#iDK I MADE SMTH RANdom so we can take this any way we want uwu

[lavienrcse]

          “ if i’m gonna sneak off from class for this, you better at least take me somewhere nice ” / @edenlured.

[redxblueihateloveyou]

spill the yoi hot takes :o

I’m really flattered with the amount of asks (I hope you won't mind that I combined at least 5, it's just easier this way), interested in my yoi opinions, I wasn’t planning to get into that honestly, until I mentioned it to my friend Alex (I’ve mentioned him here before without a name tho, he’s gay, he’s very into anime, he was also the one behind that 4am text “but how do u think Rin’s teeth feel on Haru’s dick” lol). 

I just didn't want to rewatch it, as I've said before, but something he said got me very intrigued and last week ended up with me staying until 7am for a virtual watch party that got pretty hilarious, but not for the yoi reasons lol.

So just know that to be completely fair we did it and I'm saying everything below with a very fresh impression, which hasn't changed really bc like I'm 25, I was watching it the first time when I was 21, not 14 xD. I think it got worse actually.

Once again, I know that since they’re both gay sports animes comparisons are inevitable, but to me one has nothing to do with the other and no matter the fact that I adore Free! and don’t like YOI, I don’t want to throw words like smth is “superior” out there, bc I don’t want to be like those YOI fans back in the days, who thought that none other gay ships should exist after this (unless they say smth specifically for me to counterattack, then I can say whatever lol).

Like if you love stories like this, it’s okay. Like what you like. But to yell at everybody that they must think that this is how relationships should be and trash every other gay ship in existence, you maybe should not, especially when you don’t really have much to be proud of. Just like kisses don’t make a love story high-quality, full censorship doesn’t take away a good love story.

"Heaven official’s blessing” is also censored, but no matter how much you censor it, their love for each other is seen in their actions so clear, that it is in fact will not take anything away from the power of their feelings and the greatness of their love story if at the end they won’t show them kissing. Just like if I kiss a random stranger on the street, it won’t make us the best couple in the world.

Now I went into watching YOI unbiased the 1st time I watched it (I did watch it after Free, bc it was in “recommended”). I did not expect it to be “like Free”, I just wanted smth that’ll give me the same kind of emotion, investment in the story, ship, etc. It didn’t, so I just moved on.

I didn’t even think deep about why. I thought I just grew out of the “Cinderella” stories a long time ago or as it was here not very gracefully called “how to turn the pig into the prince”.

Like if you want the “she’s all that” but with the boy instead of a girl, you’ll probably enjoy YOI. But once again, love stories I enjoy are the opposite of those. It's really nothing bad, if you enjoy the stuff like “Someday my prince will come” in whatever age tbh, but I since a certain age just wasn’t invested in those anymore and began to obsess with stories like “Anastasia” instead, and I’m talking about love stories with less naivety in between and feelings out of nowhere, but more stuff like “yes, bitch, I find you attractive, true, but whether I fall for you unconditionally or not, only real life situations will tell later on”.

And I don’t mean stuff like going through war together or some epic journey, but grown ups must know those. Those life situations or even tiny things someone do, that make you not only fall for someone, but think “yeah, I can imagine my life with you”.

Like in my humble opinion, you can’t fall in love with someone bc of the way they swim or skate, for example. What ppl call “love at first sight” is in fact “attraction at first sight”. So yes, we do joke about Rin falling in love at first sight, bc he did in fact walked into the hall, saw Haru and was like “dat bitch is so fine”, even tho he was just standing there, but once again, he was just attracted to him. What happens after this is you can go on a whole beautiful journey with tiny Rin putting together the prettiest puzzle of why he falls for Nanase Haruka. In such little things like when Haru slowed down when he saw Nagisa feeling bad during running and Rin was like “omg you’re so uwu”, how he mentions that he always helps ppl, but never asks for help himself, he slowly gradually paints a picture of what kind of person Haru is, same goes for Haru about Rin. And then you have a whole story of them falling for each other all over again when they’re already adults, and you again watch it through their eyes, and once again I’m not in fact talking about some grand gestures like 1x12, I’m talking about stuff like them focusing on Haru’s eyes shaking, when he saw that Rin secretly helps Rei to learn how to swim. It’s the little things, that you watch and you get why they feel what they feel for each other. And that also makes you fall in love more with their characters by seeing how the other sees them.

YOI doesn’t have those moments. Not only they weren’t in any situations that would make them know each other for who they really are, they hardly even know the basic info about one another. Hell, the viewer doesn’t know anything about them. And this is why to me it goes into the category of those typical romcoms I can’t get invested in.

So I don’t think these two can be compared. And while some yell “bc you’re not canon, but yoi is canon”, I think they can’t be compared for another reason. Bc some ppl are trying to prove to me that a 27 years old man fell head over heels in love with someone overnight during a drunk banquet, then watched a vid of him skating and flew to another country and hey “if you win a gold medal, lets get married”. This is not the kind of relationship progression I’m looking for like at all. Between that time he started training him and their “censored kiss” there was nothing and I mean nothing that’d made me go “yeah, I see why he loves him”.

But anyways, lets live piecefully really, you can like one, you can like both, it’s all okay.

Like I know many have ptsd and it’s true that back when YOI was popular, most of their fans for real did annoy to death almost everyone, bc they yelled that No.6 is trash, when someone said “but you’re not the only one gay story that’s not based on sex”. They yelled that Free! has no right to exist bc its queerbating (LOL). By that time, I’m not gonna lie I was ready to poke my eyes out each time I saw smth YOI related, bc it was like: you make a multigay shipping vid -  “how dare u not include YOI”, you make a gifset - “you forgot YOI” like I HAD TO like it just bc it’s gay. There is no such rule to me. Just like I don’t care for some hetero romances, I don’t care for some gay romances. Simple is that. Once again gay has nothing to do with the relationships dynamic and the story.

Yeah, comments about fanservice. Like why should I watch Victor’s naked ass for several minutes every episode, but don’t get to see Haru or Rin’s at least once? So salty rn.

Free is more fanservice-y.. well, it’s hella fanservicy, yes, but like we can’t swim in shirts, you can tho not show naked ass in each episode, I thought you were skating. 

See, it’s all debatable.

But I do wish ppl stop putting yoi relationships on a piedestal, their relationship are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too far from being inspirational for many and not even close to the what love is in my opinion. If you seek smth of a very high standart of gay love, choose MDZS for example, idk. But don’t throw YOI at ppls faces as a “this is how should be”. Not everyone wants that.

I don’t need a half-assed engagement and esp the censored kiss (like either do it or don’t do it at all honestly). Also stuff like this should carry weight. I don’t want things for the sake of things.

Like to me Rin’s “the only thing that hasn’t changed in my life is how I feel about you” speech, considering the fact that he felt like that throughout all those years, means hella more, than this. 

I think 1stly, it’s because of the “it’s like it was a destiny xD” factor and 2ndly, bc at least this scene gives a little more sense to the fact that he flew to another country to train him. Now it’s if “I fell MADLY in love in one drunk night and was pining my whole life after that and that vid was a sign for me to go see you again” makes any sense to you. At least that’s how some fans read it.

Once again it might be a good thing for a passable one-time romantic comedy. But plots and pairings like this is what made me turn to anime in the first place, so.. sorry lol.

All this mega tragic posts of “Victor was soooo in love for such long time, it’s so sad” made me laugh so hard. Like he feel in love so hard during a one drunk banquet with a guy who was so drunk he didn’t remember anything he did? WHY? HOW? what could he possibly do to make him fall that hard, no one knows. Like to me the only reason u can fall for someone in one night is if you saw him risking his life saving a kitten or a puppy from a car or smth.

I’m just not the kind of person who thinks you can fall for someone for no reasons. Again, you can find someone attractive and go from there, but there must be things along the way that will make me believe in the progression of it. It can of course all come in the future, but the story was what the story was. Whatever you are trying to add to it is already a fanfiction.

YOI is not boring per se, bc everything goes way too fast and sometimes with no reasoning, so I was more surprised that “this was it?” lmao. But their relationships are dull, yes. Bc there is nothing to even discuss really, you can only assume things, bc the whole thing didn’t give u much, esp in the characters department. It’s just really funny to me that someone would write a whole post of “I love this character bc I presume he’s like that”, usually it’s “I love this character bc facts, facts, facts”.

______

Now back to the beginning of my post and to the funny story that happened. We were randomly discussing shit, when I mentioned about possibly rewatching YOI, bc I didn’t want to start talking about smth in case I forgot some stuff (I didn’t btw lol) and turned out that he freaking disliked it a lot. I never even asked, for some reason, and we’ve been yelling about Free! and other stuff for ages and like his boyfriend is in love with Sousuke and they both adore rinharu to death.

And he has lots of gay friends who love Free (this made me happy the most, btw during our YOI chat I asked and it was 4:1 harurin:rinharu haha I win) and some ships from Haikyuu too, but turns out that literally none of them were into YOI. And the funniest thing he said was “bc it felt more heterosexual than some heterosexual stories I’ve watched”. Now I don’t know if it would make sense to anyone else out there, but I kinda did get what he meant.

I asked if it was bc of the “fairytale setting” and the fact that no one cared that they’re gay (bc “in front of the stadium?!” was the reaction, when I told them “there was a cencored kiss here” (btw not everyone got it lolz) and then “did they just write the story with a girl, but then changed it by the end?”), but they said “no, just the overall feeling”.

And like everyone knows that YOI targeted audience is hetero girls. It wasn’t made for the sake of the LGBT community and none of the homophobic ppl will watch it either, no matter what some think. So for whom they did it the way they did it is very questionable tbh. They say it’s the LGBT representation in anime, and yes, good, great, always happy about, but isn’t it kinda funny that some of LGBT representatives don’t even feel like it apparently.

Now I’m just saying some, I’ve asked him to ask around out of curiousity, and it was only 11 gay guys in total, who watched it, including our company and his bf who was forced into it haha, but 11 is quite a lot, considering the fact that not even 1 liked it. But then somehow stuff like MDZS and even uncanonical mikayuu was highly appreciated and loved, bc it accidentally made a dent in some extra conservative parents and dull ppl.

It’s just much more interesting to hear what guys who are actually dating guys think about all those kind of animes and ships, than some girls here who yell at me stuff like “why are you supporting queerbating”. Btw I asked Alex if he’s offended by that, he said “no, but we for real think they’re doing it” lmao.

It is supposed to be funny. You didn’t get it wrong. But if you saw many ppl would aggressively disagree with you. I just thought that “analysis” was an “interpretive process that draws conclusions from a set of facts”, not “writing a fanfiction based on assumptions”, but then again to each their own. 

The problem is that I don’t even get what’s cute about it, it’s just absurd to me. Like it’s pulled out of an ass, for real. They’re not in the stage of a relationships, when I would find such thing romantic. And all the agressive denying of the fact that it was indeed wedding rings made this scene cringy, too. The whole thing is cringy to me idk. The “win the gold, only then we’ll get married”.... It all gave me a weird feeling. The opposite of “touching”.

So in conclusion, when you skip most of the important parts of the love story and jump into stuff just for the sake of it, then also make fun of it, it leaves a hella weird impression and aparently not just to me.

And once again trying to market some primitive story as an epic love story, just bc it’s gay is extremely weird to me. If you make 50 shades of grey gay, it’s not gonna suddenly become a pulitzer prize winning kind of book, it’ll stay the same dumb af story with dumb af characters, but gay.

So being happy about some representation (and btw they still managed to add stuff like “its not gay if you exchange rings with your hommies” here and there and make it “hahahaha joking”), I get it, but to say that this what all the gay ships should aim for, pls stop. We really don’t wanna. Sincerelly. 

We here stick to a motto “I can picture the kiss of the characters whose story is so amazing, that the kiss is the only thing missing, but if I basically have just a picture of two guys kissing, I won’t write a whole story myself.”

P.S. I will forever laugh now tho at the fact that calling your bf a “pig” and being an arogant asshole without any canonically established reasonings is a great relationships, but Adam with his past gets what he gets now for the “dog” comments even tho his bf enjoys it lmao like I did not remember this bits in YOI. I honestly thought it was like completely “unproblematic” one, but it’s like hilariously not. So what ppl are trying to even put out their as a “pinnacle of the lgbt representation” as you say, like there are for real older yaois that are much better than this.