#there's also a small part of me that was tempted to tick the sexuality hc box just because his whole thing for tsubomi is less about her

[muninnhuginn]

@roseofcards90​

thanks for the ask! here’s the terumob part of the answer

terumob:

Okay so my main thing with this is that Teru’s lowkey worshipping of Mob is something which can be very easily read as a crush and I think that’s where the appeal is for a lot of people. For me though, I’m not a huge fan of ship dynamics where one person is explicitly put above another. I’m sure I’ll have exceptions, but as a general rule it’s something I don’t really go for.

So how this goes into Terumob is basically that their dynamic changes through the series. Initially Teru sees himself as above Mob and everyone else in the world (not realising that power-wise he’s actually completely outclassed) before being forced to reassess when Mob both psychologically and psychically dismantles him. From then on, he puts Mob on this huge pedestal, believing that if he follows Mob’s ‘teachings’ then he’ll become a better person. And tbf a lot of this has a “fake it ‘til you make it” kinda vibe in that no one can change overnight and for all that Teru tries to pretend he’s grown massively as a person when he first meets Ritsu, it doesn’t change the fact that he only met Mob the other week.

So you go through most of the series with Teru almost seeing Mob as almost this religious figure whilst Mob in turn doesn’t much seem interested in anyone but (the idea of) Tsubomi.

There is a period just prior to the finale where Mob and Teru are having a conversation and during it it becomes pretty clear that Mob puts Teru above him in terms of social aspects whilst Teru puts Mob above him in terms of, well, pretty much everything else. I do find that interesting to dig into because it means they’re both mutually lifting the other above themselves in their expectations and that’s much more fun to me than it being so one-sided. Plus, Mob is in some ways forgetting the very things he first “taught” to Teru and Teru has to actively remind him of back then.

Still, this whole conversation is happening in the context of Mob wanting to confess to Tsubomi and tbh, I do think the way the series is structured it’s hard to say Mob could come to his conclusion about Tsubomi any sooner than he did in canon and have it be convincing.

Which basically brings me to the conclusion that the only time I’d consider terumob as having an opening that I would personally find interesting and viable would be post-canon because Teru only breaks out of his hero worship in the finale confrontation and Mob is only able to move on from Tsubomi (and importantly, complete his emotional development) at the same time. And we see so little of their interactions and characters after the finale confrontation that I find it really difficult to infer what their future interactions could look like.

So most of this is why I’m saying platonic + therapy. The ‘fandom ruined it’ box is more because a big chunk of the fanart/fic I’ve seen with these two in a pairing doesn’t really convince me I’m seeing the same characters as anyone else. I don’t actively avoid/block it because I don’t super mind it and some people can get the dynamic down, but overall I just prefer platonic and find their relationship has enough meat to it as it is in canon.