Do you have any head canons for your favorite Ace Attorney characters? (Basically free pass to rant to your hearts content 💙)

Hi anon if you're still out there you sent me this ask nearly six months ago and then I never really needed an excuse to rant about a topic. but now I do and I feel bad for letting this sit so long so here's a bunch of very specific headcanons about the relationships between the protagonists and assistants.

Phoenix and Maya: the Dynamic Duo. The Best Friends. Canonically Maya is the most important person in Phoenix's world in JFA (and of course Trucy ends up taking that position but Maya is always up there in a comfortable second place.) They'd die for each other within a few days of having met. I think they're both fundamentally lonely people and the shared tragedy of losing Mia trauma bonded them for life. Insert elaborate headcanon of Phoenix not really having many lasting friendships and just latching on to all the people who are nice to him (hence switching careers to meet a guy he hasn't known since he was nine) and also Maya growing up as the heir to the Kurain Channeling Technique and not really having anyone her age to hang around with. They are undoubtedly Siblings but I don't think they're Siblings in the same way as like Miles and Franziska are Siblings. I don't think they'd necessarily introduce each other as their siblings (... which I don't think Edgeworth and Franziska do either but that's a whole other long dramatic topic) but they do secretly consider each other their annoying younger sibling. Like canonically at least Maya does. They have weekly gossip sessions which also has canon support. They'll make fun of each other all day and then die for each other in a crisis. Their dynamic means the world to me. I could go on for a very long time.

... sidenote that I don't consider Franziska an assistant at all but I want to briefly throw in some headcanons for them in here because I think Franziska Hates Phoenix's Guts but after JFA develops some respect for him and throughout Bridge and post T&T she does actually like him (platonically, just to be very clear,) but doesn't know how to express that so she just acts the same way she always does and Phoenix is convinced that she despises him for like the rest of his life or at least until Edgeworth tells him otherwise.

Phoenix and Ema: I don't think they're as close as Phoenix and Maya. I think that like they can go years without talking to each other but then when they're both in the same place and hang out they are like the best of friends for a week. Ema came to visit in the middle of the 7yg and she and Phoenix went around town and partied (or whatever social things people do I don't have a social life) and confided about all their troubles but it wasn't until Ema left that Phoenix realized he completely forgot to tell her about Trucy hence why Ema had no idea when she came back in AA4. I think that's funny.

Phoenix and Pearl: there's lots of parent trauma here on Pearl's part. Insert elaborate headcanons here about Pearl partially being so fixated on Phoenix and Maya being a romantic thing because she's subconsciously substituting them as parents in a perfect nuclear family that isn't horribly traumatizing. I don't think Phoenix ever considers her his *daughter* daughter not like Trucy but definitely if he hadn't been partially taking care of her throughout JFA and T&T he'd be even more unprepared when taking on Trucy. Also probably Pearl has some degree of jealousy at first with this but I think they sort it out early on in the 7yg.

Edgeworth and Kay: You Know This One. They are father-daughter but I don't think they ever admit it. like I think Kay after losing her prosecutor father in a horrible murder and then like took a break from school to avenge his death and then went to find this other prosecutor who helped nearly catch the murderer the first time and also says things that often remind her of her father kind of went "oh this is a dad now" but the trauma of losing her dad means she doens't. fully. like you know there's that scene at the end of aai2-4 where Miles hands her the promise notebook and it flashbacks to Byrne with the promise notebook and their hands are overlapped so it's like you can't see Byrne's face and it's an extremely clear Parallel of these two people occupying similar spaces in Kay's mind, but of course Kay doesn't fully embrace this because she does love Byrne a lot and doesn't ever really. move on from him or ever want to think she's replacing him in her mind. which she isn't, but it's something she's scared of. And obviously Edgeworth has a lot of father trauma too. I can't see this man readily accepting that he's a father in any way I think he just represses it but he does like want to protect Kay and make sure she grows up safe and eats her vegetables. and someday if he does manage to sort out father trauma I think he'd recognize he sees her in a daughterly way but by this time Kay is well into adulthood and he thinks she doesn't really need that anymore. she does and I think in a narumitsu world where edgeworth adopts trucy it's going to cause a lot of complicated feelings for her. it's very elaborate. another thing I could probably write way too much on we're going to move on

Edgeworth and Ema: It's so cute when Edgeworth is all polite to her because she's his boss's younger sister. I think he was nice to her when he was prosecuting the Joe Darke case and Ema (deeply traumatized suddenly being ignored by her sister and fourteen years old) gets this gigantic puppy crush on him because he's like just distant enough to be safe to have a crush on and is older but not too old and is also very gay. which she doesn't know yet but it contributes. anyways when she grows up it's more of a professional idolization sort of thing instead. edgeworth never knows about the crush thing because he's oblivious until ema and kay get married and kay makes a joke about ema using her to seduce her not-dad and ema nearly divorces her two hours after getting married

Apollo and Trucy: siblings by blood and in heart. Even when they don't really know each other well Apollo was sobbing when he thought Trucy got kidnapped which was really sweet. I think Trucy takes advantage of him not really knowing how she works a lot in the beginning but eventually he grows wise to her tricks and doesn't fall for them (as often). He considers her a sister figure long before he knows they're related. Definitely for most of Trucy's life the only one who really understood her was Phoenix and I think it would be sweet if eventually Apollo learned to see behind her facade sometimes too. Also I'm shaking the ending of soj really hard. Umm what else I don't always adhere to this headcanon but I think it would be very funny if Trucy knew the whole time that she and Apollo were half-siblings. Like she has the picture of Thalassa with the bracelets, and she knows Perceive power is a Gramarye thing, I think she knows. She just doesn't know how to break the news to her dad.

I could here add in Athena but I don't consider her an assistant and I probably should add in Rayfa but I can't remember enough of SOJ honestly. Also I want to add in that despite the lack of canon interactions I think Apollo and Maya teaming up would be fun. Anyways DGS time.

Ryunosuke and Susato: by the transitive property of siblings these two are siblings. But to be perfectly honest I don't see them as siblings in the same way I'd like see Phoenix and Maya as siblings and definitely not as Edgeworth and Franziska are siblings. I think they're Family but I can't really fit them into a neatly defined box. Uhh I could get into some specifics but I don't want to put a bunch of spoilers in here I guess I could make a separate post later. But I think they also really bonded over shared trauma throughout like the whole series and I think they remain really good friends for the rest of their lives, and eventually they run a law firm together. She gets to be Auntie Susato to Ryu's eventual kid(s) which I think she adores because I feel like Susato really likes kids even though I don't see her having any of her own... maybe adoption but my elaborate post-canon Susato headcanons aren't really solidified on that front.

I could probably go into Ryu's relationships with Sholmes and Iris because they're technically considered assistants to some degree but this is long enough already, I want to avoid spoilers, and Susato's really the main one.