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komoryriku · 4 years

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Queering KH: Part 2

How to Queer this Anime Game? By me, an American nerd lol

Pictured: Dream. Drop. Distance. Sequel. 8)))

What is Queering

I’m so excited to talk about this okay this is literally the only fun thing I get to do as an English major anymore lmao.

“Queering a text” is the academic term for taking a given text and extracting the queer subtext of it, or applying a queer reading to it. It is taking a piece of literature, film, or art and reading into it for the gay coding. It is an especially important tool for reading old literature written during periods of extreme homosexual oppression, wherein the author would be forced to hide hints of homosexuality under layers and layers of superficial text.

Pictured: Sora and Riku battling Ursula as she means to wreck their ship, mirroring the disaster that Sora’s friends Eric and Ariel (lovers) faced at sea.

As a post-structuralist, I am also here to inform you that every text is made up of intertextual influence. This means whether the JK Rowlings of the world intended it or not, their characters may well be queer coded because of the unconscious influence of homoerotic customs in our culture that have permeated the text. It’s why people speculated that Newt Scamander was gay, because he showed little interest in Tina and preferred to focus on his beasts, which is not normative for a male protagonist in straight media. People likewise considered that Merida from Pixar’s Brave might be gay, because she had no interest in dating men and wanted to live a wild lifestyle traditionally associated with masuculinity, things that are pretty in line with lesbian coding. And let me tell you, lgbt claimed Queen Elsa IMMEDIATELY for very good reason. Pretty much everything about her journey, purposefully or not, makes for an strikingly overt gay metaphor. Let it Go is a coming out song for a woman suffocating under normativity all her life, deal with it.

Same, Elsa.

Oh whoops I accidentally pasted this picture of Riku here.

Keep Cultural Distinctions in Mind

Something else important I want to point out is that different cultures are- different lol. They are going to vary. What is queer coding here is not necessarily queer coding in Japan. A man presenting femininely in American media would certainly get him coded as gay. A bishonen in an anime though? Not so much. Men bathing together in Japan is common practice so that would mean nothing gay over there. In America however, you have things like this vine.

In which 2 dudes are chilling as far away as possible from each other in a hot tub to prove they are not gay lol.

So when I say the male members of Organization XIII bathe together, it means literally nothing in a Japanese context.

But let me tell you this: homosexual mlm tend to enjoy bathing with other dudes. Sexual attraction is sexual attraction no matter where you go. So how would you queer code a Japanese character as gay in a hot tub context?

By American logic, if the straight thing to do is sit 5 feet apart in a hot tub, then the inverse, the gay thing to do, would be 2 men sitting very close together in a hot tub. So if I were to code 2 American male characters as gay in a hot tub context, that is what I would do. But if I really wanted to hammer it home, I would ALSO have them blushing so there is no straight explanation for their closeness.

And for a Japanese character, for whom bathing with men might well mean nothing, I’d definitely have them physically blush, so that you know it does NOT just “mean nothing” to him...

Oh look at that. Amano went out of her way to draw Roxas blushing at the concept of bathing with men. So when I say “the members of Orginization XIII bathe together”, you know that means something to Roxas, cuz the coding tells us so. There are indeed certain ways you can depict a shonen being either interested in or at least affected by that idea. You just have to mind those codes telling you what the character really feels, especially when they can’t really say it.

Speaking of blushes, Amano uses them a lot.

They’re a pretty effective tool for hiding gay coding into your characters cuz an anime character might blush for any number of reasons, from being flustered by their crush,

to being flustered because they don’t have a crush.

If you’ve ever translated Japanese media, (I haven’t, but I have friends who do), you know that Japanese is very vague which means you need the whole context to properly understand a scene. It’s a similar situation with queer coding. Consider this scene of Roxas blushing.

If Roxas felt positively about the insinuation that he and Xion are holding hands, how might one code this? Well, if he’s feeling really excited about it in a positive way, you might draw him smiling or expressing flattery on his blushing face. However, Roxas reacts negatively, with a frown on his blushing face. This insinuates he does not like this idea at all, especially since he also shuts it down right away in his dialogue.

But you might say “Well how do we know he isn’t just shy?” to which I say- well we can’t know. That’s the whole point of queer coding in literature. It is to say a character is queer but without actually saying it, to give plausible deniability for safety. It is to suggest a character is queer but without any confirmation. It does not mean that the character isn’t queer, however. It just means it cannot be confirmed by the text alone. However, a bold text that is very determined to have hidden queer characters without any straight explanations, will provide coding that has very little or no straight explanation.

Back to the Roxas and Xion dialogue^. This scene alone cannot confirm or deny anything. As I explained however, the suggestion that Roxas is not straight IS there. Considering the whole context, also, this scene is another piece of “evidence” to add to the pile of suggestions that Roxas isn’t straight. This coupled with the bathing panel, and this panel of him admiring Axel, his male mentor, with deep flattery during his first day of adventuring, all exist.

Roxas does not express negative sentiments in his blushing at men, nor does he say anything dismissive to them. When he blushes at Xion’s comment, however, it is with a negative reaction. Consider also that if the author wanted Roxas to appear straight, she would present them in ways that allude to straightness and NOT in ways that allude to queerness. Roxas would not do suggestively queer things like blush in flattery at Axel calling him special and then dismiss Xion’s suggestion that they are holding hands if he were simply coded as straight. Queering a text sometimes requires a lot of critical thought like this. This is because again, these things are hidden, and sometimes hidden really well so that unsuspecting straight people will not even consider the queer suggestions. This is one of the advantages Nomura has in his favor with Kingdom Hearts: by making it so convoluted, the gay text can be forward, strong, and blatant but remain undetected by straight powers. This keeps the series safe from oppressive scrutiny. Characters like Namine and Xion can exist as literal illustrations of compulsory-heterosexuality. And people will still think Sora and Riku are straight.

Even if I don’t know all the queer codes Japanese culture might specifically have, (and I do not, I do not live in Japan nor have any semblance of what that is like beyond what my friends who have lived there can tell me, and what I can research while sitting in my pajamas in Kentucky lol), there are certain things that are rather universal. Blushing, physical contact, lingering gazes, etc etc. Attraction is attraction and certain body language and other physical symbols will translate and will travel. So that’s the majority of what I will have to focus on.

But I do want you to know that rainbows are still gay in Japan.

Finally I also want to express that cultural intermingling is a thing. We do not live in bubbles, especially with the internet. Our cultures affect each other ALL the time. Although Kingdom Hearts is primarily a Japanese series, it is consciously tailored to appeal to both America and Japan. This is by design given the idea was to marry a Japanese hit like Final Fantasy with an American phenomenon like Disney’s media. This is why they take special care in minding the English translations and dubbing of the KH games (when they are able to do so, mistakes are still very often made and i hate it cuz they’re usually heterosexual-agenda-pushing “mistakes” =~=). The games are so intimately tied to both the Japanese and American cultures they are derived from which is part of why accurate translations are so important. And given what they would mean for queer audiences, what they represent for queer people makes accurate translations even MORE important. Some things get quite lost in translation, and some things are grossly added in translation. We will discuss that down the line...

A brief aside that I implore you to ignore:

On the subject of Roxas not being straight, I have heard of one really fun queer motif in Japanese media which is ”ryoutoutsukai (両刀使い)”, “the two sword fencer”: the dual wielding bisexual. Now- I do not necessarily think this is a means of coding Roxas as bisexual, and beyond that, from what I’ve heard in my research on bisexuality in Japan, certain age groups don’t even believe in bisexuality there. However, a love of more than one gender exists no matter who is willing to acknowledge it or not, and this motif is there. And Promisekeeper and Oblivion do rather fit the bill of representing homosexuality (Oblivion/Soriku) and heteronormativity (Promisekeeper/Sora and his childhood friend Kairi). So- while i don’t think it means anything, this fun idea is there~ I will say, however, that as far as I can tell, Nomura and his staff know exactly what they’re doing with their queer coding and are well connected to it in both cultures. So I mean- if any anime team would know bisexuality exists and how to code it, I firmly believe the KH team would, so. There is some food for thought for you~

Get ready for part 3, I hope you like TWEWY~ B)

#kingdom hearts #kh #soriku #sora kh #roxas #riku kh

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didsomeonesayventus · 7 years

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idk no one really liked my previous story ideas post but IM MAKING ANOTHER LEMME TELL U ABOUT NEXT GEN FIC IDEAS:

this is about 18 years after a rly fuckin weird KH3 just gonna establish that

SO WHO ARE THE PARENTS AND WHAT OF PEOPLE WHO AREN’T u ask

where Ven and Riku became boyfriends because tfw your sources of hurt and pain are similar and all u wanna do is sleep. Namine was surrogate mom (Ven was biological dad) of their kiddo Alba who’s 15 and a half (Ven is papa and Riku is dad for those concerned)

lil nort got to have a redemption arc and to stay thru MAGIC~* and hooked up with kairi and has two kids, Dysmas is the eldest at 15 followed by Eiru at 14

Terra and Aqua had Shiva shortly after the events of KH3 (like a year or so) and she’s 17.

Roxas and Namine had Rose (or Rosie if u want) quite late compared to the others and she’s 10

Sora’s single because he doesn’t feel a particular need for intimate, romantic love yet

Vanitas and Xion have hooked up but both kinda go “ew” at the prospect of children

Isa and Lea are doing really gay shit as far away from Keyblade shenanigans as possible

tho besides the above four everyone generally keeps in touch as possible and as for ILVX they check in every now and then (Van continues to be a loner but Rox and the other members of team “done with universal responsibility” hang out for ice cream like every two weeks or so)

every year there’s a “MAN FUCKING REMEMBER WHEN WE WERE KIDS WHO DEFEATED A MADMAN” anniversary party and it’s been a great time to catch up 100% and just reflect on oldness

Sora loves bringing paopu wine to it each year when/after they all become legal drinkers just to make sure everyone stays in touch and there’s always a toast to see each other next year

it’s a big fun party y’all it lit

King Mickey and Queen Minnie and Donald and Goofy have all become the official, if honorary, best grandparents ever to all the kids.

King Mickey made a playground in the garden and added a playroom to the castle for rainy days okay he loves the new kids and is always very sad when they grow taller than him but all the kids develop a habit of kneeling around him almost instantly after they get too tall

but anyways all the kids are acquainted with each other thru frequent playdates with each other

playdates because the grown ups frequently have “hey this is a weird thing” reports to share so there’s no “oh yeah this person was being evil we just lost track of him I mean whatever”

Shiva and Alba already have Keyblades and training with them, and Alba has Keyblade Armor while Shiva is en route to taking a Mark of Mastery exam from her parents Masters

Sora likes to take the kids on rides with the Highwind despite the fact it’s growing very vintage over time and he hopes to teach them how to pilot gummi ships with it

Dysmas is a glory-seeker if only because he’s heard so many stories about his family that he feels really inadequate and takes after his mom. No Keyblade and it sucks(tm)

Alba is a very silent kid he’s very much like Riku at first but when he warms up to you he’s very Ventus. Keyblade and it breaks papa’s heart </3

Shiva has the grace and composure of her mom until challenged then she goes 0 to 1000 real fast. Also is a total Mom Friend(tm)

Rose is a sweetie pie and the youngest and thus the most naive and also tends to follow the older kids blindly. Eiru has an affinity for her especially. No keyblade

Eiru is silent sassmaster who takes after her dad and while she don’t have a Keyblade Xeha tutors her in magic and is a smart enough kid to do independent study

Something that really kickstarts the plot is the five taking a joyride while the parents are having a meeting and it’s great until their hearts- incredibly strong and in Alba and Shiva’s cases Keyblade wielding -draw in Heartless that they can’t handle

parents to rescue ofc but there is anger and grounding also

ENTERING PLOT POINTS SUBJECT TO CHANGE

though this is yet to be fully decided Eiru may become the main antagonist for two motives:

a) Eiru feels she can do better than her parents and save the worlds by smashing them back together into one World but this kinda means a lot of things going badly that she doesn’t realize nor cares about because if she can make a New Age of Fairytales it’s what’ll be good for the worlds

b) Eiru basically becomes a serial killer because she feels the Keyblade causes too much strife and pain to let exist any longer and ends up trying to off everyone she knows with a Keyblade to stop the suffering and maybe eventually end up with a Heirs of Fate situation where only the kids are around to put a stop to things

I can’t exactly pinpoint how a lil girl like her would be able to kill keyblade masters but maybe she gets her mitts on Marluxia’s Doom/Death spell

vote now on ur phones what should happen

either way there is Pressure(tm) and she doesn’t deal w/ it well

Xeha in particular takes it hard because he saw “making a me 2.0″ from a mile away and it really delayed his decision to have kids and it hurts him a lot to see it happened even if he tried to avoid it

he basically just up and leaves eventually and becomes Disappeared Dad Classic(tm)

may or may not be caused by Ven being the sacrificial lion to establish things are going bad again and everything just kinda collapsing (but then again implications of killin ur gays and how much angst is too much angst #givevenabreak2k17)

before they know it’s Eiru there’s a lot of side-eyeing Xeha anyways cuz “gee who do we know who’s dangerous and knows where we are and is good at predicting where we are aND USED TO BE EVIL” to which Kairi is Offended(tm)

but when they do find out it’s Eiru there’s a lot of quiet and unsettledness because everyone just kinda goes “shit we made our own monster here” and have Bad Feelings(tm) about killing a minor and Alba REFUSES to hang out with the brother of the girl who killed papa

like IDK I want this fic to explore legacy and the impacts having parents like the KH crew would be like and what a new generation would behave like what ideas they would bring that’s the most I got going on

#Katie rambles #Katie writes #I wrote way too much omg

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