#with some riku and kairi stuff
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You're the sunflower/I think your love would be too much
#WOO FINALLY DONE#considered doing a second part with hanahaki riku buuuut. i got a car journey in an hour or so and im impatient#so doing it later means not at all#but anyway!!! had fun w him#still tryna figure out how to draw sora ill prob redraw this when i figure it out#rearranged the heart station more toward the redesigned one but then didnt rlly follow thru cus i wanted both riku and kairi on it LMAO#also i think i drew them too small for this to come across but my thought process was “sora with lots of freckles = sunflower center bit”#and obvi the station of awakening as well#was gonna be kh2 sora but hnnng his design is. so much#ambitious#i think “your love would be too much” works for every version of soriku though so its okay#soriku#kingdom hearts#soriku endgame actually#kh sora#kingdom hearts sora#sora kingdom hearts#riku kingdom hearts#bev draws#beverly says stuff#this happened cus 2 nights ago i satr up in bed and said THIS SONG IS SO SORIKU CODED#and then i wanted to make the sunflowers behind him look like stained glass#but i didnt know how & figured putting a station there would give a similar effect#regardless! sora looks kinda goofy in the face but im p happy w this !#using references are for cowards (NOT ACTUALLY. USE REFERENCES DO NOT FOLLOW MY EXAMPLE)#kh#kh1#kh1 sora#kh1 riku#also tried out some different brushes for colouring this and i like them :3
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#khedits#khgraphics#kingdom hearts#destiny trio#sorikai#sora#riku#kairi#**#**: edits#felt like using these artworks for an edit all of a sudden#just wanted to cut them out i guess ROFLLL#i dont think ill work much more in this lower contrast style but . it was fun cuz i tried some of my usual artwork processing stuff on it#just noise and chroma it tf up
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#kh#kairi#my art#digital art#art#fanart#(fuck hands)#(but also!!!)#(i ***need*** to draw butterflies sooooo much more often!!)#(theyre so fun to draw and stuff!!!)#(i had soooo much fun coming up with cool butterfly designs!!)#(ill probably draw more butterflies at some point because butterflies are too cool **not** to!!)#(anyways!!)#(i really really like drawing kairi!!)#(shes a lot more fun to draw than sora or riku will ever be)#(for me specifically i mean!)#(her hair isnt bullshit ive gotta figure out the logistics of)#(i get to draw cute eye lashes)#(and she wears pink!!)#(... maybe i should draw the trio in nothing but pink black and white...)#(ill write a id later cause ive got hw to do but yeah!!)#(also also i think im finally getting the hang of backgrounds!!)
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I cracked and dusted off my swan prince AU. I’m def gonna attempt to clear up the first two/three chapters and force myself to write and finish it after so many years.
#soriku#The first few chapters centered around Sora and Riku growing up and falling in love while Kairi and Aqua are off doing their own thing#and also falling in love#oooh I unearthed some stuff and I’m so excited again#I might have to write up an outline of characters and their relations cause I forgot some stuff cause it’s been 4/5 years since I first#started writing this fic but the idea had haunted me … I must write it
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I judge kingdom hearts fans by how they treat Kairi
#I saw some REALLY bad takes about her on tumblr today#just posts that. diminish her to being a love interest that ‘gets in the way’ of sor/iku#and also just stuff about how she doesn’t matter to sora and riku at all and girl!!! they’re so wrong#kairi deserves to be treated better. by both kh writers and the fans#this isn’t anything new ik lots of people feel the same way#but#it still annoys me how often I see people treating her as a character that shouldn’t exist#kris speaks#<- oh yea that’s my name now btw#ALSO LIKE. THERE WAS ONE POST THAT REFUSED TO REFER TO HER BY NAME. WHAT THE HELL#like. you dislike her so much that you won’t even use her name? wild. she’s not even real dude
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i dont much go for kh aus because theres so much happening already but like. au where roxas actually wins against sora and now sora just lives in roxas' heart instead.
#stuff#and by that i mean sort of how sora has some of roxas' emotions at the beginning of kh2 and then it sort of fades away.#kairi and riku vs roxas and lea but they're all technically the good guys still yknow
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going through the recced posts for myself in the sake of actually having a functional queue in 84 years... almost forgot why i don’t really like... any theories when it comes to a certain ship
#monie.txt#it's almost 2023 and i still see these shippers ignoring kairi's significance to the boys#also both riku and kairi have literally been referred to / seen as sora's lights in canon#the two ideas can coexist#fuck you don't even have to ship sora and kairi to acknowledge that or even kairi's importance to both boys#and to clarify i don't think all their theories are bad... there is some validity and merit to them#but i also just know it also comes from a place of being so tunnel visioned in the idea of them being endgame#well some of them do... it's why i legit don't bother following anyone that mainly ships them#granted i also don't follow folks that mostly ship kairi and sora cause they've got their own annoying eggs too#anyway that's enough of me being petty abt dumb stuff because i care too much abt all aspects of the destiny trio#back to being a void
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thinking about the end of kh1 again................
#devastating image shutting riku in kingdom hearts and then getting ripped away from kairi like that#just after being abandoned by goofy and donald in hollow bastion#idk if this was the intended reading but i think in the final ansem fight about how they disappear a couple times and you have to fight to#get them back. like its like working through difficulties in a friendship after some kind of betrayal or mistake#sora is so going though it socially they are putting him through that 14 year old wringer#at least i assume#because the characters are so young i assume that's the intended audience and that's probably what most adolescents were going through then#now i'm a little old but because i was a very self-absorbed child i'm only really dealing with that kind of social strife now#its a little embarrassing to be so obsessed with something so clearly intended for people much younger than me but what can i say#its well made and relatable and i'm really enjoying playing it#and i listen to so much hikaru utada now#ughh and i think of sora struggling with his relationships with others and i can relate so deeply#things have just been hard recently because of some stuff that happened that seemed to affect every relationship in my life#trust is hard and communication is hard and forgiveness is hard and its all so hard#but its still so powerful and beautiful you want to do it anyway#idk i think its something most people probably already know but its news to me and its the hip new thing to think about in my life#no one is allowed to be mean to me about this /lh
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I'm super late talking about the Kingdom Hearts VR Experience, I know. I was a bad fan and only skimmed a video of it when it originally came out. But I finally watched all of it and I love how you get different camera angles of scenes we've seen before with it! That might be useful for video editing.
#also the one khii scene with xemnas sora riku kairi mickey donald and goofy where kairi had fish face before now has her face fully animated#with her looking angrily towards xemnas which is nice#I mean... Angelus almost sired her#so I can get why you'd think about it. Haha.#But#tbh. I've barely thought of vampire Faith for some reason (apart for when she's been in some fics I've read). I don't know what I'm doing w#and the parts where you can actually hit things with a keyblade seem fun#i wish they'd update this again to include bbs stuff and the wayfinder trio#i also wouldn't mind a real kh vr game tbh -dodges bullets from people sick of console hopping type things- i know. i know. but i think it#could be cool and fun if they got the right people to help with it -thinks of fnaf help wanted-#for some reason i was also surprised that you could eat your ice cream bar as roxas during the 358/2 days segment too#like that it kept track of how many bites of the ice cream bar you were taking and realistically made the ice cream smaller and smaller#until eventually it was gone#and then you had a 'winner' stick to show for it:)
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I know you made shorts for Sora, Riku, and Kairi, but do you have any other thoughts about Kingdom Hearts?
Ik this is kinda vauge and you get these kind of asks all the goddamn time, but I hyperfixated on those games for most of elementary and middle school and its always cool to see your favorite Youtuber talk about stuff you really like. Not to guilt trip you into answering this one or anything, just. . . I'm very tired and it would be very cool lol.
Again, saving my character design thoughts for some more shorts, but I adore Kingdom Hearts. Like, the first game really ISN'T much more than a cross-promotional branding exercise for Disney and Square, same as any of a dozen other similar crossover centric franchises; it's a Saturday morning cartoon show that wants to get you invested (or keep you invested) in a bunch of fancy IPs to buy toys of, but it's a really good one of those.
And it's a game that understands that the central thing that's going to hook people IN to that kind of thing is characters that are willing to believe in what they've got going on with one thousand percent sincerity. Which I think is the thing they nailed more than anything. Sora cares SO MUCH, and he wants to find his friend and his love interest (Kairi and Riku, respectively) SO BADLY, you can't help but root for the poor kid and want to believe in it.
Then, with the first game successfully managing to hook a solid fanbase, the creative team went "hey what if we had even MORE extremely earnest cool anime people getting deep in their feelings?" and now we're off to the races with Organizations and Oblivion Castles and fractions of 358 days.
And the thing that makes all the hyper-convoluted wheels-within-wheels plot machination nonsense WORK is that down, deep down, right at the core of what the franchise is always trying to say, is that love will save us. Yeah yeah hearts and darkness and unversed and nobodies and keyblades and blah blah blah (to be clear: I adore all that nonsense), but all of it is top-to-bottom in service of that singular central thematic clarion call.
Love will save us.
What holds Ventus together after Xehanort tears his heart apart? The love of Sora. What keeps Roxas the nobody from fading into Sora? The love of Xion and Axel, and Hayner, Pence and Olette. What brings Xion back? The love of Axel and Roxas. Hearts ring together and resonate and bind themselves to each other and there is no darkness so deep, no tragedy so absolute, no villain so foul that the cry of a loving heart cannot defeat it.
Roxas is a nobody doomed to darkness? Fuck you, Kingdom Hearts is love, no he isn't. Xion is a mere replica puppet, a failed experiment that nobody will remember? >>EXTREMELY LOUD INCORRECT BUZZER<< get seasalt icecream'd on top of a clock tower at sunset, IDIOT.
Over and over again characters sink into despair and loneliness, they fear that their connections are fake or fading, they fear being forgotten or left behind (Riku in the first game, the breaking of Ventus, Aqua and Terra, Roxas thinking nobody would miss him, Aqua in the Realm of Darkness), and over and over again they are proven beautifully wrong. There is always a hand reaching out, there is always someone who will miss you. Love will save us.
And this absolutely gets hokey, of course it does, it's a saturday morning children's cartoon. It's a bit simplistic, maybe a bit naïve, but honestly in a world where you can't walk two steps without bleak-minded doomer cynicism forcing the assumption that nothing truly good is possible and that the worst will always happen, Kingdom Hearts is a story so absolutely drenched in hope, sincerely held, that it feels like a fucking balm.
Also, LITERALLY where the fuck else are you going to get Woody from Toy Story reading an edgy anime villain for absolute filth? Nowhere, that's where. ONLY Kingdom Hearts.
youtube
None of this is to suggest I don't have criticisms of the franchise or that it's faultless. I could talk for several hours unbroken about all my gripes and problems, chief among which is LET KAIRI DO THINGS OH MY FUCKING GOD the franchise is low key misogynistic towards its female characters sometimes but I am talking about the things I love here let me just be happy for a second.
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Hello!
So, I have a question, and it might just be me being Stupid, or not remembering right, but I always found it odd that Kairi was one of the three keys to finding Sora, according to the Fairy Godmother at the end of Melody of Memory.
I understand Riku being one: he's got the dream, the Dream Eater Link and the Power of Waking to actually cross the portal.
I understand Nameless Star being one: she's the one from Quadratum and the only one who can create the portal Riku needs.
But I don't understand how Kairi's memories are actually important. Is it simply a matter of understanding what Quadratum is (Unreality) in order for Riku to safely go through?
Maybe I'm missing something crucial, but I feel like Fairy Godmother could have just sent Riku off immediately when she told him about his dream in Radiant Garden. It almost feel like they included Kairi just to exclude her even more.
Anyway, love your stuff! Take care! Bye!
Hey there! No, I don't think you missed anything.
So I think most people would simply chalk it up to them having some kind of special connection, but then miss the rest of what they were showing us. And while I think they could have moved things forward literally any other way and had the same result, (ie fairy godmother just taking riku to nameless star post important dream revelation) I think they were taking this opportunity to make a few things clear;
playing directly into that expectation of a Big Special Connection, they make a point out of the fact that searching her heart resulted in nothing by way of any direct lead to Sora despite being at it for a year. ("You seek clues to Sora's whereabouts by using your memories of him to search through your own heart. But there's nothing for you to find here.")
it's a simple opportunity to glimpse a bit more into her past, what's lurking beneath the surface of her memories and what happened to her. This is what actually gives them a clue.
making it painfully clear that riku is leaving, in fact he's already left, and that he's going alone. (though they definitely could have made up any better reason to shelve her than "training" lol)
Also this isn't to say Sora and Kairi don't have a special connection! Obviously Sora shows up and takes the reigns for a hot minute (whatever that was), I just mean that their connection may not be what's assumed, by kairi (even riku, hence his initial hesitancy and confusion) and the audience, yknow???
Anyway yeah, it just kinda is what it is. Like, these cutscenes in khmom were decided upon suddenly and rather late in the project. Originally it was just going to be chirithy narrating so I think it was genuinely just an opportunity to give Kairi a little bit of somethin' vs the usual nothin'. A little somethin that doesn't really hurt anything aside from maybe people's expectations lol;;
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"Kingdom Hearts is so complicated" "Nomura made it up as he went along" "KH makes no sense" Have you considered that Riku is 15 and autistic and gay bc if you do I think itll change things
#domt get me wrong a lot of kh is fucking ridiculous and some of it is way too complex but like#bare bones? Rikus motivations are so real to me like Riku is such a realised character#Giving him hugs#If sora at any point in the game was like “Riku youre my best friend and i value you” nothing wouldve ever happened /hj#Obviously overhearing the dock convo with Kairi definitely triggered a fight or flight response in him#and him being like “Winner gets to get with Kairi 😼” and then as soon as the race is over being like “lol it was just a joke bro haha”#And him trying so hard to be a cool guy (which works tbf bc sora idolises him but is still evident)#Him tossing Sora a paopu and sayin “c'mon. you know you want to try it.” eithout ever saying Kairi to test the waterz#his main priority after opening the door to darkness being making sure Sora comes with him and feeling betrayed when he doesnt#and then in traverse town running when Sora has the chance to abandon him for his new friends#and then maleficent is like Lol he replaced u <3 and riku is gay and autistic and 15 about it#I care so deeply about kh1 riku. Hes just a little guy and he just needed a hug#apollo says stuff#UGHHHH#Its feeling so so sad about Riku Kingdom hearts hours#riku kingdom hearts#kingdom hearts#kh riku#soriku#beverly says stuff
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[Missing-Link] CBT1 Info
Since the closed beta began, there has been a lot of activity with testers posting images, videos, and details (and some streaming). I've compiled some for easier browsing:
Character customization
Body types A and B
Character creation
Earring (whose?)
Some customization
Maku's drip
More drip
FFXIV Black Mage but green
FFXVI Jill Warrick
Purchasable outfits named after Final Fantasy jobs (each cost 2k jewels you know the ones)
UI
Equipment menu
Vertical and horizontal resolution with seamless transition
Gameplay
Dive to the Heart tutorial (stained glass may be a spoiler)
More Dive to the Heart
Meeting other players in the hub area
Timed battles (apparently may not be all fights)
Timed battle footage (not enough info on who or what is the opponent)
Buzz Lightyear and Sulley piece usage
Charged attacks
Ranged Keyblade
Grand Chests that contains a piece
GPS and walking on buildings with no care in the world
Losing all health & reviving
Raid battle completion
Raid battle completion screens
Piece enhancement screens :worry:
Donald piece screen (JP)
Prince Phillip piece screen (JP)
Mickey piece screen (JP)
Sora piece screen (JP)
Defeating area bosses grant coins to exchange for accessories. Accessories are enhanced with a chance of failure. Using enhancement records will increase stats.
Ireland
Auto gameplay result screen (JP): AP gained, defeated enemies, times activated(?), recovery spots used, treasure chests obtained, pieces obtained
Elemental wheel (no, this was not stolen from another game, so stop that nonsense)
Gacha
Winnie the Pooh
Some pull rates (subject to change!)
2 banners
Sora, Riku, Kairi Pieces
Story (spoilers!!)
JP intro (not sure if the English version is dubbed No dub, yet anyway)
Scala ad Caelum logo appearing (not really a spoiler)
Posting any text here will spoil it - just click the link
Other
Scala ad Caelum logo
Beta data size (~1.9GB)
Guide Moogle (Cute, kupo!)
Astral Plane battle music
AimmsBear's experience thread
Key_Cast's thread on game mechanics and some lore
Summary of Nomura's visit to the Artnia Cafe in Japan with reports from those who attended (via lottery)
Streamers/Video Archives
[leeadamsmusic3630] Multiple videos with specific features
[Dive Hearts] Game records/growth log, UI editor
Our Stuff
Post on spreadsheets with data from the closed beta
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#kingdom hearts#khml#missing link#closed beta test#i'm honestly just excited to dress up my character#and story i guess#early thank you to those who will be whaling because they keep these games alive
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[ID: A digital drawing of Sora from Kingdome Hearts wearing a black hoodie with red and white accents, a black shirt with a white butterfly in the upper centre of the shirt, white and grey headphones and black jeans with silver chains hanging from them. He has his signature crown necklace and is lying down in a green, grass filled place with some of the grass ending up on his body. He has his eyes closed and his hands are behind his head as tears fall down his eyes. There is some generic warm shading done to the drawing. The drawing is set in Quadratum in some grassy area.]
#kh#sora#my art#digital art#art#fanart#(you have no idea how much time i spend just figuring out what kinda fashion id like sora to be wearing right now)#(i didnt want red to be like overpoweringly there cause like idk it just didnt feel right)#(i found a pic on pinterest of a black shirt with a butterfly decal on it and went 'yep this is what hes wearing now')#(also!!!)#(fuck soras hair)#(i still dont really get his hair and spikyish hair in general is ***not*** my forte so i spent waaaay too long just on his hair)#(the headphones are mainly there because i bet the city can get a bit overwhelming for sora)#(and if not then its there just so he can listen to the waves as he tries to go to sleep because idk i think thatd be nice)#(also hes crying cause i view this as him haveing some dream or something about his friends and how much he misses them)#(got the motivation to do this after reading life long strangers by .holleighgram on ao3)#(got a lot more kh motivation after looking at their drawings and reading their kh stuff so expect more kh related stuff!)#(might draw riku next and then kairi)
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Riku: “Taisetsu na hito - Cherished person”
Throughout the series we’ve seen an escalation of Riku’s enduring journey to find the “strength to protect what matters”. It appears to peak in KHIII with “strength to protect someone precious”, but I’m gonna propose that they could some day take it a step further than that.
I am once again slamming my tiny fistful of evidence and wish fulfilment on the KH meta table.
So as we know this line first appears in BBS when Baby Riku meets Terra and says he wants to protect his “daiji na mono”:
強くなりたいんだ
I want to become strong.
(…)
どうして強くなりたい?
Why do you want to be strong?
大事なものを守れるでしょ
So that I can protect important stuff
友達や みんなを
Like my friend, everyone…
He repeats this in DDD as he fights to save Sora, recalling twice the secret promise he made that day:
大事なものを守れる力
Power to protect important stuff
Finally this culminates in Riku’s KHIII sacrifice, following up from Mickey suggesting that he’s found the strength to protect someone he cherishes.
大切な人を守る強さか—
Strength to protect someone precious—
Which is cool. But there’s room for more, if Squisney decide it won’t hurt their profits to go down that path. Or even if they just feel like addressing at any point the absolute non reaction everyone had to being obliterated on the spot and then Riku dying for Sora. With that in mind, I began to wonder if we’ll see just one more callback later down the line.
I think there are two possible options. First:
一番大切な人
Ichiban taisetsu na hito / Most precious person
In CoM for example Namine urged Sora to remember his “ichiban taisetsu na hito” — number one most precious person. This one has more of an obvious romantic air I feel. I choose to think Namine was talking about Kairi when she said that but I respect that other SR fans think it’s Riku so I’m including it. If we’re going to hear this one again and in reference to Sora & Riku, we’ll surely get it around the time the necklace theory is inevitably revealed. Either way, it’s already been used in the series, so it’s not a crazy implausible love declaration or anything. It can happen.
I mean, in DDD Riku all but says it when Ven asks:
“Kimi ni totte ichiban taisetsu na mono tte nani?”
“What’s the number one most important thing to you?”
And of course Riku replies:
“Taisetsu na shinyuu”
“My precious best friend”
As far as I’ve noticed, Riku only calls Sora his shinyuu. It’s cute.
Another possible route they could take is:
愛するもの
Aisuru mono / Beloved person
Which sounds far fetched at a glance, but it is what Terra says to Riku during the bequeathing, in response to Riku’s “daiji na mono”.
いずれ選ばれし者として この小さな世界を出て——
Some day, you will leave this tiny world as the chosen one—
俺のもとへたどり着くだろう
You will find me.
その時こそ――
That’s the time—
本当の���い世界——
The real wide world—
愛する者を守る力を教えよう
Will teach you the power to protect the people you love.
“Love” being such a diluted word in EN means it doesn’t convey the gravity of it well at all, but “aisuru mono” is one of the strongest ways you can say you love someone in JP. It can be singular or plural, platonic or romantic, and I’ve seen KH’s fandom war cousins cloti/clerith argue over the use of this term— so it highkey wouldn’t surprise me to see this one used by Riku or someone else in reference to his feelings for Sora. Like, in a ‘vague enough to not offend the unwashed dudebros but can also be read as incredibly romantic’ kind of way.
(By the way, I’ve seen “aisuru mono” or “aisuru hito” translated as “dearly beloved” in some places before, too. So naturally I’m gunning hard for this one. Shoot that probably unintentional symbolic double meaning shit straight into my veins.)
For the reasons above, I personally can envision a realistic pipeline of:
Daiji na mono / Important stuff ->
Taisetsu na mono / Precious thing ->
Taisetsu na shinyuu / Precious best friend ->
Taisetsu na hito / Precious person ->
Aisuru mono, Aisuru hito / Beloved person
or
Ichiban taisetsu na hito / Most precious person
Not to say it will happen in any capacity, but there’s space for it. A ton of weird stuff happened around That Moment, and even if that’s just down to KHIII bunk….. the whole ass Fairy Godmother herself has come to set Riku on a solo mission to make his dreams come true.
The setup is right there if they ever want to take that opportunity to clarify the depth and nature of Riku’s feelings for Sora specifically.
Riku already promised Terra he’d find the strength to protect someone he loves, which he has now found, and in the case of ‘Aisuru’, I think it would round off that callback to the bequeathing perfectly.
#kingdom hearts#riku#soriku#ngl i think riku’s feelings for Sora will always toe the line#Like a kaworu kinda thing right?#Thats how I see it playing out in the future anyway#don’t really care as long as he takes care of best boy#kh analysis
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A Japanese video talking about Riku - Mentions the "Love Triangle."
I just found a video talking about Riku (in a sort of "10 Things You Didn't Know About This Character" kinda way). The creator of the video is Japanese and the video itself is in Japanese. Here is the full video:
youtube
They talk about 10 different things in regards to Riku, the full list of things they talk about can be seen in this image:
But the point I'm mostly going to be focusing on is #4 - 恋愛事情 or "The Romance Situation."
When the creator gets to point #4, they call it "The Sora and Kairi Love Triangle" (三角関係).
Then bring up the whole "eating (sharing) a paopu fruit with Kairi" stuff. But before jumping right into that, the creator compares Sora, Riku, and Kairi to other popular shonen trios of the time:
First mentioning Naruto with Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura.
Then Ash, Misty, and Brock. The creator notes that this kind group setup (a trio with two guys and one girl) was really popular around this time.
And that such a dynamic (two guys and one girl) has a lot of potential interest for a romance/romantic situation to come about. Which then brings up back to the whole "sharing a paopu fruit" with Kairi situation.
Specifically the scene in KH1 when Riku races Sora and says:
That whoever wins gets to eat (share) a paopu fruit with Kairi. But, then the creator of this video notes that the reading of this scene isn't necessarily clean cut:
Rather that it is unclear if this moment is just a moment meant to tease and embarrass Sora or if Riku was speaking honestly. Then they mention what Nomura says about Riku and his motives in KH1:
"Riku trying to return Kairi's heart to her wasn't about his feelings for her [Kairi], but rather his strong need to repent for the sins he committed." The Japanese word 罪 (tsumi) can also mean "wrongdoing," but I feel like Nomura is talking specifically about "sin" here, since he used the word 懴悔 (sange) as well. That word is shown to have strong connections to Christianity and Christ. The Japanese Wikipedia page for the word is specifically talking about the idea of repentance and sin in regards to Christ and the like.
(Personal little sidenote here, but this bit of info adds an extra layer to the conversation between Riku and Esmerelda in DDD, since that movie is steeped in Christianity).
Bringing this back to the video and what the creator had to say about this quote:
First, they note how there was no reference to Riku having romantic feelings for Kairi.
So, while knowing about Sora's feelings for Kairi,
It's reasonable to assume that Riku was simply teasing Sora in that scene.
Now, for most Soriku fans, this is old news. Many Soriku fans are aware of this quote in some way, shape, or form, and that interpretation is how we've viewed that scene for ages. But, I think it is important to have someone who is Japanese, speaking in Japanese, and talking about Nomura's quote in Japanese actually bringing up this line as well.
This is even more important, because this Japanese creator doesn't appear to be a Soriku shipper (he might agree with the idea of Riku having feelings for Sora, but he doesn't seem to ship Sora x Riku). After all, he does specifically note that, in KH3, Sora and Kairi are "completely in love with each other" (完全に両想い). So, to this Japanese individual, that paopu sharing scene is meant to be romantic.
The creator of this video also points out that "Riku picks up on that" with the "that" being "Sora and Kairi are completely in love with each other," and shows the scene of Riku on the beach not looking bothered by this. (In Japanese, they state that Riku is 空気が読む - reading the room).
Then they end the video by stating that they "wish people would stop saying that Riku might like Kairi."
I wanted to share this video, because while I do think that there are a number of poorly translated moments in KH (especially in KH3), which either just do the character dirty or causes certain parallels and context to be missed or miss placed in the English version...I don't necessarily agree that the Japanese text makes Soriku or Riku having romantic feelings for Sora more obvious nor do I think that it makes Sokai come off as less romantic than it is intended to be.
When I first played KH3, it was in Japanese when I was living in Japan. The Sokai stuff came off as romantic, poorly written and on the same level as the usual battle shonen stuff (of which this creator made a parallel/connection to with the trio dynamic in a way), but still meant to be read as romantic. Riku and Sora moments still made my eyebrows rise though, as per usual. (Edit: Also, to clarify, I do still think that there were aspects of drifting apart or feeling left behind, especially on Kairi's end, and there was still a lot of queer subtext in KH3, but whether Nomura actually ever does anything with that...).
But, yeah, I think there has been some misconceptions spread about Soriku and Japanese KH fans in general. There seems to be this feeling that like every KH fan in Japan ships Soriku or what have you...but that really is not the case. Soriku fans in Japan ship them, they likely also have queer readings of their bond and the text, but the regular, run-of-the-mill KH fan in Japan will see Sokai as romantic and the official/canon pairing, and view Sora and Riku's bond as friendship.
Though, Soriku is still an extremely popular pairing and I do think that, like in English speaking spaces of the fandom, there might be more of a general acceptance that Riku has feelings for Sora. But, not everyone in Japan holds these views, just like in English speaking KH spaces.
Let's just take a quick look at the comments:
One of the comments that has 14 upvotes notes the heartwarming nature of seeing Sora and Riku go from enemies in KH1 to fighting together "as friends" in KH2. Another comment notes how Sora and Riku are childhood friends. One commentator states that "Riku has Namine, so he'll be okay." Meanwhile, another comment talks about how they think that "Riku is definitely in love with Sora" they use 恋 (koi, which is used when talking about romantic love specifically). One of the replies to that comment notes how they find Soriku to be "hotter and more emotional" than Sokai. The creator responded with a laugh and a general sort of "no doubt (lol)" statement.
I'm going to check and see if there are any other Japanese videos talking about Riku in general. This video was a great little insight into a Japanese POV on Riku and general Japanese fandoms thoughts on Riku. Like with any fandom space, it's a mixed bag.
If you do decide to check out the video above or leave a comment, please be nice and kind. I just thought this was interesting and a good reference / source to point out when it comes to that Nomura comment about KH1 Riku and his motives and Riku's feelings (or lack there of) for Kairi.
#Soriku#Sokai#Kingdom Hearts#Riku#Sora#Kairi#tetsuya nomura#long post#image heavy post#fandom stuff#Japanese translation#translation#video#Youtube
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