on kaiser failing to live up to his ideals and how isagi fulfils them:
tw: mentions of child abuse.
firstly, kaiser is all too aware of the survival response to submit to a greater power, on account of his fatherās abuse of him:
what heās talking about is very similar to a concept called ālearned helplessnessā, and in defiance of his childhood and coasting off the moment he finally stood up to his father he tries to challenge the impossible. and yet, when there is true impossibility in front of him, in the form of noa being this all powerful striker- kaiser yet again runs from the challenge.
however, isagi has a noa of his own, kaiser himself and NEVER runs from him. he truly manages the impossible since he steals a team from a superior striker AND he even challenges noa outright in front of the world:
next, kaiser is again aware of those who waste away their talent in order to live comfortably (yet again his father is one of them):
but yet again, he acts in failure of his own ideals. he chose stagnation over growth, he chose to model his life after his shitbag of a father by punching down on people weaker than him instead of improving himself and becoming stronger. ness in a way is his child self, taking that abuse and enabling that weakness.
but isagi is always hungry, always greedy for more and more and more. he will never dilute his ego. everyone inside universe and out throws midfielder allegations at him, yet he refuses to rein in his ego in favour of a easier life:
it is isagi who does the impossible and kaiser himself recognises this:
despite promising to do the impossible we see that he runs from challenges he knows are impossible, and yet isagi repeatedly runs TO impossible challenges and gets off on barely scraping by. kaiser is fascinated and confused in equal measure, itās his ideal staring him in the face and he canāt admit that heās falling short of things. heās trying to be his father in representing impossibility yet it was child him facing down several grown men to protect his ball that was truly impossible. it is DEFIANCE despite odds that is impossibility.
furthermore, kaiserās magnus goal has easily defined parameters and is scientifically defined (again at odds with his claim wanting to be undefined):
(he even gives up on nessās assist when he deemed it impossible after his awakening!)
and guess whose goal is described as undefinable and impossible?
yep itās hiosagiās reflex x reflex goal, even admired by NESS THE MAGICIAN!
and speaking of goals, when ness tries to emulate hiosagiās goal, kaiser fails to meet his expectations:
if you look at kaiserās barca goal, he does exactly what ness was trying to get him to do here, use his off the ball movements fo match up to nessās play. yet it is isagi who ness sees as kaiser and who ends up matching him perfectly. by his own standards kaiser fails!
finally, kaiser wants to live as a living scar in others, carving himself into their souls through his victory:
but as established, he is already failing since he is targeting only "possible" challenges, it is isagi who manages to carve himself people who are much stronger than him and change their world view. nagi is forced to reconsider his disrespectful attitude toward football & barou was dethroned by a āpeasantā and had to embrace his villainous nature by preying on that peasantās light. chris prince is literally the worldās n2 and isagi has him seeeeething!!!
bonus: letās look at the ironies of kaiserās name, he is āGodās chosen emperorā and yet he seeks to rebel against God:
isagiās nickname is ādemon kingā, more fitting of a fight against the all mighty!
this is so out of nowhere but I just realized Kaiser's bday is Dec 25th and it reminded me of how much of a sucker I'm for the trope that's essentially "character born in day full of family/festivities grew up alone and unwanted, adding to their pain on their bday"
AND IT GOES EVEN FURTHER BECAUSE NOT ONLY WAS HE BORN ON CHRISTMAS HE WAS BORN UNWANTED BUT HIS NAME MEANS āGODāS GIFTā YET THE MOTHER WHO GAVE IT TO HIM ABANDONED HIM AND HIS FATHER NEVER USES IT!!! IN FACT NOBODY CALLS HIM MICHAEL!
I LOVE ALL YOUR KIIS POSTS!!! the way you talk about them makes me love them so much more and the detail you have too!!! tysm for that <3333
if you donāt mind answering, whatās your favourite moment(s) of them (together or individually) that you think is underrated?
anon, as someone who is self aware that i often sound like a madman each time i talk about kaiisa, im the one who should say tysm???? pls stay tuned for more of my yapping. it will get worse. ALSO I HAVE A LOT but honestly i think a lot of kiislings are also more insane than me and def have eyeballed the scenes more than me. but to me, my top will be these 6 in no particular order EXCEPT FOR NUMBER ONE:
whatever this is.
hello pretty boys. but. so. like there are other ways to visualize this. one of the other ways is featured two pages later btw. why does this panel exist. this is something i expect to see in fanarts or pinterest's "Matching Couple Items Ideas" section. like. what. huh. this is one of a kind visualization you know. what's with kaiser and isagi's puzzle pieces.
kaiser's thing with watching isagi through a screen
kaiser & isagi watching each other are nothing new but. assuming isagi's proclamation was seen by kaiser and that was indeed kaiser's first awareness of isagi + that one multiple 4k screens scene ch 207 + kaiser definitely watching footages of isagi from uber match ch 243 + the cola scene thing ch 326. it's interesting to me. like 3 canon depictions, it's a pattern. combined with how they have a lot of close physical proximity even off field + the 'they are so so similar. they are the same. they are in sync' the sense of distance juxtaposed is. hm. very yummy. very poetic.
isagi always prefers to be alone or silent whenever he is distraught and then acting Casual in front of the others
ch 1, ch 301, and then ch 329 def stands out for this one. but there is also this thing about isagi barely opening up to team z about how anxious he was, isagi never addressing the whole thing with ichinan outside of his monologues.
ng out of all people opens up more to ro & iggr about his negative feelings, compared to isagi and i think it's funny ng (and now krs, to a degree) are the closest ones to isagi opening up. but even then i will call it crashing out instead of opening up.
like, i really like this contrast of isagi genuinely being one of the friendlier cast members but also being pretty closed off about this part of him. he only opens up when he explodes. pent up emotion mascot. my blorbo i believe in u BUT R U OK
WHAT DO YOU MEAN THEY KICKED THE BALL TOGETHER?????? AT THE SAME TIME????
lrnz & the internet was right. are you two getting along fine?? meta meta besties??? best couple??? if these two didnt got shipped by the masses before this one moment def cemented it. this happens either in inazuma 11 or a planned wedding gimmick that has been rehearsed at least 19 times. how the hell did this happen impromptu. these two better be glad it wasn't a goal because how do u count that + the shipping in-universe might have gotten crazier if it did
but on a more serious note i also like it's: written as "VS" + something isagi later comments actually weakened his kick (and by this safe to assume also weakened kaiser's to a degree too) ā but also something that later hor notes as how it is also isg + hor's vision & kis' surpassing said vision. also something that really says "oh isg & kis' mind chess skill level is def on par with each other now" while setting up the whole "these two ARE IN FUCKING SYNC it's kind of creepy and disgusting and disruptive to the public"
this chevkov's gun that im sure is already out of bullet or not. it already fired once. will it fire twice?????
honestly the whole page by itself. but yeah rn i can't imagine another team up esp after the One Time Devil's Contrast line + their current mess. but hey. surprise me. if somehow these two are in the same team together again and are forced to team up again. like wow Unwilling Allies!!!! THE SEQUEL!!! but honestly. idk???? they work WAY TOO WELL i dont think it will happen easily again. even if they do i think it will be a mixture of their usual mind games with slight coordination to confuse the enemies
isagi not knowing that kaiser is THAT obsessed with him (probably) + kaiser not knowing isagi (still) thinks about him in a complementary manner on multiple instances.
mutual obliviousness. amazing. no notes. they know things exist but they do not know how DEEP those things are. dumbasses. soccer heads.
imagine kaiser bursting the door wide open and isagi starts mentally preparing to scream at him for scaring him but he turns around and sees kaiser with the most genuine smile and stars in his eyes, telling him all excited that he got a sponsor him coca-cola...... and isagi wishes that wouldn't make him crush on kaiser even more but it does
you are telling me noel noa, THE number one striker, is haunted for ten plus years by his first rival, his rotten rival, his "old war buddy" jinpachi ego. then he looks at isagi yoichi, who is near identical to jinpachi ego in many ways, and decides to use him to spur michael kaiser on, who also shares many parallels with him.
noa whatever unresolved homoerotic tragedy you have with egoāwhy you bringing the youths to this. neither isagi nor kaiser deserves this bullshit bro.
EXACTLY!!!
i made a semi-serious jokey post on the different types of kiis shippers and it weirdly holds for this topic lmfao:
like itās the specific type of rivalry heās trying to cultivate too, he actively feeds into isagiās kaiser obsession from the very start w/out knowing if that obsession is āgoodā for isagiās growth yet specifically orders kaiser to not get fixated (attached)??? WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR EGONOA, do you not want to see your (projected) self insert be obsessed back noa?????? like the idea of him trying get catharsis by simulating his rivalry but getting āhimselfā to not gaf about egoš
but honestly i think heās grasped that isagi like ego is easily motivated by the chasing, by spite, or that itās not that harmful to be chasing someone already at the top. but he knows kaiser stagnates with malice bc he picks on weaker targets and runs from him, he needs kaiser to acc face the impossible by challenging him instead. what better way then to support the usurper to show kaiser how slippery his crown is? and egoās a ghost, heās the first rival but not the latest and since noa is greedy, only results (who can spur him on now) matter. he might not think that much initially of a guy thatās exactly like ego and whose egoās protege for that reason (as he might not think of isagi as someone who can pose a challenge directly to him instead of indirectly via kaiser.)
top 5 kaisagi shippers in āverse (& what type of shipper they are): mildly healthy edition!!
hereās top 3 toxic kaisagi shippers :))))
5. rin: ĀæĀæĀæĀæhas a home wrecking kink & thinks kaisagi have enough of a home to wreck ????
walk with me here.
rin is a sadomasochist, he gets high off of hurting people whilst hurting himself, and in this very sequence of panels he re-iterates his desire to destroy isagi. everything that is precious to him, including his dreams, mind and freedom etc. and out of everything he labels KAISER as isagiās ultimate āfireā which he wants to extinguish to get his āultimate pleasureā.
so, rinrin genuinely believes that kiis has chemistry and potential, he wants to crush them bc the partnership is benefiting and inspiring isagi, that it is āpreciousā to him and so he thinks targeting kaiser will hurt isagi!! also he is hurting himself by breaking apart his fave ship :(
does he want to kill them? sure but only bc theyāre way too happy.
also he lowkey highkey midkey wants to be kaisagiās third:
oh he wants to take them BOTH on at the same time
visibly sadly frustrated that kaiser doesnāt join in on the rinsagi cuddleš
4. niko: secretly soft kaiser enjoyer
banana fish has converted niko into a āfind fluff at all costsā sort of guy, he maintains that kaiser is super soft and aggressively looks out for isagi whilst being enemies with him.
but gun to his head, heās a barousagi shipper, he likes kiis bc they remind him of bris!!!
3 & 2. issei & raichi: tsundere isagi truthers & sopping wet car kaiser
issei pre emptively gives his blessing bc he knowsšā
kaiser is a total meme to them and kaisagiās sacred esteemed rivalry is continually belittled here :/ they just see two tsunderes dancing ridiculously around each other, the second coming of kaguya-sama: love is war basically.
also it's cute to me that his parents thought it was safe to tease him about kaiser despite the whole murder plots going on between the two of them. since they're so careful not to mention anything stressful (like money / noa & isagi declaring war?) they stick to lighter things and but make sure isagi knows they have his back & they're right! imitating kaiser does make isagi laugh :)))
1. hiori: slowburn lover & monoshipper
hioriās continually fudanshing tf out since day 1, he #noticed both isagiās obsession fronting as hatred and kaiserās not-so-secret fascination & he had front row seats to the whole blatant scissoring on the pitch thing.
but whilst he did like the enemies and haters and partners bit, he is there for their development! hiori genuinely believes that not only should kaisagi be together, but they MUST be together for the sake of the (football) world. kaisagi itself is a power source to him, they are better together and they make everyone around them better too. he has a anonymous shipper sideblog and tries indoctrinating people into his kiis propaganda. he really believes in their potential as partners and like yuki, theyāre evil soulmates to him and he will aggressively engage in ship wars :0
never forget that isagi promised-threatened to make kaiser the naked emperor so kaiser decides stroll up naked to his locker room, he really is That Bitch.
