"no hints were dropped" ok not to be that person but here are the hints that were dropped regarding Colin and Trent being gay:

1. Colin mentioning Grindr in a joke

2. Trent touching the arm of a man in the background

Here is one of the hints that Keeley was bi (even though I do believe she's been canonically bi since season 1, but not everyone sees it this way)

1. Her desktop background was in the colors of the bisexual flag

Here were some of the hints that Ted was bi:

1. Bisexual flag colored triangles above his head in the hallucination sequence

2. Inverted pink triangle next to him in that same sequence (and you can't tell me the creators didn't know, when the Homomonument is based on that symbol)

3. Countless (countless!!!) comments about men's physiques ("huge muscular thighs all caked in mud", whistling at a picture of Pep, "look at that head of hair", "he's strong", "he looks like a Rodin sculpture in cleats", etc.)

4. About a man (Higgins) and a woman (Rebecca), he had to say: "that's a crowd I don't mind being smack-dab in the middle of"

5. Him checking Trent out in the pub in 2x07 (his eyes are up there, Ted!)

6. "It could go either way", "I contain multitudes" and other comments in this vein

7. Bi lighting as he entered the Yankee Doodle Burger Barn

8. Giving similar looks to the female waitress and the male waiters in that restaurant (including a waiter in a cowboy costume that looked like he belonged in a gay club, who tipped his hat at Ted when greeting him)

9. "That's cause you were put into a box", "That box ceases to exist today", the box in the hallucination sequence breaking into triangles (as in the bi triangles and the inverted pink triangke), "we've been playing too rigid", "our guys need freedom", "fast, fluid, free, with full support", the "box that one needs to break out of" being a prominent motif in season 3

10. Wishing Beard called him pet names ("Honey, is that an ingredient or something you just called me?")

11. His crush on Pep

12. The connection between Ted and Colin: "my whole life is two lives, really", both wearing orange in Sunflowers, "I just want to kiss my fella" (Colin doesn't say "fella" , but Ted says it all the time), Ted just needs to get inspired and Colin's play is "inspirational" after he comes out, as per the commentators

And so much other stuff that, had Ted not self-identified as straight (*cough* put himself into a box *cough cough*) , you could make the case that he was canonically bi.

Here are some of hints that there was a romantic connection between Ted and Trent:

1. They hit a lot of romantic beats, and not in the jokey self-aware way in which Roy and Ted hit them in "Rainbow", but in an organic and sincere way

2. They both checked each other out: Trent checked Ted out when Ted was changing in front of him, Ted checked Trent out when Trent came up to him in a pub and hit him with a pick-up line while his date that looked a lot like Ted waited for him outside

3. Did I mention that Trent was on a date with a moustachioed man who dressed in a similar style to Ted? Let's mention it again

4. In that very bar, during a 50 second long conversation, Trent managed to say the word "love" three times. I searched the word "love" in the transcripts of the episodes. There's no other instance in which its frequency is this high

5. "Love our chats" incomplete rule of threes

6. "Sport, it's quite the metaphor" (implied: a metaphor for love; see also "love's a beautiful game" from the song Ed Sheeran wrote for Ted Lasso), "Also makes for a heck of a nickname", "Good night, Ted", "Good night, sport"

7. The soft, romantic, melancholic song playing in the background of this scene, while Ted and Trent are the last ones left in the office, with lyrics such as "When your words begin to crumble like the sidewalks all around this crummy neighborhood / From the chalky cliffs of Dover / I'd come over, I'd start over if I could"

8. Trent wearing sunflower colors in the episode "Sunflowers" and in the finale; sunflowers symbolize Ted's home (it's not subtle). He's the only character dressed like that. I'm still looking for any other explanation other than "Trent is Ted's home"

9. Their constant flirting and the way they look at each other with incredible fondness

10. The entire episode "The Strings That Bind Us". It's structured around Ted and Trent's relationship, and the way Trent changed because of Ted (in season 2, Ted defined a soulmate as someone who changes your life forever). The red string metaphor. Ted points out that soulmates are connected by a string tied to their little fingers. Ted and Trent both extend their little fingers out in similar shots. They are connected by a huge block of red in their last scene of the episode. Ted makes several comments about other men that apply to Trent ("Look at that head of hair", "Frames his face nicely", "My favorite one, he was clean shaven"). Many more details that lead back to Ted and Trent: Nate tells the restaurant owner to tell Jade he said "Hello". Immediately after, Ted and Trent say "Hello" to each other. The map that Nate's father used to ask out his mom has the number 1.3 written on it and an illustration of two people at a table in a restaurant. Ted and Trent went to a restaurant together in season 1, episode 3. The last scene of the episode mimics a "Race for Love" scene from a romcom, with Trent chasing after Ted. Trent also does not say a word to anyone other than Ted in the entire episode. He is completely focused on Ted

11. "Trent, what do you love? Is it writing?" and Trent ends up writing a book about Ted and naming the manuscript after Ted and he only cares about Ted's opinion on it (he leaves the room when Beard starts reading, but stays in the office after hours just to watch Ted read. "I just wanted you to like it.")

11. Trent's crush on Ted, confirmed by Jimmy Lance (and also obvious in the show, if you ask me)

Now, why would I believe that none of these hints were intentional? Maybe some could be explained away, but all of them? The hints we got for Colin, Trent and Keeley were so much smaller than this, and those turned out to be intentional.

anon i wish i could offer you the response you deserve, but i cannot stop rereading this masterpiece & focusing on the portions of evidence you provided that i didn't even pick up on until you laid them out. holy shit

For the shipping bingo board, Rin/Isagi, Kunigami/Chigiri & Nagi/Reo :3

Woo, a fun one!

Rinsagi:

Listen. They are The ship because they are divorced and soulmates at the same time. I love that energy they have going on. Their dynamic got sidetracked with the neo egoist arc and kaiser's introduction as isagi's new foil/rival, but imho bllk peaked when these two were still navigating how to coexist with each other and simultaneously come on top of each other. What I like about their dynamic is that is balanced. While isagi makes an effort to understand rin and work with him instead of for him like everyone else, isagi also doesn't coddle him or tries to fix him.

They are equally deranged for football and their skill levels are different, but on the field they push and challenge each other in ways that other dynamics simply don't, imho. I never get the feeling from them that either one has fully caught up to the other, and that's part of why I like them so much. They barely tolerate each other, yet they're the closest thing to actual teamwork this manga will ever have. What I love about them is that despite being polar opposite in basically every respect (personalities, family curcumstances, attitude towards others), they're also very in-synch because on the field they see the same view and think the same way. Everyone always says that kaisagi is the dbhwks equivalent of bllk, but to me that's rinsagi. Enemies that have way too much in common and don't want to admit it.

Plus I find it funny that they're both lowkey-highkey touch averse so that makes imagining them as a couple fairly fun :')

Kunigiri:

This is where I'm conflicted because this is a very very small fandom, and the bloggers who actively talk here (here being tumblr or discord) as opposed to just... Sharing things are almost all kncg shippers. For the sake of finding fandom friends, I tried liking this ship. Believe me, I did! But it just isn't hitting for me. And the thing is, I can see the appeal. They have the same tragic angle of friends separed that nagireo and bachisagi do, except it's even more tragic because one of them is almost eliminated! Plus the whole "came back wrong" potential angle! I should be shipping them! I live for angst and for hurt/comfort! But I just... I don't know. I find them a bit bland, and it doesn't help that I hate with a passion the nickname "princess" and you just cannot avoid it in this corner of the fandom

I guess I will try harder, maybe eventually I will find out the fic that will convert me

Nagireo:

This is where I reveal myself as unhinged because they have completely hijacked my brain. I STARTED SHIPPING THEM AS A JOKE. because it was funny. And then I read episode nagi. And then somehow they became my biggest comfort ship ever??? They can barely communicate. They actively make each other worse (at least as far as blue lock themes go. They'd be fine in a different manga). How did this happen.

Ahem. Without writing (another) essay on them (check my meta tag for those), I will say that I am absolutely feral about these two. They're fun because they are so Weird. They're the best friends to lovers trope but they can't talk to each other at all. Miscommunication is their daily bread. They're rivals who can't help being wrapped around each other's fingers. One moment they're trying to progress as their own individuals, the next they're back to being codependent. They exemplify so many of the themes of blue lock and one day I'm gonna write a whole essay on it. Like I'm not even kidding, reonagi, bachisagi and rinsae are all faces of the same coin. I'm convinced Kaneshiro introduced them all to drive home the idea that the best striker in the world cannot live for someone else's success, and those three dynamics are different stages of self awareness in that respect. In that respect I think all three are integral to the series and that's why they're the most nuanced dynamics of the show

But as for nagireo itself? I know they will make me miserable eventually because I want them to be a team and that will never happen (well, if you don't take into account how they're both likely to make it to the u20 proper at least). But still. If I didn't like pain I wouldn't be shipping them in the first place I guess

OKAY SO. 

It’s not that often that I talk about what I really think about Jiraiya, and I guess I mean more how I feel about him, since I always try to write my ‘deeper’ headcanons/metas from a more... idk, trying not to get too emotional about it point of view. Basically it’s because I know how controversial he is, and I pretty much ritually avoid a lot of takes because I don’t want to get irritated about something that really doesn’t matter much in the grand scheme, because we’re all entitled to our opinions and I largely get my say through the act of writing and developing him how I see fit.

Which is enough for me, mostly, but for the purpose of reinforcing/building upon how I see my muse’s plight, working through some of my Sannin-feels and also to dip my toes into why I find blindly judgemental/single-faceted takes of him, his priorities and the Sannin’s bond so exasperating, I kinda feel like rambling my thoughts (feelings) anyway! 

Politely sticks this stream-of-consciousness mess under a cut.

So sometimes I do think about the fact that Jiraiya kinda, lmao, forgot about Everything Else in the world because of Orochimaru and his (frankly) obsession with him/them. And the fact that a ridiculously significant portion of bad shit that happened is down to his actions/inaction. And the fact that he really did go and leave the likes of Naruto (and maybe to a degree Kakashi, although there’s zero actual evidence he didn’t get involved given the strong indications of a great rapport in the canon), just because he was so hellbent on pursuing Orochimaru, who was not even shown to be affectionate towards him at the best of times. When I think about it in terms of Jiraiya being gone and the main reason we’re given for it, things suck for a number of people, and quite largely because of potentially unrequited/horribly communicated/obsessive JiraOro pursuits, in essence :’)

(And for all it’s still quite the rarepair, Jiraiya does express on accounts that he was destroyed when Oro left. I mean... this is the guy who rarely acknowledges his sadness so... It’s not my bias at all I sware)

Of course JiraTsu is very real in my eyes too, albeit a very different kinda tragic, as is OroTsu. And the messy poly ship? Ohohoho, even better, but... yeah. Tsunade does at least go her own way for a long time, as messed up as that is in itself, for reasons including the fact she seems to pointedly not heal or move on from her grief. And given the absolute debacle that was her and Jiraiya reuniting... and both her and Oro even discussing a possibility of sacrificing him... and just, them in general for that whole arc :’))) yeah. They are without a doubt messy and troubled, but even despite how fraught things become I genuinely think all the furtive expressions and the undercurrents of longing and the evasion of their past exhibits a history much deeper and full of lost love compared to many other team dynamics we get (otherwise the Three Way Divorce wouldn’t have been quite so horrible on them, would it? That and they’d probably have split up after Team Hiruzen was no more, if they really hated each other/just tolerated each other out of familiarity like I sometimes see speculated).

But yeah, back to our main man. Jiraiya’s intense (and frankly very Scorpio of him) love for our first series Big Bad kinda did ruin him and what he was setting out to do in some ways, to the degree that the actual story of Naruto wouldn’t be very much without him in terms of drama. I mean, he always loved a good story, right? So art imitates life, and innit just pathetic poetic.

And in so many ways it is incredibly tragic and pitiable that he’s Just Like That. Idealistic and warping everything terrible, no matter how bad, into adventure in his mind! As growth! As pain that makes you TOUGH and makes you a stronger man! As something to be pushed aside while you just keep on truckin’! Whatever anyone you love throws at you, it’s Totally Fine!

After so long narrating through his personal lens, I’ve come to realise he truly is so convinced that everything bad that happens, is sort of just... something he has to deal with and feel big and guilty and feelsy for while spinning it in ways that enable him to keep going. He just loads it on himself and sorta holds it. The fact he’s so sad and filled with sickly pining grief that he has to try and exorcise it with impulsive bouts of decadence? Fine. And it’s not abnormal at all, how he approaches things with such broad scope and just kinda... thoughtlessly wrecking-balls his way through everything he thinks is a great idea at the time. He experiences the fallout of these things and simultaneously feels the entire ravages of it acutely while compartmentalising it ever so neatly away. The crazy thing, too, is that he’s exceptionally convincing at making everything he does and how he handles things seem so grand and noble and romantic and tragic... but in a humorously self-deprecating and still ultimately very hopeful way, to the degree that I as a mun get caught up in his relentless optimism and forget he actually is a sad and heartbroken guy wrapped up in all this grandiosity.

Sometimes I do step back and look and I just think yeah, fuck, he really is a total disaster! He’s a walking disaster and he’s been so damaging to himself and others in so many ways, all because of acting on emotions and impulses without really thinking about the impact! He really did kinda give up on those who needed him and for what? A love that will never love him or prioritise him back? 

A wonderfully tragic theme that I do love with him, don’t get me wrong.

But then at the same time, there’s always more nuance to be had than just ‘he is a disaster and made bad choices, as tragic and romantic as it is, he was actually just selfish and kinda sucked in the end, pathetically whipped by his friends and unable to let go of what they had’. There’s more nuance to be had than reducing him to a purely romantically-inclined character, who just snubs everyone else for a doomed love... because in the end, I think a huge part of JiraOro’s demise in particular was that Oro felt immensely snubbed by Jiraiya when he stayed in Ame, when his loyalty to Konoha (as a place and people, not necessarily a system) and of course loyalty to his own ideals was prioritised over Oro.

To an extent, I feel like Tsunade could have been a similar case, were she not preoccupied with already having lost so much, and besides I really do think she and Jiraiya were quite firmly in best friend zone at that point. With Tsunade not being able to get comfortable around Jiraiya or to pursue any underlying affection for him because of the dumbass way he always behaved (understandably of her tbh), probably until she got with Dan, by which point I reckon Jiraiya started to really come through by showing how he valued her for her, where we see by them having each other’s backs so closely in the second war. Not to mention him generally respecting that his feelings for her have no place by the time he gets her back to Konoha.

In terms of that first split in Ame, Jiraiya, I feel, simply didn’t think him leaving was going to be a big deal, because the three were always fiercely headstrong people who had their own shit going on (simultaneously independent while also being, perhaps not to their knowledge, So Very Codependent). Not only that, but his overly affectionate ways and incessant jolliness were probably considered such a joke that he was basically like ‘they’ll be fine without me’. I certainly don’t think he felt needed by them, which I don’t think is their fault or a point of angst and ‘waaah poor blameless Jiraiya’, because quite honestly, the strain on their relationship was something I fully believe even he didn’t realise he needed out of at the time. His one-track mind was just on ‘save kids, teach kids, this is right, must seize opportunity to be the change I was told I’d be, not continue with this godforsaken war’

Selfish? Maybe. Well-intentioned? Certainly. Intended to hurt anyone or imply he stopped caring? No.

In essence, when it comes to why in the end Jiraiya seemed to be so horrendously bad at being around at the worst of times, at being responsible, whatever else (and I’m not even going to go into scenes intended to be comedic because, they are comedic)... I’ve got to look at it from more than just one view. It’s easy to say ‘he’s ridiculous and terrible because he pretty much flaked on what was important based on his whims/a doomed love/his dick’ (which I have seen said lmao) but there are so many other things at play here.

So I’m thinking, while he was shirking duties (godfatherly mainly)... did he actually consider that his most important duty? Was it anyone’s place to tell him it was? Minato didn’t, as I recall, and when he sacrificed himself he specifically left it to the Third because he (presumably) respected what his teacher was about and knew he wasn’t for staying put. Did Jiraiya not consider his primary duty to be to the prophecy, and in a more general sense fixing the big wrongs and trying to foil big dangers to his home? Were these things not pretty much what he existed for (as much as his faith wavered and went off the rails at times)? Was that not the main source of any real purpose he ever had, being a kid who showed practically no ambition before? Did he not pretty much redesign himself as being ‘from Mt. Myōboku’ rather than Konoha after two devastating wars, and thus is it not understandable for him not to focus solely on Konoha—not outright destroying it, still ultimately loyal to his home and not about to let anyone destroy it, but seeing that the world is in fact so much bigger than just his little town? Is that really something that’s so bad and wrong of him, in a story where the main cast’s country has a pretty fucking nasty system and is established to do so very early on? Is he not pretty revolutionary in his own brand of not blindly serving, but not going on a destroy-it-all frenzy either?

Also, was he not the only one who actually bothered to investigate Akatsuki and the forces that would see Naruto dead, in time? For all he did help bring Akatsuki into existence in ways, it was inevitable from before he even met the orphans that they were going to be groomed/moulded into what they became, regardless of whether Jiraiya came onto the scene. Jiraiya leaving them was just a different kind of suffering to what they were inevitably going to suffer anyway, and hell, with his influence at least there was a time where they might’ve stood a chance of going totally against Madara/Obito’s path, especially while Yahiko was still around. Jiraiya didn’t know that the whole thing with the Ame orphans was, by a design out of his control, doomed to end horribly. So while he felt personally responsible not knowing this, and it’s taken as a given that he was... actually, was he, when there was a master manipulator at play? Was it wrong to want to give some kids a chance?

With regards to all those things I see people say he should have stayed and fixed, that he should have been there, he should have done x y z... Is it not the responsibility of everyone not satisfied with their lot to step up to the plate and make where they live better? Jiraiya wasn’t the only adult. Tsunade, and I absolutely love her, does seem overwhelmingly to be absolved of leaving Konoha because... ??? Kicker is that she too is related to Naruto, of course. 

So... was she not also needed for the very material ways she could’ve helped at numerous points? Was she not also placing her grief and lost love before everything else? Are some reasons inherently more ok than others to ditch? As Kakashi’s generation grew up, was it not also then up to them to decide whether they’d change the status quo? Were Minato’s own generation, presumably his own peer group, not complicit in Naruto’s ostracisation? We got a slight taste of rebellion with Asuma, Hiruzen’s own son, but the fact is many Konoha-nin were overwhelmingly complacent with how things were. And yet never get demonised at all for it. Because it’s Jiraiya’s fault for... not staying and giving it all up to be a guardian who could well be depressed and unfit to raise a child... or just being a flaky as hell one that’s never there anyway because he has shit to do? (and in doing the former would let too many things go unchecked by a completely tuned-out Hokage, not gathering all that spicy useful intel, y’know... essentially he wouldn’t have ended up largely doing his job along with the personal shit in between).

Basically when I see claims saying that Jiraiya as an individual should have done pretty much everything better, and somehow been there for everyone that needed him at any given time, and that (mostly Naruto’s) suffering was a failing on Just His part because of his selfish whims... I feel like the point of his tragedy is absolutely missed. That tragedy being that barrelling through things alone is definitely a failing and harmful in numerous ways, as we see with Itachi shouldering everything alone too, and we see them both miss out on Naruto and Sasuke as a result... but at the same time, is just settling down and leaving everything else to chance not also a huge failing, when there are so many other circumstances and enemies acting against you, when you do have the power to change tides, and when so many other people refuse to or can’t seize their own agency? Jiraiya does put his faith in a lot of people too, and a lot of people fail. Don’t fail him, but in a general sense many, like Minato, fail to make the change they wanted to. That’s life in this world, it’s tragic, and after losing a lot of loved ones yeah, he retreats and goes at it alone. 

But how can he win? How does he do what’s right, other than by chasing what he thinks he can do to actually help the world, which happens to be bigger and not centred on individuals, even those he cares about?

(and remember, nobody knows Naruto is special-reincarnation-prophecy-boi, which is why I tend not to blame-game any characters for him being treated like so many orphans were because... while it’s not morally right or nice at all, it’s tone deaf to how the world is, to the fact all characters having different degrees of knowledge and priorities, and it’s insensitive of the fact most the characters had their own struggles and were just doing their best with a bad lot gdi). 

Hell though, Jiraiya even does put Oro, his big obsessive wild goose chase that whisks him away into selfish pining hopelessly devoted land, on the back burner at points. Maybe not in a lasting way, particularly by the last databook where he’s inspired anew by Naruto, but he does prioritise other shit on numerous occasions. And there’s a lot of shit to try and prioritise.

What I’m trying to say is, Jiraiya can’t solely be held responsible for people. Sure, he’s a character whose decisions were pivotal to events, but what of every other character in the story? Why are they not held to the same crazy high standard of doing and protecting and preventing and somehow doing everything ‘right’ that would have also meant him fitting neatly into the Konoha mould? Would other characters really have been that much better in the position of The Big Guide/Martyr/Tragic Hero/Force For Change character? And also is having a tragic Chaotic Good bastard of a hero not a sign of a damn good and interesting character, that at the very least tried where so many others didn’t? Would Naruto not have been a boring as hell story, whose main protag didn’t really have much conflict to make him compelling, without Jiraiya (among others) being a mess with the best intentions? Without so many other characters having failed him, for him to overcome it and still be able to love and inspire change (albeit through sometimes-clumsy talk-no-jutsu)? Was I missing the point of the story?

............. Hmm!

No longer sure where else I’m going with this now, so.... here, I guess, ends my ode to why character hate (especially that reduces them to One Thing) is dumb, why demonising truly well-meaning characters doesn’t feel particularly woke to me in a cast full of flawed characters and horrible circumstance, and why I’ll defend this poor bastard with far too damn much hinging on him to the end I guess :’)

TL;DR HE’S A DUMBASS AND HE TRIED, OKAY?!

top ten tagged by @linkspooky 🍊 explanations under the cut! sorry for rambling xo → rules: name your top ten favourite characters from ten different fandoms, and then tag ten people - @osomanga @kara-suno @anonimarevolts @zeninmaki @wildbishonen @shysheeperz @tkmewthyou @kaldurlenn @joxterism @marshmallowdonutsprinkles

snufkin okay so he’s the only one not from an anime or manga but i had to put him on bc he’s the most important fictional character to me, ever. i grew up watching the moomin cartoons in the 90s and thinking about it instantly calms me down - they used to air the episodes early in the morning when it would still be dark outside: the landscapes were moody and cosy, the characters were so softly spoken and articulate... it’s just peak nostalgia. anyway, snufkin is moomin’s best friend; he returns to moominvalley every year to be with his friends during the spring and says his goodbyes to go adventure again come winter. it upsets moomin when he leaves but snufkin is adamant that quiet and solitude are important and healthy, and it’s not fair to expect him to compromise on his independence - that made a really big impact on me as a kid, especially as someone who never really had their ‘own’ space (twinsies). relationships aren’t weakened by physical distance or time, they’re about communication and understanding. that was important too. i don’t think i realised just how influential it had been until i was an adult but snufkin is an anarchist. he first shows up in the comics when moomin and sniff are talking about opening a bank - he tells them they should plant fruit trees instead. he destroys private property and rescues orphans, he refuses to participate in things that don’t bring him joy. when he’s asked where home is, he replies, “nowhere. or everywhere! it depends how you look at it” - the whole world belongs to him, and the whole world belongs to everyone else too.

yomo renji in general, i like characters that trudge along in the background and do the nitty-gritty work that supports the main story. i like people like that irl too. more than anything else, yomo is desperate to form human connections, even though he’s shackled by self-doubt and self-loathing. he just wants to positively contribute to a community, thinking he’s most useful keeping a quiet eye on people who might need protection/guidance (while still giving them space to grow and act themselves) or foraging for human corpses so that others aren’t in danger or moral anguish doing it for themselves.

bird boy is a total weapon - “the perfect ghoul” - and you’re reminded over and over again but a lot of his growth is about rejecting violence and repurposing his power as something productive that he can use to help the people around him instead of hurting people (the yang to uta’s yin). in the first few chapters, he says he kills humans (he’s a ghoul, humans are food, it’s natural) and yet he’s consistently framed as a scavenger who seeks out ‘roadkill’ [suicide victims] for sustenance, even before coming to anteiku, and implements a system so other people can do the same.

suguru getou i was originally gonna say meg bc i love him but, having just finished The Flashback Arc, i can’t stop thinking about getou and i’m beyond impressed with how akutami has managed to ground him so well, so sympathetically. getou is the sick, warped darkness to the hopeful light that gojou commands but... in an uncomfortable twist, the reverse is true, kind of.

actually, gojou is arrogant and confrontational and hyper individualistic. he’s a dissident. getou is obedient, compassionate, self-aware... he has a sense of social responsibility and passionately believes that his skills should be used to protect those who can’t protect themselves - non-jujutsu sorcerers - and all of the suffering he endures as a result is worth that. idk if others are reading his downfall differently but, from where i’m standing, that overwhelming responsibility never goes away, he doesn’t give up on it - he just starts to view the social landscape differently and begins to see how jujutsu sorcerers are vilified and mistreated in spite of all the good that they do. the ‘weak’ aren’t really weak when they’re able to organise and assert collective power over a minority, and so his sympathies shift.

the nail in the coffin for getou is learning that the hurt and pain could be eradicted from the world by cutting the head of the proverbial snake: non-jujutsu users generate cursed energy, so get rid of non-jujutsu users and cursed energy won’t be generated. it’s all horribly, weirdly rooted in good intentions that weigh him down and misdirect him.  shinazugawa genya i feel like the bond that slowly starts to develop betwen tanjirou, and zenitsu and inosuke (in particular) is nicely foiled by genya’s lonely journey towards becoming a pillar. after losing almost all of his family and having sanemi walk away, genya is angry, antisocial, rude, violent, evasive...

he’s characterised as competitive, as if he hates his peers and wants to leave them in the dust as an act of self-satisfaction, a power fantasy or whenever, but this is a deliberate misdirection to cover for the fact that he’s scrambling to be a pillar so that he can reconnect with his brother and prove to him that he can protect himself; that sanemi doesn’t need to shoulder everything alone like he used to. his entire goal is an act of apology.

and in a story where so many characters are able to hone these exceptional skills, genya is uniquely disadvantaged as the only one who can’t master breathing techniques. rather than having a hero moment and powering up, his need to reconnect with sanemi is so strong that he essentially decides to compromise his humanity and become a kind of monster by ingesting the demons he’s pledged to annihilate. amajiki tamaki i wish i had a a longer explanation for this one but it’s actually super simple: tamaki is a really, really, really good portrayal of a person burdened with severe anxiety. the way he physically carries himself, the way he hides his face, his manner of speaking, his dependency on his mirio, how he interprets compliments as trickery, how he needs to be pushed and pushed and pushed before he’s finally able to release his potential... every single scene with tamaki felt deeply personal when i was reading bnha and i knew exactly what he was supposed to be feeling. shinmon benimaru sometimes good, nice people don’t fit a little friendly mould and i like that benimaru is hostile and rough and antisocial, even with people he cares about. he doesn’t expect anything of people, he doesn’t want them interfering with him, and he wants to help and support them all the same because he believes in community. he’s completely oppositional to the special fire force because he thinks it’s a tool to pursue an ideology rather than to protect people, which is why it’s so important when the eighth are finally able to win his approval - they become the only company the seventh consider allies, and it’s proof that their objectives are righteous. despite his reputation as... kind of a nuisance, his skill is acknowledged by everyone and he’s universally regarded as the strongest fire soldier there is. in spite of his antisocial attitude, he agrees that it’s important to share that with younger fire soldiers - he’s incredibly patient and understanding with them, helps them to individually adapt. the way he (and others in company seven) operate in contrast to the other companies when fighting infernals is really cool to me for two reasons: (1) it provides a commentary on how cultures and traditions often struggle to survive when they’re systematically (forcefully) replaced through power and wealth - although the subtext is a little troubling because it’s unclear whether ōkubo is conflating multiculturalism with globalisation which, uh, big nope; and (2) philosophically speaking, the approach to death is interesting. where the other companies essentially perform last rites and offer absolution to the deceased, benimaru personally takes responsibility - at the request of the people in his district - for sending them off in huge public display, kind of like a festival intending to celebrate their life. i think it speaks to how profoundly he values life. akihiko kaji i liked akihiko from the beginning because he’s stoic and introspective and also excitable and dumb. he’s a people watcher and waits for opportunities to softly guide uenoyama and mafuyu when they’re quietly crying out for help but doesn’t interfere any more than he thinks is necessary because he knows they can make their own way to where they need to go. i liked akihiko even more when he got really fucking messy. his relationship with ugetsu is sweet and it’s incredibly ugly and unhealthy because they both fail utterly to communicate with one another - they’re both to blame for avoiding and hurting each other, and i think that’s a really normal issue that people find difficult to overcome. i’m super interested (and really nervous) to see how his relationship with haruki develops. he’s done some horrible things to haruki and i want him to be accountable for those things and have them affect their relationship in a realistic way.

tanigaki genjirou one thing i really, really love about golden kamuy is the way noda satoru incorporates the importance of minority cultures into the story, and tanigaki’s apparent abandonment of his matagi heritage is really beautifully written. matagi hunting traditions shaped his life as a young man, it’s how he was able to really assimilate to the people around him and form relationships and - without getting too spoilery - he divorces himself from it all when he’s overcome by grief and hatches a plan for revenge against the person responsible. so, by allowing himself to surrender to negative feelings and thoughts instead of seeking support and learning to heal from what happened, he becomes a total shadow of himself. 

makimura takeshi i know i’ve gushed about it before but i can’t properly explain just how incredible it felt seeing an asexual character in manga dialogue about being asexual, and devils’ line does it twice. the reason i’m so attached to makimura in particular is because he doesn’t seem to have fully figured it out - and he’s kinda... comfortable with that. he wants to be with someone and he wants to be monogamous but he can’t understand why he doesn’t feel sexual desire towards her; he knows his feelings aren’t platonic but doesn’t know whether they can really be called romantic either.

not to go dark mode but i very vividly remember just how lonely and horrifying it was battling with those uncertainties when i was a teenager, thinking i was broken because i didn’t have Normal Human Feelings and needed to be fixed. i was so worried about it that i thought about all the boys i knew, picked the one i thought was the nicest and actively tried to develop a crush on him. it was dumb as fuck but, ten years later, i realise it was really desperate and sad too. i forced myself to have ~my first kiss~ (it was horrible) because i felt like i was getting left behind and i think i would’ve put myself in worse situations as i got older if i hadn’t suffered with such bad social anxiety.

i hadn’t really thought too much about a lot of this stuff for yeaaars but it all came flooding back when i was reading devils’ line. it was bittersweet bc i was remembering all of those shitty feelings but also watching this character grapple with those same questions and go: i don’t know yet and that’s not weird, let’s just grow with it. i still don’t totally know whether i’m ace or aro or bi, or whatever, but i’m trying to be okay with just... not knowing.

misora shuuji anyway, devils’ line isn’t actually a manga with a specific focus on sexuality and gender but shimanami tasogare is and all of the characters are written beautifully. if you haven’t read it yet... then why haven’t you read it yet? misora is only about twelve years old and watching them battle with their growing pains is really compelling - they’re closeted but, through the lounge, they have somewhere to explore their gender and all the questions they have about it. they’re amab and present as traditionally feminine wrt clothes, wigs, makeup, etc. but can’t quite tell if they see themselves as a girl, a boy or non-binary.

with the onset of puberty and anxieties about physical changes to their body, misora’s story puts a lot of emphasis on the pressure they face to just ‘make up their mind’ about something that’s actually incredibly complex and doesn’t have any easy answers. they snap and shout and get upset, especially when tasuku (the protag) tries to push them into a corner because he wants a concrete label or identity he can attach to misora, even though space is exactly what misora needs.

Probably weird and hard, so take you time to answer, but if Audrey was canon in the comics, what changes would be made when adapting her character into a MCU? I mean stuff like the fact that Tony built his in Afghanistan in the movie when in the comic he did it in Vietnam.

this was such a fun question thank you so much!  i’m gonna separate this into two parts: audrey’s comics storyline and how her mcu adaptation is different.  so sorry this is so long! 

audrey rogers (later audrey lange and audrey banner) was introduced in the 1950s after captain america’s popularity declined and the war ended.  her original aging thing was that she aged pretty fast and then like maxed out when she was physically 18 or 20 (like the baby from twilight).  she was originally supposed to speak to teenage girls and other women to encourage them to embrace patriotism and reject communism, and she’s mentored by her father (since peggy’s originally written in the comics as a pretty minor character).  audrey is given her batons by howard stark but in the comics they’re much more torchlike (really emphasizing the whole lady liberty moniker).  

throughout the 50s and 60s, she’s got a dual-identity thing going on.  she’s audrey lange (nee rogers), a teacher married to Joshua Lange, her high school sweetheart and a young, good-hearted, all-american politician.  nobody knows about her identity except for her father, howard stark, and howard’s son tony.  

during the 60s, lady liberty and black widow are often portrayed as character foils and enemies.  lady liberty is sweet as apple pie, she likes to kiss babies and shake hands with senators and say things like God Bless America while the black widow is seductive, brutal, and most importantly—communist.  the two are each other’s biggest rivals for the beginning of their respective comics’ histories (ok i just watched killing eve and i am obsessed with it but i think they are usually trying to track each other down similarly to eve and villanelle).  idk if you watch glow but it’s like the zoya/liberty belle characters. that’s what’s going on. 

in the comics, lady liberty is responsible for helping black widow defect from the red room and join the American cause.  their first enemy together is julian bardot, who is selling nuclear tech to the highest bidder, and both of them want to discourage their respective organizations from purchasing nuclear bombs as the comics began to go into more anti-war propaganda.  audrey teams up with tony at this point and their comics characters become friends.  

during the vietnam war, the whole american propaganda thing was declining in popularity so they sent audrey to vietnam as a spy, where she was known as the angel of mercy.  after realizing that the war was a corrupt cause, she abandoned the angel of mercy title and began working as a vigilante with civil rights activist and empire state engineering student lindsey dubois, caroline, a secretary heavily implied to be gay (living with her close female friend and unmarried) who would become the vigilante ace of spades, chinese refugee and nurse claudia liau, and delphine lamontagne, a french exchange student who came to the US looking to find a scientist to help her understand her powers.  They specifically target human traffickers.  

At this point, Josh Lange becomes mayor of New York City, and the strain of audrey’s vigilantism and her unwillingness to have children leads their marriage to crumble.  they divorce and it’s a big comics thing (later, backlash causes marvel to try to retcon their marriage at all and say they were just engaged)  

lady liberty is written into the avengers in the 1970s again because she realizes that the vigilantism was too dangerous or something (i feel like realistically it’s just that sales were low for a diverse group of female heroes but whatever).  her storylines are based around that for a few years, however, after the marvel comics watergate, captain america abandons his title and becomes nomad and audrey abandons superhero work in favor of working as a lawyer (? i think).  

in the 1980s, audrey is written as working as a law professor at culver, where she meets bruce banner.  i don’t know a ton about hulk comics but i think he was permanently hulked out for the 70s and started gaining control in the 80s? pretty sure.  anyway audrey’s never met bruce before but he’s got a dual identity thing going on and she’s like You Really Seem Familiar.  when she figures out his dual identity a) they become romantically involved and b) she tries to get into hero work again.  

there was a lack of interest in her character as more than a love interest, though, so from the late 80s to ’91, audrey is kidnapped and brainwashed by hydra.  she’s given powers through hydra experimentation but refuses to use them unless forced to because they cause her immense pain.  she is activated through trigger words and known by the name Red Scare.  During this period, she serves as one of Captain America’s primary antagonists, but he doesn’t realize that Audrey is his daughter, he just thinks she’s dead.  

When the Soviet Union falls in 1991, Audrey is returned to the united states and begins working as a shield agent because of the intelligence she’d collected while abroad.  Josh Lange, now running for president of the United States, proposes to her in the late 90s and they marry, but Audrey begins to secretly undermine his political agenda once he’s elected due to his staunch anti-gifted stance and preference for order, no matter the cost.  Audrey is portrayed as an unsatisfied First Lady until 2005, when Tony Stark starts the New Avengers to help defeat the mass breakout of the Raft, a prison holding many supervillains.  Knowing she cannot just stand by, she leaves Joshua and commits to becoming a hero full time.  

During the Civil War comics arc, Audrey opposes the mandatory federal registration of super-powered beings due to her experience with politicians.  However, many oppose her presence in the movement for that very reason.  She and Bruce Banner attempt another romantic relationship, but he favors the registration act and they soon break up.  When her father attempts to surrender in order to stop the violence, she does so instead, knowing that she will be less of a loss to the movement.  

At the same time, the United States launches Hulk into space (idk this was a real thing with the whole planet hulk arc) and Thor, wanting to help turn Hulk back into banner, breaks Audrey free from prison and brings her to Sakaar.  She helps him turn back into Bruce and the two actually begin a romantic relationship, with him seeing where the registration act got him (Launched Into Space).  When they return to Earth, Audrey and Bruce both decide to retire from hero work and open a school not for mutants but for other powered people which becomes a rival to charles xavier’s school.  

From there, it’s a bunch of sporadic storylines.  I think at some point she may become director of SHIELD when Steve is president?  Because I know that was like a thing in the 70s. audrey’s powers are connected to thanos in a way that’s spoilery so I won’t go too into detail but when he pops up with the infinity stones arc, she plays a part in that.  

anyway!

So there’s a lot of differences between the hypothetical movies and the hypothetical comics but i think obviously the biggest is Audrey’s backstory and aging.  Since she ages slowly and was without Steve’s guidance, she grew up isolated and protected from the rest of the world.  Audrey’s personality at the beginning is supposed to be reminiscent of her personality as the initial Lady Liberty—very sweet and positive and very much a character foil to Natasha, but instead of Audrey recruiting Natasha to SHIELD and helping her become a hero, it’s the other way around.  Obviously Peggy’s role is very different, too, as is Josh’s (he’s a much more minor character in the films than in the comics).  

The first Lady Liberty film adapts her transition from more of a hollow, symbolic hero to someone who is directly involved in the fight.  There’s also references to her Red Scare arc except it’s the 60s and not the 90s.  Here, we also have reference to Natasha and Audrey fighting Julian Bardot and his weapons, but removed from the Cold War context and instead shifted to the post-Chitauri circumstances.  Delphine is also introduced, though not as a vigilante at this point or as a student but as a capable DGSE agent.  The setup here is for her to have her own adventures eventually I think.  

A lot of the changes have to do with the order of things.  Because the MCU takes place over a decade and not like 50 years, things get switched around.  TWS and AOU are both more modern plotlines that got reinvented and brought into the MCU.  I think I’m probably gonna be changing the Civil War conflict to add more of the comics element to it as well.  

Audrey’s vigilante team storyline, though unpopular at the time of its original publication, works better now, so it’s brought back for the second Lady Liberty film, which is set after Civil War.  Audrey at this point is much more brutal and has lost faith in the system similarly to how she lost faith in the system because of Vietnam.  Audrey never becomes a lawyer, but she does have a reunion with Bruce post CW during the MCU equivalent of Planet Hulk because (though unlike the comics he went by choice) he got launched into space.  Audrey’s involvement in this storyline is much more accidental in the movies than in the comics.  

I think also unlike the comics, Audrey doesn’t use her powers more because she feels unnatural when she does and not because it physically hurts.  She also loses control.  The movies also more specifically detail how where her powers came from.  

The third Lady Liberty film, resurrection, is a movie that covers Audrey, Thanos, and more of her outer space adventures lol.  And the next gen TV series, which primarily just features guest appearances from the Avengers, adapts the idea of the Avengers Academy.  

thank you so much again for this ask sorry it got so long i had so much fun answering it !!!