So Keith is... like that.
I mean it's not like this came out of nowhere, the show has been telling us from the beginning that his relationship with Shiro is very important and close.
But this is the episode where it actually sits down and lets us feel it.
And I think this is also the episode where I have to officially admit something to myself.
I love the idea of Keith.
On the surface he's presented as the lone wolf, quiet, reserved. Disciplined.
When I first started the show I was honestly wondering why he was the red paladin while Lance was blue. Lance was the obviously hot-headed one while Keith seemed like the calm, collected guy.
...except you only have to watch Keith for five minutes to realize that this boy is RED in every conceivable way.
He's impulsive, he throws himself into danger without thinking, gets irritated by the smallest inconvenience.
But this episode shows a different kind of intensity.
How deeply he attaches to people and... how gentle he can be.
How fiercely loyal and protective he is once someone matters to him.
I wasn't expecting the show to put that side of him so openly on display.
Nobody gets to see this side of him. Except Shiro.
Watching him with Shiro is honestly so endearing.
The way he softens around him, worries about him.
The way all his walls just... disappear.
Especially because Keith spends so much of his everyday life keeping people at arm's length.
So it isn't that he doesn't have his soft side.
He just seems capable of expressing that softness to exactly one person.
I'm really glad the show lets its' male protagonists to be this soft.
It's not that I suddenly started liking Keith in this episode but giving him an entire episode to really show this side of him officially promoted him to blorbo status alongside Lance.
I love this awkward, emotionally repressed disaster of a boy.
I also completely understand why Keith and Shiro (Sheith?) became such a popular ship.
I see what people are seeing.
It just doesn't work for me personally because I can't stop reading them as brothers.
There's also a mentor/protector dynamic there that makes it feel very older-brother-ish to me so my brain just refuses to go anywhere else with it.
One thing I'm really starting to appreciate about vld is that the show keeps giving me pieces of each character separately so that later on interactions between them carries more weight because I already understand who they are.
That's so much more satisfying than just waiting for "klance moments"
which is what I thought I'd be doing before I started this show lmao
I'm watching for all of the context now.
The show doesn't seem to go for huge dramatic declarations.
Instead it builds these tiny moments that only become meaningful because of everything that came before them.
That's such a satisfying way to tell a story.
From where I am right now I still think it would be a stretch to describe Keith and Lance as having some incredibly deep bond already.
I think that would be reading way ahead of the text.
Right now what I see is potential.
A relationship that's gradually changing, foundation being built.
I can't wait to see how understanding this version of Keith is going to change the way I see his future relationships with other characters.
