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stromblessed · 5 months

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Mizu's spectacles, and the levels of her disguise

In drafting some more Blue Eye Samurai meta posts, I find myself writing out the comparisons between what Mizu can and cannot hide about herself, and how that affects how she moves through the world.

Like, I get the jokes about Mizu's glasses, if only color contacts had existed back then, etc. etc., and I think (hope) that most viewers don't take the glasses jokes seriously, as in "I don't care about the suspension of disbelief because BES is a cartoon." But I wanted to write these thoughts out anyway without burying them in a text post about something else.

I think the points I'm going to lay out here are viewed very differently by different people, so please feel free to add to this post, reply, or put your thoughts in the tags!

Not only do Mizu's glasses not actually help her that much, there's surely more to Mizu's mixed race appearance than just the color of her eyes.

In my view, this was pointed out in episode 1:

I'm willing to bet most of us were expecting young Taigen to say "blue eyes," not "ROUND eyes."

Obviously this is still about Mizu's eyes, but not even spectacles can hide their shape.

I don't think the show is obligated to point out everything about Mizu's face that isn't quite as Japanese as the people around her expect. Though the creators have said that they specifically designed Mizu - and her clothes - to read both as "white" and as "Japanese," as well as both male and female. I think there's more about Mizu's features that read as "white" than just her eyes.

This is where my own headcanons start entering the picture, but it's my impression that people can just tell that Mizu looks different, whether or not they can put a finger on exactly how.

There's the little girl who looks at Mizu and then hides on the way into Kyoto:

When there's more to your face you'd like to cover up than just your eyes, big hats are a big help!

By the way, most of these examples have to come from the first half of the season, since by the second half, either Mizu is too preoccupied with fighting henchmen, or everyone Mizu is facing knows who she is already, and she therefore has no reason to hide her mixed race identity.

It's worth mentioning that the mere fact that Mizu has to hide multiple aspects of her identity - her mixed race and her sex - results in her having to choose clothes that really, really cover her up, which doesn't win her any favors either:

(Zatoichi reference, anyone?)

If it were as easy as, for example, tying her glasses to her head and wa-lah, nobody would ever know she was half-white - then (1) Mizu would've just done that long ago, and (2) Mizu wouldn't be so on guard and on tenterhooks 100% of the time the way she's depicted in the show, even when her glasses are on.

Her spectacles sure don't help her in the brothel, which is full of observant women who are trying to seduce her, meaning they get good long looks at her:

Mizu never takes her glasses off, but they still send a woman to her who has light eyes, thinking that must be what will interest a blue-eyed man:

No wonder Mizu gets mad after this, lol

So Mizu never takes her spectacles off in the brothel, it's dimly lit inside, and the women can still tell that she has blue eyes. I'm getting the sense that Mizu putting on her spectacles isn't a guarantee that people suddenly can't tell that she looks different.

And yet no one spots that she's female.

Mizu can hide her breasts, can wear her hair in the right style, can hide what's between her legs, can walk and talk and behave like a man - and she's been doing it for almost her entire life, to the point that not only is she very good at it, but the threat of being found out as female is deadly, but isn't presented in the show as omnipresent.

Let me explain.

She threatens Ringo for nearly saying the word "girl" out loud, because while she's constantly ostracized for being mixed race, being a woman traveling without a chaperone, carrying a sword, and disguised as a man will get her killed or flogged or arrested or some combination of these things.

But in addition, it's been drilled into her since she was a child that if she is discovered as female, the combination of her being mixed race and female will identify her as someone extremely specific, someone known to some bad people, and she will be killed:

I think of it as Mizu thinking to herself, "Being found out as mixed race means I'm treated badly. Being found out as mixed race and a woman means I'm dead."

Mizu's hair is cut as a child. But she isn't made to wear a big hat, or cover her eyes somehow, or anything like that. Because hiding her sex is a more successful endeavor than hiding her race.

Ringo finds out she's female by accident, but once Mizu accepts the fact that he won't rat her out, she relaxes pretty early on in the season. Because the threat of being found out as female is mitigated pretty much 99.9%, since Mizu has gotten so good at being a man. And also, because most of the time, people see what they want to see. Even if Mizu's face makes her stand out as "not 100% Japanese," no one in the world of BES looks at Mizu's clothes, her bearing, her sword, hears her voice, and will ever in a million years conclude that she is a woman, because expectations around gender roles in the Edo period were so rigid and so widely enforced.

One detail that proved this to me is after the Four Fangs fight:

Ringo takes off Mizu's clothes so he can stitch her up, then leaves her clothes off even after he's done. He doesn't even throw her cloak over her as a blanket or anything. There's a little a straw (pallet?) as a divider there on the left, but anyone could just peek around it and see Mizu and her chest bindings. (I think it's mostly there as a windbreaker.)

And Taigen is right there, but he doesn't give a shit:

Opinions probably vary hugely on this, but my impression is that because the show doesn't make any kind of deal about Taigen being in the room with Mizu here, my guess is that Mizu isn't in any danger of Taigen thinking she's female. Even when I watched the show for the first time, I assumed that Taigen had seen Mizu out of her clothes here, and that he thought nothing of it.

Eat your heart out, Li Shang (Mulan 1998). I actually do think that this scene is a direct and purposeful side-eye to that movie, lol

There's obviously some nuance to how "severe" being mixed race is compared to how "severe" being a woman is for Mizu:

After all, Swordfather can't bear to listen to Mizu confess to being a woman.

So a Japanese man can go wherever he wants, whenever he wants in BES. A Japanese woman has limited options: marriage, religion, or a brothel. A mixed-race man is an eyesore in this story. A mixed-race woman is a death sentence.

May as well eliminate the female aspect, and do what you can about the mixed-race aspect. Because that's just realistic.

Meaning Mizu can avoid the strictures Edo society places on women. But she can't avoid the repercussions that come with being mixed race. And I truly don't think that it's just because "there's no brown contacts yet."

#blue eye samurai #mizu #racism #bes #I am truly disappointed that we didnt get absolute confirmation that Taigen saw Mizus bound chest and just didnt think it was a big deal #but I still think that scene is making a point #again I dont think most people take the glasses jokes seriously #but its been bothering me ever since I first saw them #I really dont think Mizu just looks like a 100 percent Japanese person...... with blue eyes #and I bet that will be made even more obvious when she goes to London where Im sure she will meet plenty of people #who are more than happy to point out their observations to her #also I ran out of room in this post to go into it but this is also what made Mizus marriage an absolutely doomed prospect #Mikio talks about wanting to find the right creature for his lord and well... a mixed race woman is the right creature huh #he just needed a little push imo #getting kind of sad at the thought that Ringo is the only person in Mizus life who knows her whole identity AND accepts it wholly

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lesbaurinkos · 3 months

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Please tell us about looking up catboys on a lodestone and what is a graha and please as many pictures as you want and also is any of it gay i am very interested 🙏🙏

CRACKS MY KNUCKLES this is gonna be a long ramble because i have a LOT to say. as a passionate xiv player and such ^_^ god im gonna put a read more actually because this is gonna be so long. whoopsie!

so FIRST OF ALL g'raha tia is a much-beloved ffxiv character (voiced by jonathan bailey. like from bridgerton. that jonathan bailey. isnt that incredible) look at him. here he is. phil is so incredibly real

he's a fan favorite for a reason he is so lovely and sweet and incredibly self-sacrificing and during my favorite story expansion, shadowbringers, we meet him as the crystal exarch- a leader of a dying world who has summoned us to help because we are that world's last hope. and his grand plan to save said world is ultimately to sacrifice himself. he's very depressed and very mysterious and slowly dying because his life force is tied to the crystal tower where he resides, which is what grants him power to keep going but is slowly crystallizing him, and he's just a very deeply tragic character at first... but then at the end of shadowbringers he LIVES! he has a new lease on life! and he didn't expect to ever get that far! so afterwards he's just so deeply earnest and excited about everything and it's so cute... so sweet... i love u graha <3 and this catboy is like gay as hell like he is soooo blatantly in love with the player character. who, like, officially in trailers and stuff, the default player character meteor, is a man. gayass cat!! anyway here's the crystal exarch figurine, which dnp own, and which i am jealous of them for. but it makes me smile that they have it. bc i love g'raha

NOW ANYWAY. DAN AND PHIL'S CATBOYS!

every ffxiv player character is displayed on this website called the lodestone, which has like community stuff and worldwide rankings and such. just like a standard mmorpg hub. and you can look up character profiles on there if youre curious, say, what mounts they have (cause in xiv you can get a whole bunch of different mounts to ride around on, from a massive shiba inu to a t-rex to the classic chocobo you are given at the start of the game to, like, actual cars and motorbikes) or what minions they might have (you can pick a little minion to follow you around in the game! just for like cute little aesthetic purposes. and they have minions of like cute little creatures, bosses you can fight, characters in the game, etc-- for example the minion iiii always have out to follow my catgirl around the world is a mini version of my favorite character y'shtola, who is a goth catgirl who is absolutely everything to me. wife of all time. she has the craziest lesbian dynamic with this goth butch named zero who you meet late in the story and who is SO everything as well. that's not the point. ANYHOW!) (also when phil said in the rating your favs video that if you play a cat in ffxiv youre definitely gay he was literally so fucking right. there are a bunch of different races to choose from, you can be elves, you can be bunny people, you can be dragon people, etc, but well. i play as a cat. they play as cats. fork. kitchen)

ANYHOW. so when phil said recently that his catboy was named MIKO STRIKER i was like "omg... i have GOT to go search him up on the lodestone and see what job he plays and how far he's gone in the story and such" and hereeee is his profile:

31st sun of the 1st astral moon does translate to january 30th bc the ffxiv calendar is offset by a day. anyway the fact phil plays summoner is both so endearing and makes so much sense to me bc it's pretty well-known as the easiest dps class to play in the whole game. and i also started out playing summoner when i started!! and part of the summoner job is, well, summoning these magical creatures called carbuncles:

isnt this thing cute... i love carbys. i named mine cherry tomato. im sure his is called susan or something ^_^ so delighted by the summoner rep. anyway then i went to look at his minions & mounts cause certain parts of the story award certain minions & mounts and i was like well i GOTTA know if dan and phil have finished endwalker (the most recent, emotionally devastating story expansion) (they have not, btw. both of their catboys are in the gear you get RIGHT before embarking on the final and MOST emotionally devastating leg of the story, but they don't have the mount and minion you get from FINISHING IT, which is killing me sooo bad. you guys.... go play the end of the story.... go cry.... it made me cry for like 7 hours nonstop it was so emotionally devastating. go do it lads)

so yeah phil does lack the venat minion and argos mount which you get from finishing endwalker. but he DOES have this cute carbuncle mount which you have to buy with real money mind you!! and they come in 3 colors on the shop. this is phil's. made me smile :)

and well after looking at phil's profile i was like "of course he doesn't play any other classes. yeah that makes sense. BUT i wonder about dan. where is his catboy" but without a name i couldn't find his profile without insane digging or something so i forgot about it UNTIL i was rewatching wdapteo sometime after christmas and i got to THIS picture:

and the thing is that dan's catboy here is wearing job-exclusive gear. only people who play the monk class can wear that outfit there. my first thought was "what the fuck is wrong with him monk is the most baffling job on the entire planet" my second thought was "yeah ok of COURSE he plays monk" my THIRD thought was "wait. i can just look up catboy monks on the server miko is on then. i can totally go look at dan's catboy" and did so and within like five seconds arrived at D'HASH TIA here ^_^

which like. definitely dan's catboy given the pictures we've seen of him. and the ffxiv calendar, again, is offset by a day, so the birthday IS june 11. bingo ^_^

and what is so special to me about this is that dan's catboy has a "canon" name while phil's absolutely does not-- sun seeker miquo'te (cat people) have clan names and then titles, basically, so a canon sun seeker male name would be like. letter of the clan, apostrophe, name, then "tia" at the end which is just a title for young males (like dearest g'raha tia). so yknow. d'hash tia is a proper canon name while also being so incredibly dan to pick, methinks. i love it

(and then i was going thru a lot and rewatched the japhan 2019 instagram stories and realized i didnt need to go thru so much because we've actually known theyre monk and summoner players since 2019. they went to the ffxiv cafe. they got job-specific drinks. for their fucking jobs. dan got the monk drink. phil got the summoner drink. it was always right there. theyre so funny)

i do think it's so funny that neither of them have ever played another job in all their years of playing ffxiv. u guys there are so many jobs out there..... dan go unlock dark knight i know you would love the job story i know it in my heart...... but no they have stuck to their guns they have stuck to their classes all this time. it's beautiful to me

anyway d'hash tia's minions and mounts mostly match miko striker's which makes a lot of sense to me bc i imagine they probably play most of xiv together

BUT the carbuncle mount d'hash has is the RED ONE. which sent me through every single stage of emotions ever.... you have to buy those mounts with real money.... and they bought matching ones.......... ridiculous. ridiculous of them.

AND. dan's catboy also has the fat moogle mount. this beautiful thing right here

which is another mount that costs real money to buy..... and it's a two-seater................ more likely than not he's flown the both of them around in this thing................... i need everyone to know this information. it's so important. to our society.

(also as an aside. the story they told in wdapteo about going to a gay bar in xiv. i cant state enough how real they were for that. bc roleplay venues are insanely common ingame and its so fucking funny and ive always wanted to go to one just out of sheer curiosity but if anyone ever spoke to me i would instantly log the fuck out. so the fact they did just that and then got flirted with by someone and instantly logged out.... like that's it. that's the exact experience. it's so beautiful)

(as another aside. xiv is real gay i prommy. and looking at their minions lets me know they've also done my favorite raid series, eden, which is essentially. two main characters, thancred and urianger, and their adopted daughter ryne who they CANONICALLY RAISED TOGETHER they are LITERALLY HER FATHERS, work to save the world and meet this goth girl named gaia that ryne falls in love with and like. ryne and gaia are blatantly meant to be canon to the point square enix made a spinoff game where characters very clearly based off them actually ARE together. it's adorable. little baby prep/goth lesbians. i hope dnp love them as much as i do. also im SO sure dan is a thancred fan honestly bc he seems right up dan's alley. anyhow look! arent they cute!)

TLDR i am such a massive fan of dip and pip's xiv catboys and i need the world to know that they bought matching mounts bc it's SO important to me. and ive gone on great journeys here. amen.

#IM SORRY THAT THIS IS SO SO INCREDIBLY LONG BUT THERE IS MUCH TO BE SAID!!!#i NEED them to talk about ffxiv more i need to know more of their thoughts i GOTTA!!!#i have my strong suspicions about dan's favorite characters. not just thancred... he MUST love emet-selch. danny give me confirmation here #it's so sad that neither of them have the tonberry minion but it IS expensive on the market board... dnp i have plenty of gil i will fund u #i will get u both tonberry minions.... i will.....#i must make them unlock other jobs. dan and phil pls go unlock fisher... go fishing. it's one of xiv's greatest joys #ANYWAY IM SORRY THAT THIS IS PROBABLY ABSOLUTE WORD SALAD. THERE IS A LOT OF PASSION. IN MY HEART. GODBLESS!!#THANK U FOR COMING TO MY TED TALK <3 #ask #calvinahobbes #dnp

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