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wlwcatalogue · 11 days ago

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A Gay Girl's Guide to Takarazuka

L to R: Sagiri Seina, Ouki Kaname, Amami Yuuki, Asumi Rio, Wao Youka, Asaji Saki, Shiraki Ayaka

If you’re queer and into theatre or Japanese media, chances are that you will have heard of all-female theatre company Takarazuka Revue… but it’s also equally likely that you won’t have checked out anything of theirs. For those who are curious but were intimidated by its over 100 years of history, or who just want a quick primer to ease in, click below!

1. Why get into Takarazuka?

L to R: Rei Makoto in Tiara Azul (2024), Yuzuka Rei

For those into androgynous women

As you probably already know, Takarazuka's big selling point is that it's an all-female theatre company where the male characters are played by women. The actresses are expected to continue presenting that way off-stage, which in practice means a lot of handsome women with short hair in binders and men's clothing... Why that might appeal to people who are into androgynous women (or GNC/enby folks) is pretty obvious.

Reality Check:

Sadly, after "graduation" (i.e. leaving Takarazuka), nearly all such actresses will transition into feminine presentation and take on female roles. It's similar to the "lesbian glasshouse" idea in Class S yuri, but for gender non-conformity. That said, there are some notable counter-examples: Shion Yuu and Nanami Hiroki have basically refused to change their presentation after graduating (the latter still frequently plays male characters in both anime and stage productions), and things are more relaxed lower down the rungs too.

L to R: Wao Youka & Hanafusa Mari, Sagiri Seina & Sakihi Miyu

For those into butch/femme pairs

Just as roughly half of Takarazuka's actresses specialise in male roles (otokoyaku/男役), there is another half specialising in female roles (musumeyaku/娘役). On top of that, Takarazuka is split into five different troupes, and for any given production, the male lead and female lead are automatically assigned to that troupe's "top star" (leading otokoyaku) and "top musumeyaku" (leading musumeyaku) - the "top combi".

Unlike leading pairs in other theatrical traditions, the "top combi" concept extends to them being marketed as a pair in interviews, magazine features, TV programmes, etc. Just watch the mini TV special where Sagiri Seina and Sakihi Miyu visit Tokyo Skytree and Sumida Aquarium-- it's basically a date, and is described as such by the commentating TV announcer. Likewise, Wao Youka and Hanafusa Mari were interviewed about being a "golden combi" by women's magazine Fujin Kouron (though to be fair this was after they had, improbably, managed to win a Kikuta Kazuo Theatre Award - an award for individuals - jointly, for their "splendid performance as a combi" in 2004's Boxman).

Taken to its extreme, there have been cases where the Japanese public have been convinced that a top combi was dating, as with the immensely popular 1980's pair Daichi Mao and Kuroki Hitomi... It's no wonder that the actresses themselves frequently describe it as being like an arranged marriage.

Separately, due to certain reasons, it's practically part of the job description for top musumeyaku to adore their top star partners. This, in theory, inadvertently creates a safe space for any top musumeyaku who could be gay for their stage partners... Just to illustrate, during her graduation speech, Hinami Fuu repeatedly referred to her feelings for her top star partner Hokushou Kairi as koi (恋), a word specifically denoting romantic love, and nobody blinked an eye.

Reality Check:

Due to conservative attitudes in both Japan and Takarazuka itself, most actresses go on to marry men, including many of those named above. Vanishingly few are publically out, though former otokoyaku Higashi Koyuki (stage name Aura Maki) is a queer activist and was one half of the first same-sex couple to be married in Japan, and another former otokoyaku, Misuzu Aki, has been living with her female partner in Europe for years. Just, well, don't forget that being married to a man isn't necessarily evidence of heterosexuality.

L to R: Asumi Rio in The Poe Clan (2018), Sagiri Seina in Rurouni Kenshin (2016)

For lovers of anime and manga

Takarazuka is probably best-known as the inspiration behind Revolutionary Girl Utena, Revue Starlight, Kageki Shoujo, and Sailor Moon’s Haruka and Michiru, but did you know that it also inspired seminal works featuring androgynous female leads such as Princess Knight? If you enjoy “prince-type” characters in yuri, you’ve got them to thank

Apart from inspiring anime and manga, Takarazuka also does quite a few animanga adaptations itself! Most famous are their Rose of Versailles musicals, but other popular adaptations include Ace Attorney, Rurouni Kenshin, Lupin III, Boys Over Flowers, and Hagio Moto’s bishounen vampire vehicle The Poe Clan. They’re also doing a Castlevania musical this year!

Wao Youka & Hanafusa Mari in Phantom (2004)

For the theatre nerds

Female Phantom of the Opera, duh

Jokes aside, Takarazuka’s unique position in the theatre world can't be overstated. As a rule, all-female productions are either smaller-scale, one-offs dependent on the work, or part of a theatrical tradition completely separate to Western-style plays or musicals (hello, Chinese Yue opera). Takarazuka is the exception: it offers productions comparable in size and scale (and budget) to the largest West End and Broadway musicals - it just so happens that it's all-female.

If the all-female aspect doesn’t excite you then why are you here, then let me emphasise again: Takarazuka is totally worth checking out as a production company in its own right. It is very much a part of the broader Japanese musical industry, and one of its powerhouses at that. Just take a look at some of these clips from past productions (all around 5 mins or less):

(a) Maeda Keiji - a musical loosely inspired by real-life samurai Maeda Keiji; features an uncannily convincing horse performed by two people in costume which needs to be seen to be believed (b) Ephemeral Love - a period piece about the doomed love between Prince Rudolph of the Hapsburgs and his lover Marie Vetsera (c) The Man Who Never Sleeps - a biographical musical about Napoleon Bonaparte (d) Casino Royale - an adaptation of the 2006 James Bond movie of the same name (e) BADDY - an off-the-wall sci-fi comedy featuring loads of velvet suits, silly shellfish outfits, and queerness.

Wao Youka and Hanafusa Mari in Dracula (2011)

2. Random Queer-ish Trivia

It's pretty common for former otokoyaku to be cast in WLW roles: Sena Jun headlined the 2018 Japanese production of Fun Home, Otozuki Kei cameoed as a lesbian escort in 2022 LGBTQ-themed J-drama Kojinsa Arimasu, and Seto Kazuya played the owner of a lesbian bar in 2024 yuri J-drama Ayaka is in Love with Hiroko. (Incidentally, Sal Jiang, the original creator of Ayaka is in Love with Hiroko, has mentioned being a fan of Sena Jun when she was younger)

Otokoyaku are sometimes mistaken for men, with amusing results: Yuzuka Rei was thought to be a “host” by a passer-by while talking to her fans, and Houshou Dai has mentioned being hit on by a woman before. But the prize goes to Todoroki Yuu, who like many women once had to rebuff unwanted advances from a man—except in her case, he thought that she was a guy

Before entering Takarazuka, Sou Kazuho – eventual Snow Troupe top star – went to a co-ed school and had long hair. To her confusion, this didn’t stop her classmates from asking her to play a male character (possibly the male lead, IIRC) in the school play. They saw her as an otokoyaku even before she did!

Continuing with the high school theme, former Cosmos Troupe top star Wao Youka has boasted about how in her high school days, she received more Valentine’s chocolates than her brother, and in fact second-most out of her year. Important note: she went to a girls’ school

Speaking of Wao Youka, her 2011 Dracula (see photo above) - from @cryoverkiltmilk's “Cunt Dykecula” post - wasn't actually a Takarazuka production! Since Wao was acquainted with and later married its composer Frank Wildhorn, some assume he was the one to cast her, and that Hanafusa Mari was brought in due to being her old stage partner. But Wildhorn had wanted Wao to play the female lead. It was she who insisted on Dracula. And Hanafusa wasn't just a third party... she had been Wao's manager since 2007, having retired from the stage after graduating and only just returned with 2010's Dietrich. (She played Edith Piaf, legendary chanson singer and “very good friend” of bisexual icon Marlene Dietrich, played by Wao.) Dracula was the swan song for their partnership, with Hanafusa going on to conquer the Japanese musical industry as she had Takarazuka-- but it marked the first, and so far only, time a top combi performed as romantic partners after graduating.

On a separate note, renowned queer photographer Leslie Kee has been responsible for taking the cover portraits for Takarazuka's offical monthly publication Kageki (歌劇) since 2010. You should definitely check out his ongoing "Out in Asia" project – he's taken literally thousands of photos of out queer people in Japan, Singapore, and Taiwan in a bid to raise visibility

Lastly, in November 2015, Takarazuka City became the first Japanese city outside of Tokyo to announce its support for same-sex partnerships… though this may of course be a total coincidence.

Flower Troupe in Takarazuka Fantasia (2015 Taiwan tour)

3. Where to Start?

Nearly all Takarazuka shows since the 1990's are available on DVD (earlier ones are on VHS), and these recordings are very well done - they have great video and audio quality, are well-edited, and use a large number of camera angles

They do livestreams and live broadcasts of performances as well! You can watch a livestream from your mobile or PC by spoofing your location. For a more communal experience, if you're in Japan, Taiwan, or Hong Kong, you can catch live broadcasts of Grand Theatre performances at a local cinema

VODs of selected productions are available on various platforms, including Amazon Japan, though this still requires location spoofing. If you're actually living in Japan, you can also consider subscribing to Takarazuka's official TV channel (yes, that's a thing) Sky Stage - they do a lot of reruns of past performances

With that done, here are several recommendations if none of the productions mentioned throughout the post caught your eye!

(a) Elisabeth - Michael Kunze and Sylvester Levay's musical about Empress Elisabeth ("Sisi") of Austria and the fall of the Hapsburg Empire, featuring an (inevitably very sexy) personification of Death and fantastic music. Takarazuka has done many, many productions of this, so just search them and pick whichever looks most appealing - but you won't go wrong with the 2014 Flower Troupe production, which has a very strong cast and a more refined version of the staging

(b) Phantom - Arthur Kopit and Maury Yeston's adaptation of Phantom of the Opera. Though obviously not the ALW version, the music is actually pretty great and Takarazuka goes all-out on the costumes and stage magic. All the productions are wonderful, but my favourite is the original 2004 version (which is also the one which went viral on Tumblr before - thanks, @wheel-of-fish!)

(c) Rose of Versailles - no list would be complete without Takarazuka's representative work, buuut I wouldn't necessarily recommend starting here if you're looking for a typical musical experience. There are loads of productions to choose from - note that these are split between a version focused on protagonist Oscar, and another focused on Marie Antoinette and her lover Fersen - but the 1991 Moon Troupe production is my personal pick

(d) Casanova - a light-hearted romp in which Casanova is reimagined as a charming playboy who falls for the feminist-minded daughter of Venice's mayor... only, she doesn't know his real identity. The very catchy music was commissioned from Dove Attia, the producer behind French musicals Mozart, l'opera Rock and 1789: Les Amants de la Bastille. Check out the performance digest here!

(e) Shinjuu: Koi no Yamatoji - Takarazuka puts Chikamatsu Monzaemon's tale of the doomed love between a commoner and a courtesan to a classic rock score (see this clip!). An Edo-era work that doesn't just focus on samurai and nobility, this romantic tragedy offers a grounded look at the social pressures of the time. (Though if you do want to watch something focusing on Japanese nobility, I highly recommend Takarazuka original and guaranteed tearjerker Hoshiai Hitoyo.) There are quite a few productions of this, but I've only watched the 2014 Snow Troupe one, which was very good.

Thanks so much for reading! Please feel free to DM me or send an ask if you have any questions~ I definitely want to do a follow-up post on musumeyaku, and maybe delve into Wao and Hanafusa's history (it's messy, but fascinating)... but we'll see!

#takarazuka #musicals #theatre #elisabeth das musical #phantom of the opera #rose of versailles #butch #yuri #queer #ayaka is in love with hiroko #wlw recommendations #takarazuka revue #musicaltheatre

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skys-archive · 7 months ago

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I think in honor of pride month and also in general forever we should stop trying fit queer people into the identities we think they should call themselves.

And I know no one is going to see this because no one ever does but I'm going to talk about it anyway because this is important.

Bisexual doesn't mean you don't date trans people, it doesn't mean you like men and women, it doesn't mean you can't have a preference. Someone can identify as polysexual or bisexual or omnisexual and have no preference and you don't get to say that that means they're pansexual. Because no, if they don't identify as pansexual then they're not pansexual.

Transmasc doesn't mean you use he/him pronouns. It doesn't mean you identify as a man. Transfem doesn't mean you use she/her pronouns. It doesn't mean you identify as a woman. You can be nonbinary or genderqueer or agender or any gender that isn't binary and not use they/them pronouns. You can use any of those labels and still identify as a man or a woman. You can use different pronouns than is typically used for your birth sex and not consider yourself transgender. People can be gender non conforming and not he trans. People can be trans and not gender non conforming.

A trans man can be fem. A trans woman can be masc. Nonbinary people don't owe you androgyny. Intersex people don't owe you androgyny. Intersex people are people, they deserve way more attention than a way to one up transphobes. Intersex people face discrimination and body altering surgeries without their consent and then are only ever talked about to say "some cis women have penises" or "some people have an extra x chromosome" and then we never talk about the struggle they face as part of the queer community.

Asexuality and aromanticism is a spectrum. Some aces like sex, some aces are repulsed, some aces only experience sexual attraction to one person or once in their life, some aces need a deep emotional bond, some aces their attraction changes. Some aros change identities. Some aros are repulsed by romance unless it's a fictional character. Some aros have romantic feelings until they get to know someone. Some aros crave a romantic relationship but never have romantic feelings. You don't get to say someone isn't asexual or aromantic enough.

Asexuality and aromanticism is having a unique relationship with romance or sexual feelings and impulses. Someone who is transgender has a unique experience with gender. You don't get to decide that they don't have a unique experience. But guess what? You don't get to decide if they do either. Someone can have a unique experience and still not identify as asexual aromantic or transgender. You can cross dress and still fully feel like a man. You can use he/him pronouns as a cis women. You can have trauma around sex and not identify as asexual. You can never have a romantic relationship and not identify as aromantic.

You can have "contradicting" labels. I don't know as many of these because I don't personally identify as any but please fell welcome to add in reblogs. There are trans men lesbians and gay women. There are sex loving asexuals. I know there are others I just genuinely am not educated enough.

YOU DONT GET TO CHOOSE SOMEONES LABELS

ANYONE CAN EITHER IDENTIFY OR NOT IDENTIFY AS QUEER

Please feel welcome to add anything in reblogs. I'm sure there's things I've missed. I haven't talked about neopronouns I haven't talked enough about "contradicting" labels. I haven't talked about queer platonic relationships or kink or polyamory or enough about intersex people or pronouns vs gender. There's so much important things but at the end of the day it's just so important to not choose other people's labels.

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johnbrand · 4 months ago

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BACS

With @mrrharper

“Hopkins,” the coach said curtly to the buff guard at the gate. The security officer barely seemed to register him as a person, rather just an item on his list to check off. Once he was allowed to proceed, Coach Hopkins entered into the corridor and proceeded to the farthest room. Quite frankly, the coach embodied everything a man should be at his age: big, strong, rich. Running one of the country’s top collegiate teams meant he was often provided with ample checks. But an investor had been hinting that the meeting he was about to attend would only raise his profits higher. And now standing before the other guests, Coach Hopkins believed this investor was not mistaken.

Feeling mighty pleased with himself, and honestly a bit haughty, the coach scanned the room, taking in all the other broad, strapping men. There was Coach Larson from one of the major east coast schools, Coach McNamara from the private military academy that swept the competition every year. Coach Hopkins recognized another prominent coach from California, but could not place his name. There were a few more men in the room, engaging in casual conversation about work, but the atmosphere in the space was mildly tense. Instead of acquainting himself with others, Coach Hopkins took a seat and remained there until the presentation began.

“Gentleman,” the host began. The suit that covered his large frame appeared painted on, tight against his skin. A former collegiate athlete who had stayed in shape; Coach Hopkins could not help but take a moment to respect the work. “Invited amongst you today are some of your finest colleagues in the field. Hopefully you all know why you are here, so we will skip past the pleasantries and get right to the presentation.”

Behind the host, the wall suddenly began to glow. A soft light filtered upon it before focusing on colors and images. Eventually, the display became clear, showcasing live camera footage inside an empty male restroom.

“We believed the best way to explain our product was to show how it works,” the host started slyly. Coach Hopkins watched as the door to the restroom opened, revealing a young college-aged male. By his medium build and uniform, the coach assumed he could have been in lacrosse, baseball, or even a non-tackling football player. His third guess was correct.

“Before us is Dawson Welch, a decent transfer from an undisclosed Division III school. Originally holding potential, he has not yet conformed to our nationwide protocol, otherwise known as BACS for short.”

The four words were then flashed in red at the bottom of the screen. A silly acronym, but one that worked nonetheless.

Beefy Aggressive Cocky Straight

“Our case study is about to demonstrate the results of our program,” the host smiled.

There were a few murmurs from the other men. The California coach even shifted a bit, slightly uncomfortable at what he was about to witness. Coach Hopkins remained silent, observing the subject. By his size and careful actions, he could already identify that three of the required four set standards were missing.

“Tyler?” Dawson called out into the room. “Baby, it’s alright, I’m here now.” The coach nodded with confirmation for the fourth characteristic. Grabbing his phone, the host then sent a simple text message. Thanks to the live camera, the men could all watch as the subject’s own device buzzed. Timidly opening it, Dawson checked his phone.

“Ok Tyler, I am going to open the link you sent me,” Dawson called out, unaware the link was not actually sent from his romantic interest. As if already suspecting the lurking danger behind the text, the subject slowly tapped the link and let it proceed forward. The room lit up in a flash, even blinding the live camera temporarily. The audio did not shut off, but the stream went quiet. Moments later, the men were reoriented back into the restroom.

Murmurs flew around the space once more. A few of their faces displayed shock at the screen presented before them. Coach Hopkins held stoic, but his eyes bore straight on. The scene before him was almost entirely the same. Nothing had changed, except for the subject.

“Gone are the days of your players attending frivolous seminars and engaging in anti-anything protests. Thanks to our technology, we can now guarantee your boys will be real, undeniably American men.”

Where once stood the rather average athletic young male was now a bulky creature. He was taller, brawnier, and brutish. His uniform had been replaced with a tight, all-black outfit to better display his offerings. The sleeveless tank outlined massive pecs, broad shoulders, a thick core, and made his cannon-like arms bulge out of his sides like an oversized action figure. The running shorts appeared more like briefs, searing into the monstrous thighs that led down to steel calves and feet so large they could not be accommodated at most shoe outlets. Speaking of briefs, Coach Hopkins noted the subject was no longer wearing any; a thick python and a low-hanging set were peeking out of one of the leg holes.

By the gigantic size, the host could easily confirm his product met the first criteria. And by the backwards cap, arrogant grin, and constant man-handling, the men in the room were all able to confirm the second and third on their own. They had been around these types long enough to know the signs.

“What was I doing anyway, bro?” Dawson asked himself in a voice deeper and duller than his previous offerings. After scratching at his thick pubes and giving it a sniff, an idea suddenly sprung into the subject’s head. Coach Hopkins could sense the process of thinking was a more difficult procedure now then it had been before. “Right, I was gonna see if that chick from last night still wanted to get laid tonight. What was her name, Jenna? Brianna? Maybe she’d be a good lil girl and bag me a threesome? God, that’s so hot…”

The stream cut off shortly after, but not before the subject’s continual groping started to awaken his massive dong. The last image was frozen onto the screen, with Dawson preparing the classic flexed picture his predatory nature utilized to ensnare victims.

“So what do you say, gentlemen,” the host sneered. “Would anyone like to try our trial package?”

#gay to straight #male tf #male transformation #dumbification #jock tf

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maevesweirdart · 2 years ago

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i’m incredibly lonely and i have no idea what you look/present like, so i can’t say i’m not interested tbh 🥺👉🏻👈🏻

#generally the more gender non conforming a person is the more I’m into them #as long as the person identifies as female #but!!! please don’t start identifying as female just because you think I’d find it attractive lol #if you do decide to become ✨more transgender✨ do it because *you* want to #and if you don’t #I’d still love to discuss weird indie video games with you in dms!#you seem like a cool person and I’d love to get to know you better even if it isn’t romantic 💖

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doubleca5t · 7 months ago

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I love hanging out with other sapphic tgirls but I desperately need more butch friends. Butch culture is so aspirational to me: the gender non-conformity, the rejection of many of the worst aspects of beauty standards, the ideal of a chivalrous desire to be of service as best you can to the woman you love, the ability to look incredibly hot in outfits I would have looked like absolute dogshit in if I wore them back when I was a man. Like don't get me wrong I enjoy the unabashed nerdiness and chaotic, sexual depravity that you get from transbians but something about old school dykes is very romantic to me. They're the kind of women that you'd want to sweep you off your feet and that's just such a beautiful way to live

#doubleca5t oc

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thy-lovelylionheart · 30 days ago

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Mike Wheeler: S4 Outfits & Identity Crisis Analysis

One of aspects of s4 I find the most interesting is Mike's costuming. We see him in 4 distinct outfits in this season (not counting the white t-shirt look since it's not a separate outfit), and they are all interesting in their own right. But ultimately, they all contrast each other and represent different aspects of Mike's internal conflict and identity crisis.

s4 is the season where Mike's internal conflict is externalized via his costume design. He’s trying to figure out who he is and – like for so many queer teens – it starts with his hair and his clothes.

Shout-out to @glisten-inthedark because it was during a fantastic discussion that I drafted out a much shorter, much rougher version of this analysis!

*Disclaimer: While a lot of my analysis is formatted as statements – more out of habit from years of writing academic essays than anything – much of this is still speculation and subjective opinion. If you have a different perspective or disagree with my analysis, that's perfectly fine! This is just my interpretation.

First up, my second favorite outfit: The Hellfire outfit.

If you put this Mike beside any of his s3 outfits, the difference is incredibly stark. s3 Mike has bright colors, neons spread throughout the palette, nearly all of them collared shirts. Yet the first outfit we see Mike wear in s3 is edgier: nearly all-black, featuring the word HELLFIRE loud and proud, the face of a tiefling or daemon, and weapons. This is also the first time we've seen Mike wear a graphic tee, which is more up Dustin's alley.

Not only this, but his hair is long enough to brush his shoulders, the longest we've ever seen it. Finn Wolfhard calls it "kind of the most metal Mike's hair has ever been."

So why is this so important? Let's talk about modeling for a second.

Dustin models himself after Steve in parts of s2. He listens to Steve's romantic advice and styles his hair like Steve's for the Snow Ball. For Dustin, Steve represents the masculine, heternormative ideal: the kind of guy who girls want to date, a "ladies man." When Dustin does find a girlfriend who loves him for him, he stops modeling after Steve in terms of outward appearance and returns to his own personal sense of style in s3. In fact, it's Dustin who ends up giving Steve romantic advice in s3, because their roles have flipped: Dustin is comfortable in who he is and his romantic prospects, whereas Steve is struggling. ("Instead of dating somebody because you think it's gonna make you cooler, why not date somebody you actually enjoy being around?"

Lucas wears a Karate Kid shirt in s3 bc Max thinks Ralph Macchio is attractive, so he wears clothes that reference him to appeal to her, his girlfriend, but he mixes it with his classic camo bandana because Lucas has a very strong sense of self that was only rocked in s4, when he tries to model after the basketball team, who are also representative of (1980's) socially acceptable masculinity and heteronormativity, for popularity's sake. But he ends up rejecting their blind conformity and regains his sense of self by the middle of the season.

And Mike…..models after Eddie. Eddie “forced conformity is what’s killin’ the kids” Munson. Not just in clothes, but in his more "metal" hairstyle. Eddie even makes a note about Mike’s wardrobe change during the cafeteria scene, saying he’s no longer wearing whatever his mom buys him at the GAP, which highlight this change for the audience.

This is significant because even though Dustin and Lucas are his fellow nerds, even though both Dustin and Lucas end up being chased down by Jason & Friends for their status as members of the Hellfire Club, even though they're labeled as outcasts and reject conformity in their own way –

– they still model themselves after classic heteronormative and socially acceptable representations of masculinity, while Mike is the only one who actively models himself after the school “freak" and vocal non-conformist.

Sure, Dustin wears the Hellfire shirt too, but Dustin is the graphic tee king of the show and he still wears an iconic baseball cap and overlays his graphic tee with a fun and funky button-up in s4. How he dresses in s4 is wholly consistent with his identity throughout the rest of the show. Whereas Mike's first outfit of the show contrasts heavily with all of his outfits from the previous seasons particularly s3.

And this is intentional. This is what Amy Parris, costume designer for Stranger Things says in this GQ interview about it:

Mike's Hellfire Outfit represents his growing internal resistance to and rejection of conformity and societal expectation.

....which is exactly why the airport outfit gives the viewer such insane whiplash.

It is bright, gaudy, dorky, cartoonish and a completely different person than we were just shown. It's no version of Mike we've ever seen. Sure, we've seen him in shorts, and that surfer shirt is technically a button-up, but that hat? Those glasses? Flip-flops? It's so clearly an act that it's laughable.

Amy Parris, in the same GQ interview as before, goes as far to say, "We knew we'd wanted something that felt like an outfit maybe he would've bought at the airport before he got there."

This isn't Mike. This is Mike's attempt at conformity, post-meeting and modeling after Eddie. This is Mike feeling like who he is in Hawkins – the edgier Mike who models after the school "freak" – isn't the "right" version of himself to immediately present to El after months and months apart. Almost like he feels the need to wear something more similar to what he wore in s3, the shorts and the bright colors, to "ease into" the rest of his wardrobe, because when he's with El, he strives to present as "normal."

Finn Wolfhard says this about Mike in s4: "I think Mike's just trying to be as normal as possible and trying to keep on a normal path." Yet Mike says this in s4: "Have you ever considered that we don't want to be popular?"

If Mike isn't trying to be "normal" in Hawkins and is sitting at lunch with the school "freak," then in what ways he is trying to be "normal"? It's when he's with El in California, particularly their first day before everything goes to hell. Yet we see that "normal" = not himself.

Amy Parris notes in the GQ interview that they picked an orange (a rather yellow orange) button-up because it's the opposite of what Mike normally wears (blue tones).

The purple shirt is also an attempt for him to appeal toward El because purple, according to Mike, is one of her favorite colors. He is trying to appeal to El's taste/likes while wearing the literal opposite of what he normally does.

Mike's Airport Outfit represents his attempts to conform to heteronormativity and society's expectation of what a "good straight boyfriend" does, is, and looks like – and how unnatural and unlike himself this attempt is.

This plaid look is my personal favorite Mike look in s5. This is one of the very few times we see Mike with an untucked shirt – possibly the first time we see him wearing a button-up/collared shirt and it's not tucked in. Untucked makes him look less preppy, taller, and more mature. It's a very flattering look and especially refreshing after the airport look.

But, I also have a lot to say about this symbolism of this particular outfit.

The rich blue is a standard Mike color, so it's the first outfit he wears in s4 that feels familiar to us. Additionally, the hint of yellow is commonly speckled throughout Mike's wardrobe. However, look at the pattern. It's plaid.

We all know by now that Mike is the king of stripes. Stripes and the color blue are the most consistent aspect of his wardrobe other than his calculator watch. But plaid?

There are only two instances in the entire show where Mike wears plaid. (I've triple-checked this, but if I still somehow overlooked anything, please let me know!) Here, in s4, and in his final scene in s1:

(top row is unedited, bottom row is brightened – no I couldn't get a flattering screenshot of the second image lol)

A blue plaid with (faint) yellow accents. Hm. How intriguingly familiar!

In s1, we see Mike experiencing conflicting emotions in his final scene. He is very happy that Will is back and that Will is having fun with his DND game. But he is also sad that Eleven is gone and experiencing survivor's guilt. His emotions are split between Will and El. This emotional turmoil is illustrated with the use of much busier pattern than Mike normally wears, but because that pattern is plaid, a pattern Will often wears, it aligns him with Will.

Why does plaid connect Mike to Will yet not El, even though El has worn plaid before? Because El has only worn plaid because of her circumstances, not her own personal style.

El first wears plaid when Hopper gives her his flannel in s1. This continues into s2 when she begins living with him. She's receiving either hand-me-downs from him or boy's clothes because he's having to hide the fact that he's sheltering a girl wanted by the government. If Hop were to start buying girl's clothing/more feminine clothing, that would be suspicious. When El goes on her shopping spree with Max in s3, after Max tells her to focus on what feels like her – "not Hopper, not Mike, you" – she picks bold, bright colors and abstract patterns, completely avoiding plaid. Then, in s4, El is living with the Byers and receiving their hand-me-downs and borrowing from their closets.

Amy Parris confirms this in the GQ interview, that what El wears in s2 is meant to feel mismatched, borrowed, and hand-me-down because she is trying to figure out who she is in Lenora.

She also says this:

It was intentional that when El wore plaid in s4, it was meant to remind the audience of Will and look as though she was wearing his clothes.

Which means Plaid = Will, not El.

So let's put this all together: Mike has worn plaid once before, when he was experiencing conflicting emotions torn between Will and El. Plaid is Will's pattern, not El's. Blue is Mike's color, and it's commonly known that yellow is Will's, which means that not only is Mike wearing Will's pattern, he's wearing a hint of Will's color. On a more minor note, the return of the black jeans and converse from his Hawkins/Hellfire outfit means that the facade had dropped and he's slipping back into what he's more comfortable in.

It's also notable that Mike wears a blue plaid shirt the very next day after Will wears a blue plaid shirt. (Also, Will's blue plaid shirt has more white, which suits his wardrobe more than black, whereas Mike's blue plaid shirt has more black, which suits Mike's.)

And this is the shirt Mike wears during his fight with Eleven, where she calls him out on never saying, "I love you," accuses him of thinking she's a monster, and he calls her ridiculous and tries to place the burden of their relationship issues on other people ("You can't let those mouthbreathers ruin you! Ruin us!")

Visually, the plaid tells us what's going on in Mike's head and heart.

Mike's Plaid Outfit represents his internal conflict between Will and El while simultaneously betraying where his true feelings lie: with Will.

Last outfit! The outfit he spends nearly a full week wearing, the teal outfit.

Right off the bat, this color is one we've seen him wearing before in s3. However, as @hawkinsschoolcounselor points out in this brilliant post, the teal polo he wears in s3 looks nearly identical to one his father wears in the same season.

This has a few nuanced implications.

Firstly, in s3, it carries the visual implication that s3 Mike is currently on a path that could cause him to turn out like Ted. What does s3 Mike do? He neglects his friendships to spend time making out with his girlfriend, tries to reject his childhood hobbies and passions as childish (Ted disdainfully calls toys "hunks of plastic," in s2) and something he needs to grow out of, and, like Ted, makes a comment that could be interpreted as a homophobic slight – ("It's not my fault you don't like girls!" – a comment that I believe is a moment of projection for Mike due to internalized homophobia, not legitimate homophobia toward Will. In s3, Mike is trying to be "normal," "grown-up," socially acceptable and heteronormative.

Remember how I talked about modeling earlier? Yeah, s3 Mike models after Ted in mild aspects.

Yet the very next season, it's revealed that his rejection of his hobbies, passions, and games like DND was a complete farce. He returns to wholly embracing DND and, other than this teal color, stops dressing like Ted. He stops modeling after his father, much to Ted's disappointment: "Might as well call [Hellfire] the high school dropout club."

Secondly, because this teal color ties Mike to Ted, it's notable that this is the color that Mike wears when he tells Eleven he loves her.

(Now if you've read this far, my guess is you're a Byler fan and you've read 50 million analyses of the I love you speech, but if you haven't, the gist of the conclusion of those analyses is this: Mike felt pressured to say he loved El in order to save her and because he believed she commissioned the painting, but he tells provable lies during it that will be dismantled in s5.)

If teal is a color Mike wore during a season where he's modeling after Ted, a husband who the show makes very clear is lacking in passion to the point of his wife feeling unsatsified, a father emotionally distant from his two eldest children, and a man who is the epitome of heteronormativity and the typical mundane nuclear family man – this does not bode well for the success of Mike's romantic relationship with El, nor does it frame his romantic relationship with El in a healthy light.

Thirdly, there are several key differences between s4's teal shirt and s3's teal shirt.

Mike's s3 teal shirt is buttoned-up to the top button (in most of his scenes wearing this shirt) and is tucked into higher-waisted black shorts. It's solid-colored, neat, and preppy, and gives two hilariously contrasting impressions: the outfit of a little boy, and the outfit of a tween trying to dress like an adult.

In s4, however, Mike's outfit is partially unbuttoned, revealing a white tshirt beneath, with gives it a more sporty or even outdoorsy vibe. It's also not a solid color and has angular grey accents – particularly, triangular and diamond shaped accents.

This is what Amy Parris has to say about those grey accents, + what she says about how they purposefully added triangles to Robin's outfit as LGBTQ+ symbolism:

Because of this, it is not a stretch to speculate that the angular accents and, in particular, triangle design on Mike's breast pocket is a nod to his queercoding.

It's no coincidence that this is the shirt Mike wears during his bedroom talks with Will, the van scene with Will, his interrupted pizza parlor talk with El (that reads more like an impending apology and amicable breakup, not a confession – just mute the music look at his face during that scene, and El's), and his speech to El.

Most notably, it's the shirt he's wearing during this moment:

Look at Mike's face. Look at how conflicted he is. How guilty. This is the first time since Mike put on this teal shirt, the first time since he had his two separate bedroom talks with Will, the first time since "as a team," and "best friends," and the van scene & painting, that Mike has to deal with Will and Eleven at the same time.

Mike's Teal Outfit represents the tug-of-war between two contrasting concepts: his internal struggle with practicing comphet and heteronormativity (pursuing a romantic relationship with El and pretending to be straight), and his growing internal resistance to comphet/hetnorm and desire to embrace a truer, more alternative/noncomforming identity (his true romantic feelings for Will and accepting his queer identity).

Conclusion

I could honestly continue this post with analysis of the s5 outfits we've seen from Mike and what that means for his characterization/arc in the final season, but this post is long enough already. Perhaps when we get more content/trailers for s5, I might put out a speculative post in anticipation for it.

If you have a different perspective and want to share it, feel absolutely free! I'd love to hear other people's thoughts.

#byler analysis #byler #mike wheeler #mike wheeler analysis #stranger things #stranger things analysis #please let this show up in the tags i swear if it doesn't!!!#long post #i should figure out how many words this is

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badgalsasuke · 2 months ago

Text

My thoughts on the Naruto ending

So I had said I was gonna post about my feelings and thoughts regarding the Naruto finale that might contain a few hot takes for some people, so here it is.

THIS IS GONNA BE A LONG POST.

The Naruto ending is universally disliked, there's not doubt in that. Veteran SNS shippers don't like it because Naruto and Sasuke end up with women they don't love and aren't attracted to, and believe Naruto and Sasuke could've end up "single" with no ships confirmed; younger SNS shippers that weren't there when Naruto was still coming out believe they should've ended up together even though that could have not been plausible due to the manga industry quite conservative practices. Het!shippers on the other hand, believe the ending is bad for two different reasons: the first being that some believe that Narusaku and Sasukarin would've made more sense than SS and NH (some say just Narusaku and Sasuke should've stayed single); the second being that although they like SS and NH and the potential they believe these ships have "but wasn't explored further", Kishimoto can't write romance so he messed up both ships, making them bland and barely romantic.

Another reason why the ending is disliked for non-shipping reasons and mostly by Sasuke stans, is that even though in the couple chapters before the 700th one Naruto and Sasuke talk about changing the shinobi system, we see in Boruto that the system has not been changed at all and instead Naruto and Sasuke are reinforcing it despite all the oppression and suffering they were put through it in its name. We even see Itachi, the man who committed genocide being lauded as a hero for his actions and zero reflection on Konoha as a genocidal State. Oh and the Hyuga clan still practices slavery.

So here I come to say the following: Naruto's ending makes sense.

Now before y'all tear me to pieces let me explain myself. The first time I read the finale I thought it was stupid, one reason being that the ships make no sense no matter the angle you try to look at them and the other reason being that Sasuke was now working for the same State that murdered his clan with Naruto now as the head of that same State and making no changes to the Shinobi system (not a very good look on him, right?), so I thought for many years that the ending sucked.

Then The Last, Boruto and Sasuke Retsuden came out and all I could think was "woah this is all really shit from the butt".

But then one day when I was thinking about the manga as a whole, mostly because I was starting to realize that Kishimoto was being intentional in his writing of Naruto and Sasuke's romantic bond and it wasn't accidental like most of the fandom thinks, I just started connecting dots and trying to make sense of the whole story and seeing how the ending fitted into that. I'm someone that whenever it comes to literary analysis and criticism always tries to think about what was the author intention before I label something as bad because it wasn't my personal preference how something was written.

And that's how I realized what there was theme to the Naruto ending is. It's all about conformity.

Now, don't get me wrong the Naruto ending still has flaws, two big ones in my opinion, which I'll point out further down the post, but what I want to do is show you the forest because I feel the fandom is mostly focused on a couple of trees when it comes to the finale. I want you to see the thread of events Kishimoto created and how he was trying to keep it as in character as possible.

So first things first. If you've read Kishimoto interviews over the years then you would know what was the ending he had envisioned: chapter 698. He talks about how he wanted Naruto and Sasuke to have their final fight, make ammends and change the shinobi system together. He achieved two out those three things he intended.

In a quite controversial interview that most of the fandom likes to ignore, Kishimoto stated that he had no emotional attachement to Naruto and Hinata as a couple and it was Studio Pierrot who had pitched the whole thing about The Last movie. He also states that he decided to make NH endgame after Shippuden had started and he had also considered Narusaku as well, but then in another interview that came later he started saying he had intended to make NH canon since the very beginning. He was constantly contradicting himself in these interviews over the years. Kishimoto has also expressed his distate for SS and Sakura's character in general in different interviews.

So what I personally believe is that Kishimoto's editorial, Shueisha, made him change his statements because saying he had no plans for NH and it was Studio Pierrot idea was quite damaging to the franchise (no wonder the interview got kinda buried too, lol).

I think the biggest challenge for Kishimoto was giving the editorial, the studio and most of the fandom the het!ships they wanted without compromising as much the characters the story of his manga revolves around, Naruto and Sasuke.

So we get to ch. 699 where I believe Kishimoto is laying the ground for the finale we ended up getting.

In ch. 698 it seemed like Naruto and Sasuke had been able to resolve their issues and been able to talk about their feelings for each other. Something Sasuke repeats in ch. 699, a chapter entirely narrated by him. However right at the end of ch. 699 we get what seems to be a regression of what we had seen in the previous chapter.

It is implied that Naruto and Sasuke had an argument off-screen hence why Sasuke thought Naruto would not come to see him and bid him farewell before his atonement journey. What was the argument about is never really explained, some fans speculate Naruto was upset about Sasuke going on an atonement journey considering Naruto had pleaded for Sasuke to not be imprisoned and saw no reason for Sasuke to go on a redemption trip. I personally believe it had something to do with Naruto failing to come to terms with his feelings for Sasuke because, as we see right away, Naruto gives Sasuke back his headband and Sasuke says he'll keep it until they have their real fight which is interesting, to say the least, because didn't we just see their real fight the literal prior chapter? basically, we're being told Naruto and Sasuke haven't been able to truly talk about their feelings and put into words what their relationship really is about hence why Sasuke keeps the headband. As long as Sasuke has the headband, it will mean Naruto hasn't been able to truly accept what he feels for Sasuke. In essence, ch. 699 is Kishimoto retconning ch. 698 to give way to what comes later.

After chapter 700 came out we started getting so much content, both filler and canon, that tries to explain how we got there. Let's start with The Last, the movie that tries to explain how the heck Naruto ended up with Hinata.

The Last is sort of a hybrid, it's written for the most part by Studio Pierrot employees who had the idea in the first place and Kishimoto corrected a few things here and there and is also what for me, makes the ending flawed for one big reason: Naruto's character assassination.

Naruto is a shonen manga that's more focused and concerned on it's emotional battles and communicates it to the audience through it's physical battles rather than the powerscaling stuff Naruto dudebros would have you thinking the manga is actually about. So this means that Naruto, its main character, spends the entire manga learning about his feelings and putting them into words. That's what his story is mainly about; learning to love and to be loved.

The Last undoes this in the stupidest way possible. To give Naruto an excuse on why he always ignored Hinata they intend to make the audience believe it's because "Naruto doesn't know what love is" by writing Naruto not being able to differentiate between loving someone and liking ramen. This is absolute nuts. We know that Naruto understands what is love, what is not love and that love doesn't come out of nowhere, we see that when Sakura fake confesses to Naruto, he's able to spot right away she's not being genuine because he understands those three things. So this is the first flaw of the Naruto ending for me.

The second flaw is the dismissal of Kurama and Naruto's status as a Jinchuuriki. I find the most embarrasing thing about The Last to be that they had to put Naruto through a genjutsu so he could hallucinate "memories of Hinata being there for him but he was too dumb to notice" but it's even worse once you remember that Naruto canonically should not be able to be put through a genjutsu in the first place. Studio Pierrot had to break rules of Kishimoto's universe in order to give NH some mediocre development and to me this will always be the worst part of the finale. If you can't make a ship work within the universe rules, then why make it a thing at all?

Some people didn't like that Hinata is totally useless in the movie, but for me this is not a flaw, as it is entirely in character with who she is in the manga. Making her a mary sue out of nowhere on the other hand, would be a flaw of the story.

Now that I've talked about what I think are the flaws of the Naruto ending, let's talk about the things that work in The Last (and I believe is where Kishimoto put his input) to make the finale make sense. The first one being that Sakura is the one that pushes Naruto to be with Hinata. In the manga we see several times Sakura is insecure about Naruto and Sasuke's bond and being jealous of Naruto's spot in Sasuke's heart. Even Hinata is baffled by Sakura wanting to help her and asks her why she's doing all that because she knows they're not friends. We then see Sakura think about Sasuke (who's also conviniently excluded from the movie) and simply say "we, girls, should support each other", she wants Naruto out of the picture so she can have Sasuke for herself and she succeeded. It's also important to note that once Sakura got what she wanted she no longer pretended to be a friend of Hinata, she didn't even kept close contact with Naruto either as we see in Naruto Gaiden, Sarada and Naruto don't know each other like that at all, if Sakura was being a genuine friend to Hinata and Naruto, she would've kept her family close to Naruto's but she didn't.

One more thing that I find works about The Last is that Naruto doesn't passionately fall in love with Hinata, but instead is constantly guilt-tripped into liking her, which is more true to his character. You have a man already struggling to accept his sexuality, who also has his deceased mother's expectation of marrying a girl and on top of that is a pathological people pleaser, of course he's gonna marry the first girl that tells him she loves him. It makes sense this all happened while Sasuke was not in the village. Naruto panicked about his sexual identity and rushed to marry an "acceptable woman" in the eyes of the people whose approval he craves, as we see in the special chapter Kishimoto wrote that came out after The Last: the villagers fawning over Konoha's hero dating the Hyuga heiress.

Likewise, Sasuke not attending Naruto's wedding helps the ending not be as contrived or out of character of them. Kishimoto never wrote anything on why Sasuke skipped the wedding as far as I can recall, but in the episodes that Studio Pierrot made dedicated to Naruto's wedding we see a Sasuke completely absent and detached from the event, something Naruto dudebros use to dunk on him because that made him a terrible friend from their perspective, but as usual they're not paying attention to the full narrative Kishimoto is creating here.

Making Sasuke be happy for Naruto and attend his wedding and give him a gift and all that crap, would've made het!shippers and Naruto dudebros happy but it would be at the expense of his character and the story Kishimoto was writing. Remember, Sasuke had kept the headband all these time until he could have his real fight with Naruto, meaning he was waiting for Naruto to be honest about his feelings for him, so him not attending Naruto's wedding is a way to communicate to the audience (at least the part that's paying attention) that Sasuke is heartbroken by the news.

I believe this is why Kishimoto designed adult Sasuke the way he did and makes him dress the way he does as an adult. All black and depressing. I also believe that Sasuke will stop dressing that way the minute he and Naruto have their real fight, if they ever have it, that is.

Additionally, Kishimoto nailed making NH canon before SS would be canon. Naruto, as I stated before, is the one that struggles with his identity and feelings for Sasuke and the one that has the expectations to marry a woman so it makes sense that he would be the one to marry a woman first. SS becoming canon first wouldn't make sense because not only is Sasuke more outspoken about his contempt for Sakura, whereas Naruto remains polite and neutral to Hinata's feelings, but Sasuke also has no reason to be with Sakura if Naruto is still available, in fact, Kishimoto making Sakura be the one to chase Sasuke after Naruto's wedding because Sasuke never came back, as we see it stated in Naruto Gaiden ch. 10, is also in character for both Sasuke and Sakura, instead of writing it the other way around like SS shippers wished, y'know their whole thing about Sasuke coming back to the village for Sakura and apologizing to her because he didn't realize how much he actually loved her because he was trapped in the darkness blah blah blah (I think this is what happens in filler novel Sasuke shinden lol).

If Naruto is not available, then Sasuke is in a very emotionally vulnerable position and Sakura took advantage of that. You see the narrative Kishimoto is creating here? There's a thread to follow on why stuff happened they way it did.

Now, I mentioned before that the theme of the Naruto finale was conformity. Here's where I explain how:

The first thing is Naruto's physical appearance. Kishimoto liked to draw a young Naruto all punk and grunge. He even had already made a design of adult Naruto where Naruto looks, well, cool and HOT.

Yet, for the actual finale he gave us an ugly Naruto, but also a Naruto that looks tired and exhausted. How does this tie with the conformity theme? when Naruto was young he used to go against the rules, defy expectations people had of him, tell authorities to fuck off. Like, when he was told to give up on Sasuke when he was 12, Naruto responded "If giving up on Sasuke makes me wise, I'd rather be fool my entire life", this man was a rebel. But as an adult we see him become the head of State that continues to reproduce the status quo that had once oppressed him. Naruto turned apathetic, his appearance reflects his attitude.

And this is consistent with the narrative Kishimoto's been crafting. Just in the same way Naruto conformed to society's expectation when he married a woman he doesn't love and barely knows, he also conformed and succumbed to the shinobi world status quo. It would *make zero sense* for Naruto to revolutionize the shinobi world while married to princess slaver Hinata Hyuga, that'd be an oxymoron, completely contradictory narrative wise. Certainly, Naruto always struggled to find an ideology, to put it in some way, when it came to Konoha and its ninjas practices and had a messed up perception of its villagers (see: the whole Dark Naruto mini plot) but he still wanted to change the shinobi world WITH SASUKE by his side, once the story established they don't end up together and Sasuke isn't by his side, Naruto doesn't care anymore.

This is why I don't find strange that Kishimoto wrote Naruto oversleeping in the eve of his name day as Hokage, a day Naruto had once dreamt about when he was a child. The spark is gone.

But the spark isn't just gone for Naruto, it's also gone for Kishimoto. Naruto didn't even attend his name day because he was knocked out by Himawari. This is Kishimoto being petty. He spent 15 years writing a story where the goal was to see Naruto become Hokage and he knew how anticipated this moment was and he still went and ruined it for the fans anyway. Naruto dudebros were furious about this, but not once did they stop to wonder about the implications of this, what it said about Kishimoto's relationship with his work if it had gotten to the point he went and "fucked it up".

Naruto cared about the state of the world before he became indifferent to it. This is why when Sasuke stans complain about Naruto not actually caring about Sasuke's trauma but can never really explain why Naruto is like that as an adult. They try to pretend Naruto never cared but this is a lie, kid and teenage Naruto was compassionate to Sasuke's trauma and pain even if he didn't always managed it in the best way possible. So, I always feel like they're missing this particular piece of the puzzle: if Naruto can't be his true self then he cannot change the world and neither can Sasuke.

Because the same thing occurs to Sasuke. One blog once posted that Sasuke not caring about his child is out of character, but Sasuke not caring about Sakura's child is very much in character and I feel that sums up Kishimoto's writing of both adult Sasuke and Naruto. This passiveness you wouldn't imagine from their younger selves, takes a hold of them once they become adults and gradually "get in line" to be a part of the real world. Sasuke doesn't care about his child because he had her with a woman he doesn't even like or respect. Sasuke is stuck in time still holding onto that headband, hoping he and Naruto will one day have their real battle.

Sasuke uses the forehead poke, a gesture he always hated, on his wife and child because he, just like his brother to him, wants to distance himself from them. Sasuke now serves the same village that plotted the mass murder of his clan and family because why not? his brother is lauded as a hero for killing his entire clan after all. Sasuke too, has conformed.

I actually wonder if this is in some way linked to modern Japanese culture. Japanese culture and society are deeply conformist with everybody is always trying to fulfill roles imposed in them, always trying to achieve what is expected of them. It could also be about how adulthood sucks the passion and hopes out of the youth (Kishimoto started writing Naruto when he was 24 and finished when he was in his forties). And of course, the closeting of queer people leading miserable lives as pretenders.

If Sasuke is meant to end up with Sakura and Naruto is meant to end up with Hinata then Kishimoto cannot make them happy marriages and give them happy families, he also cannot keep Naruto and Sasuke as revolutionary outcasts that stand up against the status quo, that fanservice would be out of character and out of theme.

This is what I mean when I say the ending makes sense, once you see the finale is all about conformity the thread of events becomes understandable and more heartbreaking too. You don't have to like it, but I do think we have to understand where is Kishimoto coming from when he wrote it the way he did.

The Naruto fandom wanted black and grey from Kishimoto and that's exactly what Kishimoto gave them, black and grey.

EDIT: I've written more on how the conformity theme starts to become present in the series as far back as in Neji's death, check it out HERE

#my thoughts on this fuckass ending #narusasu #sasunaru #anti sasusaku #anti naruhina #anti naruto ending #I guess

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