why I find trans male phoenix wright to be a legitimately compelling headcanon that adds something to the text
hint: it's the class trial.
most transmasc headcanons are made solely for fun or based on projection, and I'm personally growing tired of this oversaturated market, but think a particular reading of transmasc phoenix wright (courtesy of @transmascphoenixwright) is a genuinely well done one that adds to the themes of the game!
imagine this.
you're a really young child struggling with the role you're being forced to play in society, knowing from a relatively young age that you're a boy instead of a girl. but you can't prove it to anyone else. they won't believe you if you tell them.
so you go along.
one day you end up being accused of something you didn't do, and you can't prove that you didn't do it, so no matter how many times you tell them they're wrong, they won't listen - again. maybe it's easier not to defend yourself?
but this time, someone stands up for you. someone believes you.
two kids your age you never really talked to before, (maybe because you were socially isolating due to every interaction from the closet being painful? or otherwise, quietly socially ostracized for being, well, like that?), bite the bullet and speak in your defense.
of course, it permanently alters the trajectory of your life and you're gonna remember it forever (due to your very normal very healthy attachment styles) and you two immediately become friends, and wait-
they believe that you're a boy, too?
no questions asked?
it's not a big deal to them how it can be the case, you don't have to prove it, they just... believe you.
(to the point where one of them decades later doesn't even remember you "were a girl" when you were children)
so these friends, or the one that's left and the memories of the other, are what keeps you going and helps you transition despite not quite receiving overwhelming support anywhere else - say, in your own home.
and to an extent, everything that you are now, your job, your social standing, the light in your eyes, you owe to them
so when you finally get to meet one of these friends again, it's now your debt to repay, your duty to prove that you believe in... her?
(UNSUBTLE EMILIA EDGEWORTH PROPAGANDA I COULDN'T HOLD IT IN)
SO YEAH ITS THE CLASS TRIAL Y'ALL ITS THE SAMURAI TRIO. THE REASON IS THE SAMURAI TRIO.
- phoenix got way too attached to the only two people who ever stood up for him and doesn't seem to have any other childhood friends: social isolation due to transgener, possibly bullying lol, but he only talks about the good parts that are his friends!
- phoenix never talks about his parents like ever as if he doesn't have them: ran into Some Issues due to transgener and had to cut them out to live his own life! and/or they were just plain abusive how rare do you think it is
- phoenix went with the first girl that was willing to date him: at this point in his life maybe it was the only potential romantic partner that saw him as a man! and also he's just weird as fuck. I bet I can't explain all of his weird attachment style away with transgender, he just doesn't appear to have had many people in his life that treated him well, and it's not the universal trans experience (not that common in trans guys anyway)
- phoenix doesn't talk much about his past at all: probably partially due to the fact he's trans! although the dahlia story has to have happened when he already socially transitioned, he's also just traumatized by it quite a bit, that's why he doesn't like to bring it up a ton. and he's generally cagey as a personality trait, not everything is due to him being trans, but it does slide in quite well!
I also love how he ends up surrounded by transfems later in life ahaha😭🙏 maya, edgeworth, mia and larry (laurice) depending on some readings/hcs of my wonderful friends, and he supports them all in turn like they support him! wonderful trans women are the driving force in his life!!! if he was a cis man I swear he'd just go on e at this point😭✌️
so I do love transfem phoenix esp with mia's influence on him, but if we see where he is in the games as his destination point from which he only has to grow as a lawyer independently, because he achieved what he wanted with support of his friends and mentor (transitioning and being a lawyer), then him being transmasc is just kinda beautiful! yeah!!!
