Analyzing Aqua and Larxene's Ships
TERRAQUA: The most prominent Straight ship Aqua has. One of the few Adult Male characters in the series who isn't a villain, and is always in proximity to Aqua due to being a trio. In BBS, they have next to no chemistry and are always at each others' throats, though KH3 gives the "You never stopped lighting my way back" line, which added fuel to this ship. Likely the most it will ever get. I noticed a lot of posts arguing about the Terraqua ship in early 2019 specifically, so I think KH3 is what truly made this blossom.
One aspect people tend like with this ship is portraying Terra/Aqua as a couple and Ven as their child, acting out a family dynamic. Though there are story elements that somewhat thwart this such as Terra and Ven being viewed as "Brothers" in the story.
I wouldn't be surprised if there were Men who like to imagine themselves with Aqua and act that out vicariously through Terra in the ship art they see.
AQUARELLA: Aqua's most prominent F/F ship. This pairing almost entirely exists out of inertia. Fans want a see a non-straight paring, Cinderella is an adult, she interacted with Aqua once, and that's all there is to it.
The two main scenes for this ship's existence is the scene where Aqua takes the place of Prince Phillip helping Cinderella down the stairs, and another scene later when Lady Tremaine and Cindy's sisters die in an explosion. Aqua shields Cinderella from the blast, has some very awkward dialogue, and has Cinderella leave while she handles the threat. All the while it looks as if Aqua is resting her hand on Cinderella's backside.
This is likely Aqua's most popular ship in general. Posts on Twitter showing the scene of Aqua and Cinderella on the stairs can usually pull in a few thousand likes. It's not uncommon to see art of Aqua dressed as the prince himself, dancing with Cinderella or otherwise reenacting scenes from the original movie.
Whenever The Lady Tremaine explosion scene makes the rounds, it can garner over 10k, and you can usually see people in the replies and QRTs joking about Aqua and Cinderella's position.
Though this ship is very popular, it also has a bit of a meme quality to it, due to the aforementioned Lady Tremaine scene. I feel as though most people who react to that scene are just laughing at how silly it looks, and how weird Aqua's line is. All with jokes about how she's slapping Cinderella's ass. A far cry from the chivalrous art you see from fans.
You also see people say things like: "Wow KH is so devoid of Yuri that Aqua's most prominent lesbian ship is with Cinderella of all people."
A very popular, but very meme-able ship.
LARXAQUA / AQUALARX / LARQUA: This ship is what true desperation looks like. You desire to see Aqua with a woman who is also an original KH character; but the literal only option is Larxene. The only time these two characters have been on screen at the same time is in KH3 when the Guardians and Seekers first meet in the Keyblade Graveyard.
Don't let anyone trick you into believing these two characters aren't shipped together because their the only adult women in the series. That is 100% the case here. These two have literally nothing in common. In fact, they're borderline exact opposites. Aqua is a hero who loves her friends and protects others from danger, Larxene is an open sadist who abuses children and seemingly only cares about Marluxia. They couldn't be more incompatible if they tried.
MARLAR: A comment reminded me of this ship and I feel silly for forgetting it considering the moments they share together throughout the series. If there's one person Larxene respects; it's Marluxia. She's undoubtedly loyal to him, since he is the reason Larxene joined the New Organization in KH3. They're the only bosses that actually fight in sync with each other. It may very well be one of the deepest bonds in the franchise.
Easily Larxene's best pairing and one I'm excited to see more of as the series continues.
LARXEL: This ship likely only exists because of how playfully flirtatious Larxene acted towards Axel in CoM. The last this ship was seriously discussed was in 2020, by then Marlar had surged in popularity due to KH3 & UX, so this ship is basically obsolete.
LARXELSA: There's not much to say about this ship since it's not as popular or defined as Aquarella. However, despite Elsa and Larxene never interacting, there's still merit to this ship. Elsa built a wall of ice to prevent Sora and Co. from following her, and Larxene used that to build the labyrinth. The interior design of which is clearly inspired by the Ice Castle Elsa would later construct.
Larxene genuinely cares about Elsa and respects her. She doesn't taunt and startle her like Marluxia did to Rapunzel, she kept her distance and allowed Elsa to make decisions herself, and constantly thwarted Sora's attempts to pry into Elsa's business. Perhaps Larxene saw a bit of herself in Elsa. Either way, though it's an extremely niche ship, it has a special dynamic that ought to be explored more by fans.
