Furina's C5, Puccini's Turandot, and a short rant
(cw for mentions of suicide)
I saw someone making a wild claim on twitter, so here's an attempt to coherently dissect it:
Yes, Furina's C5 ""His Name I Now Know, It Is... !" is a reference to Puccini's opera Turandot, where the titular character announces to her father the Emperor that the Stranger's name is Love.
No, the Stranger's name is Not, in fact, Love. He's named Prince Calaf of Tartary.
Yes, there's a high chance in this context that the Stranger is used to parallel Neuvillette, whose role in Focalors' plan is to love for humanity so much he overturns the prophecy.
However, the Stranger in question could also mean Furina, whose love for her people kept her going through 500 years of suffering.
Furthermore, I would argue that the references to Turandot cast Furina/Focalors in TWO of the main roles in the opera: Prince Calaf and his servant Liu.
Furina's C3 ("My Secret Is Hidden Within Me, No One Will Know My Name") directly compares her to Calaf, who conceals his identity and uses his wits to achieve his goals. However, Furina's refusal to reveal her secret even under (perceived) threat of death via primordial seawater connects her to Liu, who chooses to kill herself rather than reveal her master's secret when captured. In a sense, both Furina and Focalors alternate in playing the roles of Calaf and Liu, relying on their wits to outsmart their opponents and sacrificing themselves so that their loved ones will live.
The take I saw posit that Neuvillette is the Love in Furina's C5 not bc of his role in saving Fontaine, but bc apparently op thought Calaf's name really was Love, and Furina loves Neuvillette, so... [gestures helplessly].
I personally enjoys seeing neuvifuri contents, but while I understand the desire to correlate Neuvillette to the "Love" in Furina's C5, when people do it SOLELY for shipping purposes, it feels like such a disservice to how richly the characters are written, and it feels especially rotten when people take elements from Furina's story that highlight her integrity and depth and redirect them to focus on Neuvillette simply because they feel their ship needs more justification.
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