#or even just kim will start trusting vegas more than he has ever trusted Kinn or tankhun

[vani-ash]

I understand people wanting like their favourite two character to interact and that Kim and Vegas can be similar but I'm mainly talking about the fact that most of the time I've seen people make them friends they are friends because Kim hates his brothers Which to me just feels so far from who Kim is, like protecting Kinn cause he thinks Porsche is a spy or whatever is literally Kim's motivation for doing things for like half the show until it changes to he wants to protect Chay as well. Like yes Kim is clearly distant and not close with his brothers but he also clearly cares about them, even if Kinn says they haven't seen each other in ages, Kim still feels comfortable he can call and ask Kinn what is happening at the main family after Chay gets kidnapped

And if Kim hates his brothers so much why would he like Vegas?

I'm not really a big Vegas fan so I don't really pay attention to him, but sometimes people write that Vegas sees Kim doesn't have anyone cause he is distant from his brothers and adopts him as a younger brother and that just ??? I keep saying Kim is raised to hate the minor family but like Kim doesn't really interact with the mafia anyway, but Vegas? Vegas has a deep rivalry thing going on with Kinn, Vegas clearly hates both Kinn and Tankhun, why would his feelings to Kim be different? And even if they were I think Kim would hate Vegas on the fact both his brothers hate Vegas alone. (Even if Kim hated his brothers I think he'd still hate Vegas based on this) 'Vegas sees Kim as younger brother in trouble and wants to help him!' Vegas did not give a fuck about Chay being in trouble? The younger brother of someone he was romantically interested in? I really don't think he cares about Kim being a younger brother. Vegas clearly loves Macau but I don't think he has that whole 'adopt stray younger brothers' vibes that Porsche has.

Idk if this is a controversial opinion but I low-key hate when people make Kim and his brothers distant but decide Kim is besties with Vegas at the same time

Kim had no problem walking into a random warehouse and immediately shooting at Vegas on sight

Like idc if it's just that Vegas and Kim are friends/friendly but it's when they specifically add that they are friends and Kim hates his brothers/does not interact with them but he kept in touch with Vegas?

[williamrikers]

vegas is the funhouse mirror version of porsche or: what are heroes and villains, anyway?

this is going to be a long read. strap in. i will argue that vegas's character arc is actually the inverse of porsche's, that at the end of season 1, vegas gets the happy ending and porsche the tragic one, even though porsche himself thinks he also got a happy ending, what makes porsche's ending so very tragic and how exactly it relates back to vegas.

so. porsche and vegas are actually two very interesting characters to compare because when you think about it, both of them basically go through the exact same character arc, their story beats are just a little bit different. both of them fall in love for the first time. both of them start out not quite trusting their love interest (although for very different reasons), both love stories start with the crossing of boundaries (kinn having sex with porsche even though porsche is drugged and cannot fully consent vs vegas kidnapping and torturing pete), both end with porsche and vegas learning to trust their respective partners and opening up emotionally.

however, they are also reversed: in the beginning, porsche is our plucky hero, while vegas is our torture-happy not-to-be-trusted antagonist. and then, something very interesting happens. as porsche is pulled into the world of crime, he starts getting good at it. even though he initially says he despises murder and violence, he sure ends up doing a whole lot of murder and violence--especially in episode 14, where he shows he is truly ride or die for kinn, so ride or die in fact that he is made head of the minor family. at the start of the show, porsche's closest relationship appears to be the one with his brother, but over the course of the show, he kinda stops caring? maybe that's too harsh a word, but porchay sure never mentions any of his big life choices to porsche, the way he (presumably) would have done when they were still living together. even at the very end, porsche has absolutely no clue what transpired between porchay and kim, because that trust relationship with his brother doesn't really exist any more.

now, that's not really a hero's journey. that's a character on their way to becoming a villain.

vegas, on the other hand, has an arc in which we learn that this seemingly unfeeling scheme-lord is actually a victim of abuse, that he is SO afraid of losing the people he loves he doesn't even let himself love, that he is actually good at caring for other people, and that basically everything he does is motivated by desperately trying to please his abusive father. his big character moment at the end is turning around to pete and letting himself accept pete's love. making himself vulnerable for pete. his final moment is being free of the mafia business (maybe just temporarily, but free all the same) by virtue of having four bullets in his body and being treated at the hospital; free from his now dead father; free from his false notions about being unlovable.

and that's not a villain redemption arc--that's more like a hero's origin story.

crucially, porsche, in his final moments, is metaphorically shackled: as head of the minor family, he is now less free than he has ever been in his life, and in his final shot, literally in the room where his mother was held captive for a decade, trapped there together with her. porsche himself doesn't see it (yet), but his mother sure does. the fact that the camera pans to her in that shot is very telling: this isn't porsche's happy ending. this is his mother's nightmare.

both vegas and porsche end the season by hugging their loved ones, but where porsche and porchay are trapped now together with their mother, and porsche doesn't even actually communicate with his mother at all (he talks at her, not with her), vegas lays his heart bare for pete, tells him he is the most important person in the world to him, and then PETE is the one who initiates the hug. whereas porsche is the one who basically uses his mother as a prop without even checking in with her.

so, even though both characters arguably experience many of the same things (falling in love, learning to trust, becoming ride or die for their love interest), their stories are still inverse because of how they change each character. porsche goes from free-spirited good guy to mafia boss--vegas goes from mafia boss to, well, not exactly a good guy, but a guy who could become good in the future under the right circumstances.

given the opportunity, vegas can be better than he used to be. and, given the opportunity, porsche can be worse.

if they made a season 2 from vegas's point of view, it would be quite easy to make vegas the hero and porsche the villain because that's where their character arcs are naturally leading, which is extremely fascinating to me. they are funhouse mirror versions of each other, and neither story arc would be complete without the other because by comparing them, we can see just why porsche's story is so tragic: at the end, he is reunited with his loved ones, but trapped, subject to the whims of kinn's father, an untrustworthy mafia boss (just like vegas used to be subjected to the whims of his own father), and literally unable to communicate with his family, knowing basically nothing about their lives: chay has started keeping secrets from him, and it is still a mystery what really happened to their mother the day their father died.

vegas is also embracing his loved ones in his final scene but both he and pete are, for the first time in their lives, finally free. finally able to make their own path, choosing very deliberately to love each other, with all that entails, no secrets between them.

and this is why i think porsche's ending is so tragic: because vegas's isn't.

thank you for reading 😘

[heretherebedork]

You know I have criticism for KP, but funnily enough it’s all worked out for me. I know you’ve been discontented with Kinn and Porsche’s relationship from the start. And I see your points. For me thankfully I was entertained by then until I guess the end of the Tawan arch, and then ever since I’ve been bored to death with them. But luckily for me that’s when Vegas and Pete started up, and they have now taken over like 90% of my brain space. And even Kim and Chay’s relationship has started to be a little teeny bit more interesting for me, now that the teeny bopper high school romance is done, and it’s more involved with the mafia.

Kinn and Porsche’s romance was so much more interesting in the beginning. Though I hated the sexual assault element. But there was still more complicated dynamics going on. Now they’re just… idk too soft? I don’t mind some softness, but it’s just too sugary sweet for me now. Vegas and Pete have the exact mix I was hoping for with the show. Even Kim and Chay, as juvenile as it felt to me in the beginning, at least now have a bit more angst to balance it out.

KP are now 2gether 2.0 Mafia Edition and I just... don't care. I liked them more when they had depth and were complicated and weren't just literal... cotton candy.

I am very much enjoying VP and I like KC for exactly what it is, a teenager taking a chance on a crush that turned out to be way more complicated than he ever could have expected. And I'm really, really loving C realizing that P is no longer someone he can trust with his issues and the way the lying has broken their relationship but he's trying to pretend it isn't.

I just...

I just don't care about KP any more and it has retroactively made me care about them less because they lost all their depth and just... meh. Done. So done. The tone just doesn't work.

But I also just don't care or have any investment. At all. I know how they work now, I know the exact formula they follow with every single conflict and I just don't care. At all.

I love the side pairings and the side character, though. Like, a lot.