#anyway sorry. i'm back to work after a prolonged sick leave

[travellingseal]

why does my job make me feel like an idiot 24/7?

[catboyebooks]

sorry for the prolonged pause — in my defense i have a podcast now & have been busy with that the past week

anyway. i worry that when i talk about this i'm going to sound like i have shipper brainrot, but at the same time i've already said that Komahina Real, Actually and i don't know what's stopping me from saying it again, especially after a scene like this. this is pretty undeniably homoerotic. not only is komaeda tied up, his whole plan in sending koizumi back to remake his breakfast was that she'd get sick of catering to him and pawn the task off on hinata (he'd have been counting on his luck to ensure it was hinata — we haven't seen his luck cycle in action much yet, but given everything we learn about it later and how he tends to "use" his "talent" it's obvious he was banking on this). that's a big part of why he looks so happy when hinata shows up: the plan worked. also now he thinks hinata is going to feed him by hand, and i'm willing to bet the specific breakfast requests figured into this. easier to have someone hand-feed you toast than rice. (i do not know if he specifically requested the milk but i wouldn't put it past him. i can see what the idea might have been there.) i would like to also point out that this fits neatly into a general pattern with komaeda, which is that he's very bad at flirting. he clearly wanted this opportunity to be a little bit gay with the boybestie and instead he shot himself in the foot by also using it as an opportunity to talk about why he thinks the killing game is actually good, which caused hinata to leave abruptly (he most likely would have stayed to ensure komaeda ate otherwise, as he's already raised concern previously about making sure komaeda is still getting fed while tied up). it's like he can't stop himself from talking about his philosophy on hope / why bad things are good actually and in fact given his FTD this is probably literally the case.

so i don't think any of the above is really in question or open to too much interpretation, because we do know for sure how komaeda feels about hinata. as per usual, hinata's side of it is left ambiguous; however, he has a notably strong reaction to this entire scene from the very beginning of it, and i think it's pretty easy to read this as him having a "hope this doesn't awaken anything in me" moment. i mean, this is explicitly the case in that he hopes what komaeda said about how they should all play twilight syndrome murder mystery doesn't influence him to actually play it (i think it might anyway, iirc), but also... he doesn't actually object to the idea of feeding komaeda when he's tied up, either out loud or in his narration. he's taken aback / flustered (stammers a little) when komaeda asks about being fed, but doesn't refuse nor say anything regarding how he feels about the idea. the "oh, i get it" line is his only real comment on it. it's komaeda who changes the subject (again, shooting himself in the foot lol). of course, hinata's side of this entire relationship dynamic is ambiguous as to whether he reciprocates komaeda's feelings, and i wanna make clear that this is the point. it's up to the player how to read this, just as it's up to the player to choose whether to spend free time with komaeda at all, and i do think it's much less plausible that hinata would actually be down to hand-feed komaeda his breakfast if he hasn't even hung out with him before. that being said we all know which choice i made.

also i wanna say more about the line i quoted previously where hinata mentally comments on how it's like komaeda is filling the room with poison when he talks (again, this is before komaeda has said much of anything beyond greeting him and telling him to relax). obviously he's right to be apprehensive, because komaeda has already proven himself very effective at manipulating the others with his words, and he's further demonstrated that he is particularly good at getting under hinata's skin. this is exactly why he got tied up in the first place, and why no one wanted to untie him. they're worried that listening to him talk &/or just being around him will be... well, unlucky for them. gundam also had that line earlier about how komaeda is cursed. they don't know much about his luck cycle but they're already treating him like a bad luck charm, and they're basically correct. think that's of interest to note.

i was going to comment on the voice acting in this scene (it's fully voiced, which i do consider an important factor in how this all reads) but i don't know if i have anything normal to say about it. thank you again megumi ogata i guess

wow. okay. that was a lot.