#shoutout to anybody who fully reads this tho i love u platonically LSDHJC

[willgrahymn]

Hey Virgilius. What’re your opinions on the popular SPOP episode Save The Cat and the very cool VLD episode The Black Paladins? Also can I kiss you directly on the mouth??

I’m so glad you asked >:) and yes you may receive a kissy.

SO I have many, many emotions about Save The Cat and The Black Paladins (and catradora/sheith parallels overall) and many, many screenshots to go with it ASDLKJH

Listen, if your best friend who you may or may not be yearning for hasn’t been captured by the leader of a genocidal alien empire leading you to fly across the universe in an ancient-tech alien ship to get them back, and then be forced to fight them while they’re being mind controlled because said leader of genocidal alien empire knows how much you mean to one another is it even really love?

Okok actually infodumping, I’m putting this under a cut because I KNOW it’s gonna get long (spoiler: it did, and I spent hours going over this).

So from that description alone you Probably have an idea of what the fuck is going on for both eps. There’s a lot of similarities, even down to the lines between the characters.

Okok small things, maybe not that big of a deal, right? But they just keep coming.

They both take a route of trying to get the other to give in as to end the pain–

Even the parts where Catra and Shiro break out of the mind control for a bit hurts me.

Shit, man, they even both get electrocuted,,,

And that part when Catra falls to her (presumable) death and Adora jumps after her? Keith chooses to fall with Shiro after realizing he can’t save them both, even if it means dying and risking the safety of the universe.

Both pairs also have their own little things about not giving up on each other (which is also where I have to start bringing up more episodes for this discussion).

Right at the start of season 3 after Shiro’s gone missing and presumed dead, Keith tells the rest of the team that "Shiro is the one person who never gave up on me, I won't give up on him." Later, at the start of season 7, he begs Shiro to stay alive because he can’t bare to lose him again. Meanwhile when Adora is dying, Catra begs her to live and says: "You can't give up. You have never given up on anything in your life. Not even on me." And it’s this love that’s able to give the other the will to survive. As Adora is dying, Catra tells her she loves her, and when Adora survives she tells Catra she loves her too, and they kiss. When Shiro wakes up, he tells Keith that he was dreaming and that he saved him, to which Keith responds telling Shiro “We saved each other.” and he leans in before pulling Shiro into a hug.

It’s also worth noting that before these scenes, Adora is dreaming of a future with Catra while Shiro is dreaming of his past with Keith. It’s during all these flashbacks that we meet Shiro’s ex-boyfriend, Adam, who the producers admitted was meant to parallel Shiro’s relationship with Keith. Where Adam failed to support Shiro and was willing to give up on him, Keith supported him the whole way through.

At some point, Adora did have to give up on Catra – at least in terms of trying to make her change. I don’t think Adora ever doubted that Catra was capable of being good, but I do think she was right to not make it her responsibility to see that through. Either way, the reunion after Catra and Shiro are both revived after their battles are very sweet (and bonus points for Keith and Adora both having the “we’re going home” line during their scenes).

There are other little things too, like how Keith gets Kosmo, a cosmic wolf that can teleport, and Catra gets Melog, a magic cat that responds to her emotions and can turn invisible that I just think are neat.

“All she ever wanted was you.” from the original Save The Cat script and “Your friend desperately wants to see you right now.” in The Blade of Marmora hit me right in the chest every time I think of them. Also the way other characters perceive their relationships and try to use it as a weakness, like how Horde Prime states that Adora means something to Catra, and Haggar points out that Keith’s connection to Shiro is deeper than any of the other paladin’s.

 Anyway, they both mean a fuck-ton to me in terms of representation (even if Voltron’s writing got fucked over in the end). That said, thank you for coming to my TED Talk, I had fun with this KSJDCH I leave you with two of my favorite moments: