#so I know that in westernized media discussions this would be called Queerbaiting since these pairings are never fully canonized

[malewifespike]

they really did not have to make death note this homoerotic that was certainly a choice that was made. or maybe this whole scene is more about the Jesus imagery of washing Light’s feet and like I get that but by god damn they made it sooooooooo gaaaaaaayyyy

[picturejasper20]

Animation and LGBT+ representantion

I need animation fans,specially western fans to read this, please it's very important.

Lately i have been seeing this a lot of misinformation about animation, one common trend is that the people who work on these shows "are lazy" and "don't want to write LGBT+ characters".

Here's the thing: writting LGBT characters in animated children's media it's very difficult and hard. There are many restrictions about what you can or can't write.

It's not that the people who work behind these shows are cowards or don't want to make real LGBT representation. Many want to, but it depends on the restrictions they are given by their superiors.

Examples:

Adventure time

Marceline and Bubblegum (video from 2014):

"In the video you can see Olsen also made a point to ask Ward if the couple would be visible on the show or in the upcoming book. Unfortunately, not so much."

Olson: "And I said, 'Are they going to do it on the show at all, or can we say anything about it in the book?" And he's like, 'I don't know about the book, but in some countries where the show airs, it's sort of illegal.' So that's why they're not putting it in the show."

Here's she explains they that they couldn't be very explicit about Marceline's and Bubblegum's relationship because of these restrictions (they latter could though).

Avatar: Legend of Korra

Korra and Asami (from one of the creators of the show)

"As we wrote Book 1, before the audience had ever laid eyes on Korra and Asami, it was an idea I would kick around the writers’ room. At first we didn’t give it much weight, not because we think same-sex relationships are a joke, but because we never assumed it was something we would ever get away with depicting on an animated show for a kids network in this day and age, or at least in 2010."

"The more Korra and Asami’s relationship progressed, the more the idea of a romance between them organically blossomed for us. However, we still operated under this notion, another “unwritten rule,” that we would not be allowed to depict that in our show."

"We approached the network and while they were supportive there was a limit to how far we could go with it, as just about every article I read accurately deduced."

Gravity falls

"Hirsch confirms that though he attempted to push for LGBT+ characters in Gravity Falls, Disney executives prevented him from including explicitly gay characters."

Alex confirming this on his twitter:

https://mobile.twitter.com/_AlexHirsch/status/1292328558921003009?s=20

"Back when I made GF Disney FORBADE me from any explicit LGBTQ+ rep. Apparently “happiest place on earth” meant “straightest”"

In 2012 the Disney censor note on this image (refering to The owl house) would have been: “inappropriate for channel, please revise, call to discuss” (to avoid a paper trail)

The owl house

Luz and Amity

Dana Terrace talking about how it was difficult for her to write LGBT characters in her show:

"In dev I was very open about my intention to put queer kids in the main cast. I'm a horrible liar so sneaking it in would've been hard haha. When we were greenlit I was told by certain Disney leadership that I could NOT represent any form of bi or gay relationship on the Channel."

I'm bi! I want to write a bi character, dammit! Luckily my stubbornness paid off and now I am VERY supported by current Disney leadership.

Steven universe

Ruby and Sapphire (talking about the LGTB+ wedding in Reunited):

That took years of work because of sensitivities around LGBT+ content in programs aimed at children, which often have to work for a global market, said Sugar, 32, who is bisexual.

"We are held to standards of extremely bigoted countries. It took several years of fighting internally to get the wedding to happen," she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by phone.

"So much bigotry is based on the idea that (LGBT+ content) is something inherently adult, which is entirely false."

"Sugar recalled the frustration of not being able to be open about her personal experiences in the early years of her career before she made her sexuality public."

“As I’m writing about this, as I’m pitching this, I’m also getting a lot of pushback,” Sugar said. “This was not considered acceptable material for children at the time. … [But] who is speaking to a generation of children about why they deserve to exist? About how they deserve to exist? I wanted to be able to do that.”

"While working on “Jail Break” in 2014, “it became clear to the network that I was incorporating LGBTQIA+ characters and themes into the show,” Sugar said. She was told that there was a chance the show could be canceled if authorities in conservative countries noticed and objected to those themes."

"Sugar tells EW it has been “extremely difficult” for her to earn this kind of visibility on Steven Universe, but acknowledges that large strides have been made. “When we started doing this in 2011, it was impossible and it has become possible over the last many years of working really hard to do this,” she explains."

"Yeah. Every time we would cover this ground, it would be a conversation. I think part of the challenge is that this show was an international show. We would be getting notes not just from the US but also from Europe, from around the world about what we could and couldn’t show, and they would be different notes from different countries."

"There was a point at which it was brought to my attention that the studio… I was brought up to a meeting where they [the studio] said, “We know that you’re doing this, and we support that you’re doing this… We don’t want to be giving notes on this, but we have to give notes on this” and it was all very difficult to navigate. Ultimately, I said, “If this is going to cost me my show that’s fine because this is a huge injustice and I need to be able to represent myself and my team through this show and anything less would be unfair to my audience.”

I could add tons of examples about this... but here's my point and it's something a lot of people need to understand: It's difficult to put LGTB+ characters in animated children media. There are certain limitations, restrictions, many times the creators cannot be very explicit about it for many reasons.

So next time you want call creators who want to write LGTB+ characters in their shows "lazy" or "queerbaiting" reconsider the fact that they are actually taking a risk by writing LGTB+ characters and they don't have all the control in their show. They can't always make their characters say "I'm gay" or "I'm bisexual" because of these restrictions. Of course, some are given more freedom than others.

If you don't like how the characters are written or a show.. that's completely fine. But reconsider that corporations have control over the creators on what they can and can't do and that it only ends up hurting their cartoons.

I would really like for people to know about this, since there's this misconception going around that animators don't really care about this. But in reality they do. And i think this it's very important thing to know when it comes to talking about animation.

[cheeseboymcgee]

Voltron Unpopular Opinion:

I’m happy with how voltron ended. 

(below the cut is my opinion and analysis on Allura’s ending, Lance’s ending, and Shiro’s ending along with my reasoning for why Shiro’s ending was better than we think it was.)

Now concerning people’s three biggest yelling points:

Allura giving up her life is something she came to terms with and understood what was necessary to save realities. She’s always been someone who’s cared about others and her story line has been one of becoming a person who needs to make hard decisions, who can empathize with people who are different than her, to trust but remain practical. In short, to be a leader, a guardian to her people. In the first episode on her date with Lance, he brings her to his family and she is conflicted because she wants a family. But she wants HER family and it would have never happened had she not taken this. She could have found a happiness on Earth but there would always be that part of her that yearns for the home she’d grown up in. She couldn’t have Altea but she could have her Father, she could have a group of people who understand.

Lance has always lacked confidence. He feigns it to try and gain others’ favor and his evolution has been one of self realization: self action to do what makes him happy. Yes, he wanted to be a pilot, a fighter with accolades, with prestige, and with valor. But looking at this and his issues of self doubt and self worth in the shows, he wants this for the recognition, as a way to make himself important in the eyes of others without realizing that people love him for who he is, not what he is. Yes, he could have found piloting a thing that he likes, but he’s achieved that dream, as a Paladin of Voltron, constantly on the front for years, risking his life and saving the lives of trillions of living things in the end. He’s always been good with animals, he understands them. He works with Kaltenecker and finds a peace with it. To farm, to bring life from the soil, to support people and care for them, this brings him peace too, as well as spreads the message of the woman he still clearly loves. He can let himself live a simple and peaceful life because he is content with himself, who he is.

As for Shiro, the Voltron writers, I believe, crafted a man who did one thing better than anyone else in that world could: do the impossible and fight against the odds. He was abducted, enslaved, forced into gladiatorial combat, escaped, crashed, and went back into space again. He joined a war as the leader of the opposing side, he fought and had his life force ripped from his body and thrown into an abyss where he kept himself sane and together until he could be returned to a physical body. He’s survived things alone that the Paladins hardly survived together. He’s a warrior, and he’s a very tired man. The character of Shiro was one without a predictable path initially, as comparing the original series to the Netflix one, he doesn’t have much convergence. But the Voltron writers took this divergence and turned it into a story of a man who continues to get up over and over again, who continues to suffer unjustly, just as many people in reality do, for the simple sake of being able to put down his weapon and never having to reach for it again, a lasting peace where he can leave the battlefield and indulge himself in a life a stability and certainty.

The fact that Shiro is, and always has been (in the Netflix adaptation) gay/queer is, and I can’t believe that I HAVE to say this but, not essential to the plot and therefore it would not make sense for him to discuss this. There could have been places that this MAY have worked, when he found out Adam died he could have talked to Allura since they’ve both lost people without being able to give a proper goodbye (Adam and Shiro arguing before Shiro went to space and Lotor loosing his mind and bending back to his evil plan), he could have talked to Keith about accepting himself as a queer man just as Keith has to accept himself as Galra, we could have had seen Shiro’s husband to be comfort him instead of Veronica when the Atlas went down, to have a direct one on one interaction, But this is not how things were done and so watchers either must accept it or stop watching as watchers always have.

The thing about Shiro being gay and his gayness not brought up in the context of a show about intergalactic war in a way makes me strangely happy inside, like it was more appropriate to the tone. Not every gay person is going to go about announcing, talking about, “being” gay to everyone and everything they come in contact with. Shiro is a serious man, not that gays can’t be serious, but he’s serious in a way that he blocks out everything and anything that isn’t vital to what he has to do before him.

Would it have been nice to see it, to hear the words come out of his mouth?

Yes?

Am I upset that in a children’s show about intergalatic war, genocide, rebirth, hope, and big ass fucking  robots didn’t make him state this explicitly?

Not really, no. I’m pretty okay with how things are. I saw a grown man who played a vital role in the show have a marriage to another man, and in clear animation kiss him. And all this wasn’t some sort of joke but a serious and happy moment for all the characters.

What’s more, Shiro is someone who found joy and fulfillment as a pilot, a commander, and a leader. He isn’t defined and characterized solely by his queerness, but it is simply given to be a part of him. A part that was always intended for him before the reveal. There was no build up to the “Adam Event”, it was plainly stated. He isn’t pursuing others in the show and others do not pursue him. While (note) this may be my own personal opinion, but a character does not need to be in a relationship, explicit or otherwise, for them to be considered queer representation. It was given to us that he is queer and if he never was shown to get in another relationship again I would have been just as happy about it.

Point is, there is no way for them to have made everyone happy. Make him a very out and talk about it gay man and people would complain about it being not right for the tone or stereotyping, make it subtle and people would denounce it for not being overt representation, make it a big plot point and people complain that it’s turning the story into dramatic romance. Do what they did and call it “fake bandage representation” or queerbaiting.

I know, you know, we all know reasonably there isn’t a way to please everyone. Nothing is perfect, but for me to see two adult men, animated to look like adult men, realistic to a point (more realistic, humanistic than Ruby and Sapphire, Bubblegum and Marciline{sp?} and other western animated shows) to be happy and have an overt kiss was a shock in that I never expected it. We are breaking the walls on Queer representation in animated western media, but many of these breakthroughs are with wlw characters which our society has made generally more acceptable because we see female sexuality not only as something we can control but also more mutable (and fetishized) where as we keep men in such a strict box of sexual expectation and gender performance.

Shiro is a strong and “masculine” male lead with both physical, emotional, and mental strength, leadership skills, self-assured-ness, and very decisive. But he’s also empathetic, understanding, gentle, a listener, a team player, and a gay man who doesn’t seek relationships. He follows his dreams: one was to go to space, and then one to leave the battle. He got both of these and he got his happily ever after, not because he married, because a happily ever after is not marriage and domestic bliss, because he returned to earth and has made a life that makes him boundlessly happy.

Is that not what we want for ourselves? To be happy, to see ourselves happy?

[exploringfiction]

Yuri On Ice - Groundbreaking representation or cheap fanservice?

DISCLAIMER! This is all my own opinion. If you disagree with what i say, ignore the post, or better, start a debate with what you think, and I’ll be happy to discuss our points of view.

If you’ve had any sort of internet connection in recent months, you’ve heard of Yuri On Ice, the ice-skating anime that’s taken the internet by storm. The hype grew out of nowhere - Yuri On Ice (YOI) has no manga or light novel source material. The show grew so massive for one reason; at face value, YOI is centred around two male ice skaters who fall in love. Yes, I said at face value, because on further inspection into the anime, the two ‘romantic leads’ never actually confirm their relationship. So why all the fuss?

The premise

Yuri on Ice starts out as the story of Yuri Katsuki (YK), a figure skater with anxiety who majorly messes up his skate in the Grand Prix Final (a skating competition), thus coming last place and losing his self-confidence. So far, so basic shounen sports anime. He goes back to Japan, where *plot twist* his childhood idol Viktor Nikiforov (VN) is chilling in the bath, and says he will be YK’s personal skating instructor. This causes some beef between YK and Yuri Plisetsky (YP), who VN had earlier promised to train. The rest of the story is YK overcoming his anxiety and performing in competitions, and the season ends with him placing second after YP in the Grand Prix. With fanservice.

Why does everyone think it’s gay?

Firstly, YOI started out strong with astronomically high levels of homoerotic fanservice. Like, higher than Free! levels of fanservice. In the first episode alone, VN turns up naked in YK’s home, and makes sexually charged statements, such as asking to ‘sleep’ with YK. The turning point however, from Free! knockoff to ‘hey this might actually be LGBT rep’ was the infamous ‘kiss’ in episode 7. Of course, there is a slight issue with this scene.

We don’t actually see the kiss.

This was chalked up by the fandom to gay censorship by Japanese television, however this is not actually true. M/M kisses have been shown on television multiple times, the most notable examples in recent years being NO.6, Mirai Nikki and Shinsekai Yori. This is when the first alarm bells go off, because this is blatant queerbaiting. The promise of a kiss that is never seen and could be easily put down as a hug is Grade A, perfect queerbaiting. This is furthered in episode 10, where YK and VN exchange rings in a romantic style, yet YK insists that they are good luck charms, and VN jokes that he will only marry YK if he wins the Grand Prix. The relationship remains unconfirmed, although there is a pair skate after the credits on the final episode, although this is also not confirmed as a ‘couple skate’.

But what’s the issue, you ask? The relationship is never explicitly stated, yet you can quite easily infer that it is canon, as most of the fandom has. Well, ask yourself - if the couple in question was straight, would this even be a question? The answer is no. Straight couples in romances almost always make the relationship explicit, whether that be through a direct confession or a kiss on the lips. As YOI stands, it is similar to Free! in that the romance can only be inferred, although it certainly has a lot more ‘proof’ (and less actual plot, if we’re being honest here).

Many members of the fandom would disagree, but I firmly believe that YOI is a queerbait anime, and that YK/VN is not canon.

The pros

As much as YOI may be queerbaiting, it did manage to do some good things.

The soundtrack. The opening was an instant hit among fans, and I personally loved the ending theme.

The scenery shots. Although the skating animation left much to be desired, the slower and more scenery-based shots were beautifully drawn.

The diversity. The other skaters were from a range of countries, including Thailand, Kazakstan, China, and Canada, and the USA was represented by a Latino, which was lovely as we do not usually see these nationalities represented.

The side characters. Not going to lie, I thought some of the side characters were better developed than the two mains, especially JJ, Phichit, Otabek, and YP (does he count as a side character?).

YK didn’t win! Now there’s a deviation from a popular trope.

Georgi Popovich. That is all.

The cons (don’t hate me i beg)

The characterisation of YK and VN. I felt like YK was a bland character, with only the anxiety as a real character quirk. TBH, he felt like a self-insert character for the watcher to project their own personality onto. VN didn’t have much of a personality and seemed to be put there as a saviour character/love interest for YK.

YK’s character design. Just my opinion, but I felt like his design was bland and standard anime protag-ish.

The skating animation. Kind of beating a dead horse here but yeah, it’s iffy. They also reused a lot of sequences and spent waaaay too much time on the competition skates, which got kind of boring after a while.

The plot. It was very stereotypical - protag meets saviour who teaches them shizz and they go on to do GREAT THINGS.

The fanservice. I’m not judging anyone who likes a bit of fanservice (I’m not impartial myself), but to me the fanservice in YOI was creepy and left a bad taste in my mouth. However that’s just how I felt, so don’t feel bad if you enjoyed it. Better in anime than real life eh?

So why is it so popular?

If you’ve come this far, and have never seen YOI, you may be wondering, ‘but how did this mediocre show come so far?’ YOI has enjoyed insane popularity - it crashed Crunchyroll and Tumblr when the final episode aired, and it took the Crunchyroll awards by storm, taking home first place in every category it was nominated in (it was decided by popular vote). Some people (me) would even call it the biggest anime since Attack on Titan, due to the amount of non-’otaku’ viewers - that is, people who do not usually watch anime.

My theory is this. Despite YOI being a pretty mediocre show, the creators know their target audience incredibly well. The teenage girl. What do teenage girls, especially those who like anime, tend to be into? Gay boys.

Usually shows aimed at this demographic go one of two ways. The way of Free!  where there is plenty of fanservice, and lots of homoerotic tension, but nothing is ever canon, or goes as far as creating a believable but not canon romance. Or the way of Diabolik lovers, where there is a reverse harem situation, with the girl’s personality so bland that the audience can project their own personality onto her and ‘live’ the romance through a proxy. Maybe with some sexual tension between the boys for laughs (and shippers)

So what did YOI do? It combined the two. It took a bland protagonist, and mixed it with a very heavily implied gay romance, and stuffed it into a plot about ice skating. It then added moderate fanservice, but nothing too strong that would force it into a sort of reverse-ecchi genre. Combine this with a couple of moments that will convince the fans that the relationship is real (and to add interest to the show), and you have the perfect anime for teenage girls.

And it paid off. Sales of YOI Blu-rays and merch are extremely high, and the fanbase is massive enough to call it a total success. I admire YOI to be honest for knowing their target demographic so darn well. To be honest, I think the reason they didn’t make YK/VN canon was to avoid any potential homophobic backlash, but if they had made it explicit I think the show would be just as, if not more popular. And despite not being a canon romance, YOI has indeed sparked a larger discussion about LGBT representation in media, and the fandom has certainly shown showrunners that gay couples = big money. Hopefully, more anime, and indeed Western, directors, will notice the success of YOI and use it to create shows with legitimate LGBT leads and romances. And if you are a fan of YOI, don’t worry! Just because I dislike the show does not mean you are wrong or bad for loving it, canon couple or not. That’s the great thing about opinion!

Who knows, maybe after all the positive feedback, VN/YK will become canon in season 2?

TL;DR: Yuri On Ice is certainly a queerbait in my opinion, due to Viktor and Yuri not being a canon couple. However, the show has still opened up a valuable dialogue about LGBT rep in media, and has shown that a show with a leading gay ‘romance’ can be just as successful as one with a straight couple.

Thank you for reading!

- H

[inkonice]

Why I am okay with the ambiguity of Victuuri

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not one of those people who think lgbt+ relationships should be left unspoken. Or that meaningful relationships (conveniently same-sex ones) are more “pure” or more “beautiful” when there is no sex or romance in them. I despise queerbaiting and have spoken against this issue in numerous occasions and about different shows. But why am I okay with the way Victor and Yuuri’s relationship is presented? First of all, I want to say that I’m talking about this as a western fan who doesn’t know much about Japanese culture and how the anime might be perceived in Japan. I can only talk from my western standards and expectations. 

That being said,  I know that many people argue that Yuri On Ice shouldn’t be praised as the gay television icon it has become, mainly because of various issues that can be summarized in: The romantic relationship between Yuri and Victor is oftenly disguised behind their relationship as coach and student. 

I know some of us like to say that Victuuri is obviously canon. That there is no way The Kiss could be anything other than a kiss. That the exchange of rings couldn’t mean anything other than an actual proposal. But that is the thing, though. If it was so glaringly obvious, we wouldn’t have to argue about it. The Kiss was censored. Their romantic relationship was never explicitly defined. Yuuri defined their rings as “lucky charms” and his opinion on Victor calling them “engagement rings” was never shown.  Their relationship, to a certain extent, is left purposely ambiguous. The creators themselves have never properly cleared doubts about it. Kubo has never called The Kiss scene as a kiss, she only refers to it as “Victor’s reaction in episode 7″ and has said herself that she never intended to confirm anything about it, and each member of the audience was meant to interpret it as they wanted. 

Here is the thing, though. What is special about The Kiss and The Proposal scenes? 

Let’s start with the first one:

So. A frame focused on their lips, a frame of Yuuri’s surprise, a frame of Victor closing his eyes, the fourth frame (the object in discussion), and the surprise of Minako and the public. 

As has been endlessly discussed before, this is either a kiss or... a kiss. It couldn’t be a hug because there is no point in showing their lips slowly coming to meet the other’s, and the surprise of the audience would be unfounded if it was just a hug since Victor has hugged Yuuri in public before, and then Victor says he wanted to surprise Yuuri and a hug wouldn’t really surprise and yadda yadda. 

But there is still that arm. There is still that possibility, however improbable, that it wasn’t a kiss, and, as we have seen, some people are going to cling to it. 

However, that doesn’t change the fact that the way this is shown sets the mind of the audience inevitably on a kiss. Even since earlier on the episode, the audience is meant to be thinking about Victor and Yuri kissing.

But more on that later, let’s move on to the next scene in discussion and how it is presented: 

A jewelry shop. Two rings. A church. A chorus. Yuuri’s radiant face. Shining eyes. 

In this scene, everything in the visuals is not only screaming proposal, it’s screaming wedding. They are exchanging rings for God’s sake. This is anything but subtle, and we have to take into account that an episode previous, these two were talking about marriage. We are meant to be wondering “Did they just get engaged?” Of course, we are wondering that because Yuuri is not, textually, proposing to Victor. He is saying the ring is a lucky charm as a “thank you gift” and later Victor does the same to Yuuri. There is no talk here about weddings or marriage other than what the visuals are telling us, but there is that question in our minds, and later this happens: 

But Yuuri doesn’t say anything. He gasps in surprise and turns away and then the audience is left with that question: 

Lucky charm or engagement ring?

Hug or kiss?  A couple or just a coach and his student? 

Based on what the audience has been presented, the visuals it has been given, the textual cues and the overall arch of the story, what is more likely?  The beauty about leaving this relationship to the interpretation of the audience is that it is made to be so obvious, so textual instead of subtextual, that there is no much of a choice for the audience to have. And the audience has decided. Victor and Yuuri have been talked about as a couple ever since episode 7. They are considered canonical for the LARGE MAJORITY of the viewers. The articles and reviews the media has made about the anime always refer to Victor and Yuuri’s relationship as a romantic one. This does not happen in a queerbaiting show.

I think the intentions behind the decision of leaving Victor and Yuuri’s relationship somewhat ambiguous was never for it to be an out for homophobes, but rather a way to make the whole audience decide on the romantic story, since it is the most plausible and glaringly obvious of all. 

Yuri on ice not only managed to be a global success with two leading queer protagonists, it managed to make the large audience root for the queer couple by choosing the queer reading of the show, and I think that is, in it’s own way, beautiful.