that last reblog actually got me thinking about Anri Sonohara and my headcanon that she's aromantic (keep in mind this is all from the perspective of someone who's only seen the anime and hasn't read the light novels).
At first I was like "well do i headcanon her this way because she seems emotionless" but like, that's actually not why at all.
I've noticed a pretty common misconception that because Anri believes she's incapable of loving people, she's devoid of all emotion, and that makes me kind of angry because she clearly does have emotions. Sure, she's not the most expressive character but she does have feelings and if you actually watch the show and pay any attention to Anri at all I don't know how you could reasonably argue that she doesn't.
But going back to my headcanon, Anri's arc, or at least the way I interpret her arc, really clicked with me as an aromantic person. She says that she's incapable of loving other people, but at the same time she's also become really close to Mikado and Kida and obviously cares about them a lot. I'm pretty sure I remember a scene in one of the last few episodes where she told them something along the lines of "you're both so important to me." She still thinks she's incapable of feeling love, despite providing tons of evidence that she is absolutely capable of loving people. I really connect with Anri because I've had times where I felt like I wasn't able to love people at all or feel things as deeply as some people, and I think it all goes back to this idea most people seem to have that love is always a romantic thing.
There's also a scene in i think episode 24 where Anri says something that I don't remember the wording of exactly but the gist of it was like "I wonder if I had feelings for Masaomi. I don't really know, I'm not good at this kind of thing." I can absolutely relate to the confusion about whether or not you have romantic feelings for someone and feeling like you're bad at figuring out relationships and feelings. That line matters so much to me because I've felt that exact same kind of thing before.
Aromantic Anri makes so much sense because she believes that she can't love people, despite providing more than enough evidence to prove otherwise. Anri Sonohara can and does love other people, just not romantically. Anri's arc in the anime is so incredibly important to me because it's so easy to interpret it as being about aromanticism. And yeah, I realize it probably wasn't intended specifically to be interpreted that way, but it works so well, and I think that's pretty damn important
