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agallimaufryofoddments · 5 years

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Hey there! So I just got back from vacation. I do still want to go back and skim through a couple novels regarding a couple things, but I was looking for some of your thoughts on Claire's abilities. Is it LN canon that his eyes glow, or is that just anime? (See I need to go back) Relationships Claire/Gandors/Firo, Claire/Chane, Claire/Raechel (which I totally head canon he still meets up with her and asks for advice. I was also thinking about if the DS ending had happened between them.)

Below is the initial/preceding Question, sent by Amara in a previous Ask (technically two) still sitting in my Inbox:

amara77 said: Loved the Luck analysis like LOVED! Sooooo ayyyyy I’m requesting one for the number 1 problem child Claire XD I have a few questions to go with that but there is a section I need to re-read. The “rambling” was actually great you pointed out a few things, that I hadn’t really stood out until I read that. Nailed it! (Also I do read tags )

Oh oh and I love that you love Keith so much.

And thanks for giving me some specifics to work with! I just wasn’t sure where to start/what to talk about; I’ve written about Claire before (in a Claire-Elmer comparison I wrote in February of last year ), so I think part of me was worried I’d potentially end up repeating myself…

Draft Update: My original plan was to respond both to the fact-checking questions and the relationship questions in one post (this post), but my response just kept getting longer and longer…

…So I’ve decided to split my responses into two posts. Sorry for taking so long to respond to these; I started writing this in February, I think (?) and had written quite a bit before stalling on the final 15%.

Below the cut: Relationships Section (My thoughts/musings on Claire’s relationships with the Gandors + Firo, with Chané, and with Rachel).

I’ll move my fact-checking/canon consultation response to another post (probably as an ‘answer’ to the ‘part 2′ ask) and link it below.

LINK to Response’s Other Half: Canon Consultation

I think my responses are going to end up more “general thoughts” than “analysis,” but who knows; I haven’t written them yet.

With the Gandors + Firo

Let’s see… You know what I appreciate? Claire always comes back to the Gandors and Firo, no matter how long it might take. He runs away to join the circus, but he comes back home–because they are home to him, a foster family worth coming back to. They’re part of his world, and important enough to remain in it.

I like, too, the different dynamics he has with them individually. I love that he respects Keith enough to apologize when he’s done wrong by him in 1932, and I love everything about the 1927 arc (which was written for me, specifically)–how he has faith in Keith’s abilities but still cares enough to search for him, and is genuinely mad at himself for letting Donatello escape. Going back to the ‘respect’ aspect, I’m just glad the ‘older brother/younger brother’ element’ isn’t overlooked. (That it’s acknowledged at all.)

(April Edit: You’ve recently sent me an ask on Claire and Keith’s relationship, so I probably shouldn’t be too elaborate here.)

That Claire and Berga had regular sparring matches is…well, it isn’t surprising, but I do appreciate that they had their own thing going on (even if Luck and Firo did occasionally get caught in the crossfire). If Luck is the brother who attracts most of the (esp. anime-only) fandom’s limelight then Berga probably gets the least, you know?

I would like more than just their brawls in terms of Claire & Berga canon scraps, of course. Berga being thoroughly not on-board with Claire’s history of ‘proposing at first sight’ (Vol 3) is neat. I’ve also latched onto him referring to Claire as a ‘kid’ in Vol 2; I always figured Claire was closer to Luck’s age, but that ‘kid’ implies Berga puts some stock into this (i.e. views Claire as distinctly younger to him, even to a small degree) is interesting.

(Interesting because an older brother-younger brother dynamic/hierarchy was not necessarily something I found as distinct w/regard to Berga and Claire as I think it is with Keith and Claire? The brawling, their shared…uh, clumsiness–they’re the less ‘well-mannered’ of the four brothers, perhaps the brawn duo vs the brain duo–but I guess Berga as the middle child gets to have the middle ground. Closer to Keith’s age than Luck’s age, I think, so he has ‘enough’ of a leg up in terms of seniority–but not enough that he’s not above roughhousing with the younger sibs.)

In Vol 4, while watching Claire and Berga brawl, Luck thinks to himself, “They complain, but those two really do get along, don’t they…?“ And you know what, that makes sense. In light of the above, Berga might have had more in common with Claire as a kid than he did his blood brothers? He’s always been boisterous and belligerent, the type of person who has a lot of energy to burn off at any given time, and Claire’s the same way….

(I’ve just revisted the 1919 flashback in the 2015 manga: on one page Berga is shouting that “It’s dangerous” as Claire flips down from the rafters; on the next, he’s giving Luck a noogie…)

Claire’s not afraid to get a little physical with Luck either, though, given how casually he throws an arm around Luck’s neck/shoulders and drags him off in 1927. Which is fun (he does the same with Firo in 1919). I think one of the reasons 1927 is so great for Gandor-Firo-Claire fans is because it’s an uncommon instance where we see these guys interacting outside of work.

..Maybe you thought I was going to say, “interacting before 1931″ and that’s definitely a part of it! But…frankly, a lot of Claire’s interacts with Luck (and the other brothers) are within a ‘professional’ context, so to speak. That’s the consequence of Claire always traveling around; when we do see him return to the brothers/interact with them, it’s often due to a job.

(He hangs around Coraggioso in Vol 4 because the brothers need him; he later shows up at the DD because Gustavo hired him. We’re told in Vol 7 that he calls Luck to vouch for Jacuzzi’s Gang. The reason he crosses paths with the Gandors in 1935 is because he’s someone else’s bodyguard.)

In other words, not as much off-duty interaction as I would like. Which is making it surprisingly more difficult for me to speak of Claire and Luck’s relationship compared to his relationships with Keith and Berga–in fact, it might be easier to think about it w/respect to Claire and Firo’s relationship instead.

See… It’s not as if Luck isn’t pleased at the thought of Claire returning home. He’s genuinely happy when he confirms Claire is coming in 1931, for instance–though I’m sure he’s partly happy at the promise of having a powerful asset against the Runoratas. Not to mention, at the time it was quite a few years since he’d last seen Claire.

However, he’s full of wry exasperation (and perhaps resignation) towards Claire as well, a lot of the time. The type of long-suffering exasperation only a sibling knows, in that he is long used to Claire’s bullshit and mostly unfazed by his existence. “You get less and less human every time I see you,” he says to Claire in 1919, but ‘so what’?

All of the brothers are like this, frankly; they recognize Claire’s skill, they’re sincerely happy to welcome Claire home after long absences, but even then they’re not, say, jumping with joy. Their subsequent ‘mini-reunions’ aren’t treated as anything special; when Luck recognizes him in 1935, he’s mostly just exasperated Claire’s committed to his one (1) disguise. (As a sibling myself, I ‘get’ it, totally get not making a big deal out of one’s sibling.)

Compared to Luck and the others, Firo does practically jump for joy at the news of Claire coming home. The brothers (as siblings are wont to do) don’t go out of their way to effusively praise Claire or act impressed with him–whereas Firo easily and openly praises Claire and doesn’t hide how much he is impressed by Claire on a regular basis.

Er, but these musings are supposed to put Claire as the focus (and people have already discussed Firo-Claire from Firo’s perspective) so let me readjust the lens back to him. If I had to name something I think is ‘key’ to their relationship…it might just be that Firo’s admiration of Claire isn’t unilateral. In other words, I think it’s important that Claire admires Firo in turn.

Perhaps not to the same degree, since Firo’s admiration of him could quite possibly border on hero-worship (it stems from both sincere awe at Claire’s skill and insecurities that he’ll never be close to Claire’s league)… but Claire admiring/respecting anyone is probably nothing to sneeze at. More important is that he praises Firo too, that he can be positive and encouraging to his friend even if Firo doesn’t necessarily believe him.

And as much as Firo can be starry-eyed over Claire, I’m glad that such admiration isn’t all there is to their relationship. Er, it certainly colors it (Firo is much more openly warm with Claire than the brothers are), but it doesn’t thoroughly imbalance their interactions?

For all that Firo strongly admires Claire, their interactions are actually quite comfortable. Look at their mini-reunion in 1933, where Firo goes from tense to relaxed and smiling as he greets Claire; he’s so comfortable with Claire that he doesn’t even protest Claire referring to his ‘baby-face’ appearance (we will wryly note that Claire shortly thereafter says Firo must call him Felix now).

Maybe I’m looking into this too much, but I do thinking this is worth noting. That Firo can so unreservedly admire Claire and be unreservedly comfortable with him despite his own insecurities about his vs Claire’s abilities. He could be intensely envious, and perhaps he is a little envious, but he never holds his insecurities against Claire. He never lets those insecurities foment into resentment. He wholeheartedly admires Claire, but not in a fawning, obsequious way.

And then there’s Mr. Claire “has no common sense when it comes to other people’s hearts” Stanfield, who for all his self-absorption may actually have picked up on some of this. After all, it’s no small thing when he does honestly believe in/respect/admire someone; the way he looks at Firo in 1927 (ch4) makes me think he might be aware Firo doesn’t believe in himself in the way Claire believes in him.

I might have more to say, I might not have more to say; at this point I am increasingly muddled on what I’ve said and not said, and all I really know is I’ve probably spent way too long on this section as it is. It wasn’t even very long originally, but then I thought “oh, it’s too short” and expanded it. I’m moving on for my own sanity.

With Chané

Luckily for us both, I’ve just now discarded my original start to this response (which was several paragraphs long and setting itself up for a long haul); this is a Take Two wherein I will ideally just share some straightforward opinions (as opposed to broadly rambling about everything and anything, which the original start was threatening to do).

Claire and Chané pair up pretty quickly in canon, and perhaps the fandom lets them get away with it because it wasn’t technically ‘love at first sight’ for either of them. (That the ship is an ‘aesthetically nice’ one I’m sure doesn’t hurt). Of course they do have the famous proposal scene two weeks on from the FPF, and of course they’re courting by 1933, so that’s far from the only reason…

Still, though they ‘get together’ relatively quickly, they’re not a ‘perfect couple’ after the fact–except they are, just a bit, in that they work so well for each other and Claire was born to be the ‘100% supportive husband who’s always there’, and…why is the fandom so gung-ho about them, again? Why am I not rolling my eyes more at the pairing?

For many reasons, I suppose, starting with how the above isn’t…all there is to them, nor is it without exaggeration. They might be ‘perfect for’ each other, but not analogous with a ‘fairy-tale’ couple; if they really were just another cut-and-dry ‘love at first sight’ success, they’d have no friction or doubts. Claire would have ‘solved’ Chané’s myriad worries and ‘fixed’ (ugh) everything wrought by her upbringing just like that, and she’d love him easily and without hesitation.

But…things aren’t that simple, as much as Claire insists that they can be.Chané’s concerns and doubts don’t magically go away forever, and Claire reassures her that he loves her and that he is there for her every time they resurface. Is that ‘perfect mannish’ of him? Yes, but to be fair…that’s probably part of his and the ship’s appeal as whole.

I’ve said it before, but what makes Claire/Chané so appealing for a lot of people is how much they care for each other. People love how cheesy/sappy Claire is when it comes toChané! People love that Chané comes to fiercely love him back! And I…find it appealing too, perhaps because I think the love is a little overwhelming for both of them. Claire can be cheesy, but their relationship ultimately comes across as more heartfelt than cloying.

That it’s overwhelming forChané is obvious: she’s terrified at the thought of loving him (not terrified of Claire, but of the prospect of loving anyone besides her father); and she’s at such a loss when she inexorably accepts that he loves her so much and with so much sincerity.

But I do think it’s a lot for Claire as well, as confident as he acts; he has to ask Rachel for advice because he doesn’t want to mess this up, he’s hesitant and maybe even just a bit shy for once in his life when he stumbles over the proposal. I’m sure this holds its own appeal, for fans.

I said this was going to be straightforwardly my own opinions on Claire/Chané, and yet here I’ve gone again. I’m too far in to start over with a ‘Take 3′, so let’s just get back on track (heh) here.

The thing I like most (and I’ve said this before as well) is the mutual respect they have for each other; that Claire believes inChané and she (despite herself) in him. Claire will joinChané’s fight not because he thinks she needs the help, but simply because he enjoys fighting alongside her. By the by, that one time when we get the reverse (i.e. whenChané has his back in the 1933 fight) is my FAVORite thing Narita has done with them as a couple, probably.

I will admit that, as lovely as it is to see how tirelessly Claire will reassureChané when she’s in emotional turmoil, I think I’ve seen enough scenes wherein Claire hugsChané from behind and says something like ‘Don’t worry, I’m here’ for the time being. It’s not that I protest the notion, far from it, but I personally get more enjoyment from them being a power couple for one thing. (It’s not like we have much opportunity forChané to be the one reassuring Claire, given how confident Claire is.)

(Honestly this might be why I kinda sorta enjoyChané‘s internal conflict in 1935, as Concerned as I am for her. I was very !!! when she worries in 1935-A that she’s going to end up relying on Claire because she trusts him–and !!! by her desire to “face Claire as an equal.” On the one hand I’m just, “Chané no it’s okay, you’re just experiencing positive character growth…shh…just let it happen…”

…but on the other a small part of me is going “but she’s not wrong, these are valid fears” anddd you know what, I’m getting off topic and I was already thinking of writing a post on “Baccano!’s couples and mutual reliance” as it is, so I’m just going to stop that train (heh) of thought for now.

Claire andChané really do hit a lot of those ‘perfect dream pairing’ beats, but…ah, I may have hit upon something: When Claire enters Chané‘s world, he doesn’t destroy it–but he doesn’t become her world either, as he might have done as a fairy-tale prince. He simply expands it, just like he promised. WhenChané arrives in New York, her world is no longer “Huey’s”–but it doesn’t become “Claire’s” either; she fashions her own world, sharing it with the world of Jacuzzi’s gang and Claire both.

And Claire, as devoted toChané as he is, still has his own life as a freelancer hitman post-Chané; really, I just think it was incredibly important thatChané continued living with Jacuzzi’s gang rather than move in with Claire post-proposal. That is something that would’ve probably happened with a fairy-tale couple (fall in-love–>marry>move-in together), but I’m so glad Narita doesn’t pull it with these two. Maybe this is another reason why I’m on board; I don’t think I would have been nearly as okay with them ‘living as’ a couple immediately post-reunion.

Isaac & Miria are each other’s world, and it works for them–butChané desperately needed that ‘in-between’ period, i.e. “between Huey” and “between Claire,” where she was no longer ‘actively’ Huey’s tool and not yet ‘Claire’s wife’. A period where she could be hers first.

(It’s similarly important I think that Ennis–and there’s certainly something that could be done by comparing Ennis andChané’s circumstances–enters the Martillos’ fold at the same time she moves in with Firo. Learning to live for oneself/outside another’s boundaries doesn’t require one live by oneself or strike out on one’s own. Both women’s roads to independence are absolutely made easier with support systems along the way; both women’s lives are bettered by experiencing the sincere kindness of others. Others plural.)

I’m going to stop here because these are getting way too long (aka they’re reaching the points where each relationship section would be better off as a separate post) and I only ever wanted to not spend hours writing this in the first place.

With Rachel

“I totally headcanon he still meets up with her and asks for advice” // I think the entire fandom headcanons this, including me, and this is why you guys rock. I was sold as soon as I saw “Claire meeting Rachel over food” popping up in unrelated fics (in my early days as a fan), and happily subscribed to the idea in my own fics later on. It feels so natural!

Honestly it feels so natural that sometimes I almost forget it’s not canon, i.e. that their Alveare lunch is the last we’ve seen of them interacting. I have to forcibly remind myself they’re not technically friends even though it feels like they are…

…It’s pretty obvious I’m all for Claire and Rachel being friends, huh? I think it’s safe to say the potential for friendship is there; with Claire’s casual/familiar way of engaging her, they’re halfway acting like friends already. My instinct is that Rachel wouldn’t be as quick to say ‘friends’, though? Some reluctance at first might be involved; at the very least, I think some resignation.

Why reluctance? Eh…while she does warm up to him in Alveare, it’s only up to a point. She thinks him a tactless oddball, and still thinks of him more in “Rail Tracer” terms than “human” terms. She came this close to liking him as a person, only for his “I’ll make her love me” line to kill such sentiment. Her approach to the conversation is, “what do I say that won’t make him want to murder me?”

I also feel that she wouldn’t be keen off the bat to be friends with Claire when the memories of him torturing Czes are so fresh? My feeling is that they’d probably need to spend more time together before she sees what they have as friendship. Enough time for her to grow more comfortable around him, even if she isn’t aware of it; enough that she doesn’t worry about watching what she says around him; enough that she does start liking him as a person; enough that she sees him as human more often than she does Rail Tracer.

I just used a whole lot of words to say, “hm, maybe Rachel would be slower to accept they are friends,” huh. See… I really enjoy the idea of Rachel and Claire being bros who regularly hang out, right? But all this has reminded me that she would…probably have some uncomfortable wariness to overcome at first; and, for all my brain likes to imagine them as being comfortable around each other…would Rachel ever feel fully comfortable around him?

Maybe. It would take time, but that was the case for Chané, too. (So much for that ‘fairy-tale’ perfection).

As for the Claire/Rachel NDS ending (#54 for those who want to look it up)…are you asking if I think the ending is plausible, for my thoughts on it and Claire/Rachel’s couple potential in general?

So. If we consider the Claire/Rachel ship within the context of Ending #54…well, it’s important to recognize that Rachel accepting his proposal is not an action borne from positive feelings–it’s one of self-sacrifice. She accepts it as a punishment for all the times she stowed away, and to stop Claire from spilling more blood.

Now, the game tells us they do sit and talk for hours after the proposal, and my guess is–as per the canon Alveare lunch–it’s in talking to him that Rachel sees he has a human side. (And from there realizes that maybe marrying him isn’t going to be the punishment she intended it to be). Obviously that’s “best case scenario” speculation, but I think it’s unlikely that the ending was intended to be a “bad end” for Rachel considering their canon interactions.

(I definitely would be v. uncomfortable if Rachel still saw it as a punishment after all those hours of talking with him in the NDS ending, but again…I don’t think that’s what Narita had in mind).

In any case… I can’t speak for Narita on this (no duh), though I’m sure they’re more plausible than the Claire/Ladd crack ending. I do see the appeal of Claire/Rachel as a couple–ah, and see how one might prefer the idea of them to Claire/Chané. Even if the latter’s romance isn’t necessarily cloying, there’s enough sappy sentiment going on that one might prefer the more casual, down-to-earth air of Claire and Rachel’s Alveare interaction.

I…really do see the appeal, but I harbor a couple reservations similar to those I felt toward LuckEve in that Luck write-up–reservations in terms of ‘how likely/easily could Rachel/Eve overlook their moral qualms with Claire/Luck’. I found myself skeptical that Eve would marry the man responsible for drowning her brother–let alone marry into the mafia–and I’m…not sure that Rachel could so easily enter a relationship with the Rail Tracer.

Whom she saw torture Czes in unspeakable ways. Who was spilling blood all over her precious railways, tantamount to blasphemy.

Well, the interesting twist is that she sees herself just as guilty as he is in terms of ‘sullying the pride of the train’ (to which Claire, speaking for all of us, points out the oddness of equating murder with stowing away)–so who knows? Rachel is wary of him in canon, but I could see her at some point asking herself if she has the right to be condemning or fearful of him; who is she to act morally ‘better’ than him when she has a history of stowing away?

Again, such logic is a bit warped, but if the alternative is the NDS Ending wherein she initially accepts his proposal as a punishment… I’ll take the former, maybe.

At the end of it day, I just want Claire and Rachel to continue having some kind of familiar relationship post-their Alveare lunch. They’re like Luck and Eve in that they have very few canon interactions so I can’t state anything definitely about a romance (though my doubts as to LuckEve are…assuredly stronger)…but I can say I’m definitely one who sees the potential for a familiar relationship at minimum.

I’m just…going to bring this to a close, since I’ve spent the last several hours trying to finish the last 15% of this and the other post, and I’ve kept you waiting on these asks for too long as it is. Also because I have increasingly less and less of an idea as to what I’ve said and not said thus far, and increasingly less brain cells with which to check.

(This is why I do better with specifics/specific questions; if you give me any leeway I am liable to vague-ramble all over the place.)

#Baccano!#Baccano #Claire Stanfield #Felix Walken #Chane Laforet #Firo Prochainezo #amara77 #Asked and Answered #long post #Rev's Musings #Rachel (Baccano!)#I could attempt to review this post. In theory.#but please don't ask me to; I'm dying

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