Fandom seems to have a real problem understanding the concept of love in Yuri!!! on Ice, so it’s little wonder some seem to have a problem understanding the concept of soulmates, as it’s understood by both Japanese and westerners. Because there’s no difference. Really there’s not. It’s just, as Ally says above, that fandom has diluted the meaning of ‘soulmate’ down to a WHOLLY romantic meaning, not understanding that it’s everything.
It’s love, in all its forms–and yes, i
ncluding romantic–it’s destiny, it’s a bond, it’s being meant to be with this person. Being completed.
It’s much like 愛 in Japanese, their word for love; they have a separate word for simply romantic love (恋), but 愛 encompasses everything, whole kind of love–romantic and bone-deep and cherishing and fawning and unselfish and selfish and everything in between. There’s a WORLD of difference between “suki da” and “aishiteru” for “I love you”–the former is rattled off easily and spans the length and breadth of like/love. You can use it to describe how you feel about corn, you can use it to describe how you feel about your wife. But aishiteru? Almost no one says it, because it’s just so HEAVY. There’s even a whole day dedicated to husbands going out in public and shouting it for their wives to hear, to kind of encourage men to be more open about their feelings and to also just express their love in its most concentrated form.
And that’s what a soulmate is–a true mate of your soul. A friend, a companion, a partner. A lover, yes, but so much more than that.
If you think having all of this love inside that word dilutes the meaning of the romantic component, then I feel very sad for you, because it means that you think romantic love is weakened by being coupled with affection and genuine LIKING someone and caring for someone’s happiness. As if platonic and romantic love cannot coexist.
More to the point, if you still need Yuuri and Victor’s romantic feelings spelled out for you? Well there’s no helping you. Kubo-sensei has gone on record as finding it amusing that western fans have to ask her what happened in episode 7. You make her laugh by not being able to figure it out. Yuuri said that he wanted the theme of his skating season to be 愛, and that means EVERYTHING involving love. It means Eros–which was initially a foreign concept to Yuuri, having to think of something that drives him wild because he had no real experience with sexual feelings (consciously at least) to fall back on. But by episode 11, he’s thrown Victor kisses and kissed their exchanged rings as a link back to Victor–a symbol so that Yuuri didn’t have to waste his focus distracted by not understanding what their relationship was.
If it was meant to be that confusing or ambiguous, then the point of the rings would be lost :P
I’m not sure where these ‘negative tweets’ are that the asker mentions; every Japanese person on my feed is thrilled, noting that their being ‘soulmates’ makes perfect sense.
The entire story of YOI is all about love and all its forms, and how all of those forms are just part of a greater whole. It’s why Yuuri just wants Victor to stay Victor, because becoming any ONE thing seems to sideline all of the other things. Even a lover, a 恋人 in Japanese, is literally someone you share 恋 with–but Yuuri doesn’t want just romantic passion. He wants a partner and companion and someone he can fight with and someone he can eat katsudon with.
So stop getting so hung up on whether or not there are outright, set-in-stone-references to them having sex or kissing each other to get hot and bothered or whatever else you need in order to validate them as a couple. That is all kinds of wrong, requiring people show you that they want to touch each other’s private bits before you’ll believe that they’re REALLY “in love”, when the entire show has been about showing you that love is love is love, and that no one should be looked down on for who or how they choose to show that love.
dededos
ellievsbear
jacobvanloon
annaxmalina
izzy806
baratheonpilled
