Remember, we're voting for the best bait, not necessarily the best ship
Propaganda under the cut:
Kate/Emilyko
They're so in love...Examples:
- them dancing together while Kate has an internal monologue about how Emilyko is wonderful despite her "many blunders"
- the Shadows House Theatre shorts where Emilyko gets super excited to talk about "how charming miss Kate is" and unrolls a giant piece of paper (she says there are 300 things in it). She also says her favourite colour is miss Kate's shade of red
- Kate holding Emilyko's hand when they have to sleep in the same bed and promising herself she'll save this girl who supported her ("It would've been nice...if I at least asked for your name")
- "I'm going to return you to normal, my beloved Emilyko!"
- Kate growing wings and carrying Emilyko in her arms...Iconic
- Shall We Dance opening where Kate dreams of hugging Emilyko and running through flower fields with her while holding hands
(spoilers for the all of currently avalible shadows house)
in ye fantasty land there is a house, the shadows house, where the noble shadows family be livin. one of them shadows is a young girl, and her name is kate. now all the shadows family are made out of living soot, so they reflect no light and emit soot when they're upset and no one can make out their faces. thus, all shadows have a Living Doll, to serve as their "face". Kate is a noble, and Emilyko is her Face.
NOW. u might be thinking 'hm. sounds iffy'. but listen. Because that thing I just said five seconds ago? a lie. No such thing as living dolls. INstead, Emilyko is a human who was kidnapped and made to be Kate's servant via brainwashing. Again, I know, but listen.
See, the number one person who wants Emilyko to be not brainwashed? thats Kate. See Shadows name their own dolls. Most shadows name their dolls something close to their own name since they're supposed to be an extension of themselves. (patrick and his doll ricky, louise and her doll lou), instead Kate names Emilyko so that she's her own person, seperate. More on that later.
They have tons of little bits of tension. Emilyko is super super devoted to Kate, and while Kate is a bit quiet and standoffish to Emilyko at first, she loves her too. Dolls get shitty bread and Shadows get good bread, so Kate gives Emilyko her nice bread and Emilyko adores it to pieces. Kate has a tiny doll of a shadow in a pink dress in her room that Emilyko touches and breaks, angering kate. Emilyko repairs this and makes a small plush for herself too. They do a little dance together. Emilyko kisses Kate on the cheek goodnight as part of being a living doll. As part of a house trial, kate gets stuck in a cage and it's emilyko's job to rescue her. Not only does she do that, but she gathers all these flowers and things to make Kate happy when they reunite. When kate starts to fall from the cage into the thorns below, Emilyko runs leaps to catch her, carrying her in a princess carry. The whole time, kate praises Emilyko for staying true to herself. Then, only a chapter later, Kate carries emilyko in a princess carry, soaring over this giant wall with soot wings. There's one male character who likes Kate, his name is John, and another character says and I quote "Emilyko, you and John really do love Kate". John wants to MARRY kate. Its tons of little moments like that. I love them for that.
BUT GUESS WHAT OP. I FUCKIN LIED TO YOU AGAIN. KATE ISNT A SHADOW. Kate's a human shadow hybrid person who snuck her way into the noble house to get REVENGE. AND HOW DOES THIS PLAY INTO THE YURI? BIG TIME.
see before Emilyko was taken to the house to be brainwashed, she was in the Circus as a tightrope walker, and the day before she was taken to the house, she ran into Kate at the lake. She was so entranced by the beautiful and strange girl she saw at the lake that she made a plush doll of her, hearing she was a fairy who stole faces. They meet again, and Kate gives Emilyko her clothes so that she can disguise herself and seek a better life, (not knowing she's going to the house selection, which is a trap), and in exchange Emilyko gives her that doll of herself. Kate tells Emilyko she has a beautiful smile, and Emilyko hugs Kate's clothes and thinks that she has a beautiful name. When Kate sneaks into the house she throws away everything that isn't necessary (a disguise and a self defence knife), except the doll. Later, when she decides to pretend to mimic Emilyko to move forward into the house, she gets rid of the cloth and knife too, but STILL keeps the doll, hiding it in Emilyko's pocket and sneaking it all the way through the selection. As they're both being brainwashed, Kate just thinks of how horrible it is that Emilyko is being made not to think for herself, and that having Emilyko with her on this journey has been so meaningful for her that she must save Emilyko too. They hold hands under the blankets of the bed they share and Kate wishes she'd asked for Emilyko's name.Kate decides to devote herself to making sure she can meet the REAL non brain washed Emilyko again. She wants to bring that Emilyko back so that they can truly be together. And when after kate is finally able to tell that to Emilyko, she hugs her immediately after, telling her "I'm so glad to meet you again!". Kate gave Emilyko her name after her beloved grandmother, while also twisting it into something unique because she wanted Emilyko to be her own unique person. Emilyko loves this name dearly, because she finally has a real name and Kate gave it to her. There's more but i've already destoryed ur responses tab. just know: emilyko and kate so fucking in love and yet they are only. besties for life.
Shion/KOS-MOS
kos-mos out here protecting shion's traumatized ass and all the promo art is them holding each other. theres no heterosexual explanation about this
shion's arc focuses on her ability to open up to others, but she struggles so much of that because of her past, and she feels like the only one she can rely on is her dead boyfriend, kevin, and to an extension, kos-mos because kos-mos is linked to kevin. throughout the game, kosmos is always there serving her as her protector and savior, and shion is always relying on her. however, towards the climax of her arc, she was able to see kos-mos as kos-mos and no longer a replacement for her boyfriend, while kos-mos begins to feel her pain and gains these feelings towards shion. they are also linked together in the past life because kosmos was mary magdalene and shion was her devoted follower.
i consider this bait because in the end, they get separated, with kos-mos sacrificing herself, and shion probably got with her colleague allen. lol. but they go on a journey to find kos-mos again in the end
tldr they invented love and they drive me insane
OK SO. Im not sure if this one counts because Xenosaga was out in the 00s and Rep Was Different Then, but theres a lot of shiptease and ambiguous feelings. Shion canonically gets together with a dude at the end of the last game (who honestly gives trans egg vibes to me so take that how you will). HOWEVER, in a later project by the same studio they have a reference to Shion and have KOS-MOS as a crossover character(xenoblade 2) and there is very obvious shiptease again, so its clear that you are intended to read them as yuri on some level.
There was also Significant Amounts of executive meddling from Namco and the original plot of the games was railroaded several times, so who knows what the original intentions were with all this. Later games made by the same director have a number of queer characters, so its possible they were prevented from being overt but it was intended to be canon.
Its NOT a overtly canon-canon relationship though, so I feel it counts here.
Uhhhhh. Also spoilers for a Very VERY Plot Dense rpg. Maybe watch a cutscene movie if you are interested first. Mind that the content warnings are 'Yes'.
KOS-MOS is a robot. A superweapon with bizarre inscrutable morals. She also houses the soul of Mary Magdeline -like from the bible. That one. She both is and is not Mary, its a complicated situation. Shion is the reincarnation of someone Mary was super close to in a wink nudge sort of way, and thus they are ~connected~.
Now KOS-MOS was built by both Shion and Shion's abusive manipulative ex who was also her boss. This is important because while testing KOS-MOS one day she just fucking kills him in a 'malfunction'. He claims he made her malfunction on purpose as Part Of The Plan, but he also secretly coded KOS-MOS to prioritize Shion's safety above all else, and KOS-MOS has a habit of Creatively Interpreting things. Read that how you will.
Later when he comes back from the dead KOS-MOS continues to protect her from him on multiple occasions.
Theres so many little shippy moments it would be hard to list them all over three cutscene-heavy games. But they are super focused on each other.
They have this reincarnation bond nonsense going on, KOS-MOS' purpose in life and how she gains proper sapience is protecting Shion from all The Horrors that keep happening in the plot, and then the FUCKING ENDING???
KOS-MOS basically tells all the big bads(shit ex included) to go fuck themselves and their commands even though they *should* have control over her. She is KOS-MOS and she protects Shion (and the rest of the world too, sure). The power of love and yuri strikes again!
KOS-MOS stays behind and sacrifices herself to blow up god (essentially, its complicated) with Twink Jesus and a little ghost girl. They have a whole touching heart to heart at the end as they say goodbye, promising to meet again, holding hands and everything.
KOS-MOS' second to last line is, "Shion. Thank you. I know that I failed to protect you back then, but, this time... I will! I'm leaving the rest to you now, Shion!".
Shion isnt even there at that point. Shes just talking out loud. Gay.
We also get a scene of the very end showing KOS-MOS heavily damaged, but alive and waiting. The implication is that eventually Shion will find her again.
Side note that Shion is an INCREDIBLE depiction of complex trauma and what that does to a person especially for the times. Very realistic, unfortunately the dudebros of the 00s couldn't handle this. KOS-MOS is a valuable part of helping Shion through The Horrors too, can't forget that.
So basically, fucked up sad space lesbians! They are fantastic! We could have had it all if they werent just yuribait!!! AAAAAAA!
Not to talk about super old O/verwatch Disk Horse again but I can't believe discourse over Symmetra's devi skin actually happened because a so called "Hindu leader" said it was bad and people took it as the truth even though Hinduism isn't a monolithic structure, like there's simply no Hindu leader that speaks for everyone
weve had polls for like half of a year now yet i still havent seen anyone try porting this classic conundrum to tumblr so.. time to take this matter into my own hands & be the change i wanna see in the world ig.
魔女 • WITCH • PART 1
OK I KNOW HOW IT LOOKS BUT I SWEAR THERES A HAPPY ENDING IN THIS AU !!! I CHANGED THE STORY !!!! UTENA DIDNT PUT HER ON THAT CROSS PLEEEASE TRUST MEE 😭😭😭
this is ANTHY HAPPY ENDING ONLY ZONE !!! i saw a tag on my homuranthy that said "DONT DO THIS TO HER" ... disclaimer that every crossover au i put on here i hav thought of happy endings for ! including that one ! never fear ! (saying this now to warn for my berserk au art DONT KILLME-) i will protect himemiyas happiness with my life ...... ill draw a cishet rgu ship before i draw an anthy au with no happy ending !! (spoiler: i will never !)
on that note somebody please show me how to make videos lmao i keep ping ponging back and forth about it but i REALLY dont wanna put a drawing of akio in plain view on this blog ... but i cant tell this au right if i dont ! id be ok with it being video form though because u cant see him IMMEDIATELY ... i think this au would be easier to view in video form anyway than pictures. either that or im going to hav to be very creative about it.
aaah. ok. well ! im going to go lay down now 🖤
sometimes i think about how some overwatch discourse i’ve seen happen back in like 2016 were because people wildly misinterpreted the lore and kinda took headcanons/over analyzed stuff as canon
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