#normally id say thats all tab but nat's hair is her pride and joy so i can totally see her losing it like howl does

[hellofanidea]

ok ok ok but like? howl's moving castle but make it morbert? bc. howl/sophie energy. is very. morbert energy.

Oh I'm fucking OBSESSED with this yes perfect and I have so many thoughts that this is gonna risk being totally incoherent because I was falling all over myself to write it.

...the main thing I can't completely settle on is who is who.

Initially I wanna say Sophie!Natalie and Howl!Tab is the obvious choice - and it is! For good reason! I've only watched the film, but from what I've heard of the book, that sounds a lot like them too, with a Natalie who has just as much love with slightly less patience. Tab is a great parallel to Howl; flirtatious, seemingly superficial, vain, but with those deep wounds just underneath. An infuriatingly charming wizard that wins Natalie over with his sincerity. With his ability to See her, regardless of her being cursed or not (and oh, what a lovely metaphor that is...). Equally, Natalie essentially saving him from himself, and from collapsing under the strain of what he thinks he has to be (again, the metaphor, the METAPHOR!).

And then I start thinking about Howl!Natalie, and I fall to bits. Nat, who pulled her own heart out as a child - for her, it was probably self preservation. Nat who thinks she can't be saved, and is destined to become something terrible. Tab, who is determined to save her because of the ways she saved him, and because he's fallen hard and fast for her and all her quietly self-sacrificing ways.

TL;DR: they're both well suited for either role depending on how you tell it, and that kinda highlights how similar they are despite first appearances. They both have heavy, hurting hearts that they try and live with in different ways that can make them either Sophie or Howl.