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Non-Heterosexual Anime Characters


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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15433
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Thu May 06, 2021 8:16 am Reply with quote
In general, characters in anime are fairly commonly coded as something not-heterosexual, yuri and yaoi are such a genre, but a lot of the time these sorts things can come across as sort of fetishistic, and often some level of mostly bait where it stops at characters being touchy feely. After I created a topic for Trans and Gender Non-Conforming Anime Characters, I was recently thinking about how maybe there could be one for non-heterosexual character, which would make up the other letters of LGBT. So I was considering a good way to do it, and kind of considered in a way that the ideal would be to not just name yuri or yaoi bait character.

So how about listing the characters that are most explicit over not being heterosexual, that would be Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Pansexual (if you consider it different from bi), and Asexual (if you can be confident enough to give that label). Being explicit might mean characters that stand above what might be the usual trappings of a genre, and perhaps how that might work for representation. That might mean as much I might want to just say everyone in Yuru Yuri, there might be a few characters stand above not just being the sort of character especially for male audience enjoyment (such as the elder sister that steals her younger sister’s underwear to keep with her hug pillow.

I would probably also at some point like to also getting into discussion of characters that might be more vague, and if they are just some element of bait. Such as Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid where one character seems more obvious lesbian, while it plays kind of coy in steering away from saying the would be partner swings that way.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15433
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PostPosted: Thu May 06, 2021 8:27 am Reply with quote
Thought that I at least a little bit, I don't know if it would get out of hand to keep it up.

Azumanga Daioh: Kaorin

Bubblegum Crisis: Dailey Wong

Cardcaptor Sakura: Tomoyo Daidouji, Yukito Tsukishiro, Toya Kinomoto

Haruchika: Haruta Kamijō

Horimiya: Izumi Miyamura

K-ON!: Tsumugi Kotobuki

Little Witch Academia: Atsuko Kagari, Diana Cavendish

Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha: Nanoha Takamachi, Fate Testarosa

Maria Holic: Kanako Miyamae

My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!: The bisexual harem (at least on the female end) Catarina Claes, Mary Hunt, Sophia Ascart, Maria Campbell

O Maidens in Your Savage Season: Momoko Sudō

Psycho-Pass: Shion and Yayoi

Revolutionary Girl Utena: ?

Sailor Moon: Michiru Kaiou / Sailor Neptune, Haruka Tenou / Sailor Uranus

Stars Align: Yuu Asuka

Symphogear: Hibiki Tachibana, Miku Kohinata

Wasteful Days of High School Girls: Lily Someya

Watamote: Tomoko Kuroki

Welcome to Demon School Iruma-kun: Eiko Oni

Yuri on Ice: Yuri Katsuki, Victor Nikiforov


Last edited by DuskyPredator on Wed May 12, 2021 4:42 pm; edited 2 times in total
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15433
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Thu May 06, 2021 8:30 am Reply with quote
Some lesbian characters.

Sailor Moon: Michiru Kaiou / Sailor Neptune Haruka Tenou / Sailor Uranus
Starting off with a very famous lesbian couple, there is Michiru and Haruka. Noted as also infamously as the old English dub tried to get around this very canon pairing in a time you could not put that into a kids show by making them cousins, which kind of just made some of their actions the more questionable. Haruka is kind of also notable for like I did in the trans/GNC discussion that their presentation is a little fluid, but I don’t that changes too much in this discussion. I have to imagine that it had to be super ballsy to have a very certain lesbian couple in the manga for children at the time.
I suspect that there are other non-heterosexual characters too.

K-ON!: Tsumugi Kotobuki
Reading queer characters into something like K-ON would be pretty easy, as a CGDCT anime, and I don’t think that it is a mistake that you could read things into Mio and Ritsu’s relationship, Ui’s worship of Yui or Yui’s skin ship with Azusa. But Mugi, despite kind of having the least shipping with the other girls, kind of has the biggest hints as being a lesbian. Arguably not really enough, but the anime has one specific scene that lingers on her checking out their female teacher, and kind of sadly never feels like it is addressed. Other arguments for evidence could be things like Mugi kind of the most vocally interested in intimacy between girls, but not usually having the courage to do what the others do. She was also the one that picked an all women college.

Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha: Nanoha Takamachi, Fate Testarosa
These two kind of sit in an interesting spot, especially if you draw a contrast to the Sailor Moon couple above, because the Nanoha franchise to my knowledge has played very vague in what exactly the relationship is between Nanoha and Fate. Following the enemies to friends path, they became “best friends” quickly, and kind of edged out any romantic interests Nanoha would have with the male characters, and the vagueness continues with them as adults, who sometimes share a bed and get a daughter. The series especially early on could show the body a bit where it might be inappropriate with young characters, but it otherwise has this sort of appearance of innocence, like it can’t confirm their sexuality.
Regardless of whether it can confirm, it still seems quite obvious even taking a step back, that saying that they are just really good friends sounds like a line a clueless person would say about a lesbian couple that re living together as a family.

O Maidens in Your Savage Season: Momoko Sudō
I wanted to mention this one because O Maidens is very specifically about female sexuality, especially around adolesce (the titular savage season), and the show sets up Momo to draw a contrast to the straight girls. The show had some great parts like having her go on a date with a guy and coming back cold, as she later talks about not understanding the expected interest in guys when girls are much prettier, like the baby gay she is. I have said before, that I would love something like a Momoko spinoff, since her part in the anime had her sort of finding out how she is different from her small social group, with her crush with a probably straight girl unrequited.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
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Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Thu May 06, 2021 8:33 am Reply with quote
Some gay characters.

Yuri on Ice: Yuri Katsuki and Victor Nikiforov
I am just going to be open and say that I was kind of a dunce when watching Yuri on Ice, because I did not fully perceive Yuri and Victor’s relationship as romantic, this despite it pretty much having a proposal scene. The reason of this, I kind of go between just a me problem, or partially a show problem. The reason I might say a show problem is that I think it could have done a bit more to come out and say that it was romantic, it kind of mostly calls the exchange of rings a promise before a competition. For many it was more than enough, for myself as a then in denial bisexual with no idea even in denial, I could think myself around it.

I maybe could also explain how I had kind of been messed with how something like Hibike Euphonium had pulled the yuri bait thing some few seasons earlier that could explain away very romantically charged scenes as not really anything.

Stars Align: Yuu Asuka
Yuu is kind Haruka from Sailor Moon earlier, that in the trans/GNC topic I talked about them (Yuu) being non-binary, so it could be a little finicky in technical terms of saying gay, but it was kind of a good deal of the earlier parts of the show in good gay representation. Yuu having a crush on a boy while they are generally seen as a boy. The show had some interesting bits such as that their peers seem to pick up on their attraction to boys and so tease him such as in the changing room, and their clubmates defend them. It is a big disappointment this show did not get the resolution it needed after it being cut in half and not continued.

Haruchika: Haruta Kamijō
Haruchika does not really have romance, and even though probably not the healthiest crush, the show was kind of upfront with one half of the series name, Haruta, openly has a crush on his male teacher. I honestly can’t actually remember too much, other than the dynamic kind of insured that the two main characters would not suddenly be forced into romance with each other, although with a crush on the same teacher. But it was still kind of notable that a series would be so forward with saying that one character was gay, and it not really otherwise affecting him.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
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PostPosted: Thu May 06, 2021 8:36 am Reply with quote
B

My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! The bisexual harem (at least on the female end) Catarina Claes, Mary Hunt, Sophia Ascart, Maria Campbell
I would love to include the boys, have the entire harem group be bisexual, but from what I have seen so far there has not been the evidence, probably especially since Catarina is at the centre of the harem. The series being about someone reborn as the villain of n otome game, and her actions to avoid a bad end for herself have her steal the affection of the male targets, along with the female love rivals and finally the would be heroine herself, that would be if Catarina was not so dense. It was honestly a fun a twist, and if we need things to lead to new trends, I need more bisexual harems.

Horimiya: Izumi Miyamura
This is arguably more up in the air, but I really wanted to include at least one male bisexual character, and Miyamura was a character that came to mind. In honesty, the show never confirmed that Miyamura is bi, romantically he is pretty single targeted with Hori, but parts such as when questioned over a possible relationship with a male character he responded that they would not be a good fit, not that he is not interested in males. The series also had elements of where his girlfriend was maybe worried that he might end up with another guy, which I otherwise think the series was being a bit homophobic with how it treated some of the idea as a joke, something worth mockery.

Welcome to Demon School Iruma-kun: Eiko Oni
Figured next would be something a bit more on the confirmed side, which is Eiko from Iruma-kun, although she is a bit more of a side character and practically a background character in having little effect on the story. But Eiko is notable for first having a kind of crush on the titular Iruma, before also having one on the female student president. Honestly the character is kind of fun in her own right, where she seems to think that the she thinks the objects of her affection are really cool, while not really understanding that she likes both boys and girls

Little Witch Academia: Atsuko Kagari, (Diana Cavendish lesbian)
Akko from LWA is another character who is a bit less confirmed, most of her more obvious ship teasing was with Andrew, where Akko kind of works her way as being worth his time more as the authentic idiot she is (authentic as a person, not specifically about how silly she is). But there is a considerable amount of ship teasing with her one time rival Diana, that I think it would probably be fair to assume Diana is probably a lesbian when comparing her lack of interest the other girls showed with boys like Andrew. As sad as it is to say it out loud, the one thing stopping knowing if Akko is bi is if she vocalised that she might consider returning feelings of both Diana and Andrew. But reading her character as bi does seem popular.

In regard to animation, kind of interesting element in regards to LWA and bi lead is that Disney’s The Owl House did the open bisexual lead in a way that feels hard to imagine was not familiar with LWA in regards to similar characters. Kind of feels like hitting a part where the West has overcome Japan in queer representation in animation for kids.

Watamote: Tomoko Kuroki
It might not be entirely right to put this one, but I kind of want to do it anyway, so I am. In regards to just the anime itself, there is not a lot of definitive evidence that Tomoko is bi, she is rather obvious with her attraction to boys, she has trouble talking to a cute one, and we see a fair enough evidence to things like fantasies with them. The one real evidence for girls, is kind of how she creeps on her friend Yuu who had a makeover when getting into high school, which you could read into a problem related to how bad the influenced of media she consumes have her mistake how she should interact with other women.

I kind of hate to say it, but it takes reading the manga that goes further to get more context into Tomoko’s character in learning that she is most likely bisexual. This includes things like her looking up the skirts of girls, and gets very anxious over social interactions with especially one girl in particular with an interest in physical contact, and seems to on at least a subconscious level treat some of their meetings like dates. If true, Tomoko herself does not seem to realise it at this point in the manga, but lets just say she agreed to go with said girl to look at an all-girls university and agreed to try and get into it with her despite the extra effort she would have to put in. Kind of regards to myself, the Tomoko not understanding this part of her that might have been an element of social problem with peers, is kind of another part that is super relatable about this character that I find relatable for other reasons.
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P€|\||§_|\/|ast@



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PostPosted: Sun May 09, 2021 9:45 am Reply with quote
I've always been a bit confused with female pairings, because a lot of time in anime with female leads, there's often a really close friend as a side or supporting character. A notable classic example of this is Cardcaptor Sakura, but a show like this would never suggest anything but pure platonic relationships between girls.

However, even more mature shows involving girls that are close; you never quite get that satisfying bit of information about how deep or physical their relationship is.

Usually in order to get more than the stuff you have to leave to your shippy ship imagination, there's always a need to venture into hentai territory, whether this be through visual novel, manga, game or direct to video versions of a TV series (just because the televised stuff needs to be more family friendly). Even if they don't show any explicit scenes, I like some kind of subtle hints at what the characters are doing under the sheets.

All the precious awkward moments, flirting and discovery of each other's feelings is nice plot development in many "yuri" shows. But my point is, without a show actually being considered hentai, even ones labeled as yuri or shojouai rarely get right to my "are they doing 'it' (or do they want to)?" itch. And I'm talking about well into the series, but if its near the end or going onto a second season and they're only at second base, it really just feels disappointing letting it drag out like that.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
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PostPosted: Sun May 09, 2021 6:00 pm Reply with quote
Past wrote:
I've always been a bit confused with female pairings, because a lot of time in anime with female leads, there's often a really close friend as a side or supporting character. A notable classic example of this is Cardcaptor Sakura, but a show like this would never suggest anything but pure platonic relationships between girls.


I have heard that Cardcaptor Sakura is a kind of confirmed case of non-hetero characters, rather than just Schrodinger's attraction. Sakura's friend, Tomoyo (Madison also comes to mind from the old English dub), is apparently in love with Sakura, which might explain why she is so interested in getting Sakura into cute outfits and filming her. It at least is an interesting character point that someone like a main character's friend could be homosexual, even in love with them, but not infringe on Sakura more evident attraction to boys by being happy for her.

I also understand that Sakura's older crush of her brother's friend, Yukito, is also in a relationship with said brother, Touya. Like the context is all there that Sakura's brother is gay with his guy pal (is there a better phrase for this like "gal pal"?). I think that I have heard in other places things like everyone in CLAMP series are actually really bi, but I don't know how true that is.

Past wrote:
However, even more mature shows involving girls that are close; you never quite get that satisfying bit of information about how deep or physical their relationship is.


One of the ones I explicitly think with this is the likes of the Symphogear series, with characters Hibiki Tachibana and Miku Kohinata, where it pretty ends up in a place that their relationship only makes sense if they are actually in love with each other. A lot of their relationship is about showing them attached to the point of jealousy if they think someone might have them, essentially having confession and promising themselves to each other, even sharing beds on a number of occasions. But the show could never do something like show them kiss. The question lingers if they are doing anything under those sheets.

Past wrote:
All the precious awkward moments, flirting and discovery of each other's feelings is nice plot development in many "yuri" shows. But my point is, without a show actually being considered hentai, even ones labeled as yuri or shojouai rarely get right to my "are they doing 'it' (or do they want to)?" itch. And I'm talking about well into the series, but if its near the end or going onto a second season and they're only at second base, it really just feels disappointing letting it drag out like that.


I think that is a part of how you get that yuri/lily dichotomy lesbianism, where there is this weird idea of purity. Pretty much that a character could either be a pure lily that is left ambiguous, or are a dirty predatory lesbian. A particular show that comes to mind with this is Maria Holic, which I would say is rare in how its main character, Kanako Miyamae, is at least internally loud about her attraction to other girls. There is a part I think early on where Maria calls her a lesbian, and Kanako shoots back something like she is "yuri", because it has a nicer or more pure sound to it.

That I think that Kanako's open desire as a lesbian kind of puts her on the same level as an insert male lead, getting nosebleeds over hot girls, and being separate from all the close relationship stuff that her classmates have. Which is interesting considering that the titular character is himself a boy pretending to be a girl. There is this certain dirty aesthetic given to female characters that might be open about sexual attraction.

A thankfully not as harsh portrayal I can think of in more recent years is from Wasteful Days of High School Girls with the fittingly named Lily Someya, who is as the norm closeted, but internally loud over her attraction to other girls. We are given some insight into her desires, where you could say there is a kind of perverted element, her biggest pairings with the class tomboy and the class "loli" who is too innocent about everything. But is arguably one of the least negatively portrayed characters where one of her defining traits is that she is a lesbian outside of a more fetishist series. Maybe some element of being compared to the boy hungry baka.
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AkumaChef



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PostPosted: Wed May 12, 2021 11:04 am Reply with quote
I love Cardcaptor Sakura. But I think it's very hard to draw the line between what is known-for-a-fact versus what they are merely hinting at, perhaps to allow fans to draw their own conclusions. On the one hand CCS is essentially G-rated. There's no nudity, nothing really violent or sexual or whatever going on overtly, yet at the same time it drops hints at a wide variety of sexual preferences and fetishes. Sakura's mother was apparently bisexual since she first dated Tomoyo's mother and then left her for a man (Sakura's father). That of course means that Tomoyo's mother is either bisexual or a lesbian as well. We never see or hear about Tomoyo's father so it's unclear if Tomoyo's mother married a man or perhaps she conceived artificially. Sakura has a huge crush on Yukito, but he acts very effeminate and was frequently the "bottom" character in doujinshi, usually with Sakura's older brother as the "top", even though there was nothing in the series which clearly indicated that either of those two men were gay. Of course there's Tomoyo throwing Sakura in the back of her van, yanking her clothes off and dressing her up in cute costumes, filming the whole thing of course. Some of Sakura's outfits have some pretty wild designs and might suggest bondage outfits. In one scene the characters are crawling through a tunnel or duct and Tomoyo is filming straight up Sakura's skirt, and if one uses the official series art book as a reference there appears to be no underwear with that particular outfit, not that we see any detail onscreen. Tomoyo dominating Sakura was extremely common doujin material. There's also the adult-child relationship between Sakura's classmate Rika and their teacher--this was rather overt in the manga but toned down in the TV series.

I think a lot of anime, especially in the past, used non-heterosexual characters either as a joke (usually gay male characters), or as fetish material. Many "lesbian" scenes are fetish fuel for straight men and many "gay" scenes or characters are fetish fuel for fujoushi and so on. But it seems that is changing and in at least some titles things are taken more seriously and LGBT characters are taken seriously.

One standout older show I think is worth mentioning are some of the characters in Bubblegum Crisis. I can't think of many shows from that era which treated homosexuality as anything other than a joke or perhaps as fanservice for a particular crowd but BGC seems to take it seriously. Leon McNichol's parter, Dailey Wong, is overtly homosexual and it is not played for laughs nor is it Fujoshi bait either. There's also an implication that Leon himself is bisexual: he seems to have no problem with Dailey's come-ons, and there's also a scene in which Leon is shown eating a parfait at a bar--something you would typically associate with a female character. But we do know he is not simply gay as he does hit on Priss, and even surmises that she might be a lesbian since she turned him down. Priss may very well be lesbian as she seems to care an awful awful lot for her female friend Sylvie. She also is conspicuously quiet while the other members of the Knight Sabers are discussing their love lives with men.

A couple others that come to mind:
Kaori aka Kaorin from Azumanga Daioh appears to be a lesbian with a serious interest in Sakaki.
Shion and Yayoi of Psycho-Pass are lesbian, and I think it's neat that it wasn't treated as fanservice or shocking or anything like that. In fact there's a scene in which Akane goes to visit Shion in her office and interrupts she and Yayoi engaged in....activities. There's no commentary about what was going on, she doesn't react with shock, it's treated totally normally.

And of course there is Revolutionary Girl Utena...
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DuskyPredator



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PostPosted: Wed May 12, 2021 5:21 pm Reply with quote
Thankyou for the extra information about CCS AkumaChef. I have done some looking into things before, but it is hard for me to get specific information over what is confirmed in text. Since I can find a manga page that has Tomoyo pretty much spelling it out loud that she has a love for Sakura that is not returned in the same way, and a number of sources seem pretty certain over the boys being in a relationship.

It is true that LGBT characters in general used as a joke or more blatant fetish material, think a word to describe that sort of thing is "exploitative". It kind of looks like more Western stuff kind of passed in not making it so okay, and it is changing too in anime. I have heard that there is a trend of yuri/yaoi being marketed as LGBT in the West, but no such distinction in Japan.

But you are right, as probably part of standard male gaze you have gay characters treated as a joke, lesbians fetishized. The argument is probably there for a comedy series like Yuru Yuri which has a cast of lesbians, it leans a bit more fetish for its Sapphic element. And one complaint I had over the highly sexual Interspecies Reviewers was how it treated the perhaps implications that the intersex Crimvael (who identifies as male mostly out of convenience) is treated as maybe a joke that he may be interested in men also. Such that at a genderswap establishment all the others went for lesbian stuff, but the fact that Crim went for a woman with the assets to experience things he normally doesn't with pre-existing parts, is enough to have a big "Rainbow" thing as a joke, let alone that he showed the barest interest in a catalogue of male workers.

I did recently watched a longform video about Revolutionary Girl Utena, the series has always come across a bit intimidating, and after watching the video I did get a sense that it is rather dense with a few different themes that I might have been confused over parts. It has things like not conforming to gender roles, possible lesbian attraction, and also maybe certain men controlling women/girls into relationships.
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AkumaChef



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PostPosted: Wed May 12, 2021 6:03 pm Reply with quote
DuskyPredator wrote:

It is true that LGBT characters in general used as a joke or more blatant fetish material, think a word to describe that sort of thing is "exploitative". It kind of looks like more Western stuff kind of passed in not making it so okay, and it is changing too in anime. I have heard that there is a trend of yuri/yaoi being marketed as LGBT in the West, but no such distinction in Japan.

One of Japan's major products is kink. Just as how their real-life adult videos cater to every imaginable fetish (And many unimaginable ones) there are a ton of different niche anime and manga titles too. Sure there's the "lesbian" themed stuff which is mainly consumed by males but there's plenty of gay themed works as well both officially and in the fan-art community. Every audience seems to be catered to. I think originally people talking about manga in the west saw all these gay and lesbian themed works but didn't realize that most of them were fetishizing the concept rather than catering to it. But there are more and more works coming out which don't treat it as fetish bait. My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness by Kabi Nagata is a great example. There's also the famous "sex ed manga" Futari Ecchi. While the main characters are heterosexual there are also homosexual and trans characters and those issues are treated seriously in the manga too.

Quote:
And one complaint I had over the highly sexual Interspecies Reviewers was how it treated the perhaps implications that the intersex Crimvael (who identifies as male mostly out of convenience) is treated as maybe a joke that he may be interested in men also.

I don't think Reviewers was perfect, or far from it. But I thought, taken as a whole, it was remarkably body-positive and accepting for what its subject matter. There's none of the bickering or the fighting that you normally see between fantasy races in anime. Everyone gets along, everyone has different preferences, and while there is some light-hearted teasing going on everyone seems very accepting of everyone else's. Crim chooses to conceal the fact he has female organs as well as male ones when he first encounters the other characters out of fear, but keep in mind that he made that decision without knowing anything about Stunk et. al. Stunk and the others didn't attack him first (or at all). And once the reader becomes familiar with the characters they realize that the others wouldn't care what parts he has between is legs or what his preferences may be--after all, throughout the many chapters of the manga all the hanky-panky is consentual, and nobody seems to care what everyone else's preferences are. I thought the chapter with the Cyclops prostitute who was self-conscious about her eye to be a feather in its cap as well.

Quote:
I did recently watched a longform video about Revolutionary Girl Utena, the series has always come across a bit intimidating, and after watching the video I did get a sense that it is rather dense with a few different themes that I might have been confused over parts. It has things like not conforming to gender roles, possible lesbian attraction, and also maybe certain men controlling women/girls into relationships.

It's a very "Arty" sort of show so there's a lot of things open to interpretation. It also references a ton of classic shoujo tropes....and turns them upside down. It has all those things in it that you list, including a lot of bishonen, though I would point out that the controlling men (and controlling women, for that matter) are not painted in a good light. I highly recommend it. It's still a great show even if you don't understand everything in the first watching, which I certainly didn't, and probably still don't now. The movie is even more avant garde.
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all-tsun-and-no-dere
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PostPosted: Wed May 12, 2021 6:50 pm Reply with quote
DuskyPredator wrote:
Thankyou for the extra information about CCS AkumaChef. I have done some looking into things before, but it is hard for me to get specific information over what is confirmed in text. Since I can find a manga page that has Tomoyo pretty much spelling it out loud that she has a love for Sakura that is not returned in the same way, and a number of sources seem pretty certain over the boys being in a relationship.


I would take a lot of what he says with a grain of salt, since much of it is heavily informed by doujinshi or blatantly incorrect. Clamp tends to take the stance of "love is love, no matter what or who," which is great for things like LGBTQ rep, but they go to an extreme where they end up with, say, a teacher giving a ten-year-old student an engagement ring. For LGBTQ characters in CCS, here is what's canon:

-Tomoyo and Sakura's mothers, Sonomi and Nadeshiko, were cousins. Sonomi was in love with Nadeshiko.
-Tomoyo is in love with Sakura
-Touya and Yukito love each other; Touya has had relationships with girls before, which would make him bisexual (yeah, it's dead wrong to say there's no indication of them being gay in canon. Like it could not get more blatantly obvious within the text and is pretty much explicitly stated.)

I have no idea what he's going on about Sakura not wearing underwear while Tomoyo films up her skirt, or the outfits being informed by bondage.

I do recommend checking Utena out! It is quite thematically dense and can be confusing on your first watch, but it's an incredible story and very rewarding, and the writing is often quite fun. There's a ton of articles on the internet out there that can help you figure out different interpretations.

For a series not mentioned yet in the thread, it's currently in licensing hell but I loved No. 6. It's a rare series with a same-sex relationship at its center, without being categorized mainly as BL, as Shion and Nezumi are struggling to survive in the slums in a post-apocalyptic future. It has pacing issues, but the central relationship is so lovely and it's well worth your time if you can track it down.
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AkumaChef



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PostPosted: Fri May 14, 2021 11:09 am Reply with quote
all-tsun-and-no-dere wrote:

-Touya and Yukito love each other; Touya has had relationships with girls before, which would make him bisexual (yeah, it's dead wrong to say there's no indication of them being gay in canon. Like it could not get more blatantly obvious within the text and is pretty much explicitly stated.)


First off, gee, thanks for the vote of confidence, I thought I clearly indicated what subject matter was official and which was the common doujin take.
As for this, I draw the line at what is explicitly stated. I don't recall either Touya or Yukito coming out as gay or bisexual, nor formally stating that they were a couple. "The symbolism seems obvious" is not good enough for me. Though if I am wrong and there is a manga scene in which any of that is stated then I stand corrected, my knowledge of the manga is admittedly limited.

Quote:
I have no idea what he's going on about Sakura not wearing underwear while Tomoyo films up her skirt

It's a scene in the TV anime ep. 4. Tomoyo has dressed up Sakura in a costume with a very stiff skirt. In the episode Sakura is leading while Tomoyo follows with her camcorder, as the two girls crawl on their hands and knees. The bit about the underwear is from the artbook. The official artbooks have detailed design sketches for all of Tomoyo's outfits for Sakura. Most have underwear, often built-into the design of the outfit. That particular outfit doesn't.
You can see the outfit sketches from the artbook here:
https://ccsakura.fandom.com/wiki/Episode_4_Battle_Costume
and compare to all the others which do have some sort of underwear included.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15433
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Fri May 14, 2021 11:14 pm Reply with quote
Is there just no official Touya or Yukito confirmation? It has been ages since I watched the original series, when I was a literal child and it was kind of my first anime next to Pokemon, with whatever random adaption the English dub was. But I did watch the 2018 series, and I think they looked close enough to be easy to see it. The TV Tropes character page for them says that they are a couple, and usually TV Tropes tries to follow evidence stuff and call something out as ambiguous when it is.

We are trying to be more confirmed here. I would love to talk about more ambiguous ones too, like arguably my earlier argument of Mugi might be a bit too much, which kind of reminds me of another KyoAni series that I was thinking about recently with this subject Lucky Star. Konata and Kagami specifically, not that they are a couple but the likes that Konata shows a fairly large degree of interest in things featuring girls for a male audience while I think claiming to supposedly not be interested in the real stuff. And Kagami has been shown an interest in boys, while also kind of reacting strongly to some of what Konata does to her, and going off of a dream she had that might say something about her subconscious. I read somewhere that apparently there is a word of author that one of them may have an unrequited crush on the other. It is all ambiguous, like most yuri/yaoi bait.
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all-tsun-and-no-dere
ANN Reviewer


Joined: 06 Jul 2015
Posts: 604
PostPosted: Fri May 14, 2021 11:24 pm Reply with quote
DuskyPredator wrote:
Is there just no official Touya or Yukito confirmation? It has been ages since I watched the original series, when I was a literal child and it was kind of my first anime next to Pokemon, with whatever random adaption the English dub was. But I did watch the 2018 series, and I think they looked close enough to be easy to see it. The TV Tropes character page for them says that they are a couple, and usually TV Tropes tries to follow evidence stuff and call something out as ambiguous when it is.


I don't remember precisely in the anime - I'm in the middle of a rewatch, so my memory of the third season is still hazy for a lot of things. However, in the manga Sakura and Yukito have this exchange:

Sakura: And you knew the way I felt... because you have someone else you love the most too?
Sakura: Is it my brother...?
Yukito: ...Yes.

So, I don't know how much more confirmed you can get than that!
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Saeryen



Joined: 26 Aug 2020
Posts: 849
PostPosted: Tue Jun 01, 2021 7:55 pm Reply with quote
I love the non-het characters in CCS. Toya/Yukito forever!

Also, I believe that in side material for Kira Kira Pretty Cure A La Mode, Yukari and Akira were confirmed to be in a romantic relationship; it was heavily implied in the show itself. They're both GREAT characters.
spoiler[This was not implied in the show, but I do love Ciel/Bibury as a couple, especially since Ciel is the one who started Bibury's path to redemption.]
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