#its why the end of kh3 happens

[cinnabeat]

i have beef with the concept of data in kh but anytime i see someone talk shit about it i get so mad

[rikuzdreameater]

Vanitas HAS to be in KH4.

So I watched a couple of Vanitas scenes and now my brainrot is back in FULL force so im gonna be annoying for a bit.

I genuinely think Vanitas is one of the best characters that Nomura can put into KH4 thematically.

This is the game where:

1) Sora will be struggling with his own darkness, especially after his breakdown in KH3. Someone on here had a brilliant theory on how light represents selflessness and darkness selfishness, ill link it below since Tumblr won't let me tag them @andrewwtca

Anyways, Sora as we all now is a very selfless, downright self sacrificial person which what can be theorized is what happens when there is "too much light".

(Need I call back to the the stronger your light the stronger your shadow grows opening from KH1)

No doubt Rage form and Anti-form will be explained or at least the game will lay the groundwork for the explanation in the future, my point is, what better way to add weight to Sora's arc than bringing up Vanitas someone hes met that is "pure darkness".

2) The start of the foretellers arc which would be a great opportunity to tie in the Darkness and Vanitas content we got from Dark Road and KHUX, especially with Strelitzia being a secondary character in the game.

(I also suspect that Ventus is going to be a major player in the arc to come with the addition of that Chriithy and Ven interaction at the end of KH3)

Because as much as everyone says otherwise...we don't really have confirmation on w h a t exactly Vanitas is, sure characters and Vanitas himself guess and speculate but we haven't got confirmation and I think thats important.

Kingdom hearts is a series which allows its characters to be wrong, we've seen this time and time again (nobodies can't grow hearts for example) which is why I find it kinda hard to believe that Vanitas is and will stay some "ancient evil pure darkness".

Especially when, regardless of whether you think the novels are canon, Vanitas is an abuse victim in the BBS novel, he comes off more as a scared child than an ancient evil. Its plain as day you can't interpret it any other way

(also canon or not Nomura had to approve them pre release)

Add to that the subtle changes in expressions and voice acting during the end of BBS, the KH3 Monsters Inc world and his theme being in the Heroes section of an orchestra.

Idk gang some of yall have way too little faith in Nomura and the team behind these games.

I was dissapointed with Vanitas' handling in KH3 at first too but if you look at it from a deeper lens (as we should always its KH after all) the Two Vanitas theory, especìally @embraceyourdestiny 's explanation which I think is fantastic btw, works.

Or at the very least, him starting a redemption arc in KH4 is more thematically cohesive with that game rather than KH3, frankly I think it would have been too rushed to add into KH3 with everything else going on.

"But he said he fully accepted his darkness" Yeah and Xigbar is Luxu, characters can hide their feelings or lie yall.

Even if he DOES truly believe that, don't you think its a touching story for a character who's hit rock bottom and has 0 faith in themselves to start their road to redemption? KH has always been sappy it would be a hard oppurtunity to miss.

[youareinacomawakeup]

I’m too tired to go too deep into detail on this one but here’s my Kingdom Hearts 4 theory that I want to put out into the world.

The nameless star and the girl we see in the Verum Rex trailer aren’t actually the same person. It’s a red herring.

Yozora takes clear inspiration from Noctis from FFXV (e.g. the scene of Yozora in the car that’s shot-for-shot a scene from an early trailer with Yozora replacing Noctis).

And while many think that’s because Nomura is using ideas he never got to bring to life when he worked on Versus XIII, aka “Beta FFXV”, before the project moved on without him, I think it’s less that and more to do with Nomura’s feelings in letting go of his characters and letting someone else write their story.

I think Yozora is the answer to the question “What if Noctis knew that his story was so far removed from what was originally planned? What if he knew his fate was changed?” (Put a pin in that, because there’s more to this question.)

Anyway, we all saw the nameless star for the first time and... Okay, well, a lot of us thought it was Strelitzia at first and that Square Enix North America (henceforth SENA) had just put romantic dialogue somewhere that wasn’t supposed to be romantic and accidentally made Marluxia sound like Strelitzia’s love interest. (Wouldn’t be the first time that happened in KH3. Thank you SENA.) But once we saw more of her and Yozora in Melody of Memory and Re:Mind respectively, we all realized she was from the same place Yozora was from, and we all thought about the only girl we know who’s from Verum Rex and we all just...

...assumed.

But we haven’t seen the nameless star’s face. And we haven’t heard Verum Rex girl’s voice. So we don’t actually have any confirmation that they’re the same person.

So here’s my suggestion.

Verum Rex girl is Luna in this equation.

And Nameless Star is Stella, the girl who was originally going to be Noct’s love interest back when FFXV was Versus XIII.

We meet Nameless Star in what is essentially Kingdom Hearts Purgatory. But she’s from a fictional world. Fictional characters can’t die. Not in the way we know it. I can pop Into the Spider-Verse into my DVD player, hit play, and boom, there’s Uncle Aaron, alive. You can’t do that with real people.

But if a character is written out of a story, they’re gone forever. That, I propose to you, is true death for a fictional character, which is why Nameless Star is hanging out with dead people. And she’s lost everything. Her whole identity. Her name. And the person she loves doesn’t remember her. Because she’s not part of his story anymore.

Yozora also says that the way he looks isn’t what he really looks like. A lot of people have taken that to be the start of an explanation for why he looks like Riku, and it still might be in some roundabout way, but I propose to you that he’s been redesigned, and he’s aware of it.

So here’s the core of what this all means, why it’s relevant.

Kingdom Hearts loves its parallels, yeah?

So here’s what I propose to you.

Sora’s story is also, as we speak, being rewritten. At least in a sense.

Sora sees Riku’s light, and twenty minutes later, it’s apparently Kairi’s light.

Sora saves seven hearts, including Riku’s, and three hours later, he’s only saved six, and Kairi’s heart is the seventh.

Somehow or another, Yozora found out about what happened to him, and, due to some trial or another, also found out what is currently happening to Sora. And he wants to save Sora from suffering his fate.

I don’t think there’s any hope for Yozora himself. He is, after all, the night sky, what could have happened if Sora’s story got the “bad end”, so to speak.

But I do think he can “save Sora.”

So here’s the rest of that question.

What if Noctis knew that his story was so far removed from what was originally planned? What if he knew his fate was changed?

And what if he saw the same thing happening to Sora, a kid destined to have a queer love story but forced into a romance with a girl by a greater power instead, and refused to let that slide?

[themattress]

I hate Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance. Everything about it.

However - there is one scene in particular that I absolutely despise above all others. Don't get me wrong, every other cutscene is bad, many of them even rage-inducing....but none of them quite measure up to this one in its wretchedness. Which one is it, you ask? THIS one.

So after Xigbar reiterates the bullshit Inception-esque "dream within a dream" plot twist that Sora is currently experiencing all because he happens to have an "X" on his clothes (yes, that is an actual thing that Nomura wrote), Sora just randomly declares that Nobodies have hearts after all. What does his base this on? The memories from 358/2 Days that he experienced.

"Axel and Roxas and Namine, and that other girl. I felt what Roxas felt and they laughed together, got mad, and they grieved. You have to have a heart to cry."

First off, "that other girl" shouldn't be here. In 358/2 Days, Namine specifically said "If you return your memories to him, you'll disappear. And since everything about you was built on those memories...no one will remember you when you're gone. There won't be any "you" to remember. I can't save you, Xion--even a memory of you." But this game, just like Coded before it and KH3 after it, is flagrantly ignoring that because the rabid fanbase that Days / Xion / the Seasalt Trio developed, particularly in Japan, demanded Xion back and because he's a clout-chasing coward Nomura complied, the story's internal logic be damned.

Secondly, all of the characters Sora mentioned are special cases. Roxas and Namine were special Nobodies built upon a literal heart-to-heart relationship (Sora and Kairi), allowing them to feel things at the cost of having no memory, when for normal Nobodies it's the other way around. Xion was not a Nobody, she was a replica with a heart constructed from memories. Of course she felt stuff. Lastly, this game continues to ignore that Axel's feelings were...off. Making a connection with a heart allowed him to start feeling things, but his Nobody nature was still technically heartless and self-centered, which meant that his feelings were purely based on himself and what his friends mean to him. He never cared about them the way someone is actually supposed to, as that depth of feeling was still foreign to him.

And finally, this seems to be in direct response to that stupid Tomoko Kanemaki-made scene from KH2:FM of Roxas talking with Axel's ghost and they wax poetic about what a heart is and what it means to have one, ending in a shot where Axel is seen shedding tears ("You have to have a heart to cry"). But even that scene, as bad as it was, was still written with Nojima's KH2 scenario in mind where the answer is a philosophical difference between a literal heart, which Nobodies can't have, and a metaphorical heart, which they can develop through bonding with someone with a heart and find a way to exist (as evidenced by Axel even having a ghost at all) within that someone's heart. But now, we get this from Xemnas:

"A heart is never lost for good. There may have been variances in our dispositions, but a number of us unquestionably showed signs of a burgeoning replacement. Once born, the heart can also be nurtured. Our experiments creating Heartless were attempts to control the mind, and convince it to renounce its sense of self. But understand, one can banish the heart from the body, but the body will try to replace it the first chance it gets, for as many times as it takes. And so I knew, even after we were divided into Heartless and Nobodies, it was just a temporary separation."

Where do I even begin?

"A number of us unquestionably showed signs of a burgeoning replacement"? Is this Nomura's way to "explain" why the Organization reacted emotionally on many occasions? Except that was already explained in KH2! As Yen Sid said, their behavior is a ruse to pretend that they have hearts and properly exist, and as Saix said, it's their memories of their human selves and the feelings they felt with hearts that allow them to do this. We literally SEE Demyx drop the facade and show his true unemotional colors right before fighting him!

"One can banish the heart from the body, but the body will try to replace it the first chance it gets". Um, HOW? The body shouldn't be able to recreate a heart because in this universe the body never created the heart to begin with! The literal title of the series, Kingdom Hearts, is where all hearts are born and where all hearts return to. We established that in Game 1!

There was talk earlier about puppets like Pinocchio "growing" a heart, but that's not even the case. As seen earlier in KH2's Space Paranoids and later in KH3's Toy Box, it's not that the non-living thing "grows" a heart, it's that Kingdom Hearts grants them a heart specifically based upon the feelings someone with a heart has toward them. Gepetto, Ansem the Wise, Andy, etc. The hearts didn't just come out of nowhere from nothing like this game suggests.

For that matter, the heart is established as holding the essence of a person; it's who they are. The whole reason Nobodies "don't exist" is because while they have the body and soul of a person plus the memories of said person, without a heart they are not actually that person, who is actually now a Heartless. So is Xemnas saying the body can grow a new freaking person? Then what will become of the original person once they're purified from being a Heartless? The same bullshit of "recompleting" that Lea and co. underwent? But doesn't that contradict the notion that Nobodies are their own individuals who supposedly deserve to live as such? Also, why does all of this only apply to the Organization? What about all of the lesser Nobodies, like the Dusks? Can they not also "regrow" their hearts? Did Nomura think any of this out at all before committing it to script form? And at this point, Sora yells out:

"Why, then? Why did you lie to them and tell them they had no hearts?"

Yep, that's right. Even though Yen Sid also said they had no hearts, Ansem the Wise's research turned up that they had no hearts, and they themselves largely behaved as though they had no hearts, apparently it was all just a lie Xemnas concocted, stripping away half the depth that he and the Organization in general had. Xemnas is now depicted as just a simplistic bad guy and the others save for Xigbar as total victims of brainwashing. Hilariously, the narrative tap-dances around how, if this is true, then Sora and the other heroes now look way more questionable for killing them. The bullshit train keeps chugging as Xigbar says:

"Xemnas and Xehanort formed the Organization for a specific reason - round up a bunch of empty husks, hook them up to Kingdom Hearts, then fill them all with the exact same heart and mind. Translation--they were gonna turn all the members into Xehanort."

So now the claim is that Xemnas, who totally had Xehanort's heart inside him even when Ansem existing should render that impossible, was gonna use the power of Kingdom Hearts to copy-paste that heart into the other Organization members as part of Xehanort's plan to forge the X-Blade. Just like with the claim that Ansem's goal was the Seven Princesses rather than the Final Keyhole they unseal, this clashes with what we actually saw in the previous games. Why would Xemnas do anything he did if this was the plan? The event that got him his thirteenth "vessel" also set the Seven Princesses loose, then several of those "vessels" perished, and yet he carried on with the plan anyway? KH3 tries to do damage control by suggesting Xemnas was out to betray Xehanort, but that just creates more issues with this abominable retcon trying to force separate villainous plans as part of some convoluted whole.

Xigbar then follows all this up with:

"Me? I'm already half Xehanort!"

.....Moving on. Xemnas proceeds to give us this absolute howler:

"However -through weakness of body...weakness of will...or weakness of trust--most of the original members we had chosen for the Organization were inadequate. Thus, naturally, they never had a chance to attain their goal."

MOST of the original Organization members were inadequate!?

Um, yeah, let's flash forward to KH3 and see who made the cut:

Xemnas Xigbar Vexen Saix Demyx Luxord Marluxia Larxene Xion (as a replacement for Roxas)

So basically, 9 out of 13. Only 4 (Xaldin, Lexaeus, Zexion and Axel) "failed".

.....Xemnas, I don't think that the word "most" means what you think it means.

Then we get to the big, dramatic confrontation as Sora yells:

"Just stop it! You treat people's hearts like bottles on a shelf, but they're not! Hearts are made of the people we meet, and how we feel about them-- they're what ties us together even when we're apart! They're what...make me strong."

This is a good line, but Xigbar proceeds to ruin it with his comeback:

"Duh! You're strong because of the ties you have with other people. As if the Keyblade would choose a wimp like you. But no pouting. We see much bigger and better things in your future...once you side with us."

To which Sora replies:

"I know the Keyblade didn't choose me, and I don't care. I'm proud to be a small part of something bigger--the people it did choose! My friends. They are my power!

Beyond this callback to a famous line in the original game feeling cheap, Nomura doesn't even seem to actually remember the scene in which the line was used! Because the Keyblade DID choose Sora in that scene, precisely because of how he bonded his heart with others and took strength from them. In fact, he may be the ONLY person the Keyblade has "chosen" in this series - the allegedly worthier "other people" who appear in the above image have either had their Keyblade bequeathed to them by a prior wielder, transformed another weapon into a Keyblade, or wield a Keyblade specifically because Sora can wield it. (Also, why are Terra, Aqua, Ven and Xion even there? Calling them Sora's "friends" is a huge stretch, especially when people like Namine and HPO who fit the bill better aren't present! And if them not having Keyblades is the excuse given, I must point out that Donald and Goofy are also here! So are they part of "the people it did choose"!? Where is the consistency!?)

This combined with Xehanort's later "dull, ordinary boy" remark reeks of Nomura being touchy about criticism BBS got for making Sora out to be more special than he was supposed to be which led to him overcorrecting here....which doesn't even stick given Data!Ansem the Wise's later monologue about Sora and the events of KH3. Just terrible, contradictory writing.

I hate Dream Drop Distance. I hate the convoluted dream mechanics, I hate Yen Sid's whole Mark of Mastery test and the stupidity and hypocrisy he displays as it unfolds, I hate the literal TWEWY cast being present, I hate the Lea subplot, I hate Maleficent and Pete doing nothing, I hate the shafting of Kairi, I hate the Sora/Riku queer-baiting, I hate young Xehanort, and I hate all of the screwy, time travel-based retconning and twist reveals in the last act that essentially destroyed the whole series. But this fucking scene in particular, I hate above all.

[phoenix-downer]

Where I Belong Chapter 1

The Big Olive. ~1700 words. Sora/Kairi. Starts during the end of KH3/during ReMind and moves into KH4. Kairi POV. Angst, Romance, Fluff.

Chapter Summary: During their world tour, Sora takes Kairi to Thebes to visit some old friends. Meg insists the two of them take a break from cleanup duty to play hooky, and Hercules asks Pegasus to give them a ride to his villa.

Story Summary: Kairi and Sora spend his final hours at Hercules' villa, trying to enjoy the time he has left while mourning the future they'll never have. After his disappearance, Kairi struggles to cope and throws herself into her training. But when she's sent on a mission with Donald and Goofy to investigate Olympus for clues, a run-in with the Lord of the Dead just might hold the key to finding Sora.

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5

Seeing the worlds with Sora was better than Kairi ever could have imagined. She’d dreamed of this for so long that it didn’t seem real, like any minute she might wake up and it would all be over. Of course, any minute it would be over. That was why it was so important to treasure things while they lasted. And their latest destination was just as magical as everything that had come before it.

Thebes was a beautiful, bustling city, filled with larger-than-life statues, soaring columns, lush gardens, and paved streets lined with classical buildings. Its citizens were hard at work restoring their home from the recent fires and destruction, and Kairi enjoyed meeting the people here and learning more about their culture and daily lives as she and Sora helped Hercules and his fiancée Meg rebuild the city. 

They were currently working on clearing a small temple dedicated to Aphrodite. Kairi and Meg swept the floors of small pieces of debris (as Pegasus assisted with his wings) while Hercules and Sora tackled the bigger obstacles. Phil barked out instructions that made everyone laugh, his knack for miscounting words a running joke with the whole group. Bit by bit, the beautiful mosaics on the floor were becoming visible again. 

“So, Sora, I can tell you’re stronger than ever,” Hercules said. He lifted and set down an entire pillar like he was rearranging a wooden block, and it felt into place with a satisfying thud. “I’m guessing you found the answer to your question?”

“It’s all my trainin’, it’s finally paying off,” Phil insisted. He was lounging in the corner on a plush Hercules pillow, eating grapes.

“Actually, Phil, I did find the answer to my question,” Sora said with a chuckle. “Though not so much an answer as an entire shift in my perspective.” He glanced at Kairi and smiled. She couldn’t help but smile back, a blush dusting her cheeks because she would never get used to how her heart fluttered when he looked at her. “I know where I belong now.”

“Glad to hear that,” Hercules said, dusting his hands off. “You’ve gotta make sure you don’t take that for granted.” 

“I never will,” Sora said, his voice soft and low. His hand flickered in and out of existence, and he quickly shoved it into his pocket. Kairi felt like someone had stabbed her in the gut but pretended not to see what had happened. He still hadn’t admitted he was fading away, and she wanted him to tell her on his terms.

Meg frowned and took the broom away from Kairi’s hands. “Enough cleaning for now, we can handle things from here. You two need to play hooky for the rest of the day.” She looked at Hercules, and Kairi noticed the way his pupils dilated and how his entire attention was focused on her. “Wonderboy, whaddya say we let them romp around the villa? I think they could really use a break from all this boring cleanup duty.” 

“Oh! Um, that’s fine, yeah, that’s totally fine. Please, make yourselves at home. I’ll have Pegasus take you there.” 

Kairi gave Meg a grateful look. She was happy to help their new friends, but her time with Sora was running out, and she wasn’t sure how much longer they’d have together. Meg smiled and winked, then tossed Kairi’s former broom to Phil. 

“Goat-man, get up and make yourself useful,” she said. Phil complained loudly and stomped his hooves, making them all laugh, but he did as Meg asked. 

Pegasus dutifully clopped into position and used his head to gesture at his back. Kairi gulped. She’d ridden a horse with a saddle before, but Pegasus didn’t have a saddle or reins, plus he had those big old wings. How was she supposed to get on his back?

Sora smiled softly. “Here, I’ll help.” He put his hand over hers and moved it to Pegasus’s mane. “Grab a tuft of his mane like this, then skip to get a little momentum. You’ll throw your right leg up and use that momentum to get the lower half of your body up. Then you’ll grab his withers to help you pull the top half of your body up too.” 

“If I fall, you’ll catch me, right?” she asked, gripping onto Pegasus’s mane for dear life.

“Always.”

She looked at him, her heart racing, then took a few deep breaths. “I can do this.” 

“You can do this. I believe in you.” 

She nodded, his faith giving her courage. She did what he said, skipping and then throwing her right leg up. Pegasus dutifully shifted position when she under-calculated her momentum and overshot how far she needed to go, but between his help and Sora’s help, she managed to mount successfully.

“See?” Sora said, smiling proudly as she straightened. “That wasn’t so bad, now was it?” 

She shook her head. “I’m always learning new things when I’m with you.” 

He looked at her in a way that made her so flustered she had to look away, her face as red as her hair. He kept looking at her like that, and it was so much that her heart couldn’t handle it. 

Hercules looked at Meg like that, too.

“Hang on, I’ll join you,” Sora said. “Scoot back a little, okay?” She did what he said, and a moment later, he gracefully mounted Pegasus and settled in front of her, grabbing tufts of Pegasus’s mane.

“But what will I hold on to?” she squeaked, realizing there was no easy way for her to grab onto Pegasus’s mane from her current position. 

Sora turned his head and grinned. “Me.” 

Gulping, she wrapped her arms around Sora as Pegasus broke into a trot, then a lope, then a gallop. She’d be more flustered by how close she was to Sora, by how her chest was pressed into his back, if she weren’t scared witless and holding on for dear life.

Then they weren’t on the ground anymore, and her stomach lurched as they rapidly ascended. She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to fight the waves of nausea descending on her as the wind whistled past them. 

“Kairi, open your eyes,” Sora called back to her. 

“Ungh, I’m gonna be sick,” she moaned. 

“Trust me, it’s worth it.”

She took a deep breath, then peeked at their surroundings. The steady thump, thump, thump of Pegasus’s wings was soothing, and Sora was right. The view was absolutely worth it. All of Thebes plus the surrounding countryside unfolded beneath them, brilliant greens and lush fields and mysterious forests and winding rivers. In the distance was Mount Olympus, and Kairi marveled at how beautiful this world was, how different it was from Destiny Islands and Radiant Garden.

And best of all, she was getting to experience this with Sora. Now that she was feeling more comfortable, she rested her head on his shoulder and sighed happily. They were so close to each other and it felt really, really nice. She felt him stiffen a little at the increased contact and then melt under her touch.

She wished she could see his face, see how he felt about this, but then again, it might make her so flustered she had to look away again. Maybe touching him like this at first would help them feel more comfortable doing more later. 

No, what was she thinking. There would be no later. All they had was now. 

Presently, they began to descend. Below them was a sprawling villa with verdant walled gardens, elegant buildings with tiled red roofs supported by sprawling columns, and fountains and pools filled with beautiful blue water. This must be Hercules and Meg’s home. It was right by the ocean, and the sparkling sea glittered up at them. The villa got bigger and bigger till at last Pegasus glided to a smooth, easy landing by the foot of a tall stone staircase. They were on a paved garden path near a rounded seating area, and one of the fountains enticed them with its cool waters. 

She, Sora, and Pegasus were all panting, Pegasus from carrying two people on the journey, Sora from doing all the difficult parts of riding him, and Kairi from the thrill of it all. 

“Kairi?” Sora asked. “Mind if I dismount?”

“I wish I didn’t have to let go of you,” she murmured, her face red. She was sad their wonderful flight was already over. Yet another ending on the path to their final separation.

“It’s only temporary,” he promised, and she relented and released her grip. He dismounted and then helped her down, his touch gentle and strong at the same time.

She wobbled a little when her feet made contact with the ground, and he was quick to wrap his arms around her to steady her.

“Thank you,” she said, resting her hand over his heart. They were both breathing heavily, and Sora licked his lips. Their faces were so close that he could lean forward just a little further and kiss her. Her heart hammered in her chest. He had this look in his eyes that she’d never seen before, and a thrill went through her. She closed her eyes and tilted her head, imagining what it would feel like to kiss him at long last—

Pegasus neighed loudly, startling them apart. 

“Sorry, thanks for the ride, Pegasus!” Sora said, his face bright red as he rubbed the back of his neck. An overly cheerful smile was plastered on his face, like he was really embarrassed and was trying to hide it.

“Yes, thank you,” Kairi quickly added. Maybe she’d just imagined Sora had wanted to kiss her. She’d caught him by surprise, that was all. 

Pegasus whinnied appreciatively, then took flight again. Kairi and Sora watched until he became just a small figure in the sky, no bigger than a toy horse. Sora turned to her, a soft smile on his face. He put his hands behind his back in that delightfully charming Sora way of his and tilted his head.

“Well Kairi? We have this entire villa to ourselves for the rest of the day. What do you wanna do?”

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A/N: The prompt for this fic was provided by Aquafolia, who requested a story based on the following quote from Hercules during KH3 in regards to why he gave up immortality to be with Meg: “I’d have to be apart from the person I love most, and that life would be empty.” She also suggested Sora and Kairi explore Thebes together as well as a few later plot points 👀 ✨ Thank you for providing the prompt and a basic framework for the story 🙏

Thank you also to Liv for reading through the story, providing suggestions, helping me stay motivated, and providing helpful feedback as always ❤️ I really enjoyed bouncing ideas off of you and hearing your thoughts. Thank you for always being so supportive of my writing, it really means a lot 🥺 ❤️ 

Also, the instructions for mounting a horse bareback are from this YouTube video. I just thought it would be really fun for Sora and Kairi to get to ride Pegasus together, but he doesn’t have a saddle or reins, so reality ensued and I had to do a little additional research. And I also rewatched the actual Hercules movie, pausing to take screenshots and make notes about character dialogue and world details to incorporate. It was a lot of fun and gave me a deeper appreciation for the movie and for how Kingdom Hearts has incorporated various details from the movie over the years. As I was watching the movie too I was like “wait a second, I don’t know that Hercules’ villa has really appeared in Kingdom Hearts yet at all (unless the garden-y areas in KH3 count), it’s so beautiful and I’d really like to feature it,” and thus the end of this chapter (and the next chapter) was born.

Also, the title is taken from one of the lyrics in Hercules’ song, “Go the Distance,” since his search for belonging is such a core part of his character arc, and he finds that place of belonging with Meg. Wink wink nudge nudge I wonder how that will apply to this story 🧐 😉 

As always, thank you for reading!

[storm-driver]

kh4 rambling below the cut

im hoping they include multiple character campaigns for KH4. not just because i wanna see characters be playable that we havent seen in a while, or at all. but also because i feel like a whole game centered on sora in quadratum would get really difficult to tell a story in. not because interesting things couldn't happen. but the series has always had everyone venturing to other worlds to help progress the plot.

having sora, as limber and mobile as he was in that kh4 trailer, be secluded to a city, feels like he'd outpace the world itself and you'd end up traversing the same maps for tens of hours of game time. im sure there's gonna be plenty of narrative to push that world around, but i just dont wanna be in that single world the entire game.

it's part of why i wasn't the biggest fan of chain of memories. i didnt hate the story, and i didnt dislike castle oblivion. but KH excels at having the characters just be all over the universe in their journey. COM sorta shirks the responsibility of telling its story in one world by having illusions of the other worlds. but the most important parts are still only in castle oblivion. and after an hour or so of those cutscenes, it really starts to dawn on me how much ive grown used to the white walls of the castle.

perhaps that was the point? it's been a handful of years since those days, so i couldnt say anymore. ive grown up a lot since then, thematic choices will appear different to me from when i was a kid.

i digress, it'd also be a shame to bring back the whole main cast properly in kh3, free of their shackles or imprisonments, and then have them scarcely appear in the next mainline game. the hints that kairi will be training with ventus, terra, and aqua are already there, which gives me hope. donald and goofy are out looking for sora on their own, while mickey is on his way to the old scala ad caelum. it definitely FEELS like everyone is gonna be present.

im simply praying.

[derekscorner]

Kingdom Hearts: Gods & Angels

Just as the name implies this is a bit of a random shower-type of thought. It's not me complaining or trying to rewrite KH either, what I'm about to describe isn't even a problem objectively.

The thing I'm about to explain is a very much "me problem" that extends to any story I invest in but if you're bored like I am let's indulge a bit.

Kingdom Hearts: Angels & Gods

You see, I have the type of brain that tries to understand the lore of something. I do not need every answer given since a story should always retain mystery but there will always be some aspect of a world I can't help but hyper-focus on.

In KH's case it's the way life & death work. Initially it was easy to assume that Hades was the de-facto end point since the Disney version of the Olympians are very much godly.

Even in their source film the gods are depicted as immortal and omnipotent over their domain. Even Hades is, in actuality, a very powerful threat both in the movie and KH series.

(you see Hades display super strength in the movie a few times in fact)

Sora always wins with the power of friendship and Hercules has literal god-tier strength so Hades isn't that threatening but to the average living being he's basically a force of nature.

Even with his keyblade and otherworldly magic Sora can't actually kill Hades. He's legitimately immortal, there is no death for him.

Then later I assumed that each world essentially had it's own afterlife. Which may still be true to some extent at the time of me writing this. The presence of Joshua in DDD solidified this idea for me for a while.

I do keep in mind (as should you) that any Square character that cameos in KH is not the same one you see in the game they appear in. Squal isn't Squal, he's Leon. Cloud isn't Cloud, he's emo Cloud in Vincent Valentines outfit. Their backstories and personalities are rewritten entirely.

Even Zack who appeared in BBS was from the world of Hercules rather than having a history shared with Cloud. The closest being we seen to having a backstory hinted to be similar to their source material was Auron but the very fact he was in Hades underworld means some obvious variation has happened there as well.

This is very important because that means the same level of alteration exists for Joshua, his reapers, and the Shibuya that Neku calls home. We know the reapers game exists, we know that a Composer exists, but the actual accuracy to TWEWY's lore isn't guaranteed.

If anything, you should assume that the Shibuya that Neku calls home in KH is basically its own thing entirely. Especially now that Verum Rex exists with a Shibuya of it's own. (it was confirmed that the two shibuya's are indeed different)

The Final Headache World

But this all changes with KH3's Final World- hell, it all changes with Dark Road from the mobile titles.

In KH3 we're shown the "Final World" the place you supposedly go when you are done. There is no tricks, there is no miracles, you are as dead as you can be.

Sora literally broke time twice to save the day and still wound up here...or you're supposed too? See thanks to Dark Road or KH4's premise it's confusing.

We know you go to this Final World if you die both in heart, body, and soul. A total demise, KH3 tells us this in-game.

We also know that "Unreality" functions as a type of afterlife for people like Sora too since Strelitzia tells us as such in the KH4 trailer.

So...where do Joshua and Hades fit into that?

According to Hades here, according to what we've actually seen, the Underworld is your death. A Kh wielder or two die (okay more) in KHDR and they do go here.

The protagonists make a deal with Hades to speak to the spirit of one such dead key kid. Soooo that just makes my brain question "why?".

What dictates these differences. On a surface level you can assume Sora and Strelitzia are in Unreality because they were kicked out of "reality". We know this is true for Sora at the very least, the world at large didn't kill him it flat out removed him from reality as he knows it for breaking time.

But the first time Sora died he went to the Final World not the Underworld. The excuse that Kairi was keeping his heart connected to life is also a stretch because Sora still went to the Final World.

She offered a way back but she did not stop his death leading him to this world.

So where does the Underworld fit into that? How does Joshua's reaper game fit into this set up? Is there even a common denominator at all?

It's possible that every afterlife is connected to the Final World but that's conjecture on my part not a fact. I only offer it because Hades is shown fully capable of summoning dead people (like Auron or the Key Kid) and Joshua has shown that he's fully capable of retrieving dead people and moving them to worlds not within his domain.

He took Neku's group to the Realm of Sleep, he left his world behind to help reconstruct them. We don't know why he did but the point is that he could.

Hades and Joshua are literally two beings that you witness working on a cosmic scale. They clearly have power over death even in worlds they don't physically live in.

Kingdom Hearts: Gods & Angels???

And you want to know the real kicker? This bothers me personally not just for these questions about death but because my brain jumps the shark to the divine.

Death is always governed by something in any religion and what I have just described is an angel based on monotheistic religion and a pagan god working on a cosmic scale.

(technically composers are more like super-reapers or lower ranked angels than true angels but Joshua has the wings so semantics)

What is bothering me is that I do not comprehend how the cosmic landscape works. I know Hades is the god of death for everyone thanks to Dark Road, even Xigbar pokes fun at Hercules for having help in "high places". The Olympians in KH effect the universe as a whole.

But...Joshua exists and so does he. Do the gods just pick worlds to personally run? Do they make them? Between Joshua and the church in Notre Dome how do pagan gods like the Olympians or even Callisto from Pirates of the Caribbean fit in?

It's these kind of questions that my mind wanders too in KH and any story. I want to know, it bothers me that there's no concrete law.

Hell, I bet you even forgot that Davy Jones Locker was in KH3, it's an after life as well! Calisto is barely shown in KH3 but she's there, she's a sea goddess.

I didn't forget but I don't know where they all fit.

There is no answer for any of this and honestly it would be wiser from a writers standpoint to not try and do so. I just needed to rant about it for a bit.

I hope you enjoyed this trip through my insanity, I hope that I cured your boredom and never forget; this is a very me problem.

[the-au-collector]

I have no backing for this but I feel like every post about KH I’ve been making lately has been very negative??? Idk I reblogged a post today and realized it was really really negative? And like. I don’t like KH3. I stand by that. And it’s because I fucking love this series. I love it’s characters. I love how much of a madman Nomura is.

But. I can also feel the lack of love that went into KH3. That’s not to say there wasn’t any love. The world designs are phenomenal (did you know they modeled a specific city block in San Francisco for San Fransokyo’s level? I need to post that comparison soon). The gameplay, while too flashy and breaking the flow of gameplay constantly, looks really good. The game looks good. It feels good to play. I hate the game yet it’s my most replayed KH game to date.

Yet I can’t help but feel like Nomura was tired when writing it. He was tired of these characters. Tired of this arc. He wanted to move on. I don’t blame him. He’s been working on the Xehanort arc for around a decade. Damn, I would be tired too. But it’s a problem when I can feel that tiredness in the story.

And it permeates the story. The sequel-baiting. The bringing up things out of left field. Fucking Verum Rex. It’s just. KH3 feels tired. It feels tired of its own IP. It feels tired of the arc it’s supposed to be ending. It feels tired of Disney and Sora and the characters we’ve been following for years.

Idk, I mostly just feel disappointed about KH3. At this point, I’m just tired of it. I loathe the game because I love the series and I hate how lackluster of an ending KH3 got because Nomura got tired/wants to do other things with the series (*side eyes the hideous rebrand of Versus XIII as Verum Rex*). This series is near and dear to my heart and it’s just sad. When the game came out, I felt betrayed. There was too much coming out of left field. Too much focusing on what was ahead instead of closing off arcs. It was too little too late.

We waited thirteen years—and for what? For Sora to be sent left and right with no direction across 6 Disney worlds? For everything to be wrapped up in a nice little bow with little to no struggle or emotional agony that all of the previous games have consistently given us? For Sora to just be able to fix things with no consequences? For every world Sora was sent to to feel inconsequential (and I can see the effort there. I can see so, so much effort to make something. Each movie featured has themes of loss and sacrifice but it’s just not there in KH3)? For Sora to not even take a front-seat in most of the story? He’s just there, a vessel for the player to watch events that he has nothing to do with unfold? What happened to Sora, the main character? Why does no one want to involve him on anything? Now he’s just the dues ex machine all the important people get to call when they get in trouble. Where’s the setup? Where’s the payoff? Where’s the hours of Lea agonizing over Roxas and Xion? Where’s Aqua and Ven trying desperately to save Terra, knowing he might be too far gone? Where’s Sora, facing up against the biggest foe of his life, who’s supposed to be the most conniving, deceitful man ever? It all just gets shoved to the end, barely mattering outside of a single world.

The worst part is—I know Nomura can write something good. I know he can do the setup and payoff. He explained why Mickey was shirtless in KH1 for Pete’s sake! He did really good at Union X’s story and making us really care about the new characters we have never met! He made impeccable Disney Worlds in Dark Road that had plot relevance! I know he can make something good, great even! So why didn’t he with KH3?

Sorry for the long post. Figured I’d explain some of my disappointment in KH3. I really do love the series, and it’s what makes KH3 so disappointing and bad to me. I know this is a 5-year old conversation but I’d figured I’d put my 2 cents into the pot.

[suolainensilakka]

favorite kingdom hearts characters. for science

WELL, gently taps the current pinned post of this blog, that one's a freebie ^__^

Anyway. BOY ranking them all is really hard bc so many characters in the series have permanently set up camp in my head by now and arent particularly inclined to leave any time soon, but if I had to list off just a couple examples that have caused me the most brain damage so far, itd be:

- Terra, hands down my number 1 most specialest guy in the whole world. Instantly became enamored with him from the moment I first set eyes on him and then proceeded to have all of my ribs carefully and meticulously pulled out of my chest one by one throughout the entirety of bbs and the entire rest of the series after that. Its so dire man I literally cannot look at any images of him now without physically having to hold myself back from making a long strangled whine Out Loud With My Mouth every time

- the entire Wayfinder Trio as a collective unit + Vanitas also tbh. Terra's obviously my Primary Favorite but the wayfinders as a whole also make my heart hurt so fucking bad man. My partner and I choose to interpret them all as siblings bc it leads to some exceptionally delicious and painful rs dynamics to explore imo and something abt it just makes The Miseries hit that much harder in ways that have literally had me writhing on the couch with a thousand yard stare rapidly cycling through the five stages of grief on loop. I'm also counting Vanitas as part of the unit bc he's just so closely tied to Ven in my brain that separating them (lol.) feels Wrong (lmao.), and. God. Vanitas might just be one of THE most tragic characters in literally any media I've experienced and I say this without a single hint of irony. The current total wordcount of the rps that I've written abt the wayfinders with my partner so far has probably shot past 50k by now. Why am I hurds

- Kairi. I was originally mostly ambivalent/neutrally intrigued abt her but kept getting increasingly more pissed abt her treatment and constant sidelining by the writing to the point where I got to kh3/mom and something in me snapped entirely, and from that moment onwards I decided to love her entirely out of spite. She instantly shot up to become one of my favorites after that and if I think abt her meta and story potential for longer than five minutes at a time I start frothing at the mouth

- Sora, naturally. I have so so so so many thoughts on this little darling boy that could easily double the wordcount of this ask just by themselves but the most important thing to mention here in lieu of that, for now, is that he's is the One (1) and ONLY child ive ever seen, whether real or fictional, that has made me experience emotions anywhere Close to resembling baby fever. I want to dribble him like a basketball but also gently pinch his cheek affectionately and also spoil him silly like a grandma seeing her beloved grandson again for the first time in months

- Xigbar. This fucko is the one I'm the most mad about ending up liking as much as I do, not because hes a bad character, absolutely far from it I fucking ADORE this terrible bodyhopping little cunt, but because it happened by complete accident after I realized he shares a lot of (surface) similarities with my favorite blorbo from another entirely unrelated franchise and I then got mad about realizing I have a very easily clockable Type (which I've affectionately dubbed the Guys That Suck category. I have more too obv but its the funniest one I have). He's also infuriatingly fun to write. Get me OUT of here

- Xemnas, Terranort and Ansem SoD. Everyone in the Nort Collective counts tbh but those three are the ones I lose sleep over the most, particularly the first two; Xemnas bc he makes me feel an unfathomably deep and haunting sense of grief (brought on by me finishing bbs and then realizing days later the exact way his creation connects to Terra's story and hearing the sound of fucking glass shattering at the back of my head instantly), and Terranort bc I'm fucking terrified of him and he also makes me want to eat gravel whenever I think abt him in context with him interacting with the rest of the wayfinders. He's also really fun to write and this fact Upsets Me. Ansem's listed bc you can never go wrong with the ol reliable mad scientist. The rest of the norts I would probably also be a lot more insane over once I actually get off my damn ass and start picking through the mobile games but that's an endeavor for Future Salty (i am very excited and terrified)

- the Lingering Will. I'm counting it as a separate entity from Terra and the rest of the Terra Collective on a technicality bc (LOUD TELEVISION STATIC AS I GESTURE FRANTICALLY AND FURIOUSLY @ THE JUMBLED BALL OF YARN LABELED "my thoughts on the physical and psychological effects of being a guy who got his soul and entire being shattered into like five million distinct pieces for over 10 Whole Entire Years" THAT I HAVE NOT EXPLAINED THE ENTIRETY OF TO A SINGLE OTHER SOUL ON EARTH) but. Eah. This fucking haunted hunk of metal has been eating holes through my brain tissue ever since I first saw the kh2 secret superboss and I'm distraught over it every single day of my life. This thing is like a weird bug to me. Do you understand. (tearign up) Do you get me. Do I have to pull out the Lingering Will/The Hollow Knight venn diagram

And as for the other fuckos haunting my cranium on the daily I can only mention a couple other honorary picks that honestly could also very well have made it to the main list if not for the fact that this post is already long enough as it is, and these following characters are therefore mostly delegated to Sleeper Agent Blorbos who I don't think about QUITE as often as the ones listed above but whenever I Do I get just as distraught and ailed over them. Anyway, shoutout to the entire Seasalt Trio, Demyx, Riku, Repliku, Naminé and Saïx and probably many others I'm forgetting rn bc it is currently 2 am and I'm running on approximately 5-6 hours of sleep and a prayer 👍 god bless and amen

[eradicatetehnormal]

Okay So I Watched Some of the 6 Hour "Riku Is Gay" Video

Disclaimer: I only watched the KH1-2 sections, the KH3 section, and Sora's Comphet section. Also, I already agree with the preset that Riku is a queer character. Sorry guys, but he is.

Personally, I think it's a good video. It's not overly malicious or angry and the evidence it presents is actually really good, though I'm in the queer spaces of the KH fandom so I've seen most of it.

I really only have 3 major issues:

The video is way too fucking long. Something like this would have benefited from being a multipart series. Also, if all you wanted was condensed proof that Riku is "gay" that's really only a 30-40 minute video. This leads me to my next point.

The title is very misleading. This isn't just a video about Riku's queerness. Hell, there's an entire portion of the video called "Sora's comphet." Most of the KH2 section is dedicated to how passionate Sora is about finding Riku. This video should not be called "Riku is gay (and why it matters)", it should be called something like "SoRiku is canon actually (It's more than a ship)" or "The queerness of KH and why it's essential."

This video has a habit of minimizing Kairi's importance to Sora. Like, they try to give the disclaimer that they don't think Kairi means nothing to Sora, but it's hard to buy it. In the KH2 section, for example, they bring up that Sora doesn't ask about Kairi until he realizes she's been captured by the organization. That's the thing though, for most of the game Sora knows where Kairi is. He saw her drift away with the islands in one and he finds out when she's been captured in 2. Don't forget he also dropped to his knees for Kairi when Saix comes to tell him what happened. Does that disprove any potential queerness Sora might have? No, especially with the scenes of the reunion. "Kairi, you've changed, but we'll always be friends :)" "RIKU OH MY GOD *cries and gets on the floor* I LOOKED EVERYWHERE FOR YOU!" Really it's more of a personal belief that shines through that the romantic love interest has to single-handedly be the most important person to you that sets me off. Though, I don't solely blame Mr. "Whatever his name is" for that. It's more of a "we live in a society" thing.

Aside from that, most of my criticisms are nitpicks. The structure is hella off with the video. He starts off by stating his beliefs and then giving the evidence. Like, dude, you have to lead with the evidence and then tell people what it means. Anyone who's skipping through the video and doesn't already agree that Riku is queer is going to get frustrated watching it and feel compelled to not take it seriously. Especially since the video is 6 fucking hours.

Arguably the KH3 and Coded sections aren't needed. The KH3 section is just theory and conjecture that he could've saved for the end of the video and the Sora and Riku of Coded are different characters than regular Sora and Riku. Can they give us insight into their relationship and their feelings? Yes, but ultimately, their circumstances are different. Feelings can manifest one way in one context and a whole other way in a different one. Regular Sora and Riku have enough evidence all on their own to carry a video.

The novel should have honestly been its own section. People are not compelled to take that seriously. It's cool that Nomura himself was impressed with the writer's understanding of the characters and had her write the novels so far, but that doesn't mean she never takes any creative liberties. It's also worth pointing out that Nomura IS NOT the only writer for the series. He's not even the main writer for the games.

Bro, you're gonna bring up the scene where Namine comes to Riku about getting him to use the darkness but not bring up the aggressively gay scene before that where Zexion makes himself look like Sora in order to defeat him because Zexion knows that Sora is his potential weakness?

But yeah, the vid has a few glaring issues, but it is great. I'm happy something like this exists where we can get all the major SoRiku talking points in one place. No hate to this man, especially for something like this.

[kosmic-arts]

An Unhinged KH Rant That I Needed To Get Out of My Brain

here i am, once again, tortured by hypotheticals like- "what if kingdom hearts didn't suck?" and, "if i could rewrite kh, how and what would i cut or add?"

honestly,, my ideal kingdom hearts timeline is kh1, com, kh2, and days. that's literally it. games extending backwards or forwards from the end of kh2 (bbs & ddd kh3 unioncrossfuckinghell) really sapped the life from the series imo. in a better world, square and disney would've put kingdom hearts to rest by 2, and we would've all grown up and moved on with happy memories :))))

lol. but is it possible to extend the story of kh without draining it of all the magic, mystery, and charm established since kh1? by now i think we can all agree that here at the tailend of the timeline (kh3), this game has reduced itself to a fake deep shitpost soulless disney ad. :) -so, how could it be done anyway? ultimately, bbs would have to exist. you would need something to expand on the story's lore, and the lore of the keyblade and it's wielders is a prime target. i love and hate bbs; but i do think it really takes away from the charm of the keyblade itself and the mystery surrounding it. explains too much, if you will. lets not get into how the wayfinder trio spends their entire time talking about how much they gotta train and how their entire lives revolve around training and how wooden and stiff a vast majority of their interactions are eraqus dont even get me started he is so boring do not talk to me about the shitty gacha paytowin mobile game god help me also their shitty mark of mastery exam is with the fucking flying balls its so lame are you telling me this is what keyblade masters are capable of; what fucking happened to lingering will in kh2fm??? why cant we do any of that shit in bbs? wheres the fuckin keyblade transformations and capes in that game-

ok. bbs would have to exist… but it should've revived kh1's way of integrating disney plots into the main story. ALL the games shouldve revived that trick post kh2. whats the point of disney being a major half of these games if you dont use them. like- ven goes to fucking cinderella world and meets cinderella (NOT AS A RAT), and ven is sad and lost an looking for his friends and cinderella convinces her stepmother to hire ven as a stableboy or a peasent servant or some shit. something to get a roof over his head. ventus learns from cinderella about her dreams and it gets him thinking about what he wants out of life… maybe he wants to see his friends succeed and become masters but thats mainly just a pretty excuse hes been using to mask his true feelings. truthfully hes scared of getting left behind. maybe he discovers that he feels inadequate in comparison to his friends, and fears for the inevitable future where they leave home to lead their own lives/search for their own apprentices. fuck idk. 1 talk with cinderella could unlock all of that. easy. imagine writing. what a concept.

WHAT im saying is. disney shouldn't exist in kh just to be an ad. the reason why sora in kh1 came to the conclusion that MY FRIENDS ARE MY POWER, is because of the lessons he learned in each of the disney worlds up until his confrontation with riku. he literally explains his entire reasoning before he says the line- the disney plots mattered to sora's character development! by the end of the game, he became so much more wisened and was capable of butting heads with ansem who had studied all the esoteric makings of the universe and thought he knew where life began and eneded: darkness lol. but sora had come to a different conclusion: kingdom hearts is light!!! lmao!! it was an asspull, but shit. i could follow the line of logic well enough and it was cool and dramatic without insulting my intelligence.

what am i talking about? disney? i think the timeline extending backwards as far as bbs is serviceable, but nothing in this world will convince me otherwise from the belief that unioncross is hot garbage and needlessly complicates the plot to an insane degree. its literally star wars prequel movies but even shittier, but this time, theres a casino for the little kids!!! yay!! :))

aanyway. what about ddd..? the resurrection of org 13 needs to not fucking happen. and if it does, only like, 4 of the 13 and half of them arent even enemies. i dont want to kill guys i already slaughtered 2 games ago. theyre not threatening anymore GOD. what if kingdom hearts established new villians starting from ddd that would lead into kh3 being a whole new story? pretty epic right? it would be just like how com introduced the org13 the first time after ansem was beaten to lead into kh2! woww! but, like, who would this hypothetical new ddd-introduced villian be? we all know the kh team cant design characters for shit who aren't walking talking black coats. MoM? lol? i like the guy, but hes an overpowered omnipotent all knowing god that is too strong to feasibly be beaten by anyone without a humongeous ass pull deus ex machina to solve the problem. like c'mon, dont act surprised when sora inevitably walks up to him, goes- "light light friendship heart. the future can be changed!" and then MoM is like, "ah fuck i guess you're right. i suppose i, the master of masters, the most powerful keyblade wielder ever, maybe even the progenitor and also seer of all time and existance who knows everything you're going to do before you're going to do it-- knows less than you. i was wrong all along. guess ill die!". don't act like it wont happen like that :))). you really think the kh writers are competent enough to handle a character as difficult to manage as MoM? he's a cool guy, but they fucked up trapping him in this garbage game.

lmao. but anyway, who knows who this hypothetical new ddd villian would be. but it would have to be some other dumbfuck obsessed with the (((power of kingdom hearts))). thats the name of the game after all. so really, what im actually saying is- kh3 shouldve been a whole new storyline with new villians and plot, rather than dredging up closed plotlines from the previous games. we shouldnt have to be waiting till mf kh4 just for a new story. im not playing that game btw. not unless square figures out how to make a game fun to play like its literal 20 yr old predecessors of kh1&2, while also not selling me the fixes to the game in a 40$ dlc. fuck you. REMIND me not to ever play this shitty game ever again.

ok. i think im ok… i got everything out my system. bbs shouldn't have been garbage where you cant even be like lingering will by the end of the game. also disney worlds need to serve a purpose in kh beyond serving merely as ads… ddd shouldve introduced a new villian for a new plotline continued in kh3, rather than retconning and resurrecting everything from the previous games… and MoM is a cool guy trapped in a shit game that will inevitably get botched. yup.

ok i feel better now.

[missingmywing]

Okay: here's a few! Emet, ANY of the Foretellers, and Sephiroth.

Okay, take my essays on each of them XD

Emet, Foretellers, Sephiroth

First impression

Emet: Well I was a bit biased from the beginning because I had a pair of certain someones talking him up and blowing him air kisses, but even without that I adored him instantly. He’s was and is my favorite type of character - insanely complex and hiding it behind snarky over dramatic dramatic bastard. His entire scene with Varis was just me cackling gleefully because “holy shit he’s so fun”. Very Ardyn vibes, but with a much better written ending.

Aced: Okay you said any so you get all the Foretellers. My initial impression of Aced? “Oh he’s an ass, I hate him. Talk about an inflated ego and bad attitude.” KHX/UX did not give him any brownie points. Aaaand then Back Cover came out. But he had a very bad first impression and was the character I definitely considered to be the main antagonist of KHX/Chi.

Gula: I loved him. I didn’t trust him, but I loved him. Snarky sneaky catboi my beloved. He was doing his best, but I could already see that he was too smart for his own good and that it would get him in trouble (and I was right). But the sneaky ones running rings around everyone else to pull their strings are my favorite characters, so Gula had my heart almost immediately.

Invi: “Oh she seems cool, reminds me of Aqua.” And… that’s about it. She’s a lot like Aqua, and X/UX/BC did not change that impression in the least.

Ira: “Oh I’m going to like him, I mean he’s automatically my chosen Foreteller bc of the unicorn that matches Etheria’s lore too well, and he’s the type of stoic serious character I tend to like.” X/UX/BC didn’t really add much to that. There was a little, but not a ton.

Ava: “She’s adorable, and seems sweet. I wonder if she’s going to die or turn evil later.” My opinion didn’t really change much until UX started dropping its bombs, and then I got increasingly concerned about what exactly had happened to her - especially the KH3 epilogue.

Sephiroth: Okay so the thing is. My first FFVII experience was Crisis Core, bc I found it through Kingdom Hearts (technically my first impression was in KH2 but that was just WHY DID THEY PUT AN IMPOSSIBLE BOSS IN THIS GAME D: so it doesn’t count.) So my first impression of Sephiroth was “oh this is so unfair, he’s being so screwed over. I love him, he’s doing his best to help his friends despite being stuck in an impossible situation.” So he was a really tragic character right off the bat for me, since I didn’t have the impression of him starting out as an enemy in the OG game.

Impression now

Emet: He has remained one of my favorite characters and I still adore him, but I can really appreciate his depth now. Elpis gave me a lot of feelings because we got to see him before he had to endure the tragedy of technically being the only ancient to truly survive the Final Days/Sundering untouched - Lahabrea was half of himself even before that point, and Elidibus was… more of a primal than a person by that point, from what I can tell. So Emet-Selch was the sole remaining whole Ancient for twelve millenia, on top of having to deal with the world being reset back to the pre-stone age era. He’s tragic, and one of the most relatable and emotional characters in the whole game despite his attempts at convincing everyone that he has a solid arm’s length of distance between himself and the world at large. He absolutely does not, he’s just a tsundere. I can understand why did what he did - from the beginning to the end, I definitely understand his perspective

Aced: He’s probably my favorite now, thanks to Back Cover and the character analyses I’ve done on him. Because oh. look. he’s just scared and desperate and doing his best to save the world, despite everyone else making fun of him or accusing him of things. (The fact that he’s clearly spent his life as the too-serious one of the group who doesn’t quite get the jokes the others are making about him and just getting upset only to get made fun of more or told to chill out in a relatable way definitely has nothing to do with that. Definitely not.) His relationship with my main Keykid is honestly fascinating to me, because they kind of hate each other and it’s on sight, but that’s because they consider each other a threat to the world/her health, and they highly respect each other’s perspectives/intentions. They just don’t trust each other and would sooner stab each other than compromise to work together at the time of the Keyblade War.

Gula: Look he did his best and I will stand by that. He was a an idiot who got himself in over his head by his own designs, but he’s self aware enough to know and acknowledge that in canon to our Keykid, and he feels incredibly guilty about it. I’m excited to see where they’re going with him in future games and how he’ll grow, as well as what’s going to happen with Ava because he’s clearly worried about her.

Invi: My initial impression of "she's basically Aqua" has not changed, except Aqua has had character growth and Invi is still… “I believe in MoM, and believe he has the best of intentions and will do all I can to uphold his teachings.” Maybe (hopefully!) that’ll change in KH4 and beyond, but as of the end of X/UX my impression of her hasn’t changed.

Ira: I - Look. He’s still my chosen Foreteller, I’ve never switched from Unicornis, and Etheria still respects him, but. He’s… honestly kind of boring? His “rivalry” with Aced is the most characterization he gets, and while he does save our ass and acknowledges us, he’s more distant than anyone but Invi. I’m hoping we get more characterization for him because right now my impression is “*Shrug.* He’s there. I respect his attempts but they failed and he didn’t make me sympathize with him.”

Ava: I. I have so many questions. I’m so torn. I like her a lot, she’s sweet, but man oh man I don’t trust anything about her situation. While I don’t think she’s turned evil, I do think she’s become extremely complicated and whatever is going on with her is going to be a twist of some sort. My current theory is that she’s somehow tied to Namine. Not sure how, but questions and convenient hints are beginning to line up between them somehow.

Sephiroth: His dedication to chasing Cloud across the whole universe and every single game he’s in and now TIME TRAVEL LIKE THE MANY FICS I’VE READ is hilarious and that’s always going to be his defining feature to me now. I still find him incredibly tragic because his insanity was cultivated and purposeful by Hojo and Jenova, so if the situation in Nibelheim - and Genesis’ own insanity making him be an ass - hadn’t happened as it had, things wouldn’t have snowballed as they did. The whole thing could have been avoided if he’d had proper support and a bit of interference from someone who wasn’t as cut out of the loop as Zack.

Favorite moment

Emet: “Do no squander it, the legacy I leave you.” Honestly all of Elpis was gold and one joy after the next, but that line is what really really stuck with me. His little monologue at the end of Ultima Thule also got to me, the list of places left to visit and then his final “I certainly did.” was just- *chef’s kiss* I also loved him throughout SHB, all his sarcastic drama was amazing and I loved it all. Amaurot tore me apart as was intended. Every time this man smiles That Smile at us I die of pain and joy.

Aced: His moment of vulnerability with Ira in Back Cover was wonderful, and was the moment that made him click for me. His tired resignation, from his posture to his words were “I did my best. I did all I could, and everything I did was to protect the world and stop this war. If I failed then I will accept my end.” AND IF THAT’S NOT A CHARACTER TYPE THAT INSTANTLY WINS MY HEART. One scene made me go from disliking him to taking him on as one of my favorites.

Gula: His scene with the Master, probably, because it - more than anything else - was what set the tone for both Back Cover and the entirety of KHUX. THAT was the moment when it clicked exactly what kind of story this was, and exactly what kind of long game MoM was playing. The complete breakdown of Gula’s role combined with MoM’s sudden personality switch was top tier, and made all of Gula’s actions make complete sense - tragic and stupidly reckless though they were.

Invi: Hmm probably that fight with Aced? She had some good moments there, and they were the most definitive of her character across the whole series so far. Although her scene in the Keyblade War to the Player was pretty good too.

Ira: His scene with Aced in Back Cover was great - his response of “No I’m not going to kill you, we need everyone we can and I still trust you and believe that you were trying to help.” was FANTASTIC and exactly what I love in a character, and validated me for choosing him as my leader. He may be among the least interesting/utilized, but he has his moments.

Ava: Hmmm it’s hard to pick one, but probably either the scene where she gave Brain the book and keyblade or the fountain scene where she was talking to Ephemera. I enjoyed the complexity of the first, and the genuine warmth and sweetness of the second.

Sephiroth: He’s so tragic. Nibelheim could have been avoided so easily if he’d just BEEN GIVEN SUPPORT. AND HIS TWO BEST FRIENDS NOT ABANDONED HIM AND THEN ONE OF THEM SHOWED UP AND CALLED HIM A MONSTER THEN DEMANDED HIS HELP. I like Genesis and his potential but the blame for Nibelheim and everything after is at least 20% on his shoulders. The other 80% is divided between Hojo and Jenova. I love him, I love his potential, and I think his insanity was something cultivated and triggered purposefully and could have been avoided.

Idea for a story

Emet: I have fucking lists. One of my current favorites is either Etheria (my WoL) being trapped back in time and Emet having to vouch for her/work with her, or Elpis!Emet being dragged forward with a couple of others and having to deal with modern Etheirys and just reacting to everything. Otherwise though give me young Solus, show me Emet building up the Garlean empire with Gaius and the others, and what that looked like from the Garlean side.

Foretellers: Combining all of these into one, I want to write an au “nothing goes wrong, the war never breaks out” story series, consisting purely of Daybreak Town shenanigans and the Foretellers dealing with the would-be main Dandelion group causing trouble. Aced says if Ephemera, Skuld, and Etheria break into the tower one more time he’s locking their Keyblades away and trapping them in Agrabah. MoM and Luxu are too busy laughing and enabling them to offer the Foretellers any help. Lauriam and Brain are trying to act as the group brain cells and keep them out of trouble. Poor Strel, Elrena, and Ven have no idea how they got here but they’re stuck within the madness now.

Sephiroth: Time Travel is and will always be my favorite story trope, give me the good old FFVII classic fic of Seph and Cloud travelling back in time to when Cloud was a cadet and both of them just completely dismantling ShinRa.

Unpopular opinion

Emet: Hmmm not sure I’m familiar enough with fandom opinion to give an unpopular one? I know I’ve seen some people say he’s overrated, which I strongly disagree with but can understand for the people who don’t like him. Hmm, probably the closest I can give is that I disagree with the idea that he hates/resents the WoL for not being Azem and didn’t care at all about Garlemald - what he says and what he does are two very different things, and he offered WoL too much support to hate them (and that smile is a story of its own), plus he was beloved in Garlemald and canonically considered a kind and caring leader for a reason (until his son died maybe, but that’s a whole analysis of its own).

Aced: He’s not an idiot, he doesn’t try to kill our Keykid for the lulz, and despite what he says in UX I don’t actually think he ever wanted to “rule the world” - he was scared and desperate and trying to save the world from something that he’d been told and convinced was an inevitability so he got angry and frustrated and lashed out. Something he (and the others) was manipulated into by MoM, so… he handle the situation badly - exactly how he was supposed to. Tragically.

Gula: Same with above - he had good reasons for doing what he did, and he was scared and angry and not thinking clearly. It was planned, and he did exactly what he was supposed to. Maybe it was stupid, but given the situation he didn’t believe he had other options.

Invi: Despite what I said above, Invi is not a blind follower. She makes comments that perhaps MoM wasn’t correct, or wasn’t the right path. Her faith in him wasn’t blind - it was a choice, one she thought through and acknowledged. It’s very possible that she’ll set aside that faith when she learns the whole story.

Ira: The same as above, though I haven’t really seen much fandom opinion on him. He… really doesn’t have much.

Ava: I don’t think she’s evil, but neither do I think she’s a pure cinnamon role who can do no wrong. She made mistakes as well, she had her moments of panic (see the fight with Luxu triggering the Keyblade War) and the jury’s out on how her switch of the BoP and Master’s Defender will play out - we still don’t know if that was planned as well (probably) or if she managed to pull one over on MoM. I don’t think she’ll turn out to be evil and malicious, though. She has the best intentions, I think - but then so do the others.

Sephiroth: He hasn’t been an irredeemable madman his whole life, and what happened at Nibelheim wasn’t some inevitable end for him. I don’t know if he can be pulled back at this point - as of ACC and who even knows what’s going on with Remake/Rebirth - but he wasn’t always a madman just waiting for the moment to snap.

Favorite relationship

Emet: Hythlodaeus and Azem for sure, but his relationship with various WoLs is always fascinating, and I really want to see how he interacts with the rest of the Convocation more. I also think it would have been interesting to see his relationship with his family in Garlemald, before Lucius died and everything started falling apart.

Aced: Probably his relationship with Ira - it’s so nuanced. There’s respect and resentment in equal measure, and that’s always fun to play around with. Second is with the Player because complicated doesn’t even begin to cover it.

Gula: Hmm probably Ava? Either that or the Keykids, bc he has some very interesting dynamic moments with the Player.

Invi: I have to say MoM? We don’t see her a lot, but that’s the relationship that has the most potential to be interesting.

Ira: Aced, for the same as above. Aced is the only one who can get him riled up, so it’s interesting to see them bounce off of each other.

Ava: Either Ephemera or Brain, because there’s so much there. I’m actually going to have to say Brain? Because there’s a story there that we don’t know, especially how much she trusts him and how he seems reserved about trusting her. Ephemera trusts her more than Brain, and I want to know why Brain is so important and how they know each other. There’s nuance and complication there, much more so than Ava and Ephemera.

Sephiroth: Cloud. We’ve established that I like complicated relationships, and you can’t get much more complicated than this. There’s so much there, whether in canon or what-if aus, and it’s always fascinating to analyze and explore.

Favorite headcanon

Emet: WoL is not the first time in which Emet has taken a major role in the life of Azem’s shard - they’ve been at the center of every major conflict in history in one form or another, and Emet is very used to both fighting against them and alongside them. My WoL’s previous life was actually as a half-Dalmascan Garlean assassin who helped create Garlemald’s alchemist division during the very early days of Solus building his reign, and was his (secret) lover for a time - until she found out just a little too much about the Ascians and he killed her before she could become a threat (and she would have). There have been multiple times throughout history that he’s sought a shard out, though it always ends with them enemies and he’s never given any of them Azem’s crystal.

Aced: He loves his Union, and is really protective of his kids (unless Player is one of them. In which case oops). He bluffs and blusters loudly, but he’s a softy if you trick him into admitting it, and if an upset kid asks genuinely for help he’ll cave immediately.

Gula: He kind of hates himself for the specific role he plays in the Keyblade War, even once he finds out it was inevitable. His Union is the first to begin falling to darkness and is the most aggressive about the war, and he hates what it's done to them and that he has only himself to blame.

Invi: I… don’t really have any? I think she has a bit of a mischievous streak of her own, she just hides it really well. Make her angry though, and - well, you’ll never be able to prove it.

Ira: His attitude and “uptightness” is a very purposeful thing he projects and cultivates, because he thinks he has to. He was named leader, but even before that he… basically he and Invi the result of gifted child syndrome, and I’m sure MoM encouraged that. He has do be perfect and make the right choice every time, mistakes aren’t allowed. And when he can’t match it… well, he copes the best he can while bottling anything negative up because he can’t afford to think about it now.

Ava: She’s a prankster who’s the most vicious of all for Foretellers, and has very little respect for rules unless she can see a clear reason for them (if it’s not dangerous or potentially hurting anyone then it’s fine to break it). She’s really close to all her Union kids, and is perfectly willing to befriend kids from other Unions.

Sephiroth: He has a strong respect for Wutai’s culture, and believes that ShinRa’s actions were extreme and pointless and is a little resentful over them. He followed orders because… well, they were orders and it wasn’t until Angeal and Genesis deserted that he even realized that leaving was an option (although it really wasn’t, but he could’ve taken anything ShinRa threw at him). So he followed orders and fought, but he did it as cleanly as possible and earned at least some measure of respect from Wutai in turn.

[braveheartstoryteller]

Why does anything happen? In real life, it can be difficult to answer this question. Life tends to have its way of making us scratch our heads. Especially since humans do illogical things all the time.

In fiction however, often it can be easier to answer this question, usually. You can find the “cause and effect” of most plots and character arcs. What happens then when you can’t? Does that mean it’s written poorly, or something else?

I’m finding myself asking this question as I’ve spent the evening playing the KH3 DLC: Re:Mind.

After playing through the story the first time, I felt unsettled. I’ve mentioned this before on here. Sora’s choice left me asking the question “why”. Why would he chose this? This has led me to even more questions. Why did this clash even have to happen? Why did it all lead to this point? Why did any of it had to happen the way it did?

Yet, as I played tonight another question came to mind. “Is this what grief feels like?”

I’ve been lucky. Loss of that type has not touched my heart yet. I don’t know that type of pain. So I don’t know. And until I do, I won’t know.

But, as I play, knowing how it ends, I hurt. Each battle that much closer to the end. Every moment that passes one less than before. And I wonder, is what I’m feeling grief? Wanting more than anything just to understand… to make sense of it all. To have it mean something, anything, just to make it ok.

I’m like Sora, I have to understand. I long to comprehend, and I will keep pushing till I do.

I guess it means I’ll keep picking apart this story, looking for these answers. But I have to wonder, will I find them? And should I find them?

Going back to what I originally said, life has its way of not having the answers that which we seek. Perhaps a story shouldn’t have these answers, because then…

We wouldn’t feel the grief. Even if we know that one day Sora will have some sort of happy ending, we still grieve now. And perhaps that is good for our hearts. We learn something. Just like Data-Sora did at the end of Re:Coded. We learn through illusion, i.e. stories.

That’s the power of storytelling.

[ajdrawshq]

ztd crossover with kh but it's just Carlos meeting Terra, Diana meeting Aqua and Sean meeting Ven. Cursed or blessed concept. Go

HM. WELL. i immediately leaned toward cursed bc like (gestures vaguely at ztd) but that feels mean so im gonna try putting some thought into this

Carlos and Terra :] very good pair for the most part i think. just 2 big older bros doing what they do to try to help people.. but it all goes to shit kupo. i can see them getting along pretty well, both due to their personal experiences and bc of who they are in general. also now that i think abt it its kinda funny that both of them happen to be plagued by visions but only Carlos' have an actual explanation?? Terra morphogenetic field moment?? even funnier is that both of them have the same "welp. anyway" reaction to it like yeah this just happens sometimes 👍 kind of unfortunate Terra couldnt use his to prevent bad things from happening too but oh well. its not like hopping timelines is that easy in his universe anyway. Terra still gets bonus points on an individual level bc while there was very little he couldve done differently there Are things Carlos couldve just uh. not done. yknow. things that i think Terra would kick his ass over tbh

Diana and Aqua.... oof. on god we're gonna get u girls some therapy. they were both so severely fucked over by like. literally everything from ingame events to the narrative itself. trapped in two different but absolute hellholes of sitautions for Very Long Amounts of Time and only called upon as a pawn in a game that both defines and ruins their lives and their entire world, and they barely even know it. and the only people they get to talk to at some point in their respective hells are Sigma and Micheal Mouse (and Terra sort of).. yea i think id lose it too tbh. its interesting that Diana was a 100% crucial part of why ztd happened while Aqua's role in Xehanorts plan wasnt really until ddd/kh3 unless u count him planning the whole end of bbs.. before that she was more of an outside force? not that taking her out wouldnt change anything ofc but her direct actions were more harmful to the overall plan than going according to it. i might need to play bbs again to confirm that more but uhh i forgot where i was going with this. i could see them getting along but i dont really remember enough about Diana as a person to know just how well they would? i guess itd at least be nice to have someone else who knows what their oddly specific and horrific situations are like, more or less

finally Sean n Ven.. Man. talk abt kids who cant catch a break for their entire lives no matter how outragously short OR long. they both just have a Lot going on and play some of the most major roles in their respective stories and god knows they didnt ask for any of it!! tho weirdly enough i dont feel much for Sean considering how he fits into the kinda characters i usually get attached to. but maybe thats just bc it was ztd. anyway !! out of the 3 duos here i think these two are most likely to become actual friends. from the memory fuckery to having a greater role in everything than they couldve imagined (both of them essentially being a key at some point..) to even just. having a very limited world in some way. and not having full control over their bodies. and several other major things im probably forgetting they both have. lots and lots and lots of things. they are friends to me

and just some general other thoughts - while im. not entirely sure how to feel abt what ztd does with the morphogenetic field i can at least appreciate the weird memory stuff that comes with body hopping and the possibilities that has when tied to all the other weird memory stuff that already happens in kh for similar or different reasons. like the way ztd (and vlr to some extent) went about it didnt quite hit the way i wanted it to but the concept is cool to me? itd be fun to play around with it in the context of kh i think. or vice versa. altho maybe introducing multiple timelines to the kh universe isnt the best idea.. hm. much to think about

but yeah!!!! overall verdict: mostly blessed with some underlying hints of cursed. like a weird aftertaste

[tarofel]

been in a very Kingdom Hearts mood recently so a small KH3 rant about random topics.

since it's the obvious ill just go over it, but the disney worlds have a lot of problems. several just have sora exist while the movie plays (tangled/frozen), others are just kinda bad (bighero6/monsters inc). i enjoyed olympus, toy story, and pirates most of all (they all have gameplay problems sadly), but all of the worlds mean nothing to the story in total.

there are also no original worlds you go around. twilight town is a... hub area? but not utilized barring one cutscene. it had more to it in KH2 than 3. yen sid's tower area was removed, nothing like traverse town or hollow bastion, not even like the world that never was (in this game you have a single hallway and then a gauntlet).

im not a big fan of the world design in this game. for me it's a step up from KH2 that was literally just hallways for most of it, but in a way KH3 feels like lengthy hallways of no consequence a lot of the time. though KH1 had its problems, its areas felt compact and connected. at times in KH3 i feel like im running forever getting to the next section, especially bad when grinding.

KH3 resolves all the problems set up all at once with no consequence, that'll be the next few sections.

xion comes back because the new organization just kinda found a person they didn't know and put them in a body bc they needed xehanort fodder. sure, that much is cool, but because of her being put in the final gauntlet she comes back very quickly. personally (i think i have a soft spot for xion) it feels like there's a lot more that could have happened with her that could helped sora grow. those funny nobody xion bosses from 358/2 could've made some sort of comeback too.

aqua is saved pretty easily by sora with one fight. meh.

ventus gets awoken because sora just believes in himself enough, despite the disney worlds being useless. you'd think there'd be more to either castle oblivion or the land of waking, or both even, but it's just a vanitas boss fight.

terra is probably fine (dont care too much about the bbs story too much honestly) but it still suffers being put in the gauntlet.

axel and kairi got to train in the dragonball hyperbolic time chamber but are still useless. honestly everyone was aside from sora donald and goofy (and mickey/yen sid at times) outside the gauntlet. not helped by every enemy being all-powerful in cutscenes.

i really despise xehanort as a character. he straight up is irredeemable and evil, grinning madly when he is killing and traumatizing children throughout the series. and then at the end of kh3 they go "actually you should feel bad for him, he's actually good(???). he wanted to destroy all worlds to function as a universe reset." i... straight up don't enjoy him.

attractions are incredibly unfun aside from a few times. i took too long to turn them off. the combat in the game is a mixed bag. i think shotlock dash is neat, but shotlock itself isn't that fun to me, basically just slowing down the game and needing you to point at the enemy for 5 seconds (while also losing your lock-on and pointing you in a random direction). removal of combo variations with square feels bad too.

i think this game has the worst gummi ship. it plays like a generic space exploration game with random guff scattered everywhere. WHY the HELL do you have to grind on SHOOTING ASTEROIDS to upgrade keyblades are you KIDDING ME. the golden ship makes it less painful but wow it's harder to get in critical mode.

the minigames suck. winnie the pooh is a single minigame copy-pasted 3 times. cooking is better but not by much, and im not a fan of having to find ingredients and cook them for a one-use meal.

i still haven't done the data organization in KH3 Re:Mind yet but it seems pretty fun, if a bit tough on critical mode. grinding out stat boosts is... a time. it's funny how i only got into the series only a few years ago, but it really grabbed me. wish 3 was more enjoyable, but i have some hope for 4.

[theophagie]

ngl, for a long time my idea of the destiny trio clouded what was actually in front of me. just what happens when youre very nostalgic about the early games i guess. but its also like nomura himself doesnt really know what to do with riku and kairi. or maybe just not how to show it right. or maybe he constantly changes his mind, i dont fucking know. for me kh3 really drove home that riku and kairi dont have much of a connection left. and its just so odd when kh2 went out of the way to show us they do care. and then you got them being excited about seeing each other in khmom, though that could just be because theres no sora around so its like hey the other guy from my home island! i dont know. i still dont know how to see them

Honestly considering how inconsistent their friendship is I think I half agree with the hypothesis that Nomura isn't sure of what to do with them :/ it just really feels like they have nothing going on anymore on a personal level, not unless Sora is involved (and even then... 😬). I think that the Female Characters Discourse™ is a bit of a thorny subject because historically it has always been a breeding ground for mysoginy, casual and not, but yeah it should be more than fair to say that Kairi has pulled a few dick moves towards Riku lol (re: KH3, had that scene ended with that I wouldn't really raise an eyebrow at it, it's what she does after it that has me ???, because it really comes across as her wanting to distract Sora from thinking about what's up with Riku). But even then this weird behavior wouldn't really be a problem if her character was handled in a better way, in a way that would make you understand where it's all coming from and why, and truthfully most of the weirdness of the Riku-Kairi friendship comes from her side. I don't think that her being a princess of heart is as much of a problem as the repetitiveness of her story is, especially because it's coupled with her being The Girl. Kairi has a role in all three main titles, and in all three main titles she gets kidnapped by a villain and is ultimately saved by Sora, with KH3 absolutely reaching the bottom of the barrel by straight up having her get fridged for... manpain reasons. And then after Sora sacrifices himself for her, in Melody of Memory she once again has to resort to channelling him or whatever to face fake!Xehanort. It's more than fair to look at all this and go "what the hell" !!!!!! The fact that she pulls her weight and uses her powers to save him back is the bare minimum... And on a more personal note, I get that one of the points made is that she needs time to become as strong as the others blah blah blah, but I'm like, genuinely almost repulsed by this kind of narrative when it comes to female characters ansjdkfgk, so really. 😬 (and by contrast I think that this is one of the reasons why, say, Aqua is instead so universally loved but shhh that's just a theory™). And again, it's unfortunate that this is conflated with mysoginy or character bashing because it's literally not about her, it's about the way she's written, and people can't and shouldn't force themselves to shallow down these things just because some people are dickheads about her

Riku definitely needed to calm down (10/10 teenage angst though), but while I do think that ideally all three of them should find a balance, I wouldn't actually mind it if the point if their trio was that relationships change and evolve over time, possibly even for the worse or in sad ways... if only the writing was clear about wanting to do that instead of telling us that they're all besties despite showing us something else, or at least if it was more consistent in showing us how things between them have changed >_>