#i love talking about a dead fandom (unironic please give me a reason to) years after the fact

[septembersghost]

"i feel like people really desperately want to put female characters into boxes and get frustrated when it can't be done" it's been years but you're reigniting my fixation so please talk about this wrt norma bates

norma is everything a Strong Female Character™ is not supposed to be. she's emotional to the point of hysteria, she's irrational and reckless, she's beautiful and her beauty is commented upon and coveted and admired in unhealthy, obsessive (even territorial) ways, she is a survivor of extreme abuse and sexual assault and she does not respond the way "good" survivors are supposed to respond - it doesn't make her kinder or stronger, she's kind and strong on her own, but it has nothing to do with the horrors she's suffered, which have made her traumatized, reactive, and fearful, and also have taught her she can use her body and her powers of emotional persuasion to manipulate men when she has to, even though she hates herself for it and is disgusted by it. men crowd around her and grasp at her and are continually connected to her. norman, dylan, alex, caleb...and those are only the ones we spend the most time with...she can't get away from what they want from her, how they perceive her, the pedestal they put her on that she didn't ask for, the desire they have for her to be their ever-present angel and caregiver and lover and forgiver and martyr, shifting depending on the situation.

(i reblogged a post a while back about how the narrative never really moralizes about how "bad" the actions of the characters are, and that's vital in understanding it too.)

she is defined by her role as a mother. it's unavoidable. she knows she whittles herself down in this ("parents do not have needs. you ever read the book The Giving Tree? it's about a tree, and this kid keeps coming and taking stuff from it his whole life, until there's nothing left but a stump. and then the kid sits on the stump. that's being a parent" norma, baby. no. you're still allowed to need things!). she struggles with some real internalized misogyny and messed up jealousy issues and a controlling streak. she breaks down in front of people ("welcome to the world ladies! there are axe murderers and whores stuffed under every rug, so your kids better read up on it and get educated, because that's what life is. it's a cesspool you claw and scratch and fight to swim out of, but you never get to the top!"), she does her very best to be hopeful, sometimes to the point of living in denial ("it's all gonna be good"/"I had this dream when I was little, of a home where the door was open and friends could come and go, and stay for dinner and talk, and everything would be lovely"), and at the same time gets disoriented by despair ("no one's gonna help us, norman, no one's ever helped us"/"maybe fate wins here..."). she unfairly shuts out her older son, and he doesn't understand why or what his presence constantly reminds her of until he's grown, and though they love one another, they can never quite mend. she coddles and overly shields and protects and ferociously loves her younger son, to the point where they are unfathomably codependent, and he feels that she's the only person who could matter to him in the world, but also resents her hold on him and is stifled by it. she judges his friendships/connections and he begrudges her interference, but he doesn't want her involved with anyone else either and views outsiders with suspicion and possessiveness. he also, you know, disassociates and becomes a dangerous (and promiscuous, femme fatale-like) image of her. she is never safe and she lives in continual terror - even of her precious son, because she knows somewhere in him is a simmering hazard, though she tries her very best to deny and suppress and even reshape it. she is overly intimate with him emotionally (and physically on occasion, i wouldn't classify it in an abusive way, just too close of one, though that stems from her own history of abuse), trying to make him into the one man she can trust, rely on, the one who will always stay and will protect her, while also keeping him as her innocent, her baby. she's not neglectful (she's overly attentive, if anything), but her inability to face how severe his illness is and assess the care he needs because she is frightened of losing him is ruinous. she tries with everything she has, to the bone, to be a good mother for him, and coming from her background, with nothing to model that on, it's courageous of her. their extremely abnormal relationship is the beating heart of the story in beautiful and terrible ways.

she brutally kills a man (he deserves it, but still), and is complicit in covering up other murders, and when she realizes her son is capable of doing harm, she does not initially do the right thing and get him help or turn him in, she hides it. when she does eventually get him help, it's too late, and she concedes to letting him out early, and it quite literally gets her killed. (she gets alex to marry her for his insurance and then they wrap themselves up in their bubble of tremulous comfort and let their guards down and find a very real, if ephemeral, love, but it's still not enough to overcome.) she is, in short, a mess. she does not have it together. she does not make the right or reasonable choices. she does not balance her emotions or control her anger or hide her desires.

she is also warm, and compassionate, and funny, and brave, and talented, and a freakin' warrior. she is caring and luminous and immeasurable in her capacity for love. she makes every space brighter, she brings home along with her. everyone who meets her is infatuated and admiring of her because she has a uniquely special spark in her soul, and it can't be resisted. she says once in dejection, "i'm not educated, or polished, or nice, i'm nothin'," but that couldn't be further from the truth. she is a light in the dark and affecting to all around her. she's graceful and sweet. in a softer world, one where she hadn't been so hurt and hindered, she would be nothing but wonder and sunshine and resilience. in a softer world, her son wouldn't ever have deteriorated or split like he did, or harmed anyone, especially not her.

she cooks, she sews, she nurtures, she weeps. she dresses herself up. she is every feminine thing we're not supposed to be, if classifications are divided into "strong" and "not strong," she is every emotion we're not supposed to display, every flaw we're supposed to hide, all the things that make a woman "too much" - too broken, too angry, too ashamed, too giving, too tender, too loving. too alive. she is so, so vibrantly alive. she is complicated and awful and wonderful and real. she feels real because they never dull her emotions or shave down her edges. she is everything she is, to her last breath. it's no wonder she has a gravitational pull. it's no wonder romero, despite his resistance, falls so persistently, poignantly in love with her. it's no wonder norman cannot exist without her, has to conjure a version of her that will never match the real thing, never be the real thing, because she is half his soul, and he is in an abyss without her. she is the cord bound to his heart. losing her is akin to losing the sun.

she is not a heroine, strictly speaking, and yet she somehow is (she's nowhere close to a villain). she's just...this astonishingly whole person. astoundingly damaged, but perseverant. it's...norman's eulogy. as shattered as he is himself, as incapable as he is of grasping reality in the moment, what he says is true to him and thus the story. the most wonderful person who ever lived. she was just beautiful beyond words...radiant...half queen, half little girl. she had an innocence to her that illuminated everything that she did, everything that she touched, every word that she said. she was like a miracle. what chick says is true. she was a lovely woman. too lovely for this world. it'll be a darker place without her. it's shelby (evil bastard that he is), when he says, you're so beautiful, it just makes my heart hurt. it's caleb (all his unforgivable sins notwithstanding), saying, to my sister, who has always been like the sun in a cold universe. it's romero, who wants so badly to be her savior even though he has blood on his own hands and cannot possibly achieve such a thing, saying, i love you, i'll always love you, whether you're here or not, okay?

her death is treated with such care that it transcends its own horror in an unsettling way, and (like i said the other day) the image of that, of norman walking calmly through the house, sealing out the air, is seared into my memory. before the narrative even begins, we know she's going to end up a preserved body in a basement, her beauty frozen, her inner flame blown out, her physical self eerie and slowly withering away. her true soul gone, a dark mirror of her existing only in projection, in the schism of her son. we know this, and we still fall in love with her, and understand her, and sympathize with her, and, maybe most surprisingly, root for her. we desperately want her to live. she's dead from the beginning and there's still this irresistible urge to wish that she lives. but because we know she can't, she haunts everything. her heels clicking down the stairs, her music in the parlor, when she laughs and when she screams, her presence permeates each frame of story like lingering perfume. she is aching and adoring and doomed forever. a dream and a death. she is the ultimate ghost. you can't help but love her. no one can.

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 299: No Chains Left

Previously on BnHA: Horikoshi was all “and then AFO broke out all of the inmates from six other prisons and took a nap. well anyways, here’s the hospital angst.” Kacchan woke up two days later and was all, “WAIT BUT HOW ARE DEKU AND TODOROKI AND ALL OF THE OTHER CHARACTERS EXCEPT IIDA DOING” and then we cut to Shouto’s room where the other U.A. kids were sitting around being Mutually Traumatized and giving each other moral support and such. Everyone was alll, “...”, and then the rest of the Todofam showed up, INCLUDING POSSIBLY REI?! which, omg. The chapter ended with Kacchan STOMPING THROUGH THE HALLS all “WHADDYA MEAN DEKU HASN’T WOKEN UP YET”, dragging along Satou and Mineta behind him, fueled by the power of ALL OF THE FUCKS HE NOW GIVES. He gives so many fucks now you guys. This boy cares so much he can probably deduct it on his taxes.

Today on BnHA: SPEAKING OF PEOPLE WHO GIVE A LOT OF FUCKS, the story cuts abruptly to Hawks, freshly recovering from his near-death experience, and pondering the threads that have weaved the tapestry of his life and led him to this moment. Basically he grew up in poverty with his Jerk Dad and Jerk Mom until his dad got arrested one day and his mom sent him off to go Find Money Or Something, and so he rescued a busload of people and found himself a new career. Back in the present day, Hawks and Jeanist ride around town in Jeanist’s Jamborghini having awkward encounters with civilians in a country on the brink of social collapse, and visiting Hawks’s mother’s home. Hawks is all “I know from an outsider’s perspective it must look like my life currently sucks, but now that the HPSC is gone, my public image is shot, and my parents are finally out of my life, I’m actually feeling SURPRISINGLY GOOD.” Anyway so he’s gonna go meet up with Endeavor now, and p.s. this chapter was fucking fantastic though, damn.

oh my god?? is this Hawks narration?? something about him growing up watching the heroes on TV and thinking of them as fictional characters

okay I scrolled down a little bit more to see the rest of that “Keigo” panel, and wow

this is basically a shed. poor boy definitely grew up rough. let me tell you guys, I came in here ready for some BakuDeku shenanigans; I was not prepared for Hawks Flashback Angst. I AM HERE FOR IT, but also wow I gotta brace myself now lol

HELLO MISTER HAWKS’S JERK DAD, SIR

BnHA sure does have an array of Jerk Dads, doesn’t it. makes me appreciate characters like Masaru and JirouDad all the more for bucking the trend

anyway. so Horikoshi, you really thought that one itty bitty chapter of hospital catharsis would be enough to calm us all before you went right back to showing us child abuse huh. my god man can we rest

BABY HAWKS

swear to god this kid can’t be more than five or six, and yet he has this completely blank look on his face even with his dad looming over him being all threatening and shit. like he’s shut down his emotions to protect himself. imagine what has to happen to a child for him to have learned this at such a young age. fuck

AND MEANWHILE THIS GUY

don’t mingle with humans?? not “other” humans, just humans?? what is this implying here?? and also holy shit Hawks definitely didn’t inherit his looks from his dad orz

then again he doesn’t really bear much of a resemblance to his strung-out mom here either

omg omg omg. and this child is basically trapped here in this environment with these two people. this explains a SHITLOAD about Hawks’s personality though you guys. his ability to completely separate his real thoughts from the face he presents to the outside world. his pragmatic approach to analyzing and solving problems. his layers of emotional walls. turns out almost none of that came from the HPSC training -- that was all learned hands-on in his own personal do-or-die survival nightmare childhood!! oh, boy

and small wonder then that he latched on to Endeavor so strongly if he really is the one who brought down his dad and inadvertently saved him from this. also, just putting this out there, I know people are always talking about him and Dabi being foils, and I think it’s very interesting how Touya grew up in a household where he saw firsthand the dark side of hero society, and so ended up becoming a villain in order to bring it down. whereas young Keigo had almost the exact opposite experience, growing up experiencing the dark side of villain society and becoming a hero in order to bring about a world where no one else has to experience that. just. both of them are so determined not to become their fathers. some interesting parallels there

so Hawks was sort of an accident after his parents had “thanks for helping me not get caught after I killed that guy” sex, and now this little boy is growing up in squalor and being beaten by his father for things like Sitting In The Wrong Out-Of-The-Way Corner Trying Not To Be A Bother To Anybody. holy fuck. this is so rough to read through you guys

wait so does Jerk Dad have a an eyeball manipulation quirk?? because he doesn’t have the wings like his son, but wth are these things??

this presumably also means that Keigo has never been to school or anything either. he basically doesn’t exist. he thinks heroes are fictional characters, he doesn’t realize that they’re real people. these are people who could help him if he could escape and find them, but he doesn’t know, and they don’t know about him

OH MY GOD HE’S JUST SITTING IN HIS CORNER HUGGLING HIS ENDEAVOR PLUSH OH MY GOD

how could this child possibly have an anti-fandom when he’s done NOTHING WRONG HIS ENTIRE LIFE. huh. just explain that to me. lol I mean I’m not looking to pick a fight with anyone, but also, MAYBE I AM, idk?? this kid has gotten me all riled up lmao

anyways, Protect Keigo 2021, and thank you Horikoshi for these three very terrible pages. I am pleased to inform you that you’ve effectively gotten your point across and you may now commence saving this kid already

YAY

oh no, Keigo’s dumbass jerk dad tried to steal a car and the popo nabbed his ass and now his mom can’t just sit around neglecting her VERY YOUNG SON all day long, oh horrors. sorry lady my tiny violin is on backorder. just imagine that I’m playing a very sarcastic song on it for you

anyway so what are you gonna do now, abandon him? I can hardly imagine he’d be worse off, if anything it might be a near-instant improvement

LMAO HE’S ALL “WAIT WHAT ENDEAVOR’S A REAL FUCKING DUDE?!”

AND THEY SAY THAT A HERO CAN SAVE US~~~~ I’M NOT GONNA STAND HERE AND WAAAAAIT~~~~~ I’LL HOLD ONTO THE WINGS OF THE EAGLES, WATCH AS WE ALL FLY AWAAAAAAY~~~~

lol what a randomly pivotal moment in his young life. TIME TO GO MAKE THESE MEMES INTO DREAMS YOUNG ONE

anyway so his mom freaked out and grabbed him and they wound up at a train station with her TELLING HIM TO GO GET HER SOME MONEY, oh my god. SURE MOM LEMME JUST WALTZ RIGHT ON DOWN TO THE “JOBS FOR FIVE-YEAR-OLDS” STORE AND TELL THEM I NEED SOME CASH. ffff manifesting someone to come help him in 3... 2...

...

SIGH, JUST GO RESCUE THE PEOPLE FROM THE BUS, KEIGO. is this the outfit he was wearing when that happened?? it must be, right?? I can’t imagine them surviving more than a couple days out here unless this starts getting REALLY dark in a way I know that even Horikoshi won’t explore, so yeah. cut to the HPSC now please. never thought we’d be glad to see them. I mean sure, it may be an “out of the frying pan...” case, but good god

THANK YOU!!

and I guess it was his mom’s eyeball quirk then. anyway, whatever, see you again never, hopefully. lol oh man. thaaaat, was upsetting. need to center myself here for a sec. NAMASTE

OH YAY THE PRESENT

so we cut from Baby Hawks Angst straight to Present Day Hawks Angst, huh. not that this exhausted and traumatized lil lad isn’t still a baby to me too, I’ll have you know

BEST JEANIST, ALWAYS WITH THE JOKES

“WHEW, THOUGHT YOU DIED ON ME FOR A SEC THERE KID.” lmao. Caleb will no doubt ruin this by making his word choice all stiffly formal as usual, so I’m just going to treasure this “WOULD YOU LOOK AT THAT, I’M FRESH OUT OF FUCKS” version of Jeanist while I can

look at him, driving his Jeanistmobile

again, is it any wonder Kacchan was bitching about Endeavor’s dinky little car when he was used to riding around town in style like this. anyone else staring at this panel trying to figure out how this car is somehow secretly made of jeans

NOOOOO

FUCK YOU DABI LMAO. PUTTING THESE VOICE ACTORS OUT OF A JOB ONE BY ONE

anyway so Jeanist is all “GOOD THING IT’S THE FUTURE AND WE’RE SO GOOD AT MEDICAL SCIENCE” to handwave how Hawks went from one step shy of being a very handsome corpse, to sitting around texting Jeanist in a car all of two days later

OH MY GOD, AND FINALLY AN EXPLANATION FOR THIS

wait a minute. I’m so confused lmfao. soooo, was Hawks all “anyway, here’s Jeanist’s dead body, you can examine it but please don’t look at him too closely and also I’m gonna need that back unharmed.” how tf did you pull that off lmao

(ETA: also isn’t this technically confirmation of the ol’ Noumu Jeanist theory lol. I’m gonna go ahead and say it is.)

NO BUT PLEASE, CONTINUE. I unironically love reading Horikoshi’s overly convoluted “SEE IT’S NOT A PLOT HOLE” explanations

lkldslfk so wait, you’re telling me Hawks convinced Dabi and the League to put Jeanist’s body in storage, and basically just hoped they wouldn’t use him for any experiments until he could put his plan into action and have the HPSC’s people break in and find and revive him?? WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG. A FOOLPROOF PLAN IF I’VE EVER HEARD ONE

fff this man really asked Jeanist to risk it all to prop up his little cover story, and Jeanist was all “sure why not” omfg. anyways, thanks for recapping all of this out loud for no particular reason in your car conversation you two

LMAO NOW WHAT

TROUBLE YOU SAY? GOOD THING THE NEW NUMBER ONE HERO IS ON THE JOB THEN

okay no it’s just some random thugs strolling around terrorizing the downtown. fuck ‘em. so Jeanist is making short work of them now

uh oh

won’t come? not can’t, but won’t?? what???

WOW

well I guess that makes the local heroes A BUNCH OF SHITHEADS now doesn’t it?? jesus

and okay, serious question, if the cops are spread too thin and the heroes have literally walked out on the job, what exactly is stopping everyone from deciding to use their quirks to defend themselves, legal or not? nothing, as far as I can tell. society just got a hell of a lot more chaotic

anyway so this is an interesting panel here

man, Dabi really did pull it off, didn’t he. well anyway so here’s that better world all of the villains were wanting, you guys! isn’t it so great?? everyone’s terrified and angry and losing hope and society is inches away from collapsing into total anarchy! but hey, at least we exposed the number one hero as a hypocrite

anyway so what are these guys up to

fucking hell, he’s visiting his mom. I really wasn’t prepared to commit this much emotional energy towards reading this chapter today. BUT VERY WELL, WE PRESS ON

?? wait she’s not there?

is this supposed to explain how Dabi knew who Hawks really was? except that there’s the little matter of how he even know where to find his mother in the first place. feels like we’re still missing something there, but oh well

OH MY GOD

RHA I TAKE BACK EVERY WORD I EVER SPOKE AGAINST YOU. YOU ARE A SCANLATION GROUP FILLED WITH ANGELS LMAO. I WILL TAKE THIS PANEL IN MY HANDS, AND TREASURE IT AND KEEP IT SAFE

ANYWAY, BECAUSE MY TIRED BIRD SON’S LIFE SUCKED SO MUCH ALREADY, IT TURNS OUT HE’S ACTUALLY PLEASED WITH THIS NEW TURN OF EVENTS LOL HOW ABOUT THAT

GOOD FOR YOU BBY. YOU GO OUT THERE AND BE YOUR OWN PERSON

and in all seriousness, I love that identity he chooses -- chooses, because it actually is him making a choice now, possibly for the very first time in his life -- is “guy who helps people”, though. it really is nothing short of miraculous that he held on to that kind of optimism and desire to do good even with everything he’s been through. there were so many times he could have chosen to turn his back on the world in retaliation for the way it treated him. but he didn’t!! and here he is now, finally free, and what he wants to do with the rest of his life now is simply to help others. anyway please excuse me for a moment, I need to go find some sort of basket or a big vase to put all of my fresh new Hawks Feels in, pardonne-moi

YEAH BOIIIIII

“FIRST ORDER OF BUSINESS, MISTER JEANIST, WHERE DID YOU FIND YOUSELF THAT SWEETASS CAR.” hey, all I’m saying is if this boy’s wings really aren’t growing back, he’s gonna need to find himself a new means of transportation y’know?

oh my god you guys it’s a flashback to his mom buying him the Endeavor plushie when he was like two because, and I quote, ALL MIGHT WAS TOO EXPENSIVE

oh my god oh my god. my boy out here with a new lease on life finding hope in the darkest of times

wasn’t your throat supposed to be all fucked up lmao. Horikoshi was suddenly all “oh shit the VAs are gonna be pissed at me if I keep this up huh”

“that’s why Bubaigawara was such a great guy” motherfucker IT IS A TERRIBLE DAY FOR RAIN. FORECAST SAID NOTHING ABOUT THIS

:’)

yes ma’am. yes indeed. confirmed, I really will straight up fight some motherfuckers for this child. well not really, but YOU KEEP YOUR DISCOURSE OFF MY LAWN AND OUT OF MY BLOG YOU HEAR. THIS IS A HAWKS-FRIENDLY SPACE. WE RESPECT TAKAMI KEIGO IN THESE STREETS

and he’s saying (or is he thinking?? what a weirdly shaped speech bubble this is) that even if what Dabi said about the Todoroki household is true, “I’m not sure it’s the same now.” which happens to be ABSOLUTELY CORRECT. man this whole chapter really is all about saying “fuck the past” and moving forward and I am living for it

SON!!!!

“the first step is at my beginning” fklkjlk. what an iconic fucking line??

AND HIS WINGS!!!! THEY ACTUALLY ARE GROWING BACK AHHHHHHH. “PUT A RAINCHECK ON THAT CAR, JEANIST-SAN.” THE HAWKSMOBILE CAN WAIT, RIGHT NOW HE HAS TO GO INSERT HIMSELF BACK INTO THE TODODRAMA WHETHER THEY LIKE IT OR NOT

you guys. I came here ready for some BAKUDEKU HOSPITAL ANGST, and I got DIDDLY SHIT of that, and none of my other kids were even in this chapter, but!!! ASK ME IF I CARE LMAO omg. because bird son is hanging with his new best friend, and he’s out here Finding Himself and picking up the pieces and putting them back together stronger than ever because RESILIENCE HAS A NAME, AND IT’S SPELLED H-A-W-K-S, and you guys. profound, my love for this child. holy shit. hey google, play Silence by Marshmello

[aprito]

hello <3 since i got these asks at the same time i decided to combine my thoughts on them in this post. yet another annoying sjw essay from yours truly on this blog 

before i get into these i think i need to preface why im like. i guess overly hyperfocused on a certain unproblematic base (same age au / platonic canon) for them and avoid the ped0philic content like the plague lol

tw for pedophilia ment, rape ment if that makes you squicky. ALSO THIS IS LONG AND RAMBLY

as i’ve mentioned a couple times already, ive been into the ship since i was 12, back when it was very very common to not only post untagged (nsfw) canonverse content of the two in writing and in drawing but also non con and the like, so you can imagine how bad my first impression online was. thinking back on it ...as a child i found it disturbing but didnt really register how problematic it really was?? (i know, but i also lived in the middle of nowhere and had no one explain this to me) 

skip to 2014 aka me coming back to naruto at 17ish and i had kinda become hyper aware of the fact that there was an increasing amount of people online who had come forward with explaining how fictional problematic content, mostly pedophilia, had been used to groom them into starting relationships with adullts. it was also a time where a lot of people didnt believe these victims, not registering how common it was for minors to be online friends with adults who had no boundaries and no qualms exposing them such content. not gonna get into my personal life here but i was lucky to not having gone through this myself. like... it kinda was my first time truly realising how fiction can EASILY be used to manipulate others irl (and yes i will not argue this, if you dont think fictional media can form and manipulate people’s opinions on attitudes, countries, cultures and virtues, pick up a book about the effects of propaganda media at least once please) 

i, being young, still liking the dynamic but not really the romance, would point this out here and there in the fandom and get into fights with grown adults in their mid 20s who assumed i automatically hated the ship(s) and tried to restrict their freedom of speech or whatever, heard everything from the “age of consent doesnt exist in naruto” to the “sasori looks like a child what does it matter” despite people clearly playing on him being older and experienced. it made me so upset that people were just consuming all this content uncritically and exposing children to it tbh?? not really just sos but a lot of minor/adult ships in naruto in general. and thats where i sat down and thought, i do not want to be a grown adult talking down to children that point out how unsafe the fandom is. theyre absolutely right in drawing these boundaries and calling out adults who defend the uncritical consumption and creation of this content. i do not want to consume or create content that predators could use to groom minors, and i absolutely do want to let younger people in fandom know that i am respecting their comfort zones and want them to have a safe and fun experience. after all, naruto is not an adult show and i think a lot of people forget that!!!! i am not perfect in that regard but its something that i, at the age of 23, am very passionate about and strive towards to.

and i guess thats where same age au was born for me and i have been sticking to it ever since. 

so finally we can move to the first question 

aside from the fact that we both dont like canon sos, i dont think it would work out even if i wasnt prejudiced to it anyways. in all honesty, 35 year old canon sasori is not a redeemable character to me, given the fact that he’s easily amongst the cruelest villains in naruto (torturing and killing and taxiderming people for his own fun personal gain, never for a goal that served anyone but himself. how do you redeem having over 300 corpses in your backpack that you felt absolutely no remorse for killing). sasori was legit one of the only cruel villains that didnt had someone else pull the strings, which sends a clear message on kishi’s part, who absolutely loves to redeem villains LOL.

being that old, he obviously had already been very manifested in what he believed in, even if it was shakey, to the point where the first crack in that world view (sakura and chiyo protecting each other) immediately had him give up on his life all together. that, in my opinion, is not a man who’s going to know what healthy relationships would look like, regardless of it being romantic or not. 35 year old sasori to me has the same appeal as an expired can of tuna and he’s probably very happy 6 feet under. he’s supposed to be a failed gaara in that sense that he had no one to look out for him and therefore was never going to experience anything but a bad ending in life. its fine that hes dead honestly, it wraps up his short character development the best IMO.

adding to that, seriously, sakura was obviously interested in knowing why he was that way, and called him out for being seriously fucked in the head, but it’s weird to me that people assume she had any interest in actively rehabilitating him, let alone starting a serious romantic relationship with him. sakura who’s not only very, uhm, immature and straight forward when it comes to her romantic viewpoints also, as a big bootlicker, wouldnt soil her standing in the village by starting anything with a disgraced and far too gone criminal like sasori. shipping that version of sasori with sakura intimately is still going to set her up for a huge power imbalance that would be difficult to handle imo, even if she was the one in the fight ultimately exerting her power over him. i would still look at it and think damn she deserves better than having to play therapist for man like that lol.

additionally, even if you ignored all of this, you cant really ignore that sasori had already known her as a child, and that had been his first and most impactful impression of her. i dont think that sasori would look at 35 year old sakura and see her as a grown woman and not the little green girl she was in the fight. plus, you easily fall into predatory comparison territory between the “childish” and “womanly” and i have seen way too often in fic just being boiled down to her now being fuckable. a lot of of ships do this and i would just like to remind yall thats it not normal for adults to want to start relationships with children they have seen grown up or known as a child when they themselves were fully grown adults. therefore, maybe if sakura hadnt met sasori before it would be less of a problem? but that also obviously defeats the point of the dynamic and the reason he died in the first place. so yeah, it sounds kind of doomed especially if you were to make it romantic. 

WHICH BRINGS ME TO THE SECOND QUESTION

let me preface this that im not fundamentally against age gaps, even if im not super interested in it. after all, colorblind had a 5 yr age gap (with sakura being 21), even if, say, i wrote similar fics today i probably would make it smaller lol. i think it can be handled well if both parties have enough life experience to deal with it, and the author is cautious of where the age gap starts, i think a 10+ year age gap would be fine in a scenario where the younger party (i guess sakura) was at least 25-27ish, meaning she has completed most of her most formative life stages and probably had been in relationships before, meaning she would be able to handle it without having to fear a huge power imbalance. the older the younger party is the less the age gap is going to matter tbh .TsukiHoshino and AngelOfDeath10 both handle age gaps in their fics really well imo, so i do not mind reading about them.

unfortunately, a lot of people in this fandom think making sakura barely "”””legal””””” (18, not even 20 which is hilarious to me because the source material is obviously japanese) because they both cannot stand her being past her “prime years” of being young fertile and fuckable to much older men as well as thinking a 20 year old is automatically old enough to handle that type of relationship. ive seen a lot of unironic takes that believe it will absolve them of callout posts if they throw around age of consent and “shes 18 now suckers!!!” enough lmfao. absolutely hilarious. aging a minor up without aging the adult down seriously reeks of predatory “cant wait until youre 18″ narratives and thats why i find it similarly disturbing as straight up pedo shipping.

ultimately, sasosaku is and will always be a inherently problematic ship in canon, which is why i think it should always be handled a little more responsibly in fandom spaces, ignoring or outright excusing the main problem factor, which is sasori, isnt going to convince anyone that the dynamic in itself is well written and interesting enough to explore in aus, like giving sasori the redemption most of us wanted him to have by aging him down to a point in time where he was still realistically going to allow being positively influenced, similar to gaara. 

so really, what i think is well handled age gap and how most people handle age gap in the naruto fandom are two different worlds at times lol 

tl;dr

canon shippers have never been anything but gross when i was younger and i didnt wanna be like that, even if youre “smart”enough to differenate, actual creeps dont really care and might use your content to blur the lines, sasori isnt rly redeemable so romantic canonverse realistically wouldnt make much sense and is still iffy, age gaps are fine if they are handled well, but given that the dynamic doesnt really need the age gap to still work im not that invested on making that an essential part of my shipping experience.  

thank you for reading and hope this makes sense!