so i dont think yamatsuro it’s doomed, or toxic. it COULD be if yamato didn’t died during chapter 5, but in both chapter EX and a no killing game AU this shipp could be… normal, to an extent. they’re a secret 3rd thing.
so yeah, this pairing COULD be doomed and toxic in the “what if yamato survives chapter 5” scenario. yamato loves his classmates and even if utsuro and akane were part of them too, i don’t think he could see past this. not saying he would outright be horrible about this, but the resentment will be there. it will never leave. and that’s the route you could take in order to get the most angst, since the other routes this shipp could go are just troublesome but not completely sad.
both in chapter EX and the no killing game AU i could see them working out, in chapter EX it would be a TERRIBLE slow burn, but see my vision.
we know utsuro closed himself after realizing how much his luck could affect the people around him. he first saw it happen w his parents. He lost the value of his talent after seeing how artificial life was with it, using it to help ppl in order to feel “something” but it never came.
junko’s despair was a new feeling to him, something to crave, which is the reason why he choose to aid her in her plan. that’s my super duper summary of my utsuro’s character reading. anyway. he’s very closed off, at this point he has internalized that anyone who gets to get in touch with him will use him in some sort of way, his talent grants him the control but that’s not reassuring at all, it makes people unintentionally dehumanize him and he actually believes this! woah!
i think what utsuro has failed to realize is that he wasn’t at fault for what happened in his childhood, he was a kid and he only wanted to make his parents proud. he didnt got any guidance, which made the dehumanizing feeling continue to grow.
what utsuro needed was human company. and he was getting BETTER after entering hope’s peak. i know the flashback is meant to tell us that this was some big scheme he was planning since the beginning, but honestly? if he didn’t met junko i think he would have opened his heart a bit. eventually. i think this point its implied, he was starting to care for these people. he ultimately wanted the all to live, as shown in chapter EX. with some extra pushes, i dont we would have gotten the “bad ending” of his journey.
i mean i could say “omg utsuro you’re such a fake idgafer” but like i know how hard is to get in touch with your emotions, so the hit of eventually realizing he CARES about these people was probably a big thing for him, “if i wasn’t born broken, could i have lived a normal life?”
it’s a common phrase if you deal with these type of thoughts. what this give us its insight that utsuro isn’t fully evil, which yes, kinda obvious, and that does fuel about how, if they had more time, could’ve find a way to live a relatively normal life, recovery i mean.
uhm this is supposed to be a yamatsuro text post, so let’s dive into how i see his dynamic with him. we know yamato it’s a faker, he wants to be the leader and the reliable person everyone needs to have, not due to malice or control (like utsuro w the latter) but because he thinks these people NEED a light to rely on.
ever since he was young he probably grew up w this mentality, not a people pleaser but that one friend who you feel comfortable talking about your problems, but he never tells you about theirs.
an important detail is how he knew at first glance there’s something making utsuro act distant towards his new classmates, which yes, im aware im over analyzing this, but it’s interesting once you put on the lens by knowing yamato’s that kind of guy.
he can tell when something’s wrong, so it’s no wonder he could’ve been able to see the walls the more time they all spent with each other. yamato isn’t perfect, that’s something i know, but he’s the type of guy that, no matter what you did, he will try to see the good light out of it, or more like finding the “perfect” solution to their problem by thinking in advance.
that’s the main reason why i believe their relationship in the two scenarios i planted dont really inquire any toxic elements, id rather feel like they’d need TONS of communication and it’ll take a whole while for them to get on good terms in the chapter EX scenario, cuz by that point they did killed are the ppl in the lab + the kidnapping, like c’mon yamato’s that good of a guy but even for him this would take a bit to make amends.
the resentment will be there, but not as much as the kisaragi lives AU, i guess you could make this a bit toxic but overall i just feel like it would be “complicated” you see. i dont have anything else add, but i’ll try to expand more about this cuz i love their dynamic!