauma since he was a kid and him ending the season thinking he doesn’t deserve fun or love is heartbreaking because it isn’t true, he deserves all the love in the world especially since he is actively trying to break the cycle (along with his sister). That doesn’t negate the fact that he agreed to being partners with Syd and then left her to make decisions on her own about a business they agreed to start together. Which is why he apologized and rightfully so.

And I know for a fact annoying Sydney and Marcus shippers are going to be like “well ackshully they are clearly setting up Sydcus this season so how can they hate black women.” I love Marcus as much as the next person and honestly after I saw where the writing was going I was like fuck it why not at this point, but if Sydney and Carmy’s shippers were living off crumbs Sydney and Marcus shippers were living off the memory of food. But sure that ship had development.

also no i don’t fuck with that syd and marcus ship because why the fuck are you snapping at sydney cause she rejected you and it wasn’t even really a rejection that was very incel core and it’s not about being upset half the kitchen is always screaming about something, it’s why he snapped at her.

I’m just angry so yeah fuck this show.

I’m genuinely contemplating if I want to watch the next season at all. I said if they wanted to go no romance, fine go no romance, but to not only lie about that but bring in some whole new girl we don’t know and throw the black girl to the closest guy despite the fact Sydney and Carmy are more alike than anyone else? You clearly need to do some introspection and think about why you can view Sydney and Carmen as friends but get sick at the thought of them being more.

There is a possibility (a slight possibility) that they are playing the long game we wanted, but i am wary because they lied and put a manic pixie indie girl in as a love interest this time and it sucked. But then I remember the scene with Syd and Carmy under the table and how open and honest they were with each other and even though their relationship wasn’t the best this season I can see it’s potential, because that one scene had more chemistry than all of that other ships other scenes combined. I don’t know.

This got me thinking though Will Poulter romcom when? I will be seated. Also the consensus on twitter is that people really didn’t like Claire and thought the show should have ditched their plot all together so that’s nice. A lot of people seem to think this is a setup for sydcarmy and idk, maybe i’ll rewatch when i’m more calm.

[novasolstarr]

Hello and Welcome to NovaSolStarr’s blog!

Come in come in, take a seat!! I don’t bite here {:

Welcome to my blog! Apologies for this lengthy post but I just wanna get down a few rules and regulations here before you venture any further friend!

This is not a required read but it may provide some helpful insight to you {;

Let’s get it started

INTRODUCTION

My name is NovaSolStarr, feel free to call me Nova or Dusty!

I go by They / Them and It / It’s but feel free to also use bun / buns and fae / fier {:

I’m a digital artist and traditional doodler, you’re gonna see a mixed batch of content from me!

My fandom interests vary greatly and you’re likely to see some jarring switch ups to say the least

I do primarily Fandom and personal OC content, but you are likely to see other things!

Art Trades are 🔒Closed to the public, friends can ask but I am busy

Commissions are 🔒Closed

Art request are 🔐Tentative, see more in “Ask Rules”

‼️ACCOUNT WARNINGS‼️

I make a variety of content, though all SFW please know that I may also;

Make fairly suggestive content

Curse a lot, I mean a lot [I promise I’m not an aggressive user

Make blood and gore related content

Make some horror related content

May touch on more sensitive topics [Drugs, Abuse, Alcohol, etc.]

I usually try to censor that which needs it but sometimes I forget to properly tag things, please be aware of this!!

This is a VERY important section and I want you all to listen!!

Please be kind and respectful here

I try to keep my space drama free, and yes this will apply to real world happenings as well. I’m sorry if this disappoints anyone but I want to keep things stress free here.

So if you have drama please take it somewhere else, maybe to an account that’s more attuned for that, this is not the space and will result in a block.

Also please do not be weird towards me, I have a wife, I love my wife, @cyanide-cafe you are my silliest :3

This is a safe space for most people, although there’s exceptions, which leads me to

Let’s get things cleared up right now

IF YOU APPLY UNDER ANY OF THESE, PLEASE UNFOLLOW ME or better yet block me

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Bigots of any form or fashion

Transphobia, Homophobia, LGBTQA+phobia in general

Racism

Body shaming of ANY kinda

Misogyny

Zoophiles

Pedophiles

Proshippers [People who romanticizes problematic or harmful things]

If more needs to be added I will, but so long as you are not one of these people I don’t care.

I had a smaller post related to this but I’ll go ahead and squeeze it into here as well!

My ask blog is completely open for any and all!! With that though here’s some rules to keep it fun for everyone!

Do Not post anything NSFW or explicit in there, this will result in a block

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Now we have that covered, let’s talk about what IS okay and what is acceptable {:

Questions related to OCs or AUs of canon characters, I have a lot of fun with it [:

Art requests between OCs and Canon, although I might use my own design for this so be warned! This interaction could be familiar, an introduction, angsty, shipping or whatever! So long as it’s SFW I don’t mind

Art requests of canon characters! Always happy to give new characters a spin

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And that about wraps it all up!

That’s all I have for today! Please just be kind, respectful, and over all have fun here!! I like having a space for people to enjoy and have fun with {:

[luxurydumpsterfire]

Hey, everyone in the murder drones fandom! So that finale was pretty crazy,huh? The animation, voice acting and humor was awesome as usual!

Here's the thing, though. And yes, I am aware of how irrational this will sound. I'm aware. But then again Tumblr isn't always very rational. So I'll just explain (this is kind of a rant).

So we all know eNVy, right? The ship between these two cuties? From the get go, people knew this wouldn't be canon. Simple enough, right?

So why the fuck did this upset me so much, people?!

There's literally nothing wrong with it! It's cute,they have chemistry and it's canon!

And yet,I prefer her,I prefer N being with her.

So, going into the episode, when she was revealed to be alive, I smiled so much. They could finally get some closure. Acknowledging their own feelings and being content with staying friends.

They didn't talk. They didn't hug. They didn't look at each other for more than a few seconds.

Even after she poured her heart out to him.

Dude,even UZI acknowledged her and welcomes (?) her back. "Glad you're not dead or whatever."

AAAAGH-

What do you do in this situation?! Because now, I can't just go "Oh,I hope they talk things out in the next episode!" Because this is it! There is no next episode and there will never be a next episode!

How do I even begin to feel better? :( Help me out.

[archivomeow]

yelena belova is aroace.

Yelena Belova is canonically aroace.

Lately people dismissing that has been getting on my nerves VERY much, so I’m making this post lol.

First the terminology:

Aromantic — an individual who doesn’t experience romantic attraction.

Asexual — an individual that doesn’t experience sexual attraction.

AroSpec — spectrum that includes different aromantic identities, from aros who don’t feel romantic attraction to those who do under certain circumstances or rarely.

AceSpec — spectrum that includes different asexual identities, from aces who don’t feel sexual attraction to those who do under certain circumstances or rarely.

*note that some aroace’s choose to use only asexual to define their sexual orientation. not both are and ace, kinda like bisexuals don’t say biromanic, bisexual, just bisexual.*

So first thing i will put here is this;

This in my humble opinion should be enough of a proof, but apparently it is not.

First this part of an interview, the person speaking is a creator/co-creator of Yelena. She says she is most likely to identify as asexual than to follow Nat’s romantic path. Hinting at both aro & ace.

So in the comics Yelena shows no interest dating, as far as i am aware she has no romantic interest in the comics. She is repulsed by sex, she calls herself „nothing” referring to her sexual identity.

As much as many like to say she is a lesbian, she is not, how fucking stupid you sound, honestly. She says it herself, if I said I’m not a lesbian, would you question it? No? Then don’t question her, she says she is not a lesbian, she has no wlw storyline. Drop the fucking lesbian hc.

Some possible foreshadowing in the MCU

1. When she is talking with a widow and a former Ana (show: Hawkeye), there is a line said by the widow accompanying her: „…you and Natasha can be reunited again and live your sex in the city fantasy”.

^ Yelena leaves the room, as soon as the word „sex” is mentioned her face drops, then we have this scene where she’s looking at herself in the mirror.

2. When talking about kids and family (movie: Black Widow) she mentions she wants a dog.

3. When describing „fake story” of her life she made up because her birth certificate was burnt she says Natasha has a husband and talks about her parents, but mentions nothing about her husband or possible spouses or children. (movie: Black Widow)

4. Yelena tends to wear a lot of aro/ace flag colors.

green coat & purple lipstick (green = aro | purple = ace)

yellow & blue colors = aroace flag

Overall Yelena wears a lot of green and white and black together, aromantic flag colors.

^^ can you call that „over the top?” yeah sure… let me remind yall something else:

when enid wore this sweather yall went WILD.

but when Yelena is wearing aroace colors all the time it’s called „reaching”…?

I will continue this with even more, because while you can agree with me and say she is aroace, still there will be people who claim she is aroace, agree, but then this fucking argument comes into place:

„AROS CAN DATE”

„ACES CAN FUCK”

„QPRS EXIST”

Do you see what’s wrong with those sentences? Nothing.

There’s a „but” thoooo…

There is nothing wrong with those, but using those arguments to totally ignore her sexuality ship her and treat her like suddenly she is allo is not it.

Yelena has shown no interest in dating or sex, we can assume she is sex-repulsed as she has shows repulsion to sex and she is to me at least implied to be romance-repulsed.

And we’ve found the problem.

Sex Repulsed Aces are as you can imagine repulsed by sex. Romance Repulsed Aros are repulsed by romance… So how is someone repulsed by said things engaging in said interaction and is not repulsed by them???

I think it’s a great idea to write her into said situations to show she is repulsed and to show it’s okay, because her life, my life, the lives of other uninterested in such thing aro/ace, our lives don’t end here.

Using how some people navigate through their sexuality to justify this is wrong.

You wouldn’t write a lesbian with a man, because bi lesbians exist and she may be a bi lesbian, right?

^ just an fyi, that’s an example, the term bi-lesbian is extremely harmful to both bisexuals and lesbians. check out this for more.

The QPR dilemma is that you don’t understand what a QPR is… it’s not more than friends…it’s not in the middle, it’s out of the regular binary of relationships. Relationships I actually think are QPRs:

Friends with benefits — purely platonic, but you fuck.

Situationship — just friends that do romantic stuff together, unless you call it a romantic relationship, with the other person agreeing on that, it is not one.

QPRs are amazing and beautiful, but it’s not always about fucking and kissing and „acting like a couple” but being a QPR. It can be being friends and living together, not temporary. It can be being friends and co-parenting. It can be many things.

But as I said Yelena is repulsed, why would someone repulsed by sex/romance engage in said thing happily with no doubts, fears, negative feelings just because it’s a qpr, so it’s suddenly fine…?

This is for now all I have to say about this.

As an AroAce, who desires no romantic relationship or a sexual one please please please let us have this representation, for once in our fucking lives.

MORE OF MY POSTS ON YELENA BEING AROACE AND ARO/ACE LINKS LINKED HERE:

asexual/aromantic yelena panels

even when a character is canonically/confirmed aroace there will still be allo romance and allo sex/smut written by them

answering an anon-ask.

more talk about the comic panel.

harmful aro stereotypes.

shipping aroaces + yelena belova.

rant on yelena being aro.

another rant about thunderbolts & yelena.

[eisforeidolon]

You seem to have been in the fandom for quite some time and I was curious has the factions in the fandom always been at odds with each other in regards to the actors and the story of SPN? It just seems like the hellers are trying way to hard to take over this show and it irritates me that they insist on a story moving forward that looks drastically different from what we got from this series. I really hope if there is a continuation of some sort that both Jared and Jensen stick to this story being about these two brothers because I would hate to see that diminished by delusional fans with an agenda to just win and prove themselves right. Misha continues to frustrate me with his pandering and now Jensen is having to try and navigate "gotcha" questions to prove his character is actually bi. It just seems like some fans are not enjoying this show for what it was and now I am in the camp of hoping no reboot happens. Maybe J2 can do something else together. I would enjoy anything at this point to get away from Destiel and crazy shippers.

Someone else may be able to give a more thorough picture with detailed history, because I haven't been here the whole time, just since about season 8 or so. The general impression I've gotten from my own observations and previous discussions on the topic is that it was a cumulative thing, though.

A lot of people are squicked by incest and RPF, which is entirely fair. So there was a certain portion of the audience prior to season four that was desperately looking for something to ship that wasn't either of those things. Then Castiel came along and stuck around for more than just one or two episodes, and they were off. Obviously there was some shipwarring over that. No fandom over a certain size is actually very peaceful and there had already been some back and forth between Samgirls and Deangirls over who was The Worst or The Woobiest in the early seasons. But it started out as just typical shipping stuff at the beginning. You know, writing fanfic, making gifsets, talking up certain scenes, enjoying the shipper teases, coming up with wishful scenarios that could happen. Just shipping something that isn't canon which fandom has been doing basically forever.

Except somewhere along the line, some of those shippers started to take their own fan activity way too seriously. It wasn't just an interesting possibility to read that scene as intimate, the writers totally intended it as intimate, how could they not? That joke? Wasn't really a joke, it was the characters' hidden feelings trying to come out. All those things that could be very, uh, creatively associated with sexuality/a romantic relationship? Were secret signals for the Real Audience aware of the Real Story that had to stay hidden for now for Reasons, but would obviously be Endgame! No one they acknowledged the existence of cared about Sam & Dean & the family business anymore. Except maybe a couple lingering creepy wincest shippers, and ew, nobody likes them! It just kind of built on itself over time. It wasn't as intense when I joined the fandom as it was by the end, because each secret hint they convinced themselves was actually there, each lie and misleading hint Misha told them? Built on itself to where they convinced themselves they had a mountain of evidence rather than a house of cards that was all jokers scribbled on by a five year old.

I don't know exactly why it happened or what any more specific tipping points may have been, although it has been a more general trend for fanon ship shippers to get very demanding of TPTB as those people have become more accessible on SM. Still, I don't know of any faction that are still going nearly four years after their canon ended like hellers are. Is it the conventions? Is it that they were already talking revival as it ended? There are some interesting questions there, but I don't think anyone has really delved deep into all the specifics of the whys and wherefores.

Regardless, I really don't see any universe in which Jared and Jensen agree to a continuation that isn't about Sam & Dean, given everything they've ever said about those characters and their story. I can't even see any kind of additional attempt at a spin-off including D/C. It's just not a canon thing (according to anyone who hasn't been shown to have a hidden agenda). Even Castiel's final scene interpreted as romantic? Is just about Castiel's feelings, not the ship being a thing. Jensen may have decided it's not worth trying to talk people out of their wild interpretations, but that doesn't mean he's actually decided they actually know the show or his character better than he does.

On the other hand, I don't see any continuation that doesn't involve hellers eagerly convincing themselves they're getting secret signals through Dean's eye blinks up until the very last second that the ship will happen ANYMOMENTNOW! And then wailing in bafflement about how they could be so wrong and screaming about homophobia before self-soothing each other that surely it will be canon next time. Surely the Sam & Dean show has to stop being about Sam & Dean sooner or later. It's not like not having a revival is going to stop them, clearly.

I'm not actually against a revival, I'm more ambivalent, but I would actually rather see J2 together in something else given the choice. I don't really need more SPN, especially SPN of the same caliber as the last several seasons, and I think it would be really interesting to see what kind of dynamic they'd have together as entirely different characters.

[orangeejuice]

“Canon Ships” in One Piece

I actually hear some discussion of this quite often… even on here, the idea that One Piece is going to have some endgame romances or something like Naruto did, is a topic I see talked about a lot. Personally, I find this hilarious since Oda almost never writes requited romantic interactions, much less one-sided romantic ones which are usually just Sanji.

One Piece is a story about friendship and families of choice. Looking at almost any character, especially the Straw Hats, makes that abundantly clear. This ties back to the theme of being free in my opinion. You aren’t bound by your biological family. It’s who you consider to be your actual family that matters.

We have Luffy, whose only present biological family member is Garp and instead finds his family in Ace and Sabo. Zoro’s family is never mentioned yet he had his bond with Kuina. Nami’s family is dead but her family is Bellemere and Nojiko. Sanji’s family are assholes but he has Zeff. Chopper with Doctor Hiriluk and Doctorine, Robin with the scholars and Saul, Franky with Tom, Kokoro, Iceburg, and the Franky Family, and Brook with the Rumbar Pirates and Laboon. Usopp is the only one that doesn’t really fit as both his biological parents are known and his mother was actually a good parent, Yasopp is questionable though. Still, he did have the Usopp pirates. Jinbe’s a bit tricky but I’d definitely count the Sun Pirates.

Romance has never really played a part in the story beyond Sanji being… Sanji. Obviously people are free to ship what they want but when I see people say stuff like, “look how Nami looks at Luffy… they’re canon," dead seriously, it’s funny as hell to me. She looks at him like that because they're friends/family.

Of course there's still a chance we’ll get canon pairings, but I honestly feel like Sanji would be the only one to end up with someone. Literally no other straw hat actually has had any romantic development in the story, and people really want canon romantic pairings? At least in Naruto there was romance throughout the actual story... but if One Piece actually ended up pairing off its main cast I think it would be such a huge fumble and poor writing choice. Plus no one wants that discourse lmao.

Also, I am aware of what Oda has said in interviews, but I feel like even without that, it's still easy to infer that One Piece isn't a story that will end up with canon pairings.

[shinakazami1]

Handsome Jack pretty please

One handsome jack coming right up! I Loved your thoughts on the characters BTW and that inspired me to do this so thank uuu

How I feel about this character

I love hating him. I bought the main games only to understand his character more. And he. Is. An. Asshole! A liar! A Bastard, a manipulator, scared man, and a sad story of a man who tried to get out of the abuse he's gone through and change, to only lose that chance by an accident.

He thought he was the hero because to him, he was! He went on path of revenge to show everybody who abused him - his grandma, his boss - how from nobody, he could become not just somebody. But a hero. And he sure left an imprint on the world.

I still think though, how he couldn't bring himself to kill granny with his own hands.

At the end of it all, he was scared. And I feel that shows a lot about him.

And God. His relations. The mistrust. The way he

All the people I ship romantically with this character

Nisha,,, like they had such good chemistry bro I'm just like. @sanzosin's propaganda works. He gets just so djrhjsjsjs around her and he's just speechless when you kill her. I also would love to know more about hsi wife. Like he had two somewhat good relations for the moment he was in, and both times, a 'bandit' caused his love to die. Sad!

My non-romantic OTP for this character

I sort of mentioned it in both Rhys and Timothy's posts but I will talk about these two once more here.

Rhys and Jack have such an intriguing dynamic. Jack uses a Rhys but also considers him a friend. He's the closest man Jack ever got to it seems and it's just outright sad. And Rhys both learns a lot through Jack but also, looses a lot. It's an interesting dynamic and I'm glad we were given it.

Same with Jack and Timothy. Timothy works for Jack but isn't scared to talk back often, though he does his job still and sometimes trusts Jack. I don't know if Jack ever assumed he could die. If the keeping in was a curse he was ready for but, since he got them there, that might have been the case. He is a manipulative man with few folks he trusts. And these two were a part of it.

My unpopular opinion about this character

Lort. I really am bad with what's unpopular cus I don't interact much with fandoms sjshshsh so onto some headcanons and random opinions!

I think few people even wonder how much of a persona we witness. After all, the fact even the casino shows not Jack the manipulator but just Villain Jack is interesting to me. He doesn't see himself this way. It feels like a play. He knows his demographic to me. He thinks he's misunderstood and tires to use it to his advantage. I think he both lacks self awareness sometimes but also, is a lot more aware than he shows.

He comes up with such deep plans and manipulates around, I don't see how he could Not. Be concious of some of the effects. He can misinterpret them sure. But isn't it more interesting when w fhsrsfrer is so into himself, he notices and just uses his haters to his advantage?

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon.

Hh. What. What would happen if his wife didn't die. I want him to live. Ouu... Not exactly canon but. Just to see.

[neolxzr]

Literally a genuine question no ill intent

What do you like about Aira? As much as people are absolutely adamant Akira is projecting (I really don't think he is (I'm not saying Akira is innocent) I just think he's trying to address the prejudiced thoughts the average Japanese person will have on the Ainu) Aira's weird comments and behaviour to Hiiro have been there since day one. And I also think Aira being the one who says all this is because he's supposed to reflect the fans and the average Japanese fan probably isn't that educated on the Ainu + there can be a good few racist enstars fans...

I'm not trying to sound heated about this I'm just coming from a genuine place, what appeal is there in Aira?

Also, as much as the Aira fans are talking about blaming Akira, I feel like there should absolutely be a focus on Hiiro right now considering that comment was... yknow said to him. I just think we should actually be talking about the Amagis considering that comment was intended to discuss the Amagis and their culture and the discrimination they go through.

i had someone ask me a similar question once but not in the context of all thats happening currently so you can read that here if youre inclined

buuuut what made me like aira so much in the first place was honestly that his concept as a character is really funny. i made a post a long while back that went into the funny meta jokes that you could make using aira as a character before i really knew much about enstars at all. having a character in your idol series that loves idols and canonically reads fanfic about them is just a funny concept in general. and as i continued to read more he continued to be funny and annoying and endearing (his little mini interaction with midori comes to mind immediately. there is something wrong with him)

also i tend to gravitate towards characters that give me like. little sibling energy. i love having a favorite little guy to dote on

but afterwards what really drew me to him was the main story!! thermometry specifically comes to mind (ouuugh,,,,). his feature scout stories are also great and so is feather touch! i wont like. go into detail really cause my blog is covered in me talking about aira already

his dynamic with hiiro is one of my favorites too, especially in mainstory. their dynamic isnt JUST aira says shitty things to hiiro and thats it. their relationship develops really far to the point where aira admits that he needs hiiro as much as hiiro needs him. they're young and inexperienced and kind of codependent as they're trying to keep themselves from going under in a sort of cutthroat industry. i think thats really neat. their relationship is really sweet to me and aira is a great tsundere type of character. he regularly is shown to actually like hiiro a lot as mean as he can be to him sometimes i.e. here. and you know the whole holding hands thing (which they also fucked up in the climax story but Whatever)

theres also this. which i think about regularly. the hiiai shipping fuel is vast

and additionally i think aira has some really great relationships with other characters too, alkaloid especially. feather touch develops his relationship with tatsumi a lot and its one of my favorite aira moments. i couldnt find my screenshots for this one but basically aira gives tatsumi his unlocked phone (something VERY important to aira since hes a little screenager) and it shows tatsumi just how much aira trusts him and he realizes how important aira is as a friend to him. being someone with a history like him aira's friendship is sort of new to him and it helps them both grow

he loves his friends so so much and he’s had a positive impact on all of alkaloid. he is its heart after all

but in any case i'm not going to like, defend myself for liking aira. i am aware that the shitty stuff has been there from the start but i've said something similar in the past that was like. aira isn't real and he cannot take accountability for what he says. he's a character written by real people who doesn't have any control over how he acts. so i guess that's why when i think the writers write something i dont think he would do or say in my own personal aira opinion i can sort of brush it off as just bad writing.

and not in the sense that i dont recognize that enstars sucks, because it does. enstars can be terribly racist sometimes and not just when concerning aira, and thats important to talk about (i.e. the orient cards, the king of thieves cards, etc). but at the end of the day the most important thing to recognize is the people and company behind the game as well as the real people who play the game and are affected by it. and not like, the specific characters in the game. cause they didn't actually do anything or feel anything you know

[austinmaris18]

Personal Thoughts on Yona (No Bashing)

I'm gonna be honest, I hate shipping discourse because at the end of the day, characters aren't real and muting tags, posts, accounts are a thing. I also don't want to clog the Sidlink tag with discourse bc it's bad enough on twitter. However, if there's one thing I've learned about myself, it's that when something's bothering me, I need to talk about it, if only to process it. So, apologies but here I go. I will say that I feel like this is a nuanced take, so I guess if you're interested in that feel free to read. Disclaimer before I go in: there will be absolutely no Yona bashing. This post isn't to bash or attack Yona, anyone who enjoys Yona individually or paired with Sidon. I don't necessarily dislike her as a character, I'm more annoyed at the writing surrounding her introduction.

I've been thinking a lot, and I think the reason that Yona's introduction bothers me so much is because it mirrors (more than likely unintentionally) a pretty annoying heteronormative trope. In Jeffrey Brown's book Love, Sex, Gender, and Superheroes (an amazing analytical book in general, would highly recommend) they note that following the publication of Seduction of the Innocent in 1954 - which claimed amongst other things that Batman and Robin were a couple - there was a sort of moral panic about comic books. This was also during the era of McCarthyism, and so to avoid Senate action, the comic industry created the Comics Code Authority, which partly ensured that "illicit relationships" weren't hinted at, and in 1956 Kate Kane as Batwoman was introduced to be a love interest for Batman to reinforce his heterosexuality.

Now, am I comparing Sidlink to the supposed queer subtext of Batman and Robin in 40s and 50s comics? No. Am I saying that Nintendo purposefully introduced Yona for the same purpose as DC did Batwoman? Not necessarily. I just think it's almost comical how similar the situation feels, and the writing doesn't help either. Now, Yona is apparently Sidon's "dear childhood friend" and is also from a different kingdom. That in and of itself feels so awkward because again, we've had Breath of the Wild and Age of Calamity AND their respective DLCs, and not once have gotten mention of Yona or her kingdom. Not in a throwaway line from an NPC, not in the murals of Zora's Domain, not in Mipha's diary. (Also, I know that technically, Age of Calamity isn't canon. But it still had input from the Zelda team, and it provides a supposedly canon view of the settlements in Hyrule before the Calamity.) Especially considering the fact that we get confirmation from Sidon's mural and King Dorephan's dialogue that the engagement to Yona is political/arranged, this engagement was not really foreshadowed in any meaningful way other than this sort of heteronormative notion of "He's a prince so he'll have to get married at some point." Like, Sidon had a whole fanclub in BotW, and not one of them knew?? Did the engagement happen in the six/seven years between BotW and ToTK? Again, for a race of long lived beings like the Zora, that feels a bit hard to believe.

This in particular is what makes her introduction so jarring. We've seen all the countless Twitch and YouTube streamers reacting, the TikToks, the tweets and Tumblr posts of people shocked and disappointed. Here's where I point back to the fact that Aonuma and Fujibayashi even addressed the fact that Sidon was so popular during the BotW DLC Dev Talk. That's not to say they were aware of the ship or even cared enough to have taken the action of mitigating any potential queer readings. Other than reactions to the gameplay and the overall story, I don't think Nintendo particularly cares what we do, think, or ship. But they did know that Sidon in particular was a standout popular character, and so it seems so strange to not pair him off in a more well written way.

That's before even mentioning the whole Zora mural where Sidon parallels his relationship with Yona to that of Mipha, literally calling her a sister. There's also no getting around the fact that he uses that phrasing as in Spanish, French, and the original Japanese (those are the languages I read, so that's what I'm referencing) so it's not an English localization quirk. And I know there's the line about his feelings become more "difficult to quantify" but again, why? Why not just say he admired her instead of comparing her to Mipha in that way if they want to show us there was something there even in their childhood? I know it's meant to be sweet and to depict a sort of growth of feelings between them, but it reads strangely.

So we have these aspects and then we compare this to Sidon's interactions with Link this game. (Also before that, I want to acknowledge something: the vast majority of us who ship Sidlink or just enjoyed Sidon's character were never under the illusion that Nintendo would go towards any canonical romance between Sidon and Link.) We arrive to Zora's Domain to find a statue of us riding Sidon from the Vah Ruta battle. There is a whole Hylian bedroom constructed near the area where Sidon and Link fought Vah Ruta (more built out than the bed area Mipha used). The whole "Link Shrine" Sidon has singing his praises. Sidon literally getting down on one knee, taking OUR HAND in both his hands before presenting us the ring (I know that the other champions say the same oath and give us rings, it's the imagery of a proposal that I'm referring to). Link standing equally distant to Sidon as Yona during Sidon's crowning. Yona telling us that when Sidon speaks it's more than likely to talk about Link. Already Yona's introduction so funnily parallels heteronormative tropes, but to actually have so much imagery and subtext for Sidon and Link makes it feel even more crazy? I think this is where people get so hung up on the idea that "Yona was just introduced to get in the way of Sidlink." Honestly, I think the interactions with Link are more probably concessions for fans (not necessarily shippers) because again, the devs know how popular Sidon is. But it compounds with the manner in which Yona is written into the game.

All that being said, I don't necessarily have a neat conclusion to draw from these thoughts, but going back to the Batwoman parallels, I do think it's a shame Yona won't have to chance to canonically develop further the way Batwoman did. After all, despite her original introduction, most people nowadays think Batwoman and think of Kate Kane, the redhead badass lesbian superhero. But that happened over the course of decades in a medium that iterates narratively on the same characters over and over. Even if we get a story DLC for ToTK that has more Yona content, I don't know that it would be enough to smooth over how awkward her introduction was, and it's hard to believe Nintendo would make another direct sequel or carry over Sidon and Yona to the next version of Zelda. But we can already see Yona's iterative growth through fandom!

Now listen. I know myself, and the truth is I'm never going to actively ship Sidon and Yona. But I'm sure there are amazing artists and writers out there who will flesh Yona and her relationship and history with Sidon out (whether that includes Link in a polycule or not). I'm glad that the game has made the interpretation of a lavender marriage between Sidon and Yona who have their respective paramours possible (with the politically arranged aspect of the marriage, Sidon's boisterous actions concerning Link, Yona's acknowledgement of Link's importance to Sidon). I'm looking forward to fics, standalone art and comics that take that route. I'm sure that there will continue to be art and fanfiction that don't acknowledge ToTK or Yona, and I will surely be consuming those as well. I really hope the homophobia and general discourse towards Sidlink subsides, because it's been surprisingly overwhelming on Twitter. I also hope that there aren't people actively attacking posts about Yona. After all, muting and blocking words, tags, and accounts are options across all social media platforms.

This post will definitely be a one off for me, and I don't ever see myself making another post like this again. I honestly might also delete this post in the future now that I've properly written out my thoughts. Anyways, time to get back to drawing practice and working on my fics.

[theneighborhoodwatch]

What are your thoughts on the potential Julie and Frank 'relationship'?

(serious answer under the cut. also, again, disclaimer that this is all speculation and i'm not saying that any of this is 100% For Sure going to happen, i am just speaking within the context of this one particular theory.)

(edit: nvm i might actually be right. yeehaw [said unimaginably haggardly])

i've talked about that before on this blog, in this post specifically (with extra links for context so maybe check it out) and it's still something that i think about A Lot. in that post, i describe it as a source of Mutual horror, i.e. "you were created to both bring out the best in someone and to keep each other shackled to someone else’s incomprehensible idea of normalcy." and when i say incomprehensible, i really do mean incomprehensible; going by a few posts clown's made in the past, the idea of gender being tied to presentation and vice versa seems to be a foreign one to the playfellow puppets - and yet, this does not seem to prevent them from the consequences of being Perceived a certain way. it's also probably worth mentioning that if the 2022 pride art is to be believed, then neither frank or julie are cis, either (for whatever the playfellows puppets' definition/equivalent of "cis" is, anyway.)

i would be lying if i said i haven't thought about Several ways this could all play out; how it could affect both of them as individuals, their other relationships, their pre-existing friendship. i won't go over all of those here bc this post would be way too fucking long otherwise, but i will say that i think that they would have been friends regardless of whether or not the show decided they were (and regardless of whether or not the show wanted friends or "friends."*) i don't think either of them start out Aware that they're "supposed" to be together. i think they are likely made aware of it later on - of how they are seen. in this way, it's a good example of what i meant when i previously described welcome home feeling like a setup for some cosmic horror-as-coming of age shit (or coming of age as cosmic horror??) for example, in this particular context, i saw A Lot of these two scenarios when it came to growing up queer and/or closeted, especially in an unsafe environment: 1. "i'm told that because i spend so much time with this person, and they are (X) and i am (Y), that i am in love with them. i don't think this is true, but i have no idea how to refute this, so i'm just gonna Go Along With It until i am emotionally, mentally, and/or physically no longer able to do so bc i'm scared of what'll happen to me and/or the people i care about if i don't - OH FUCK THAT HAPPENED A LOT SOONER THAN I THOUGHT IT WOULD FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK"

2. "i'm told that because i spend so much time with this person, and they are (X) and i am (Y), that i am in love with them. i think that's the dumbest fucking thing i've ever heard and it does not apply to me at all" [is punished for this] "Ah." it's just that here, the scale would be magnified to the point of cosmic horror, in order to drive home the turmoil these situations bring, both internal and external. do i think frank and julie would be the only examples of this, or that it is mutually exclusive from any of WH's other potential themes? absolutely not. but if all we have to go off of are crumbs, then We Will Work With Crumbs. * side note, i was gonna talk about how it was interesting that despite knowing next to nothing about frank/eddie in canon except for the fact that It Happens, all of the frank/eddie art we have so far is a lot more unambiguously romantic than any supposed in-universe ship teasing between frank and julie, buuut then i realized that was probably bc we're still in the prologue and all the frank/eddie stuff we have is like, side sketches and concept art. of course it's gonna be more indulgent.

tl;dr: I Care Them and i hope you can tell