#the next time i see a post about how allura is being totally irrational and unreasonable i am going to scream

[words-writ-in-starlight]

Keith (VLD) for the headcanon meme?

For this headcanon meme!

A: what I think realistically

Listen, I see and appreciate the hell out of the generalheadcanon that Lance has ADHD, but I propose ADHD Keith?  Like, hear meout here.  Fixated on aliens for his whole life, hyperfocused when he’sflying (pros in battle: very hard to shake him up; cons in battle: he doesn’talways react emotionally when or how he’s supposed to, which can be rough onthe others during a merge), prickly around most people but also v e r y attached to His People, and that specific combinationof “intense emotions that can burst out at unpredictable times”and “extremely controlled emotions when under pressure” tbh all of it justkind of reads ADHD to me.  Possibly because I myself have ADHD and ambasically just likethis terrible sword boy.  Especially the look on his face after he dumps amassive amount of information about his aliens theory at the start of the firstepisode–it just screams ‘fuckfuck fuck someone please shut me up I can’t stop talking and I can feel you getting annoyed with me’ which, like, same.

Unrelatedly, I feel like Keith knows how to pickpocket peopleand hotwire most vehicles.  He knows how to knife fight and he lives in ashack with no apparent form of income, and he definitely stole that hoverbikein the first episode.  He has some Weird Life Skills.  At some pointI expect this to become pertinent in the show with Keith boosting a spaceship.

B: what I think is fuckinghilarious

Keithscores a solid C in Emotions generally, but more specifically he just fucking sucks at noticing when someone’s interested in him.  Like,in terms of friendship and romance and/or sex, he just won’t notice.  Heand Shiro were hanging out on the regular in their big brother/little brotherrelationship for solidly eight months before Keith looked up from a book andwent “Wait, we’re friends” and Shiro was like “…yes?”

This is pertinent becauseLance, within Not Too Long, realizes that he’s actually pretty into Keith (he’s horrified, they are rivals, he can’t have a crush on Keith).  Once Hunk and Pidge–mostly Hunk, because Lance burstinto the kitchen yelling ‘SOS’ and once they got him to explain, Pidgelaughed so hard they gave themself a black eye on a table corner–talk Lancedown off the ceiling, he spends a while waiting for his feelings to go away andthen goes back to hitting on Keith casually at every opportunity, but WithIntent this time.  Keith, on the other hand, spends months being confused and distressed about the unidentifiablephysical sensations that being around Lance causes and that all translates straight into Prickly Mode.  Two conversations that happenwithin days of each other are:

> Lance telling Hunk,entirely depressed, that he just really thinks Keith hates him?  Like,clearly he has no shot there.  And Hunk is a good friend and they lie onthe floor while he listens to Lance go on at length about Keith.

> Shiro sitting Keith downand asking what’s wrong and listening to Keith’s mildly panicky outburst abouthow he DOES NOT UNDERSTAND what’s going on with him and he feels bad forlashing out at Lance but he can’t??? Stop???  And Shiro is justlike “Oh my god Keith you’re into him, you’re fucking into him and peopleon the other side of the star system know he’s into you, just fucking kiss himand see what happens.”

No one is more confused thanLance when Keith corners him alone and goes “I’m going to try somethingand if it’s a disaster blame Shiro” and walks up to Lance like he’s a wildanimal and just.  Fucking plants one on him.

Anyway, thesisstatement: Keith is a failure, and Lance is a disaster, and Shiro and Hunkdeserve plaques, and Pidge gets nothing because they believe that getting frontrow seats to this mess is it’s own reward. 

C: what is heart-crushing andawful but fun to inflict on friends

Keithhas always wanted answers about the mysteries of the world, but not like this. He has never been so bone-deep sickened as he is when he’s told that he’snot human, he’s Galra,he’s one of the monsters fighting to put the universe under a boot heel. On that shuttle trip back to the Castle, Keith locks himself in thebathroom and sits on the floor until he feels like he can open his mouthwithout hyperventilating or vomiting or both, and Shiro has to coax him out.

“Come on, Keith,” Shiromurmurs, once he’s gotten Keith to unlock the door.  He wraps his fleshand blood arm around Keith’s shoulders as a support, and Keith dimly thinksabout how Shiro tries to touch them with the Galra arm as rarely as possible. He gets it, now.  “Come on, Keith, let’s go.  We should be atthe Castle soon, it’ll be okay.”

“No, I–no, I can’t,” Keithsays, digging in his heels.  Shiro is easily strong enough to move him byforce, but he doesn’t, lets Keith press back against the wall again and makes asoothing sound under his breath.  “I can’t,” he says again.

“It’s okay, Keith,” Shirosays, and his voice is low and soft and calm, soothing even though Keithdoesn’t care to be soothed right now.  Something clutches hard in Keith’schest, and he hears a ragged keening sound as if down a long hallway, and ittakes him a moment to realize that it’s him.  “The others will understand.”

“I–they’ll be so angry,” Keithsays blankly, clutching weakly at Shiro’s vest.  “They’ll be right to be angry.”  His stomach lurchesand he might throw up if he had anything left.  “Allura will never speakto me again.”  He can see the look on her face already, the grief anddisgust and rage that twist over her face every time they face the Galra, andhe can’t see it directed at him, he can’t.

“They won’t be angry. The princess will understand that you didn’t know, and you’re a part ofthe team.”  Shiro gives his shoulders a squeeze.  “Come on, everyoneunderstood about me,” he says, clearly trying to be encouraging.  “Andyou’ve met the Blade, they’re good people.  Our allies.”

Keith can feel tears burningbehind his eyes and clenches his teeth against them.

It takes Shiro another twentyminutes to talk Keith out into the body of the shuttle, and another ten to gethim to walk out into the Castle dock.

D:  what would neverwork with canon but the canon is shit so I believe it anyway

Keith finds Allura a few hours after his heritage comes tolight.  She’s standing alone on the bridge, her hands folded behind her atparade rest, and Keith finds her by accident on his quest to find somewhere tostand alone himself.

“Hello, Keith,” she sayscoolly as he stops dead in the doorway, apparently identifying him withoutlooking away from the starscape.

“Um,” he says, wishing thathe could curl up and die instead of having this horribly awkward interaction. It takes a few tires before he can force another sentence through histhroat. “I can leave, I’m sorry.”

“The Castle is your home aswell,” she says, turning halfway to present her profile.  “Do as you like.”

Keith hovers in the doorway,frozen between the impulse to beg her to forgive him–please, please, he’ssorry, he didn’t know–andthe impulse to run and never come back.  Allura doesn’t say anything, andthe silence is tense and uncomfortable and he hates everything about it. He’s kept his gloves on all night, because whenever he looks down he seeshimself scratching at his arms like he’s trying to peel his blood vessels outof his body and Shiro had quietly recommended that he keep the gloves on sothat he doesn’t hurt himself.

“I’m sorry,” he blurts again. “I’m so sorry.  I didn’t know, that–I didn’t know.  We don’thave to, um.”

“Discuss it?”  Alluraturns her back on him again, but this time her shoulders curve as if she wantsto curl up on the floor too, maybe.  As if she wishes she wasn’t the lastof her kind–wiped out by his.  God, Keith is a monster.  “It is notyour fault, Keith,” she says, stiff and clipped, as if she’s trying to convinceherself.  “And the Red Lion chose you.  We are in a brief pausebetween battles and we do not have time to have elaborate conversations aboutthe finer points of the Galra, so.  I trust that you will not turn on us. Everything else can wait.”

“Right,” Keith whispers. The words should be reassuring.  He feels more like he’s beenstabbed in the gut.  “That’s good.”

After Shiro disappears, hefinds her on the bridge again, in almost exactly the same place.

“We must get him back,” shesays lowly.  

“I know,” Keith says. “We will.”

“Keith,” Allura says, andthis time when she half-turns to him, she beckons minutely, and he hesitantlysteps up beside her.  “I’m sorry, for the way I’ve treated you,” shewhispers, looking away from him toward the stars.  “You did nothing todeserve it.”

“I feel like I did,” Keithmutters.

“You had no hand in whathappened to Altea,” she says.  “It may take me time to let go of my anger,but.”  She sets her shoulders, looking over at him, and offers a tinysmile–the most genuine smile she’s directed at him since they found out. “If you bring Shiro back to us–back to me–that will go far.”

Keith stares for amoment, then allows a tiny smile of his own, and nods.

[cait-el]

Keith Analysis - Season 3

Pre S1E1 + Introduction / Season One / Season Two / Season Three / Season Four / Season Five

I highly recommend reading the rest of the posts in this series to get the most out of this! But here’s my take on Keith’s role in VLD Season three!

Season Three

Boy oh boy, does S3e1 have a lot to unpack. Let’s start at the very end of S2/ the beginning of S3 where we see Keith up in arms about the fact that Shiro is gone. By this point, I’ve already established that Shiro is as close to an actual family that Keith’s got, so of course he’s upset. Also, this upset of normal is just another nail in the coffin that is Keith’s sense of safety. He was finally feeling like he had a place on Voltron, then the whole half-Galra thing happened, and that was sort of solved in Allura’s apology, but with losing Shiro, Keith is losing his own sense of validity. Season 3 will be about re-establishing that in his own way, without Shiro there to back him. It’s a huge opportunity for character growth.

Brief Lance Note

Another really good scene in S3e1 is during the fight on Planet Puig with Lance, Hunk, and the Blade of Marmora. Firstly, we have Lance starting to feel the pressure of being the face of a team that’s falling apart at the seams. He’s supposed to be the glue of Voltron or the light-spirited one that keeps things happy. Now that Voltron can’t really form, he’s starting to feel that pressure now more than ever.

We also have discrimination against the Blade for being Galra, which is understandable, but demonstrative of systematic racism/oppression. No wonder Keith feels so lost; he’s literally at the center of all of that!

Back to Keith

This is the instance that I referenced at the very beginning of this whole thing where Keith says that he won’t give up on Shiro because Shiro was one of the only people that never gave up on him. I think that startles the other paladins a little bit because they’re finally realizing that Keith isn’t just some “lone wolf” who’s full of shit. Yes, he can be volatile, but he’s really hurting now, which is demonstrated when he blows up at the diplomacy dinner.

The most important part about Keith’s outburst is what happens afterwards – this will draw on a little bit of Lance’s development as well, so bear with me. At the very end of the episode, we have Keith staring at the black lion, with the other paladins standing awkwardly in the background. They all look to Lance, who is the first to step forward and tell Keith it’s alright to be hurting.

Pidge, Hunk, Allura, and Coran jump in with their own anecdotes about how they feel about suggesting to replace someone who seems irreplaceable, but it’s Lance tying everything together that makes Keith take a deep breath and decide that he’s being irrational. This is the first in a long arc in season three that establishes Lance and Keith’s relationship in a way that goes beyond just a romantic ship. I’m going to return to what I talked about in season one with Keith having a borderline crush on Lance, which I still stand by. In season one, it was all fun and games. In season two, Keith had a lot of his own stuff to worry about with the Blade, but he had Shiro to talk to about it, both the Galra stuff and the Lance stuff, so it didn’t seem as overwhelming.

Now that Shiro’s gone, Keith is looking for something to fill the rapidly growing void that’s sucking away his sense of validation and trust, and he’ll find it in Lance, but most importantly, in himself, and I’ll prove that with my analysis of the rest of S3.

And just for fun, here are my two cents on Lotor’s introduction

Lotor is one of my favorite characters for a few different reasons that are established in this episode. Firstly, he’s crafty. He had Ezor watch Throk, and then used that to call him out in front of the whole crowd. He’s the embodiment of the honest and martyr-like villain (which will play into his romance line with Allura later, but that’s not for a while) in that he preaches that what he does will be good for the universe because it fosters loyalty rather than fear. Secondly, he’s charismatic as all fuck. He’s the villain that says “okay, I’m going to write down everything I’m about to do on a piece of paper and give it to you. You’ll know my entire plan. Will that stop me from completing it? You can bet the fuck not.” And he’s right. Even I believed him! When I first watched it, I was like “yeah, okay, this guy could actually be a good king.”

And then, the kicker, he gives all this confidence to Throk, and then demotes him to the farthest reaches of the empire under the impression that he just got this huge promotion. That’s savage. Lotor is so good at what he does. I’m thrilled to see what he does next for the sheer cleverness of it.

Back to Keith/Lance – I’m just going to start referring to them jointly for now because here’s where they start to become super intertwined

Man, S3 literally has so much in the way of character development that I’m only on the second episode and I already have so much to say. Let’s start with the discussion of who should pilot the black lion while in the lounge of the Castle. Pidge points out that everyone has their “thing,” and she calls Lance the goofball, which he doesn’t take well to (remember S2e10). He calls himself a ninja sharpshooter, to which Keith responds with “is that a joke?” Honestly he probably shouldn’t have poked the dragon, but I do believe he meant it in a good way. His eyes were nice and he was smiling. Lance was just feeling particularly insecure at that moment. Payback for S1e6 when Lance totally invalidated Keith’s tiny advance. Ugh, boys.

Anyways, Lance says that he would never follow Keith as a leader in retaliation, which sparks an argument and triggers Keith to say “that’s just what Shiro wanted.” This puts Keith in kind of a tough spot; it’s not that he’s against piloting the black lion, he just doesn’t want to 1) undermine Shiro, who is his idol, and 2) he’s afraid he can’t be what everyone needs him to be – he can hardly be what he needs for himself. This is reflected in the moment where he actually enters the black lion. While everyone else was thinking of themselves (except Lance, but I’ll get to that in a second), what caused the lion to awaken for Keith was Keith saying (about Shiro) “I can’t lead them like you.” This is the beginning of Keith learning to respect himself outside of what others project on to him.

However, he still doesn’t want to accept it. This is where Lance comes in. Lance literally tried so hard to be the one to take up responsibility of the black lion, but not for himself. This becomes apparent when he yields to Keith. Everyone is appalled at Keith’s objection to the lion even though it chose him, except Lance. Lance steps up, puts a hand on Keith’s shoulder, and tells Keith he can do it. And Keith actually listens. This shows that Keith responds well to respect; he just doesn’t have a lot of it for himself yet.

When Keith actually goes to fly the lion for the first time, he does so by saying “this one’s for you, Shiro.” This hearkens back to the idea of Keith being a self-imposed martyr – he justifies doing things for himself through the lens of doing things for others. This will be the season that subverts that, though, which I will discuss once I get to the end of the episode.

Now back to Lance for a moment. Blue shuts him out (quick interlude for some cute headcanon: Lance has referred to his lion as male in the past, but in order to get Blue to open up, he hits on the lion like he would presumably hit on a girl, as he is so famous for. Does this provide evidence that Lance is bi? Maybe if you squint and tilt your head to one side. It’s something to think about anyways). Then, which lion calls to him? Red, of course! Lance being Keith’s right hand is really elevating their relationship – it plays perfectly into all of their other interactions. They’re a messy team, but a team all the same, and they each need the other to properly function.

Also, something that starts in this episode and will continue through S5 is Lance’s reflection of Alfor and Altean values. Keith is a reflection of Galran values; this has already been made abundantly clear. We’re just setting up another parallel between the two and further entwining their paths in some way. Also, more of Lance’s insecurities show when he’s actually considering that he may not even have a contribution to the team as he originally thought, that he might just be “the goofball.” This starts to show a self confidence issue that is far from being resolved. He’ll definitely need a little help with that one. Luckily, he’s just starting to form a relationship with a little emo boy who is legitimately built out of insecurities and MCR. It’s beautiful. One last thing about Lance in S3E2 is that he says at the end “sometimes what you want is not necessarily what you get,” and I think this is starting to reference his shift in viewing Allura as an object for romance to a friend and true teammate, which is something we’ll see more of in S4 and 5.

And finally, Keith grows a lot during that battle, especially towards the end when he makes that terrible decision and rockets off to track Lotor without consulting the team. But here’s the thing about that scene: Keith made that decision of his own accord and not because he was trying to emulate Shiro. His whole arc in S3 is learning how to accept himself as a valid leader, and this is just the beginning of that. While I want to whack him over the head with a stick for putting everyone else in danger, at least he’s trying.

And now, a word on Lotor in S3E2

Lotor, you mother fucker. First, he says “mercy has never been the way of the galra…until now.” Again with the craftiness! And his whole role in S3E2 was just to gather intel on Voltron by using their need to protect to draw them out and force them to work as a team. What he doesn’t realize, though, is in forcing the paladins to make up for their shortcomings, he’s acting as a foil to the whole team. Without being pressed by Lotor, Allura and Lance would have never figured out that they needed to pilot different lions. This is the beginning to a long storyline of Lotor and Voltron working together that doesn’t actually get played out until S5.

Back to Keith/Lance

S3E3 takes us to the first real instance of the new team of paladins working under Keith’s leadership, and it’s pretty much a mess from the beginning. What I appreciate about this episode is that it further develops the bond between Lance and Keith as a team and as people, starting with Lance’s immediate opposition to entering Thaeserix (the gas planet that fucks up everyone’s sensors.) We have Keith barreling through and getting everyone lost until Allura finally can’t keep up and gets separated. Everyone’s freaking out, and Lance is the one to tell Keith they need to go back, and he finally does. As demonstrated before, Keith listens to Lance before he listens to the others. This shows that Keith has some measure of respect for Lance.

They rescue Allura, but Keith is still all hot for battle and continues forward, getting the team separated even further until it’s just him and Lance. This is the first time where Keith actually admits that he messed up, and he hits a low point for a second. He voices his concern to Lance, who responds perfectly, saying “yeah, you fucked up. But hey, we’ll fix it together.” This is what inspires Keith to keep going, and the team can eventually form Voltron because Keith is actually starting to think like a leader, and not just because of the leader Shiro was. He’s starting to become his own leader. He couldn’t have done it without Lance.

My favorite part is the cute line at the end where everyone is ragging on Lance for being dumb (not true btw, Lance is very intelligent and kind, he just has some self confidence issues, so shame on the other paladins for taking advantage of that), and Keith says “I’m glad we’re all making fun of Lance, but we have a job to do,” or something along those lines. It’s the look in Keith’s eyes that gets me; he’s teasing Lance, but not in the same way as the others. He’s really grateful to have the blue paladin there for support. It’s a different type of support than he’s received in the past; from Shiro it was support of an upper, someone he idolizes and thus tries to emulate. From Lance, it’s support from an equal, so it’s an even stronger sense of self-validation, which is something that Keith really needs at this point.

A quick note: in the episode where they enter the alternate reality and find Sven and Slav, Keith all of the sudden has the black bayard and Lance has the red bayard. When did that happen? That seemed to come out of nowhere, but I think it’s an important thing to note, especially when we get to some of the symbolism in terms of the past paladins at the end of this season. This episode also has good evidence of Keith stepping into the leadership role, which he will continue to develop over the next few episodes. I’m also glad that Keith was able to find Shiro, but as I’ll discuss in the next few paragraphs, I think he senses that something is not quite right.

The Symbolism of 6

I’m about to discuss S3E6, but begore I get into that, I’d like to talk a little bit about the symbolism of the number six as it relates to Keith and Lance’s relationship. Coran says pretty early on that he’s ordered the paladins by height, most notably calling Pidge “number five.” He doesn’t ever refer to the other paladins by these number names, but that implies that they all have a number (and they all have pretty distinguishing heights). Shiro is the tallest and the leader; he’s number one. Lance is the next tallest; he’s number two. Then comes Hunk, then Keith. Keith is number four. What’s four plus two? Six.

I already talked at length about the importance of S1E6 to Keith and Lance, with this being the first instance where Keith realizes he may have feelings for Lance (the “I cradled you in my arms!” moment). In season two, the distinction isn’t quite as obvious, but we see Lance questioning Keith running off with Allura. Granted, this is probably canonically related to Lance’s “crush” on Allura (which I’ll discuss a little more come season four and five), but the fact that he’s asking if the two of them are together and he’s so bent up about Keith doing anything with Allura could be in reference to his conflicted rivalry feelings towards Keith in the first place. He probably doesn’t realize it, but he’s just as annoyed at the idea of Keith being with someone as he is at the idea of Allura being with someone (hint: he’s bi /like meeeee!/).

Anyways, now we have S3E6, which has, in my opinion, one of the most important Klance scenes so far (save maybe the pool scene, but that was just too too cute so does it really count?).

Season Three, Episode Six

We open from Lance’s POV as he’s acting sniper for the rest of the team. He’s about to take someone out when Keith rushes in with some sword badassery (“Hey, Keith! I had that guy!”). He keeps the scope on Keith for a little while, then watches Allura do some crazy stunts with her whip, to be met with “Well, that was awesome!” Similar to what I was talking about back in S2E6, this is a neat parallel drawn between Lance’s feelings for both the red paladin and the pink paladin. This, in conjunction with the sheer symbolism of colors (red/blue/pink), practically seeps with Lance being bisexual.

Anyways, now that we have Shiro back, this episode throws a wrench into the leadership dynamic that Keith has built for himself. Throwback to season two where everything was going fine until he found out about his Galra blood, this is another instance of regression for Keith. He spent all that time building up his confidence and leadership skills, only to now butt heads with Shiro. Actually, he doesn’t even really butt heads; he yields. He completely yields the black lion to Shiro. Coincidentally, Shiro can’t use the black lion right away, and I think that might have something to do with the whole Clone Shiro arc (which I honestly still don’t understand completely, so I’m going to keep my theorizing about that to a minimum). It’s a complete back swing to his seeing himself as an invalid leader (“they need you, you know” – Keith is once again isolating himself from the other paladins in favor of doing what he thinks is right for the team and placing himself at a disadvantage).

This is interesting when we get to the major Klance scene, and I’m pretty sure you know where I’m going with this: Lance voicing his concern to Keith. Initiall, Keith is surprised at Lance’s advance, but he’s very accepting of it. It’s an interesting side to keith’s character that we haven’t necessarily seen yet. He’s soft and kind of flustered at the whole thing, which is sO cute.

Lance, on the other hand, is being so brave by voicing these concerns in the first place. We’ve seen multiple occasions of him wanting to be on team Voltron (for glory, for recognition, for the universe, etc – we saw this when he tried to pilot the black lion), but he’s willing to give all of it up if it’s what’s best for the team. Remind you of anyone? Yes, Keith!

Keith is appalled by this and instantly shuts it down, telling Lance not to worry about who pilots what. I think he’s surprised that Lance trusts him so much, but that trust gives Keith confidence. As we’ve seen, Keith responds to trust very well, even enough to make a joke (leave the math to Pidge + a bonus Klance smile). I also believe that he’s telling Lance these things just as much to comfort him as it is to comfort himself; he cares about Lance, and he doesn’t want him to leave. We see that in Keith’s initially reaction (“What are you talking about?!”). Another important line in this scene is Lance’s “this isn’t a participation game. This is war and you want you best soldiers on the front line.” Judging from Keith’s reaction, Keith honestly believes that Lance is one of their best warriors; he values Lance’s place on the team and wouldn’t think of jeopardizing that for a second. Overall, this scene was great. It had Lance’s vulnerability, and it’s the first time another member of the team has recognized that and actively comforted him for it. This will be important to remember once Keith leaves and Lance doesn’t have anyone to talk to about it anymore.

Also, when the Paladins are fighting Lotor’s generals, Keith is blindsided by Acxa, but then he is saved by a good shot from Lance and a reassuring “I’ve got you, buddy!” They really have bonded trust-wise. If romance does come out of this, it will definitely be a slow burn, built on a strong bond of vulnerability and trust. And the smile Keith gives Lance after that interaction! I headcanon that at this point he’s over his initial crush and is instead seeing Lance as a real person and teammate that he cares for deeply. Lance’s faith in him is a beacon of strength and light in a particularly dark time. And Keith switching hands with the bayard? That’s some cool shit. He just keeps getting better and better.

Side note for Keith and Acxa: I’ve seen the theories where they are siblings, but I don’t know if I buy it. We know virtually nothing about Acxa’s past except that she somehow got trapped in the stomach of a weblum for who knows how long until Keith rescued her. It’s just not enough for me to see them as related. If ANYTHING, they could be half siblings since we don’t know anything about Krolia yet either except that she’s a deep cover agent for the Blade. This versus the literal ten pages I’ve written on Klance thus far.

Okay, now back to Keith’s leadership conflict. It’s especially apparent when he starts arguing with Shiro about taking out Lotor on the recon mission. He shows off some of his old colors by wanting to run off on his own, but then listens when the team tells him to stick together. What’s important, though, is that Keith doesn’t completely give in to Shiro. In choosing between taking out Lotor’s ship and taking out the cargo ship, Keith makes a snap choice, against Shiro’s wishes, that targets both. He’s a good leader, and he’s making good decisions. The rest of the team just invalidates that, bringing back the doubt that has brought him so much trouble in the past, which we see in Keith and Shiro’s exchange at the end of the episode.

Final note on season three: past parallels

In the last episode of the season, we get some back story on Alfor and Zarkon’s relationship as well as some of the other past paladins. There’s the potential to see Alfor and Zarkon as a parallel to Shiro and Keith, but there’s also the potential to see it as a note on Lance and Keith, seeing as Lance is showing Altean traits vs Keith’s Galran traits. I’m about to try to debunk that with my own theory: there was also a scene in that episode where Alfor, in the red lion, saved Blades, the pilot of the blue lion. The connections between red and blue just keep being dredged up. There are red and blue stars in the astral plane. Red and blue are everywhere. Keith and Lance are literally written in the stars.

[delicious-blues]

VOLTRON SEASON FOUR ANALYSIS/CALLOUT TO FANDOM

WARNING:THIS POST IS GOING TO BE SUPER LONG BUT IT’S GOING TO BE THE MOST WORTHWHILE THING EVER. (hopefully)

So, I just finished watching Voltron season 4 and let me just say WHAT A RIDE. This show is amazing and it continually gets better and better with each passing season. There were many fans that were complaining that season 4 wasn’t well written and that it didn’t satisfy any questions. I’m going to talk about many points of the entire show and hopefully explain MY OPINION about why season 4 was absolutely amazing and that we have SO MUCH TO LOOK FORWARD TO.

1. Clone Shiro-

So, it is quite obvious that the “Shiro” we have now is not the real Shiro. Season 3 talked a lot about project Kuron and its different stages. There was lots of evidence and speculation to why he was a clone. We were hoping that in season 4 that someone would discover that he was a clone and that the real Shiro would come back. That did not in fact happen. What did happen was “Shiro” going back to piloting the black lion which was SHOCKING. We all thought that wasn’t going to happen since the black lion would obviously realize that “Shiro” is a clone. But when you look in context, if the black lion didn’t let clone Shiro pilot him, then other members of voltron could have died or gotten injured badly. Also, as far as we know, clone Shiro thinks he is real Shiro. He is trying desperately to bond with his lion again in a sincere way. The black lion may just have let this new Shiro pilot him. When the real Shiro comes back though(which it’s obviously GOT to happen) it’s going to be so much more dramatic since clone Shiro is the black lion’s pilot now.

2. Lotor-

I believe that Lotor may just be one of the greatest characters in this entire show. Many people were complaining about how much screen time and character development he got this season, but I was loving every second of it. Lotor is THE most confusing character in the entire show when it comes to his motives and goals. He fully deserves the screen time he got. In season 3 he started off looking like the most powerful bad guy ever. He was cool and interesting. Then at the end of the season he attacked his own base(which we still don’t have an explanation for). He also wants to harvest quintessence from other realities just like his parents did. I feel like that is a strange motive for him. He is far too intelligent and he has seen what it did to Zarkon and Haggar. Season 4 came around and it seemed as if one thing after another went wrong for him. Zarkon took command, he was cast out, written off as a traitor to be killed on site, he was spied on and had to kill Narti, his gate to the alternate reality didn’t work, his generals betrayed him, and Zarkon attacked him. WHILE ALL THESE THINGS WERE HAPPENING THOUGH HE WAS SO CALM. HE DISLOCATED HIS SHOULDERS WITH SUCH EASE JUST GOOD GOD. He always seemed to have a plan even when he didn’t really have a plan. At the end of the season when he says he wants to talk with Voltron, he has truly hit rock bottom yet he still has so much confidence. I see but two possibilities for him currently. The first one is about the redemption arc he appears to be going down. Fans are saying it is way to early for him to be having this kind of arc, but what if this was supposed to be his main arc all along? He could become a full-on member of Voltron and it would be EPIC. The second possibility seems to make more sense to me. Despite all the things that happened, Lotor was ALWAYS calm(maybe a little frustrated or tired, but never irrational). I would NOT surprised if Lotor just wanted to use team voltron for a while so he could take them down from the inside. Or he could have even been planning this ALL FREAKING ALONG(bit far-fetched, I know). There could be so many other bad possibilities that could happen to team voltron if they end up trusting Lotor. I personally believe that Lotor is going to play a huge role in this show.

2. Character development-

There have been SOOO many complaints throughout the ENTIRE show that there hasn’t been enough character development. I could actually agree on a few points, the show needs lots more character development, but we have seen a total 39 episodes and we still have 39 more to go. This show is not over. But I think there still has been a lot of great character development in some characters. Keith was willing to give himself up in the last episode and that terrified me. I was already plan to post something about his death before he THANKFULLY survived. He went from someone who was all about being a part of voltron in season 1 to being so detached that he joined the Blade and became willing to give up his own life whenever circumstance called. Allura became a strong and great character when she became a paladin. She has so many untold powers that she has yet to unlock, both within herself and the blue lion.   (I would really like some of these to explained SOON). Allura has turned into a independent character who has learned to live on even with the loss of her father. Lance has so many insecurities that he keeps hidden most of the time. I am thoroughly convinced that this might cause something terrible to happen to him(I’m not saying him dying, that scares me to much) but he could get terribly injured or something. Even through all of his insecurities, he has turned into a mature(definitely not all the time) “right-hand-man” kind of character. He gave Allura a SPECTACULAR speech in episode 6 that broke me. Just so many things! I love all of the characters so much and I would love to see more development with Hunk, Pidge, Coran, and whatever the heck is going on with clone Shiro and real Shiro. Pidge showed some promising character development in season four that made me excited for the next seasons. I am positive that our precious children will get the development they deserve.

4. Ships-

This is stupid. Yes, I do in fact ship a lot of different ships in this show, but the show comes before the ships. Ships should be our last concern when it comes to things in the show. We still need things like character development, plot, and answered questions. I promise you the people who are creating this show do listen to us. I wouldn’t be surprised if a ship did become canon, it would just probably be later in the show after all the characters get full development. It’s not wrong to ship things in the show, but when ship gets in the way of show, then it’s a problem.

*SUPER IMPORTANT MUST READ IF YOU READ PREVIOUS PARAGRAPHS

This is the paragraph where I will do a lot of tying everything together with a crap lot of persuading. Voltron is a show that is planned to have 78 episodes. That is a lot. We have seen 39 of these episodes which means we still have 39 episodes to go(which I think is pretty neat). In the first season was a lot of setting things up with character development and getting an arc going. Season two continued on that arc, but it also went a few other directions at the same time.In both of these seasons the show moved at a good and healthy pace. At this point the show didn’t have that many unanswered questions and we were expecting them to be answered in the coming season. But in season 3 and season 4,  we got only more questions. We got more characters. We got more relationships. We got more variety. We got more action. We got more everything until it overwhelmed itself and us. There was simply no time to address any previous questions because of all the new ones being created. Let me tell you why this was the greatest decision they could have ever made with the show. I know what you’re thinking, you probably think I’m crazy. They ignored a lot of character development and each of the characters flew into so many different arcs that it just became insane. The plot was also crazy, there were so many different characters with different character points of view that the plot was all over the place. So, so many unanswered questions that remain to be answered. All the while all I’m thinking is how excited I am to watch season 5. Am I the only one here that realized that all these four seasons have been doing is just to set up some huge story-line? This is totally my opinion, but I just feel as if something huge is about to happen. We are EXACTLY half way through the show, 39 episodes in, 39 more to go. The show up until this point has been all about trying to confuse the crap out the fans with all the questions and theories. They have introduced so many concepts and theories into this show that have yet to be explored. Characters have progressed so much already that I can’t wait to see how much more dramatically they are going to develop soon. I feel that that was the point of the show up until this point. They wanted to introduce all the variables on the board before they begin to play with them. I feel the next half of the show is going to be INSANE. Huge reveals, questions answered in the most unexpected ways because they were left for seasons unanswered which makes them so much more satisfying when they are answered. Just think of all the possibilities! Think of all the different ways the Shiro/Kuron/Clone thing could go down. Think of the unexplained character Lotor and all the terrifying possibilities he can take in this show. Will Zarkon even be one the throne for much longer or will Lotor take over again? I don’t know! The whole concept of alternate realities has so much potential to be explored. For all you people out there who are upset that Keith is with the Blade of Mamora now, don’t be! Keith has already gone through so many character arcs that I severely doubt that this character arc is going to last long. Let me tell you something important right now: the paladins and their lions are not set in stone. I wouldn’t be surprised if any of the current paladins right now go off on their own and then come back and be a paladin again to a different lion. I’m convinced that Keith could easily become a paladin of voltron again later in the show. Who knows whether or not the paladins will remain paladins? They could switch around more, or certain characters could decide to work in a different area. All of the characters are going to get their characters arcs I can assure you. I’m still a firm believer in the fact that someone in the show could die(that scene with Keith in season 4 episode 6 really scared me ok) There is in fact still time left show. We don’t even know what kind of outcome the show is going to get. Will it be a good outcome? A bad outcome? Or something none of us ever expected to happen? There are so many different opportunities to explore and I personally can’t wait to see what they do. This is an extremely well developed show. The show has changed drastically since the first two seasons, so why can’t it change even more? Whose to say that in season 5 we are blown away with how vastly different it is from previous seasons?

The point of this entire post was to help people realize that voltron is going to be an excellent show. The writers know what they are doing. The show is going to develop beautifully. We just need to sit back and let it happen.

(this was truly a 3 am induced post so take it or leave it your choice)