#(like wish n°1 for me is them just FUCKING. AKNOWLEDGING OR GOD FORBID *CALLING* EACH OTHER FATHER AND SON AT SOME POINT)

[scalproie]

tekken 8 tells us that one of the reason jin hates kazuya so much was because he saw his past self in his father's actions, so hiding behind the general "kaz is a bad guy and we must stop him at all cost" sentiment is jin's general brand of self-hatred. Reaffirming he is not his father is the first step jin takes to accept himself.

(That whole thing is also the main reason behind my hc/theory as to why devil jin and kazuya are dressed so much alike in their main t8 outfits: in his storymode subconsious confrontation, when jin first encounters devil jin and is still rejecting him/who he is, dj is wearing that heavy coat which is similar in silhouette to kaz's, and the more jin confront dj (or vice-versa really), dj's clothes change going from his first outfit from t3 to eventually wearing jin's t8 clothes when the latter realizes they are one and the same and accepts him as part of himself, if not wholly himself all along.)

ANYWAY to go back to the boys' feelings on each other: so jin (in t8) hates kaz bc he saw himself in him and also bc kaz is a certified asshole™️, but even if we take it in consideration and if we look at past games... jin's hatred toward kaz has never been explicitly said to be a direct one:

some games like pxz try to explain jin's hatred of kaz bc kaz was absent for most of his life (jin himself could consider him a deadbeat but kaz was fucking dead dont call him that in my presence) (bloodline does this too to an extant but jin was mostly neutral and curious about his absent father). That's the most direct feelings jin has toward kaz, but its not 100% canon.

the other main source of hatred of jin toward kaz is bc jin hates the entire mishima family and. thats not kaz's fault (mostly), its the impact of what heihachi did to jin in t3 that had him give up entirely on half of his bloodline, kaz didnt help those feelings tbh bc he was the other main carrier of the devil gene that was plagueing jin's life at the time but jin had made peace with it as of t8

the endings of t4 (the ONLY CANONICAL FATHER & SONS INTERACTIONS prior to t8 btfw) are also kinda vague. "Kaz" was tormenting jin in his sleep for. some reasons I guess? And that was enough for jin to want him dead, on top of the other reasons above? Sure, we know kaz's a bastard but before properly meeting the man, its not like jin knew much about how kaz is enough to warrant downright murderous hatred. And as for kaz, it was pre-retcon so it was still devil in control, when kaz took control the only thing he did was yell at jin to wake up and fight, and even if devil WAS kaz... well the offense wasnt that hard yknow. AND kaz still gasped in shock when he saw jin chained up so. Idk.

Anyway thats it for jin toward kaz, as for kaz toward jin, yeah we know kaz never hated jin, he never really minded jin at all ngl. Only moment I can think of when kaz cared™️ was when jin presented the threat of getting a power to rival his own, and at the very end of their final fight when jin refused to go down in classic mishima perseverance and kaz was experiencing genuine frustration. In the "bad" ending you can tell hes had enough of him bc he resorted to the cliff tossing to fully get rid of jin.

but thats not canon, yknow whats canon tho? Kaz talking about killing whoever gets on his way or whoever tries to control him will suffer and then he just fucking walks away from jin when hes down.

(I know the meta reason was just so jin rising back up and turning the mishima mantra on his father would be so cool BUT. they still made kaz walk away. We know how a hateful kaz who wants to finish the job looks like and it did not look like how he fought jin)

Anyway jin accepted himself and the devil gene and his mishima heritage, in a perfect world I wouldve had him try to "extand a hand" to his father bc if he (and everyone else) could forgive himself for all the stuff he did, then surely he could do the same for his dad who is LITERALLY the same as him... but I understand why they didnt bc neither of them are there yet (i mean jin just forgave himself and kaz 100% had no intention of self-reflecting or god forbid changing his ways)

So if jin keeps hating kaz on a quote unquote "personal" it would be EXTREMELY hypocritical of him so I hope he just views his father more neutrally now, esp if he just has to stop him from trying some new world domination shit. And as for kaz, well we know the man values power and i think being beaten but NOT killed afterward would be new to him (not counting t4, it doesnt count when its heihachi doing it, even if he took kaz to jin, he 100% had bad plans in mind for both of them) so I think he should at least CONSIDER jin now.

and idk, even if the dynamic now is "only I can defeat my dad/my son" theres still SOME protectiveness in there yknow?

anyway all of that to say tl;dr theyre in the perfect headspace to get a beer right now

my ultimate tekken guilty pleasure™️ is wanting to see more instances of kazuya and jin just. getting along